130 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. ix. 



without. We may therefore trace, with some degree of definite- 

 ness, the extension of the greater Indian families as they existed 

 when first discovered, grouping together, for this purpose, many 

 tribes which, though speaking the same or cognate languages, 

 and with a general similarity in habits and modes of life, were 

 not unfrequently at bitter enmity among themselves, and in some 

 cases had almost forgotten their original organic connection. 



In North-eastern America, the great Algonkin family was 

 numerically the most important, occupying a vast extent of coun- 

 try, from beyond the western end of Lake Superior, along its 

 northern shores, to the region of the Ottawa — wliich appears to 

 have been the original focus of this group of Indians — filling the 

 great wilderness between the St. Lawrence River and Gulf and 

 the southern part of Hudson's Bay, occupying New Brunswick, 

 Nova Scotia and the present New England States, and stretching 

 even further southward, to the confines of Florida. 



There appear to have been seven main tribal divisions, which 

 are said to have numbered each from 3,000 to 6,000 warriors, 

 and are those referred to collectively by the Jesuits, who had 

 comparatively little knowledge of the tribal intricacies of this 

 part of the continent, as ces grands hourgs des Naragenses. Many 

 of the names of these tribes and of their smaller subdivisions are 

 still perpetuated in a more or less travestied form in the names 

 of places ; and in the history of the early days of the English 

 colonies some of them appear continually. In addition to these, 

 inhabiting Maine and New Hampshire, was the great Abenakis 

 tribe, afterwards of some importance in Canadian history, when 

 pressed northward by the disturbances incident to the establish- 

 ment of the English Colonies. Closely allied to these, were the 

 Malecetes and Micmacs of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia. To 

 the north of the Gulf and lower part of the River St. Lawrence 

 were a number of roving tribes, afterwards known collectively as 

 the Montagnards ; in the Ottawa region, the Algonkins proper, 

 -and further to the north-west the Chippewas or Ojibways centred, 

 when first discovered, near the Sault Ste. Marie, whence the 

 name Sauteux applied to them by the French. These last were 

 pressing westward, waging incessant warfare with the Sioux, and 

 gradually dispossessing them of their hunting grounds about the 

 sources of the Mississippi. 



South of the Algonkin territory was the great Iroquois 

 nation, extending from the southern part of Lake Champlain to 



