THE GEOEGE CATLIN INDIAN GALLERY. 173 



could be constantly sliifted from one person or family to another, and could never re- 

 main settled longer than he or they were able to uphold the qualities entitling them 

 to the supremacy. The founders of the league may or may not have considered this 

 question in the organization they made. They perfected a confederacy of tribes, 

 ofilicered by forty-eight hereditary sachems or peace men and two hereditary military 

 sachems or chieftains. They ignored the individuality of persons (except Tododaho) 

 and families and brought the several tribes into the closest relationship by the estab- 

 lishment of common clans or totemships, to whom was confided the hereditability of 

 the league officers. It was a purely accidental circumstance that some of the clans 

 in some of the tribes were not endowed with sachemships and that others got more 

 than one. But because some of the clans got more than one sachem, and that a family 

 in that clan was temporarily intrusted with the care of it, the clan or family were not 

 in consequence thereof ennobled or made aristocratic. Bear in mind this fact, a 

 sachemship belongs to a clan and is the property of no one family. Honorary distinc- 

 tions are only assumed by the tribes of clans from the fact that the league makers gave 

 them the rank of the elder or younger, and the family government and gradation of 

 kinship was introduced to 1>ring the same more readily to their comprehension, under- 

 standing, and remembrance. 



This idea of Indian social grades with titles is all a vain and foolish fancy of the 

 early imaginative writers, who were educated to believe in such things ; and the idea 

 is retained, used, and still disseminated by our modern susceptibles who love and adore 

 rank and quality, and who give and place them where none is claimed. I do not deny 

 that royaner in the Mohawk means lord or master, but the same word, when applied 

 to terrestrial or political subjects, only means councilor. The Seneca word is hoyarna, 

 councilor — Tioyarnagoivar, great councilor. These names are applied to the league 

 officers only, and the term "great" was added to designate them more conspicuously 

 and distinguish them from agreat body of lesser men who hadforced themselves into 

 the deliberations of the league councilors. The term hdsanoivaneh (great name) is 

 given to this last great body of men, a body now known as chiefs. They were never 

 provided for and, as I believe, were never contemplated by the league originators, 

 but they subsequently came to the surface, as I have hereinbefore set forth, and forced 

 a recognition of their existence upon the " great councilors," and, on account of their 

 following and ability, were provided with seats at the council board. 



Eed Jacket was one of these " chiefs." He was supremely and exclusively intel- 

 lectual. He was a walking encyclopedia of the affairs of the Iroquois. His logical 

 powers were nearly incontrovertible, at least to the untutored Indian generally. In 

 his day, and to the times I am referring, the " Great Councilor's" word was his bond ; 

 it was of more weight and consequence than the word of a chief. Eed Jacket knew 

 this well, and, while he could not be made a league officer, he used every means 

 which his wisdom and cunning could devise to make himself appear not only the 

 foremost man of his tribe but of the league. He was ever the chosen spokesman of 

 the matrons of tribes. He was s]3okesman of visiting delegations of Indians to the* 

 seat of Government, whether State or Federal. In the signing of treaties, though un- 

 successfully opposiag them in open council, he would secretly intrigue for a blank 

 space at or near the head of tflie list of signers, with a view, as the Indians asserted, 

 of pointing to it as evidence that he was among its early advocates, and also that he 

 was among the first and leading men of his tribe. He was even charged with being 

 double-faced and sometimes speaking with a forked tongue. These and many other 

 traits, both good and bad, which he possessed worked against him in the minds of 

 his people, and interposed an insurmountable bar to his becoming a league officer. 



After the war of 1812, whenever Eed Jacket visited the Tonawanda Eeservaf ion, 

 he made my father's house his principal home, on account of his tribal relationshii> 

 to my mother, who wns of the Wolfclau. My father and his brother Samuel were 

 both intelligent men, and knew and understood the Indians well, and were also 

 fairly versed in Indian politics. During my early youth I have heard them discuss 



