FOOTNOTES:
[73] The name of Thyrsanthus, given by Mr. Elliott, has been already employed for another genus.—Nuttall.
[74] See post, note 133.—Ed.
[75] Fort Smith. See chapter viii.—Ed.
[76] Probably Charles Bogy, as the name is given by later writers. He was a native of Kaskaskia, Illinois, who came to Arkansas Post with the federal troops which took possession in 1804.—Ed.
[77] For a brief history of Arkansas Post, see Cuming’s Tour, volume iv of our series, note 195.—Ed.
[78] Of these merchants, Lewis may be the Eli I. Lewis who was clerk of Arkansas County from 1821–29. Local histories mention none of the others save the Frenchman, Frederick Noteribe. He took part in the French Revolution and was an army officer during the consulate, but left France when Napoleon became emperor. Coming to Arkansas about 1815 or 1818, he became a wealthy planter, being considered in the forties the most prominent man in the county. He died of cholera in 1849, at New Orleans.—Ed.
[79] The loose system pursued by the Spanish in making land grants caused much trouble after jurisdiction passed to the United States. In 1804 President Jefferson appointed commissioners to examine land titles in the newly-acquired territory, and considerable legislation resulted. Most of these large grants were finally invalidated (1847–48), on the ground of indefiniteness; among them, the Winter grant referred to in the text. This grant was made (1797) to Elisha, William, and Gabriel Winter, William Russell, and Joseph Stillwell. Other large grants in the same region were made to Captain Don Joseph Vallière, on White River (1793); Don Carlos de Villemont, commandant of the post (1795); and Baron de Bastrop (1799).—Ed.
[80] A much earlier settlement was made by Chevalier de Tonti, who, in 1685, proceeding from the fort of the Illinois, recently established, down to the mouth of the Mississippi, in order to second the unfortunate La Salle, and not finding him, ascended the river in order to return to his post. In his way he entered the Arkansa, and proceeded up to the village of that nation, with whom he made an alliance, and left 10 of his people, at their earnest request, to settle among them. This small party, occasionally augmented by the Canadians who descended the river, keeping on peaceable terms with the natives, and intermarrying amongst them, continually maintained their ground, though rather by adopting the manners of the Indians, and becoming hunters, than by any regular industry or attention to the arts and conveniences of civilized life. Families of this mixed race are now scattered along the banks of the Arkansa, to the extremity of the present Quapaw reservation.
Had the unfortunate grant of Mr. Law been carried into effect, which proposed to settle at, and round the present village of Arkansas, 9000 Germans from the Palatinate, we should now probably have witnessed an extensive and flourishing colony, in place of a wilderness, still struggling with all the privations of savage life.—Nuttall.
[81] Pierre-François-Xavier de Charlevoix (1682–1761) was admitted to the Jesuit order in 1698. In 1720 he went to Canada, ascended the St. Lawrence, crossed Illinois, and descended the Mississippi. Passing by the Gulf to St. Domingo, he returned to France in December, 1722, and as a result of his tour wrote an authoritative history of New France.—Ed.
[82] Charlevoix’s Historical Journal, p. 307, London Edition.—Nuttall.
[83] The Arikara. See Bradbury’s Travels, our volume v, note 76.—Ed.
[84] The Quapaw belong to the Siouan family; the Omaha, Ponca, Osage, and Kansa being their nearest kindred. In prehistoric time, the Siouan stock dwelt east of the Mississippi. The five tribes mentioned constituted one nation, which dwelt near the Ohio River; the Illinois called them Arkansa. When, in the course of their migration westward, the Siouan tribes separated, at the mouth of the Ohio, those who turned down the Mississippi became known as the Quapaw, meaning “the down-stream people.” The rest, who went up the river, received the name Omaha, “those going against the current.” See Dorsey, “Migrations of Siouan Tribes,” in The American Naturalist, xx, p. 211.
Notwithstanding Nuttall’s account, the Quapaw are doubtless the same Indians whom De Soto encountered in this region. It is surprising that our author does not think of identifying them with the “Capaha” of La Vega. He may have been misled by the name “Pacaha,” which he takes (see Appendix) from the “Gentleman of Elvas” and Biedma (see post, note 87). The seat of the Quapaw in De Soto’s time is variously placed, by modern students, on the Red, White, St. Francis, and Mississippi rivers; but it is agreed that, roughly speaking, their territory was the lower Arkansas valley. In the early days of French exploration, they were still partly east of the Mississippi.
The Quapaw lands were purchased by treaties in 1818 and 1824 (see post note 102), and the tribe was removed during the winter of 1825–26 to a reservation in the extreme northeast corner of Indian Territory. At that time it numbered 158 men, 123 women, and 174 children; the present population is about 275, and the tribe is practically civilized.—Ed.
[85] Henri de Tonty (Italian form, Tonti) was the son of an Italian refugee at Paris. The father was the originator of the form of life insurance known from the inventor as tontine. In 1678 Henri sailed from Rochelle with La Salle, and with him (1682) descended the Mississippi. After this expedition, Tonty returned to the Illinois and was there engaged in the fur-trade until 1702. In 1686, hearing of La Salle’s ill-fated attempt to found a colony on the Texas coast, he sought in vain to find him with a relief party. (See Cuming’s Tour, volume iv of our series, note 195.) In 1702 he joined D’Iberville in lower Louisiana, and his subsequent career is unknown. Tonty having lost a hand by the explosion of a grenade in the Sicilian wars, wore in place of the lost member a metal hand covered with a glove, which on several occasions he used to good purpose on disorderly Indians, gaining their regard as great “medicine.”
Nuttall is in error in assigning the first visit of Tonty to the Quapaw to the year 1685. La Salle and his followers ascended the Arkansas in March, 1682, and in the open space in the midst of the Quapaw village raised a cross bearing the arms of France, taking formal possession of the country in the name of their king. The official report of this occurrence was dated March 13–14, 1682. See document in Margry, Découvertes et Établissements des Français (Paris, 1877), ii, p. 181. For a secondary account, see Parkman, La Salle (Boston, 1892), index. In 1686, as Tonty ascended the Mississippi after his vain search for La Salle, he visited the Arkansas village and left six men to hold a post. Nuttall seems to have confused the two visits.—Ed.
[86] Samuel Purchas, born in Essex about 1575, attempted to continue the work of Hakluyt, and collected numerous MSS. in addition to those left to him by the latter. Several editions of Hakluytus Posthumus; or Purchas, his pilgrimes, were published in London, the best being that of 1626. The abstracts of the journals printed are imperfect, for Purchas in his editorial work was neither accurate nor judicious. Most of the material is now accessible in better editions; but Purchas’s collection still has value for the student, because it contains some accounts not recorded elsewhere. Volumes iii and iv deal with America; the account of De Soto’s explorations is in volume iv.—Ed.
[87] Garcilaso Inca de la Vega, born at Cuzco about 1540, was the son of a member of an illustrious Spanish family and on his mother’s side was of the Peruvian blood royal. His history of Peru is the chief original ancient authority, and includes a narrative of De Soto’s explorations, based, it is said, on the account given him by a soldier who took part in the expedition. It is one of the three important sources of our information regarding De Soto’s wanderings. The others are, the narrative by the “Gentleman of Elvas,” who was a Portuguese adventurer in De Soto’s company, and that of Biedma, a Spanish factor on the expedition. For a critical discussion of the value of these sources, see Hakluyt Society Publications, ix, introduction; this volume contains Hakluyt’s translation of the account of the “Gentleman of Elvas” (London, 1851).—Ed.
[88] On the Kaskaskia Indians, see André Michaux’s Travels, in our volume iii, note 132.—Ed.
[89] Le Page Du Pratz went to Louisiana in 1718 with a colony of eight hundred men sent out by John Law’s West India Company. He was a planter there for sixteen years, and travelled extensively through the territory, being overseer of the public plantations under the Company, also after the crown resumed control. The French original of his History of Louisiana appeared in 1758, being Englished and published in London in 1763; second edition 1764.—Ed.
[90] Du Pratz, History of Louisiana, p. 61.—Nuttall.
Comment by Ed. Father Zénobe Membré, a Recollect friar in La Salle’s Company, reported to his superior: “I cannot tell you the civility and kindness we received from these barbarians.... They are so well formed that we were in admiration at their beauty.” See Parkman, La Salle, p. 279.
[91] Various interpretations of the meaning of Lenno Lenapi have been given. Lenno means genuine or real, and Lenapi signifies male. The combination denoted a race of eminent antiquity, valor, and wisdom, and may best, perhaps, be rendered in English as “manly men.” The character thus boastfully ascribed to themselves by the Delawares was apparently confirmed by the name “grandfather” applied to them by kindred tribes. Illini is the Illinese equivalent of Lenno. See Schoolcraft, History, Condition and Prospects of the Indian Tribes (Philadelphia, 1851–57), v, p. 1360; vi, p. 177.—Ed.
[92] Charlevoix, Hist. p. 306, 307. Lond. Ed.—Nuttall.
[93] Michigamies was the name given by the French to several tribes of Algonquian stock who lived on Lake Michigan. The designation sometimes included the Mascoutin, or Fire-Indians, and the Illinese. See Croghan’s Journals, volume i of our series, note 111.—Ed.
[94] Du Pratz, Hist. Louisiana, p. 318.—Nuttall.
[95] See post,note 110.—Ed.
[96] A ceremony similar to this, was also, according to Adair, practised among the Creeks.—Nuttall.
[97] For an exhaustive account of the customs of the kindred Omaha, see Dorsey, “Omaha Sociology,” in Report of Bureau of Ethnology, 1881–82, iii, pp. 205–370.—Ed.