All Around the Bay of Passamaquoddy

by Albert Samuel Gatschet

ALL AROUND

 

THE BAY OF PASSAMAQUODDY

 

WITH THE INTERPRETATION OF ITS INDIAN NAMES OF LOCALITIES

 

by

ALBERT S. GATSCHET

 

[Reprinted from The National Geographic Magazine, Vol. VIII, No. 1, January, 1897]

 

Washington, D. C.
Judd & Detweiler, Printers
1897

ALL AROUND THE BAY OF PASSAMAQUODDY

 

By Albert S. Gatschet,
Bureau of American Ethnology

 

Travelers coming from the south will find in the deeply indented coast lands of the state of Maine a type of landscape differing considerably from others previously noticed. Through the fiord-like character of Maine's tidewater section the water element every where blends in with terra firma, which alternately projects and recedes, and by the well-marked color contrast between the blue ocean and the green or somber-hued earth strikes our sight agreeably. The level shore lands of the southern Atlantic states are here replaced by hills, headlands, and capes of bolder outlines, partly clothed in the fainter green of northern vegetation, while other elevations exhibit the rocky, ocean-beaten foundation upon which they are built. The dark-hued pine and fir trees, which in other countries live in the mountains only, here descend to the sea-coast, enlivening the tops and sides of the numerous islands which lie scattered along the coast. The further we proceed northeastward along the coast, the more the scenery assumes a northern character. This is well evidenced by the spare vegetation and the thinness of the humus which we notice everywhere in and around Passamaquoddy bay, an extensive basin, the waters of which are fed by the majestic St Croix river from the north and by the St George or Megigadevic river from the east. The mainland encompasses this bay on all sides, fringing it with rock-bound promontories and some flat sand spits; only on the southeast side does it open toward the Atlantic ocean, and there a row of islands forms its limit and affords numerous passages suitable for navigation.

The elevations encircling the bay of Passamaquoddy, though bolder than those we see further south, are mostly flat-topped and of tame outlines. They are nearing an incline of 20 to 30 degrees, and therefore the local erosion through the impact of rain is not very considerable. None of the hills or islands in the bay rise above sea level more than about 300 feet. A feature that may be pertinently called the headland shore is prominent here.

Whenever a portion of the mainland or of one of the larger islands in this region advances toward the salt water it first sinks down, forming a depression, and then rises as a knoll or rounded hillock or hill before it plunges its rocky face abruptly into the ocean. These formations, appropriately termed heads or headlands, are frequent all around Passamaquoddy bay, Campobello island, Cobscook bay, and in many other sections of the Maine and New Brunswick coasts. Beaches filled with course gravel, the detritus of the rocky shores, form the transitory stage between the headlands and the more level promontories or points. Not infrequently one headland succeeds another in a line before reaching the water, and even after reaching the shore they reap-pear, jutting out from the briny element, two or three in succession, and lying in one continuous file. This I have observed, e. g., on the north shore of Cobscook bay, west of Eastport, Maine. Campobello island, New Brunswick, is replete with "heads" on its far-extending shores, the island being eleven miles long from north to south; thus we have Bald head, Wilson head, East Quoddy head, Friar's head, Hend harbor—whereas the term "point," less frequent there, appears in more numerous instances on the west side of the bay and up the St Croix river.

Two large whirlpools, perceptible in the channel of the St Croix river, are objects of great curiosity to the strangers visiting these parts. One of them occurs between Moose island and the southern end of Deer island, New Brunswick; the other, of minor proportions, lies two miles above the river being over one mile wide at each place. They are carefully avoided by people passing, either in a white man's boat or in the Indians' canoe, for, like Charybdis of old, they are liable to capsize any small craft that ventures to come too near. They owe their existence not exclusively to the shock produced by the impact of the currents from the bay meeting those of the river, but also to the incoming tides and to a difference of temperature between the two bodies of water.

The air temperature is generally low on the bay and around it. Winter begins in October, and even at midsummer persons who are not provided with warm clothing will often feel a chill pervading their system when a sudden breeze breaks in from the north or a thick fog stays till noontime over the ever-moving waters. The weather is generally serene throughout the year, but nevertheless morning fogs are of frequent occurrence.

The Canadian Pacific is the only railroad company that brings visitors to the hospitable shores of Passamaquoddy bay, but there are numerous steamboats plying between St Andrews, St Stephen, Calais, and Eastport and the neighboring cities of St Johns, Bar Harbor, and Portland. Whether the tourist visits these parts for sightseeing or for restoring impaired health by the aid of their bracing sea-breezes, he is sure to take a peculiar interest in the native Indians, whom he sees peddling their neat baskets and toys along the streets, on steamboats, and on hotel verandas. But little attention is needed to scan the Indian among a crowd of people by his dusky complexion and a sort of nonchalance in his deportment. His appearance and habits show him to be a living and moving survival from prehistoric times.

The Passamaquoddy Indians of Maine constitute a portion of the northeastern or Abnáki group of the widespread Algonkinian stock, of which the ancient domain extended over a large area of the United States and Canada. The Abnáki Indians now surviving are divided into five sections, among which (1) the Penobscots in Oldtown are the nearest affinity in language and race to the (2) St Francis Indians of Canada; (3) the Passamaquoddies, whose nearest kinsmen are (4) the Milicites, or Etchemins (this is their Micmac name), scattered along the St Johns river, New Brunswick; (5) the Micmacs, settled in Nova Scotia and on the east coast of New Brunswick.

The present Passamaquoddies are about five hundred in number, and a large intermixture with white blood has taken place, which according to a safe estimate may amount to one-third of the tribe. In about the same proportion they have also preserved their Indian vernacular, which among its European loan words counts more of English than of French origin. Many of these natives exhibit unmistakably the full physical marks of Indian descent—the long, straight, and dark hair, the strong nasal bone, and a rather dark complexion. The check-bones are not very prominent. The majority of the tribe are slim-built and of a medium stature. They are not increasing, and their Indian congeners on the Penobscot river are positively on the decrease.

No central chief rules over these Indians now, but each of their three settlements in Maine has a sagum or elective governor. These settlements all lie on watercourses or on the seashore. The one nearest to Eastport is at Pleasant point, near the town of Perry; another is in a suburb of Calais, and a third one formerly lived upon Lewis island, but transferred its seats to the neighboring Peter Dana's point, near Princeton, on the Kennebassis river, about 42 miles north of Eastport. Fishing is one of their chief industries, but in this they now follow entirely the example set by the white man; they care nothing for agriculture, and their village at Pleasant point is built upon the rockiest and most unproductive ground that could have been selected. The same may be said of some other Indian settlements, for many Indians do not require any better soil to rest their houses upon.

The industries now forming their main support are the manufacture of toy boats from birch bark, of fishing canoes from the same material, of fans from ash-wood, and, chiefly, of ornamental and fancy baskets from the wood of the yellow ash. The baskets are made by the women, and during the summer season the men sell them in the markets, especially at the watering places and in the commercial centers of the eastern states, The women display a high degree of taste in selecting their models for these tiny, elegant, and delicate art-products. The ash-wood is split into splints or blades of extreme thinness by machinery, seldom wider than an inch, then dyed in all possible, but always bright, colors. After this the splints are interlaced so as to form baskets of the most varied shapes. During the work of interlacing, blades of sweet-scented grass are inserted in the baskets, and thus "finished" they are sent to the stores with a fragrant odor, which clings to them for months and increases their salability.

The present area of the Passamaquoddy dialect is confined within a small district in Washington county, in southeastern Maine, and limited to the three settlements already mentioned. We may, however, add to it the area of the Milicite or "Broken language" dialect, which is heard in five or six Indian villages on the St Johns or Ulastuk river, in New Brunswick, and differs but little from Passamaquoddy. In former centuries these two dialectic areas were much more extensive, the proof of this resting in the spread of geographic names worded in Passamaquoddy over the whole of Washington and Hancock counties, a part of Aroostook county, Maine, and over the western part of the New Brunswick territory. Just as large as this historic area was that of the Penobscot dialect, for, as the local names still demonstrate, it embraced the whole Penobscot river basin, with the valleys of its numerous tributaries.

Inquiry into the signification of historic and actual geographic names of Indian origin has of late become popular among the educated classes of Americans. It is just twelve years since Charles Godfrey Leland encouraged those who might be able to accomplish the task to solve the riddles contained in the names of that country, most of which have a sound so musical and harmonious.^[1] Long acquainted with the great historic value of topographic names, Leland's suggestion induced me, while studying the dialect, to listen to the opinions of capable Indians when I requested them to interpret a series of these names. Many interpretations thus obtained were so crude and ungrammatic that they could not be sustained for a moment; but the majority of those resting on a correct linguistic basis disclosed the fact that they are mostly compound nouns and combinations either of two substantives or of an adjective and a substantive, with the substantive standing last. In the first case, the noun standing first is sometimes connected with the noun standing second by the case-suffix i, as in Edu′ki m'ni′ku, Deer island, from ĕdúk, deer. The local names around the bay mostly refer to the watery element, for the terms beach, sand-bar, cliff, rocky shore, island, headland, point, bay and cove, current and confluence make up almost the whole terminology of the region. The frequent ending –k (–ăk, –ĭk, –ŏk, –ûk) sometimes marks the plural of a noun considered as animate, but more frequently it is the locative case-ending observed in all Algonkinian dialects under various forms. This case-suffix corresponds minutely to our prepositions at, in, on, upon, at the place or spot of. It also obtains in the Penobscot and Milicite dialects; but in the southwest corner of Maine occur a number of geographic names in –et, –it, –ot, which approximates the dialect in which they originate to that of Massachusetts and of Eliot's Bible. So we meet there with names like Abadasset, Harriseekit, Manset, Millinoket, Ogunquit, Pejepscot (Sheepscot), Webhannet, and Wisensset. The name Penobscot cannot be adduced here, for its original form in that dialect is Panawámpskek, "where the conical rocks are."

The Indian names of elevations, rivers, and localities are in this article spelt in a scientific alphabet in which the vowels possess the value of and are pronounced as they are in the languages of the European continent.^[2] To readers it will soon appear how inconsistently the Indian names were rendered by the American and British natives in their pronunciation and how often parts of them were dropped entirely. These Indian names are generally easy to pronounce for Americans; still, Algonkinian dialects have a tendency to drop vowels when standing between consonants at the beginning of words. This causes a peculiar difficulty of utterance, and makes some of them unpronounceable to a majority of English-speaking people.

1. The Century Magazine, New York, 1884, vol. 28, pp. 668–677, in Leland's article: "Legends of the Passamaqnoddies."
2. g is always hard and ĕ has the sound of e in bucket.