The etymology of Chicago appears to be this:—­

     Chi-cag, Animal of the Leek or Wild Onion. 
     Chi-cag-o-wunz, The Wild Leek or Pole-cat Plant. 
     Chi-ca-go, Place of the Wild Leek.

She also says that Captain Robinson, while commanding at Mackinack, discharged a negro servant named Bonga, who afterwards, with his wife, purchased the house and lot in which Mr. Wendell now lives (the old red house next Dousman’s, south), where he kept a tavern, and maintained a respectable character.  He afterwards sold out and went to Detroit, and lived with Mr. Meldrum.

She adds:  “The son of this Bonga was the late Bonga, who died as a comme, at Lake Winnepec, of the Fond du Lac Department.  The present Stephen Bonga of Folleavoine, a trustworthy trader, is the grandson of this Bonga—­Robinson’s freed slave.  His connections are Chippewas, and all speak the Chippewa language fluently.”

Having seen and known this Bonga, the grandson, I was led to remark that climate and intermarriage have had little or no appreciable effect on the color of the skin.

The traditions of Mr. Viancourt, one of the oldest French residents of Point St. Ignace, who visited the office (24th April), relate that he was born the year Montreal was taken, 1759.  That Mackinack (the island) was first occupied four years after.

He further says that Gov.  Sinclair built a small fort on Black River, and that he gave his name to that part of the straits which have since been called St. Clair.[72] Says he has been on the island forty-seven years, consequently came in 1788.

[Footnote 72:  Consult Charlevoix’s Journal.  Is not so, go far as the origin of the name is concerned.]

The late Mr. J.B.  Nolin, of Sault St. Marie, remarked to John Johnson, Esq., that Governor Sinclair came up with troops the year after the massacre at old Mackinack; and that he landed with a broad belt of wampum in his hands.

Aishkwagon-ai-bee, or the feather of honor, first chief of the Chippewas of Grand Traverse Bay, Lake Michigan, says that the Nadowas (Iroquois) formerly lived at Point St. Ignace—­that they fell out with the Chippewas and Ottawas on a certain day, at a ball-playing, when a Chippewa was killed.  Hereupon, the Chippewas and Ottawas united their strength and drove them away, destroying their village.

The Chippewas and Ottawas then divided the land by natural boundaries.  Grand Traverse Bay fell to the Chippewas.

Another Indian tradition respecting the old village on Isle Rond, was gleaned:—­

Sagitondowa visits the office:  he says he lacks one year of fifty.  His earliest recollections are of the old village on Round Island.  It was then (say 1783, the close of the American Revolutionary War) a large village, and nearly half the island in cultivation.  It was not finally abandoned until lately.