ABORIGINAL USE OF WOOD IN NEW YORK 



173 



that the ordinary wooden mask may have been intended. While 

 with the Mohawks in 1634, Van Curler made this note, apparently 

 of the usual medicine : " The chief showed me his idol ; it was a 

 head, with the teeth sticking out ; it was dressed in red clotru Others 

 have a snake, a turtle, a swan, a crane, a pigeon^ or the like for their 

 idols, to tell the fortune ; they think they will always have good 

 luck in doing so." Wilson, p.88 



Maj. James Norris, while at Chemung with Sullivan's army, Aug. 

 12, 1779, said : " In what we supposed to be a Chappie was found 

 indeed an Idol, which might well enough be Worshipd without a 

 breach of the 2d Commandmt. on account of its likeness to anything 

 either in heaven or Earth." Conover, p.229. Other soldiers said 

 the same in other places. 



The following, from Col. Thomas Proctor's journal of Ap. 3, 

 1791, is more to the purpose. He was at the village of Canaseder, 

 on a high bluff overlooking the Genesee river, between Squakie Hill 

 and Oil Spring. He said : 



In this place was erected a wooden statue, (or deity) fashioned 

 like a fierce looking sage. This formerly they worshiped by dancing 

 before it on certain festival occasions or new moons, looking on it 

 as through a veil or assistant, whereby they pay adoration to the 

 Supreme Spirit, as knowing it hath a form, but not a substance. 

 Proctor, 4:565 



At Cornplanter's upper village, Ap. 21, he saw a thanksgiving 

 feast, in which a statue appeared. Due preparations were made : 



Thus prepared, they proceed to the statue, which was erected in 

 the center of the village, bearing some proportions to a man, and 

 justly painted as the Indian at its coming, but having no weapon 

 of war about him, intimating that he was the maintainer of peace. 

 This figure is about 9 feet in hight, and stood on a pedestal of about 

 12 feet, having on breech clout leggings, and a sash over its 

 shoulders, and a very terrible appearance. Under this statue were 

 placed two chiefs, termed the women's speakers ; each of these had 

 in his hands the shell of a large tortoise, the belly part covered with 

 a thin skin, stretched very tight, having in the inside several small 

 stones ; which shells being struck upon a deer skin which is stretched 

 between them, beating time together, accompanying the same with 

 their voices, they made such melody that the whole of the assembly 

 were delighted. The old and the young women danced around in 

 a circle, the image in the center, the men following them, using 



