and tribal organization, it may be well briefly to observe the position
and prominent distinctive features of the various communities speaking
dialects of the generic tongue of the Iroquois. In this remarkable
family of tribes occur the fullest developments of Indian character,
and the most conspicuous examples of Indian intelligence. If the higher
traits popularly ascribed to the race are not to be found here, they are
to be found nowhere. A palpable proof of the superiority of this stock
is afforded in the size of the Iroquois and Huron brains. In average
internal capacity of the cranium, they surpass, with few and doubtful
exceptions, all other aborigines of North and South America, not
excepting the civilized races of Mexico and Peru.

[ "On comparing five Iroquois heads, I find that they give an average
internal capacity of eighty-eight cubic inches, which is within two
inches of the Caucasian mean."--Morton, Crania Americana, 195.--It is
remarkable that the internal capacity of the skulls of the barbarous
American tribes is greater than that of either the Mexicans or the
Peruvians. "The difference in volume is chiefly confined to the
occipital and basal portions,"--in other words, to the region of the
animal propensities; and hence, it is argued, the ferocious, brutal,
and uncivilizable character of the wild tribes.--See J. S. Phillips,
Admeasurements of Crania of the Principal Groups of Indians in the United
States. ]

In the woody valleys of the Blue Mountains, south of the Nottawassaga Bay
of Lake Huron, and two days' journey west of the frontier Huron towns,
lay the nine villages of the Tobacco Nation, or Tionnontates.
[ Synonymes: Tionnontates, Etionontates, Tuinontatek, Dionondadies,
Khionontaterrhonons, Petuneux or Nation du Petun (Tobacco). ] In manners,
as in language, they closely resembled the Hurons. Of old they were