No. 3.] G. M. DAWSON — INDIANS OF CANADA. 131 



Lake Erie, and including the Senecas, Cayugas, Onondagas, 

 Oneidas and Mohawks, a fierce, intelligent, unscrupulous con- 

 federacy or league of tribes, estimated afterwards by La Hontan 

 at 70,000 in number, warring with neighbours and extending 

 their boundaries in every direction, their very name a terror 

 over half the northern part of the American coiitinent. Allied 

 to these by blood and language, although at the dawn of history 

 at bitter enmity with them, were the Hurons, estimated at 

 30,000 to 40,000 in number, inhabiting the eastern border of 

 the great lake which now bears their name. The Neutral Nation 

 also inhabiting the peninsula of Upper Canada, and of the Iro- 

 quois stock, were, with the Eries, destroyed by the confederated 

 Iroquois almost before their contact with the whites, and scarcely 

 figure in history. 



Following the more fertile country of the valley of the St. Law- 

 rence, there appears to have been an outlying member of the 

 great Iroquois-Huron family, holding the banks of the River 

 and present sites of Montreal and Quebec, while the Algonkins, 

 as we have already seen, peopled all the neighbouring regions. 



Such were the main features in the distribution of the Indian 

 nations of the north-east portion of the Continent at the time 

 when they were about to be brought into contact with a stronger 

 external power. In regard te their internal condition and 

 progress in the arts, notwithstanding the gloss with which time 

 may to some extent cover these aborigines, we cannot disguise 

 from ourselves that they were for the most part the veriest 

 savages. The northern Algonkins were found rarely, if ever, 

 cultivating the soil, even on the most limited scale ; hunters, 

 fishermen adding to their dietary such wild roots and berries as 

 the country happened to afford ; living from hand to mouth, 

 with little providence even for the annually recurring season of 

 cold ; probably then, as now among the more remote tribes, not 

 infrequently forced even to cannibalism during seasons of scarcity; 

 wanderers, not as some of them afterwards became in the service 

 of the great fur companies, over immense areas of the Continent, 

 but each little tribe migrating, with the seasons, in its accus- 

 tomed district, from the lake abounding in trout or white fish, 

 to the region frequented by deer, or the rocky hills and islands 

 where berries ripened most abundantly ; battling, with scanty 

 means, against the heat of summer and the winter's cold, and 

 not usually living with any sense either of security in life or in 



