discoverers and original owners of New Jersey.

We will not now allude to the rights they then acquired to the country
which is now Pennsylvania and other States, because we are confining
ourselves to what relates to the country of Scheyichbi, the land where
their eastward migrations ceased. Now, they could go no farther towards
the rising sun, and they were satisfied to stop.

These Lenape, or "Grandfather Tribe" as they were often called, were not
merely cruel and ignorant savages: they had many admirable traits of
character, and some of their manners and customs might well have been
imitated by those who found them here.

They had an admirable system of government; and at regularly appointed
periods their wisest men met at the great "Council House" to make laws,
and arrange the affairs of the nation. Their conduct in their councils
was far more decorous and becoming than that we often hear of among
legislators of the present day, whether they are met together in
Congress, Parliament, or Reichstag. These chiefs, chosen for their
wisdom and experience, treated each other with the highest regard and
respect. When one of them arose to address his fellow-legislators, every
man in the council room paid the strictest attention to what he said;
and interruptions, jeers, and ridicule, such as legislators often make
use of at the present day, were totally unknown among these grave and
earnest Indians.

There can be no doubt that the Lenape were superior to other Indian
nations, and worthy of the proud title which they gave themselves; and
in later years, when the river was named after Lord De la Warre, and
they were called the Delawares, they were considered the noblest of the
Indian tribes.

I dwell upon the good qualities and high character of the Lenape,
because it was from their main body that numerous tribes came across the
Delaware River, and became the first Jerseymen, or, if any one likes it
better, Scheyichbians. They settled in many pleasant places, building
wigwam villages, many of which have since grown into modern towns, and
still bear their old Indian names. In fact, the modern Jerseyman has had
the good sense to preserve a great many of the names given to rivers,
mountains, and villages by the first owners of the soil.

But, after all, Scheyichbi was not sufficiently discovered and settled
for the purposes of civilization, and its fertile soil waited long for
the footsteps of the new immigrants. These cam