Although little is also known about the source of his Sketches, correspondence between the author and historian H. G. Spafford suggests that by late 1825 Cusick did not sell his manuscript, continued the project alone and had it published in Lewiston, New York.

[2]: 217  Driven to preserve the Iroquois tradition, he reveals in a preface to the 1828 edition that he found himself demoralized and unsuited to the task; "the history [was] involved with fables.

"[3]: 3  He tried again, and produced a pamphlet of sketches: some myth, some fact, some a blend of the two, all intended "to throw some light on the history" (unrecorded) "of the original population of the country.

"[1]: 3 Notable aspects of Cusick's preface are his admission that there was no consensus about Iroquois history, and any interpretation he made was likely to be contentious; the humility of his tone, and his observation that truth and myth were indistinct.

Two millennia before the arrival of Christopher Columbus, the Eagwehowe people of the north settled along the river Kanawage and were besieged by a clan of "giants": the Ronnongwetowanea.

After a period of conflict between the Ronnongwetowanea and Eagwehoewe peoples, there was a brief peace which ended in a tumult of hostility when the trickster Shotyeronsgwea sowed chaos throughout the land.

"[1]: 15 According to Iroquois legend, the tribes have battled foes from the invading Otneyarheh ("Stonish Giants") to prehistoric creatures such as the Lake Serpent, "Flying Heads" and musqueto and wars with the Odawa, Erian, and Mississauga nations.

Another divine agent visited the confederacy, imparting lessons in reason and morality and "seeds for corn, beans, squashes, potatoes, and tobacco.

"[1]: 18 The Holder of the Heavens departed, leaving the country vulnerable to plundering – first by the Ko-nea-rau-neh-neh (or Flying Heads) and then by the Lake Serpent and the Otne-yar-heh (Stonish Giants), who brought the Long House to heel.

The serpent-headed chieftain Atotarho led the hostilities at first, before becoming a lawmaker renowned for restoring the bonds among the Five Families and establishing Onondaga as the political and social heart of the confederacy.

About "800 years"[1]: 27  before Columbus's arrival, "the Twakanhahorss (now Mississaugers) ceded the colonies lying between the Kea-nau-hau-sent (Oak-Orchard creek) and the Onyakarra (Niagara) river to the Five Nations."

About 650 years before Columbus's discovery, King Ototarho IV commissioned a western expedition of fifteen men and two captains to "explore the countries toward to the setting sun.

The commander at fort Kauhanauka became ambitious and amassed an army of 2,000 warriors to cross the Niagara river and reach the lake, where they were beaten back by the Twakanhah.

"[1] The Tuscarora were reportedly visited about 400 years before Columbus's landing by an elderly diviner who told them that "beyond the great water"[1]: 38  whites had committed deicide, killing their "Maker," and nothing would stop their march to the Big Island.

The confederacy won the early encounters and, fearing imminent defeat, the Erian queen Yagowanea sued for a favorable peace and they were returned to their country.

Another prophet appeared, "foretell[ing that] the whites would cross the Big Waters and bring strong liquors, and bye up the red people's lands" and exhorting them not to acquiesce "lest they should ruin themselves and displease their Maker.

In a variation on the earth-diver myth, Sketches begins with a dualist story of Iroquois origins similar to Zoroastrian or Manichean narratives in which Good and Evil battle.

"[1][6] If the Native American character was being besmirched, Cusick intended to correct the perception and portray the Iroquois as a formidable, irrepressible people for whom the United States government was another in a long series of adversaries.

Cusick had "produced a small pamphlet in a language almost unintelligible, and filled with a medley of traditions in which a few grains of truth are inextricably mixed with a tangled mass of absurdities.