The Delaware Indians by Richard C Adams

Great Spirit to give him relief.
He began Ms
supplication with O-oo and heard twelve voices
with the same sound.
When he went to sleep there came to him a
man with his face painted red, and as he
emerged from the darkness only half of his
face showed. This man talked to him and
told of the great things there were in the
world beyond; that his people were wicked,
not only his own family but all his tribe;
that they had forgotten the Great Spirit, which
was the reason why the earthquakes and other
trouble had been visited upon them, and that
more would follow, if they did not repent. The
boy asked why he heard twelve voices answer his
prayer, and the spirit to whom he was talking
replied that he would have to pass through
twelve worlds or spheres before he could get to
the home of the Great Spirit; that in each
sphere there was a Manitou ruling, and that no
prayer could reach the Great Spirit
that did
not come through the twelve spheres ; that his
cry had reached the first, who transmitted it
to the second, and he in turn to the third, and
so on until the twelfth delivered it to the Great
Spirit himself.
He was told to go to the head chief or sachem
and tell him that the people should return
thanks each autumn to the Great Spirit, and
when the people all met he should say that the
Great Spirit sent him to talk to them ; that he
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