XXVm INTRODUCTION. 



He who entered on a winter night beheld a strange 

 spectacle : the vista of fires lighting the smoky concave ; 

 the bronzed groups encircling each, — cooking, eating, 

 gambling, or amusing themselves with idle badinage ; 

 shrivelled squaws, hideous with threescore years of 

 hardship; grisly old warriors, scarred with Iroquois 

 war-clubs ; young aspirants, whose honors were yet to 

 be won ; damsels gay with ochre and wampum ; restless 

 children pellmell with restless dogs. Now a tongue of 

 resinous flame painted each wild feature in vivid light ; 

 now the fitful gleam expired, and the group vanished 

 from sight, as their nation has vanished from history. 



The fortified towns of the Hurons were all on the side 



that of Sagard, Voyage des Hurons, 118. See also Champlain (1627), 78; 

 Brebeuf, Relation des Hurons, 1635, 31 ; Vanderdonck, Neiv Netherlands, 

 in N. Y. Hist. Coll., Second Ser., 1. 196 ; Lafitau, Mceurs des Sauvages, II. 10. 

 The account given by Cartier of the houses he saw at Montreal corre- 

 sponds with the above. He describes them as about fifty yards long. 

 In this case, there were partial partitions for the several families, and a 

 sort of loft above. Many of the Iroquois and Huron houses were of 

 similar construction, the partitions being at the sides only, leaving a wide 

 passage down the middle of the house. Bartram, Observations on a Journey 

 from Pennsylvania to Canada, gives a description and plan of the Iroquois 

 Council-House in 1751, which was of this construction. Indeed, the Iro- 

 quois preserved this mode of building, in all essential points, down to a 

 recent period. They usually framed the sides of their houses on rows of 

 upright posts, arched with separate poles for the roof. The Hurons, no 

 doubt, did the same in their larger structures. For a door, there was a 

 sheet of bark hung on wooden hinges, or suspended by cords from above. 



On the site of Huron towns which were destroyed by fire, the size, 

 shape, and arrangement of the houses can still, in some instances, be 

 traced by remains in the form of charcoal, as well as by the charred 

 bones and fragments of pottery found among the ashes. 



Dr. Taclie, after a zealous and minute examination of the Huron 

 country, extended through five years, writes to me as follows. " From 

 the remains I have found, I can vouch for the scrupulous correctness of 

 our ancient writers. With the aid of their indications and descriptions, 

 I have been able to detect the sites of villages in the midst of the forest, 

 and by the study, in situ, of archaeological monuments, small as they are, 

 to understand and confirm their many interesting details of the habits, 

 and especially the funeral rites, of these extraordinary tribes." 



