St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1894-02-21

You have heard, M doubt, that the
thoughts of the wild Indian sometimes
run in a poetical vein. This is true. and
L will give You all instance OF it which
is in line with the idea ! am presenting
of the resort TO description for naming
persons and things. or course, a Sioux
Indian in his natural state never saw n
domestic rooster or chicken cock. When
immigration began to crowd them,
this splendid bird made his appear
ance. They observed his noble
carriage, his beautiful plumaya AMI
his defiant air. but none of these char
acterisiicS afforded ground for a name.
They then discovered that he had the
popularity of Growing before the dawn
each morning, and they gave him his
name from this circumstance. They
called him "An-pay- ho-tU-na." or 1.-The
voice Of the morning." which ma be
rendered, "He speaks i'll the morning."
l,howeyer. prefer the former as contain
ing a really poetic expression.
Many such cases can be recalled. |
will give you another that contains both
the poetic and descriptive idea.
OF course before the advent Of the
whites, all Indian never saw the refiec-
ton OF his face in anything but The sur
face Of a lake or stream. When he was
presented with a looking glass he vas
amazed 10 see the m phenomenon
repeated. lie called it ''Minne Odessa"
OF at looks like water"
We see in these things IA certain UNI
studied tinge of natural poetry.
When the steamboat appeared among
them, with It's fiery furnaces and huge
sinokeStackS. putting out volumes of
black smoke and sparks, they were
amazed, and called 1t the only name
that WnnII naturally nnaur tn tI,a,n
'pata- wata," or fire canoe"
The ley phenomenon that came
along was The railroad cars, propelled
by fire as the steamboat was. Ald what
do you think they called them? The
fire canoe that goes over the mountain"
AS there were no railroads when l lived
among the Indians, | cannot give you
the Sioux tor ii.
There was "A Virginia friend of mine
who, OH his first seeing an express train
go whiZZIng by, gave it a name equally
descriptive. he called it sHeli i'll llar-
ness"
There is another point to which |
woaid like to draw your attention,
Among the Sioux, the dog seems to De
the generic type or standard for al most
all animals. They call dog "cnunka,"
IL wolf 'chunka toka-cha," or the other
dog, which Is very appropriate, as the
Two animals very much resemble each
other. The horse is called ''wakol
%chuIka," or the spirit dog. The
panther or tiger "enemu chunka.' or
the cat dog, 4 cat being called "enemu."
II may extend to other animals. out
L am fast forgetting my Sioux, and can
not give more instances.
SOURCE OF The MISSISSIPPI.
In speaking of the name; of natural
objects in Our state. one of the most
interesting is the word 'Itasca." which.
Is the name OF tae lake now Hn)yn to
be the true source of the Mississippi
river. Most people think it is an In
dian word, but such is not the case. 1t
is a coined word. AMI was made under
the following circumstances:
1t las always been an object of inter-
est to know where this great river has
it's source. More than fifty years ago.,
when Gen. Lewis Cass was governor of
Michigan, his territory included ali that
is now Minnesota, AMI he IN lde a voy-
age of discovery to find the source of
the river. He assembled in birch canoes
until he reached the large lake now
known as Cass lake, and not finding
any inlet he decided it to be the source,
and did not pursue his Investigations any
further. This lake was from that
time called CaSS lake, and supposed to
be the head of the river. Some years
after Mr.. Schoolcraft undertook the
same exploration, and, finding Il conSid-
cradle inlet to CaSS lake, he pursued it
hundreds of miles. ami found a SIN all
lake, which he was convinced was tn e
true head, which our historical society
has since absolutely verified. Sch DOL
craft Was not a man of much education,
and knew little Latin and less Greek.
He wanted a name for his lake
that would be agreeable to the
ear and appropriate to the
subject. He had with him a gentleman
who recently died in Saltwater, Rev.
William L. Boutwell,. to whom ne COM
United the important subject of naming
his new-found lake. This party took
two Latin words, ''veritas." truth, and
'caput." the head. He placed them
together and cut off the last two sylla-
bles of ~veritas. making ''Itas' and the
first syllable of caput, making "ca.''
lie then Joined them and made the
beautiful word .'Itasca," or the true
head. A more sklllful or beautiful feat
in a literary point of view was never
chieved.
You will find in some of the edi-
tons of Webster's dictionary the
word accounted for in this way. He
says Ii is taken from two Indian words,
ia" and ''totoSha," meaning, | have
found the breast of the woman, or the
source of life. This is entirely unfound-
ed, as the words cannot b tort ured into
making the word 1tasca, and we know
without 4 doubt that the e. ~planatiun |
give above is absolutely correct. Some
one fooled Webster. It is true that the
words he quotes are strictly good Chip
pewa, and mean what he says they do.
ia" l have found land "To-tO-sha,' 1.-THE
female breast, but they are utterly for.
eign 20 the word "Itasca."
NAMES PASSING AWAY
1t occurs to me that we have an Illus
tration of the fact that original names
are last passing away in our own state
and city. We have a county of Wabasha,
a city of Wabasha, and in st. Paul a
WabaSha street. Ali these names come
from an Indian chief whom l knew very
well and highly respected. He was a
chief OF the Undergraduates. or leap
shooters. and his name was 'Wa-pa-
sha," not Wabasha, Wapa means a
leaf, or a bears head; Sha means red.
So his name meant either Red Leaf or
Red Bears Head. We always thought
it meant the Red Leaf. This corruption
between Wabasha and Wapasha is not
of so much Importance, but it is well.
NVnIlp wa nAn RI rnf fhInrc rIrhE 4
amounts to about as much as Thompson
with a D, or Thomson without a D.
A singular thing among the Sioux In -
dians was their faith in their medical
mysteries. There is a guild among them
called medicine men,. They work Won
ders with the sick and afflicted. l have
known men sick with rheumatism to be
cured by the medicine men rafting
gourds full of beans over their pros
trate forms, and chanting IN a manner
calculated to kill the sick and DESTROY
the nerves of the we'll Thova bod .bon,