story and fix the identification of
the expelled tribe. According to their tradition, as narrated in 1802,
the ancient fortifications in the Ohio valley had been erected in the
course of a long war between themselves and tin 'Cherokee, which
resulted finally in the defeat of the latter. '
The traditions of the Cherokee, so far as they have been preserved,
'Brinton. D.G., Walani Olum, p. 231; Phila., 1885.
2 Schoolcraft, H. E., Notes on the Iroquois, p. 162; Albany.1847.
20 MYTHS OF THE CHEROKEE [eth.ahij.19
supplement and corroborate those of the northern tribes, thus bring-
ing the storj down to their final settlement upon the headwaters of
the Tennessee in the rich valleys of the southern Aileghenies. < >wing
to the Cherokee predilection for new gods, contrasting strongly with
tin conservatism of the Iroquois, their ritual forms and national epics
hadfallen into decay even before tin' Revolution, a- we learn from
Adair. Some vestiges of their migration legend still existed in Hay-
wood's time, but it is now completely Forgotten both in the East ami
in the West.
According' to Haywood, who wrote in 1823 on information obtained
directly from leading members of the tribe long before the Removal,
the Cherokee formerly had alone- migration lee-end. which was already
lost, hut which, within the memory of the mother of one informant
say about L750 was still recited by chosen orators on the occasion of
the annual green-corn dance. This migration lee-end appears to have
resembled that of the Delawares and the Creeks in beginning with
genesis ami the period of animal monsters, and thence following the
shifting fortune of the chosen hand to the historic period. The tradi-
tion recited that