[c.] Exploit of Hi-a-de-o-ni.
The following incident in the verbal annals of Iroquois hardihood and heroism, was related to me by the intelligent Seneca Tetoyoah, (William Jones of Cattaraugus) along with other reminiscences of the ancient Cherokee wars. The Iroquois thought life was well lost, if they could gain glory by it.
Hi-a-de-o-ni, said he, was the father of the late chief Young King. He was a Seneca warrior, a man of great prowess, dexterity, and swiftness of foot, and had established his reputation for courage and skill, on many occasions. He resolved, while the Senecas were still living on the Genesee river, to make an incursion alone into the country of the Cherokees. He plumed himself with the idea, that he could distinguish himself in this daring adventure, and he prepared for it, according to the custom of warriors. They never encumber themselves with baggage. He took nothing but his arms, and the meal of a little parched and pounded corn.[82] The forest gave him his meat.
[82] One table spoonful of this mixed with sugar and water will sustain a warrior twenty-four hours without meat.
Hi-a-de-o-ni reached the confines of the Cherokee country in safety and alone. He waited for evening before he entered the precincts of a village. He found the people engaged in a dance. He watched his opportunity, and when one of the dancers went out from the ring into the bushes, he despatched him with his hatchet. In this way he killed two men that night, in the skirts of the woods, without exciting alarm, and took their scalps and retreated. It was late when he came to a lodge, standing remote from the rest, on his course homeward. Watching here, he saw a young man come out, and killed him as he had done the others, and took his scalp. Looking into the lodge cautiously, he saw it empty, and ventured in with the hope of finding some tobacco and ammunition, to serve him on his way home.
While thus busied in searching the lodge, he heard footsteps at the door, and immediately threw himself on the bed from which the young man had risen, and covered his face, feigning sleep. They proved to be the footsteps of his last victim’s mother. She, supposing him to be her son, whom she had a short time before left lying there, said, “My son, I am going to such a place, and will not be back till morning.” He made a suitable response, and the old woman went out. Insensibly he fell asleep, and knew nothing till morning, when the first thing he heard was the mother’s voice. She, careful for her son, was at the fireplace very early, pulling some roasted squashes out of the ashes, and after putting them out, and telling him, she left them for him to eat; she went away. He sprang up instantly, and fled; but the early dawn had revealed his inroad, and he was hotly pursued. Light of foot, and having the start, he succeeded in reaching and concealing himself in a remote piece of woods, where he laid till night, and then pursued his way towards the Genesee, which, in due time he reached, bringing his three Cherokee scalps as trophies of his victory and prowess.
Such are the traditionary facts which are yet repeated by the Iroquois, to console their national pride in their decline. The incident reminds one strongly of the class of daring personal deeds of the noted Adirondack Piskaret, as related by Colden; and it demonstrates how soon the daring traits of one ruling tribe may be adopted and even surpassed by another.
The Tonawandas, who are Senecas, appear to have preserved more distinct recollections of the origin of this war. Hohoeeyuh,[83] stated to me, as did Tetoyoah, that it originated from the contact of their hunting parties on the plains of the southwest. But the latter affirms, that the Cherokees were the original offenders, by robbing and plundering a Seneca hunting party, and taking away their skins. Retaliation ensued. Tragic scenes of surprise and treachery soon followed. The Five Nations took up the matter in all their strength. They, contrary to what is above intimated, raised large war-parties, and marched through the country to the Cherokee borders, and brought away scalps and prisoners. There are now, he added, descendants of the Cherokees in the third degree living on the Tonawanda reservation. Le Fort, an Onondaga chief, speaking on the same subject, said that there was, some years ago, a chief of pure Cherokee blood, by father and mother, living among them. He had been taken captive when a mere child. The fact being revealed to him after he had obtained the chieftaincy, he went to seek his relatives in the south, and to live and die among them; but after every inquiry, he was unable to find them. The memory of the event of his loss was forgotten. He lingered a time, and then came back to the Senecas, and died among them—an example of that severe principle in the policy of this people, which has been before referred to, under the term of We hait wa tsha, i. e. flesh cut in pieces, and scattered amongst the tribes.
[83] J. A. Sandford.
Iroquois tradition on this subject is the same now that it was in 1794. During this year, the interpreters told Col. Timothy Pickering, who was a commissioner on the part of the United States, that there were then living, warriors of the Six Nations, who had marched the whole distance to the Cherokee county, and attacked the latter. In proof of the former wars, they showed him a chief, who was a native Cherokee, born in the Cherokee country, who had been captured when a boy, and invested with this honor in mature life by the Senecas.[84] While the foregoing tradition of living Iroquois is strengthened by this coincidence, we are, at the same time, furnished by the latter with a proof that the Iroquois policy was favorable to the rise of talent and bravery, and that whatever be the checks provided by the Totemic system, on the descent of chiefs, the elective feature was ever strongly marked upon their entire government and policy.
[84] Yates and Moulton, p. 232.
[d.] Embassy of Peace to the Cherokees, and Daring Feat of a Seneca.
In the course of the long and fierce war between the Six Nations and the Cherokees, it happened, said Oliver Silverheels, that eight Senecas determined to go on an embassy of peace. Among them was Little Beard, the elder, and Jack Berry. They met some Cherokees on the confines of the Cherokee territories, to whom they imparted their object. Intelligence of this interview was sent forward to their village, where the ambassadors were duly received, and after this preliminary reception, they were introduced to the ruling chiefs, and favorably received by the Cherokee council.
All but one of the Cherokee chiefs agreed to the terms of peace. He also would consent, if, prior to the treaty, the eight Seneca delegates would first consent to go to war against their enemies, situated south of them. [Who their enemies were is not mentioned.] They consented, and set out with a war party. A fight ensued in which the leader of the Senecas, called Awl, was taken prisoner. The other seven escaped. The fate of Awl was decided in the enemies camp, where it was determined that he should be burned at the stake. Preparations were made for this purpose, but as they were about to bind him, he claimed the privilege of a warrior, to sing his death song and recite his exploits by striking the post. Pleased with the spirit of his request, and his noble air and words, his suit was granted, and they put a tomahawk into his hands, that he might go through the ceremony. He began by relating his exploits in the north. He recited his feats against the western Indians, adding, with the usual particularity, times and places, and the number of scalps taken. They were pleased and interested in these recitals, and quite forgot the prisoner, in the warrior. At last he came to the late battle, in which he was taken. He told how many of the Catabas, Apalaches, or Muscogees (if these were the tribes) he had killed. He kindled with redoubled ardor as he struck the post with his tomahawk, exclaiming, “so many of your own people, I have killed,” and suiting his actions to his words, “so many I will yet kill.” With this he struck down two men, bounded through the ring and ran. Consternation, for a moment, prevented pursuit, which gave him a start. Being swift of foot he outran his pursuers, eluded them in the woods, and reached the Cherokee camp, where he found and joined his seven companions.
They concluded the peace, and returned in safety to the Seneca country.
[e.] The Graveyard Serpent and Corn Giant.
Seneca tradition states that they formerly lived on the Chippewa river, near Niagara Falls, Canada. One year, while thus located, they were visited by a calamitous sickness, and their corn was blighted. Their prophet dreamt, one night, that a great serpent laid under the village, with his head to the graveyard, and that it devoured all the bodies buried. This gave a most offensive breath, which was the cause of the sickness.
He also dreamt that there was a great giant under the cornfield, who ate up the corn.
When he revealed these dreams to the chiefs, they determined to abandon the town, and immediately removed to Buffalo creek. The serpent soon followed them, and entered the mouth of the creek; but the Great Spirit, whose especial favorites they ever were, sent lightning to destroy it. The monster, however, proceeded up the stream, until the arrows from above fell so thick, that he was obliged to turn. His great size made him press against the shores, and break off the ground, and this is the cause of the expanse of the river three miles above its mouth. Before he reached the mouth of the stream, however, the arrows had cut him apart and thus they escaped this scourge.
When they went back to visit their old town on the Chippewa river, they found the giant who had eaten up the corn, hanging by one leg from the crotch of a high lodge pole, with his body on the ground. He was very meagre, and had very long and thin legs, with scarcely any flesh on them. [W. I. C. Hosmer.]
[If the above is to be regarded, as it clearly must, as an allegory of sickness and famine, it would have put Greek fancy to the task, to have concentrated the matter in a smaller compass, or to have exhibited it in a more striking light.]
[f.] Allusion to the siege of Fort-Stanwix and the Battle of Oriskany.
Seneca tradition is rife on this subject. Tetayoah says that they lost thirty-three chiefs in the battle of Oriskany.
Jacob Blacksnake adds, that he has seen a book in which it was stated that the Senecas had burned eight officers taken at this battle, in revenge for their losses. This he contradicts, on the authority of his father, Governor Blacksnake, who was there. The officers had been asked for after the battle, by the British; but they were refused, on account of their great losses. They were not, however, burned at the stake. It was decided that they should run the gauntlet, and they were killed by clubs, &c. in this ordeal.
[g.] Defeat of the Kah-Kwahs on Buffalo creek.
Some of the Senecas affirm, that it is ninety years since the battle with the Kah-Kwahs, on the site of the grave yard, on the Buffalo creek reservation, was fought. This would place the event in 1755, a date so modern, and so well known, in our colonial history, as to prove what a poor figure they make in attempts to adjust chronology. If 190 years [and, perhaps, such should be the tradition,] be taken, the event (allowing two years for their defence) would assume the precise time [1655] indicated for it, by one of Le Moyne’s missionary letters, in which he says, that the war with the Eries had broken out afresh in 1653.
[h.] Era of the Confederation.
There is a tradition among portions of the Senecas, that the present confederation took place four years before Hudson sailed up the river bearing his name. This gives A. D. 1605. This question has been examined in its general bearings in a prior paper. All other authorities indicate an earlier date.
[i.] Some passages of the traditions of their wars with monsters, giants and supernatural phenomena.
It is proposed to narrate a few passages of their early wars with monsters and giants, the two prominent objects in the foreground of their traditions. If it be thought, in perusing them, that mythology and superstition mingle too freely with real events or actions, to which the mind makes no exception, that is a matter upon which we have nothing to offer. Let it rather be considered as a proof of the authenticity of the narrative; for certainly there could be no stronger indication of a contrary character, than to find the Indian narrator relating a clear, consistent chain of indisputable facts and deductions, to fill up the foreground of his history. What is said of such creations tallies admirably with their belief, at the present day, and harmonizes with itself, and with that state of proud heathendom, adventurous idolatry, and wild and roving independence in which they lived. Who but an Aonaod? who but an Iroquois? could enact such a part, or believe that his ancestors ever did? To be great, and admired and feared, they roved over half America in quest of beasts and men. Surely, the man should be allowed to tell his own story in his own way, with all the witchcraft and spirit-craft he has a mind to bring to bear upon it.
No people in the world have ever, probably, so completely mingled up and lost their early history, in fictions and allegories, types and symbols, as the red men of this continent. Making no sort of distinction themselves, between the symbolic and the historical, they have left no distinctions to mark the true from the false. Their notions of a Deity, founded, apparently, upon some dreamy tradition of original truth, are so subtile and divisible, and establish so heterogenous a connection, between spirit and matter, of all imaginable forms, that popular belief seems to have wholly confounded the possible with the impossible, the natural with the supernatural. Action, so far as respects cause and effect, takes the widest and wildest range, through the agency of good or evil influences, which are put in motion alike for noble or ignoble ends—alike by men, beasts, devils or gods. Seeing some things mysterious and wonderful, he believes all things mysterious and wonderful; and he is afloat, without shore or compass, on the wildest sea of superstition and necromancy. He sees a god in every phenomenon and fears a sorcerer in every enemy. Life, under such a system of polytheism and wild belief, is a constant scene of fears and alarms. Fear is the predominating passion, and he is ready, wherever he goes, to sacrifice at any altar, be the supposed deity ever so grotesque. When such a man comes to narrate events, he stops at nothing, be it ever so gross or puerile. He relates just what he believes, and unluckily he believes every thing that can possibly be told. A beast or a bird, or a man, or a god, or a devil, a stone, a serpent, or a wizzard, a wind or a sound, or a ray of light—these are so many causes of action, which the meanest and lowest of the series, may put in motion, but which shall, in his theology and philosophy, vibrate along the mysterious chain through the uppermost skies; and life or death may, at any moment, be the reward or the penalty. If there be truth, mingled in the man’s narrations, as there sometimes is, it must be judged of by the lights of reason, common sense, science, sound philosophy and religion. It is a gordian knot for the modern historian to untie; or it is a mass of traditionary chaff, from which we may, perhaps, winnow a few grains of wheat. Herodotus had, probably, just such materials to work upon, and he made the best possible use of them, by letting the events stand as they were given, without exercising any inductive faculty upon them, or telling us the why and the wherefore; or if he ever deviates from the rule, as in the case of the fishes descending the Nile, it is a species of labor which might as well have been omitted.[85]
[85] It was designed, when these preliminary remarks were penned, to add some wilder legends than are here presented, which are, at present, withheld.
By the figure of a long house, the Iroquois meant to denote the confederated frame work of the league; by a great tree planted, they symbolized its deep seated natural power, one in blood and lineage, and its overshadowing influence and permanency. To assail such a combination of stout hearts, nature they thought must send forth the stoutest and most appalling objects of her creation.
The first enemy that appeared to question their power, or disturb their peace, was the fearful phenomenon of Ko-nea-rau-neh-neh, or the Flying Heads. These heads were enveloped in a beard and hair, flaming like fire; they were of monstrous size, and shot through the air with the velocity of meteors. Human power was not adequate to cope with them. The priests pronounced them an emanation of some mysterious influence, and it remained with the priests alone, to exorcise them by their arts. Drum and rattle and incantation, were deemed more effective, than arrow or club. One evening, after they had been plagued a long time with this fearful visitation, the Flying Head came to the door of a lodge occupied by a single female and her dog. She was sitting composedly before the fire roasting acorns, which, as they become done, she deliberately took from the fire and eat. Amazement seized the flying head, who put out two huge black paws, from beneath his streaming beard. Supposing the woman to be eating live coals he withdrew, and from that time he came no more among them.[86]
[86] For a poetic use of this tradition of the Heads and Stonish Giants, see Hoffman’s Wild Scenes, vol. 1, page 82. New-York edition of 1843.
The withdrawal of the Ko-nea-rau-neh-neh, was followed by the appearance of the great Onyare,[87] or Lake Serpent, which traversed the country, and by coiling himself in leading positions near the paths, interrupted the communication between the towns. He created terror wherever he went, and diffused a poisonous breath.
[87] Mohawk.
While this enemy yet remained in the land, and they were counselling about the best means of killing him, or driving him away, the country was invaded by a still more fearful enemy, namely: the Ot-ne-yar-heh, or Stonish Giants. They were a powerful tribe from the wilderness, tall, fierce and hostile, and resistance to them was vain. They defeated and overwhelmed an army which was sent out against them, and put the whole country in fear. These giants were not only of prodigious strength, but they were cannibals, devouring men, women and children in their inroads.
It is said by the Shawnees, that they were descended from a certain family, which journeyed on the east side of the Mississippi, after the vine broke, and they went towards the northwest. Abandoned to wandering and the hardships of the forest, they forgot the rules of humanity, and began at first, to eat raw flesh, and next men. They practiced rolling themselves in the sand, and by this means their bodies were covered with hard skin, so that the arrows of the Iroquois only rattled against their rough bodies, and fell at their feet. And the consequence was, that they were obliged to hide in caves, and glens, and were brought into subjection by these fierce invaders for many winters, (or years.) At length the Holder of the Heavens, visited his people, and finding that they were in great distress, he determined to grant them relief, and rid them entirely of these barbarous invaders. To accomplish this, he changed himself into one of these giants, and brandishing his heavy club, led them on, under the pretence of finding the Akonoshioni. When they had got near to their strong hold at Onondaga, night coming on, he bid them lie down in a hollow, telling them that he would make the attack at the customary hour, at day-break. But at day break, having ascended a height, he overwhelmed them with a vast mass of rocks, where their forms may yet be seen. Only one escaped to carry the news of their dreadful fate, and he fled towards the north.
They were thus relieved, and began to live in more security, but the great On-yar-he, or Lake Serpent, was yet in the country. Alarmed by what Tarenyawagon had done to relieve his people, and fearing for himself, he withdrew to the lakes, where he and his brood were destroyed with thunder bolts, or compelled to retire to deep water.
The Five Families were so much molested with giants and monsters, that they were compelled to build forts to protect themselves. The manner of doing it was this: they built fires against trees, and then used their stone axes to pick off the charred part; in this way, by renewing the fire, they soon felled them; and the fallen trunks were burned off in suitable lengths, in the same way, and then set up according to the size and plan of the fort, a bank of earth being piled outside and inside. They left two gates, one to get water, and the other as a sally port. [[D].]
For some time after the great On-yar-he had left the country, they had peace; but in after years a still more terrific enemy came. It had a man’s head on the body of a great serpent. This terrific foe took his position on the path between the Onondagas and Cayugas, and thus cut off all intercourse between their towns, for this was also the great thoroughfare of the five families, or nations. The bravest warriors were mustered to attack him with spears, darts and clubs. They approached him on all sides with yells. A terrible battle ensued; the monster raged furiously, but he was at last pierced in a vital place, and finally killed. This triumph was celebrated in songs and dances, and the people were consoled. They hunted again in peace, but after a time rumors began to be rife of the appearance of an extraordinary and ferocious animal in various places, under the name of the great O-yal-kher, or mammoth bear. One morning, while a party of hunters were in their camp, near the banks of a lake, in the Oneida country, they were alarmed by a great tumult breaking out from the lake. Going to see the cause of this extraordinary noise, they saw the monster on the bank rolling down stones and logs into the water, and exhibiting the utmost signs of rage. Another great animal of the cat kind, with great paws, came out of the water, and seized the bear. A dreadful fight ensued; in the end the bear was worsted and retired, horribly lamed. The next day the hunters ventured out to the spot, where they found one of the fore legs of the bear. It was so heavy that two men were required to lift it, but they found it was palatable food and made use of it, for their warriors believe that it inspires courage to eat of fierce and brave animals.
After a while, a great pestiferous and annoying creature of the insect tribe, appeared about the forts at Onondaga, in the guise of the Ge-ne-un-dah sais-ke, or huge musquito. It first appeared in the Onondaga country. It flew about the fort with vast wings, making a loud noise, with a long stinger, and on whomsoever it lighted, it sucked out his blood and killed him. Many warriors were killed in this way, and all attempts made to subdue it were abortive, till Tarenyawagon, or the Holder of the Heavens, was on a visit one day to the ruler of the Onondagas. The giant musquito happened to come flying about the fort, as usual at this time. Tarenyawagon attacked it, but such was its rapidity of flight that he could scarcely keep in sight of it. He chased it around the border of the great lakes, towards sun-setting, and round the great country at large, east and west. At last he overtook it and killed it near Gen-an-do-a, or the salt lake of Onondaga. From the blood flowing out on this occasion, the present species of small musquitoes originated.