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He knew further that if he should succeed now in staying the Onondagas and Cayugas by pledges which, perchance, it might not please Governor Denonville to observe, the last frail ties that held the Iroquois to the French would be broken, and England would reign from the Hudson to the river of the Illinois.
If the Onondagas have a grievance, he will not forget it, and if they ask for vengeance he will hear them. The Great Mountain knows that the Onondagas are his children, that they will not make war upon their father. He sends this coat of seal fur that the hearts of the Cayugas and Onondagas and Oneidas and Mohawks may be kept warm, and to tell them that he loves them and will protect them."
The council was formally opened on the eighteenth of October, by a speech of condolence on the part of the Oneidas and Onondagas, to the Senecas, Cayugas, Tuscaroras and Delawares, some of whom were present, on account of the death of a number of their chiefs since the last meeting.
"You think it will be wise to go to the Cayugas, M'sieu?" asked Father Claude. "I think so. The chiefs must have returned before this time, or at least by the morrow." He dropped into the Iroquois tongue. "Is not this so, Teganouan? Would the chiefs of the Cayugas linger among the Onondagas after the close of the council?" "The Cayuga warriors await the word of the Long House.
"Gone to Niagara, Denonville and all, to build a fort. They'll give it to De Troyes, I imagine. It's a sort of triumphal procession through the enemy's country, after rooting up the Seneca villages and fields and stockades until you can't find an able-bodied redskin this side of the Cayugas. Oh, I didn't answer your other question. What do you think of these?"
But by far the most important branch was the renowned confederacy called the Five Nations. This included the Senecas, Onondagas, Cayugas, Oneidas, and Mohawks. These five tribes occupied territory in a strip extending through the lake region of New York.
These younger members, originally two in number, the Oneidas and Cayugas, had afterwards an important accession in the Tuscarora nation; and in later years several smaller tribes, or, as they were styled, additional braces of the Extended House, were received; Tuteloes, Nanticokes, Delawares and others. In the Onondaga portion of the book the younger tribes speak as "we three brothers."
This line of march should take them through the Cayuga country, a natural move on the part of the Long Arrow, for the Cayugas were closer to the scene of the fighting than the Onondagas, and therefore would be less likely to interfere with the persecution of a Frenchman, particularly before their chiefs should return from the council.
Without a knife or a musket or a hatchet he killed the Long Arrow and came across the Long Lake. He knew that the Cayugas were his brothers, that they would not break the pledge of the Long House." The grave faces of the Indians showed no surprise, save for a slight movement of the eyes on the part of one or two of the younger men, when the Long Arrow was mentioned.
The Cayugas' villages had been burnt, almost all their warriors destroyed, and those who remained had sought a shelter in the fissures of the earth, or in the passes of the mountains unknown to any but themselves. Two of the Mexican girls had also been rescued, but what had become of the others they could not tell.
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