60 



NEUSIOK NEUTRALS 



[b. a. e. 



Ind. Aff., Victoria, 1872). Tliis would 

 be in the country of the Cowichan. 



Neusiok. An unclassified tribe, per- 

 haps of Iroquoian stock, found in 1584 

 occupying the country on the s. side of 

 lower Neuse r., within the present Craven 

 and Carteret cos. , >'. C. They were at war 

 with the more southerly coast tribes. In 

 the later colonial period the Indians of 

 the same region were commonly known 

 as Neuse Indians and had dwindled by 

 the year 1700 to 15 warriors in two towns, 

 Chattookaand Rouconk. They probably 

 disappeared by incorporation with the 

 Tuscarora. (.i. m. ) 



Neuses.— Martin, Hist. N. Car., 127, 1829. Neus 

 Indians.— Lawson, Hist. Car. 1714, 884, repr. 1860. 

 Neusiok. — Mooni-y, Siuuan Tribes of tlie East, 7, 

 1894. Neuusiooc— De Bry map in Hariot, Brief 

 and True Re]!., l')90. Nusiok.— Amadas (1584) in 

 Smith's Worlcs, Arber ed., 309. 1884. Nustoc— De 

 Bry map (1590), ihid., 342 (misprint.) 



Neutrals. An important confederation 

 of Iroquoian tribes living in the 17th cen- 

 tury N. of L. Erie in Ontario, having four 

 villages e. of Niagara r. on territory ex- 

 tending to the Genesee watershed; the 

 western bounds of these triljes were in- 

 definitely w. of Detroit r. and L. St Clair. 

 They were called Neutrals by the French 

 because they were neutral in the known 

 wars between the Iroquois and the Hu- 

 rons. The Ilurons called them Attiwan- 

 daronk, denoting 'they are those whose 

 language is awry', and tliis name was 

 also applied by the Neutrals in turn to 

 the Ilurons. The Iroquois called them 

 Atirhagenrat ( Atirhaguenrek) and Rha- 

 genratka. The Aondironon, the Wen- 

 rehronon, and the Ongniaahraronon are 

 names of some of the constituent tribes 

 •of the Neutrals. Champlain, reporting 

 what he saw in 1616, wrote that the "Na- 

 tion Neutre" had 4,000 warriors and in- 

 habited a country that extended 80 or 100 

 leagues e. and w., situated westward from 

 the lake of the Seneca; they aided the 

 Ottawa (Cheueux releuez) against the 

 Mascoutens or "Small Prairie people," 

 and raised a great quantity of good to- 

 bacco, the surplus of which was traded 

 for skins, furs, and porcupine quills and 

 quillwork with the northern Algonquian 

 peoples. This writer said that the In- 

 dians cleared the land " with great pains, 

 though they had no proper iustruments 

 to do this. They trimmed all the limbs 

 from the trees, which they liurned at the 

 foot of the trees to cause them to die. 

 Then they thoroughly prepared the 

 ground l>etween the trees and planted 

 their grain from step to step, putting in 

 each hill about 10 grains, and so contin- 

 ued planting until they had enough for 

 3 or 4 years' provisions, lest a bad year, 

 sterile and fruitless, befall them." 



The Rev. Father Joseph de la Roche 

 Daillon, a Recollect, sjjent the winter of 

 1626 among this people for the purpose 



of teaching them Christianity. The first 

 village, Kandoucho, or All Saints, wel- 

 comed him. He then went through four 

 other villages, meeting with a friendly 

 reception, and finally reached the sixth, 

 where he had been told to establish hiin- 

 self. He had the villagers call a council 

 of the tribe for the jturpose of declaring 

 to them his mission. He was adopted 

 by the tribe, being given to Tsohahissen 

 (Souharissen?), the presiding chief. 

 Daillon says of the Neutrals: "They 

 are inviolable observers of what they 

 have once concluded and decreed." 

 His "father and host," Tsohahissen, had 

 ever traveled among all neighboring 

 tribes, for he was chief not only of his 

 own village, l)ut even of those of the 

 whole tribe, composed of about 28 vil- 

 lages, villas, and towns, constructed like 

 those of the Hurons, besides many ham- 

 lets of 7 or 8 lodges for fishing, hunting, 

 or for the cultivation of the soil. Daillon 

 said that there was then no known in- 

 stance of a chief so absolute; that Tso- 

 hahissen had acquired his position and 

 power by his courage and from having 

 been at war many times against 1 7 tribes, 

 and had brought back heads (scaljis?) 

 and prisoners from all. Their arms were 

 only the war club and the bow and arrow, 

 but they were skilful in their use. Dail- 

 lon also remarked that he had not found 

 in all the countries visited by him among 

 the Indians a hunchback, one-eyed, or 

 deformed person. 



But the Hurons, having learned that 

 Father Daillon contemplated conducting 

 the Neutrals to the trading jjlace in the 

 harbor of C. Victory in L. St Peter of St 

 Lawrence r., api)roximately 50 m. below 

 Montreal, spread false re[)orts about him, 

 declaring to the Neutrals that he was a 

 great magician, capable of filling the air 

 of the country with pestilence, and that 

 he had then already taken off many Hu- 

 rons by poison, thus seeking to comj^ass 

 his death by fomenting suspicions against 

 hira. The bearing of the accusation may 

 be judged when it is known that sorcerers 

 were regarded as public enemies and out- 

 laws and were remorselessly slain on 

 the slightest pretext. 



The father declared that there were an 

 incredible number of deer in the country, 

 which they did not take one by one; but 

 by making a triangular "drive," com- 

 posed of two convergent hedges leading 

 to a narrow opening, with a third hedge 

 placed athwart the opening but admitting 

 of egress at each end of the last one, 

 they drove the game into this pen and 

 slaughtered them with ease. They prac- 

 tised toward all animals the policy that, 

 whether required or not, they must 

 kill all they might find, lest those which 

 were not taken would tell the other beasts 



