All the legends when related by different people, have slight variations, but the general features are the same, and are preserved with remarkable exactness, considering [[107]]that they have been handed down for centuries in this oral way. The following is all the account the Senecas can give concerning their origin.
They grew out of the crest of a mountain, at the head of Canandaigua Lake. The mountain which gave them birth is Ge-nun-de-wah-gauh, or the Great Hill. Hence they are called the Great Hill People.
A little boy during his rambles in the woods, found a pretty serpent, which he carried home for a plaything. In the course of time the serpent grew to be very large, and so voracious that he devoured all who came within the reach of his monstrous jaws. At length he coiled himself around the base of the mountain, so that none could pass to and fro, without falling victims to his ravenous appetite, and besides, the atmosphere was poisoned by his fetid breath. But starvation stared them in the face, and the people determined upon a sally, hoping to destroy the monster and escape unharmed. The serpent was so large that there was no hope of leaping over his body, and there was no way but to attempt a passage where the head and tail met. In a body all the people rushed down, determined on victory or death, and were all destroyed, except a little boy and his sister, who were left alone to defy the monster. Then came a pleasant dream to the boy, which directed him to string his bow with the silken tresses of his sister, and shoot the serpent in the eye, or underneath a scale. The child obeyed, and the arrow performed the work of death. In the convulsive throes of the serpent, the heads of the multitudes which he had devoured, were thrown upon the earth, and when he uncoiled, they rolled with him into the lake, where being petrified by the water, they still remain in the form of round stones, which cover the bed of the lake to this day! [[108]]
This is about as marvellous as the preservation of Romulus and Remus, and exhibits the same kind of propensity to account for what is unaccountable, and give themselves “a local habitation and a name.” It is also quite as credible as many of the stories concerning the early history of the heroes of ancient history and fable, which are thought worth recording by every author who writes of Greece and Rome, and are read by every child with wonder.
MEDICINE LEGENDS.
The two following, are the legends concerning the principal medicines used among the Iroquois. The ancient manner of administering them, was to take a small wooden goblet, and go to a running stream, and dipping towards the way which the stream ran, fill the goblet and return to set it by the fire, with some tobacco near it. A prayer is offered, while tobacco is thrown upon the fire, that the words may ascend upon the smoke.
The medicine is placed upon a piece of skin near the goblet, and being very finely pounded, is taken up with a wooden spoon and dusted upon the water in three places, in spots in the form of a triangle, thus—⁂ The medicine man then looks at it critically, and if it spreads itself over the surface of the water and whirls about, it is a sign that the invalid will be healed. If it sinks directly in the places where it is placed—there is no hope—the sick person will die, and they throw the whole away.
Once in six months there is a great feast made, at the hunting season in the fall and spring. On the night of the feast, as soon as it is dark, all who are present assemble in one room, where no light or fire is allowed to burn, and placing the medicine near the covered embers, and the tobacco by its side, they commence singing something [[109]]which proclaims that the crow is coming to their feast, and also many other birds, and various animals, the brains of whose species form part of the medicine. At the end of the song, some one imitates the caw of the crow, and the songs of the birds, and howl of the wolf, &c., as if the animals were present.
Three times in the course of the night they offer a prayer, while throwing tobacco upon the smothered flames, asking that the people may be protected from all harm, and if they receive wounds that the medicine may be effectual in healing them.