The woodland growth along the Indian path was doubtless cleared to suit the native habit of bearing burdens across the back. Thus the red men of all times transported their loads of game or merchandise, and the women carried their children or bore the household goods of skins and earthen pots. We can suppose therefore, that the trail was cleared only so far as to cut away the underbrush waisthigh, wide enough to pass a load or a package projecting beyond its bearer's shoulders, while the path itself was but a couple of hand-spans wide.

INDIAN NOTES

INTRODUCTION

The practical necessity of avoiding unnecessary grades when bearing a heavy load was doubtless a moving element in the choice of a route, and there are many evidences in the course of the known paths of the aborigines that such a defined method was followed by them.

The special purpose of the well-used trails was intercommunication between the native stations, either camps or villages, for the purpose of intercourse or trade, and probably for mutual protection against distant enemies. Such paths, however, ran not only between the several stations of related members of a single tribe or chieftaincy, but were highways of communication between very diverse peoples. The trail up the east side of the Hudson, which is in great part followed by Broadway and the old Albany post-road, provided not only access to the friendly tribes up-river, but to the masterful Mohawk, whose representatives periodically appeared in the region of Manhattan to collect the indemnity or tribute which they had imposed