May 25, i9or:J 
oFOREST --AND ©STREAM? 
408 
tered them. But, as Tonga said, they were not all killed, 
tor there arc still albinoes in Samoa. 
Eastward still went Polu in search of adventure, and 
not many miles away he found the giant Anianiloa, who 
seems to have been somewhat of a tight-rope walker. 
His path, when in search of people on whom to dine, lay 
along a cord stretched from a moimtain top. Polu asked 
a woman how they knew when the giant was coming, 
and she told him that they could judge from the fact 
that the cord grew heavy. Accordingly, Polu took the 
woman's place, with his hand on the cord. When he 
felt the strain come on the cord Polu waited to make 
sure that the giant was coming across, and then he let 
go his end of the rope and the giant fell down into a 
deep valley and broke his neck, and the people had peace. 
This exploit, according to several informants, is quite 
satisfactorily confirmed by imperishable evidence; any 
person who is willing to go to Solosolo will find there 
both the mountain top and the deep valley referred to. 
The next cannibal giant encountered was at Saluafata, 
a few miles beyond. The townsfolk warned the hero 
against using the most traveled road out of their town 
because it was devoted entirely to their particular ogre, 
who used it when he wanted to come into the town to 
select a man for food. This was all that'the exterminator 
of giants and ogres needed to know; he set out on that 
path at once, and to show his disregard of this private 
ownership of a public highway, he tied a cord across the 
road. Withotit loss of time the giant came hurrying 
along his road to wipe out the insult, and leaped on Polu 
to kill him. But just as he was making his attack Polu 
called out, "Look out; what's that over you?" The giant 
stopped to gaze up into the tree tops and the hero got 
in the fir-st blow and finished his opponent. 
The last of the giants lived at the back of the island of ' 
Upolu, at Falealili, where is the most interesting cave 
in all Samoa. His name was Carpenter, and he prac- 
ticed daily cannibalism. By strict attention to business 
he had reduced the population of the town to four indi- 
viduals — two chiefs and two talking-men. Things had 
come to such a pass that the giant had actuall};^ moved 
into the town, where he could make himself comfortable 
in the tenantless houses, and the four survivors were 
living in the groves of screw-palm in fear and trembling. 
By a happy chance Polue turned up at Falealili in his 
hunt for giants, and discovered the four men in the 
thicket. They detailed their sad situation, and asked 
relief. Polu delayed only to ascertain in which house the 
giant lived, and made his waj^ thither. The giant was 
from home, probably hunting for the four men in the 
thicket, but Polu sat down inside to wait for him. As 
soon as Carpenter bent under the eaves to enter the 
house Polu seized the opportunity, which gave him the 
advantage, got in the first blow, and killed this giant, 
also. 
This was the last of the giants; all had been killed of? 
by the exploits of this one hero, and there was peace in 
Samoa afterward, except for such little differences of 
opinion as could be settled man to man with clubs. Hav- 
ing converted his own father from cannibalism, and hav- 
ing secured an edict that the practice should cease in 
all Samoa, the young man dealt personally with all these 
worst offenders who set themselves above the law, and 
executed its provisions upon them. Since that time, 
Sarnoans say, there has been nothing of the sort. 
Llewella Pierce Churchill. 
Adirondack Place Names. 
The Adirondack region is a good deal like some old 
people one meets. It was young once and had a wild 
career for a while, especially when the whites got within 
the woods borders. Real pioneer adventure was of daily 
occurrence — but it is tame now. The wolves there went 
in the seventies, no one knows how; the moose in the 
fifties, everybody knows the reason why; and the In- 
dians were as good as gone more than a hundred years 
ago. Even their very bones have become dust, much 
more the tracks they made in snow and mud have disap- 
peared. Almost the onlj^ trace of the wild life now left 
is a lot of names. A few moss-grown moose horns may 
be seen, found by hunters in the swamps. Large steel 
traps of odd construction and very much rusted, are 
occasionally discovered by lake and stream sides. A few 
men liave eyes capable of discovering arrow heads, of 
which there are bushels on all sides of the mountains. 
But the chief things by wnich the adventures and events 
of the early days are remembered, are the names. If 
one had the stories which gave the many "Indian" rivers, 
lakes and ponds their names, they would be thrilling 
enough. They were doubtless named from real adven- 
tures with redskins, and very probably by trappers who, 
like Nat Foster, murdered Indians to rob them, or for 
the sake of keeping them awaj^ from a favorite fur 
country. 
So, too, there are moose ponds and moose rivers, real 
haunts, at one time, of the great animals. Wolf ponds. 
Otter creeks. Buck ponds. Mink lakes, etc., every one of 
them with a meaning now forgotten, though certainly 
associated with an animal of the sort indicated by the 
name. 
Natural features haA'e left their impress. A map shows 
dozens of names which the hunter and fisherman knows 
to be appropriate. The Rock lakes and ponds; the 
Spruce and Balsam ponds and lakes; Beaver Meadow and 
Flat streams of various sorts; Mica, Mountain, Sard and 
Mud ponds; Cedar, Marsh and Long Ponds are all truly 
named. But what can be said of such poverty of mind 
that calls the first chain of lakes in the mountains, First, 
Second, etc., to the Eighth? A little pond near by is 
called Quiver Pond, a name that at once conjures up a 
scene of woods beauty, which the Fulton chain never 
will, save to thbse who have been there, though it does 
suggest the first Yankee steamboat, as was intended. 
"Odor" Lake is on the maps, but the real name is 
Stink Lake. Some forest commissioner, with delicate 
ears, probably, made the change, robbing the name of 
its meaning. A dead deer, or moose, doubtless gave the 
place its real appellation, the true significance of which 
is lost 'in the possibly delicious "Odor." 
Many of the names now used are mere translations of 
the Indian nomenclature, especially those that relate 
to natural features and to the animals of one sort of 
other. The Indians, knew how to describe, or appro- 
l)riatcly name, a place. Lower Saranac Like is white man 
for the "Lake- of the Clustered Stars;" Trenton 
Falls, on the West Canada (West Ten, I believe), is 
vvhite man for the Kany-a-hoo-ka, Leaping Waters. 
The change in the name was just as well, for now the 
Trenton Falls chasm has been completely destroyed by 
a water power company for every purpose save run- 
ning water into a pipe at one end and out of the other 
with the dollar extracted. Not that I would deny the 
use of commercial progress, but merely express regret 
that tke beautiful so invariably vanishes when it is a 
question of dollars or the beautiful. 
Where men's names have been used to designate Adi- 
rondack features there is usually cause for gnashing of 
teth, but not always. There is Herkimer county, for 
instance. General Nicholas I-Icrkimer, the greatest man 
in the upper MohaAvk valley, ruled and fought there, and 
finally died of his wounds. By the battle of Oriskany, 
in- which, thoitgh wounded badly, he smoked a big pipe 
with relish, he saved the valley from St, Leger's Tories 
and Indians on Aug. 6, 1777, as well as made the battle 
of Saratoga, perhaps American independence, possible 
then. x\ good name for a rugged country! But what 
can be said when Tahawus, the Cloud Splitter, is known 
by the wretched name of "Mt. Marcy," with '*McIntyre," 
"Colden" and "Seward" for companions? 
Here is what Thoreau .said under similar provocations: 
"Flint's Pond! Such is the poverty of our nomencla- 
ture. .What right had the unclean and stupid farmer, 
whose farm abutted on this sky water, whose shores he 
has ruthlessly laid bare, to give his name to it? Some 
skinflint, who loved better the reflecting surface of a 
dollar, or a bright cent, in which he could see his own 
brazen face; who regarded even the wild ducks as tres- 
passers; his fingers grown into crooked and horny 
talons from the long habit of grasping, harp}^-like. I go 
not there to see him, nor to hear him. Who never saw 
it; who never bathed in it; who never spoke a good 
word for it, nor thanked God that He had made it. Rather 
let it be named from the fishes that swim in it, the wild- 
fowl or quadrupeds which frequent it; the wildflowers 
which grow by its shores, or some wild man or child, 
the thread of whose history is interwoven with its own; 
not from him who could show no title to it but the deed 
which a like-minded neighbor or legislature gave him — 
him who thought only of the money value, whose pres- 
ence, perchance, cursed all the shore; who exhausted the 
land around it and would fain have exhausted the waters 
within it; who regretted only that it was not English 
hay or cranberry meadow — there was nothing to redeem 
it, forsooth, in his ej^es — and would have drained it and 
sold it for the mud at its bottom." 
All things considered, the Adirondacks have been 
rather forttmate in names, , more so than one might ex- 
pect. It is true there are Sampson's Lakes, Eckford 
Chain, O'Neil Flow, Swanson's Dam, Brown's Tract, 
Griffin (a man!) Brook, Stephen's Pond, Buell Brooki 
Tirrell Pond, My Pond, Your Pond. Jenkins' Pond and 
Merritt's Lake, and so on^ — and of what possible signifi- 
cance are these? But really descriptiA'e names are seen 
and heard. 
S. H. Hammond made a trip southward into the Adi- 
rondacks and in 1865 he printed a book about it. Mea- 
cham Lake was sixteen miles in the wilderness then, and 
a few rniles beyond it in the "southeast corner of Duane" 
township, Flam.mond came to a pond of about 200 acres, 
nameless so far as he or his guide knew. Here is how 
it got a name: 
"Having rested ourselves, we were about starting on 
our journey when we saw an animal called the fisher. 
* * * As he passed behind a large boulder. I raised 
my rifle, and as be again emerged into sight, I fired 
and killed him. * * * We took the gentleman's 
hide as the spoils of Avar, and to pay for the trouble of 
shooting and skinning him. The death of the animal 
was the occa.'^ion of the christening of this sheet of water. 
Vye hewed a smooth place on the side of an ancient 
birch, and with a knife carved thereon in large letters, 
'Fisher's I..ake.' Whoever shall hereafter visit it, let 
him respect the name Ave gave it and speak of it accord- 
ing'},." Whether the name lasted I don't know, but it 
is typical of one sort of names, including the Deer, Wolf, 
Bear, etc. 
About three miles up from the foot of LoAver Saranac 
Lake is a great rock, like a boulder. It is called Signal 
Reck, and Avith the bit of land behind it, is knoAvn as 
Bluff Island. The name Signal Rock is older than any 
one in Saranac Lake village, having originated in the 
days Avhen Indians used smoke instead of the telegraph 
to convey information to their felloAvs. Indian Carry 
(near SAveeney's). on the Upper Saranac, leading to the 
Stony Creek ponds, has some significance, historically, as 
it is probable that Sir John Johnson, Avhen he fled from 
the MohaAvk valley in May, 1776, Avent to Canada that 
way, Avhile doubtless small parties of Indians, with their 
canoes, folloAved thewater route from St. Regis to the 
Bisby's on their way to attack the Dutch settlements 
along the Mohawk. ArroAv heads are to be found around 
all the large Adirondack lakes, telling of prehistoric 
sport. 
Some names are of doubtful origin. One of these is 
"Raquette," or "Racket," applied to a riA'er and a lake. 
A guide Avould say that it was the tumbling of the Avaters 
on the rocks of the river, the roar or racket of Avhich 
suggested an appropriate name. But a French Canadian 
may have seen a resemblance to a snow shoe — "Raquette" 
—in the shape of a marsh or flae, Avhile traveling with 
Indians. The Iroquois Indians named it the Ni-ha-na- 
Ava-te, or the Fall-of-Rapids. a circumstance likely to 
be noticed by canoe men. 
The Indians called the present Mt ScAvard "Ou-kor- 
lah. The Great Eye, because from its heights a vast terri- 
tor-- could be seen and the warrior or hunter might ob- 
serve the fire smokes of his friends or foes, and lay his 
plans accordingly. In some cases the Indian names 
have been merely translated into English. White face 
for White head is an example; Flurricane Peak, for Hill 
of the Wind. Lake Chainplain Avas The Door of the 
Country; Schroon Lake, at first unattractive, groAvs to 
Scaroon, and Sca-ni-a-dar-oon, a Large Lake; and, inci- 
dentally, Scaroona, name of the Indian maiden whose 
French lover deserted her. It is interesting to note that 
several of the greatest Adirondack peaks derive their 
names from "five gentlemen," who "were engaged in the 
development of the ifm interest at the Upper Works." 
"Cod-a-cra-ga, the Dismal Wilderness, is just south of 
these; Seward Mountain, not far from the Long Lake 
summer resorts, Avhere there is an Indian ahvays on exhi- 
bition Avithin easy walking distance. The Dismal Wilder- 
ness, was a frightful region in the old days; not much 
visited by even the trappers and Indian hunters, who 
dreaded its dense solitudes, and the fierce creatures to. 
which their experience and imaginations had introduced 
them on its borders. 
Within the borders of the present tree line of the 
mountains there are numerous little clearings grown of 
ferns, or briers, and a sprinkling of second growth around 
the edge, or crowding to the very center. These clear- 
ings have more often than not curious histories. Refu- 
gees of every sort from France and England, as Avell as 
from inhabited portions of America, sought the shadows 
of the tree-groAvn mountains to escape the penalties of 
dissenting from the course of "public opinion." Joseph 
Bonaparte, ex-King of Spain, was honored by having a 
pure Adirondack lake named after him; while a high 
fall on Deer River Avas called the King's because he 
looked at it once. The French exiles that followed or 
preceded this man left many traces on the northwest 
side of the mountains in clearings, names, and the blood 
of the people Avith Avhom they commingled. 
A stronger class than these Frenchmen was the 
Tories after the Avar of the American Revolution. Their 
property in the Mohawk valley, amounting to vast 
estates. Avas confiscated by the Americans, and they were 
exiles from their native haunts, The enmity of their 
old neighbors prevented them fi*om returning, so they 
came as near as they dared to the fertile alluvial flats of 
the valley and settled on the rough, sterile and rocky 
soutliAvest slope of the mountains, heAved out patches of 
land to live on until they could return to the Mohawk 
again AA'ithout being shot. Young's Clearing and the 
old Vaughn place are of this sort. They are on the old 
trail folloAved by Indians and painted Tories, Avhen on 
their Avay to surprise the lower valley settlements, and 
are within tAVO miles of Btttler's Ford, in the West Can- 
ada, Avhere Walter N. Butler, after a wild flight from 
Johnston, Avith Indians and felloAV Tories, Avas shot and 
scalped in October, 1781, by Colonel Marinus Willett's 
men. 
The noted Tory names may still be recognized in many 
a place, commingled, now, Avith the Conklings, Quacken- 
bushes, Fordas, Dygerts, etc., who Avere patriots, and 
eventually chopped their Avay to the borders of the clear- 
ings of their old time enemies. 
The patriot trappers, after the war, Avho found these 
Tory clearings, sometimes had trouble over trap lines, or 
old questions, and odd duels Avere occasionally fought, 
after Avhich the survivor never told his experience; de- 
caying log cabins being the only clue to what had hap- 
pened. The Indians, lioAvever, suffered most, for the 
Tories and the Yankees united to SAA'indle them out of 
their lands, if leaders like Colonel John Butler, father of 
Walter, or if mere trappers like Nat Foster, shot them in 
the back to get their furs and traps, Avhich made hard 
times for the Indians. 
Hunters and trappers led the Avay into the Adiron- 
dack Avilderriess just as they have led the way into the 
Rockies and into the far north. Naturally, they gave 
names to a good many of the prominent features which 
have since become generally knoAvn by them. Their own 
names Avere likely to become attached to the ponds by 
which they made their camps, Avhile their adventures or 
captures suggested fit appellations for localities round 
about. A trapper's life led him from 50 to 100 miles 
through the Avilderness in the old days, usually in a cir- 
cle. Hanging the head of the moose or deer he killed 
for bait on a tree OA'erlooking a lake, Avas apt to give it 
the naroe of Horn Lake or Moosehead Pond. The 
ridge on which he trapped martens Avas likely to be 
called after that pretty though ferocious creature. When 
he came to a pond he had once seen, but had tried to 
find many times in vain, he Avas apt to call it the Lost 
Pond to distinguish it for the benefit of his sons or yOTOg 
partner. 
Curious and various associations are connected with 
the many Adirondack mill brooks and streams. The 
ruins of grist and saAV mills, erected by forgotten men, 
may sometimes be found by hunters tramping along 
streams of considerable size. It is natural to call such 
a stream Mill Brook. At Noblesborough, in Herkimer 
county, is a "Mill Stream," from Avhich the mill has long 
since disappeared, and most people are doubtful whether 
it Avas to grind corn or to saw Avood that it was erected. 
These mills were commonly put up by men Avho had 
failed in more "likely" situations, and AA'ho thought to 
do better "further back." I have never heard that any- 
one of these mills Avas noted as grinding the corn mash 
that makes moonshine whisky. The only home made in- 
toxicating drink that is found among the Adirondack 
Avoods is made from various berries^ — black, rasp, and 
elder berries being oftenest used for that purpose. But 
on every road, trail and other Adirondack thoroughfare 
is a'"AAdiisky spring." Fcav Avoodsmen are so foolish 
as to drink under a pack, lioAvever much they may like 
it. So it happens that Avhen the announcement of a ''good 
drink of Adirondack Avhislcy" is in sight it means simply 
the approach to a white sard, boiling spring. 
Raymond S. Spears. 
NORTHAVOOD, N. Y. 
Pfotability. 
Prom the Sjiringfield Republican. 
If Pegasus, winged horse of which we read. 
Should wing his way to Eartli as once he came 
Should browse in our green pastures, fiery steed! 
He wotild be winged no longer but in name; 
^jSTo fountain now would spring beneath his hoof, 
His wings were more desirable, in truth. 
No longer free to roam, without excuse, 
He would be caught and tethered, put to use, 
Nay, not for racing! — no one cares for that — 
His wings would decorate some woman's hat. 
While envious women, weeping, gathered around 
To ask "Avhere wings like these were to be found?" 
—Helen Hart Woodavorth. 
