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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of A Treatise on the Six-Nation Indians
+by James Bovell Mackenzie
+
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+Title: A Treatise on the Six-Nation Indians
+
+Author: James Bovell Mackenzie
+
+Release Date: September, 2004 [EBook #6581]
+[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule]
+[This file was first posted on December 29, 2002]
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+Edition: 10
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+Language: English
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+
+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE SIX-NATION INDIANS ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Sean Barrett, Charles Franks
+and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team.
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+
+                 A TREATISE ON THE SIX-NATION INDIANS
+                          By J. B. MACKENZIE
+
+
+                        ---------------------
+
+                        (_Page 28--lines 7-9_.)
+
+It has seemed to me that it was not quite ingenuous in myself to attribute
+to the Indian writer in question (Rev. Peter Jones), the reflection on
+his countrymen, obviously conveyed in my expression, "discovering in
+him such in-dwelling monsters as revenge, mercilessness, implacability."
+
+That writer's position, more fairly apprehended, is this: That, while
+confessing these to be blots on the Indian nature, in the abstract,
+he yet seeks to fasten them on _many_ whites as well.
+
+                        ---------------------
+
+
+
+                             A TREATISE
+                               ON THE
+                         SIX-NATION INDIANS
+                         BY J. B. MACKENZIE
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+
+The little production presented in these pages was designed for, and
+has been used as, a lecture; and I have wished to preserve, without
+emendation, the form and character of the lecture, as it was delivered.
+
+J. B. M.
+
+
+
+
+A TREATISE ON THE SIX NATION INDIANS
+
+
+INTRODUCTORY
+
+
+As knowledge of the traditions, manners, and national traits of the
+Indians, composing, originally, the six distinct and independent tribes
+of the Mohawks, Tuscaroras, Onondagas, Senecas, Oneidas, and Cayugas;
+tribes now merged in, and known as, the Six Nations, possibly, does
+not extend beyond the immediate district in which they have effected a
+lodgment, I have laid upon myself the task of tracing their history from
+the date of their settlement in the County of Brant, entering, at the
+same time, upon such accessory treatment as would seem to be naturally
+suggested or embraced by the plan I have set before me. As the essay,
+therefore, proposes to deal, mainly, with the contemporary history of
+the Indian, little will be said of his accepted beliefs, at an earlier
+epoch, or of the then current practices built upon, and enjoined by,
+his traditionary faith. Frequent visits to the Indian's Reservation, on
+the south bank of the Grand River, have put me in the way of acquiring
+oral data, which shall subserve my intention; and I shall prosecute my
+attempt with the greater hope of reaping a fair measure of success,
+since I have fortified my position with gleanings (bearing, however,
+solely on minor matters of fact) from some few published records,
+which have to do with the history of the Indian, generally, and have
+been the fruitful labour of authors of repute and standing, native
+as well as white. Should the issue of failure attend upon my effort,
+I shall be disposed to ascribe it to some not obscure reason
+connected with literary style and execution, rather than to the fact
+of there not having been adequate material at hand for the purpose.
+
+
+
+
+THE INDIAN'S CONDITIONS OF SETTLEMENT.
+
+
+The conditions which govern the Indian's occupation of his Reserve are,
+probably, so well known, that any extended reference under this head
+will be needless.
+
+He ceded the whole of his land to the Government, this comprising,
+originally, a tract which pursued the entire length of the Grand River,
+and, accepting it as the radiating point, extended up from either side
+of the river for a distance of six miles, to embrace an area of that
+extent. The Government required the proprietary right to the land, in
+the event of their either desiring to maintain public highways through
+it themselves, or that they might be in a position to sanction, or
+acquiesce in, its use or expropriation by Railway Corporations, for the
+running of their roads; or for other national or general purposes. The
+surrender on the part of the Indian was not, however, an absolute one,
+there having been a reservation that he should have a Reservation, of
+adequate extent, and the fruit of the tilling of which he should enjoy
+as an inviolable privilege.
+
+As regards the money-consideration for this land, the Government stand to
+the Indian in the relation of Trustees, accounting for, and apportioning
+to, him, through the agency of their officer and appointee, the Indian
+Superintendent, at so much _per capita_ of the population, the
+interest arising out of the investment of such money.
+
+_Sales_ of lands among themselves are permissible; but these, for
+the most part, narrow themselves down to cases where an Indian, with the
+possession of a good lot, of fair extent, and with a reasonable clearing,
+vested in him, leaves it, to pursue some calling, or follow some trade,
+amongst the whites; and treats, perhaps, with some younger Indian, who,
+disliking the pioneer work involved in taking up some uncultured place
+for himself, and preferring to make settlement on the comparatively well
+cultivated lot, buys it. The Government, also, allow the Indian, though
+as a matter of sufferance, or, in other words, without bringing the law
+to bear upon him for putting in practice what is, strictly speaking,
+illegal, to _rent_ to a white the lot or lots on which he may be
+located, and to receive the rent, without sacrifice or alienation of
+his interest-money.
+
+Continued non-residence entails upon the non-resident the forfeiture of
+his interest.
+
+The Indian is, of course, a minor in the eye of the law, a feature of
+his estate, with the disabilities it involves, I shall dwell upon more
+fully at a later stage.
+
+Should the Indian intermarry with a white woman, the receipt of his
+interest-allowance is not affected or disturbed thereby, the wife coming
+in, as well, for the benefits of its bestowal; but should, on the other
+hand, an Indian woman intermarry with a white man, such act compels,
+as to herself, acceptance, in a capitalized sum, of her annuities for a
+term of ten years, with their cessation thereafter; and entails upon the
+possible issue of the union _absolute_ forfeiture of interest-money.
+In any connection of the kind, however, that may be entered into, the
+Indian woman is usually sage and provident enough to marry one, whose hold
+upon worldly substance will secure her the domestic ease and comforts, of
+which the non-receipt of her interest would tend to deprive her. Should
+the eventuality arise of the Indian woman dying before her husband,
+the latter must quit the place, which was hers only conditionally,
+though the Indian Council will entertain a reasonable claim from him,
+to be recouped for any possible outlay he may have made for improvements.
+
+The Government confer upon the Indian the privilege of a resident medical
+officer, who is paid by them, and whose duty it is to attend, without
+expectation of fee or compensation of any kind, upon the sick. His
+relation, however, to the Government is not so defined as to preclude
+his acceptance of fees from whites resident on the Reserve, provided
+the advice be sought at his office. The Government, probably, being
+well aware of the stress of work under which their medical appointee
+chronically labours, and appreciating the consequent unlikelihood of
+this privilege being exercised to the prejudice of the Indian, have not,
+as yet, shorn him of it.
+
+Another privilege that the Indian enjoys, and which was granted to him by
+enactment subsequent to that which assured to him his Reserve, is that
+of transit at half-fare grates on the different railroads. This is a
+right which he neither despises, nor, in any way, affects to despise,
+since it meets, and is suited to, his common condition of slender and
+straitened means. The moderate charge permits him to avail frequently
+of the privilege at seasons (which comprehend, in truth, the greater
+portion of the year) when the roads are almost unfit for travel, the
+Indian, as a rule, going in for economy in locomotive exercise (so my
+judgment decrees, though it has been claimed for him that, at an earlier
+period of his history, walking was congenial to him) hailing and adopting
+gladly the medium which obviates recourse to it.
+
+
+
+
+HIS MEETINGS OF COUNCIL.
+
+
+The Indian Council has a province more important than that which our
+Municipal Councils exercise. Its decisions as to disputes growing out
+of real estate transactions, unless clearly wrong, have in them the
+force of law.
+
+The ordinary Council is a somewhat informal gathering as regards a
+presiding officer or officers, and, also, in respect of that essential
+feature of a quorum, for which similar bodies among ourselves hold out
+so exactingly. The Chiefs of the tribes, who, alone, are privileged to
+participate in discussions, can scarcely be looked upon in the light of
+presidents of the meeting; nor can there be discovered in the privileges
+or duties of any one of them the functions of a presiding officer.
+
+The Chiefs of the Mohawks and Senecas, who sit on the left of the house,
+initiate discussion on all questions. The debating is then transferred
+to the opposite side of the house, where are seated the Chiefs of the
+Tuscaroras, Oneidas, and Cayugas, and is carried on by these Chiefs. The
+Chiefs of the Onondagas, who are called "Fire-Keepers" (of the origin
+of the name "Fire-Keeper," I will treat further, anon) then speak
+to the motion, or upon the measure, and, finally, decide everything;
+and they are, in view of this power of finality of decision with all
+questions, regarded as the most important Chiefs among the confederated
+tribes. The decision of the "Fire-Keepers" does not, by any means,
+always show concurrence in what may have been the _consensus_
+of opinion expressed by previous speakers, very frequently, indeed,
+embodying sentiments directly opposite to the weight of the judgment
+with those speakers. As illustrating, more pointedly, the arbitrary
+powers committed to these Chiefs, they may import into the debate a
+fresh and hitherto unbroached line of discussion, and, following it,
+may argue from a quite novel standpoint, and formulate a decision based
+upon some utterly capricious leaning of their own. I have not been able
+to learn whether the decision of these Chiefs, to be valid, requires to be
+established by their unanimous voice, or simply by a majority of the body.
+
+The reason or cogency of the system of debate followed in the Indian
+Council has not seemed to me clearly demonstrable; nor is the cause for
+the honour attaching to the Chiefs of the Mohawks and Senecas, and of
+the Onondagas, respectively, of commencing and closing discussion, very
+explicable. I believe, however, that the principle of kinship subsisting
+between the tribes, the Chiefs of which are thus singled out for these
+duties, governs, in some way, the practice adopted; and am led, also,
+to imagine that exceptional functions, in other matters as well, vest
+in these Chiefs; and that they enjoy, in general, precedence over the
+Chiefs of the other tribes.
+
+The Chiefs in Council take cognizance of the internal concerns,
+and control and administer, generally, the internal affairs, of the
+community. There are often special and extraordinary deliberations of the
+body, which involve discussion upon points that transcend the operation
+of the Indian Acts, and require the Government to be represented; and,
+in these cases, the Indian Superintendent, whose presence is necessary
+to confer validity on any measure passed, is the presiding officer.
+
+As mention is made here of the Superintendent, or, as his title runs in
+full, the Visiting Superintendent and Commissioner, it will be opportune
+now to define his powers, so far as I understand them.
+
+It may be said, in general, that he exercises supervisory power over
+everything that concerns the well-being and interests of the Indian. By
+the representations made by him to the Government in his reports (and by
+those, of course, who hold the like office in other Indian districts)
+has been initiated nearly every law, or amendment to a law, which the
+pages of the Indian Acts disclose.
+
+He will often watch (though in his commission no obligation, I believe,
+rests upon him to do this) the trial of an Indian, where some one of the
+graver crimes is involved, that he may, perchance, arrive at the impelling
+cause for its perpetration. This may have had its origin, perhaps, in
+the criminal's having over-indulged in drink, or in his having resigned
+himself to some immoral bent; or it may have been connected, generally,
+with some deluging of the community with immorality. If, haply, the
+origin of the crime be traced, the Superintendent embodies in his report
+a reccommendation looking to a change in the law, which shall tend to
+suppress and control the evil. If there be indication that a particular
+order of crime prevails, or that, unhappily, some new departure in its
+melancholy category is being practised, it will, again, be his place to
+represent the situation to the Government, to the end that a healthier
+state of things may be brought about. He is authorized, in certain cases,
+to make advances on an individual Indian's account, and, also, on the
+general account, where some emergency affecting the entire tribe arises,
+such as a failure of the crops, confronting the Indian with the serious,
+and, but for this Governmental provision, insuperable, difficulty of
+finding the outlay for seeding for the next season's operations.
+
+It is customary for the Superintendent to attend important examinations
+of the Indian schools, that he may have light upon the pupils' progress,
+and may report accordingly.
+
+Where an occurrence of unusual moment in the history of any of the
+Churches takes place; the projecting, perhaps, of some fresh spiritual
+campaign amongst the Indians; or one, marking some specially auspicious
+event, he will often lend his presence, with the view to enlightenment
+as to the spiritual state of his charges.
+
+I have already said, that through the agency of the Superintendent, the
+Indian receives his interest-money, and it may, perhaps, be interesting to
+detail the manner in which this is usually drawn. The tribes are told off
+for this purpose, and, I believe, certain other purposes, into a number
+of bands; and a given day is set (or, perhaps, three or four days are
+assigned) whereon the members of a particular band shall be privileged
+to draw. If the drawing of the money be not marked by that expedition
+which the plan is designed to secure, but rather suggests that there
+are a number of stragglers yet to come forward to exercise their right,
+the turn of another band comes, and so on, the straggling ones of each
+band being treated with last.
+
+It is usual for the head of each family to draw for himself and his
+domestic circle.
+
+The present incumbent of the Superintendent's office is a gentleman of
+fine parts, and one who has striven, during a term of nearly twenty years,
+with tact and ability, to conserve the interests of the Indian. Speaking
+of tact, the Indian character exacts a large display of it from one whose
+relation to him is such as that which the Superintendent occupies, his
+overseer and, to a large extent, his mentor. There have been outcries
+against his course in some matters, though these have been indulged in
+only a small section; but the Indian chafes under direction, and is,
+for the most part, a chronic grumbler; and his discontent frequently
+finds expression in delegations to the Government, which, though they
+_may_ be planned with the view of ventilating some grievance, are
+more generally conceived of by him in the light of happy expedients
+for giving play to his oratory, or for setting about to establish
+his pretensions to eminence in that regard, in a somewhat exacting
+quarter; or, mayhap, for conveying to the powers that be, by palpable
+demonstration, the fact of his continued existence, and more, of his
+continued _dissatisfied_ existence.
+
+But to return to the Council. Where complaint of irregular dealing is
+preferred by either party to a transfer or sale of real estate, it comes
+within the scope of the Chief's powers to decree an equitable basis upon
+which such transfer or sale shall henceforward be viewed, and carried
+out. The jurisdiction of the Chiefs also ranges over such matters as
+the considering of applications from members of the various tribes for
+licensing the sale to whites of timber, stone, or other valuable deposit,
+with which the property of such applicants may be enriched; and they
+likewise treat with applications for relief from members of the tribes,
+whom physical incapacity debars from earning living, or who have been
+reduced to an abject state of poverty and indigence; and have authority
+to supplement the interest-annuities of such, should they see fit,
+with suitable amounts.
+
+The silent adjudging of a question is something abhorrent to the genius
+of the Indian, and is in reality unknown. Dishonouring thus the custom,
+he can grandly repudiate the contemptuous epithet of "voting machine;"
+so unsparingly directed against, and pitilessly fastening upon, certain
+ignoble legislators among ourselves. The manner of proceeding that
+obtained with the Ojibways was somewhat different from the practice I have
+detailed, and I allude to it now, because the tribe of the Delawares,
+who are now treated as an off-shoot of the Oneidas, and are merged with
+their kin in the Six Nations, belonged originally to the Ojibways. With
+them the decision was come to according to the opinions expressed by the
+majority of the speakers--a plan resolving itself into the system of a
+show of hands (or a show of _tongues_, which shall it be?) it having
+been customary for all who proposed to pass upon a measure to speak as
+well. The issue upheld by the greater number of hands shown, naturally,
+as with us, succeeded. Where a measure, in the progress of discussion,
+proved unpopular, it was dropped, an arrangment which should convey a
+wise hint to certain bodies I wot of.
+
+It will be readily gathered from what has been said, that the method of
+voting, in order to establish what is the judgment of the greater number,
+does not prevail with the Indian Councils.
+
+
+
+
+HIS ORATORY.
+
+
+As it is at his meetings of Council, and during the discussions that
+are there provoked, that the Indian's powers of oratory come, for the
+most part, into play, and secure their freest indulgence, that will
+appropriately constitute my next head.
+
+We are permitted to adjudge the manner and style of the Indian's oratory,
+whether they be easy or strained; graceful or stiff; natural or affected;
+and we may, likewise, discover, if his speech be flowing or hesitating;
+but it is denied to us, of course, to appreciate in any degree, or to
+appraise his utterances. I should say the Indian fulfils the largest
+expectations of the most exacting critic, and the highest standard of
+excellence the critic may prescribe, in all the branches of oratory that
+may (with his province necessarily fettered) fitly engage his attention,
+or be exposed to his hostile shafts.
+
+The Indian has a marvellous control over facial expression, and this,
+undeniably, has a powerful bearing upon true, effective, heart-moving
+oratory. Though his _spoken_ language is to us as a sealed book,
+his is a mobility of countenance that will translate into, and expound
+by, a language shared by universal humanity, diverse mental emotions;
+and assure, to the grasp of universal human ken, the import of those
+emotions; that will express, in turn, fervor, pathos, humor; that,
+to find its completest purpose of unerringly revealing each passion,
+alternately, and for the nonce, swaying the human breast, will traverse,
+as it were, and compass, and range over the entire gamut of human emotion.
+
+The Indian's grace and aptness of gesture, also, in a measure, bespeak
+and proclaim commanding oratory. The power, moreover, which with the
+Indian resides in mere gesture, as a medium for disclosing and laying
+bare the thoughts of his mind, is truly remarkable. Observe the Indian
+interpreter in Court, while in the exercise of that branch of his duty
+which requires that the evidence of an English-speaking witness or, at all
+events, that portion of it which would seem to inculpate the prisoner at
+the bar, or bear upon his crime, shall be given to him in his own tongue;
+and, having been intent upon getting at the drift of the testimony, mark
+how dexterously the interpreter brings gesture and action into play,
+wherever the narration involves unusual incident or startling episode,
+provoking their use! What a reality and vividness does he not throw, in
+this way, into the whole thing! It records, truly, a triumph of mimetic
+skill. Again, the opportune gesture used by the Indian in enforcing
+his speaking must seem so patent, in the light of the after-revelation
+by the interpreter, that we can scarcely err in confiding in it as
+a valuable aid in adjudging his qualities of oratory. We are, often,
+indeed, put in possession of the facts, in anticipation of the province
+of the interpreter, who merely steps in, with his more perfect key, to
+confirm our preconceived interpretation. It may be contended by some
+gainsayer, that the Indian vocabulary, being so much less full and rich
+than our own, gesture and action serve but to cover up dearth of words,
+and are, in truth, well-nigh the sum of the Indian's oratory; a judgment
+which, while, perhaps, conceding to the Indian honour as a pantomimist,
+denies him eminence as a true orator. This may or may not be an aptly
+taken objection, yet I have no hesitation in assigning the Indian high
+artistic rank in these regards, and would fain, indeed, accept him as
+a prime educator in this important branch of oratory.
+
+The attention of his hearers, which an Indian speaker of recognized merit
+arrests and sustains, also lends its weight to substantiate his claim,
+to good oratory; unless, indeed, the discriminating faculties of the
+hearers be greatly at fault, which would caution us not to esteem this
+the guide to correct judgment in the matter that it usually forms.
+
+The Indian enlivens his speaking with frequent humorisms, and has,
+I should say, a finely-developed humorous side to his character; and,
+if the zest his hearers extract from allusions of this nature be not
+inordinate or extravagant, or do not favor a false or too indulgent
+estimate, I would pronounce him an excessively entertaining, as well as
+a vigorous, speaker.
+
+There are in the Indian tongue no very complex, rules of grammar. This
+being so, the Indian, pursuing the study of oratory, needs not to
+undertake the mastery of unelastic and difficult rules, like those
+which our own language comprehends; or to acquire correct models of
+grammatical construction for his guidance; and, being fairly secure
+against his accuracy in these regards being impeached by carping critics,
+even among his own brethren, can better and more readily uphold a claim
+to good oratory than one of ourselves, whose government in speaking, by
+strict rules of grammar is essential, and whom ignorance or contempt of
+those rules would betray into solecisms in its use, which would attract
+unsparing criticism, and, indeed, be fatal to his pretensions in this
+direction.
+
+
+
+
+HIS PHYSICAL MIEN AND CHARACTERISTICS.
+
+
+It will be interesting, perhaps, to notice the particulars, as to physical
+conformation, in which the Indian differs from his white brother.
+
+He maintains a higher average as to height, to fix which at five feet
+ten would, I think, be a just estimate. It is rare, however, to find
+him attain the exceptional stature, quite commonly observed with the
+white, though, where he yields to the latter in this respect, there is
+compensation for it in the way of greater breadth and compactness. There
+are, of course, isolated cases, in which he is distinguished by as great
+height as has ever been reached by ordinary man, and, in these instances,
+I have never failed to notice that his form discloses almost faultless
+proportions, the Indian being never ungainly or gaunt. I think, on the
+whole, that I do no injustice to the white man, when I credit the Indian
+with a better-knit frame than himself.
+
+I am disposed to ascribe, in great measure, the evolving of the erect
+form that the Indian, as a rule, possesses, to the custom in vogue of
+the mother carrying her child strapped across the back, as well as to
+the fact of her discouraging and interdicting any attempts at walking
+on the part of the child, until the muscles shall have been so developed
+as to justify such being made. To this practice, at least, I am safe in
+attributing the rarity, if not the positive absence, with the Indian, of
+that unhappy condition of bow-leggedness, of not too slight prevalence
+with us, and which renders its victim often a butt for not very charitable
+or approving comment.
+
+The Indian is built more, perhaps, for fleetness than strength; and
+his litheness and agility will come in, at another place, for their due
+illustration, when treating of certain of his pastimes.
+
+The Indian has a large head, high cheek bones, in general, large lips
+and mouth; a contour of face inclining, on the whole, to undue breadth,
+and lacking that pleasantly-rounded appearance so characteristic of the
+white. He has usually a scant beard, his chin and cheeks seldom, if ever,
+asserting that sturdy and bountiful growth of whisker and moustache, in
+such esteem with adults among ourselves, and which they are so careful
+to stimulate and insure. Indeed, it is said that the Indian holds rather
+in contempt what we so complacently regard, and will often testify to
+his scorn by plucking out the hairs which protrude, and would fain lend
+themselves to his adornment.
+
+The Indian, normally, has a stolid expression, redeemed slightly, perhaps,
+by its exchange often for a lugubrious one. I should feel disposed to
+predict for him the scoring of an immense success in the personation
+of such characters as those of the melancholy Dane; or of Antonio,
+in the Merchant of Venice, after the turn of the tide in his fortunes,
+when the vengeful figure of the remorseless Shylock rests upon his life
+to blight and to afflict it.
+
+He is easily-moved to tears, though, perhaps, his facile transition from
+the condition presented in the foregoing allusion, into a positively
+lachrymose state, will be readily conceived of, without proclaiming
+specially, the fact. He will maintain a mien, which shall consist
+eminently with the atmosphere of the house of mourning; in truth, as an
+efficient mourner, the Indian may be freely depended upon.
+
+It is contended that the complexion of the Indian has had the tendency to
+grow darker and darker, from his having inhabited smoky, bark wigwams,
+and having held cleanliness in no very exceptional honor; and the
+contention is sought to be made good by the citing of a case of a young,
+fair-skinned boy, who, taking up with an Indian tribe, and adopting in
+every particular their mode of life, developed by his seventieth year
+a complexion as swarthy, and of as distinctively Indian a hue, as that
+of any pure specimen of the race.
+
+If we accept this as a sound view, which, however, carried to its logical
+sequence, should have evolved, one would imagine, the negro out of the
+Indian long are this, why may we not, in the way of argument, fairly and
+legitimately provoked by the theory, look for and consider the converse
+picture (now that the Indian lives in much the same manner as the ordinary
+poor husbandman, and now that we have certainly no warrant for imputing
+to him uncleanly habits) the gradual approach in his complexion to the
+Anglo-Saxon type? If we entertain this counter-proposition, it will then
+be a question between its operation, and his marriage with the white,
+as to which explains the fact of the decline now of the dark complexion
+with the Indian.
+
+The custom of piercing the nose, and suspending nose-jewels therefrom,
+has fallen into disrepute, the Indian, perhaps, having been brought to
+view these as contributing, in a questionable way, to his adornment.
+
+The Indian woman has a finer development, as a rule, than the white
+woman. We may, in part, discover the cause for this in the prevalence
+of the custom, already alluded to, of the mother carrying her offspring
+on her back, which, with its not undue strain on the dorsal muscles,
+no doubt, promotes and conserves muscular strength. The Indian woman
+being commonly a wife and mother before a really full maturity has been
+reached, or any absolute unyieldingness of form been contracted, the
+figure yet admits of such-like beneficent processes being exerted upon it.
+In making mention of this custom, and, in a certain way, paying it honor,
+let me not be taken as wishing to precipitate a revolution in the accepted
+modes, with refined-communities, of bringing up children. To a community,
+however, like that of which we are treating, such plan is not ill-suited,
+the Indian mother being secure against any very critical observation of
+her acts, or of the fashion she adopts. Let the custom, then, continue,
+as it can be shown, I think, to favour the production of a healthier
+and stronger frame both in the mother and in the child. A good figure is
+also insured to the Indian woman, from her contemning, perhaps at the bid
+of necessity, arising from her poverty, though, I verily believe, from
+a well-grounded conception of their deforming tendencies, the absurdly
+irrational measures, which, adopted by many among ourselves to promote
+symmetry, only bring about distortion.
+
+The Indian has very symmetrical hands, and the variation in size,
+in this respect, in the case of the two sexes, is often very slight,
+and, sometimes, scarce to be traced. The compliment, in the case of the
+man, has, and is meant to have, about it a quite appreciable tinge of
+condemnation, as suggesting his self-compassionate recoiling from manual
+exertion; and the explanation of the near approach in the formation of the
+hand of the woman to that of the man, may be found in the delegating to
+her, by the latter, in unstinted measure, and in merciless fashion, work
+that should be his. It is rare, also, to find a really awkwardly shaped
+foot in an Indian. The near conformity to a uniform size in the case of
+the two sexes, which I have noticed as being peculiar with the hand,
+may also be observed with the foot. I would sum up my considerations
+here with the confident assertion that the examination of a number of
+specimens of the hand or foot in an Indian, would demonstrate a range
+in size positively immaterial.
+
+The Indian woman keeps up, to a large extent, the practice of wearing
+leggings and moccasins.
+
+I should be disposed to think that the blood coursing through the Indian's
+frame is of a richer consistency, and has, altogether, greater vitalizing
+properties than that in ourselves, since on the severest day in winter
+he will frequently scorn any covering beyond his shirt, and the nether
+garments usually suggested by its mention, and, so apparelled, will not
+recoil from the keenest blast.
+
+
+
+
+HIS CHIEFS AND THEIR FUNCTIONS.
+
+
+The dignity of a chief comes to the holder through the principle of
+hereditary succession, confined to, and operating only with, certain
+families. In the cage of the death of one of these chiefs, the distinction
+and powers he enjoyed devolve upon his kinsman, though not necessarily
+upon the next of kin. The naming and appointing of a successor, and the
+adjudicating upon the point as to whether he fulfils the qualifications
+esteemed necessary to maintain the dignity of the chiefship, are confided
+to the oldest woman of the tribe, thus deprived by death of one of
+its heads. She has a certain latitude in choosing, and, so long as she
+respects in the selection of her appointee, the principle of kinship
+to the dead chief (whether this be proximate or remote is immaterial)
+her appointment is approved and confirmed.
+
+The chiefs are looked upon as the heads or fathers of the tribe,
+and they rely, to a large extent, for their influence over the tribe,
+upon their wisdom, and eminence generally in qualities that excite or
+compel admiration or regard. In an earlier period of the history of the
+Indian communities, when their forests were astir with the demon of war,
+eligibility for the chiefship contemplated in the chief the conjoining
+of bravery with wisdom, and these were the keynote to his power over his
+people. He, by manifesting on occasion, these, desirable traits, had his
+followers' confidence confirmed in his selection; upheld those followers'
+and his own traditions; and often assured his tribe's pre-eminence. The
+chief, in addition, by bringing these qualities to bear in any contact or
+treaty with a hostile tribe, compelled in a sense the recognition by his
+enemies of the prestige and power of his entire following. Hospitality
+was also considered a desirable trait in the chief, who, while habitually
+dispensing it himself, strove (having his endeavors distinctly seconded
+by the advocacy of the duty enforced in the kindly precepts of the old
+sages of the tribe) to dispose the minds of his followers to entertain
+a perception of the happy results which would flow to themselves by
+their being inured to its practice, the expanding of the heart, and the
+offering of a vent to the unselfish side of their nature.
+
+If the chief do not, in the main, conserve the qualities that are deemed
+befitting in the holder of the chiefship; or if he originate any measure
+which finds popular disfavour, his power with the people declines.
+
+A number of the chiefs have supplementary functions, conferred upon
+them by their brother dignitaries. There is, for example, one called
+the Forest-Ranger, whose place it is to interpose for the effectual
+prevention and checking of sales of timber to whites, by members of
+the different tribes; or removal by whites of timber from the Reserve,
+where a license, which suffers either to be done, has not been granted.
+In cases where an Indian meditates, in a spirit of lofty contempt for
+the license, any such illicit sale; or attempts to abet any such unlawful
+removal, this functionary has authority to frustrate both objects.
+
+The chief who, at present, fulfils these duties has not been permitted to
+hold barren or dormant powers. In putting into effect that interference
+which his office exacts of him, he has been more than once terribly
+assaulted by whites, foiled in their plans, and exasperated by the agency
+that had stepped in for the baffling of their ill-formed designs. On
+one occasion, his death was all but brought about by a cruelly concerted
+attack upon him.
+
+Certain other chiefs are called Fire-keepers, though their functions
+are not in any way suggested by their rather remarkable title. They are,
+however, very important persons, and I have already, in treating of the
+Indian's meetings of Council, touched upon their duty. I believe the
+name Fire-keeper is retained from the circumstance that, in by-gone days,
+when the council was an open-air affair, the lighting of the fire was the
+initiatory step, and, taken in this way, therefore, the most important
+step, in the proceedings.
+
+Another chief is called Marshal, and it is incumbent upon him to
+co-operate with the officers of the law in effecting the capture of any
+suspected criminal or criminals, who may lie concealed, or be harbored,
+on the Reserve. He is a duly qualified county constable, though his
+services are not often in request, as the Chief of Police in Brantford,
+whose place it is to direct the way in which crimes (committed, of
+course, in the city) shall be ferreted out, or their authors tracked,
+usually confides in his own staff to promote these desirable purposes,
+from the fact of their accountability to him being well defined, whereas
+the county constable yields no obedience to him.
+
+
+
+
+HIS CHARACTER, MORAL AND GENERAL.
+
+
+It is often claimed for the Indian that, before the white man put him in
+the way of a freer indulgence of his unhappy craving for drink, he was
+as moral a being as one unrenewed by Divine grace could be expected to
+be. Unfortunately, this statement involves no definition of what might be
+considered moral, under the circumstances. Now, there will be disagreeing
+estimates of what a moral character, upon which there has been no
+descent of heavenly grace, or where grace has not supervened to essay its
+recreation, or its moulding anew, should be; and there will also, I think,
+be divergent views as to a code of morals to be practised which shall
+comport with the exhibition of a _reasonably_ seemly morality. I
+cannot, at least, concur in that definition of a moral character, upon
+which no operation of Divine grace has been expended, for its raising or
+its beautifying, which accepts that of the pagan Indian as its highest
+expression; and, distinctly, hesitate to affirm that a high moral instinct
+inheres in the Indian, or that such is permitted to dominate his mind;
+and, when I find one of these very writers who claim for him a high
+inborn morality, discovering in him such indwelling monsters as revenge,
+mercilessness, implacability, the affirmation falters not the less upon
+my tongue. That very many of the graver crimes laid at the Indian's
+door, and the revolting heinousness of which the records of our courts
+reveal; may be traced to his prescribing for himself, and practising,
+a lax standard of morals, is a statement which it would be idle to
+dispute. That the marriage tie exacts from him not the most onerous of
+interpretations, and that the scriptural basis for a sound morality,
+involved in the declaration, "and they twain shall be one flesh," not
+seldom escapes, in his case, its full and due honoring, are, likewise,
+affirmations not susceptible of being refuted. That, for instance, is
+not a high notion of marital constancy (marital is scarcely the term,
+for I am speaking now of the pagan, who rejects the idea of marriage,
+though often, I confess, living happily and uninterruptedly with the woman
+of his choice) which permits the summary disruption of the bond between
+man and woman; nor is paternal responsibility rigorously defined by one,
+who causes to cease, at will, his labor and care for, and support of,
+his children, leaving the reassuring of these to those children contingent
+upon the mother finding some one else to give them and herself a home.
+
+To follow a lighter vein for a moment. The Police Magistrate at
+Brantford, before whom many of these little domesticities come for
+their due appreciation (for they disclose, often, elements of really
+baffling complexity) not less than their ventilation and unravelling,
+is an eminently peace-loving man, and quite an adept at patching up
+such-like conjugal trifles. He will dispense from his tribunal sage
+advice, and prescribe remedial measures, which shall have untold efficacy,
+in dispelling mutual mistrust, restoring mutual confidence, and bringing
+about a lasting re-union. He will interpose, like some potent magician,
+to transform a discordant, recriminating, utterly unlovely couple, into
+a pair of harmless, peaceable, love-consumed doves. There rises before
+my mind a case for illustration. A couple lived on the Reserve, whose
+domestic life had become so completely embittered that every vestige
+of old-time happiness had fled. The agency of the Police Magistrate was
+sought to decree terms of separation, as there was an adamantine resolve
+on the part of each to no longer live with the other. Thus, in a frame
+of mind altogether repelling the notion of conversion to gentler views,
+or the idea of laudable endeavor, on the part of another, to instil
+milder counsels, being availingly expended, they repaired to the Police
+Magistrate's office. He, by invoking old recollections on either side,
+and judiciously inviting them to a retrospection of their former mutual
+courtesies, and early undimmed pleasures, gradually brought the would-be
+sundered people to a wiser mind. I believe there have only been two or
+three outbursts of domestic infelicity since.
+
+Certain notions, bound up with the Indian's practice, in times now
+happily passed away, of polygamy, may be construed into an advocacy
+of the Deceased Wife's Sister's Bill, which engaged the attention of
+Parliament last session, and bids fair to take up the time and thought of
+our legislators, in sessions yet to come. The Indian usually sought to
+marry two sisters, holding that the children of the one would be loved
+and cared for more by the other than if the wives were not related. The
+concurrent existence of both mothers is, of course, presumed here. The
+question remains to be asked, would the children of the one sister,
+were their mother dead, be as well loved and cared for by the surviving
+sister, were she called upon to exercise the functions of a step-mother;
+and would the children of the dead sister love the children of the living
+sister, were they not viewed upon the same footing as those children?
+
+That the Indian--the _Christian_ Indian--frequently contemns the
+means unsparingly used, and the attempts and arguments put forth, by his
+spiritual overseers, to restrain his immoral propensities, to bridle his
+immoral instinct, and to ameliorate and elevate, generally, his moral
+tone, I fear, will not be gainsaid. That very many, on the other hand,
+practice a high morality, and set before themselves an exalted conception
+of conjugal duty, and strive, with a full-hearted earnestness, to fulfil
+that conception, none would-be so blind or so unjust as to deny.
+
+There are some features in the Indian character to which unstinted praise
+is due, and shall be rendered.
+
+He is very hospitable; and (herein nobly conserving his traditions) it
+is in no wise uncommon for him to resign the best of the rude comforts he
+has, in the way of accommodation, to some belated one, and content himself
+with the scantest of those scant comforts, impressing, at the same time,
+with his native delicacy, the notion, that he courts, rather than shrinks
+from, the almost penitential regime. Though one would naturally think,
+that the scorn of material comforts, suggested here, and which many others
+of his acts evince, would scarcely breed indolence in the Indian, yet this
+is with him an almost unconquerable weakness. It is, indeed, so ingrained
+within him, as to resist any attempt, on his own part, to excise it from
+his economy; and as to defy extirpating or uprooting process sought to
+be enforced by another. The Indian is, in truth, a supremely indolent
+being, and testifying to an utter abandonment of himself to the power
+of indolence over him, has often been known, when recourse solely to the
+chase was permitted him for the filling of his larder, to delay his steps
+to the forest, until the gnawing pangs of hunger should drive him there,
+as offering him the only plan for their appeasing.
+
+When I have said that the Indian is hospitable, I have said that he is
+kind and considerate, for these are involved with the other. He has
+much of native delicacy and politeness; and though, from deep-seated
+prepossession, he denies the woman equal footing with himself; and,
+though through misconception of woman's true purpose and mission in
+the world, or through failing to apprehend that higher, greater, more
+palpable helpfulness she brings to man (all these, because self-dictated,
+self-enforced) he commits to her much of the drudgery, and imposes upon
+her many of the heavy burdens, of life, the Indian is not wholly devoid
+of chivalric instinct.
+
+He is usually reticent in his manner with strangers, (but this is readily
+explained by his imperfect command of English, and his reluctance to
+expose his deficiency) though voluble to the last degree when he falls
+in with his own people.
+
+The Indian has been lauded and hymned by Longfellow and others as the
+hunter _par excellence;_ but, to apply this to his present condition,
+and look there for its truth, would be idle. The incitements to indulge
+his taste for hunting are now so few, and of such slight potency, and the
+opportunities for giving it play so narrowed down, and so rare, that the
+pursuit of the chase has become well-nigh obsolete, and something to him
+redolent only, as it were, with the breath of the past. As the Indian
+is at present circumstanced and environed, he can beat up little or no
+game, and his poverty frequently putting out of his reach the procuring
+of the needful sporting gear, where he _does_ follow hunting, it
+is pursued with much-weakened ardor, and often bootless issue. He is
+moved now to its pursuit, solely with the hope of realizing a paltry
+gain from the sale of the few prizes he may secure.
+
+Though his reputation as a hunter has so mournfully declined, the Indian
+is yet skilled in tracking rabbits, in the winter season, the youth,
+particularly, finding this a pleasant diversion. I trust I do not invoke
+the hasty ire of the sportsman if, in guilelessness of soul, I call this
+hunting. This very circumscribing of the occasions, and inefficacy of
+the motive powers, for engaging in hunting, will tend, it is hoped, to
+correct the indolent habits that the Indian nurses, and the inveteracy
+of which I have just dwelt upon, and emphasized; for it will not,
+I think, be denied that his former full-hearted pursuit of the chase
+(in submission, largely though it was, to imperious calls of nature), is
+responsible, mainly, for the inherence of this unpleasing trait. Though,
+of course, hunting in its very nature, enforces a certain activity, it
+is an activity, so far as any beneficent impressing of the character is
+concerned, void of wholesomeness, and barren of solid, lasting results;
+and, viewed in this way, an activity really akin to indolence. With
+the craving for hunting subdued, the Indian may take up, with less
+distraction, and devote himself, to good advantage, to his farming,
+and to industrial callings.
+
+Want of energy and of steadiness of purpose are with the Indian
+conspicuous weaknesses, and their bearing upon his farming operations
+may be briefly noticed. He will not devote himself to his work in the
+fields with that full-intentioned mind to put in an honest day's toil,
+that the white man brings to his work, often being beguiled, by some
+outside pleasure or amusement, into permitting his day's work to sustain
+a break, which he laments afterwards in a melancholy refrain, of farming
+operations behind, and domestic matters unhinged, generally. Though the
+white has endeavored (and I the more gladly bear my witness to these
+attempts at the redemption of the Indian from some of his weaknesses,
+since the white has been so freely charged with ministering to his
+appetite for drink, and to the evil side of his nature generally)
+to infuse these qualities of energy and resolution into the Indian,
+my observation has not yet discerned them in him. Though irresolute
+himself, the Indian will not tolerate, but is sufficiently warm in his
+disapprobation, of any unmanly surrender to weakness or vacillation on
+the part of whites set in authority over him.
+
+He imbibes freely (I fear the notion of a certain physiological process
+is embraced by some minds, and that these words will be taken as curtly
+enunciating the Indian's besetting weakness; but pray be not too eager
+to dissever them from what is yet to come, as I protest that I am not
+now wishing to revert to this sad failing). He imbibes freely--the
+current fashions of the hour amongst whites. If raffling, for instance,
+be held in honour as a method for expediting the sale of personal effects,
+the Indian will adapt the practice to the disposal of every conceivable
+chattel that he desires to get off his hands.
+
+
+
+
+HIS PRONENESS TO DRINK.
+
+
+The Indian Law, it is well known, puts a restraint, not only upon
+the purchase of liquor by the Indian, but upon its sale to him by the
+liquor-seller, or its supply, indeed, in any way, by any one. It forbids,
+as well, the introducing or harboring of it, in any shape, under any
+plea, on the Reserve. The law, in this respect, frequently proves a dead
+letter, since, where the Indian has not the assurance and hardihood to
+boldly demand the liquor from the hotel-keeper, or where the latter,
+imbued with a wholesome fear of the penalty for contravening the law,
+refrains from giving it, the agency of degraded whites is readily
+secured by the Indian, and, with their connivance, the unlawful object
+compassed. Of course the white abettor in these cases risks trifling,
+if any, publicity in the matter, and is inspired with the less fear of
+detection. There are some few hotel-keepers who, though they more than
+suspect the purpose to which the liquor these whites are demanding is
+to be applied, permit rapacity to overpower righteous compunction or
+scruple, and lend themselves, likewise, though indirectly, to the law's
+infraction. Happily, the penalty is now so heavy ($300) that the evil is,
+I think, being got under control.
+
+The effect of drink on the Indian is: to dethrone his; reason; cloud,
+even narcotize, his reasoning faculties; annul his self-control; confine
+and fetter all the gentler, enkindle and set ablaze, all the baser,
+emotions; of his nature, inciting him to acts lustful and bestial; and,
+with direful transforming power, to make the man the fiend, to leave him,
+in short, the mere sport of demoniac passion. It may be thought that
+this is an overdrawn picture, and that, even if it were true, which
+I aver that it is, to have withheld a part of its terribleness would
+be the wiser course. I wish, however, in exposing all its frightful
+features, to secure the pointing of a moral to all who lend themselves
+to the draughting of such a picture, or, in any way, hold in favor the
+draughts which lead to its draughting. Let not the Indian, then, resent
+this picturing of him in such unpleasing and repugnant light, but let him
+rather apply and use the lesson it is sought to teach, that it may turn
+to his enduring advantage. Let him overmaster the enslaving passion; let
+him foreswear the tempting indulgence; let him recoil from the envenomed
+cup, which savors of the hellish breath and the ensnaring craft of the
+Evil One, ever seeking to draw chains of Satanic forging about him. The
+Indian will plead utter obliviousness of the _fracas_, following
+some drunken bout, and during the progress of which the death-stroke has
+been dealt to some unhappy brother. He will disavow all recollection of
+the apparently systematic doing to death, when drunk, under circumstances
+of the most revolting atrocity, of an unfortunate wife.
+
+Though the proximate result of drink is with the Indian more alarming than
+with the white, the ultimate evils and sorrows wrought by continued excess
+in drink are, of course, identical in both cases: moral sensibilities
+blunted; manhood degraded; mind wrecked; worldly substance dissipated;
+health shattered; strength sapped; every mendacious and tortuous bent
+of one's nature stimulated, and given free scope.
+
+
+
+
+HIS HUMOR.
+
+
+In its very nature this essay will partake largely of the element
+of historical preciseness, and if it do not, I have so far failed to
+gain my end. I have wished to introduce matter of a kind calculated to
+relieve this, and to insure the escape of the essay from the charge of
+a well-sustained dryness.
+
+Of the humorous instinct of the Indian, as indulged toward his
+fellow-Indian, I cannot speak with confidence; of the malign
+operation upon myself of the same instinct, I can speak with somewhat
+more exactness, and with somewhat saddening recollections. The cases,
+indeed, where I have been exposed to the play of his humor exhibit him
+in so superlatively complacent an aspect, and myself in so painfully
+inglorious a one, that I refrain, nay shrink, from rehearsing the
+discomposing circumstances. I should be pleased if I could call to mind
+any instance which would convey some notion of the Indian's aptness in
+this line, and yet not involve myself, but I cannot. I would say, in a
+general way, that the Indian is a plausible being, and one needs to be
+wary with him, and not too loth to suspect him of meditating some dire
+practical joke, which shall issue in the utter confusion and discomfiture
+of its victim, whilst its author shall appropriate the main comfort and
+jubilation. Though the Indian, perhaps, does not conceive these in the
+determinedly hostile spirit with which the Mohometan who seeks to compass
+the Christian's undoing is credited, there is yet such striking accord
+in the two cases, so far as exultant approval of the issue is concerned,
+that I am disposed to look upon his creed in this respect as a modified
+Mahometanism. I could relate many instances, affecting myself, where
+trustfulness has incurred payment in this coin, but, having no desire
+to stimulate the Indian's existing proneness to practical joking, I stay
+my hand at further mention of the peculiarity.
+
+
+
+
+HIS INTELLECTUAL GIFTS.
+
+
+The Indian has little hope of occupying a sphere, where the discipline
+and cultivation of the mind shall be essential to the proper balancing
+and developing of its powers, and shall render it equal to the collision
+with other keen intellects. It would, therefore, be equally idle and
+unprofitable to attempt to measure his mental capabilities, until we
+shall have experience of his intellectuality, with proper stimulating
+and inciting influences in play, or under circumstances, conducing,
+generally, to mental strength and vigor, to note; and which we may employ
+as a reliable basis for judgment; and it would be manifestly unfair
+to argue weak mental calibre, or to presage small mental capacity in
+the Indian, from his present deplorable state of inertness, a condition
+which has been sadly impressed and confirmed by repressive legislation,
+and of which that legislation, by practically denying him occupation of
+improving fields of thought, and, indeed, scope for any enlarged mental
+activity, seeks to decree the melancholy perpetuity.
+
+In some of the few cases where supervenient aid has enabled him to
+qualify for, and embrace, a profession, I have perceived a tendency
+to subordinate its practice to the demands of some less exacting
+calling, which has rendered nugatory any efficient mastery of the
+profession. Memory is, undoubtedly, the Indian's strong point, and I can
+myself testify to exhibitions of it, truly phenomenal. The interpreter
+will placidly proceed to translate a long string of sentences, just
+fallen from a speaker's lips, to engraft which upon our memory would be
+a performance most trying and difficult; and to have their repetition.
+even with a proximate adherence to the sense and the expressions used,
+imposed upon us, in the peremptory fashion in which it is sprung upon
+the interpreter, would carry the wildest dismay to our mind. Those
+understanding the Indian tongue have frequently assured me that the
+Indian, when interpreting, reproduces with minuteness, if he be granted,
+of course, a certain latitude for differences of idiom, the speaker's
+thought and expressions. It is said by one of his own writers that the
+Indian is much more prone to follow the evil than the moral practices
+of the white; and there can be no doubt, I think, that, if habitually
+thrown with a corrupt community, or one where a low order of morality
+should obtain, the acquisition of higher knowledge would tend to make
+him better skilled in planning works of iniquity, than to give him
+higher and purer tastes. Actual experience of the Indian, in one or two
+cases, where there has been a more than common accession to his mental
+accomplishments, rather gives color to the notion of the misdirection
+of those accomplishments (even without the baneful white influence)
+that has been hinted at.
+
+I should think the Indian would, probably, even with proper discipline
+to bear, lack powers of concentration, with the kindred faculty of being
+able to direct the mind to the achieving or subserving of some one grand
+purpose or aim, and would, likely, be deficient in other allied ways,
+by which a gifted and powerful mind will be asserted; and would imagine,
+on the whole, that there is slight ground for thinking him capable,
+under the most favourable circumstances, of imperilling the eminence of
+the white in respect of intellectual power and attainments.
+
+
+
+
+HIS PASTIMES.
+
+
+Lacrosse, it is well-known, is the Indian's national game. The agile form
+with which nature has gifted him, and which I have mentioned already as
+one of his physical characteristics, brings an essential pre-requisite
+for success or eminence to a game, where the laggard is at heavy discount.
+
+Though a white team can often boast of two or three individual runners,
+whose fleetness will outstrip the capacity of an equal number on the
+side of the Indians, I think, perhaps, that it will be allowed that
+the Indian team, as a rule, will comprehend the greater number of fleet
+members. While the Indian, then, can scarcely be said to yield to the
+white in this respect, he lacks obviously that mental quick-sightedness
+which, with the latter, defines, as it were, intuitively, the exact
+location on the field, of a friend, and, with unerring certitude,
+calculates the degree of force that shall be needed to propel the ball,
+and the precise direction its flight shall take, in order to insure
+its reposing on the net of that friend. In the frequently recurring
+_mêlees_, begotten of the struggle amongst a number of contestants
+for the possession of the ball, the Indian exhibits, perhaps, in more
+marked degree than the white, the qualities of stubborn doggedness,
+and utter disregard of personal injury.
+
+The worsting of the Indian by the white in the majority of competitions of
+this kind is due to the latter submitting to be governed by system, and
+to his recognizing a directing power in the captain. The Indian, on the
+other hand, will not bend to such controlling influence, but chafes under
+direction of any kind. He has good facilities for practice at this game,
+and, I believe, really tries to excel in it, often, indeed, the expense of
+duties, which imperatively call him elsewhere than to the lacrosse-field.
+
+The Indian is a proficient canoeist, and will adventure himself
+with confidence in a canoe of the frailest construction, which he
+will guide in safety, and with surpassing skill. He will dispel the
+fears of his disquieted and faithless fellow-voyager (for the motion
+at times in canoeing is, unmistakably, perturbing and discomposing;
+indeed, in this unsettling experience, the body is a frequent, if not
+an inevitable, sharer) who, in view of his sublime disregard of danger,
+will quickly re-assert the courage that had waned. If, however, there
+be a second Indian in the canoe, he usually strives to counteract the
+reassuring effect that the pilot's bearing has upon you. He stands up in
+the bottom, and sways, to and fro, and, with fell and malignant intent
+proceeds to evolve out of the canoe a more approved see-saw action than
+_a priori_ and inherently attaches to that order of craft. On that
+really "Grand" river, which was his sometime heritage, the Indian can
+well improve his skill in this modest branch of nautical science.
+
+
+
+
+HIS TRADING RELATIONS WITH WHITES.
+
+
+The consciousness of unsatisfied pecuniary obligation does not, as a
+rule, weigh heavily on the Indian mind, nor does it usually awaken,
+or offer food for, burdensome reflection.
+
+The Indian Act, which decrees his minority, disables him from entering
+into a contract of any kind, though it scarcely needs any statement
+from me to assure my hearers that the law does not secure, nor does the
+majestic arm of that law exact, from him, the most rigid compliance.
+
+The Indian will make and tender to a white creditor his promissory note
+with a gleeful complacency. There are usually two elements contributing,
+in perhaps equal degree, to produce in him this complacent frame of mind:
+The first, that, for removing from his immediate consideration a debt,
+he is adopting a temporizing expedient, which in no way vouches for,
+and in no sense bespeaks, the ultimate payment of the debt; the other,
+that his act records his sense of rebellion against a restrictive law,
+ever welling up in his breast, and seeking such-like opportune vent for
+its relief.
+
+In trading with a merchant, who, appreciating the wiliness of his
+customer, felt a natural concern about trading upon as safe a basis as
+might be secured, it was, until quite recently, customary with the Indian
+to anticipate his interest-money, in paying for his goods. That the
+merchant might have a guarantee that previous instances of the setting
+on foot of this plan in the individual Indian's case, had not effected
+the entire appropriation or exhaustion of his allowance, or that in
+the immediate transaction with him, the Indian's allowance would not be
+exceeded, a chief of the particular tribe to which the Indian belonged,
+who was assumed to keep track of the various amounts that at different
+times impaired the interest-fund, signed an order for him to tender to
+the merchant; and in order that the Superintendent might properly award
+and pay the balance coming, these orders would go into his possession,
+before he should proceed with the season's payments. Now, however, the
+place and times at which interest payments are made, are not allowed to
+be viewed by merchants and others as a collection depôt, or as occasions
+on which their orders from Indians may be confirmed, or debts from those
+Indians made good.
+
+The merchant, foreseeing that a large proportion of the debts from Indians
+that he books are not recoverable, will frequently--and I presume there
+is nothing savoring of dubious dealing in the matter--add, perhaps,
+thirty or forty per cent. to the usual retail price of the goods sold
+to them, that the collection of some of the debts may, as it were,
+offset the loss from those that are irrecoverable.
+
+It is not pleasant to impugn the character of the Indian for uprightness
+and probity, but that there is no conspicuous prevalence of these
+qualities with him, I fear, can be sufficiently demonstrated. I am
+disposed to ascribe this state of things, to a large extent, to the
+operation of the Indian Law. If the Indian who buys, and does not pay,
+and who never intends to pay, were not exempted from the salutary lesson
+which the distraint, at suit of a creditor, upon his goods, teaches,
+he would not seek to evade payment of his debts.
+
+If, again, the Indian were not regarded as one "childlike," shall I say,
+"and bland" (no! I must dissever these words from the otherwise apt
+quotation, as, though this be to proclaim how immeasurably he has fallen,
+and to dissipate cherished popular beliefs about him, I conceive him to
+be bland, without being so decreed by the law) there would be a manifest
+accession to his fund of self-respect. The idea of holding him a minor,
+and as one who cannot be kept to his engagements is a mistake, and its
+effect is only to stimulate the dishonest bent of his nature, prompting
+him to take advantage of his white brother in every conceivable way,
+where the latter's business relations with him are concerned.
+
+
+
+
+HIS RELIGION.
+
+
+The pagan, though not so alive to the serene beauties of the Christian
+life, and not so attracted by the power, the promises, and the assurances
+of the Christian religion, as to evince the one, and embrace the other, or
+to make trial of the moral safeguards that its armoury supplies, would yet
+so honour, one would think, the persuasive Christian influences, operating
+around him and about him in so many benign and kindly ways, as to abandon
+many of the practices that savour of the superstition of a by-gone age.
+Though there has been a decline, if not a positive discontinuance, of
+his traditionary worship of idols; though his adoration of the sun, of
+certain of the birds of the air, and of the animal creation, is not now
+blindly followed, and the invocation of these, for the supposed assuring
+of success to various enterprises, is rarely put in effect, there is yet
+preserved a relic of his old traditions, in the designs with which he
+embellishes certain specimens of the handiwork, with which he oft vexes
+the public eye. (I must really, though, pay my tribute of admiration
+for the skilled workmanship many of these specimens disclose.) It is
+common for him, when at work upon the elaborate carving in wood that he
+practises, to engrave some hideous human figure, intended, obviously,
+to represent an idol. Does it not excite wonder with us that such
+refinements upon hideousness and repulsiveness could ever have provoked
+the worship or adoration of any one?
+
+One almost insuperable difficulty that the missionary experiences in his
+attempts to instil religious principles into the Indian mind, is to get
+him to entertain the theory that the human race sprang originally from
+one pair. The pagan believes in the existence of a Supreme Being, though,
+his idea of that Being's benignity and consideration relates solely to
+an earthly oversight of him, and a concern for his daily wants. His
+conception of future bliss is almost wholly sensual, and wrapped up
+with the notion of an unrestrained indulgence of animal appetite, and
+a whole-souled abandonment to feasting and dancing. His supreme view
+of happiness is that he shall be, assigned happy hunting-grounds, which
+shall be stocked with innumerable game, and where, equipped in perfection
+for the chase, he shall ever be incited to its ceaseless pursuit.
+
+Of course, such impressions, clogged and clouded as they are with
+earthliness, have been dispelled in the cases of those, who have opened
+their minds to the more desirable promises of the Gospel.
+
+The Indian's expectation of attaining and enjoying a future state of
+bliss, which shall transcend his mundane experience, is often present
+to his mind. I remember once walking with rather measured gait along
+one of the roads of the Reserve, bearing about me, it _may_ be,
+the idea of supreme reflection, when an Indian stopped me, and asked
+(though, as my eyes sought the ground at the time, I cannot conceive how
+his attributing to me thoughts of celestial concernment could have been
+suggested) if I were thinking of heaven. I should have been pleased to
+own to my mind's being occupied at the time with heavenly meditations,
+a confession not only worthy, if true, to have been indulged in, but one
+having in it possibly force for him, as helping, perhaps, to confirm the
+course of his thoughts in the only true and high and ennobling channel,
+which his question would suggest as being their frequent, if not their
+habitual, direction.
+
+Truth, however, compelled me to admit the subserviency of my mind,
+at the moment, to earthly thought.
+
+The pagan Indian celebrates what he calls dances, which frequently,
+if liquor can only be had, degenerate into mere drunken orgies. Here
+the war-whoop, with its direful music, greets the ear, carrying terror
+and dismay to the breasts of the uninitiated; and here the war-dance,
+with all the accessories of paint and feathers, gets free indulgence.
+
+
+
+
+HIS MODE OF LIFE.
+
+
+A mode of life will be suggested by the individual's estate and
+surroundings, and will, naturally, be accommodated to the exactions merely
+of the society in which he moves. With the Indian, poverty shapes his
+habits of life, and he bends to compulsion's decree in the matter. If
+we consider his hypothetical translation to a higher sphere, the Indian
+might develop and maintain a course of living which should not, in those
+altered circumstances, discredit him.
+
+As our notions of early Indian life are so associated with the wigwam,
+a description of the manner and stages of its construction may be
+interesting. Poles, twelve or fourteen feet long, are placed in the
+ground, these meeting at the top, and leaving an opening through which
+the smoke may escape. Over the poles are placed nets, made of flags,
+or birch bark, and, sometimes, the skins of animals.
+
+The Indian, in defining comfort, evidently does not mean soft beds and
+generous covering. His couch, as often as not, is the bare floor, without
+mattrass, or, indeed, aught that might be conceded to a weak impulse;
+and his covering _nil_, as a rule, in summer, and a buffalo robe,
+or some kindred substitute, in winter. He adopts very frugal fare,
+doing high honour to maize, or Indian corn. Indeed, to the growth and
+cultivation of this order of grain he appropriates the greater part of
+his land.
+
+In walking, the man usually goes before the woman, as he thinks it
+undignified to walk alongside. Nothing like social intercourse ever goes
+on between man and wife; and in their domestic experience they have no
+little pursuits in common, such as cheer and brighten life with us.
+
+The hut (for, in the majority of cases, it is really little better) that,
+with excess of boldness, commingles its cramped, unpleasing outlines with
+the forest's wealth of foliage; and has reared its unshapely structure on
+the site of the historic wigwam, obliterating, in its ruthless, intrusive,
+advent, that lingering relic of the picturesque aspect of Indian life--a
+relic that, with its emblems and inner garniture of war, bids a scion
+of the race indulge a prideful retrospect of his sometime grandeur,
+and pristine might; that has power to invoke stirring recollections of
+a momentous and a thrilling past; to re-animate and summon before him
+the shadowy figures of his redoubtable sires, and re-enact their lofty
+deeds: in view of which, there is wafted to him a breath, laden with
+moving memories of that glorious age, when aught but pre-eminence was
+foreign to his soul; when, though a rude and savage, he was yet a lordly,
+being; when he owned the supremacy, brooked the dictation, of none;
+when his existence was a round of joysome light-heartedness, and he,
+a stranger to constraint--this habitation of the Indian, to my mind,
+emphasizes his melancholy, and, perhaps, inevitable decadence, rather
+than symbolizes his partnership with the white in the more palpable
+pursuits of a practical, enlightened, and energetic age, or co-activity
+with him on a theatre of enlarged and more vigorous action. It is in some
+respects more comfortless than even was his experience under his primitive
+style of living, and is usually composed of one room, answering all the
+purposes of life--eating-room, bed-room, reception-room, principally,
+however, for the snow and mud, which have been persuaded here to relax
+their hold, after antecedent demonstration of their adhering qualities.
+
+
+
+
+HIS ALLEGED COMMISSION OF PERJURY.
+
+
+The Indian very frequently has the crime of perjury alleged against him,
+though what is assumed to be perjury is usually demonstrated to have
+nothing whatever of that element in it.
+
+These imputations come about in this way: If the Indian, about to give
+evidence, be declared to have a reasonable mastery of English, the Court,
+sometimes rather hastily, I think, dispenses with the interpreter,
+in order to save time. A question is put to a witness, who, though
+not understanding it sufficiently to appreciate its full import and
+bearing, yet protesting, in a self-sufficient spirit, that he does (for
+the Indian likes to have imputed to him extensive knowledge of English)
+returns an answer apart from the truth, and one which he really never
+intended to give, and becomes, through the interpreter, committed to it
+on the records.
+
+Or, the allegation may arise after this fashion:--The interpreter,
+having to master several different languages, will almost insensibly,
+in the confusion of idioms, misinterpret what has been said. The
+outrageous prevalence of this supposed perjury would of itself point to
+an explanation of this kind, since, we cannot believe that the Indian
+wishes to canonize untruthfulness.
+
+
+
+
+THE INDIAN AS A MUSICIAN.
+
+
+The Indian's musical taste is conceded on all hands. He is a proficient
+in the use of brass instruments, the Mohawk Brass Band always taking high
+rank at band competitions. He has usually fine vocal power, and is in
+great request as a chorister. He has a full repertory of plaintive airs,
+the singing of which he generally reserves for occasions, resembling
+much the "wakes" that obtain with Roman Catholics, where he watches over
+night the body of some departed member of the tribe.
+
+
+
+
+THE INDIAN AS AN ARTIST.
+
+
+As an artist in wood-carving, the Indian, I should say, stands almost
+without a rival. He will elaborate the most beautiful specimens in this
+kind of work; though he generally directs his skill to the embellishing
+of walking sticks and the like articles, which (their ornate appearance
+alone precluding their practical use) the white only buys with the view
+of preserving as ornaments. The Indian, therefore, would do well to
+allow his skill in this line to take a wider range, since, by so doing,
+he would not only bring about larger sales to enrich his not over-filled
+money-chest, but he would also extend his fame as an artist. The pencil,
+in the hand of the Indian, is often made to limn exquisite figures,
+and to trace delightful landscape-work. I am confident that he would,
+with appropriate training, cause his fame to be known in this line
+also. The Indian woman is a marvellous adept at bead-work, though her
+specimens disclose, usually, finer execution, than they do a tasteful
+or faultless associating of colours.
+
+
+
+
+HIS SCHOOLS.
+
+
+The New England Company, an English Corporation have established, and
+maintain, in addition to the Mohawk Institute, which is on unreserved
+lands, a large number of schools for the education of the Indian youth. It
+is a question whether these schools really secure the patronage that
+the philanthropic spirit of their founders hoped for. The shyness of the
+girls is so marked (a trait I have observed even among the adult women)
+as to lead to a small attendance, of this element, at least, where the
+teacher is a white young man--in truth, a very ultra-manifestation of
+the peculiarity.
+
+The Mohawk Institute contemplates the receiving of pupils who have
+reached a certain standard of proficiency, their boarding, and their
+education. It is an institution the aim of which is truly a noble one,
+the throwing back upon the Reserve of educated young men and women, who
+shall be qualified to go about life's work, fortified with knowledge,
+to pave the way to success in any walk of life that may be chosen.
+The Mohawk Institute has secured, in the person of its principal and
+directing power, one who is imbued with the desire so to use its powerful
+agency as to compass the maximum of good among the Indians.
+
+
+
+
+HIS MISSIONARIES.
+
+
+The missionary demands notice as he, above all others, has left his
+impress on the life and character of the Indian.
+
+The Ven. Archdeacon Nelles may be regarded as the pioneer missionary to
+the Indian. His work covers half a century, and, though, for some years,
+he has not been an active worker amongst the Indians, a solicitude for
+their welfare still actuates him. His province has been rather that of
+general superintendence of the New England Company's servants, than one
+involving much active mingling with the Indians. The association of his
+name with that time-honoured and revered structure, the old Mohawk Church,
+is his, grandest testimonial to his fruitful labour on the Reserve.
+
+The Rev. Adam Eliot, whose widow still lives in the old missionary home,
+was a man of a singularly gentle and lovable disposition. In his contact
+with the Indian, the influence, if haply any could be exerted, was certain
+to be on the side of the good. He was one who moved about the Reserve
+with the savor of a quiet and godly life ever cleaving to him, a life,
+radiating forth, as it were, to circle and embrace others in the folds
+of its benign influence. He was tender, and unaffected in his piety. His
+life and work have left their abiding mark on the Indian character.
+
+The Rev. R. J. Roberts was the first missionary who was really a
+constant resident on the Reserve, and this circumstance, no doubt,
+assured in larger measure his usefulness. I believe him to have been
+filled strongly with the missionary spirit, and with ardent zeal for the
+furthering of his Master's cause. His poor health always handicapped him,
+but I feel confident he leaves behind him, in the kind memories of many
+of his charges, a monument of his work not to be despised.
+
+The Rev. James Chance was one of the old English type of clergyman,
+cheery, genial, and whole-souled. Had he planned nothing higher than the
+infusing of some of his own geniality into the Indian nature; and, had his
+missionary work effected nothing greater than this, his would have been
+no unworthy part. As the spiritual husbandman, he strove so to break up
+the fallow ground, that the harvest of souls might be the more bountiful.
+
+I have not referred to the later or present occupants of the mission-field
+amongst the Indians, as they were, or have been identified for so short a
+time with them. I would also say, that it is from no denial to them of the
+achieving of solid, lasting work, that I have not alluded to missionaries
+outside of the Episcopal body. I have merely made such allusions here
+as personal contact with the missionaries has enabled me to record.
+
+It may be thought that any work which contemplates the chronicling of
+the Indian's history, will be incomplete, which should fail to trace the
+career of Thayandanagea, or Chief Joseph Brant; or which should, at least,
+withhold reference to that mighty chieftain. Lest my making no mention
+of Brant here might be taken as denying to him the possession of those
+sublime qualities, which have formed the theme for so much of laudatory
+writing, I make a passing allusion to his life, passing, because his acts
+and career have engaged the ability and eloquence of so many writers of
+repute for their due commemoration, that I cannot hope to say anything
+that should cause further honour or glory to attach to his name.
+
+Brant, above all others of his race, deserves an abiding place in the
+memories of his countrymen, and he is entitled to be held in enduring
+remembrance by us also.
+
+In the war waged by Britain against the United States in 1812-15, he
+allied himself, it is well known, with the British. He bridled license and
+excess among his people, and strove to add lustre to the British arms,
+by dissuading them from giving rein to any of those practices, nay, by
+putting his stern interdict on all those practices, into which Indian
+tribes are so prone to be betrayed, and to which they are frequently
+incited by merciless chiefs. He posed, indeed, during the war as the
+apostle of clemency, not as the upholder of the traditional cruelty of
+the Indian.
+
+He always displayed conspicuous bravery, and was the exponent, in his
+own person, of that intense and unflinching loyalty, which I verily
+believe to be bound up with the life of every Indian.
+
+His loyalty was untainted with the slightest suspicion of treachery,
+another vile characteristic from which he redeemed the Indian nature.
+
+The position of Brant and of Sir Walter Scott, so far as each has
+left living descendant to uphold his name, is almost analogous, and
+marks a rather interesting coincidence. The male line in both families
+is extinct. Sir Walter's blood runs now only in the daughter of his
+grand-daughter: two daughters alone of a grand-daughter are living,
+who own the blood of Brant.
+
+Brant is buried in the graveyard of the old Mohawk Church, a building
+instinct with memories of the departed might and prowess of the Indian.
+
+
+
+
+CONSIDERATIONS UPON HIS STANDING AS A MINOR.
+
+
+Is it a wise or a politic thing in the Government to seek to brand the
+Indian, in perpetuity, as a minor in the eye of the law? Repressing in
+him anything like self-assertion, is not, to hold him such, fatal to his
+self-respect? Does it not make him doubt his manhood entirely? Does it
+really, save in the single respect of the restraining of his drinking,
+conserve his true interests?
+
+Is that a judicious law, which, while decreeing the Indian's disability
+for making a contract with a white man, yet visits upon him no penalty
+when he evades and contemns such law; which, guaranteeing to him
+immunity for violating or dishonouring his engagement, prompts him to
+cast about for some new and, haply, more admired expedient, whereby he
+may circumvent and defraud his creditor? Is that an enviable position for
+one to be placed in, who, ignorant of the disability I have mentioned,
+and guileless enough to suppose, that an Indian, who has fair worldly
+substance, when he gives a promissory note, means to pay it, and who, in
+that belief, surrenders to him valuable property, only to find afterwards
+that the debt is irrecoverable by legal process, and the chattels are
+likewise, by moral, or any other effectual, process?
+
+It will be said that the white should not be a party to a contract with
+an Indian. Well, man is often trustful, and he does not always foresee
+the disaster that his trustfulness shall incur. He frequently credits
+his white fellow with an honourable instinct: why may he not, sometimes,
+impute it to the Indian?
+
+The law, so far as it involves the restraining of the Indian's drinking,
+cannot be impeached: and in the application to the white of a similar
+law lies the only solution of the temperance problem.
+
+
+
+
+REFLECTIONS AS TO THE POSSIBLE EFFECT UPON HIM OF ENFRANCHISEMENT.
+
+
+We cannot estimate the transforming power that his enfranchisement might
+exert over the Indian character.
+
+The Indian youth, who is now either a listless wanderer over the confines
+of his Reserve; or who finds his highest occupation in putting in, now
+and then, desultory work for some neighbouring farmer at harvest-time;
+who looks even upon elementary education as useless, and as something
+to be gone through, perforce, as a concession to his parents' wish, or
+at those parents' bid, would, if enfranchisement were assured to him,
+esteem it in its true light, as the first step to a higher training,
+which should qualify him for enjoying offices or taking up callings,
+from which he is now debarred, and in which, mayhap, he might achieve a
+degree of honour and success which should operate, in an incalculable
+way, as a stimulus to others of his race, to strive after and attain
+the like station and dignity.
+
+There can, I think, be no gainsaying of the view that the Indian, if he
+were enfranchised, would avail much more generally than he does now,
+of the excellent educational facilities which surround him. The very
+consciousness, which would then be at work within him, of his eligibility
+for filling any office of honour in the country, which enfranchisement
+would confer, would minister to a worthy ambition, and would spur him
+on to develop his powers of mind, and, viewing education as the one
+grand mean for subserving this end, he would so use it and honour it,
+as that he should not discredit his office, if, haply, he should be
+chosen to fill one.
+
+
+
+
+CONCLUDING REMARKS.
+
+
+The present Indian legislation, in my judgment, operates in every way
+to blight, to grind, and to oppress; blasts each roseate hope of an
+ameliorated, a less abject, estate: quenches each swelling aspiration
+after a higher and more tolerable destiny; withers each ennobling
+aim, cancels each creditable effort that would assure its eventuation;
+opposes each soul-stirring resolve to no longer rest under the galling,
+gangrenous imputation of a partial manhood.
+
+Though not authorised to speak for the Indian, I believe I express his
+views, when I say that he cherishes an ardent wish for enfranchisement,
+a right which should be conceded to him by the Legislature, though
+it should be urged only by the silent, though not, therefore, the less
+weighty and potent, appeal, of the unswerving devotion of his forefathers
+to England's crown.
+
+He desires, nay, fervently longs, to break free from his condition of
+tutelage; to bring to the general Government the aid of his counsels,
+feeble though such may seem, if we measure him by his present status; aid,
+which, erstwhile, was not despised, but was, rather, a mighty bulwark of
+the British crown; and pants for the occasion to assert, it may be on the
+honour-scroll of the nation's fame, his descent from a vaunted ancestry.
+
+
+
+
+ADDENDA TO SECTION ON ENFRANCHISEMENT.
+
+
+It will be said, perhaps, that to harbor the idea of the Indian's
+elevation, following, in any way, upon his closer assimilation with the
+white; his divestiture of the badge of political serfdom, and deliverance
+from even the suggestion of thraldom--all of which his enfranchisement
+contemplates; or that these would assure, in greater degree, his national
+weal, would be to indulge a wild chimera, which could but superinduce
+the purest visionary picture of his condition under the operation
+of the gift. Some might be found, as well, to discredit the notion
+that there would supervene, on the consigning to the limbo of inutile
+political systems of the disabling regime that now governs, an epoch,
+which would witness the shaking off, by the heavy, phlegmatic red man of
+the present, of his dull lethargy, with the casting behind him of former
+inaction and unproductiveness; and his being moved to assert a healthy,
+genuine, wholesome activity, to be directed to lofty or soulful purpose,
+or expressed in high and honourable endeavour. And it might be set down
+as a reasoning from the standpoint of an illusory optimism, to look for,
+through any change in the Indian's political condition, the incoming of
+an age, which should be distinguished by a hopeful and helpful accession
+to his character of honesty, uprightness, and self-respect, or by their
+conservation; or which should be the natal time for the benign rule
+over him of contentment, charity, and sobriety, or for the dominance
+of a seemly morality. That, likewise, might be deemed idle expectancy,
+which would foresee, as a result of the changed order of things, now being
+prospectively considered, a season in the Indian's experience, when should
+be illustrated the greater sacredness of the marriage relation, and the
+happy prevalence of full domestic inter-communion, harmony, and order;
+or should be honored a more gracious definition of the woman's province,
+with the license to her to embrace a kindlier lot than one decreeing for
+her mere slavish labour; or project a mission, to see its fruit in the
+softening and refining, and in the reviving of the slumbrous chivalry,
+of the man, or to leave, mayhap, some beauteous impress on the race.
+
+It may be maintained, indeed, that the withdrawal from the Indian of
+the Government's protecting arm, and the recognition of his position,
+as no longer that of a needy, grovelling annuitant, but as one of equal
+footing with the white before the law, would--far from bringing blessings
+in their train--promote, with other evils, a pernicious development,
+with calamitous reaction upon him, of the aggrandizing instinct of
+the white, who would lure and entrap him into every kind of disastrous
+negotiation--its outcome, in truth, a very maelstrom of artful intrigue
+and shameless rapacity, looking to the absorption of the Indian's land,
+and of the few worldly possessions he now has. Nay, many would foresee
+for the Indian, through the consummation of his enfranchisement, naught
+but gloom and sorest plight. These would invest their picture with the
+sombrest hues; and, making this assume, under their pessimist delineation,
+blackest Tartarean aspect, would crown it with the exhibition of the
+Indian, as one sunken, at the instance of the white, in extremest depths
+of human sorrow; as plunged, engulphed, and detained in a horrible slough
+of degradation and misery. Such would, in short, have an era opened up,
+which should mark, at once, the exaltation of the white to a revolting
+height of infamy, proclaiming the high carnival of unblushing trickery and
+chicane; and should signalize the whelming of the Indian in the noxious
+flood of the high-handed, unrighteous, and unprincipled practice of the
+white, who would project for him, and through whose unholy machinations he
+would be consigned to, a state of existence which should be the hideous
+climax of physical and moral debasement.
+
+Now I contend that the claim to ascendancy of the Indian over the white,
+in respect of sagacity and cunning and craft, which this condition of
+things presupposes, is not satisfactorily made out. And I can readily
+conceive of the application of that astuteness, that distinguishes the
+Indian in his present trading relations with the white, to the wider
+field for its display, which would arise from the extended intercourse and
+more frequent contact with the white, that would ensue upon the Indian's
+enfranchisement; and of this astuteness operating as his efficient
+shield against evil hap or worsting by the white in any coping of the
+kind with him.
+
+I do not deny, however, that there might be realization, in part, of
+such painful spectacle, as has just been imagined, were enfranchisement,
+_pure and simple,_ conferred upon the Indian; and I would distinctly
+demur to being taken as an advocate of enfranchisement for him without
+certain safeguards. Yet I honor a somewhat wide use of the term, and
+discredit the system of individual election for the right (if I may
+so call it)--which, I believe, obtains--with its vexatious exactions
+as to mental and moral fitness, and the very objectionable feature,
+to my mind, of laying upon the band, as a collective organization, the
+obligation of assigning to the individual member seeking enfranchisement
+so much land, thus imposing upon it, in effect, the onus of conferring
+the land qualification. Let its consummation be approached gradually,
+and with caution; and let a modified form of it, designed to meet
+the Indian's peculiar situation, be recognized and enforced. Let the
+enfranchisement be made a tentative thing; and let there be a provision
+for the divestiture of the Indian of the right, in case disaster to him
+should supervene upon its application.
+
+I have spoken elsewhere of the _fact_ of the Indian's enfranchisement
+prompting him, in view of the prospect of occupying various stations
+of dignity in the country, which, through the extension to him of the
+franchise, would be thrown open to him, to set a greater value upon
+education, as qualifying him for enjoying and filling with credit these
+stations. Perhaps, it would be the stricter view, and more apropos,
+to regard the Indian's more thorough education as that which would lead
+him to more readily perceive and better appreciate the full import and.
+significance of enfranchisement; which would bring home to his mind a
+clear apprehension of the duties and obligations it exacts, and enable
+him, as well, to exercise the rights thereto pertaining with a wiser
+foresight and greater intelligence.
+
+Let a higher order of mental attainment than he now displays be insured,
+by all means, and if possible, to the Indian; and, to this end, let
+the authorities concerned invite, through the inducement of something
+better than a mere bread-and-butter salary, the accession to the Reserve
+of teachers, no one of whom it shall be possible for an Indian youth of
+tender years to outstrip in knowledge; or shall be reduced to parrying,
+as best as he can, the questionings of a pupil on points bearing upon
+merely elementary education.
+
+I would mention a prospective result of the Indian's enfranchisement,
+which would suggest, forcibly, the desirability of, and the need for his
+anticipatory instruction in the English language. He, unlike the German
+or Frenchman, has never been able to maintain, indeed, has never had,
+a literature; and I can scarcely conceive of his _tongue_ even
+surviving the more general mingling with the white, which would be the
+certain concomitant of enfranchisement, which, indeed, with its other
+subverting tendencies, would seem to me to ordain its utter effacement.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of A Treatise on the Six-Nation Indians
+by James Bovell Mackenzie
+
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