the tenor of the instructions, to my own discretion.
I should have héén, I am free to confess
happy to have extended these comparative views
much more fully than I have,, going further into
their vital statistics, their succedaneous modes
of employment and subsisted, some parts of
their lexicography, besides that affecting the
names of places, and a, few kindred topics* had
not' the legislature omitted to fnake provision
for the expenses incidental to' such extended
labors, find the department to whick 'I applied
giving me little encouragement that the Oversight
would be remedied. I have^ however,
proceeded to render the comparative tables effectual,
and, I trust, satisfactory. ;
It cannot be said that the Iroquois cantons of
Kew York have as yet any productive commerce,
arts and manufactures. They are, to spme extent,
producers ; fiirhis|i a few mechanics, and
give employment to, and own a lumber
mills; but it is believed, while some of the bands,
and at least one of the entire cantoris, namely,
the Tuscaroras, raise more grain and : stock, than
is sufficient for their own full subsistence, the
average of the agricultural products of the whole
people is hot more, at the móst favorable view,
than is necessary for their annual subsistence;
If so, they add nothing to the productive industry
of the state. But it is gratifying to know that
they are at least able to live upoh their own
means; and their condition and improvement
is (certainly within the era of the temperance
movement among them,) decidedly progressive
and. encouraging. They have reached the point
in industrial progress, where it is only necessary
to go forward. Numbers of families are eminently
entitled to the epithet of good practical
farmers, aud are living, year in and year out, in
the midst of agricultural affluence.' That the
proportion of: individuals, thus advanced, is as
considerable as the census columns denote it to
be, is among the favorable features of the in-
*quify- There would appear to be. no inaptitude
for mechanical ingenuity, but hitherto, the proportion
of their actual. number who have embraced
the arts, is, comparatively, very limited,
no.t; ekcOeding, at most, two or three to a tribe,
and the effort has hitherto been confined to silversmiths,*
blacksmiths, carpenters and coopers.
A «ingle instance of a wheelwright and fancy
wago% maker occurs.
. Viewed in its extremes, society, in the Iroquois
cantons*, still exhibits no unequivocal vestige
« of the tie which bound them to the hunter
state; and even, among the more advanced
classes,1 there is too much dependance on means
of living which mark either the absolute barbaric
state* or the first grade of civilization. Hunters
they are, indeed, no longer ; yet it was desirable
# Tjte Iroquois, in acfoiibng dttr costume, hafe transferred
their ancient p u p of. silver amulets, frontlets, and other bar*
baric ornaments, to their-guns and tomahawks, whiehare fre-
yp^htej^ih^^ith the- shining meta], worked with
great'skill into tfie richest devices. They also fashion beautiful
earrings of siEyer fpi* their women.