they tried to harm us or our friends. I shook my bow
and showed him my arrows. That made him look sad.
In their Council, the Shining People had divided
into many bands. Most had resolved to stay where
they were and keep to the old ways. They would
continue to dwell in the hills, forests, and waters
around the land, but would hide themselves so well
that they would never more be seen. Of course, the
Yar-Ons all laughed at this and said it could not be so.
But it was so.
Other bands said they would go far into the West,
or North, or South, away from the Men who were
coming. Now, in those days, I myself was always
looking for an adventure. I decided I would go West
with some of them.
The Shining Ones took with them their Treasures,
which were stones like glass with fire inside it. No one
knows, to this day, what became of those stones. Not
even I know.
The Yar-Ons were sorry to lose their friends and
could not understand why they had run away, until
several years had passed–and they themselves had
experience of the Whitemen from the Old World.
Then they also knew that the Whitemen were com-
pletely crazy, because their dreams are impossible and
cruel and their chiefs are bad.**
For more than a hundred moons, I travelled West
in the company of the Shining Ones. We saw some
strange tribes, who were slaves to big animals with
horns. We forded rivers and came to a land where the
ground was smoking. We met people who lived in caves in
the air. I might have been killed many times,

*This seems to be a reference to Jacques Cartier’s landing in 1534.
**The Hurons competed with the Iroquois for the Dutch and French fur trade. In 1649, in a,
single night, an Iroquois war party exterminated the Huron nation.’ 27