Book-bot.com - read famous books online for free

Myths and Legends of Our Own Land — Volume 06 : Central States and Great Lakes by Charles M. (Charles Montgomery) Skinner
page 22 of 73 (30%)
mortals.

These giants still exist, but in the form of conical rocks, one of
which-called Sugar-Loaf, or Manitou's Wigwam--is ninety feet high. A cave
in this obelisk is pointed out as Manitou's abiding-place, and it was
believed that every other spire in the group had its wraith, whence has
come the name of the island--Michillimackinack (place of great dancing
spirits). Arch Rock is the place that Manitou built to reach his home
from Sunrise Land the better. There were many such monuments of
divinities in the north. They are met with all about the lakes and in the
wooded wilderness, the most striking one being the magnificent spire of
basalt in the Black Hills region of Wyoming. It is known as Devil's
Tower, or Mateo's Tepee, and by the red men is held to be the wigwam of a
were-animal that can become man at pleasure. This singular rock towers
above the Belle Fourche River to a height of eight hundred feet.

Deep beneath Mackinack was a stately and beautiful cavern hall where
spirits had their revels. An Indian who got leave to quit his body saw it
in company with one of the spirits, and spread glowing reports of its
beauties when he had clothed himself in flesh again. When Adam and Eve
died they, too, became spirits and continued to watch the home of
Manitou.

Now, there is another version of this tradition which gives the, original
name of the island as Moschenemacenung, meaning "great turtle." The
French missionaries and traders, finding the word something too large a
mouthful, softened it to Michillimackinack, and, when the English came,
three syllables served them as well as a hundred, so Mackinack it is to
this day. Manitou, having made a turtle from a drop of his own sweat,
sent it to the bottom of Lake Huron, whence it brought a mouthful of mud,
DigitalOcean Referral Badge