METALLIC IMPLEMENTS OF NEW YijRK INDIANS IT 



Massawomekes, and other people, sigiiifyiiio- they inhabit the 

 river of Cannida, and from the French to have their hatchets 

 and such lilve tools by trade." 



The Virginia Indians told him that this hostile peoj)lc lived 

 ^' on a great salt water, which by all likelihood is some i^art of 

 Commada, some great lake, or some inlet, or some sea that 

 falleth into the South Sea.'' In his well known account of his 

 battle on Lake Champlain in 1G09, the great French explorer 

 observed that the Mohawks had axes of iron, though that year 

 included his own first visit to New York and the first Dutch 

 voyage up the Hudson river. He said: " The Iroquois repaired 

 on shore, and arranged all their canoes, the one beside the other, 

 and began to hew down trees with villainous axes, which they 

 sometimes got in war, and others of stone, and fortified them- 

 selves very securely." We are thus not to limit the possible 

 use of European metallic articles in New York to the year 1609. 

 It is every way probable that a few implements or ornaments 

 reached the interior mauv vears before, and in some instances 

 these mav have been found. 



Attention has elsewhere been called to early wrecks along 

 the Atlantic coast, whence some metal was obtained. More 

 of these occurred than ever were reported. Fishermen from 

 Europe haunted the mouth of the St Lawrence and the points 

 and islands adjacent but did not publish their voyages. They 

 were not exploring, but getting a living. In a similar way, at 

 a later da.y, there were French and Dutch traders penetrating 

 the wilds of New York, of whose names and adventures we are 

 equally ignorant. For their own profit they said as little as 

 possible. 



It is somewhat surprising to see how rapidly our knowledge 

 of the early use of copper has grown. Squier and Davis brought 

 to light many copper ornaments and articles in their mound 

 explorations, the report of which was published in 1848. The 

 report of Foster and V.liitney on the Lake Superior district, 

 published in 1850, showed something of the early work done 

 there. Schoolcraft was at his best in that region. Lapham 



