180 PEARLS AND PEBBLES. 



seeks for no rhymes in which to clothe his simple 

 thoughts, no flowery verse ; but there is poetry in his 

 speech, and a musical ring in the names he has given to 

 the rivers, lakes and flowers that is absent in ours. The 

 Indian names are both descriptive and characteristic, 

 and in some instances contain the germ of local or dis- 

 tinctive history, which change or even mispronunciation 

 would obliterate for ever. 



The disjointed syllables may not sound euphonious to 

 foreign ears, but to the understanding of the native 

 Indian they convey a simple description, a graphic word- 

 picture. The beautiful rapid Otonabee is described in 

 the name, " water running swiftly flashing brightly " ; 

 Katchewanook, "lake of three islands " ; Ontario, " sheet 

 of placid water " ; Pem-a-dash-da-kota, " lake of the 

 burning plains,'' the original name of Rice Lake. How 

 many years ago it was that these plains were burned 

 over they do not know, but that they were the scene of 

 a great conflagration the Indian name, as well as the 

 half-charred blackened roots below the surface of the 

 soil, prove. Napanee, the Indian word for flour, indi- 

 cates that on the site of that now flourishing town the 

 first flour-mills in the district were erected. 



How much prettier is the Indian name for Spring 

 Beauty, " Mis-ko-deed,'* than the unmeaning botanical 

 one of Glaytonia Virginica. In the latter some botan- 

 ist has perpetuated his own insignificant name of 

 Clayton, while the Itidian mother, with truer instinct, 



