Page:Lacrosse- The National Game of Canada (New Edition).djvu/18



origin of Lacrosse, like that of the Indian race from whom we derived it, is lost in the obscurity which surrounds the early history of this people; but that it had its first existence in his wild brain is claimed in his own traditions, and entitled to every belief. The subject, however, is a mystery, and the most patient research cannot but meet with bewilderment. Indian traditions concerning it are scarce and unreliable, while anything that might be learned from their hieroglyphics is met by the fact that they could not transmit more than outward events. Doubtless there were rude Pindars and Homers in the "forest primeval" who could have saved their early records from oblivion, had there been means to preserve them; but as it is, the more we try to unravel such mysteries as the origin of the Indian