( ) 



other Indians, towards a juft conception of this 

 nrft principle, but the little commerce we have 

 hitherto had with them, does not permit me to be 

 fufficiently informed of their traditions, to enable 

 me to fpeak of them with any degree of cer- 

 tainty. 



Almoft all the nations of the Alqonquin lan- 

 guage, give this fovereign Being the appellation of 

 the great Hare ; fome again call him Michabou, 

 and others Atahocan. Moil of them hold the opi- 

 nion that he was born upon the waters, together 

 with his whole court, entirely compofed of four 

 footed animals like himfelf-, that he formed the 

 earth of a grain of fand, which he took from the 

 bottom of the ocean, and that he created man of 

 the bodies of the dead animals. There are like- 

 wife fome who mention a god of the waters, who 

 oppofed the defigns of the great Hare, or at leaft 

 refufed to be aflifting to him. This god is ac- 

 cording to fome, the great Tyger, but it muft be 

 obferved, that the true tyger is not to be found in 

 Canada ; thus this tradition is probably of foreign 

 extraction. Laftly, they have a third god called 

 Matcomek, whom they invoke in the winter fea- 

 fon, and concerning whom, I have learned no- 

 thing particular. 



The Arefkoui of the Hurons, and the Agref- 

 koue of the Iroquois, is in the opinion of thefe 

 nations, the Sovereign Being and the god of war. 

 Thefe Indians do not give the fame original to 

 mankind with the Alqonquins ; they do not fo 

 much as afcend fo high as the firft creation. Ac- 

 cording to them there were in the beginning fix 

 men in the world, and if you afk them who placed 

 them there, they anfwer you, they dont know. 



They 



