proof of the correctness with which they have been handed down, there
were circumstances remembered at each place which had not been preserved
at the other. The Onondagas, as was natural, retained a fuller
recollection of the events which took place before the flight of
Hiawatha to the Caniengas; while the annalists of the latter tribe were
better versed in the subsequent occurrences attending the formation of
the League. These facts should be borne in mind by any inquirer who may
undertake to repeat or continue these investigations. When the
narratives varied, as they sometimes did in minor particulars, I have
followed that which seemed most in accordance with the general tenor of
the history and with the evidence furnished by the Book of Rites.]

At this time two great dangers, the one from without, the other from
within, pressed upon these tribes. The Mohegans, or Mohicans, a powerful
Algonkin people, whose settlements stretched along the Hudson river,
south of the Mohawk, and extended thence eastward into New England,
waged a desperate war against them. In this war the most easterly of the
Iroquois, the Caniengas and Oneidas, bore the brunt and were the
greatest sufferers. On the other hand, the two western nations, the
Senecas and Cayugas, had a peril of their own to encounter. The central
nation, the Onondagas, were then under the control of a dreaded chief,
whose name is variously given, Atotarho (or, with a prefixed particle,
Thatotarho), Watatotahro, Tadodaho, according to the dialect of the
speaker and the orthography of the writer. He was a man of great force
of character and of formidable qualities--haughty, ambitious, crafty and
bold--a determined and successful warrior, and at home, so far as the
constitution of an Indian tribe would allow, a stern and remorseless
tyrant. He tolerated no equal. The chiefs who ventured to oppose him
were taken off one after another by secret means, or were compelled to
flee for safety to other tribes. His subtlety and artifices had acquired