The Cannitticutt¹

(Source)

Just before the bow of the canoe scraped the bottom of the river, Jacques had jumped out and was now pulling the vessel ashore. His brother Alain soon followed and had also waded ashore, they had learned through harsh experience that a rough river bottom could tear the bottom out of a birch bark canoe.

Once the canoe was firmly ashore, the brothers listened to the sounds around them. On the riverbank the sounds of the forest continued unabated - the song birds, the insects, the distant chittering of a squirrel all blended together to give the men a sense of comfort. Only when the forest went silent was there danger.

To the north was a continuous dull roar signifying nearby falls. Both men knew that they would shortly have to portage around that part of the river, hopefully the falls weren't too extensive. The last one had cost them a day and a half. While they were in no hurry, there was a certain urgency to return to Montréal. While it was still summer, it was late summer, autumn was not all that far away.

The boys had come to the New World with their father when both were still young, Jacques had been four and Alain six. Their father, Étienne, had been a farm laborer in Gascony. When the land he had worked since childhood had been sold to an aristocrat from Bordeaux, all of the families who made their living there were evicted.

Étienne had taken his family to Bordeaux and had found work as a day laborer, working on projects throughout the city. Eventually he found work as a fisherman, something he soon discovered that he enjoyed. Unfortunately that occupation took him away from home for long periods of time. The cod fishing along the coast of the New World required a long journey across the Atlantic.

While returning from one such journey, Étienne had resolved to take his family to the New World, people there ate fish didn't they? One of the other men on the boat had extolled the benefits of New France to Étienne, so that was that.

Upon his return to Bordeaux his reunion with his wife Marie was short lived. She sickened and died of the bloody flux within two weeks of his returning home. So he took the two boys and convinced the captain of his fishing boat to take them to the New World, he would work their way over, Étienne would forego his share of the catch, paying the way for the boys.

Upon landing in New France at Port Royale, Étienne had found a job on the docks, he couldn't very well continue going to sea when the boys were still young.

After a year on the docks Étienne had heard that there was money to made in the backwoods of New France as a trapper. So he picked up and moved deeper into New France, eventually making his way to Montréal, his two sons in tow.

Years passed, Jacques and Alain followed their father into the wilderness and learned to trap and to hunt. Étienne made himself welcome in the camps of the native peoples of the region, by the time the boys reached their late teens, they looked more Wyandot than French, which helped them to blend in when out in the wild. Until one day when the boys traveled down The Great River. They would be entering lands where the Wyandot were looked upon as enemies.

(Source)

Suspicious eyes were focused on the two young men from a nearby stand of maples. The two were dressed as the Wyandot dressed but they did not cut their hair as those people did. Their facial features were all wrong as well.

The leader of the small hunting band looked at his three companions, while they could have easily overwhelmed the two men, they wanted to speak to their sachem first. The river valley had been at peace the entire summer, the leader, a man called Tall Elk, did not wish to disturb that peace. He gestured at two of the band, they would follow the strangers.

Turning to his brother he nodded and moved off, and his brother, Little Wolf, followed. Let the sachem decide this, Tall Elk thought, he had no desire to take to the warpath, let other men make the decision to shed blood or not.

"Alain, this river is full of fish, we should catch some for our supper." Jacques was going through their baggage, he had a fishing net for this very purpose and he was very tired of eating pemmican. Fresh fish would be a treat.

Alain was nervous, he sensed that they were being watched. His younger brother was not cautious enough for his tastes. Encroaching on a tribe's territory was fraught with danger. They were far to the south on the Great River, further than anyone had gone before. He didn't know what people inhabited this area. He had been told that a branch of the Iroquois confederation, the Mohican,² lived in this area.

The Iroquois were friendly with the English and hated the Wyandot, being caught by them would mean a long lingering death by torture.

"Jacques, be quiet, I think we are being watched. Let's get back onto the water, we can make the falls by dusk I think. There is something here which frightens me."

Jacques realized that his brother was very nervous, he also knew that his brother knew how to avoid trouble. Without another word, the two brothers slid their canoe back into the river.

The sachem was an old man of sixty-three winters, he had led his tribe for a long time and was respected for both his wisdom and his wit. Though his hair was as white as the snows of winter, a fire still burned inside of him.

"Two men, dressed like Wyandot, but not Wyandot?"

Tall Elk nodded and added that the men didn't look like anyone he had ever seen, narrow noses and facial hair.

"These men may be the friends of the Wyandot, les français. The men along the great water to the north. Go back, do not molest them. If they dress like the Wyandot they may be enemies of our enemies. It does not make them friends, but they are not our enemies. Watch them until they leave our lands."

Tall Elk stood, "We shall go back in the morning, it will be night soon and I would rather sleep with my wife tonight instead of some raccoon in the woods."

The sachem chuckled, "Then go in the morning."

¹ The word "Connecticut" is a corruption of the Mohegan word quinetucket, which means "beside the long, tidal river". The word came into English during the early 1600s to name the river, which was also called simply "The Great River". It was also known as the Fresh River, and the Dutch called it the Verse River.

Early spellings of the name by European explorers included "Cannitticutt" in French or in English. (Source)

² Not to be confused with the Mohegan, a different tribe. Also spelled "Mahican."

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