BULL. 30] 



POQLTIM PORTER 



287 



the acquisition of firearms gave one body 

 an immense superiority over its neigh- 

 bors. Among tlie wars most destructive 

 to the Indians may be noted those in 

 Virginia and southern New England, the 

 raids upon the Florida missions by the 

 Carolina settlers and their savage allies, 

 the wars of the Natchez and Foxes with 

 the French, the Creek war, and the war 

 waged by the Iroquois for a period of 

 thirty years upon all the surrounding 

 tribes. 



A careful study of population conditions 

 for the whole territory n. of Mexico, 

 taking each geographic section separately, 

 indicates a total jiopulation, at the time 

 of the coming of the white man, of nearly 

 1,150,000 Indians, which is believed to 

 be within 10 per cent of the actual num- 

 ber. Of this total 846,000 were within 

 the limits of the United States proper, 

 220,000 in British America, 72,000 in 

 Alaska, and 10,000 in Greenland. The 

 original total is now reduced to about 

 403,000, a decrease of about 65 per cent. 

 The complete study is expected to form 

 the subject of a future Bulletin of the 

 Bureau of American Ethnology, (.i. >i.) 



Poquim, Poquoiam. See U)tcas. 



Poquonnoc ( from }>a i((ji(' im-auke, 'aclear- 

 ing' ). A tribe formerly living alwut the 

 mouth of Farmington r. in Hartford co.. 

 Conn. Their principal village, called also 

 Pequonnoc, was near the i^resent Windsor. 

 Paquaanocke. — Windsor Rec. (1636-59) cited by 

 Trumbull, Ind. Names Conn., 55, 1881. Paquan- 

 aug.— Plymouth deed (1687), ibid. Paquanick,— 

 Windsor Rec. op. cit. Pequanucke.— R. I. Col. 

 Rec. (1614) cited by Trumbull, ibid. Poquan'noc. — 

 Trumbull, ibid., 54. Poquannock.— ilcClure (1797) 

 in Mass. Hist. Soc. Coll., 1st s., v., 169, 1806. 

 Poquonock. — Windsor Rec.op.cit. Powquaniock. — 

 Ibid. 



Poquosin. A name applied in eastern 

 Maryland, Virginia, and North Carolina 

 to a low wooded ground or swamp, which 

 is covered with shallow water in winter 

 and remains in a miry condition in sum- 

 mer. Some of these swamps in North 

 Carolina, such as the "Holly Shelter 

 pocoson," are 40 m. in length, and over- 

 grown with great liodies of valuable tim- 

 ber trees, rendered inaccessible to the 

 outer world by reason of overflow and the 

 perpetual miry state of the ground. In 

 Duplin CO. in the same state, in which 

 pocoson^, or "dismals" as they are also 

 called, abound, there are 105 sq. m. of 

 pure mud swamps, and in Pender co. 206 

 sq. m. of overflowed land. The name is 

 sometimes applied to a reclaimed swamp. 

 The name is from Eenape ptU-wesen, a 

 verbal adjective meaning 'it (the land) is 

 in a slightly watered condition.' The 

 word is common to all Algonquian dia- 

 lects, and in Wood Cree is used substan- 

 tively as a name for a 'shoal' or 'shallow'. 

 The name is spelled also poaquesso7i, 

 poquoson, pocoson, perkoson. ( w. r. g. ) 



Porgy. According to Bartlett (Diet. 

 Americanisms, 484, 1877), a name given 

 in New York to a fish {S/)arus argyrops) 

 called in Khode Island and e. Connecti- 

 cut scup, and in some other parts of New 

 England scuppaug. The dictionaries give 

 porgy the following meanings: 1. Braize 

 {Pagriis vulgaris), scup, pintish, and mar- 

 gate-fish. 2. Surf-fish of the Pacific coast. 

 3. Angel-fish. 4. Toad-fish and men- 

 haden. Porgij, spelled also poggy, pogy, 

 pogie, paugie, etc., is a reduction of 

 mislicnppauog, plural of misJicnp, in 

 the Narraganset dialect of Algonquian, 

 which Roger Williams (1643) rendered 

 'breames.' The Avhites took the plural 

 as a singular and decapitated it, hence 

 porgy, pangie, etc. The decaudated form 

 appears as viisJicup in some parts of New 

 England. Gerard, on the other hand, 

 asserts that porgy is " not a corrujition of 

 an Indian wonl, but a name in England 

 for a fish allied to our porgy. It was in- 

 troduced at an early period, and is men- 

 tioned by Josselyn. Catesby gives it also 

 as the name of a Bermuda fish. It was 

 evidently derived from jxirgns, one of 

 the forms of pugrus, a word of Greek 

 origin." See Mishcup, Fogy. (a. f. c. ) 



Porphyry. Rock of igneous origin and 

 resembling granite, but characterized by 

 the presence of crystals of quartz and 

 feldspar which, when large and contrast- 

 ing with the somber matrix, give a very 

 attractive appearance. It was often used 

 by the native tribes in making their 

 heavier implements, and the more showy 

 varieties were selected for the manufac- 

 ture of ornaments and objects of cere- 

 mony. (\V. H. H.) 



Portage Band. A Winnebago division 

 that resided in 1811 at the portage of Fox 

 and Wisconsin rs., at the present site of 

 Portage, Wis. — Gale, Upper Miss., 185, 

 1867. 



Porter, Pleasant. The last chief of the 

 Creek Nation; born at the family home 

 near the present town of Coweta, n. of 

 Arkansas r., in the Creek Nation, Okla., 

 Sept. 26, 1840, died of paralysis at Vinita, 

 Cherokee Nation, Sept. 3, 1907, while en 

 route to Missouri. His father was a white 

 man. Pleasant Porter inheriting his In- 

 dian blood from his mother, who, through 

 her father, Tulope Tustunuggee, of the 

 Big Spring town of Creeks, had a decided 

 strain of negro blood. He was a bright 

 boy, but acquired only a limited educa- 

 tion at the old Tallahassee mission school ; 

 from wide reading, however, after he be- 

 came of age, he was regarded as one of 

 the best informed Indians in the entire 

 Indian Ter. When the Civil War broke 

 out many of Porter's relatives and friends 

 espoused the cause of the North and en- 

 listed in its service, but with the majority 

 of the Creeks he entered the service of 



