At the period of the formation of the league and for at least 75 years afterwards these five tribes, thus united, were surrounded by a number of powerful and hostile tribes, nearly all of which were cognate with them in speech. On the St. Lawrence River, approximately on the present sites of the cities, Montreal and Quebec, dwelt two strong Huron tribes. On the upper Ottawa River were the Algonquin and their congeners. Around Lake Simcoe were two more powerful Huron tribes, to which the two mentioned above as living on the St. Lawrence River migrated about the beginning of the seventeenth century, and formed an alliance with them. These are the four Huron tribes mentioned in the Jesuit Relations. Southward from the Huron tribes, and in the peninsula lying westward from Niagara River and northward from Lake Erie and extending eastward over Niagara River to the watershed of the Genesee River in New York State, were situated the numerous towns of the powerful “neuter nation,” also of cognate speech. South and southeastward of Lake Erie dwelt the warlike Erie, who also were of cognate speech with the Iroquois tribes; and still farther eastward were the little known Black Minqua also of cognate language. In the upper Susquehanna river valley, especially in the Wyoming valley, lived the noted Massawomeke also of cognate speech. On the lower Susquehanna dwelt the fiercely warlike Conestoga. On the Delaware river and its affluents dwelt the Lanape or Delaware tribes who spoke Algonquian dialects. Eastward, along and beyond the Hudson River dwelt the Mohegan and their cognates who also spoke Algonquian dialects. Such summarily was the tribal environment of the five Iroquois tribes at the era of the institution of their league or confederation. Tradition is silent as to any extensive warfare with these surrounding tribes anterior to the founding of the league. History records the use of two fundamentally distinct methods of grouping peoples by means of institutional bonds. The grouping of men in this manner has been aptly termed regimentation. The two systems mentioned are the tribal system of regimentation and the national system of regimentation. In the first, men are regimented or organized on the basis of kinship and affinity, real or as a legal fiction, and in the second, men are regimented or organized in institutional units on the basis of territory. But history records transitional forms of organization, and the most important of these is the feudal, for both methods mentioned above are found in feudal society, showing transition from tribal to national society and government. Now, the tribes of the Iroquoian stock of languages are regimented or organized on the basis of kinship and affinity, real or as a legal fiction, and they trace descent or lineage of blood only through the mother.