72 A SYNOPSIS OF THE INDIAN TRIBES. [iNTROD. Charlevoix, in 1721, writes, that they were still the soul of the councils oi all the Western Indians. Still assuming the right of sovereignty over the country hetween the Lakes and the Ohio, as far west as the Miami, they encouraged the Shawnoes ami the Delawares to remove to the Ohio, by granting to them the possession, though not the right to the soil, of the territory west of Alleghany River, bordering principally on Lake Erie, the Muskingum, and the Scioto. This last river is particularly mentioned by Mr. Johnston, the Indian Agent, as having re- ceived its name from them and belonging to them. It has been seen, that Pennsylvania thought it necessary to obtain a deed of cession from the Wyandots for the north- western part of the State. The treaty of Greenville was sinned by all the nations which had taken part in the war. But it was from the Wyandots, that the United States obtained the cession of the territory, west of the Connecticut Reserve, lying between the northern boundary line of that ceded by that treaty and Lake Erie.* Those remaining in the United States, and till lately at Sandusky, on the Scioto, and near Detroit, are said not to amount to one thousand souls. A still less consid- erable part of the nation, which took part with the British during the last war, resides in Canada. The vocabulary is principally extracted from that supplied by Mr. Johnston, with some additions from Smith Barton, and from a collection of sentences in the War Department. A specimen is also given of the ancient Huron from the vocabu- lary of Sagard, which would have been farther extended if full confidence could have been placed in his knowledge of the lammage.f Father Brebeuf w T as sent in the year 1641, on a mission to the Attiouandas, who were seated south of the Wyandots on the northern shores of Lake Erie. But we know nothing of their language, except that it was a dialect of the Huron. That tribe was, on account of the strict neutrality it preserved during the wars between the Five Nations and the Hurons,
- Treaty of 29th of September, 1817, Article V. The Miami of
Lake Erie, and its branch, the St. Mary's, are there specified as their western boundary. The St. Mary's was to its mouth the line between them and the Miamis. f Since this paper was completed, I have been informed that there is a vocabulary and grammar of the Wyandot language in the li- brary of Yale College. Mr. Johnston's Vocabulary is contained in 1 Trans. Am. Antiq. Society, p. 292.
