Lake George and, Niagara. So completely'identified
were they in feeling and policy with this
politic and brave man/ that after his death,
which happened at the crisis of ’76., they transferred
their attachment to his family, and staking
their all on the issue, abandoned their beloved
valley and the bones of their fathers, and
fled to the less hospitable latitudes of Canada,
from which they have never permanently returned.
Some twenty or more persons of this tribe are
mingled as, residents of the villages of their
brethren, the Seneeas, Tuscaroras, and Oneidas.
A much greater number exist with intermixture
of other kindred tribes, in the St. Regis canton
of St. Lawrence county; but the greater number
of the parent tribe reside on lands appropriated
for their use by the British government at
Brantford, on the Grand river of Canada West.
To this place at the close of the warr they followed
their distinguished leader, Thayendane-
gea, the Jeptha of his tribe, who,, against the
custom of birth and descent, and every- oth,er
obstacle, after the failure of the line of wise and
brave chiefs to lead them to battle, was made
their tekarahogea and leader, and displayed a degree
of energy and firmness of purpose, which
few of the aboriginal race in America have ever
equalled.
What light the examination of the ancient
places of burial of this tribe in the valley would
throw on their ancient history or arts, by entombed
articles, cannot be told without examinations
which have not been made. Probably
the old places of Indian interment about Cana-
joharie, Dionderoga, and Schenectady, would
reveal something on this head, conforming at
least, in age and style of art, with the stone
pipes, tomahawks and'amulets of the Onondaga
and Genesee countries. The valley of the Schoharie
and that of the Tawasentha, or Norman’s
kill, near Albany, might also be expected to reward
this species of research. A human head,
rudely carved in stone/ apparently aboriginal,
Was sent to the New York Historical Society
early in 1845, which was, represented to have
been found in excavating a bank at Schenectady.
If this piece of sculpture, which denoted more
labor than art, be regarded as of Mohawk origin,
it would evince no higher degree of art, in this
respect, than was evinced \by similar outlines
.Cut in the rock, but not detached, by some of
the New England tribes.*
f The Oneida canton of the Iroquois nation, deduces
its origin in a remote age, from the Onon-
dagas, with the language of which, the Oneida
has the closest affinity. According to a tradition
which was related to me, and which is believed
to be entitled tn respect, they hre, descended
from two persons, who, in their obscure ages,
and before a confederation had been thought of,
* Rude carvings of this kind are" represented to exist on the
banks of the Connecticut, at Bellows’ Falls, &c.