It was found that there were eight geographical bands, consisting of separate villages, living on the ceded tract. The whole population of these did not exceed, by a close count, 569 souls. The population had evidently deteriorated from the days of the French and British rule, when game was abundant. This was the tradition they gave, and was proved by the comparatively large old fields, not now in cultivation, particularly at Portagunisee, at various points on the Straits of St. Mary's, and at Grand Island and its coasts on Lake Superior.
They cultivate chiefly, the potato, and retire in the spring to certain points, where the Acer saccharinum abounds, and all rely on the quantity of maple sugar made. This is eaten by all, and appears to have a fattening effect, particularly on the children. The season of sugar-making is indeed a sort of carnival, at which there is general joy and hilarity. The whole number of acres found in cultivation by individuals, was 125-1/2 acres; and by bands, and in common, 100-3/4 acres, which would give an average of a little over 1/3 of an acre per soul. Even this is thought high. There were 1459 acres of old fields, partly run up in brush. There were also 3162 acres of abandoned village sites, where not a soul lived. I counted 27 dwellings which had a fixity, and nineteen apple trees in the forest. In proportion as they had little, they set a high value on it, and insisted on showing everything, and they gave me a good deal of information. The whole sum appraised to individuals was $3,428 25; and to collective bands, $11,173 $11,173 50.
While off the mural coast of the Pictured Rocks, the lake was perfectly calm, and the wind hushed. I directed the men to row in to the cave or opening of the part where the water has made the most striking inroad upon the solid coast. This coast is a coarse sandstone, easily disintegrated. I doubted if the oarsmen could enter without pulling in their oars. But nothing seemed easier when we attempted it. They, in fact, rowed us, in a few moments, masts standing, into a most extraordinary and gigantic cave, under the loftiest part of the coast. I thought of the rotunda in the Capitol at Washington, as giving some idea of its vastness, but nothing of its dark and sombre appearance; its vast side arches, and the singular influence of the light beaming in from the open lake. I took out my note-book and drew a sketch of this very unique view.[88]
[88] See Ethnological Researches, vol. i., plate xliv.
The next day the calmness continued on the lake, and I took advantage of it to visit the dimly seen island in the lake, off Presque Isle and Granite Point, called Nabikwon by the Indians, from the effects of mirage. Its deep volcanic chasms, and upheaved rocks, tell a story of mighty elemental conflicts in the season of storms; but it did not reward me with much in the way of natural history, except in geological specimens.
Aug. 7th. The Chippewas have some strange notions. Articles which have been stepped over by Indian females are considered unclean, and are condemned by the men. Great aversion is shown by the females at finding hairs drawn out by the comb, which they roll up, and, making a hole in the ashes, bury.
Indian females never go before a man: they never walk in front in the path, or cross in front of the place where a sachem is sitting.
A man will never eat out of the same dish with a woman. The lodge-separation, at the period of illness, is universally observed, where the original manners have not been broken down. If she have no barks, or apukwas to make a separate lodge, a mere booth or bower of branches is made near by.
10th. Mrs. Deborah Schoolcraft Johnson died at Albany, aged fifty-four years. The father of this lady (John McKenzie, usually called McKenny) was a native of Scotland, and served with credit in the regiment of Royal Highlanders, before the Revolutionary War, of whose movements he kept a journal. He was present during the siege of Fort Niagara, in 1759, witnessed the death of Gen. Prideau, and participated in the capture of the works, under Sir William Johnson. He was also engaged in the movements of Gen. Bradstreet, to relieve the fort of Detroit from the hosts brought against it by Pontiac and his confederates three or four years after. He settled, after the war, as a merchant at Anthony's Nose, on the Mohawk, where he was surprised, his store and dwelling-house pillaged, and himself scalped. He recovered from this, as the blow he received had only been stunning, and the copious bleeding, as is usual in such cases, had soon restored consciousness. He then settled at Albany, a place of comparative safety, and devoted himself in old age to instruction. He left a numerous family. His son John, who embraced the medical profession, became a distinguished man in Washington County (N.Y.), where his science, as a practitioner, and his talents as a politician, rendered him alike eminent. But he embraced the politics of Burr, a man whose talents he admired, when that erratic man ran for Governor of the State, and shortly after died. Five daughters married respectable individuals in the county, all of whom have left families. Of such threads of genealogy is the base of society in all parts of America composed. One of her granddaughters, now living in Paris, is a lady entitled to respect, on various accounts. Deborah, whose death is announced, married in early life, as her first husband, John Schoolcraft, Jr., Esq., a most gifted son of one of the actors and patriots of the revolution--a man who was engaged in one of its earliest movements; who shared its deepest perils, and lived long to enjoy its triumphs. The early death of this object of her choice, induced her in after years to contract a second marriage with an enterprising son of Massachusetts (R. Johnson), with whom she migrated to Detroit. Death here again, in a few years, left her free to rejoin her relatives in Albany, where, at last at ease in her temporal affairs, she finally fell a victim to consumption, at a not very advanced age, meeting her death with the calmness and preparedness of a Christian.
"As those we love decay, we die in part."