There our grandsires' words repeating,
All hail! All hail! All hail!

Graciously, Oh, grandsires, hear,
All hail! All hail! All hail!


The singing voice was sweet, penetrating, and thrilling, and the
song was sad. At the pauses deep murmurs of sorrow ran through
the crowd in the Long House. Grief for the dead held them all.
When he finished, Satekariwate, the Mohawk, holding in his hands
three belts of wampum, uttered a long historical chant telling of
their glorious deeds, to which they listened patiently. The
chant over, he handed the belts to an attendant, who took them to
Thayendanegea, who held them for a few moments and looked at them
gravely.

One of the wampum belts was black, the sign of mourning; another
was purple, the sign of war; and the third was white, the sign of
peace. They were beautiful pieces of workmanship, very old.

When Hiawatha left the Onondagas and fled to the Mohawks he
crossed a lake supposed to be the Oneida. While paddling along
he noticed that man tiny black, purple, and white shells clung to
his paddle. Reaching the shore he found such shells in long rows
upon the beach, and it occurred to him to use them for the
depiction of thought according to color. He strung them on
threads of elm bark, and afterward, when the great league was
formed, the shells were made to represent five clasped hands.
For four hundred years the wampum belts have been sacred among