102 NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



Then Dekanahwideh again said : " We have now completed 

 binding this bundle of arrows and we shall leave it beside the great 

 tree (Skarehhehsegowah) and beside the Confederate Council fire 

 of Thadodahho." 



Then Dekanahwideh said : u We have now completed our power 

 so that we the Five Nations' Confederacy shall in the future have 

 one body, one head and one heart." 



Then he (Dekanahwideh) further said: "If any evil should 

 befall us in the future, we shall stand or fall united as one man." 



Then Dekanahwideh said : " You lords shall be symbolized as 

 trees of the Five Confederate Nations. We therefore bind our- 

 selves together by taking hold of each other's hands firmly and 

 forming a circle so strong that if a tree shall fall prostrate upon it, 

 it could neither shake nor break it, and thus our people and our 

 grandchildren shall remain in the circle in security, peace and happi- 

 ness. And if any lord who is crowned with the emblem of deer's 

 horns shall break through this circle of unity, his horns shall become 

 fastened in the circle, and if he persists after warning from the 

 chief matron, he shall go through it without his horns and the horns 

 shall remain in the circle, and when he has passed through the 

 circle, he shall no longer be lord, but shall be as an ordinary war- 

 rior and shall not be further qualified to fill any office." 



Then Dekanahwideh further said : " We have now completed 

 everything in connection with the matter of Peace and Power, and 

 it remains only for us to consider and adopt some measure as to 

 what we shall do with reference to the disposal of the weapons 

 of war which we have taken from our people." 



Then the lords considered the latter and decided that the best 

 way which they could adopt with reference to the disposal of the 

 weapons would be to uproot the great tall tree which they had 

 planted and in uprooting the tree a chasm would form so deep that 

 it would come or reach the swift current of the waters under it, 

 into which the weapons of war would be thrown, and they would 

 be borne and swept away forever by the current so that their grand- 

 children would never see them again. And they then uprooted the 

 great tree and they cast into the chasm all manner of weapons of 

 war which their people had been in the custom of using, and the* 

 then replaced the tree in its original position. 



Then Dekanahwideh further continued and said : " We have 

 completed clearing away all manner of weapons from the paths of 

 our people." 



