CHIPPEWA (puckered up roasting, a term said. to have been degiv,ed from the peculiar puckered shape of „their urtoceasuis, 4 which were gathered in 404t 4. a shorten form of Ojihway: (ojib, to, pu: e,r, and . ubrae. to roast) ; one or the largest, Firth, American Indian tribes. They covererLat.one time, over 1,000 miles of territory; from east,to west. They were stretched, along the shores of,lakes Huron and Superior and across the interventpg Icountry,.totO Nor uagota- It is had to define.accurately, the. ippewa country as the Chippewa blended ,readily, in the course of years, with members of thee; Algonquin. race to which they belonged. DUreover, they Irenucatly,;chariged their habitat in places. The Chippewa w4a:99,e of the native races with which..the early into contact; and so we have, had frequent, though somewhat 'uncertain, ,accOltrils -Of .,thern from French sources,• They arc knqwn.to have oc cupied considerable territoryi in Wisconsin, some of it,as far bark as the time ,of the discovery of •America by Columbus. ,Acceirtitrig to native tra4itiou•:.Some of :the:Chippewa have lived in the, territory in and aroqpflijakes.Haroa and Superior ever since:the begaitung,of the race. At Abe time of their, they. were a e snkavilized , people.: oultitfating., oar* beans and medicinal plants and Faecting wild rice. They , were forest dweljerS .aed, even they surged westward, .theyi preferred to keep to the ,:woorlad, couatry„,;though, they emerged from it in places. They were a ha* race, good; hunteree waisrsqrs and, pos &wed of cosisiderahleanteltifr 1 orators, tce., new medi cine, men, were, famed ihro out ,all. the lake region apdahe 'eloquenee of , O the st . their ,story tellers, aa the wisdom and cunning of their great trtba 'leaders still form the subject of the • stories of the old men on the Canadian reservations. , . ,
, The Ch_ippewas - drove , from aortherix Wisconsin : abean-,ths ii Waning of the 18th Celittrry 'and forced-the Rolla across the Mississippi River. They continued their conquest until they' reached Turtle Mountains in North Dakota and established their western headquarters near the head-waters of the Red River. In the meantime other Chippewa bands had entered western Ontario .overrunning the peninsula' between lakes Huron and Erie and forced the 'Iroquois to .reeire eastward. They were .eonstantlY at war with the white settlers as they attempted to move Westward until 1815 when they made a 'treaty of peace with the United States. government, • Which has been fairly well kept iby them over since. The Chip pewas now in the United States are on reserva tions or on:piivate lands in Minnesota, Itikhi gan Wisconsin, North Dakota and Kansas.
The Chippewas were always friendly with the French who gave them' the reputation of being honorable and very faithful in the kee ing of all their treaties .uul other obligations into which. they had once entered. They' were expert canoemen and made long voyages by water; coasting f hundreds of: miles along the 'shored the 'Great Lakes,' Where, in the 'later days'of their prosperity, they met friends everywhere. They were separated into 'more than a score of tribal divisions and were a fairly numerous people; though, on account of the extent of territory they covered, no accurate estimate of their numbers when they were a power in, the land can be made. There are. now about .33,000 Chippewas, one half of which kin Canada and the other in the United States: