A single remark more. The Delawares have never lived, or held an acre of land on the Mississippi, in its whole course between Itasca lake and the Balize. When Penn came to America, they lived on the Delaware, in central Pennsylvania. They were ordered to quit the sources of the Delaware river by the Iroquois in 1742, and go to Wyoming or Shamoken.[95] They found their way across the Alleghanies, in time to burn Col. Crawford at the stake,[96] and oppose the settlement of the Ohio valley, prior to the revolution; they settled on the Muskingum, and after some afflictions and mutations, chiefly brought upon themselves, they accepted lands, and began to recross the Mississippi in 1818[97]. They are now located on the west banks of the Missouri, on the Konza. Yet the etymology adverted to attributes to this tribe, not only the naming of the river upon which they never lived, and never held any lands, but presupposes, that the Illinois and other Algonquin nations living on its banks, above the influx of the Ohio and the Missouri, to whom, with the influence of the French, the actual name is due, preserved the Delaware term “Namæsa Sepu,” although it is neither used by their descendants nor by Europeans.
[95] Colden’s Hist. Five Nations, vol. 1. p. 31.
[96] Metcalf’s Indian Wars in the West.
[97] This is the first time that this tribe ever by history, or tradition, other than their own, saw this river.
[d.] War with the Kah Kwahs.
Some inquiries have been made in a prior paper, on the strong probabilities of this people, being identical with the Ererions or Eries. While this question is one that appears to be within the grasp of modern inquiry, and may be resumed at leisure, the war itself, with the people whom they call Kah-Kwahs, and we Eries is a matter of popular tradition, and is alluded to with so many details, that its termination may be supposed to have been an event of not the most ancient date. Some of these reminiscences having found their way into the newspapers during the summer[98] in a shape and literary garniture, which was suited to take them from the custody of sober tradition, and transfer them to that of romance, there was the more interest attached to the subject, which led me to take some pains to ascertain how general or fresh their recollections of this war might be.
[98] See Buffalo Com. Adv. 12th July, 1845, article “Indian Tradition.”
My inquiries were answered one evening at the mission house at Buffalo, by the Allegany chief, Ha-yek-dyoh-Kunh, or the Woodcutter, better known by his English name of Jacob Blacksnake. He stated that the Kah-Kwahs had their chief residence at the time of their final defeat, on the Eighteen-mile creek. The name by which he referred to them, in this last place of their residence, might be written perhaps with more exactitude to the native tongue, Gah Gwah-ge-o-nuh—but as this compound word embraces the ideas of locality and existence along with their peculiar name, there is a species of tautology in retaining the two inflections. They are not necessary in the English, and besides in common use, I found them to be generally dropt, while the sound of G naturally changed in common pronunciation into that of K.
Blacksnake commenced by saying, that while the Senecas lived east of the Genesee, they received a challenge from the Kah-Kwahs, to try their skill in ball playing and athletic sports. It was accepted, and after due preliminaries, the challengers came, accompanied by their prime young men, who were held in great repute as wrestlers and ball-players. The old men merely came as witnesses, while this trial was made.
The first trial consisted of ball playing, in which, after a sharp contest, the young Senecas came off victorious. The next trial consisted of a foot race between two, which terminated also in favor of the Senecas. The spirit of the Kah-Kwahs was galled by these defeats. They immediately got up another race on the instant, which was hotly contested by new runners, but it ended in their losing the race. Fired by these defeats, and still confident of their superior strength, they proposed wrestling, with the sanguinary condition, that each of the seconds should hold a drawn knife, and if his principal was thrown, he should instantly plunge it into his throat, and cut off his head. Under this terrible penalty, the struggle commenced. The wrestlers were to catch their hold as best they could, but to observe fair principles of wrestling. At length the Kah-Kwah was thrown, and his head immediately severed and tossed into the air. It fell with a rebound, and loud shouts proclaimed the Senecas victors in four trials. This terminated the sports, and the tribes returned to their respective villages.