BEAUTY AND MUSIC.
The Indian has a high sense of beauty in woman, and has been demonstrated on several occasions during their visits to the different towns. A Seminole chief was taken to the parlor of a hotel, where a new piano was the exciting theme, to see what effect the music would have upon his savage mind. But the fair-haired performer absorbed his attention, and with a shrug which showed his appreciation for beauty more than for music, he said, “Ugh! white man’s squaw heap purty!”
Music is not a genius with the Seminoles. True, they have some songs which are monotone and rhythmical. They are the hunter’s songs, the camp songs and the lullabies. The war songs which sent such terror to the hearts of the white settlers in Seminole war days they seem to have forgotten. Some of the Indians have natural musical ears, and they are recognized by their people as musical leaders. They have no standard pitch, but start their songs where the natural quality of the voice renders it easiest to sing. The pitch of the song depends upon the individual.
An incident, full of pathos, yet illustrating one of life’s parodies, is recalled. It was occasioned by hearing the music of some old familiar tunes played in a gruesome Everglade home. As the picture recurs, one sees a savage tribe—a weird camp scene, with its storm-beaten wigwams in the background—and dusky warriors and squaws moving hither and thither in the dim shadows of the camp fire. In the center of the group sat the musician, who was the happy possessor of a “box of music,” an organette, which he had recently purchased. The melodies of “Home, Sweet Home,” “Hail Columbia,” and “Nearer My God To Thee,” floated out upon the stillness of the night, telling the story of the white man’s inheritance—happy homes, a free Government and an ennobling religion. To the Seminole the tuneful strains contained no more sentiment than the murmur of the brook: for they are a people without a home, without a country, and without a God in the sense of these songs.