Ojibwa

“ Among the Ojibwa of northern Minnesota the cross is one of the sacred symbols of the society of the Midē or shamans, and has special reference to the fourth degree. A neophyte who has been advanced to the third initiation or degree, is instructed in ritualistic chants purporting to relate the struggle between Mi'nabō'zho, the mediator between the Ojibwa and Ki'tshi Ma'nidō, and the malevolent Bear spirit, which contest occurred when Mi'nabō'zho entered the fourth degree structure at the time when the first Indian was inducted therein for initiation. ”

“ It will be understood that in all instances presented scrupulous care has been taken to eliminate European influence and to obtain assurance of the aboriginal and ancient origin of the legends.
An Ojibwa tradition tells the adventures of eight, ten, and sometimes twelve brothers, the youngest of whom is the wisest and the most beloved of their father and especially favored by the high powers. He delivers his brothers from many difficulties which were brought about by their folly and disobedience. ”

“ The Ojibwa shook his head. “No need to prove it,” he said. “Awishtoya came this way. Always there are evil deeds where he goes.”
From the ashes of the fire and the condition of the sand, the Indian thought the deed a recent one, committed not longer ago than the night before, perhaps that very day. The three righted the canoe, but found nothing about it to show its owner. Though they searched the shores of the cove, they did not discover the body of the murdered man, if he had been murdered, or any further traces of him or of the man or men who had attacked him. ”

“ The Ojibwa is one of the largest tribes of the United States, and it is scattered over a considerable area, from the Province of Ontario, on the east, to the Red River of the North, on the west, and from Manitoba southward through the States of Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Michigan. This tribe is, strictly speaking, a timber people, and in its westward migration or dispersion has never passed beyond the limit of the timber growth which so remarkably divides the State of Minnesota into two parts possessing distinct physical features. ”

“ The sole saving grace is the natural cheerfulness and optimism of the Ojibwa people, as a whole. Many of them are discouraged, and most of them will not farm or work, for the reason that the farming and working in the past resulted in those who were industrious being disciplined, (see page 68) and those who were indolent being rewarded. No white man or woman would work under similar circumstances. ”

“ XVII, A, B, C, and D, were obtained from Ojibwa shamans at White Earth, Minnesota, by Dr. Hoffman, and pertain to the ceremony of initiating new members into the Midē' wiwin or Grand Medicine Society. The language, now omitted, differs to some extent from that now spoken. The songs and ritual are transmitted from generation to generation, and although an Indian who now receives admission into the society may compose his own songs for use in connection with his profession, he will not adopt the modern Ojibwa words, but employs the archaic whenever practicable. ”

“ No prescribed system of characters is used at the present time by the Ojibwa, in the indication of direction or travel. When anyone leaves camp or home for any particular hunting or berry ground, a concerted arrangement is made by which only those interested can, with any certainty, recognize “blaze” or trail marks. ”

“ The Ojibwa nation, like other Indian races, is divided into a number of clans or families, each supposed to be descended from and under the protection of some mythical, magical beast or bird. Nangotook belonged to the Amik or Beaver Clan, and his totem, his protecting spirit, was the Great Beaver. The figure on the rock was very old, he said. ”

“ An individual of any one of the several Totems belonging to a distinct tribe, as for instance, the Ojibway, is a close blood relation to all other Indians of the same Totem, both in his own and all other tribes, though he may be divided from them by a long vista of years, interminable miles, and knows not even of their existence. ”

“ The Ojibwa attributed nearly all pictographs to the Iroquois. On Lady Evelyn lake are a number of such figures, showing animals and men in canoes.
(28) An Iroquois Legend.
At that time there were people living, four in number: a woman, a young baby who could hardly walk, and two sons who were grown-up men. Their father had died and the family lived together in a wigwam. It was winter and the sons had two rabbit snares’ trails, one to the east and the other to the north, and they went to different lines on different days. ”

“ The name of Ki ́tshi Man ́idō is never mentioned but with reverence, and thus only in connection with the rite of Midē ́wiwin, or a sacred feast, and always after making an offering of tobacco.
The first important event in the life of an Ojibwa youth is his first fast. For this purpose he will leave his home for some secluded spot in the forest where he will continue to fast for an indefinite number of days; when reduced by abstinence from food he enters a hysterical or ecstatic state in which he may have visions and hallucinations. ”

“ Every crevice in the cliffs where the battle had been fought, contained a dead or wounded enemy. The Ojibways suffered a severe loss in the death of a large number of their bravest warriors. The brother of Waub-o-jeeg was numbered among the dead, and the war-chief himself carried on his person the marks of the sanguinary fight, in a wound on his breast. But a few of the Odugamies escaped, and from this time they forever gave up the contest with the victorious Ojibways. ”

“ Everything, therefore, favored the scheme which the Ojibway chieftain had laid to ensnare his confident enemies. On the eve of the great English king's birthday, he informed the British commandant that as the morrow was to be a day of rejoicing, his young men would play the game of ball, or Baug-ah-ud-o-way, for the amusement of the whites, in front of the gate of the fort. In this game the young men of the Osaugee tribe would play against the Ojibways for a large stake. ”

“ The Ojibways, anxious for a fight, made a stand, and a fierce fight ensued in the darkness, the combatants aiming at the flashes of their enemies' musketry. The bravest warriors gradually approached to within a few feet of one another, in the midst of the darkness, when a Dakota chief was heard to give orders to his people in a loud voice, to divide into two parties, and making circuits to the right and left, surround the enemy and cut off their retreat. ”

“ From this period the Ojibways are traditionally well possessed of the most important events which have happened to them as a tribe, and from nine generations back, I am prepared to give, as obtained from their most veracious, reliable, and oldest men, their history, which may be considered as authentic. ”

“ The affair created great excitement, and on the 31st of August, John Holiday, [20] a trader, came to Sault Ste. Marie bearing a small coffin painted black containing the scalp of the American killed at Lake Pepin, which had been sent down by the Ojibway chief at Keweenaw. Schoolcraft, then Indian agent, forwarded it to the Governor of Michigan, who was Superintendent of Indian Affairs in the Northwest, and on the 22d of June, 1825, the murderers were delivered up. ”

“ Marie, accompanied by the trader Alexander Henry, and by way of Lake Simcoe and Toronto, reached Niagara and attended the grand council. On the 6th of August, Henry and his Ojibway companions, accompanied General Bradstreet's army on the way to Detroit. At this point Bradstreet, on the 7th of September, made a treaty with the Ojibways and some other tribes. The principal speaker of the Indians was Wasson, an Ojibway chief, who said to Bradstreet, "My brother, last year God forsook us. God has now opened our eyes, and we desire to be heard. It is God's will, our hearts are altered. ”

“ It is only from such religious and genuine traditions that the fact is to be ascertained. The common class of the tribe who are spread in numerous villages north and west of Lake Superior, when asked where they originally came from, make answer that they originated from Mo-ning-wuna-kaun-ing (La Pointe) , and the phrase is often used in their speeches to the whites, that "Mo-ning-wuna-kaun-ing" is the spot on which the Ojibway tribe first grew, and like a tree it has spread its branches in every direction, in the bands that now occupy the vast extent of the Ojibway earth ”

“ The French early gained the utmost confidence of the Ojibways, and thereby they became more thoroughly acquainted with their true and real character, even during the comparative short season in which they mingled with them as a nation, than the British and Americans are at this present day, after over a century of intercourse. The French understood their division into clans, and treated each clan according to the order of its ascendency in the tribe. ”

“ Is it not probable from these beliefs that ages ago the Ojibways resided westward, and occupied a country "flowing in milk and honey"—a country abounding in all that tends to their enjoyment and happiness, and to which they look back as the tired traveller on a burning desert looks back to a beautiful oasis which he has once passed, or as the lonely wanderer looks back to the once happy home of his childhood? ”

“ On the 15th of September, 1801, Henry arrived at his post on Pembina River near its junction with the Red River, from his annual trip to the Grand Portage of Lake Superior, and here he found sixty Saulteaux camped, anxiously waiting to taste some new milk, as rum was called, and the next month the chief Le Sucre, and ten other Ojibways from Leech Lake arrived. In January, 1804, Cameron, Cotton, Hesse, and Stitt were trading with the Red Lake Ojibways. ”

“ For the space of three generations, or one hundred and twenty years, the Ojibways remained congregated on the island of La Pointe, in one extensive town.
At the end of this period, we come to a dark chapter of their history, on which the old men dislike to linger. ”

“ Among these may be mentioned the Ojibway, who are at the present day, the most numerous and important tribe of the formerly wide extended Algic family of tribes. They occupy the area of Lake Superior and the sources of the Mississippi, and as a general fact, they still live in the ways of their ancestors. Even among these, a change is so rapidly taking place, caused by a close contact with the white race, that ten years hence it will be too late to save the traditions of their forefathers from total oblivion. ”

“ Over a hundred on each side of the Ojibways and Osaugees, all chosen men, now sallied forth from their wigwams, painted and ornamented for the occasion, and proceeding to the open green which lay in front of the fort, they made up the stakes for which they were apparently about to play, and planted the posts towards which each party was to strive to take the ball. ”

“ Prior to this event, the dignity and influence of the Cranes had been upheld by Keesh-ke-mun (Sharpened Stone) , the son of Sha-da-nish, the first Ojibway pioneer towards the Wisconsin. He is first mentioned by the old men and traders of the tribe, as having attained a prominent position as chief, between forty and fifty years ago. He made it his home, or permanent village, at Lac du Flambeau, and from this point he ruled over that division of his tribe, who occupied the midland country, between Lake Superior, southwest to the Mississippi. ”

“ Marie—They separate into two divisions—Movements of the northern division—Traditional anecdote of the war between the Marten and the Omush-kas families—Movements of the southern division—Allegory of the cranes—Copper-plate register of the Crane family—Era of their first occupation of Point Shaug-a-waum-ik-ong—Tradition of the extermination of the Mundua tribe.
The history of the Ojibway tribe, till within the past five centuries, lies buried in darkness and almost utter oblivion. ”

“ Their warfare with the Odugamies has been of such long standing and so sanguinary, that the Ojibways may naturally consider them as much a distinct race from themselves, as the Dakotas or Winnebagoes, the last of whom, in time of peace, they are accustomed to denominate as "younger brothers," which circumstance, however, should not mislead us into the belief that they consider them as being really a kindred tribe in any closer degree than their being respective families of the red race in general. ”

“ The Ojibways form one of the principal branches of the Algic stock, and they are a well-marked type, and at present the most numerous section or tribe of this grand division of the aboriginal inhabitants of North America. ”

“ While still living in their large and central town on the Island of La Pointe, a principal and leading Me-da-we priest, whose name was Ma-se-wa-pe-ga (whole ribs) , dreamed a dream wherein he beheld spirits in the form of men, but possessing white skins and having their heads covered. They approached him with hands extended and with smiles on their faces. This singular dream he related to the principal men of the Ojibways on the occasion of a grand sacrificial feast to his guardian dream-spirit. ”

“ They have ever borne the reputation of being the bravest and most warlike division of the Ojibways, from the fact of their ever having formed the vanguard of the tribe, and occupied the most dangerous ground in their westward advance and conquests. ”

“ The Ojibway chieftain meanwhile looking steadfastly at the trader, made various inquiries of his head boatman, a Canadian. He then coolly observed that "the English were brave men and not afraid of death, since they dared to come thus fearlessly among their enemies."
When the Indians had finished smoking their pipes, the chief took a few wampum strings in his hand and commenced the following harangue:—
"Englishman! It is to you that I speak, and I demand your attention!
"Englishman! You know that the French king is our father. He promised to be such ”