Historic Highways of America/Volume 2/Chapter 1

by Archer Butler Hulbert

CHAPTER I

INDIAN THOROUGHFARES

A KNOWLEDGE of the Indian thoroughfares of the United States forms a most valuable key to the pioneer history of any and all portions of it. To a larger degree than has ever been realized, the explorers, conquerors, and settlers of any portion of this country were indebted to the narrow trail of the Indian. The explorers were, largely, compelled to travel by land rather than by water, and when they took to their canoes for a plunge down the swift rivers they almost invariably retraced their course on Indian trails in preference to stemming the swift tide which brought them down. Moreover, all who attempted water travel in early times found themselves the slaves of circumstances. For many weeks in winter the lesser streams were frozen and the greater streams filled with running ice. Washington, returning in winter from his mission to the French forts for Governor Dinwiddie, was compelled, on so considerable a river as the lower Allegheny, to desert his canoe and make his journey homeward on foot. For many weeks, too, many rivers were so shallow as to prohibit any navigation save for canoes. Céloron, who descended the Ohio burying the leaden plates for his Bourbon king, had a desperate time in ascending the Miami to the lakes in canoes, and Washington, even in midwinter, waded in icy waters, dragging his canoe over shoals in French creek on his return from Fort La Bœuf to Venango. The smaller streams were filled with drift and felled trees, impeding the traveler's progress. Gen. Moses Cleaveland was compelled to give up the attempt to ascend the Cuyahoga because the way was quite impassable.

The trail of the Indian, though often blocked by fallen trees and tangles of vine, ever offered a course through the heart of the continent. Like the buffalo trails they clung to high ground, mounting the hills on the long ascending ridges. Here, as was true of the routes of the earlier Indians and buffaloes, the paths found the driest courses, for from the ridges the water was most quickly shed; the hilltops, too, were wind-swept of snow in winter and of brush and leaves in summer, and suffered least from the annual forest fires; for the Indian, the hilltops were coigns of vantage for outlook and signaling.

To what degree the routes of the buffalo became the routes of the Indian it will be difficult to determine. So far as the continental routes of the buffalo are concerned, it is practically sure that these were adopted by the Indian, for the buffalo found the points of least resistance with an accuracy as infallible as the sagacity of any savage. In the instance given by Daniel Boone it is plain that, just north of Cumberland Gap, the Indian thoroughfare branched westward from the buffalo trace on Rock Castle creek. The local trails of the Indians differed from the local traces of the buffalo much as their individual destinations differed. Yet, after white men came among the Indians of the Central West they found them using the great, broad roads which the buffalo made to and from the salt licks and feeding-grounds. But it is quite sufficient for us to know that the earliest travelers in the West found Indian trails and buffalo traces and spoke of each as distinct thoroughfares, and easily recognized whether they belonged to one class or another. This is proved by Dr. Walker's references to them in his Journal of 1750.

The trails of the Indian were laid out with reference to the location of several things, among which their enemies and their hunting-grounds were originally of greatest importance. After the advent of the white man into the interior, the trails most used were those which led to the nearest trading-posts and to the forts of white men to whom the Indian became allied in the struggle that eventually broke out, and that continued in one form or another until the Indian was an eliminated factor in the West.

An Indian trail, in the abstract, was a narrow runway through the forest. Animal-like, the Indians always traveled in single file. The trail, while not worn five or six feet into the ground as a buffalo trace was, often lay a foot or two below the surrounding ground, especially when worn by the hoofs of Indian ponies laden with peltry or stores. Often, however, when on a rocky ridge, the path was not worn perceptibly into the ground. It is a matter of record that when Washington and his company made a night march from Fort Necessity to find Sieur Jumonville's hidden "embassy" on Laurel Hill, the men frequently lost the trail and spent some time in finding it again. In many instances the depression in the ground of an Indian trail can be recognized today. The very appearance of the summits of certain ranges of hills now gives testimony, which is borne out by the oldest inhabitants, that a pioneer roadway followed an Indian trail along that height of land. "We have gone up the Kittanning gorge," writes an historian of Juniata valley, Pennsylvania, "and looked upon . . . the road . . . and were forcibly struck with the idea that it must once have been traversed, without knowing at the time that it was the famous Kittanning trail."^[1] This writer affirms that the trail was then worn a foot below the surface of the ground. In 1834, while Dr. S. P. Hildreth was making a professional visit on Dry Ridge, between the Ohio and Little Kanawha, he was shown the old Monongahela trail on which he heard the wolves howling over the carcasses of deer which had recently been killed there. "This path was then pointed out to me," writes Dr. Hildreth, "as 'the old Indian trail,' and was doubtless the same along which Tecumseh and his party had marched."^[2]

Of the many old-time trails which can be located today there is perhaps not one which has not left its print plainly on the ground. As a rule, the tracks are very plain in the case of trails which became pioneer routes. On Braddock's Road, for instance, great gorges are still to be found, five feet in depth, plowed by hundreds of pioneer wagons. On a hundred hilltops may be found a slight, gently rounding depression which, on the longer ranges, can be followed for miles. These old thoroughfares are most plain where the forests are still standing on the hilltops, for here, among the trees, the explorer finds a great aisle which was once the ancient thoroughfare. Small trees and underbrush may impede the way, but no large trees—and less underbrush than elsewhere—will be found in the old-time track.

The bed of an Indian trail was very narrow, since made only by one traveler passing at a time. The trees and bushes encroached closely upon the path and it was generally impossible to see ahead more than a rod or two. There were, probably, no such vistas in the ancient forests as those now visible along our woodland roads. Surprises were easily achieved.

The narrowness of these early thoroughfares with heavy forests on either side combined to render such passage-ways frequently impassable. Zeisberger, who came westward as missionary for the Moravian Brethren, relates that much of the journey was accomplished on hands and knees—such was the impenetrable growth that choked the slender trails which were the only roads over the Alleghanies.^[3]

It is evident that a single windstorm, in such aged forests as those which covered the country a century ago, could easily fill a narrow roadway with fallen branches, so that it would be as well-nigh impassable as the adjacent jungle itself. The bushes, jealous of even the slightest space reserved for man's use in the virgin forest, overhung on either side, and after a rain the traveler was frequently drenched to the skin by the water which the branches retained. The bruised or broken ends of the twigs of the bushes beside a trail were an invariable sign to the Indian's keen eye of the size and destination of any party that had passed.

But Indian trails were not always on high ground, at least not always on the summits of the hills. Their general courses were determined by the destinations to which they offered thoroughfare, and toward these there were, oftentimes, no hill-ranges which offered a direct and easy course. In such instances the trails were forced to seek the most practicable courses available. Thus many of them wound for miles through low grounds which were often covered with water or otherwise rendered impassable. In such locations the trails were exceedingly circuitous. The few men who are still to be found who traveled and remember any Indian trail will attest to this fact that in low ground the trail was wont to double back on itself many times, even in a few rods. This in itself is interesting proof that even in low ground the path of the Indian sought the highest ground. In describing the portage path between the Cuyahoga and Tuscarawas rivers in northern Ohio, an old resident affirmed that the circuitousness of the path when it entered the lowland of the Cuyahoga valley was invariably a matter of comment among the early pioneers who traversed it.

Trails in low ground were far less stable than those on the heights; indeed, very many were probably impassable for many months of the year, being subject to constant overflow from neighboring rivers or swamps. Thus numerous trails well worn in the summer season must have been quite deserted in winter. And when such abandoned routes were again traversed, the old track was doubtless found to be destroyed throughout the lowlands, and a new course was chosen each year by the first travelers who sought that route.

Thus through all Indian and pioneer history one of the chief qualifications of a guide was the ability to know what trails to use at each season, and to be able to estimate the extent of local storms or floods and know what trails would be affected by each. In winter and during times of floods, the hill trails were undoubtedly the routes to be used and watched. In summer, the lowland trails were broken again for the season's travel. Forest fire was another important factor to be counted by one who was to make his way or guide others through the primeval forests of America. These fires, which so frequently licked up the forests for miles in extent, wiped out also the little ways man and beast had broken open. The fires did least damage on the summits of the hills because here the forest growth was lighter and here a less amount of brush and undergrowth had collected. But forest fires came, usually, like the floods, at certain regular seasons, and a woodsman of the old school knew well what thoroughfares were most endangered by them and laid his courses accordingly.

The nightmare of travelers forest-bound was the passage of streams—the fords where the woodland thoroughfares left them for a space to the mercy of bogs, morasses, swift tides, quicksands, hidden rocks, sand-bars, and the other uncertainties of the "crossing-place." With an instinct no less shrewd than that displayed on the highland trail, the buffalo and the Indian found with great sagacity the best crossing-places over the streams of America.

One student, at least, wondered for many months why the old trails he studied and traversed always crossed streams just at the mouths of other streams. It seemed to him (as is true of our streams today) that at this very point the deepest water would be encountered. Yet, one item of evidence after another accumulated until the mass of it pointed surely to a law. Some of the more notorious "crossing-places" will be remembered by the casual reader of pioneer history to have been at the junction of two streams, as the famous Braddock's ford over the Monongahela at the mouth of Turtle creek, or the "Great Crossings" over the Muskingum at the mouth of Sandy creek, or the crossing-places on the Ohio at the mouths of Wheeling and Sunfish creeks, the Little and Great Kanawha and Licking rivers. The explanation is that in the old days, before the era of slack-water navigation and dredging, bars of sand or mud were always to be found in any stream at the mouths of its tributaries. Here, if the crest of this earth deposit was carefully followed, a drier ford could be made than at almost any other point. If, in certain places, the rocky riffles offered a shallower ford, the approach to the rivers at such rocky places was exceedingly dangerous for horses and absolutely impassable for any vehicle.

Thus the "bar" became an important factor in early travel—as important as it was capricious. And he was a good guide indeed who knew the sign of the shifting sands—for no bar ever remained in the same relative position from year to year. Each flood-tide left its mark here, if nowhere else, and not infrequently the bar was completely washed away; sometimes it was entirely altered in position. Floods in certain rivers were known to leave peculiar deposits on the bars, which rendered them exceedingly treacherous; travelers whose temerity was greater than the knowledge of their guides frequently lost horses and baggage in attempting a headlong ford over treacherous bars containing the flood-deposit from a "soft-mud" stream. Sandbars had a particularly nomadic trait of moving down stream. Oftentimes they were found half a mile distant from the point where only a year ago they offered a sure ford. The uncertainty of their movement was, of course, increased by any change of the estuary of the stream whose eddying waters created them. Many lesser streams made new estuaries for themselves in the high-water season; for the flood-tides found new courses which thereafter became the regular channel. The mouths of certain streams have been known to change long distances by the flood-tides cutting a shorter course to the main stream. Old residents along our greater streams are often familiar with a number of mouths of the smaller streams. All this greatly affected the travel on the old thoroughfares where the bars beneath the water were the only bridges.

Over some of the small streams and across such bogs as could not be skirted, the first thoroughfares were supported by logs laid closely together, but this was an innovation very seldom found on purely Indian trails. So far as the records go, there is almost no testimony to show that the red men did anything at all to the beds of their little roads. When wet ground was encountered, the Indian either skirted it on surrounding higher land, or plunged recklessly through it—as also did George Roger Clark's brave army which captured the Illinois forts from the British in the Revolutionary War, after wading through "drowned lands of the Wabash." The need of bridges came with the wheeled vehicles, and of these the Indian knew nothing. Two poles which were bound to each side of his pony and dragged behind on the ground was his only "wagon;" and goods placed upon this contrivance would clear any stream that a diminutive Indian pony could ford. Oftentimes a fallen tree was made to serve as a bridge over a stream, though this of course could only be used by those traveling on foot.^[4]

As has been remarked, road-building was a lost art among Indians of historic times—however much was known in the days of their mound-building ancestors. This was all in keeping with the law of need. The transportation of immense quantities of earth and stone, of which the mounds were built, necessitated the graded roads for which the mound-building Indians were celebrated. The deterioration of the civilization of the Indian is in nothing shown more plainly than in the study of the roads of the prehistoric and historic tribes. Living almost entirely on the generosity of the forest and stream, the later Indian needed thoroughfares only for hunting and for war. The little trail to the hunting-ground and the track which led to the enemy's country, were, when history dawned, his only thoroughfare. It answered all his needs, and he did nothing to improve it. If it became impenetrable because of the wind-strewn wreck of the forests, or by the action of the floods, he merely sought out another pathway and broke it open by continual use.

Nor did the Indian waste any energy in marking out his narrow roadways. In southwestern Pennsylvania, in the Alleghanies, the explorer will be shown whatare generally known as "Indian stones," thin rocks of considerable size which are found standing on edge as though having been placed in that position by human hand. A tradition exists that these "Indian stones" were placed beside the Indian trails either to mark out their course or for some other special purpose. Beyond the fact that there are several of these stones similarly placed, nothing can be learned, and there is perhaps no testimony extant in the literature of the earliest pioneer times which would give any reason for believing that the red man used anything to mark out his paths. This legend of Pennsylvania is, however, of interest and there may be some significance in the position of these rough and peculiar monuments.^[5]

Neither was the custom of blazing the trees beside a trail an Indian custom, contrary to what seems to be the general opinion. The "blaze" was a white man's invention, and, though the red man could by one deft stroke leave considerable information on a tree's trunk, there is not a shred of testimony or evidence that the Indian ever marked out the course of his paths by means of blazed trees. Upon consideration it seems beneath the dignity of such crafty woodsmen as were the aborigines of America to cut upon each succeeding tree a mark to guide them on the course; it also would require an amount of labor and patience which has seldom, if ever, been accredited to them. True, the trees, next to the stars, were the pilot of the Indian, but it was to the heavy moss on their southern sides and the ragged branches on the northwestern sides that he looked—not to the white blaze which the clumsy European made and depended upon. It will be remembered that, after the siege at Bryant's Station, Kentucky, the unsuccessful Indian horde attempted the scheme of luring the white man out by feigning a retreat. Accordingly, they deserted their camp suddenly in the night, leaving meat unroasted upon the spits and garments scattered about, as though their flight were a precipitous rout. Among other means by which they let their pursuers know which way they fled, a historian affirms that they blazed their course upon the trees so that there would be no doubt of their pursuers falling into their craftily laid ambush. The whites followed the blazes—though this, and other un-Indian signs, made such men as Boone suspicious—and the bloody and fatal massacre at Blue Licks was the result. This is one of the few recorded cases of Indians blazing trees, and nothing could be better evidence that such was not a custom of the race. The keen eye of a savage, who, by looking at a track in the sand, could tell how many days old it was, needed not a blazed tree or sign-stone to tell him the direction of a broken path. If there is any evidence that Indians ever made efforts to outwardly mark the course of any of their thoroughfares, it is not to be found in the most trustworthy records of the first white men who entered the Indians' land. Indian hieroglyphics announcing their triumphs in war may yet be seen at low tide on rocks in certain of our rivers, and rough blazes made centuries ago by Frenchmen who first crossed the portages of the West have been brought to light by removing earth from the trunks of old trees along the trail,^[6] but the Indian land-thoroughfares were not marked.

Wrote an early student, "Indeed all the Indians have this Knowledge to a very great Degree of practical Purpose. They are very attentive to the Positions of the Sun and Stars, and on the Lakes can steer their Course by them. The different Aspects which the Hills exhibit on the North Side, from that which the South has impressed on their Eyes, suggest, habitually, at the Moment, in every Spot, an almost intuitive Knowledge of the Quarters of the Heavens which we, mechanically, mark by the Compass. This, at the first Blush, may appear incredible to some; but it may be explained even to the most incredulous. Can any, the most inattentive Observer, be at a Loss to pronounce, in a Moment, which is the North or South Side of any Building in the Country? The same difference between the South or North Aspect of a Mountain or a Hill, or even a Tree, is equally striking to the Attention of an Indian; and is much more strongly marked by that Accuracy with which he views these Objects; he sees it instantly, and has, from Habit, this Impression continually on his Mind's Eye, and will mark his courses as he runs, more readily than most Travellers who steer by the Compass. The Ranges of the Mountains, the Courses of the Rivers, the Bearings of the Peaks, the Knobs and Gaps in the Mountains, are all Land Marks, and Picture the Face of the Country on his Mind." These were the words of Governor Pownall of the Massachusetts Bay colony, given in his A Topographical Description of the Middle British Colonies, written in 1776.

The lowland trails, as has been observed, suffered severely from floods and were, undoubtedly, completely lost, never again to be traversed as they once had been. The northern trails, also, were buried in snow. The records of the brave Catholic missionaries north of the great lakes are replete with testimony of trails buried deep in the snow, rendering traveling temporarily uncertain. "The roads," wrote one missionary, "were very difficult on account of the newly fallen snows, which obliterated the trails."^[7] Elsewhere one records, "There was everywhere three feet of snow; and no paths had yet been made."^[8] "We departed," wrote another Father, "therefore, on the 13th and reached home very late at night, after considerable trouble—for the paths were only about half a foot wide where the snow would sustain one, and if you turned ever so little to the right or left you were in it half way up to your thighs."^[9] However, the winter season was best for traveling in the northern country, for the snow, when once packed, made the paths more even,^[10] and when the fall of snow was not too great the smooth surface of ice on river and lake offered a free passage-way unknown during the other seasons of the year. "We have twice come near dying in the roads; once it was on a frozen lake."^[11] In Canada, with rivers running practically east and west, the water-ways were the great routes of travel, and the missionaries called the land and water-ways "roads" indiscriminately: "The whole length of the road [from the Huron country to Quebec] is full of rapids and precipices."^[12] Again: ". . . . over various rivers and many lakes, which had to be reached by roads the mere remembrance of which fills me with horror."^[13]

A most vivid and interesting account of a journey made two centuries and a half ago through the primeval forests of Canada is left us in the writings of the brave Father Buteux, concerning a journey made northward from the St. Lawrence to the country of the Attikamègues in the year 1651:^[14]

"On the 27th of March we started, four Frenchmen together—namely, Monsieur de Normanville and myself, with our two men—accompanied by about forty Savages, both adults and children. A squad of soldiers went with us the first day, for fear of the Iroquois. The weather was fine, but was not good for us on account of the heat of the Sun, which thawed the snow; this impeded our trains, and loaded our snowshoes, and even put us in peril of sinking into the water. I was suddenly endangered by a piece of ice that gave way under my feet; and had it not been for the assistance of a soldier, who held out his hand to me, I would not have been able to save myself from destruction, owing to the rapidity of the current that flowed beneath me. The first day's journey was amid continual rapid torrents and cataracts falling over precipices,—causing a great deal of thin ice which was very dangerous and very troublesome, because we were compelled to walk with our feet and snowshoes in the water, making the latter very slippery when we had to climb up ice-cliffs near falls or precipices. We passed four of these on that day; and all the distance we could get over was about six leagues, although we walked from morning until night. The end of the day was harder than the beginning, owing to a cold wind that froze our shoes and our stockings, which had been wet since morning. Our escort of soldiers, who were little accustomed to such fatigue, was disheartened; and it was still more so when, at night, it was necessary to encamp in the midst of the snow, as in a sepulchre in the ground.

"On the second day after our departure, we dismissed our escort, and advanced toward the upper part of the river. At a distance of a mile from our halting-place, we came to a waterfall which barred our way. We had to climb over three mountains, the last of which is of enormous height; then we felt the weight of our trains and our snowshoes. When we came to descend on the other side of these precipices, there was no other way but to let our trains slide from the top to the bottom, the height of the fall causing them to go beyond the middle of the river, which at that point may be about four hundred paces wide. At a distance of about a league from each other, there were three other cataracts of prodigious height, over which the river falls with a horrible noise and wonderful impetuosity, forming high icebergs, the mere sight of which inspires fear. Through these places full of horrors we had to walk, or rather to drag ourselves, as if on all fours. Finally, we stopped on the summit of a mountain that was very difficult to pass over. This day's journey was very hard, and every one was fatigued with the march of eleven whole hours, and with hauling his load like a horse that draws a plough, without taking either rest or food.

"On the third day, we struck our camp early in the morning, and walked upon the river, which was still frozen all along its course, and very wide at that point. About two o'clock in the afternoon, the mirage made some branches of trees that had fallen into the river, and showed above it, assume the shape of men; every one thought that they were a band of Iroquois who were lying in wait for us on our passage. Some young men were sent to reconnoiter, and they reported that it was the enemy. Thereupon, all the Christians prepared themselves to receive absolution, and the Catechumens to be Baptized. After that, the Captain exhorted his people to the fight by a most Christian harangue, placing his trust in God; all resolved to conquer or to die. On approaching, the enemy proved to be an imaginary one, but the sentiments of devotion were quite firm in their hearts; and I can truly say that I have never seen greater or more filial confidence in God than that which I have admired among these people, either in their sicknesses or their famines or in the fear of the enemy. . . .

"The fifth and sixth days were very different, and still they were both alike as regards the fatigues of the road. It rained the whole of the first, and it was very fine on the second; but both were very inconvenient because the snow, melted by the rays of the Sun, loaded our snowshoes and our trains. To avoid this, we were compelled on the ten following days to start very early in the morning, before the ice and snow had time to thaw.

"On the seventh day, we walked from three in the morning until one in the afternoon, in order to reach an Island, and to say holy Mass there on Palm Sunday. I said it, but I really endured in my own person some of the sufferings of the Passion of our good Master, and a thirst which glued my tongue to the roof of my mouth. . . .

"On the eighth day, to avoid the rapid torrents and the dangers of the river,—the ice on which was beginning to break up, and could not have borne us,—we entered the woods by a valley between two mountains. It was nothing but a mass of old trees overthrown by the winds, which blocked up a very bad road, over which we had great difficulty in proceeding with our snowshoes on our feet, as they caught in the branches of those trees. Finally, beyond the declivity of the land, we reached a mountain, so high that it took us more than three hours to reach its summit. In addition to hauling my train, I held in my arms a little child three years old, the son of my host. I carried him in order to relieve his mother, who was loaded with another child, besides her baggage, on her train. Beyond the mountain, we came to a great lake which must be crossed; every step that we took made us think of death, and made us fear that we would be swallowed up by the waters. We sank in it up to our knees, and deeper still, beneath the upper layer of ice, which was thinner, while the second stopped us from sinking farther. Frequently the road was too slippery, and a false step would occasion a bad fall; and not only the legs, but the whole body, would be immersed in the water.

"The ninth day was an extraordinary one, as regards both the length of the road,—amid several lakes and rapid rivers, and the descent of mountains,—and the time consumed in it, from early morning until evening. The fear that the lakes and rivers would thaw caused us to hasten our steps until we were extremely fatigued. From time to time, to cheer us amid the hardships of the road, we sang Hymns as we walked; our only consolation was to direct our thoughts toward God.

"On the tenth day, we walked past various mountains; we had to climb up and down until we reached a great lake, whose shores consist of perpendicular rocks, higher than any cliff in France.

"On the eleventh day, we started three hours before daylight to walk over the ice, which a cold wind had hardened; we were favored with the light of the Moon. When day came, we resumed our way through the woods and by mountains, intersected by lakes and very rapid rivers.

"On the twelfth day after the Office of Good Friday, and after having confessed several Savages,—who wished to separate from us, in order to take another road, and make some canoes,—we reached the summit of the mountains, and a small river, on which we found some Beaver lodges; we killed six of these animals. Then we continued our route past three great lakes, in the last of which was an islet; here we slept on the snow, without erecting any cabins.

"The thirteenth day was the most fatiguing of all, for me; we started at three in the morning, by horrible roads, through brushwood so dense that at each step we had to look for a place whereon to put a foot or a snowshoe. I lost myself at various times, because the darkness prevented me from following the tracks of those who went before me. Afterward, we came to lakes that were quite slippery and on which it was very dangerous to walk without snowshoes for fear of falling through the ice; but it was extremely difficult to walk on snowshoes there, because the surface of the lakes was roughened by the freezing of the melted snows. At noon, we halted; and I had the happiness of saying holy Mass. That was my only consolation, and from it I derived strength to endure so much fatigue. To restore my energy, they gave me a morsel of Beaver, that had been kept over from the previous day for me. I offered it to Our Lord, as I had not yet eaten any of it, or any other meat throughout the whole of Lent.

"On the fourteenth day after our departure,—which was Easter Sunday, and the ninth of the month of April,—it was very consoling to me to see how Our Lord was honored by our band. . . .

"On the tenth of April, we started early in the morning; the rain, which had fallen throughout the night, had thawed the first layer of ice on the lakes, and the snow in the woods,—so that we had to walk in water up to our knees, and with snowshoes on our feet for fear of breaking through the lower ice. After having crossed four lakes, we reached the one on which my host usually has his abode."^[15]

An Indian thoroughfare met frequent cross-trails, and was paralleled at intervals by offshoots which circled about to the right or left, coming back to the main trunk when the desired points were touched. The smaller trails were perhaps entirely like the main trails save that they were less used at many seasons of the year. The meeting-place of two great Indian trails was an historic spot, not to be forgotten by the scout, guide, or geographer. They were vital points in the country and often became landmarks. A narrow Indian trail, portage, or junction became in more than one instance the boundary line of the United States. A post or pillar was sometimes raised to mark the junction of two routes. Here large cleared spaces were formed where Indian peddlers plied their trade and Indian orators appealed to listening audiences.

1. Jones's History of Juniata Valley, p. 135.
2. Hildreth's Sketches of Pioneer History, p. 205.
3. Cf. Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents, vol. xviii., p. 29.
4. Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents, vol. xviii., p. 36.
5. There was an Indian village "Standing Stone" near Lancaster, Ohio; and another by the same name on the Juniata in Pennsylvania, mentioned in Weiser's Journal under date of August 18, 1748. See Pownall's map. There was a well-known Kentucky village "Painted Stone" near Shelbyville.—Collins's History of Kentucky, vol. i., p. 13.
6. See Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents; vol. xxxvii., p. 33; also Baker's St. Joseph-Kankakee Portage.
7. Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents, vol. xx., p. 45.
8. Id., vol. xii., p. 261.
9. Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents, vol. xxii., p. 307.
10. Id., vol. xviii., p. 39.
11. Id., vol. xx., p. 99.
12. Id., vol. xxii., p. 307.
13. Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents, vol. xxxvii., p. 10.
14. Id., vol. xxxvii., pp. 19–37.
15. Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents, vol. xxxvii., pp. 19–33.

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