Page:The last of the Mohicans (1826 Volume 1).djvu/13

Rh the sun," was reclaimed, and admitted into a full communion of all their political privileges. This tribe (the Tuscarora) increased their number so far, that the English changed the appellation they had given the confederation, from the "Five" to the "Six Nations." It will be seen, in the course of the narrative, that the word nation is sometimes applied to a community, and sometimes to the people, in their most extended sense. The Mengwe were often called by their Indian neighbours, the "Maquas," and frequently, by way of contempt, "Mingoes." The French gave them the name of "Iroquois," which was probably a corruption of one of their own terms.

There is a well authenticated and disgraceful history of the means by which the Dutch on one side, and the Mengwe on the other, succeeded in persuading the Lenape to lay aside their arms, trusting their defence entirely to the latter, and becoming, in short, in the figurative language of the natives, "women." The policy on the part of the Dutch was a safe one, however gene-