difficulties of analysis have been increased by phonetic corruption,
sometimes to such a degree as hardly to leave a trace of the original.
Another and not less striking example is presented by _Snipsic_, the
modern name of a pond between Ellington and Tolland. If we had not
access to Chandler's Survey of the Mohegan Country, made in 1705, who
would suppose that 'Snipsic' was the surviving representative of
_Moshenupsuck_, 'great-pond brook' or (literally) 'great-pond outlet,'
at the south end of _Moshenups_ or _Mashenips_ 'great pond?' The
territories of three nations, the Muhhekans, Nipmucks and River
Indians, ran together at this point.

'_Nameroake_,' '_Namareck_' or '_Namelake_,' in East Windsor, was
transformed to _May-luck_, giving to a brook a name which 'tradition'
derives from the 'luck' of a party of emigrants who came in 'May' to
the Connecticut.[80] The original name appears to have been the
equivalent of 'Nameaug' or 'Nameoke' (New London), and to mean 'the
fishing place,'--_n'amaug_ or _nama-ohke_.

[Footnote 80: Stiles's History of Ancient Windsor, p. 111.]

But none of these names exhibits a more curious transformation than
that of '_Bagadoose_' or '_Bigaduce_,' a peninsula on the east side of
Penobscot Bay, now Castine, Me. Williamson's History of Maine (ii.
572) states on the authority of Col. J. Wardwell of Penobscot, in
1820, that this point bore the name of a former resident, a Frenchman,
one 'Major Biguyduce.' Afterwards, the historian was informed that
'_Marche bagyduce_' was an Indian word meaning 'no good cove.' Mr.
Joseph Williamson, in a paper in the Maine Historical Society's
Collections (vol. vi. p. 107) identifies this name with the
_Matchebiguatus_ of Edward Winslow's quitclaim to Massachusetts in