THE SIOUX.The Sioux belong essentially to the savage, in opposition to the Aztecan peoples of the New World. In the days of Major Pike (1805-1807), they were the dread of all the neighboring tribes, from the confluence of the Mississippi and the Missouri to the Raven River on the latter. According to Lieutenant Warren, they are still scattered over an immense territory extending from the Mississippi on the east to the Black Hills on the west, and from the forks of the Platte on the south to Minsi Wakan, or the Devil’s Lake, on the north. Early in the winter of 1837 they ceded to the United States all their lands lying east of the Mississippi, which became the Territory of Minnesota. They are to the North American tribes what the great Anizeh race is among the Bedouins of Arabia. Their vernacular name, Dakotah, which some pronounce Lakotah, and others Nakotah, is translated “leagued” or “allied,” and they sometimes speak of themselves as Osheti Shakowin, or the “Seven Council Fires.” The French call them “les Coupes-gorges,” from their sign or symbol, and the whites generally know them as the Sues or Sioux, from the plural form of Nadonaisi, which in Ojibwa means an enemy. The race is divided into seven principal bands, viz.:

1. Mdewakantonwan (Minowa Kantongs[60] or Gens du Lac), meaning “Village of the Mdewakan”—Mille Lacs or Spirit Lake. They formerly extended from Prairie du Chien to Prairie des Français, thirty-five miles up the St. Peter’s River. They have now moved farther west. This tribe, which includes seven bands, is considered the bravest of the Sioux, and has even waged an internecine war with the Folles Avoines[61] or Menomenes, who are reputed the most gallant of the Ojibwas (Chippewas), and who, inhabiting a country intersected by lakes, swamps, water-courses, and impenetrable morasses, long bade defiance to all their neighbors. They have received annuities since 1838, and their number enrolled in 1850 was 2000 souls.

2. Wahpekute (Washpeconte, translated Gens de Feuillestirées, and by others the “Leaf Shooters”). Their habitation lies westward of the Des Moines, Cannon, and Blue-Earth Rivers. According to Major Pike, they were like the Bedouin Ghuzw, a band of vagabonds formed of refugees, who for some bad deed had been expelled their tribes. The meaning of their name is unknown; in 1850 they numbered 500 or 600 souls.

3. Sisitonwan (Sussitongs, or the Village of the Marsh). This band used to hunt over the vast prairies lying eastward of the Mississippi, and up that stream as high as Raven River. They now plant their corn about Lake Traverse (Lac Travers) and on the Côteau des Prairies, and numbered in 1850 about 2500 souls.

4. Wahpetonwans (Washpetongs, Gens des Feuilles, because they lived in woods), the “Village in the Leaves.” They have moved from their old home about the Little Rapids of the Minnesota River to Lac qui Parle and Big Stone Lake. In 1850 they numbered 1000 to 1200 souls. They plant corn, have substituted the plow for the hoe, and, according to the missionaries, have made some progress in reading and writing their own language.

The above four constitute the Mississippi and Minnesota Sioux, and are called by those on the Missouri “Isánti,” from Isanati or Isanyati, because they once lived near Isantamde, one of the Mille Lacs. They number, according to Major Pike, 5775 souls; according to Lieutenant Warren, about 6200; and many of those on the Mississippi have long since become semi-civilized by contact with the white settlements, and have learned to cultivate the soil. Others, again, follow the buffalo in their primitive wildness, and have of late years given much trouble to the settlers of Northern Iowa.

5. Ihanktonwans (Yanctongs, meaning “Village at the End”), also sometimes called Wichiyela, or First Nation. They are found at the mouth of the Big Sioux, between it and the Missouri River, as high up as Fort Look-out, and on the opposite bank of the Missouri. In 1851 they were set down at 240 lodges = 2400 souls; they have since increased to 360 lodges and 2880 souls, of whom 576 are warriors. Distance from the buffalo country has rendered them poor; the proximity of the pale face has degenerated them, and the United States have purchased most of their lands.

6. Ihanktonwannas (Yanctannas), one of the “End Village” bands. They range between the James and the Missouri Rivers, as far north as Devil’s Lake. The Dakotah Mission numbered them at 400 lodges = 4000 souls; subsequent observers at 800 lodges = 6400 souls, and 1280 warriors; and, being spirited and warlike, they give much trouble to settlers in the Dakotah Territory. A small portion live in dirt lodges during the summer. This band suffered severely from small-pox in the winter of 1856-7. They are divided into the Hunkpatidans (of unknown signification), Pabakse or Cut-heads, and Kiyuksa, deriders or breakers of law. From their sub-tribe the Wazikute, or Pine Shooters, sprang, it is said, the Assiniboin tribe of the Dakotahs. Major Pike divides the “Yanctongs” into two grand divisions, the Yanctongs of the North and the Yanctongs of the South.

7. Titonwan (Teton, “Village of the Prairies”), inhabiting the trans-Missourian prairies, and extending westward to the dividing ridge between the Little Missouri and Powder River, and thence south on a line near the 106° meridian. They constitute more than one half of the whole Dakotah nation. In 1850 they were numbered at 1250 lodges = 12,500 souls, but that number was supposed to be overestimated. They are allied by marriage with the Cheyennes and Arickarees, but are enemies of the Pawnees and Crows. The Titonwan, according to Major Pike, are, like the Yanctongs, the most erratic and independent not only of the Sioux, but “of all the Indians in the world.” They follow the buffalo as chance directs, clothing themselves with the robes, and making their lodges, saddles, and bridles of the same material, the flesh of the animal furnishing their food. None but the few families connected with the whites have planted corn. Possessing an innumerable stock of horses, they are here this day and five hundreds of miles off in a week, moving with a rapidity scarcely to be imagined by the inhabitants of the civilized world: they find themselves equally at home in all places. The Titonwan are divided into seven principal bands, viz.:

The Hunkpapa, “they who camp by themselves” (?). They roam from the Big Cheyenne up to the Yellow Stone, and west to the Black Hills, and number 365 lodges, 2920 souls, and 584 warriors.

The Sisahapa or Blackfeet live with the Hunkpapa, and, like them, have little reverence for the whites: they number 165 lodges, 1321 souls, and 264 warriors.

The Itazipko, Sans Arc, or “No Bows;” a curious name—like the Sans Arc Pawnees, they are good archers—perhaps given to them in olden times, when, like certain tribes of negroes, they used the spear to the exclusion of other weapons: others, however, translate the word “Bow-pith.” They roam over nearly the same lands as the Hunkpapa, number about 170 lodges, 1360 souls, and 272 warriors.

The Minnikanye-wozhipu, “those who plant by the water,” dwell between the Black Hills and the Platte. They number about 200 lodges, 1600 inmates, and 320 warriors: they are favorably disposed toward the whites.

The Ogalala or Okandanda are generally to be found on or about the Platte, near Fort Laramie, and are the most friendly of all the Titonwan toward the whites. They number about 460 lodges, 3680 souls, and 736 warriors.

The Sichangu, Brûlés or Burnt-Thighs, living on the Niobrara and White-Earth Rivers, and ranging from the Platte to the Cheyenne, number about 380 lodges, containing 3680 inmates.

The Oohenonpa, “Two Boilings” or “Two Kettle-band,” are much scattered among other tribes, but are generally to be found in the vicinity of Fort Pierre. They number about 100 lodges, 800 inmates, and 160 warriors.

The author of the above estimate, allotting eight to ten inmates to a lodge, of whom between one fifth and one sixth are warriors, makes an ample allowance. It is usual to reckon in a population between one fourth, one fifth, and one sixth—according to the work—as capable of bearing arms, but the civilized rule will not apply to the North American Indian. The grand total of the number of the Sioux nations, including the Isánti, would amount to 30,200 souls. Half a century ago it was estimated by Major Pike at 21,675, and in 1850 the Dakotah Mission set them down at 25,000. It is the opinion of many that, notwithstanding the ravages of cholera and small-pox, the Dakotah nation, except when mingled with the frontier settlements, rather increases than diminishes. It has been observed by missionaries that whenever an account of births and deaths has been kept in a village the former usually exceed the latter. The original numbers of the Prairie Indians have been greatly overestimated both by themselves and by strangers; the only practicable form of census is the rude proceeding of counting their “tipi,” or skin tents. It is still a moot question how far the Prairie Indians have diminished in numbers, which can not be decided for some years.[62]

The Dakotahs are mostly a purely hunting tribe in the lowest condition of human society: they have yet to take the first step, and to become a pastoral people. The most civilized are the Mdewakantonwans, who, even at the beginning of the present century, built log huts and “stocked” land with corn, beans, and pumpkins. The majority of the bands hunt the buffalo within their own limits throughout the summer, and in the winter pitch their lodges in the clumps or fringes of tree and underwood along the banks of the lakes and streams. The bark of the cotton-wood furnishes fodder for their horses during the snowy season, and to obtain it the creeks and branches have been thinned or entirely denuded of their beautiful groves. They buy many animals from the Southern Indians, who have stolen them from New Mexico, or trapped them on the plains below the Rocky Mountains. Considerable numbers are also bred by themselves. The Dakotah nation is one of the most warlike and numerous in the United States territory. In single combat on horseback they are described as having no superiors; a skill acquired by constant practice enables them to spear their game at full speed, and the rapidity with which they discharge their arrows, and the accuracy of their aim, rival the shooting which may be made with a revolver. They are not, however, formidable warriors; want of discipline and of confidence in one another render them below their mark. Like the Moroccans in their last war with Spain, they never attack when they should, and they never fail to attack when they should not.

The Dakotahs, when first visited by the whites, lived around the head-waters of the Mississippi and the Red River of the north. They have gradually migrated toward the west and southwest, guarded by their allies the Cheyennes, who have given names successively to the Cheyenne of Red River, to the Big Cheyenne of the Missouri, and to the section of the country between the Platte and the Arkansas which they now occupy. The Dakotah first moved to the land now occupied by the THE OJIBWA.Ojibwa (anciently known as Chippewas, Orechipewa, or Sauteurs[63]), which tribe inhabited the land between Sault[64] St. Marie and Lake Winnipeg, while their allies the Crees occupied the country from Lake Winnipeg to the Kisiskadjiwan and Assiniboin Rivers. The plains lying southward of the latter river were the fields of many a fierce and bloody fight between the Dakotahs and the other allied two tribes, until a feud caused by jealousy of the women arose among the former, and made a division which ended in their becoming irreconcilable enemies, as they are indeed to the present day. The defeated party fled to the craggy precipices of the Lake of the Woods, and received from the Ojibwa the name of Assiniboin or Dakotah of the Rocks, by which they are now universally known to the whites. They retain, however, among themselves the term Dakotah, although their kinsmen universally, when speaking of them, called them “hohe” or enemies, and they still speak the Sioux language. After this feud the Assiniboins strengthened themselves by alliance with the Ojibwa and Cree tribes, and drove the Dakotah from all the country north of the Cheyenne River, which is now regarded as the boundary-line. The three races are still friendly, and so hostile to the Dakotah that no lasting peace can be made between them; in case of troubles with either party, the government of the United States might economically and effectually employ one against the other. The common war-ground is the region about Lake Minsiwakan, where they all meet when hunting buffalo. The Assiniboin tribe now extends from the Red River westward along the Missouri as far as the mouth of Milk River: a large portion of their lands, like those of the Cree, is British territory. They suffered severely from small-pox in 1856-7, losing about 1500 of their tribe, and now number about 450 lodges, or 3600 souls. Having comparatively few horses, they rely mainly upon the dog for transportation, and they use its flesh as food.

The Dakotah, according to Lieutenant Warren, are still numerous, independent, warlike, and powerful, and have the means of prolonging an able resistance to the advance of the Western settlers. Under the present policy of the United States government—this is written by an American—which there is no reason to believe likely to be changed, THE INDIAN’S FUTURE.encroachments will continue, and battle and murder will be the result. There are many inevitable causes at work to produce war with the Dakotah before many years.[65] The conflict will end in the discomfiture of the natives, who will then fast fall away. Those dispossessed of their lands can not, as many suppose, retire farther west; the regions lying beyond one tribe are generally occupied by another, with whom deadly animosity exists. Even when the white settlers advance their frontier, the natives linger about till their own poverty and vice consign them to oblivion, and the present policy adopted by the government is the best that could be devised for their extermination. It is needless to say that many of the Sioux look forward to the destruction of their race with all the feelings of despair with which the civilized man would contemplate the extinction of his nationality. How indeed, poor devils, are they to live when the pale face comes with his pestilent fire-water and small-pox, followed up with paper and pen work, to be interpreted under the gentle auspices of fire and steel?

The advance of the settlements is universally acknowledged by the people of the United States to be a political necessity in the national development, and on that ground only is the displacement of the rightful owners of the soil justifiable. But the government, instead of preparing the way for settlements by wise and just purchases from those in possession, and proper support and protection for the indigent and improvident race thus dispossessed, is sometimes behind its obligations. There are instances of Congress refusing or delaying to ratify the treaties made by its duly authorized agents. The settler and pioneer are thus precipitated into the Indian country, without the savage having received the promised consideration, and he often, in a manner that enlists the sympathies of mankind, takes up the tomahawk and perishes in the attempt. It frequently happens that the Western settlers are charged with bringing about these wars; they are now, however, fighting the battles of civilization exactly as they were fought three centuries ago upon the Atlantic shore, under circumstances that command equal admiration and approval. While, therefore, we sympathize with the savage, we can not but feel for the unhappy squatter, whose life is sacrificed to the Indian’s vengeance by the errors or dilatoriness of those whose duty it is to protect him.

The people of the United States, of course, know themselves to be invincible by the hands of these half-naked savages. But the Indians, who on their own ground still outnumber the whites, are by no means so convinced of the fact. Until the army of Utah moved westward, many of them had never seen a soldier. At a grand council of the Dakotah, in the summer of 1857, on the North Fork of the Platte River, they solemnly pledged themselves to resist the encroachments of the whites, and, if necessary, to “whip” them out of the country. The appearance of the troops has undoubtedly produced a highly beneficial effect; still, something more is wanted. Similarly in Hindostan, though the natives knew that the British army numbered hundreds of thousands, every petty independent prince thought himself fit to take the field against the intruder, till the failure of the attempt suggested to him some respect for les gros bataillons.

The Sioux differ greatly in their habits from the Atlantic tribes of times gone by. The latter lived in wigwams or villages of more stable construction than the lodge; they cultivated the soil, never wandered far from home, made their expeditions on foot, having no horses, and rarely came into action unless they could “tree” themselves. They inflicted horrid tortures on their prisoners, as every English child has read; but, Arab-like, they respected the honor of their female captives. The Prairie tribes are untamed and untamable savages, superior only to the “Arab” hordes of great cities, who appear destined to play in the history of future ages the part of Goth and Vandal, Scythian, Bedouin, and Turk. Hitherto the rôle which these hunters have sustained in the economy of nature has been to prepare, by thinning off its wild animals, a noble portion of the world for the higher race about to succeed them. Captain Mayne Reid somewhere derides the idea of the Indian’s progress toward extinction. A cloud of authorities bear witness against him. East of the Mississippi the savage has virtually died out, and few men allow him two prospective centuries of existence in the West, unless he be left, which he will not be, to himself.

“Wolves of women born,” the Prairie Indians despise agriculture as the Bedouin does. Merciless freebooters, they delight in roaming; like all equestrian and uncivilized people, they are perfect horsemen, but poor fighters when dismounted, and they are nothing without their weapons. As a rule they rarely torture their prisoners, except when an old man or woman is handed over to the squaws and pappooses “pour les amuser,” as a Canadian expressed it. Near and west of the Rocky Mountains, however, the Shoshonees and the Yutas (Utahs) are as cruel as their limited intellects allow them to be. Moreover, all the Prairie tribes never fail to subject women to an ordeal worse than death. The best character given of late years to the Sioux was by a traveler in 1845, who writes that “their freedom and power have imparted to their warriors some gentlemanly qualities; they are cleanly, dignified and graceful in manners, brave, proud, and independent in bearing and deed.”

THE SIOUX CHARACTER.The qualities of the Sioux, and of the Prairie tribes generally, are little prized by those who have seen much of them. They ignore the very existence of gratitude; the benefits of years can not win their affections. After boarding and lodging with a white for any length of time, they will steal his clothes; and, after receiving any number of gifts, they will haggle for the value of the merest trifle. They are inveterate thieves and beggars; the Western settlers often pretend not to understand their tongue for fear of exposing themselves to perpetual pilfering and persecution; and even the squaws, who live with the pale faces, annoy their husbands by daily applications for beads and other coveted objects; they are cruel to one another as children. The obstinate revengefulness of their vendetta is proverbial; they hate with the “hate of Hell;” and, like the Highlanders of old, if the author of an injury escape them, they vent their rage upon the innocent, because he is of the same clan or color. If struck by a white man, they must either kill him or receive damages in the shape of a horse; and after the most trivial injury they can never be trusted. Their punishments are Draconic; for all things death, either by shooting or burning. Their religion is a low form of fetichism. They place their women in the most degraded position. The squaw is a mere slave, living a life of utter drudgery; and when the poor creature wishes, according to the fashion of her sex, to relieve her feelings by a domestic “scene,” followed by a “good cry,” or to use her knife upon a sister squaw, as the Trasteverina mother uses her bodkin, the husband, after squatting muffled up, in hope that the breeze will blow over, enforces silence with a cudgel. The warrior, considering the chase an ample share of the labor-curse, is so lazy that he will not rise to saddle or unsaddle his pony; he will sit down and ask a white man to fetch him water, and only laugh if reproved. Like a wild beast, he can not be broken to work; he would rather die than employ himself in honest industry—a mighty contrast to the negro, whose only happiness is in serving. He invariably attributes an act of kindness, charity, or forbearance to fear. Ungenerous, he extols, like the Bedouin, generosity to the skies. He never makes a present except for the purpose of receiving more than its equivalent; and an “Indian gift” has come to be a proverb, meaning any thing reclaimed after being given away. Impulsive as the African, his mind is blown about by storms of unaccountable contradictions. Many a white has suddenly seen the scalping-knife restored to its sheath instead of being buried in his flesh, while others have been as unexpectedly assaulted and slain by those from whom they expected kindness and hospitality. The women are mostly cold and chaste. The men have vices which can not be named: their redeeming points are fortitude and endurance of hardship; moreover, though they care little for their wives, they are inordinately fond of their children. Of their bravery Indian fighters do not speak highly: they are notoriously deficient in the civilized quality called moral courage, and, though a brave will fight single-handed stoutly enough, they rarely stand up long in action. They are great at surprises, ambuscades, and night attacks: as with the Arabs and Africans, their favorite hour for onslaught is that before dawn, when the enemy is most easily terrified—they know that there is nothing which tries man’s nerve so much, as an unexpected night attack—and when the cattle can be driven off to advantage. In some points their characters have been, it is now granted, greatly misunderstood. Their forced gravity and calmness—purely “company manners”—were not suspected to cloak merriment, sociability, and a general fondness of feasts and fun. Their apathy and sternness, which were meant for reserve and dignity among strangers, gave them an air of ungeniality which does not belong to their mental constitutions. Their fortitude and endurance of pain is the result, as in the prize-fighter, of undeveloped brain.

The Sioux are tall men, straight, and well made: they are never deformed, and are rarely crippled, simply because none but the able-bodied can live. The shoulders are high and somewhat straight; the figure is the reverse of the sailor’s, that is to say, while the arms are smooth, feeble, and etiolated, the legs are tolerably muscular; the bones are often crooked or bowed in the equestrian tribes; they walk as if they wanted the ligamentum teres; there is a general looseness of limb, which promises, however, lightness, endurance, and agility, and which, contrasted with the Caucasian race, suggests the gait of a wild compared with that of a tame animal. Like all savages, they are deficient in corporeal strength: a civilized man finds no difficulty in handling them: on this road there is only one Indian (a Shoshonee) who can whip a white in a “rough and tumble.” The temperament is usually bilious-nervous; the sanguine is rare, the lymphatic rarer, and I never knew or heard of an albino. The hands, especially in the higher tribes, are decidedly delicate, but this is more observable in the male than in the female; the type is rather that of the Hindoo than of the African or the European. The feet, being more used than the other extremities, and unconfined by boot or shoe, are somewhat splay, spreading out immediately behind the toes, while the heel is remarkably narrow. In consequence of being carried straight to the fore—the only easy position for walking through grass—they tread, like the ant-eater, more heavily on the outer than on the inner edge. The sign of the Indian is readily recognized by the least experienced tracker.

It is erroneously said that he who has seen a single Indian has seen them all. Of course there is a great similarity among savages and barbarians of the same race and climate. The same pursuits, habits, and customs naturally produce an identity of expression which, as in the case of husband and wife, parent and child, moulds the features into more or less of likeness. On the other hand, a practiced eye will distinguish the Indian individually or by bands as easily as the shepherd, by marks invisible to others, can swear to his sheep. I have little doubt that to the savages all white men look alike.

The Prairie Indian’s hair and complexion have already been described. According to some savages the build of the former differs materially from that of the European and the Asiatic. THE INDIAN CONSTITUTION.The animal development varies in the several races: the Pawnee’s and Yuta’s scalp-lock rarely exceeds eighteen inches in length, while that of the Crow, like the East Indian Jatawala’s, often sweeps the ground. There are salient characteristics in the cranium which bear testimony to many phrenological theories. The transverse diameter of the rounded skull between the parietal bones, where destructiveness and secretiveness are placed, is enormous, sometimes exceeding the longitudinal line from sinciput to occiput, the direct opposite of the African negro’s organization. The region of the cerebellum is deficient and shrunken, as with the European in his second childhood: it sensibly denotes that the subject wants “vim.” The coronal region, where the sentiments are supposed to lie, is rather flat than arched; in extreme cases the face seems to occupy two thirds instead of half the space between poll and chin. The low conical forehead recedes, as in Robespierre’s head, from the region of benevolence, and rises high at the apex, where firmness and self-esteem reside: a common formation among wild tribes, as every traveler in Asia and Africa has remarked. The facial angle of Camper varies, according to phrenologists, between 70° and 80°. The projecting lower brow is strong, broad, and massive, showing that development of the perceptions which is produced by the constant and minute observation of a limited number of objects. The well-known Indian art of following the trail is one result of this property. The nose is at once salient and dilated—in fact, partaking of the Caucasian and African types. The nostrils are broad and deeply whorled; the nasal orifice is wide, and, according to osteologists, the bones that protect it are arched and expanded; the eyebrows are removed, like the beard and mustache, by vellication, giving a dull and bald look to the face; the lashes, however, grow so thickly that they often show a sooty black line, suggesting the presence of the Oriental kohl or surma. The orbits are large and square: largeness and squareness are, in fact, the general character of the features: it doubtless produces that peculiar besotted look which belongs to the Indian as to the Mongolian family. The conjunctival membrane has the whiteness and clearness of the European and the Asiatic; it is not, as in the African, brown, yellow, or red. The pupil, like the hair, is of different shades between black and brown: when the organ is blue—an accident which leads to a suspicion of mixed blood—the owner generally receives a name from the peculiarity. Travelers, for the most part, describe the organ as “black and piercing, snaky and venomous;” others as “dull and sleepy;” while some detect in its color a mingling of black and gray. The only peculiarity which I observed in the pupil was its similarity to that of the gipsy. The Indian first fixes upon you a piercing glance, which seems to look below the surface. After a few seconds, however, the eye glazes as though a film passed over it, and gazes, as it were, on vacancy. The look would at once convict him of Jattatura and Molocchio in Italy, and of El Ayn, or the Evil Eye, in the East. The mouth is at once full and compressed; it opens widely; the lips are generally bordés or everted—decidedly the most unpleasant fault which that feature can have—the corners are drawn down as if by ill temper, and the two seams which spring from the alæ of the nostrils are deeply traced. This formation of the oral, combined with the fullness of the circumoral regions, and the length and fleshiness of the naked upper lip, communicates a peculiar animality to the countenance. The cheek-bones are high and bony; they are not, however, expanded or spread backward, nor do they, as in the Chinese, alter the appearance of the eyes by making them oblique. The cheeks are rather lank and falling in than full or oval. The whole maxillary organ is projecting and ponderous. The wide condyles of the lower jaw give a remarkable massiveness to the jowl, while the chin—perhaps the most characteristic feature—is long, bony, large, and often parted in the centre. The teeth are faultless, full-sized and white, even and regular, strong and lasting; and they are vertical, not sloping forward like the African’s. To sum up, the evanishing of the forehead, the compression of the lips, the breadth and squareness of the jaw, and the massiveness of the chin, combine to produce a normal expression of harshness and cruelty, which, heightened by red and black war-paint, locks like horsehair, plumes, and other savage decorations, form a “rouge dragon” whose tout ensemble is truly revolting.

The women when in their teens have often that beauté du diable, which may be found even among the African negresses; nothing, however, can be more evanescent. When full grown the figure becomes dumpy and trapu; and the face, though sometimes not without a certain comeliness, has a Turanian breadth and flatness. The best portrait of a sightly Indian woman is that of Pocahontas, the Princess, published by Mr. Schoolcraft. The drudgery of the tent and field renders the squaw cold and unimpassioned; and, like the coarsest-minded women in civilized races, her eye and her heart mean one and the same thing. She will administer “squaw medicine,” a love philter, to her husband, but rather for the purpose of retaining his protection than his love. She has all the modesty of a savage, and is not deficient in sense of honor. She has no objection to a white man, but, Affghan-like, she usually changes her name to “John” or some other alias. Her demerits are a habit of dunning for presents, and a dislike to the virtue that ranks next to godliness, which nothing but the fear of the rod will subdue. She has literally no belief, not even in the rude fetichism of her husband, and consequently she has no religious exercises. As she advances in years she rapidly descends in physique and morale: there is nothing on earth more fiendlike than the vengeance of a cretin-like old squaw.

The ancient Persians taught their progeny archery, riding, and truth-telling; the Prairie Indian’s curriculum is much the same, only the last of the trio is carefully omitted. The Indian, like other savages, never tells the truth; verity is indeed rather an intellectual than an instinctive virtue, which, as children prove, must be taught and made intelligible; except when “counting his coups,” in other words, recounting his triumphs, his life is therefore one system of deceit, the strength of the weak. Another essential part of education is to close the mouth during sleep: the Indian has a superstition that all disease is produced by inhalation. The children, “born like the wild ass’s colts,” are systematically spoiled with the view of fostering their audacity; the celebrated apophthegm of the Wise King—to judge from his notable failure at home, he probably did not practice what he preached—which has caused such an expenditure of birch and cane in higher races, would be treated with contempt by the Indians. The fond mother, when chastening her child, never goes beyond dashing a little cold water in its face—for which reason to besprinkle a man is a mortal insult—a system which, perhaps, might be naturalized with advantage in some parts of Europe. The son is taught to make his mother toil for him, and openly to disobey his sire; at seven years of age he has thrown off all parental restraint; nothing keeps him in order but the fear of the young warriors. At ten or twelve he openly rebels against all domestic rule, and does not hesitate to strike his father; the parent then goes off rubbing his hurt, and boasting to his neighbors of the brave boy whom he has begotten.

THE INDIAN’S RELIGION.The religion of the North American Indians has long been a subject of debate. Some see in it traces of Judaism, others of Sabæanism; Mr. Schoolcraft detects a degradation of Guebrism. His faith has, it is true, a suspicion of duality; Hormuzd and Ahriman are recognizable in Gitche Manitou and Mujhe Manitou, and the latter, the Bad god, is naturally more worshiped, because more feared, than the Good god. Moreover, some tribes show respect for and swear by the sun, and others for fire: there is a north god and a south god, a wood god, a prairie god, an air god, and a water god; but—they have not risen to monotheism—there is not one God. None, however, appear to have that reverence for the elements which is the first article of the Zoroastrian creed; the points of difference are many, while those of resemblance are few and feeble, and it is hard to doubt that the instincts of mankind have been pressed by controversialists into the service of argument as traditional tenets.

To judge from books and the conversation of those who best know the Indians, he is distinctly a Fetichist like the African negro, and, indeed, like all the child-like races of mankind.[66] The medicine-man is his mganga, angekok, sorcerer, prophet, physician, exorciser, priest, and rain-doctor; only, as he is rarely a cultivator of the soil, instead of heavy showers and copious crops, he is promised scalps, salmon trout, and buffalo beef in plenty. He has the true Fetichist’s belief—invariably found in tribes who live dependent upon the powers of Nature—in the younger brothers of the human family, the bestial creation: he holds to a metamorphosis like that of Abyssinia, and to speaking animals. Every warrior chooses a totem, some quadruped, bird, or fish, to which he prays, and which he will on no account kill or eat. Dr. Livingstone shows (chap. i.) that the same custom prevails in its entirety among the Kaffir Bakwaina, and opines that it shows traces of addiction to animal worship, like the ancient Egyptians; in the prophecies of Israel the tribes are compared with animals, a true totemic practice. The word totem also signifies a sub-clan or sub-tribe; and some nations, like the African Somal, will not allow marriage in the same totem. The medicine-men give away young children as an atonement when calamities impend: they go clothed, not in sackcloth and ashes, but in coats of mire, and their macerations and self-inflicted tortures rival those of the Hindoos: a fanatic has been known to drag about a buffalo skull with a string cut from his own skin till it is torn away. In spring-time, the braves, and even the boys, repairing to lonely places and hill-tops, their faces and bodies being masked, as if in mourning, with mud, fast and pray, and sing rude chants to propitiate the ghosts for days consecutively. The Fetichist is ever grossly superstitious; and the Indians, as might be expected, abound in local rites. Some tribes, as the Cheyennes, will not go to war without a medicine-man, others without sacred war-gourds[67] containing the tooth of the drum-head fish. Children born with teeth are looked upon as portents, and when gray at birth the phenomenon is attributed to evil ghosts.

I can not but think that the two main articles of belief which have been set down to the credit of the Indian, namely, the Great Spirit or Creator, and the Happy Hunting-grounds in a future world, are the results of missionary teaching, the work of Fathers Hennepin, Marquette, and their noble army of martyred Jesuit followers. In later days they served chiefly to inspire the Anglo-American muse, e. g.:

My conviction is, that the English and American’s popular ideas upon the subject are unreliable, and that their embodiment, beautiful poetry, “Lo the poor Indian,” down to “his faithful dog shall bear him company,” are but a splendid myth. The North American aborigine believed, it is true, in an unseen power, the Manitou, or, as we are obliged to translate it, “Spirit,” residing in every heavenly body, animal, plant, or other natural object. This is the very essence of that form of Fetichism which leads to Pantheism and Polytheism. There was a Manitou, as he conceived, which gave the spark from the flint, lived in every blade of grass, flowed in the streams, shone in the stars, and thundered in the waterfall; but in each example—a notable instance of the want of abstractive and generalizing power—the idea of the Deity was particular and concrete. When the Jesuit fathers suggested the unity of the Great Spirit pervading all beings, it was very readily recognized; but the generalization was not worked out by the Indian mind. He was, therefore, like all savages, atheistic in the literal sense of the word. He had not arrived at the first step, Pantheism, which is so far an improvement that it opens out a grand idea, the omnipresence, and consequently the omnipotence, of the Deity. In most North American languages the Theos is known, not as the “Great Spirit,” but as the “Great Father,” a title also applied to the President of the United States, who is, I believe, though sometimes a step-father, rather the more reverenced of the twain. With respect to the happy hunting-grounds, it is a mere corollary of the monotheistic theorem above proved. It is doubtful whether these savages ever grasped the idea of a human soul. The Chicury of New England, indeed, and other native words so anglicized, appear distinctly to mean the African Pepo—ghost or larva.

Certain missionaries have left us grotesque accounts of the simple good sense with which the Indians of old received the Glad Tidings. The strangers were courteously received, the calumet was passed round, and they were invited to make known their wants in a “big talk.” They did so by producing a synopsis of their faith, beginning at Adam’s apple and ending at the Savior’s cross. The patience of the Indian in enduring long speeches, sermons, and harangues has ever been exemplary and peculiar, as his fortitude in suffering lingering physical tortures. The audience listened with a solemn demeanor, not once interrupting what must have appeared to them a very wild and curious story. Called upon to make some remark, these antipomologists simply ejaculated,

“Apples are not wholesome, and those who crucified Christ were bad men!”

In their turn, some display of oratory was required. They avoided the tedious, long-drawn style of argument, and spoke, as was their wont, briefly to the point. “It is good of you,” said they, “to cross the big water, and to follow the Indian’s trail, that ye may relate to us what ye have related. Now listen to what our mothers told us. Our first father, after killing a beast, was roasting a rib before the fire, when a spirit, descending from the skies, sat upon a neighboring bluff. She was asked to eat. She ate fat meat. Then she arose and silently went her way. From the place where she rested her two hands grew corn and pumpkin; and from the place where she sat sprang tobacco!”

The missionaries listened to the savage tradition with an excusable disrespect, and, not unnaturally, often interrupted it. This want of patience and dignity, however, drew upon them severe remarks. “Pooh!” observed the Indians. “When you told us what your mothers told you, we gave ear in silence like men. When we tell you what our mothers told us, ye give tongue like squaws. Go to! Ye are no medicine-men, but silly fellows!”

Besides their superstitious belief in ghosts, spirits, or familiars, and the practice of spells and charms, love-philters, dreams and visions, war-medicine, hunting-medicine, self-torture, and incantations, the Indians had, it appears to me, but three religious observances, viz., dancing, smoking, and scalping.

The war-dances, the corn-dances, the buffalo-dances, the scalp-dances, and the other multiform and solemn saltations of these savages, have been minutely depicted and described by many competent observers. The theme also is beyond the limits of an essay like this.

Smoking is a boon which the Old owes to the New World. It is a heavy call upon our gratitude, for which we have naturally been very ungrateful.