Fortunately,âpé there were few of these beasts. The last one known was to the east, somewhere beyond the left bank of the Mahicanni Sipu (the Hudson river). When its presence was learned a number of bold hunters went there, and mounted a rock with precipitous sides. They then made a noise, and attracted the bear's attention, who rushed to the attack with great fury. As he could not climb the rock, he tore at it with his teeth, while the hunters above shot him with arrows and threw upon him great stones, and thus killed him.
Though this was the last of the species, the Indian mothers still used his name to frighten their children into obedience, threatening them with the words, "The Naked Bear will eat you."
[222] D. G. Brinton, _Myths of the New World_, Chap. VI. (N.Y., 1876), and _American Hero Myths_, Chap. II (Phila., 1882). The seeming incongruity of applying such terms as Trickster, Cheat and Liar to the highest divinity I have explained in a paper in the _American Antiquarian_ for the current year (1885) and will recur to later.
[223] Thomas Campanius, _Account of New Sweden_, Book III, cap. xi.
[224] _Traditions and Language of the Indians_, in _Bulletin Hist. Soc. Pa._, Vol. I, pp. 30-31.
[225] _Journal of a Voyage to New York in 1679-80_. By Jasper Donkers and Peter Sluyter, p. 268. Translation in Vol. I of the _Transactions of the Long Island Historical Society_ (Brooklyn, 1867).
[226] Schoolcraft says of the Chipeway pictographic symbols: "The turtle is believed to be, in all instances, a symbol of the earth, and is addressed as mother." _History and Statistics of the Indian Tribes_, Vol. I, p. 390.
[227] Zeisberger, MSS, in E. de Schweinitz, _Life and Times of Zeisberger_, pp. 218, 219; Heckewelder, _Indian Nations_, p. 253.
[228] "The Indians call the American continent an island, believing it to be entirely surrounded by water." Heckewelder, _Hist. Indian Nations_, p. 250.
[230] Heckewelder, MSS in the Library of the American Philosophical Society. It is one of the points in favor of the authenticity of the WALAM OLUM that this halcyon epoch is mentioned in its lines, though no reference to it is contained in printed books relating to the Lenape legends.
[231] Van der Donck, _Description of the New Netherlands_, _Coll. N. Y. Hist. Soc._, Ser. II, Vol. I, pp. 217-18.