me vista of the upper lakes: men, who threaded
these broad forests in search of the deer, or who descended the powerful
and rapid channels of the Alleghany, the Susquehanna, the Delaware and
the St. Lawrence, in quest of their foes, must have felt the influence
of magnitude and creative grandeur, and could not but originate ideas
favorable to liberty and personal independence. Their very position,
became thus the initiatory step in their assent to power.

2. Such was the country occupied, at the era of the discovery, by the
Iroquois. They lived, to employ their own symbolic language, in a long
lodge extending east and west, from the waters of the Ca-ho-ha-ta-tea[A]
to those of Erie. Their most easterly tribe, the Mohawks, extended their
occupancy to a point which they still call, with dialectic variations,
Skan-ek-ta-tea, being the present site of Albany. To this place, or, as
is more generally thought, to this geographical vicinity, the commercial
enterprize of Holland, sent an exploring ship in 1609. Here begins the
certain and recorded history of the Iroquois. We have only known them
200 years. All beyond this, is a field of antiquarian inquiry.

[A] Hudson.

From the historical documents recently obtained by the State from
France, and deposited in the public offices at the capitol, it is seen
that this people are sometimes called the NINE nations of the Iroquois.
Algonquin tradition, which I have recently published, denotes that they
originally consisted of EIGHT tribes. (ONEOTA.) Whatever of truth or
error, there may be in these terms, it is certain that, at the period of
the Dutch discovery and settlement referred to, they uniformly described
themselves as the FIVE NATIONS, or United People, under the title of
AKONOSHIONI.[B] The term Ongwe Honwee, which Colden mentions as
peculiarly applied to themselves, as proudly contradistinguished from
others, is a mere equivalent, in the several dialects, at this day, for
the term Indian, and applies equally to other tribes, throughout the
continent, as well as to themselves. By the admission of the Tuscaroras
into the confederacy, they became known as the Six Nations. The
principles of their compact, were such as to admit of any extension.
They might as well, for aught that is known, have consisted of Sixteen
as Six Tribes, and like our own Union, they would have been stronger and
firmer in their power, with each admission.

[B] Or Ho-de-no-son-ne.

I have directed so