CHAPTER VI.
LANGUAGE AND MANNERS.
The Muscogulge language is spoken throughout the confederacy (although consisting of many nations, who have a speech peculiar to themselves), as also by their friends and allies, the Natches. The Chicasaw and Chactaw, the Muscogulges say is a dialect of theirs.
This language is very agreeable to the ear, courteous, gentle and musical: the letter R is not sounded in one word of their language: the women in particular speak so fine and musical, as to represent the singing of birds; and when heard and not seen, one might imagine it to be the prattling of young children. The men’s speech is indeed more strong and sonorous, but not harsh, and in no instance guttural, and I believe the letter R is not used to express any word, in any language of the confederacy.
The Cherokee tongue, on the contrary, is very loud, somewhat rough and very sonorous, sounding the letter R frequently, yet very agreeable and pleasant to the ear. All the Indian languages are truly rhetorical, or figurative, assisting their speech by tropes; their hands, flexure of the head, the brow, in short, every member, naturally associate, and give their assistance to render their harrangues eloquent, persuasive and effectual.
The pyramidal hills or artificial mounts, and highways, or avenues, leading from them to artificial lakes or ponds, vast tetragon terraces, chunk yards,[64] and obelisks or pillars of wood, are the only monuments of labour, ingenuity and magnificence that I have seen worthy of notice, or remark. The region lying between Savanna river and Oakmulge, east and west, and from the sea coast to the Cherokee or Apalachian mountains, North and South, is the most remarkable for these high conical hills, tetragon terraces and chunk yards. This region was last possessed by the Cherokees, since the arrival of the Europeans, but they were afterwards dispossessed by the Muscogulges, and all that country was probably many ages preceding the Cherokee invasion, inhabited by one nation or confederacy, who were ruled by the same system of laws, customs and language, but so ancient that the Cherokees, Creeks, or the nation they conquered, could render no account for what purpose these monuments were raised. The mounts and cubical yards adjoining them, seem to have been raised in part for ornament and recreation, and likewise to serve some other public purpose, since they are always so situated as to command the most extensive prospect over the town and country adjacent. The tetragon terraces seem to be the foundation of a fortress, and perhaps the great pyramidal mounts, served the purpose of ook-out towers, and high places for sacrifice. The sunken area, called by white traders the chunk yard, very likely served the same conveniency that it has been appropriated to, by the more modern and even present nations of Indians, that is, the place where they burnt and otherwise tortured the unhappy captives that were condemned to die, as the area is surrounded by a bank, and sometimes two of them, one behind and above the other, as seats, to accommodate the spectators at such tragical scenes, as well as the exhibition of games, shows, and dances. From the river St. Juans, Southerly, to the point of the peninsula of Florida, are to be seen high pyramidal mounts with spacious and extensive avenues, leading from them out of the town, to an artificial lake or pond of water; these were evidently dignified in part, for ornament or monuments of magnificence, to perpetuate the power and grandeur of the nation, and not inconsiderable neither, for they exhibit scenes of power and grandeur, and must have been public edifices.
The great mounts, highways, and artificial lakes up St. Juans on the East shore just at the enterance of the great Lake George, one on the opposite shore, on the bank of the Little Lake, another on Dunn’s Island, a little below Charlotteville, one on the large beautiful island just without the Capes of Lake George, in sight of Mount Royal, and a spacious one on the west banks of the Musquitoe river near New Smyrna, are the most remarkable of this sort that occurred to me; but undoubtedly many more are yet to be discovered farther South in the peninsula; however I observed none westward, after I left St. Juans, on my journey to little St. Juan, near the bay of Apalache.
But in all the region of the Muscogulge country, South-West from the Oakmulge river quite to the Tallapoose, down to the city of Mobile, and thence along the sea coast, to the Mississipi, I saw no signs of mountains or highways, except at Taensa, where were several inconsiderable conical mountains; and but one instance of the tetragon terraces, which was at the Apalachucla old town, on the west banks of that river: here were yet remaining conspicuous monuments, as vast four square terraces, chunk yards, &c. almost equalling those eminent ones at the Oakmulge fields; but no high conical mounts. Those Indians have a tradition that these remains are the ruins of an ancient Indian town and fortress. I was not in the interior parts of the Chactaw territories, and therefore am ignorant whether there are any mounts or monuments there.
To conclude this subject concerning the monuments of the Americans, I deem it necessary to observe, as my opinion, that none of them that I have seen discover the least signs of the arts, sciences, or architecture of the Europeans or other inhabitants of the old world; yet evidently betray every sign or mark of the most distant antiquity.
FINIS.
[64] Chunk yard, a term given by the white traders, to the oblong four square yards, adjoining the high mounts and rotundas of the modern Indians.—In the centre of these stands the obelisk, and at each corner of the farther end stands a slave post or strong stake, where the captives that are burnt alive are bound.