Osera means "Beaver-dam" as well as "Winter," wrote Horatio Hale. (See Saratoga.) In explanation of Canagariachio Mr. Hale wrote : "Kanagariarchio is a slightly corrupted form of the Iroquois word Kanna' kari-kario , which means simply 'Beaver.' It is a descriptive term compounded of Kannagare, 'Stick' or club, Kakarien, To bite,' and Kario, 'Wild animal.' It is not the most common Iroquois word for Beaver, which, in the Mohawk dialect is Tsiomiito, or Djonnito. That the word should be understood to mean 'The Beaver-Hunting Country,' is in accordance with Indian usage."

Hudson's river on the west. 189

continuance, by conference, of Adirondacks as the name of the district; but it may lead to the replanting of the much more expressive Iroquoian title, Kohsarake, on some hill-top in the ancient wilderness.

On the Mohawk.

Mohawk, the river so called -- ^properly "the Mohawk's River," or river of the Mohawks -- rises near the centre of the State and reaches the Hudson at Cohoes Falls. Its name preserves that by which the most eastern nation of the Iroquoian confederacy, the Six Nations, is generally known in history -- the Maquaas of the early Dutch. The nation, however, did not give that name to the stream except in the sense of occupation as the seat of their possessions to ; them it was the O-hyo^hi-yo'ge, ''Large, chief or principal river" (Hewitt) ; written by Van Curler in 1635, Vyoge and Oyoghi, and by Bruyas "Ohioge, a la riviere," now written Ohio as the name of one of the rivers of the west, nor did they apply the word Mohawk to themselves ; that title was conferred upon them by their Algonquian enemies, as explained by Roger Williams, who wrote in 1646, "Mohozvaiig-sitck, or Mauquazuog, from Moho, 'to eat,' the cannibals or men-eaters," the reference being to the custom of the nation in eating the bodies of enemies who might fall into its hands, a custom of which the Huron nations, of which it was a branch, seem to have been especially guilty.