Heckewelder, after remarking that some of the Tuscaroras claim affinity with the rabbit and the ground hog, says: "I found also that the Indians, for a similar reason, paid great respect to the rattlesnake, whom they called their grandfather, and would on no account destroy him. One day, as I was walking with an elderly Indian on the banks of the Muskingum, I saw a large rattlesnake lying across the path, which I was going to kill. The Indian immediately forbade my doing so, 'for,' said he, 'the rattlesnake is grandfather to the Indians, and is placed here on purpose to guard us, and to give us warning of impending danger by his rattles, which is the same as if he were to tell us 'Look about!' 'Now, added he,' if we were to kill one of those, the others would soon know it, and the whole race would rise upon us, and bite us.' I observed to him that the white people were not afraid of this, for they killed all the rattlesnakes they met with. On this he enquired whether any white man had been bitten by those animals, and of course I answered in the affirmative. 'No wonder, then,' he replied, 'you have to blame yourselves for that. Take care you do not irritate them in our country, they and their grandchildren are on good terms, and neither will hurt the other.'"
Adair, after killing one which infested the camp of the Seminoles, found himself in serious danger, whereupon he remarks in a note page 263, that the Seminoles "never kill the rattlesnake."
[THE LEGEND OF MOSHUP.]
The sound or strait, which divides Nope[28] from the main land and the islands of Nashawn, was not, in the days of our fathers, so wide as it is now. The small bays which now indent the northern shore of Nope, and the slight promontories, which, at intervals of a mile or two, jut out along its coast of a sun's journey, were then wanting; neither the one nor the other obtruded on its round and exact outline. The strong current of waters from the boundless bosom of the Great Lake, sweeping down between this island and the opposite little islands of Nashawn and its sisters, has made great encroachments upon the former, widening to a journey of two hours what was once only the work of one to perform. My brothers, who are with me from the lands of the Pawkunnawkuts, know that my words are true. They know that the air has also changed as much as the shape of the shores of Nope. In the times of our grandfathers, the waves which roll between these islands were always frozen over, from the hunting month to the month of the red singing bird. During the cold months, the canoe of the Indian hunter and fisherman was not permitted to traverse its dark and angry waters in quest of finny spoil, or in chase of the wild fowl. Then, to procure his food he took down his spear, and wandered far out on the frozen water to catch the foolish duck, which had suffered itself to be imbedded in the congealed clement; or, nearer to his cabin, he cut holes in the ice, and, as the stupid and benumbed fish glided across the opening, applied his unerring dart, and threw him to his delighted woman.
But the face of Nope changed, and with it the winters grew milder and milder. The hunting month was no longer the month of early snow, and when the red singing bird came, he hopped on an opening bud, and listened to the croaking of frogs. The alarm of the great sentinel[29] was heard no longer in the hour of darkness in the depth of the woods. There was too much sun for the hardy old warrior, and he followed his great chief, the brown eagle, to the regions of the north. Meantime the waters, no longer bound up with a chain by the Manitou of Cold, scooped out bays and heaped up headlands, till they made the shores of Nope crooked as the path of a bewildered white man, or the thread of a story which has no truth.
Once upon a time, in the month of bleak winds, a Pawkunnawkut Indian, who lived upon the main land, near the brook which was ploughed out by the great trout[30], was caught with his dog upon one of the pieces of floating ice, and carried in spite of his endeavours to Nope. Hitherto, it had remained unknown, and, as our people supposed, unapproachable. Several times they had attempted to visit it, but their canoes had always been swept away, or pushed back by some invisible hand, some friendly Manitou of the water, who feared danger to them, or some angry spirit of the island, who, by these signs, forbade their approach to his dominions. For many years, and ever since the memory of our fathers, the Indians, supposing it the residence of Hobbamock, the being who rules over evil men, sends disease and death to the Indians, breeds storms in the air, and utters the fearful sound in the black clouds, had carefully abstained from attempting to visit it. Nor was it altogether a mere uncertain dread of evil, which had operated on their minds to people it with living and moving beings. They could see at times men of monstrous stature moving rapidly over the island, and at all seasons in the calm evening, or when the winds blew from it, could hear sounds of anger or wailing, or of music and merriment, proceeding from its gloomy shades. And some pretended to have seen distinctly the form of a tall man wading into the water to grasp whales. The forced visit to its shores of Tackanash, the Pawkunnawkut, made them see it was not the dream of a sleeper who has eaten too much meat, but like that which men see with their eyes when they are awake, and would talk only what the Good Spirit may hear.
When Tackanash and his dog arrived at Nope, he found the man whose existence had been doubted by many of the Indians, and believed to have been only seen by deceived eyes, heard by foolish ears, and talked of by lying tongues, living in a deep cave near the end of the island, nearest the setting sun. And this was the account which Tackanash on his return gave the chiefs of the strange creature. He was taller than the tallest tree upon Nope, and as large around him as the spread of the tops of a vigorous pine, that has seen the years of a full grown warrior. His skin was very black; but his beard, which he had never plucked nor clipped, and the hair of his head, which had never been shaved, were of the colour of the feathers of the grey gull. His eyes were very white, and his teeth, which were only two in number, were green as the ooze raked up by the winds from the bottom of the sea. He was always good-natured and cheerful, save when he could not get plenty of meat, or when he missed his usual supply of the Indian weed, and the strong drink which made him see whales chasing deer in the woods, and frogs digging quawhogs. His principal food was the meat of whales, which he caught by wading after them into the great sea, and tossing them out, as the Indian boys do black bugs from a puddle. He would, however, eat porpoises, when no larger fish were to be had, and even tortoises, and deer, and rabbits, rather than be hungry. The bones of the whales, and the coals of the fire in which he roasted them, are to be seen now at the place where he lived. I have not yet told my brothers the name of this big man of Nope—it was Moshup.
I hear the stranger ask, "Who was he?" I hear my brothers ask, "Was he a spirit from the shades of departed men, or did he come from the hills of the thunder? I answer, he was a Spirit, but whence he came, when first he landed in our Indian country, I know not. It was a long time ago, and the Island[31] was then very young, being just placed on the back of the Great Tortoise which now supports it. As it was very heavy the tortoise tried to roll it off, but the Great Spirit would not let him, and whipped him till he lay still. Moshup told the Pawkunnawkut that he once lived upon the main land. He said that much people grew up around him, men who lived by hunting and fishing, while their women planted the corn, and beans, and pumpkins. They had powwows, he said, who dressed themselves in a strange dress, muttered diabolical words, and frightened the Indians till they gave them half their wampum. Our fathers knew by this, that they were their ancestors, who were always led by the priests—the more fools they! Once upon a time, Moshup said, a great bird whose wings were the flight of an arrow wide, whose body was the length of ten Indian strides, and whose head when he stretched up his neck peered over the tall oak-woods, came to Moshup's neighbourhood. At first, he only carried away deer and mooses; at last, many children were missing. This continued for many moons. Nobody could catch him, nobody could kill him. The Indians feared him, and dared not go near him; he in his turn feared Moshup, and would seek the region of the clouds the moment he saw him coming. When he caught children, he would immediately fly to the island which lay towards the hot winds. Moshup, angry that he could not catch him, and fearing that, if the creature hatched others of equal appetite and ferocity, the race of Indians would become extinct, one day waded into the water after him, and continued in pursuit till he had crossed to the island which sent the hot winds, and which is now called Nope. There, under a great tree, he found the bones of all the children which the great bird had carried away. A little further he found its nest, with seven hatched birds in it, which, together with the mother, he succeeded after a hard battle in killing. Extremely fatigued, he lay down to sleep, and dreamed that he must not quit the island again. When he waked, he wished much to smoke, but, on searching the island for tobacco, and finding none, he filled his pipe with poke, which our people sometimes use in the place of tobacco. Seated upon the high hills of Wabsquoy, he puffed the smoke from his pipe over the surface of the Great Lake, which soon grew dim and misty. This was the beginning of fog, which since, for the long space between the Frog-month and the Hunting-month, has at times obscured Nope and all the shores of the Indian people. This was the story which Moshup told Tackanash and his dog. If it is not true, I am not the liar."
Moshup, at the time when Nope was visited by Tackanash, had a wife of equal size with himself, and four sons, and a daughter, the former tall, strong, and swift, very expert at catching fish, and nimble in pursuit of deer, the latter beautiful, sweet-voiced, and bounding as the fawn. She would sit in the first of the evening, when the dew began to fall, and the shadows of men lengthened, and sing to her father songs of the land of the shades of evil men, songs which told of the crimes they had committed, and their repentance, and guilt, and compunction, and shame, and death. Though Moshup appeared to care little for any body, he nevertheless loved his little daughter, as he called her, whose head peered over the tallest trees, and whose voice was heard upon the main land. He shewed by many signs how much he loved his daughter. He strung up the teeth of the shark as a necklace for her, gathered the finest shells for her anklets, and always gave her the fattest slice of whale's meat to her portion.