Note 35 — Chapter I · INTRODUCTORY.—INDIAN TRIBES EAST OF THE MISSISSIPPI.

The story told by the Lenape themselves, and recorded with the utmost good faith by Loskiel and Heckewelder, that the Five Nations had not conquered them, but, by a cunning artifice, had cheated them into subjection, is wholly unworthy of credit. It is not to be believed that a people so acute and suspicious could be the dupes of so palpable a trick; and it is equally incredible that a high-spirited tribe could be induced, by the most persuasive rhetoric, to assume the name of Women, which in Indian eyes is the last confession of abject abasement.