Timmendiquas, as an honorary chief of the Mohawks, and as the real head of a brave and allied nation, was present throughout the council.His advice was asked often, and when he gave it the others listened with gravity and deference.The next day the village played a great game of lacrosse, which was invented by the Indians, and which had been played by them for centuries before the arrival of the white man.In this case the match was on a grand scale, Mohawks and Cayugas against Onondagas and Senecas.
The game began about nine o'clock in the morning in a great natural meadow surrounded by forest.The rival sides assembled opposite each other and bet heavily.All the stakes, under the law of the game, were laid upon the ground in heaps here, and they consisted of the articles most precious to the Iroquois.In these heaps were rifles, tomahawks, scalping knives, wampum, strips of colored beads, blankets, swords, belts, moccasins, leggins, and a great many things taken as spoil in forays on the white settlements, such is small mirrors, brushes of various kinds, boots, shoes, and other things, the whole making a vast assortment.
These heaps represented great wealth to the Iroquois, and the older chiefs sat beside them in the capacity of stakeholders and judges.
The combatants, ranged in two long rows, numbered at least five hundred on each side, and already they began to show an excitement approaching that which animated them when they would go into battle.Their eyes glowed, and the muscles on their naked backs and chests were tense for the spring.In order to leave their limbs perfectly free for effort they wore no clothing at all, except a little apron reaching from the waist to the knee.
The extent of the playground was marked off by two pair of "byes"like those used in cricket, planted about thirty rods apart.But the goals of each side were only about thirty feet apart.
At a signal from the oldest of the chiefs the contestants arranged themselves in two parallel lines facing each other, inside the area and about ten rods apart.Every man was armed with a strong stick three and a half to four feet in length, and curving toward the end.Upon this curved end was tightly fastened a network of thongs of untanned deerskin, drawn until they were rigid and taut.The ball with which they were to play was made of closely wrapped elastic skins, and was about the size of an ordinary apple.
At the end of the lines, but about midway between them, sat the chiefs, who, besides being judges and stakeholders, were also score keepers.They kept tally of the game by cutting notches upon sticks.Every time one side put the ball through the other's goal it counted one, but there was an unusual power exercised by the chiefs, practically unknown to the games of white men.If one side got too far ahead, its score was cut down at the discretion of the chiefs in order to keep the game more even, and also to protract it sometimes over three or four days.
The warriors of the leading side might grumble among one another at the amount of cutting the chiefs did, but they would not dare to make any protest.However, the chiefs would never cut the leading side down to an absolute parity with the other.It was always allowed to retain a margin of the superiority it had won.
The game was now about to begin, and the excitement became intense.Even the old judges leaned forward in their eagerness, while the brown bodies of the warriors shone in the sun, and the taut muscles leaped up under the skin.Fifty players on each side, sticks in hand, advanced to the center of the ground, and arranged themselves somewhat after the fashion of football players, to intercept the passage of the ball toward their goals.
Now they awaited the coming of the ball.
There were several young girls, the daughters of chiefs.The most beautiful of these appeared.She was not more than sixteen or seventeen years of age, as slender and graceful as a young deer, and she was dressed in the finest and most richly embroidered deerskin.Her head was crowned with a red coronet, crested with plumes, made of the feathers of the eagle and heron.She wore silver bracelets and a silver necklace.
The girl, bearing in her hand the ball, sprang into the very center of the arena, where, amid shouts from all the warriors, she placed it upon the ground.Then she sprang back and joined the throng of spectators.Two of the players, one from each side, chosen for strength and dexterity, advanced.They hooked the ball together in their united bats and thus raised it aloft, until the bats were absolutely perpendicular.Then with a quick, jerking motion they shot it upward.Much might be gained by this first shot or stroke, but on this occasion the two players were equal, and it shot almost absolutely straight into the air.The nearest groups made a rush for it, and the fray began.
Not all played at once, as the crowd was so great, but usually twenty or thirty on each side struck for tile ball, and when they became exhausted or disabled were relieved by similar groups.
All eventually came into action.
The game was played with the greatest fire and intensity, assuming sometimes the aspect of a battle.Blows with the formidable sticks were given and received.Brown skins were streaked with blood, heads were cracked, and a Cayuga was killed.
Such killings were not unusual in these games, and it was always considered the fault of the man who fell, due to his own awkwardness or unwariness.The body of the dead Cayuga was taken away in disgrace.
All day long the contest was waged with undiminished courage and zeal, party relieving party.The meadow and the surrounding forest resounded with the shouts and yells of combatants and spectators.The old squaws were in a perfect frenzy of excitement, and their shrill screams of applause or condemnation rose above every other sound.
On this occasion, as the contest did not last longer than one day, the chiefs never cut down the score of the leading side.
