34 UPLAND AND MEADOW. 



val," it is some satisfaction to know that we can still 

 stand in the shade of single trees and say of such, " This 

 is a remnant of the primeval woods." Such a tree, it 

 may be, is this lone button wood on Poaetquissings' bank. 

 It measures nearly seven feet in diameter at the base; 

 and so long ago as 1750 was the " big buttonwood " 

 of the neighborhood. There are others still standing 

 which are even larger, but none of equal height and 

 general massiveness. Poaetquissings' buttonwood is the 

 tree, according to local tradition, wliich was used by the 

 Lenap6 Indians as a stake, when they tortured Iroquois 

 prisoners. They bound the victim to the creek side of 

 the tree, so that the sight of the water would increase 

 his agony, while the flames licked his limbs. There is 

 even a slight hollow or dent in the trunk at its base, 

 which, it is said, was burned out gradually, as prisoners 

 were tortured. This is nonsense, I believe, for so long 

 ago as the Indian daj^s, when such tilings occurred, the 

 tree was too small for any such purpose, and stakes, in 

 the centres of villages, were used. Still, such a tale, once 

 heard, invests a tree with an unusual interest, and every 

 black speck at the roots we imagine is charcoal or 

 burned bones, while, at the same time, we laugh at the 

 absurdity of such an idea. Stories of this tree, in con- 

 nection with the Indians, were told me nearly forty years 

 ago, and to me it must remain an "Indian tree," while 

 I know that the possibilities are, to say the least, that no 

 Indian was ever aware of its existence. 



The trunk of the tree, for a distance of thirty or forty 

 feet, is now half hidden with grape-vines, green-brier, 

 and Virginia creeper, and in winter it looks like a ship's 



