rable conceptions; and of his general and particular Providence they know nothing. They profess no obligations to him, nor acknowledge their dependence upon him. Some of them, it is said, are of opinion, that there are two distinct, powerful beings, one able to help, the other to do them harm. The latter they venerate most, and some alledge, that they address him by a kind of prayer. Though there are no public monuments of idolatry to be seen in their country, yet the missionaries have discovered coarse imagery in wooden trinkets, in the hands of their jugglers, which the con verts deliver up as detestable. The sight of them would remind a man of letters of the lares and penates of the ancients, but no certain judgment can be drawn of their use. The Indians sometimes assemble in large numbers, and retire far into the wilderness, where they eat and drink in a profuse manner. These conventions are called kenticoys. Some esteem them to be debauched revels or Bacchanalia; but those, who have privately followed them into these recesses, give such accounts of their conduct, as naturally lead one to imagine, that they pay a joint homage and supplication to some invisible being."

The following extract of a letter to the late Dr. Morse, from the Rev. Mr. Kirkland, missionary among the Six Nations, gives an interesting account of their views of a future state. "The region of pure spirits, the Five Nations call Eskanane. The only characters, which, according to their tradition, cannot be admitted to participate of the pleasures and delights of this happy country, are reduced to three, viz: suicides, the disobedient to the councils of the chiefs, and such as put away their wives on account of pregnancy. According to their tradition, there is a gloomy, fathomless gulf, near the borders of the delightful mansions of Eskanane, over which all good and brave spirits pass with safety, under the conduct of a faithful and skilful guide appointed for that purpose; but when a suicide, or any of the above mentioned characters, approaches this gulf, the conductor, who possesses a most penetrating eye, instantly discovers their spiritual features and character, and denies them his aid, assigning his reasons. They will, however, attempt to cross on a small pole, which, before they reach the middle, trembles and shakes, till presently down they fall with horrid shrieks. In this dark and dreary gulf, they suppose resides a great dog, some say a dragon, infected with the itch, which makes him perpetually restless and spiteful. The guilty inhabitants of this miserable region all catch this disease of the great dog, and grope and roam from side to side of their gloomy mansion in perpetual torment. Sometimes they approach so near the happy fields of Eskanane, they can hear the songs and dances of their former companions. This only serves to increase their torments, as they can discern no light, nor discover any passage by which they can gain access to them. They suppose idiots and dogs go into the same gulf, but have a more comfortable apartment, where they enjoy some little light."

Mr. Kirkland adds, that several other nations of Indians, with whom he has conversed on the subject, have nearly the same traditionary notions of a future state. They almost universally agree in this, that the departed spirit is ten days in its passage to their happy elysium, after it leaves the body. Some of them suppose its course towards the south; others, that it ascends from some lofty mountain.

The number of Indians comprised in the Five Nations, at the time of the first European settlements in New York, has been estimated from twenty to twenty-five thousand. This number is supposed to comprise the main body of Indians living in the pres

ent limits of the state at that period. Their number at present, including those in Canada and elsewhere, is said not to exceed six or seven thousand souls, although for the last fifty years they have been somewhat on the increase.

During the war between the English and French, which commenced in 1755, and ended in 1763, the Mohawks, and some other confederates, joined the English, while the Senecas and others joined the French. Hendrick, the Mohawk chief, accompanied Sir William Johnson to the head of Lake George, near which he fell in a battle with the French. As the French interest declined in Canada, those tribes who aided them came over to the English. At the commencement of the Revolutionary War, all the Six Nations, except the Oneidas, took up the hatchet against the United States, being seduced by English agents to make common cause with England against the Americans. In the early part of 1776, a treaty was negotiated with them at Herkimer, in which they engaged to remain neutral. Large presents were made them. Notwithstanding General Schuyler, the American commissioner, in this delicate affair, acted with the utmost prudence and skill, still it was unavailing, for the Indians violated the treaty.

The Mohawks, who had hitherto resided on the Mohawk river, broke up their settlements and retired to Canada. The Oneidas, preferring peace to war, upon the suggestion of the American government, removed from the vicinity of Oneida creek to Schenectady, where they remained till the peace in 1783, being provided by the government with the means of subsistence. The Mohawks, Onondagas, Cayugas, and Senecas, in the course of the war made numerous inroads into New York and Pennsylvania. In 1778, a large body of these Indians, accompanied by a band of tories or loyalists, fell upon the flourishing settlement at Wyoming, laid it entirely waste, and killed most of the inhabitants. The settlement at Minisink, and of Cherry Valley, were likewise destroyed, and the enemy under Brandt an Onondaga, or Mohawk chief, and Col. John Butler a royalist, committed many atrocities.

In order to repress these barbarities, Gen. Sullivan was detached in 1779, to march into the Indian country with four thousand men. He proceeded up the Susquehanna and Tioga, rivers, and from thence down the Genesse. He destroyed eighteen towns and villages in this vicinity in the course of a few days. By these proceedings, the Indians, though not conquered, were greatly intimidated. Since 1783, the Six Nations do not appear to have acted in unison; the bonds which formerly held them together became loosened, and the several tribes have, in many instances, acted separately. Most of their lands, which are the best in the state, have been purchased, and are now occupied by flourishing settle

ments.

INDIANS IN NEW JERSEY.

THE Indians inhabiting New Jersey at the period of its settlement, were of that race called Mohekaneews, who inhabited the country between the St. Lawrence in Canada, and the Potomac in Virginia. The confederation of the Lenni Lenape,* or Delawares as they are usually called, was the most extensive and powerful of the Mohekaneew states. Its limits extended from Connecticut river on the northeast, to the Susquehanna river and the head of the Chesapeak bay on the southwest. The tribes which composed the confederacy were subdivided into numerous clans, and this circumstance has been the source of much confusion among writers.

The Delawares, who were numerous on the river and bay of that name, were conquered by the Five Nations, about the time the English began the settlement of Virginia. The war between these Indians raged with great fury at the time Capt. Smith, the founder of Virginia, was exploring Chesapeak bay. The Delawares were

so enfeebled and exhausted by this war, that the Dutch and English settlers in their vicinity had but little to fear from them, and experienced few difficulties. They received some addition to their numbers by the Indian war in New England, when the remains of several of the vanquished tribes retired westerly, and crossed the Hudson. During the Revolutionary War, a portion of the Delawares took up arms against the United States. Since this period they removed to Ohio, where they continued upwards of fifty years. They have since removed farther westward, and at present but few of this tribe remain.

The following account of the Indians in New Jersey, is taken from Smith's history of this state. "When they bury their dead, it was customary to put family utensils, bows and arrows, and sometimes money, (wampum) into the grave with them, as tokens of their affection. When a person of note died far from the place of his own residence, they would carry his bones to be buried there; they washed and perfumed the dead, painted the face, and followed singly; left the dead in a sitting posture, and covered the grave pyramidically. They were very careful in preserving and repairing the graves of their dead, and pensively visited them; did not love to be asked their judgment twice about the same thing. They generally delighted in mirth; were very studious in observ

* These words are said to mean "the original people," whereby they expressed they were an unmixed race, who had never changed their character since the creation.Watson's Annals of Philadelphia.

ing the virtues of roots and herbs, by which they usually cured themselves of many bodily distempers, both by outward and inward applications. They besides frequently used sweating, and the cold bath. They had an aversion to beards, and would not suffer them to grow; but plucked the hair out by the roots. The hair of their heads was black, and generally shone with bear's fat, particularly that of the women, who tied it up behind in a large knot; sometimes in a bag.

They were very loving to one another; if several of them came to a christian's house, and the master of it gave one of them victuals, and none to the rest, he would divide it into equal shares amongst his companions; if the christians visited them, they would give them the first cut of their victuals; they would not eat the hollow of the thigh of any thing they killed.

The Indians would not allow of mentioning the name of a friend after death. They sometimes streaked their faces with black, when in mourning; but when their affairs went well, they painted red. They were great observers of the weather by the moon; delighted in fine clothes; were punctual in their bargains, and observed this so much in others, that it was very difficult for a person who had once failed herein, to get any dealings with them afterwards. In their councils they seldom or never interrupted or contradicted one another, till two of them had made an end of their discourse; for if ever so many were in company, only two must speak to each other, and the rest be silent till their turn. Their language was high, lofty, and sententious. Their way of counting was by tens, that is to say, two tens, three tens, four tens, &c., when the number got out of their reach, they pointed to the stars, or the hair of their heads.

They lived chiefly on maize, or Indian corn roasted in the ashes, sometimes beaten and boiled with water, called hommony; they also made an agreeable cake of their pounded corn; and raised beans and pease; but the woods and rivers afforded them the chief of their provisions. They pointed their arrows with a sharpened flinty stone, and of a larger sort, with withes for handles, cut their wood; both of these sharpened stones are often found in the fields. Their times of eating were commonly morning and evening; their seats and tables the ground. They were naturally reserved, apt to resent, to conceal their resentments, and retain them long; they were liberal and generous, kind and affable to the English. They were observed to be uneasy and impatient in sickness for a present remedy, to which they commonly drank a decoction of roots in spring water, forbearing flesh, which if they then eat at all, it was of the female. They took remarkable care of one another in sickness, while hopes of life remained; but when that was gone, some of them were apt to neglect the patient.

Their government was monarchical and successive, and mostly of the mother's side, to prevent a spurious issue. They commonly washed their children in cold water as soon as born; and to make their limbs straight, tied them to a board, and hung it to their backs when they traveled; they usually walked at 9 months old. Their young men married at 16 or 17 years of age, if by that time they had given sufficient proof of their manhood, by a large return of skins. The girls married about 13 or 14, but stayed at home with their mothers to hoe the ground, and to bear burdens, &c. for some years after marriage. The women, in traveling, generally carried the luggage. The marriage ceremony was sometimes thus ; the relations and friends being present, the bridegroom delivered a bone to the bride, she an ear of Indian corn to him, meaning that he was to provide meat, she bread. It was not unusual, notwithstanding, to change their mates upon disagreement; the children went with the party that loved them best, the expense being of no moment to either; in case of difference on this head, the man was allowed the first choice, if the children were divided, or there was but one.

Very little can be said as to their religion; much pains were taken by the early christian settlers, and frequently since, to inform their judgments respecting the use and benefit of the Christian Revelation, and to fix restraints; but generally with unpromising success, though instances have now and then happened to the contrary. They are They are thought to have believed in a God and immortality, and seemed to aim at public worship; when they did this, they sometimes sat in several circles one within another; the action consisted of singing, jumping, shouting and dancing; but mostly performed rather as something handed down from their ancestors, than from any knowledge or inquiry into the serious parts of its origin. They said that the great king that made them, dwelt in a glorious country to the southward, and that the spirits of the best should go there and live again. Their most solemn worship was the sacrifice of the first fruits, in which they burnt the first and fattest buck, and feasted together upon what else they had collected; but in this sacrifice broke no bones of any creature they ate; when done, they gathered and buried them very carefully; these have since been frequently ploughed up. They distinguished between a good and evil man-etta, or spirit; worshipped the first for the good they hoped and some of them are said to have been slavishly dark in praying to the last for deprecation of evils they feared; but if this be generally true, some of the tribes much concealed it from our settlers.

That is, the children of him now king, will not succeed, but his brother by the mother, or children of his sister, whose sons (and after them the male children of her daughters) were to reign; for no woman inherited.