In sundry other respects they displayed an intelligent activity. In many localities they were agricultural, cultivating maize, beans and tobacco, building large communal houses of logs, fortifying their villages with palisades, and making excellent large canoes of birch bark. According to traditions, which are supported by recent archæological researches, the Cherokees when they were upon the Kanawha and Ohio had large fields under cultivation, and erected mounds as sites for their houses and for burial purposes. When first encountered in East Tennessee they constructed long communal houses like the Five Nations, had large fields of corn, built excellent canoes and manufactured pottery of superior style and finish. Although no method of recording thought had acquired any development among the Iroquois, they had many legends, myths and formal harangues which they handed down with great minuteness from generation to generation. In remembering them they were aided by the wampum belts and strings, which served by the arrangement and design of the beads to fix certain facts and expressions in their minds. One of the most remarkable of these ancient chants has been edited with a translation and copious notes by Horatio Hale.[98] The Cherokees had a similar national song which was repeated solemnly each year at the period of the green corn dance. Fragments of it have been obtained quite recently. The Iroquois myths refer to the struggle of the first two brothers, the dark twin and the white, a familiar symbolism in which we see the personification of the light and darkness, and the struggle of day and night. IROQUOIS LINGUISTIC STOCK. _Andastes_, see _Conestogas_. _Cayugas_, south of Lake Ontario. _Cherokees_, on upper Tennessee river. _Conestogas_, on lower Susquehanna. _Eries_, south of Lake Erie. _Hurons_, see _Wyandots_. _Mohawks_, on Lakes George and Champlain. _Neutral Nation_, west of the Niagara river. _Oneidas_, south of Lake Ontario. _Onondagas_, south of Lake Ontario. _Senecas_, south of Lake Ontario. _Susquehannocks_, on lower Susquehanna. _Tuscaroras_, in Virginia. _Wyandots_, between Lakes Ontario and Huron. 6. THE CHAHTA-MUSKOKIS.