[ganong] INDIAN PLACE-NOMENCLATURE. 291 



probably be read as PEGKWAHLAGAS. In this form it differs only in its 

 terminal letter from some of the forms above given as early recorded forms of 

 Pocologan. Through this word I think we shall find the confirmation of our 

 interpretation, or else, if that proves wrong, the clue to the one that is correct. 



Of course the root ELAKUN is itself compound, and is resolvable perhaps, into 

 a root EL, carrying the idea of enclosure, and AKUN, which signifies an opening or 

 passage. Now this latter root occurs in a great many place-names as a suffix, as will 

 later be shown, and exhibits a considerable range of pronunciation from OKUN, 

 AKUN, AGUN, to EGUN, etc., which will explain not only some variation in the pro- 

 nunciation of pokelogan, but the spelling of the latter part of some forms of the New 

 Brunswick place-name earlier given (page 286). 



While this explanation seems to me probable, it rests simply upon parallel re- 

 semblances and hence lacks proof-connection with the word in question. In this 

 manner one can build up other explanations of the word, all reasonable, of which I 

 have made two or three, though less probable than the one given, and hardly worth 

 full description. 



Finally, a little coincidence pointed out to me by Mrs. Eckstorm is worth notice, 

 especially as sooner or later it is sure to be adduced in this connection. If the word 

 were not so certainly Indian, we could readily find for it an Anglo-Saxon origin, for, 

 according to Murray's Dictionary, an old word POKE means POCKET, while 

 LOKEN means CLOSED, so that POKELOKEN could be imagined to mean a 

 pocket-like enclosure, which a pokelogan commonly is. Of course there is nothing 

 in this resemblance other than one of those coincidences which are so common in all 

 philological studies. 



As the foregoing discussion exhibits, the preferred spelling of the Dictionaries 

 is POKELOKEN, which is clearly based upon the spelling used by Bartlett and 

 adopted by Haliburton; and they have naturally been followed by others. Yet 

 POKELOGAN is a much preferable form, both because historically prior, and also 

 because reflecting far better the local pronunciation, as the common abbreviations 

 LOGAN and BOGAN well show. 



POPELOGAN. The name of a Brook, a branch of the Upsalquitch River, in 

 northern New Brunswick. Although apparently Indian, the Micmacs repudiate 

 it, and have for the brook quite a different name of their own {these Transactions, II, 

 1896, ii, 263). A Micmac chief told me, it is "a bad place to get logs out of — must 

 be named for that", which remark not only recalls Thoreau's above noted, to a some- 

 what similar effect, but also suggests a possible reason for the application of the 

 name, viz., that it was given by a lumberman from Maine because of some resem- 

 blance to a pokelogan stream there. Its form POPELOGAN long antedates that 

 spelling on the modern maps for our Harbour and Stream in the south of the Prov- 

 ince, for I find it on Saunders' published Map of New Brundwick of 1842. Saunders, 

 in turn, undoubtedly drew the name from a Ms plan in the Crown Land Office at 

 Fredericton, a survey of the Upsalquitch by Hunter, of 1836, for it appears thereon 

 with the present spelling. But here is an interesting fact about the name upon 

 Hunter's map, that while it occurs thereon as POPELOGAN, it is given also as 

 POKE LOGAN, and the latter word is in Hunter's writing, and the former apparently 

 in another hand. Thus we have marked support of the supposition above men- 

 tioned, that the word is a lumberman's importation from Maine, soon corrupted by 

 the rivermen, to whom it was unfamiliar, to POPELOGAN; and still further support 

 is given the idea of importation by the fact that the word does not appear at all on 

 the earlier fine plan of 1820-1 by McDonald, — the original survey plan of this River. 



