thus revised, was published by the
Historical Society of Pennsylvania as the first number of its "Student
Series." Various interesting items illustrating the beliefs and customs
of the Delawares of the present day, communicated to me by Mr. Anthony,
I collected into the article (18), "Lenape Conversations."
A few years previous I had succeeded in obtaining the singular MS.
referred to by C. S. Rafinesque, in 1836, as the "Painted Record" of the
Delaware Indians, the _Walum Olum,_ properly, "painted" or "red"
"score." This I reproduced in No. 17, with the accessories mentioned
above (p. 9). There is no doubt of the general authenticity of this
record. A corroboration of it was sent me in March of this year (1898)
by Dr. A. S. Gatschet, of the U. S. Bureau of American Ethnology. He
writes:
"When the Delaware delegate, Johnnycake, was here for the last time, he
told Mr. J. B. N. Hewitt (also attached to the Bureau) that some of the
Lenape Indians, near Nowata, Cherokee Nation, had seen your publication
on the _Walum Olum_. They belong to the oldest men of that tribe, and
stated that the text was all right, and that they remembered the songs
from their youth. They could give many additions, and said that a few
passages were in the wrong order and had to be placed elsewhere to give
them the full meaning they were intended to convey."
This was cheering confirmation to me that my labor had not been expended
on a fantastic composition of Rafinesque's, as some have been inclined
to think.
Some years ago I contemplated the publication of a work through the
American Folklore Society on Algonquian Mythology. Various reasons led
me to lay it aside. Part of the material was introduced into my works on
the general mythology of the American tribes,[12-1] and one fragment
appeared in (20) in which I offered a psychological explanation of the
character of the hero god Gluscap, so prominent in the legends of the
Micmacs and Abenakis. At that time I was not acquainted with the
ingenious suggestions on the etymology of the name subsequently
advocated by the native author, Joseph Nicolar.[12-2]
The Nanticokes lived on the eastern shore of Chesapeake Bay. In
collecting their vocabularies I found one alleged to have been obtained
from them, but differing completely from the Algonquian dialects. It had
been partly printed by Dr. Benjamin Smith Barton,[12-3] but remained a
puzzle. My article (21) proves that it belongs to the Mandingo
|