the valley, or lands both sides of the river. In one early deed
(1636), I find the name written _Quinetucquet_; in another, of the
same year, _Quenticutt_. Roger Williams (1643) has _Qunnihticut_, and
calls the Indians of this region _Quintik-óock_, i.e. 'the long river
people.' The _c_ in the second syllable of the modern name has no
business there, and it is difficult to find a reason for its
intrusion.

'_Lenapewihittuck_' was the Delaware name of 'the river of the
Lenape,' and '_Mohicannittuck_,' of 'the river of the Mohicans'
(Hudson River).[8]

[Footnote 8: Heckewelder's Historical account, &c., p. 33. He was
mistaken in translating "the word _hittuck_," by "a rapid stream."]

Of _Pawtucket_ and _Pawtuxet_, the composition is less obvious; but we
have reliable Indian testimony that these names mean, respectively,
'at the falls' and 'at the little falls.' Pequot and Narragansett
interpreters, in 1679, declared that Blackstone's River, was "called
in Indian _Pautuck_ (which signifies, a Fall), because there the fresh
water falls into the salt water."[9] So, the upper falls of the
Quinebaug river (at Danielsonville, Conn.) were called "_Powntuck_,
which is a general name for all Falls," as Indians of that region
testified.[10] There was another Pautucket, 'at the falls' of the
Merrimac (now Lowell); and another on Westfield River, Mass.
_Pawtuxet_, i.e. _pau't-tuk-es-it_, is the regularly formed diminutive
of _paut-tuk-it_. The village of Pawtuxet, four miles south of
Providence, R.I., is "at the little falls" of the river to which their
name has been transferred. The first settlers of Plymouth were
informed by Samoset, that the place which they had chosen for their