Traditions of the North American Indians, Vol. 1

ions entitled "Legends of the Happy Hunting-Grounds," (commencing at p. 225 of volume first) being in my estimation by far the most interesting and valuable in the volume, deserve a more elaborate commentary with a view to the authenticating them. They are all of them genuine, but there is but one of them that belongs, as has been supposed in the tradition, exclusively to the tribe of whom it is related. Thus "Akkeewaisee, the Aged," which is supposed to describe the heaven of the people called the Dahcotahs, describes also that of many other tribes. Keating assigns the belief to the Dahcotahs. (See his Narrative of an Expedition to the Source of St. Petre's river. London, 1825, Vol. 1., p. 410).

The second tradition in the series, "The Delaware Heaven," I believe is peculiar to the tribes which compose that nation, and rests upon the authority of Loskiel. (History of the Missions of the United Brethren. Lond. 1794, p. 35). He was a Moravian missionary, and has been esteemed an accurate and faithful re