298 
The Newettee Indians about Millbank Sound, in British 
Columbia, believe in a Great Spirit who is good, and made us 
and the world ; and the Bella Bellas thought they could make: 
a steamship, when they first saw one, with the help of the 
Great Spirit.* 
Missionaries among the Dakotas or Sioux have been unable 
to satisfy themselves that those Indians had any idea of the 
Great Spirit before the coming of the whites, but that He was 
a dream of the poets and sentimentalists; yet, besides their 
numerous gods, the great object of their veneration was their 
Takoo Wakan, the Great Mysterious, which comprehended all 
mystery, secret power, and divinity, who dwells everywhere, 
rather a pantheistic God, yet so much of a being that the Indian 
exclaims in prayer, “ Mystery, Father, have mercy on me.’’+ 
Dr. W. Mathews agrees with them, and yet says one de- 
signated as the Old Man Immortal has no vague existence 
in their minds, for he made all things and instructed their 
forefathers in their ceremonies. { 
From this I understand that these Indians did not believe 
in the Great Spirit of the Indians as described by some writers, 
and yet that they had a conception of a Supreme Being greater 
than all their other gods. 
Among the Omahas, the Wakonda is believed to be the 
greatest and best of beings, who has various attributes of the 
Supreme Being, and punishes men for their evil deeds.§ 
Captain Carver relates an interesting incident of the worship 
of the Great Spirit at the Falls of St. Anthony, by a young 
Winnebago Chief. || 
The Algonquins, both of Canada and the United States, 
give him the name of the Great Hare, Michabou; the Agres- 
koui of the Hurons, and the Agreskouse of the Iroquois, is the 
Sovereign Being of these tribes, and the New England tribes 
conceived of one Almighty Being who dwells in the south-west 
regions, who was superior to all other divinities. 
McCoy speaks of the same ideas among the Indians of 
Indiana and the Indian Territory, especially the Pottawotta- 
mies ;** Bradford certifies to them among the Hskimo, Osages, 
Arikarees, Pawnees, Indians of Virginia, Algonquins, and 
* Dunn, On Oregon Territory, pp. 178, 184. 
+ Gospel Among the Dakotas, chap. v. 
{ Hidatsa Indians, p. 47. 
§ Long's Expedition, 1819-20, vol. i. p. 267. 
|| Century of Dishonour, pp. 239, 240. 
“| Hayward’s Book of All Religions, pp. 210-212. 
** History of Indian Missions, p. 457. 
