THE CODE OF HANDSOME LAKE 11 



of the white settlers all conspired to bring despair. There is 

 not much energy in a despairing nation who see themselves hopeless 

 and alone, the greedy eyes of their conquerors fastened on the few 

 acres that remain to them. It was little wonder that the Indian 

 sought forgetfulness in the trader's rum. 



As a victim of such conditions, Handsome Lake stalked from the 

 gloom holding up as a beacon of hope his divine message, the 

 Gai'wiio'. He became in spite of his detractors a commanding 

 figure. He created a new system, a thing to think about, a thing to 

 discuss, a thing to believe. His message, whether false or true, was 

 a creation of their own and afforded a nucleus about which they 

 could cluster themselves and fasten their hopes. A few great 

 leaders such as Red Jacket denounced him as an imposter but this 

 only afforded the necessary resistant element. The angels then 

 conveniently revealed that Red Jacket was a schemer and a seller 

 of land and an unhappy wretch doomed to carry burdens of soil 

 through eternity as a punishment for perfidy. This was enough 

 to create a prejudice among the Indians and one that lasts to this 

 day among all classes of the reservation Iroquois. A few others 

 endeavored to expose the prophet but this action only created a 

 large faction that stood strongly for him. 



Whatever may be the merits of the prophet's teachings, they 

 created a revolution in Iroquois religious life. With the spread of 

 his doctrines the older religious system was overturned until today 

 it- is to be doubted that a single adherent remains. Handsome 

 Lake's followers were few at first. He was despised, ridiculed and 

 subject to bodily insults. Certain failures to live up to a precon- 

 ceived idea of what a prophet should be caused a continual perse- 

 cution. Cornplanter, his half brother, continually harassed him, as 

 may be seen in the relation. Some of his failures, real or fancied, 

 caused calumny to be heaped upon him and they are current today 

 among those inclined to scoff. It is said that he learned his ideas 

 of morality from his nephew, Henry Obail (Abeal), who had been 

 at school in Philadelphia. Henry, it is said, took him up in the 

 mountains and explained the Christain Bible to him, thus giving 

 him the idea of devising the i^ai'wiio'. Other tales are that he failed 

 to find the great serpent in the bed of the Allegany river though he 

 pretended to locate it and charge it with having spread disease 

 among the people, and that he erected an idol on an island in the 

 river, a thing which from more authentic accounts he did not do. 



Previous to his residence at Tonawanda he had lived ten years 



