Old Indian Town of Frankstown--Indian Burial-Places--Massacre of the Bedford Scout, etc. 324
Shaver's Creek--Mysterious Death of old Shaver--Heroic Conduct of two Children--Abduction of Miss Ewing and Miss McCormick--Peter Crum, the last Victim of the Savages, etc. 337
Warrior Ridge--Warrior's Mark--Job Chillaway, Shaney John, and Captain Logan, the last Red Men in the Juniata Valley 347
THE ABORIGINES OF THE VALLEY--THEIR HABITS AND THEIR CUSTOMS.
When the persevering and adventurous Anglo-Saxon first entered the wilds of the Juniata, his eye, as far as it could reach, beheld nothing but a dense forest; but his quick penetration observed its natural beauties, its advantages, and the fertility of its soil. Hence he did not long stand upon the crest of the Tuscarora Mountain, debating the advantages to be derived from making it his home, or the risk he was taking upon himself in doing so, but plunged boldly down into the valley and called it his own. He found it peopled with dusky warriors and their families, who received him with open arms; and the golden hues of hope for the future lightened his cares, and made his privations no longer a burden. On the banks of the beautiful river the majestic stag trod, a very monarch; and the pellucid stream, from the bubbling brooks that formed it, to its mouth, was filled with the noble salmon and sportive trout, with little to molest them; for the Indians did not possess the penchant for indiscriminate slaughter of game which characterized their successors. They held that the land was given to human beings by the good _Manitou_ for a dwelling-place, and not for the purpose of being broken up and cultivated for game. The fish and game were also a free gift from the same spirit, for the support of his people. Hence hunting and fishing for more than what would supply immediate and absolute wants were held in supreme contempt by the red man.
The Indians found in the valley, when the whites first invaded it, belonged to three or four tribes--the Delawares, Monseys, Shawnees, and probably the Tuscaroras; all of whom, with the exception of the latter, belonged to one of the eight great Indian confederations scattered over the land, from the Rocky Mountains to what they called, in their figurative language, the rising of the sun. These Indians called themselves the _Lenni Lenape_, or "original people," of which the Delawares and Monseys were by far the most numerous of the tribes settled in the valley. The Shawnees, a restless, lawless, and ferocious band, were threatened with extermination by a powerful foe in Florida, when they came to Pennsylvania and craved the protection of the _Lenapes_, which was granted to them, and they were permitted to settle upon the lands of the Delawares. The Delaware Indians soon discovered that the Shawnees were quarrelsome and treacherous neighbors, and their company not desirable. Notice was given them to quit, and they settled upon the flats of the Susquehanna, near Wilkesbarre, and from thence they found their way to the Juniata; and there is little doubt but that they were first and foremost in the depredations committed during the French and Indian wars, as well as during the American Revolution. The Tuscaroras did not claim to belong to the _Lenape_ tribes, yet a large portion of them lived in their territory. They came from the South, and joined the _Aquanuschioni_, or "united people," known in history as the Six Nations. As they did not speak the language of either the "united people" or the "original people," it would appear that they were people on their own account, enjoying a sort of roving commission to hunt the lands and fish the streams of any of "their cousins," as they styled all other tribes.
