light".[1] Thus, originally, the Red Men adored "The Spirit of
Light, maker of the heavens and the world". Strachey claims no
more than this for Ahone. Now, of course, Dr. Brinton may be
right. But I have already expressed my extreme distrust of the
philological processes by which he extracts "The Great Light;
spirit of light," from Michabo, "beyond a doubt!" In my poor
opinion, whatever claims Michabo may have as an unique creator of
earth and heaven--"God is Light,"--he owes his mythical aspect as a
Hare to something other than an unconscious pun. In any case,
according to Dr. Brinton, Michabo, regarded as a creator, is
equivalent to Strachey's Ahone. This amount of corroboration,
valeat quantum, I may claim, from the Potomac Indians, for the
belief in Ahone on the James River. Dr. Brinton is notoriously not
a believer in American "monotheism".[2]


[1] Myths of the New World, p. 178.

[2] Myths of the New World, p. 53.


The opponents of the authenticity of Ahone, however, will certainly
argue: "For Oke, or Oki, as a redoubted being or spirit, or general
name for such personages, we have plentiful evidence, corroborating
that of Smith. But what evidence as to Ahone corroborates that of
Strachey?" I must confess that I have no explicit corroborative
evidence for Ahone, but then I have no accessible library of early
books on Virginia. Now it is clear that if I found and produced
evidence for Ahone as late as 1625, I would be met at once with the
retort that, between 1610 and 1625, Christian ideas had contaminated