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Thirdly, there were the Iroquois, of whom the most famous were the Five Nations of what is now central New York. These five great tribes the Mohawks, Oneidas, Onondagas, Cayugas, and Senecas had for several generations been united in a confederacy which they likened to a long wigwam with its eastern door looking out upon the valley of the Hudson and its western toward the falls of Niagara.
There was at this time among the Onondagas a chief of high rank, whose name, variously written Hiawatha, Hayenwatha, Ayonhwahtha, Taoungwatha is rendered, "he who seeks the wampum belt." He had made himself greatly esteemed by his wisdom and his benevolence. He was now past middle age.
When by the events of the Revolutionary war the original confederacy was broken up, the larger portion of the people followed Brant to Canada. The refugees comprised nearly the whole of the Caniengas, and the greater part of the Onondagas and Cayugas, with many members of the other nations.
Heap big medicine both of um!" grunted the Indian. Eagle Feather was one of the oldest of the tribe of Onondagas who lived on the reservation, and though he usually spoke fairly good English, sometimes he talked as his grandfather had done when he was a boy and the early settlers first had to do with the Indians.
The Onondagas and Tonawandas made application for a copy of the constitution to be sent to them, that they might form temperance societies on their respective reservations, which was granted them, and Mr. Josiah Hill was appointed to write the copy and send the same to them. The convention adjourned on the evening of the third day to meet again the next year at Grand River, Ontario. Mr.
So, among the Onondagas, Oneidas, and Mohawks, evil demons were few, and good fairies many; among the Cayugas good and bad seemed fairly balanced; but among the sullen, brutal, and bestial Senecas, devils, witches, demons, and goblins were in the vast majority.
They took the calumet; they called the Onondagas into their great lodge; and in the sleep of the white man's fire-water they chained them. Five score Onondagas have gone to be slaves to the Great-Chief-Across-the-Water, who loves his children and is kind to them, and would take them all under his arm where no storm can harm them.
He has told the chiefs that he has not been a traitor to the brothers who have for so long believed that his words were true words. The Big Buffalo is a pine tree that took root in the lands of the Onondagas many winters ago. From these lands and these waters, and the sun and winds that give life to the corn and the trees of the Onondagas, he drew his sap and his strength.
That your memorialists have been credibly informed by letters received from individuals among them, and by the statements of such as have returned, that great distress has, from their first arrival there, existed among them, and does exist without mitigation, in consequence of the insalubrity of the climate; that twenty persons of the sixty-two Senecas were already dead some six weeks since, and about the same proportion of our friends of the other tribes; that many others were sick; that three of the leading Seneca chiefs, one of the Onondagas, one of the Oneidas, and a leading man of the Tuscaroras, were dead; that the remnant of the people, with very few exceptions, were very anxious to return, but were destitute of the means of doing so; that many of them have sent earnest requests to us for assistance to enable them to do so; but that only a few families among us are able to furnish efficient relief to their suffering friends.
Father Dablon, who had previously gone with Father Chaumonot among the Onondagas, and had brought back the request for a colony, accompanied the expedition, which left Quebec in the month of June, 1656. On the way up the river the Onondagas were attacked by a band of Mohawks, when the boats carrying the French had gone ahead and were not within sight.
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