Colonial Literature – Wheatley, Pontiac, & Occom
56 Pontiac – Speech at Detroit (c. 1763)
Pontiac
PONTIAC
Translated by John DuVal from [Robert Navarre?], “Journal ou dictation d’une conspiration, faite par les sauvages contre les Anglais, et du siège du fort de Detroix par quatre nations différentes le 7 mai, 1763” in Journal of Pontiac’s Conspiracy, ed. M. Agnes Burton (Detroit, 1912), 23-33. Public Domain.
An Indian[Neolin] of the Loup Nation wanted to meet the Master of Life, which is the name all the Indians call God. He decided, without telling anyone in his nation or village, to go on a journey to Paradise, where he knew the Great Master lived. But since he didn’t know the way to get there and knew no one who had been there and could show him the road, he tried magic, hoping to pull forth good omens from his dreams.
All Indians, as a general rule, put great faith in their dreams, and it is very hard to free them from this superstition, as this story proves. In his dream, the Loup Indian imagined that all
he had to do was start out, and after many, many steps, he would arrive at the heavenly dwelling place, so very early the next day he did start. He dressed and equipped himself for hunting, not forgetting to take his weapons and a large cooking pot.
And thus he set out on his journey to Heaven to see the Master of Life.
The first seven days went well according to his plans. He walked with good courage, always firm in the confidence that he could reach his goal. Eight days went by without anyone appearing to block his way. On the evening of the eighth day, as the sun was setting where it always sets, he stopped at an opening into a little meadow where he saw a good place to spend the night along the bank of a creek. As he was setting up camp, he noticed at the other end of the meadow three paths, all very wide and well trodden down, and this seemed strange to him. Nevertheless, he kept working, setting up shelter and starting a fire. As he cooked his supper, he realized that the farther the sun went down and the darker the day grew, the lighter the three paths became. This surprised him, and frightened him, too.
He hesitated, considering what to do—stay where he was or get away from there and camp somewhere else. But as he reflected, he remembered his magic, or rather, his dream, and that the only reason he had started out on this journey was to see the Master of Life, and this thought led him to feel and believe that one of the three paths was the one he had to take to get where he wanted to go.
[Neolin tries two of the paths but comes upon huge fires on both.]
So he had to go back and take the third path. He walked on it for a whole day without seeing a thing to hold him back, when all of a sudden there appeared before him an astonishingly white mountain, which amazed him and brought him to a halt. Nevertheless, he firmed his resolve and kept going, determined to see what this mountain could be.
When he reached the foot of the mountain, t