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But among the North American Indians, as the old missionaries Lafitau and Charlevoix observed, 'the four stars in front of our constellation are a bear; those in the tail are hunters who pursue him; the small star apart is the pot in which they mean to cook him. It may be held that the Red Men derived their bear from the European settlers.
Lafitau also states that the war took place during Sequeira's absence at the Red Sea, and that the mainlands were taken after the Adil Shah's defeat. Turning to Firishtah, I find a difference. That he is speaking of the same affair is obvious from the details given.
It was merely the gathered wisdom of the nation. Lafitau compares it to the Roman Senate, in the early and rude age of the Republic, and affirms that it loses nothing by the comparison.
Lafitau in one place makes Tharonhiawagon a deified man, and in another the grandson of Ataensic. After the declaration of the laws of the League, there follows a passage of great historical importance. The speaker recites the names of the chiefs who represented the Five Nations in the conference by which the work of devising their laws and establishing their government was accomplished.
Lafitau, whose book appeared in 1724, says that the nation was corrupt in his time, but that this was a degeneracy from their ancient manners. La Potherie and Charlevoix make a similar statement. Megapolensis, however, in 1644, says that they were then exceedingly debauched; and Greenhalgh, in 1677, gives ample evidence of a shameless license.
Schoolcraft's works, though its value is much impaired by the want of a literal rendering, and the introduction of decorations which savor more of a popular monthly magazine than of an Indian wigwam. Mrs. Other tales are scattered throughout the works of Mr. Schoolcraft and various modern writers. Some are to be found in the works of Lafitau and the other Jesuits.
"It is by a most subtle policy," says Lafitau, "that they have taken the ascendant over the other nations, divided and overcome the most warlike, made themselves a terror to the most remote, and now hold a peaceful neutrality between the French and English, courted and feared by both." Many other French writers speak to the same effect.
Among the native tribes of Brazil, according to Lafitau, it used to be the custom for the women, on the approach of any one to whom they wished to show especial fidelity, to crouch down on their heels, and, spreading their hands over their faces, to remain for a considerable time in that posture, howling in a sort of cadence, and shedding tears.
It was, as Lafitau remarks, the very method which was prescribed for rekindling the vestal fire at Rome, when it was accidentally extinguished. This writer describes it as in use also among several tribes of the Indians of South America.
Modern writers on the theme had been anticipated by the less systematic students of the eighteenth century Goguet, de Brosses, Millar, Fontenelle, Lafitau, Boulanger, or even Hume and Voltaire. As pioneers these writers answer to the early mesmerists and magnetists, Puységur, Amoretti, Ritter, Elliotson, Mayo, Gregory, in the history of Psychical Research.
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