departed brave, where they will forever Very many of the tribes speak dialects, enjoy the pleasures of the chase and of rather than languages, distinct from those war. Even of their own origin they have of their neighbours. East of the Missisnothing but a confused tradition, not ex-sippi River, and within the bounds of what tending back beyond three or four genera- is now the United States, when the colonitions. As they have no calendars, and zation of the country by Europeans comreckon their years only by the return of menced, there were eight races, or families certain seasons, so they have no record of of tribes, each comprehending those most time past. alike in language and customs, and who Though hospitable and kind to strangers constantly recognised each other as relato a remarkable degree, they are capable tives. These were, 1. The Algonquins, of the most diabolical cruelty to their ene- consisting of many tribes, scattered over mies. The well-authenticated accounts of the whole of the New-England States, the the manner in which they sometimes treat southern part of New-York, New-Jersey, their prisoners would almost make us Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virdoubt whether they can belong to the ginia, and what is now Ohio, Indiana, Illihuman species. And yet we have only to nois, and Michigan. Being the most nurecall to our minds scenes which have merous of all the tribes, they occupied taken place in highly-civilized countries, about half the territory east of the Missisand almost within our own day, when sippi and south of the St. Lawrence and Christian men have been put to death in its the lakes. 2. The Sioux, or Dacotas, livmost horrible forms by those who pro- ing between Lake Superior and the Missisfessed to be Christians themselves, to be sippi. These were a small branch of the convinced that, when not restrained by the great tribe of the same name, to be found grace and providence of God, there is no- about the higher streams of that river, and thing too devilish for man to do. between them and the Oregon Mountains. Some remains of the law, written origi-3. The HURON-IROQUOIS nations, who occunally on the heart of man by his Creator, pied all the northern and western parts of are to be found even among the Indian what is now the State of New-York, and a tribes. Certain actions are considered part of Upper Canada. The most imporcriminal and deserving of punishment; tant of these tribes were the Five Nations, others are reckoned meritorious. The as they were long called, viz., the Mohawks, catalogue, it is true, of accredited virtues Oneidas, Onondagas, Cayugas, and Seneand vices is not extensive. Among the cas. These were afterward joined by the men, nothing can atone for the want of Tuscaroras from the Carolinas, a branch courage and fortitude. The captive war- of the same great family, and then they rior can laugh to scorn all the tortures of took the name of the Six Nations, by which his enemies, and sing in the very agonies title they are better known to history. of a death inflicted in the most cruel man- 4. The CATAWBAS, who lived chiefly in ner, what may be termed a song of triumph, what is now South Carolina. 5. The rather than of death! The narrations which CHEROKEES, who lived in the mountainous the Jesuit (French) missionaries, who knew parts of the two Carolinas, Georgia, and the Indian character better, perhaps, than Alabama. Their country lay in the southany other white men that have ever writ-ern extreme of the Alleghany Mountains, ten of them, have left of what they themselves saw, are such as no civilized man can read without being perfectly appalled.* Roman fortitude never surpassed that displayed in innumerable_instances by captured Indian warriors. In fact, nothing can be compared with it except that said to have been exhibited by the Scandinavians, in their early wars with one another and with foreign enemies; and of which we have many accounts in their Elder and Younger Eddas, and in their Sagas.

* The reader is referred to the work entitled "Rélation de ce qui s'est passé en la Nouvelle France," in 1632, and the years following, down till 1660. Also to the work of Creuxius, and the Journal of Marest. Much is to be found on the same horrible subject in Charlevoix's "Histoire de la Nouvelle France;" Lepage Dupratz's "Histoire de la Louisiane;" Jefferson's "Notes on Virginia;" "Transactions of the American Philosophical Society," vol. i. ; and the volumes of the late excellent Heckewelder, who was for forty years a missionary among the Delaware Indians, and whom the author of this work had the happiness of knowing intimately.

and abounded in ridges and valleys. 6. The UCHEES, who resided in Georgia, in the vicinity of the site occupied at present by the city of Augusta. 7. The NATCHEZ, so famous for their tragical end, who lived on the banks of the Mississippi, in the neighbourhood of the present city of Natchez. 8. The MOBILIAN tribes, or, as Mr. Gallatin calls them, the MUSKHоGEE-CHOCTA, who occupied the country which comprises now the States of Alabama and Mississippi, and the Territory of Florida. The tribes which composed this family, or nation, are well known by the name of the Creeks, the Chickasas, the Choctas, and the Seminoles; to whom may be added the Yamasses, who formerly lived on the Savannah River, but exist no longer as a separate tribe.

tribes are very different, and yet they are The languages of these eight families of marked by strong grammatical affinities. It is most probable that the people who

first settled America, come whence they | which they knew not how to protect themmight, spoke different, though remotely re-selves. If the Europeans introduced some lated languages. All the languages of the diseases, it is no less certain that they Aborigines of America are exceedingly found some formidable ones among the complicated, regular in the forms of verbs, natives. A year or two before the Pilgrim irregular in those of nouns, and admitting of changes by modifications of final syllables, initial syllables, and even, in the case of verbs, by the insertion of particles, in a way unknown to the languages of Western Europe. They exhibit demonstrative proof that they are not the invention of those who use them, and that they who use them have never been a highly-civilized people. Synthesis, or the habit of compounding words with words, prevails, instead of the more simple method of analysis, which a highly cultivated use of language always displays.* The old English was much more clumsy than the modern. The same thing is true of the French and German; indeed, of every cultivated language. The languages of the tribes bordering upon the frontier settlements of the United States begin to exhibit visible evidences of the effect of contact with civilization. The half-breeds are also introducing modifications, which show that the civilized mind tends to simplify language; and the labours of the missionaries, who have introduced letters among several tribes, are also producing great results, and leading to decided improvements.

A great deal has been said and written about the gradual wasting and disappearance of the tribes which once occupied the territories of the United States.

It is not intended to deny that several tribes which figure in the history of the first settlement of the country by Europeans are extinct, and that several more are nearly so. Nor is it denied that this has | been partly occasioned by wars waged with them by the white or European population; still more by the introduction of drunkenness and other vices of civilized men, and by the diseases incident to those vices. But while this may be all true, still the correctness of a good deal that has been said on this subject may well be questioned. Nothing can be more certain than that the tribes which once occupied the country now comprised within the United States, were, at the epoch of the first settlement of Europeans on its shores, gradually wasting away, and had long been so; from the destructive wars waged with each other; from the frequent recurrence of famine, and sometimes from cold; and from diseases and pestilences, against *The reader who desires, may see much on the Indian languages in Humboldt's Voyages; Vater's Mithradates, vol. iii.; Baron Will. Humboldt; Publications of the Berlin Academy, vol. xliv.; Gallatin's Analysis; Duponceau's Notes on Zeisberger; American Quarterly Review, vol. iii.; Heckewelder's two works respecting Indian manners, customs, etc.; and Mr. Schoolcraft's publications.

Fathers reached the coast of New-England, the very territory on which they settled was swept of almost its entire population by a pestilence. Several of the tribes which existed when the colonists arrived from Europe were but the remnants, as they themselves asserted, of once powerful tribes, that had been almost annihilated by war or by disease. This, as is believed, was the case with the Catawbas, the Uchees, and the Natchez. Many of the branches of the Algonquin race, and some of the Huron-Iroquois, used to speak of the renowned days of their forefathers, when they were a powerful people. It is not easy, indeed, to estimate what was the probable number of the Indians who occupied, at the time of its discovery, the country east of the Mississippi and south of the St. Lawrence, comprising very nearly what may be called the settled portion of the United States; and from which the Indian race has disappeared, in consequence of emigration or other causes. But I am inclined to think, with Mr. Bancroft, an American author who deserves the highest praise for the diligent research he has displayed in his admirable work on the United States, and to whom I am greatly indebted on this subject, as well as many others which are treated in this work, that there may have been in all not far from one hundred and eighty thousand souls.* That a considerable number were slain in the numerous wars carried on between them and the French and English during our colonial days, and in our wars with them after our independence, and that ardent spirits, also, have destroyed many thousands, cannot be doubted. But the most fruitful source of destruction to these poor "children of the wood" has been the occasional prevalence of contagious and epidemic diseases, such as the smallpox, which some years since cut off, in a few months, almost the whole tribe of the Mandans, on the Missouri.

Of the ALGONQUIN race, whose numbers, two hundred years ago, were estimated at ninety thousand souls, only a few small tribes, and remnants of tribes, remain, probably not exceeding 20,000 persons. Of the HURON-IROQUOIS, not more probably than two or three thousand remain within the limits of the United States. The greater part who survive are to be found in Canada. The Sioux have not diminished. The CHEROKEES have increased. The CATAWBAs are nearly extinct as a nation. The remains of the UCHEES and NATCHEZ have

Bancroft's History of the United States, vol. iii.

p. 253.

ors.

been absorbed among the Creeks and countries having caught the spirit of disChoctas; and, indeed, it is certain, that tant adventure in quest of gold, these soon not only straggling individuals, but also entered into competition with the nation large portions of tribes, have united with whose sovereign had won the title of Most other tribes, and so exist in a commingled Catholic Majesty; and as all Christendom at state with them. It has happened that an that day bowed its neck to the spiritual doentire conquered tribe has been compelled minion of the Vicar of Christ, as the Bishop to submit to absorption among the conquer- of Rome claimed to be, they could not be And, finally, the MOBILIAN or MUSK- refused a portion from the "holy father," HOGEE-CHOCTA tribes, taken as a whole, on showing that they were entitled to it. have decidedly increased, it is believed, On the ground that Spain could not justly within the last twenty-five years. They, appropriate to herself any part of the Amerwith the Cherokees, and the remains of ican Continent which she had not actually several tribes of the Algonquin race, are discovered, by coasting along it, by markalmost all collected together, in the districting its boundaries, and by landing upon it, of country assigned to them by the General Government, west of the States of Arkansas and Missouri. Respecting this plan, as well as touching the general policy of the government of the United States towards the Indians, I shall speak fully in another place.

It is difficult to estimate, with anything like absolute precision, the number of Indians that now remain as the descendants of the tribes which once occupied the country of which we have spoken. Without pretending to reckon those who have sought refuge with tribes far in the West, we may safely put it down at one hundred and fifteen or twenty thousand souls. Of what is doing to save them from physical and moral ruin, I shall speak hereafter.

The most plausible opinion respecting the origin of the Aborigines of America is, that they are of the Mongolian race; and that they came to America from Asia, either by way of the Polynesian world, or by Behring's Straits, or by the Aleutian Islands, Mednoi Island, and the Behring group. Facts well attested prove this to have been practicable. That the resemblance between the Aborigines of America and the Mongolian race is most striking, every one will testify who has seen both. "Universally and substantially," says the American traveller, Ledyard, respecting the Mongolians, "they resemble the Aborigines of America."

CHAPTER III.

DISCOVERY OF THAT PART OF NORTH AMER-
ICA WHICH IS COMPRISED IN THE LIMITS

OF THE UNITED STATES.-THE EARLY AND

UNSUCCESSFUL ATTEMPTS TO COLONIZE IT. As the American hemisphere had been discovered by expeditions sent out by Spain, that country claimed the erre continent, as well as the adjoining islands; and to it a pope, as the vicegerent of God, undertook to cede the whole. But other

* Lang's View of the Polynesian Nations. Bancroft's History of the United States, vol. iii., p. 315-18.

they created for themselves a chance of obtaining no inconsiderable share.

England was the first to follow in the career of discovery. Under her auspices, the continent itself was first discovered,* June 24, 1497, by the Cabots, John and Sebastian, father and son, the latter of whom was a native of that country, and the former a merchant adventurer from Venice, but at the time residing in England, and engaged in the service of Henry VII. By this event, a very large and important part of the coast of North America was secured to a country which, within less than half a century, was to begin to throw off the shackles of Rome, and to become, in due time, the most powerful of all Protestant kingdoms. He who "hath made of one blood, all nations of men, for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation," had resolved in this manner to prepare a place to which, in ages then drawing near, those who should be persecuted for Christ's sake might flee and find protection, and thus found a great Protestant empire. And yet how near, if we may so speak, was this mighty plan to being defeated? A Spanish discoverer, a year or two before, was diverted, by some apparently trivial circumstance, from directing his course from Cuba to the very coast which the Cabots afterward sailed along. Had he done so, how different, in some momentous respects, might have been the state of the world at this day! We have here another illustration of the littleness of causes with which the very greatest of human events are often connected, and of that superintending Providence which rules in all things.

Spain, however, far from at once relinquishing her pretensions to a country thus discovered by England, insisted on claiming a large part of it, and for a long time extended the name of the comparatively insignificant peninsula of Florida, with which she was compelled to be contented at last, over the whole tract reaching as far

* Columbus had not at that epoch touched the continent, but had only discovered the West India Islands.

first settled America, come whence they which they knew not how to protect themmight, spoke different, though remotely re-selves. If the Europeans introduced some lated languages. All the languages of the diseases, it is no less certain that they Aborigines of America are exceedingly found some formidable ones among the complicated, regular in the forms of verbs, natives. A year or two before the Pilgrim irregular in those of nouns, and admitting of changes by modifications of final syllables, initial syllables, and even, in the case of verbs, by the insertion of particles, in a way unknown to the languages of Western Europe. They exhibit demonstrative proof that they are not the invention of those who use them, and that they who use them have never been a highly-civilized people. Synthesis, or the habit of compounding words with words, prevails, instead of the more simple method of analysis, which a highly cultivated use of language always displays. The old English was much more clumsy than the modern. The same thing is true of the French and German; indeed, of every cultivated language. The languages of the tribes bordering upon the frontier settlements of the United States begin to exhibit visible evidences of the effect of contact with civilization. The half-breeds are also introducing modifications, which show that the civilized mind tends to simplify language; and the labours of the missionaries, who have introduced letters among several tribes, are also producing great results, and leading to decided improvements.

A great deal has been said and written about the gradual wasting and disappearance of the tribes which once occupied the territories of the United States.

It is not intended to deny that several tribes which figure in the history of the first settlement of the country by Europeans are extinct, and that several more are nearly so. Nor is it denied that this has been partly occasioned by wars waged with them by the white or European population; still more by the introduction of drunkenness and other vices of civilized men, and by the diseases incident to those vices. But while this may be all true, still the correctness of a good deal that has been said on this subject may well be questioned. Nothing can be more certain than that the tribes which once occupied the country now comprised within the United States, were, at the epoch of the first settlement of Europeans on its shores, gradually wasting away, and had long been so; from the destructive wars waged with each other; from the frequent recurrence of famine, and sometimes from cold; and from diseases and pestilences, against * The reader who desires, may see much on the Indian languages in Humboldt's Voyages; Vater's Mithradates, vol. iii.; Baron Will. Humboldt; Publications of the Berlin Academy, vol. xliv.; Gallatin's Analysis; Duponceau's Notes on Zeisberger; American Quarterly Review, vol. iii.; Heckewelder's two works respecting Indian manners, customs, etc.; and Mr craft's publications.

Fathers reached the coast of New-England, the very territory on which they settled was swept of almost its entire population by a pestilence. Several of the tribes which existed when the colonists arrived from Europe were but the remnants, as they themselves asserted, of once powerful tribes, that had been almost annihilated by war or by disease. This, as is believed, was the case with the Catawbas, the Uchees, and the Natchez. Many of the branches of the Algonquin race, and some of the Huron-Iroquois, used to speak of the renowned days of their forefathers, when they were a powerful people. It is not easy, indeed, to estimate what was the probable number of the Indians who occupied, at the time of its discovery, the country east of the Mississippi and south of the St. Lawrence, comprising very nearly what may be called the settled portion of the United States; and from which the Indian race has disappeared, in consequence of emigration or other causes. But I am inclined to think, with Mr. Bancroft, an American author who deserves the highest praise for the diligent research he has displayed in his admirable work on the United States, and to whom I am greatly indebted on this subject, as well as many others which are treated in this work, that there may have been in all not far from one hundred and eighty thousand souls.* That a considerable number were slain in the numerous wars carried on between them and the French and English during our colonial days, and in our wars with them after our independence, and that ardent spirits, also, have destroyed many thousands, cannot be doubted. But the most fruitful source of destruction to these poor "children of the wood" has been the occasional prevalence of contagious and epidemic diseases, such as the smallpox, which some years since cut off, in a few months, almost the whole tribe of the Mandans, on the Missouri.

Of the ALGONQUIN race, whose numbers, two hundred years ago, were estimated at ninety thousand souls, only a few small tribes, and remnants of tribes, remain, probably not exceeding 20,000 persons. Of the HURON-IROQUois, not more probably than two or three thousand remain within the limits of the United States. The greater part who survive are to be found in Canada. The Sioux have not diminished. The CHEROKEES have increased. The CATAWBAs are nearly extinct as a nation. The remains of the UCHEES and NATCHEZ have

Bancroft's History of the United States, vol. iii.

p. 253.

Spain, however, far from at once relinquishing her pretensions to a country thus discovered by England, insisted on claiming a large part of it, and for a long time extended the name of the comparatively insignificant peninsula of Florida, with which she was compelled to be contented at last, over the whole tract reaching as far * Columbus had not at that epoch touched the Lang's View of the Polynesian Nations. Ban- continent, but had only discovered the West India croft's History of the United States, vol. iii., p. 315-18. | Islands.