uctifying seeds of grace among the natives in
1607-1608. But the missionary efforts of French traders may, of course,
have been blessed; nor can I deny that a yellow-haired man, whose corpse
was found in 1620 with some objects of iron, may have converted the
natives to such beliefs as they possessed. We are told, however, that
these tenets were of ancestral antiquity. I cite E. Winslow, as edited
by Smith (1623-24):--

"Those where in this Plantation (New Plymouth) say Kiehtan(1) made all
the other Gods: also one man and one woman, and with them all mankinde,
but how they became so dispersed they know not. They say that at first
there was no king but Kiehtan, that dwelleth far westerly above the
heavens, whither all good men go when they die, and have plentie of all
things. The bad go thither also and knock at the door, but ('the door is
shut') he bids them go wander in endless want and misery, for they shall
not stay there. They never saw Kiehtan,(2) but they hold it a great
charge and dutie that one race teach another; and to him they make
feasts and cry and sing for plenty and victory, or anything that is
good.

(1) In 1873 Mr. Tylor regarded Dr. Brinton's etymology of Kiehtan as =
Kittanitowit = "Great Living Spirit," as "plausible". In his edition
of 1891 he omits this etymology. Personally I entirely distrust the
philological theories of the original sense of old divine names as a
general rule.

(2) "They never saw Kiehtan." So, about 1854, "The common answer
of intelligent black fellows on the Barwon when asked if they know
Baiame... is this: 'Kamil zaia zummi Baiame, zaia winuzgulda'; 'I have
not seen Baiame, I have heard or perceived him'. If asked who made
the sky, the earth, the animals and man, they always answer 'Baiame'."
Daramulun, according to the same authority in Lang's Queensland, was
the familiar of sorcerers, and appeared as a serpent. This answers, as I
show, to Hobamock the subordinate power to Kiehtan in New England and to
Okee, the familiar of sorcerers in Virginia. (Ridley, J. A. I., 1872, p.
277.)

"They have another Power they call Hobamock, which we conceive the
Devill, and upon him they call to cure their wounds and diseases; when
they are curable he persuades them he sent them, because they have
displeased him; but, if they be mortal, then he saith, 'Kiehtan sent
them'; which makes them never call on him in their sickness. They say
this Hobamock appears to them sometimes like a ma