criminal also held a council, and endeavored to effect an adjustment
or condonation of the crime with the gens of the murdered person;
but it often happened that the gens of the criminal called upon the
other gentes of their phratry, when the slayer and the slain
belonged to opposite phratries, to unite with them to obtain a
condonation of the crime. In such a case the phratry held a council,
and then addressed itself to the other phratry, to which it sent a
delegation with a belt of white wampum asking for a council of the
phratry and for an adjustment of the crime. They offered reparation
to the family and gens of the murdered person in expressions of
regret and in presents of value. Negotiations were continued between
the two councils until an affirmative or a negative conclusion was
reached. The influence of a phratry composed of several gentes would
be greater than that of a single gens; and by calling into action
the opposite phratry the probability of a condonation would be
increased, especially if there were extenuating circumstances. We
may thus see how naturally the Grecian phratry, prior to civilization,
assumed the principal though not exclusive management of cases of
murder, and also of the purification of the murderer if he escaped
punishment, and after the institution of political society with what
propriety the phratry assumed the duty of prosecuting the murderer
in the courts of justice.

At the funerals of persons of recognized importance in the tribe the
phratric organization manifested itself in a conspicuous manner The
phrators of the decedent in a body were the mourners, and the
members of the opposite phratry conducted the ceremonies. At the
funeral of Handsome Lake (Ga-ne-o-di'-yo), one of the eight Seneca
sachems (which occurred some years ago), there was an assemblage of
sachems and chiefs to the number of twenty-seven, and a large