Personal Memoirs of a Residence of Thirty Years with the Indian Tribes On The American Frontiers Part 65

_3d_. The mail hunts up everybody. Go where you will, and particularly to the seat of government, and letters will follow you. Whoever is in the service of government bears a part of the functions of it, though it be but an infinitesimal part. Mr. H. Conner, the Saginaw sub-agent, in a letter of this date, reports the Saginaws at one thousand four hundred and forty-three souls, and the Swan Creek and Black River Chippewas at one hundred and ninety-eight. One of the most singular facts in the statistics of the most of the frontier Indian tribes of the Lakes, is, in the long run, that they neither _increase_ nor _decline_, but just keep up a sort of dying existence.

_4th_. Dr. Thomas H. Webb, Secretary of the Rhode Island Historical Society, announces the plan of that Society in publishing a series of works ill.u.s.trating, in the first place, the history and language of the Indians, and soliciting me to become a contributor of original observations. The difficulty in all true efforts of our literary history is the want of means. A man must devote all his leisure in researches, and then finds that there is no way in which these labors can be made to aid in supplying him the means of subsistence. He must throw away his time, and yet buy his bread. There is no real taste for letters in a people who will not pay for them. It is too early in our history, perhaps, to patronize them as a general thing. Making and inventing new ploughs will pay, but not books.

_9th_. The Secretary of War confirms my leave of absence, to visit Europe, and extends it beyond the contingencies of a re-appointment, on the 4th of March next.

_10th_. Attended a general and crowded party at Gen. Macomb's, in the evening, with Mrs. Schoolcraft. The General has always appeared to me a perfect amateur in military science, although he has distinguished himself in the field. He is a most polished and easy man in all positions in society, and there is an air and manner by which he constantly reveals his French blood. He has a keen perception of the ridiculous, and a nice appreciation of the mock gravity of the heroic in character, and related to me a very effective scene of this latter kind, which occurred at Mr. John Johnston's, at St. Mary's Falls, on the close of the late war. He had visited that place in perhaps 1815 or 1816, as military commander of the District of Michigan, in the suite of Major-Gen. Brown. They were guests of Mr. Johnston. In going up the river to see Gros Cape, at the foot of Lake Superior, the American party had been fired upon by the Chippewas, who were yet hostile in feeling.

When the party returned to the house of Mr. Johnston, their host, the latter drew himself up in the spirit of the border times of Waverley, and, with the air and accent of a chief of those days--which, by the way, was not altogether unnatural to him--manifested the high gentlemanly indignation of a host whose hospitality had been violated.

He exclaimed to his eldest son, "Let our followers be ready to repel this gross affront." The General's eye danced in telling it. The thing of the firing had been done--n.o.body was hurt--n.o.body was in fact in hostile array; and far less was the party itself alarmed. It had been some crack-brained Indian, I believe Sa.s.saba, who yet smarted at the remembrance of the death of his brother, who was killed with Tec.u.mseh in the Battle of the Thames.

_11th_. Left Washington, with my family, in the cars for Baltimore, where we lodged; reached Philadelphia the next day, at four P.M.; remained the 13th and 14th, and reached New York on the 16th, at 4 o'clock P.M.

_14th_. Mrs. Schoolcraft, having left her children at school, at Philadelphia and Princeton, remained pensive, and wrote the following lines in the Indian tongue, on parting from them, which. I thought so just that I made a translation of them.

Nyau nin de nain dum May kow e yaun in Ain dah nuk ki yaun Waus sa wa kom eg Ain dah nuk ki yaun

Ne dau nig ainse e Ne gwis is ainse e Ishe nau gun ug wau Waus sa wa kom eg

She gwau go sha ween Ba sho waud e we Nin zhe ka we yea Ishe ez hau jau yaun Ain dah nuk ke yaun

Ain dah nuk ke yaun Nin zhe ke we yea Ishe ke way aun e Nyau ne gush kain dum

[FREE TRANSLATION.]

Ah! when thought reverts to my country so dear, My heart fills with pleasure, and throbs with a fear: My country, my country, my own native land, So lovely in aspect, in features so grand, Far, far in the West. What are cities to me, Oh! land of my mother, compared unto thee?

Fair land of the lakes! thou are blest to my sight, With thy beaming bright waters, and landscapes of light; The breeze and the murmur, the dash and the roar, That summer and autumn cast over the sh.o.r.e, They spring to my thoughts, like the lullaby tongue, That soothed me to slumber when youthful and young.

One feeling more strongly still binds me to thee, There roved my forefathers, in liberty free-- There shook they the war lance, and sported the plume, Ere Europe had cast o'er this country a gloom; Nor thought they that kingdoms more happy could be, White lords of a land so resplendent and free.

Yet it is not alone that my country is fair, And my home and my friends are inviting me there; While they beckon me onward, my heart is still here, With my sweet lovely daughter, and bonny boy dear: And oh! what's the joy that a home can impart, Removed from the dear ones who cling to my heart.

It is learning that calls them; but tell me, can schools Repay for my love, or give nature new rules?

They may teach them the lore of the wit and the sage, To be grave in their youth, and be gay in their age; But ah! my poor heart, what are schools to thy view, While severed from children thou lovest so true!

I return to my country, I haste on my way, For duty commands me, and duty must sway; Yet I leave the bright land where my little ones dwell, With a sober regret, and a bitter farewell; For there I must leave the dear jewels I love, The dearest of gifts from my Master above.

NEW YORK, _March 18th_, 1839.

_17th_. Went, in the evening, to hear Mr. Stephens, the celebrated traveler, lecture before the Historical Society, at the Stuyvesant Inst.i.tute, on Mehemet Ali. Public opinion places lecturers sometimes in a false position. An attempt was here made to make out Mehemet Ali a great personage, exercising much influence in his times. An old despotic rajah in a tea-pot! Who looks to him for exaltation of sentiment, liberality and enlargement of views, or as an exemplar of political truth? Mr. Stephens, however, knew the feeling and expectation of his audience, and drew a picture, which was eloquently done, and well received. This popular mode of lecturing is certainly better than the run-a-muck amus.e.m.e.nts of the day. But it panders to an excited intellectual appet.i.te, and is anything but philosophical, historical, or strictly just.

_18th_. I received instructions from Washington, to form a treaty with the Saginaws, for the cession of a tract of ground on which to build a light-house on Saginaw Bay.

The next letter I opened was from Mrs. Jameson, of London, who writes that her plan of publication is, to divide the profits with her publishers, and, as these are honest men and gentlemen, she has found that the best way. She advises me to adopt the same course with respect to my Indian legends.[91]

[Footnote 91: I followed this advice, but fell into the hands of the Philistines.]

"I published," she says, "in my little journal, one or two legends which Mrs. Schoolcraft gave me, and they have excited very general interest.

The more exactly you can (in translation) adhere to the _style_ of the language of the Indian nations, instead of emulating a fine or correct English style--the more characteristic in all respects--the more original--the more interesting your work will be."

_21st_. I read the following article in the New York Herald:--

NEW INDIAN TRIBE.--Dr. Jackson, in his report of the geology of the public lands, states that at the mouth of the Tobique there is an Indian settlement, where a large tribe of Indians reside, and gain a livelihood by trapping the otter and beaver. These Indians are quite distinct from the Pen.o.bscot tribe, and speak a peculiar language.

_Query_. What is the name of this tribe? what language do they speak?

and what evidence is there that they are not Souriquois or Miemacks, who have been known to us since the first settlement of Acadia and Nova Scotia?

Indian compound words are very composite. _Aco_, in the names of places once occupied by Algonquin bands, means, _a limit_, or _as far as_, and is intended to designate the boundary or reach of woods and waters.

_Ac-ow_ means length of area. _Accomac_ appears to mean, at the place of the trees, or, as far as the open lands extend to the woods: _mac_, in this word, may be either a derivative from _acke_, earth, or, more probably, _auk_, a generic participle for tree or trunk.

_21st_. The editor of the _North American Review_ directs my attention to Delafield's Antiquities as the subject of a notice for his pages.

Delafield appears to have undertaken a course of reading on Mexican antiquities. The result is given in this work, with his conjectures and speculations on the origin of the race. The cause of antiquarian knowledge is indebted to him for the first publication of the pictorial Aztec map of b.u.t.turini.

_24th_. Called on Mr. Ramsey Crooks, president of the American Fur Company, at his counting-house, in Ann street. He gave me an interesting sketch of his late tour from La Pointe, Lake Superior, to the Mississippi. The Chippewas were not paid at La Pointe till October. This made him late at the country. The St. Croix River froze before he reached the Mississippi, and he went down the latter, from St. Peter's, in a sleigh. Bonga had been sent to notify the Milles Lacs, Sandy Lake, and Leoch Lake Indians to come to the payments. When he reached Leech Lake, Guelle Plat had gone, with twenty-four canoes, to open a trade with the Hudson's Bay Factor, at Rainy Lake. Mr. Crooks thinks that the dissatisfaction among these bands can be readily allayed by judicious measures. Thinks the Governor of Wisconsin ought to call the chiefs together at some central point within the country, and make explanations. That the payments, in future, should be made at _one_ place, and not divided. That the Leech Lake, and other bands _living without the ceded district_, ought not to partic.i.p.ate in the annuities.

Mr. Crook's manner is always prompt and cordial. He concentrates, in his reminiscences, the history of the fur trade in America for the last forty years. I have always thought it a subject of regret, that such a man should not have kept a journal. There was much, it is true, that could not be put down, and he was always so exclusively an active business man that mere literary memoranda never attracted his attention; they were not adverse to his tastes. He has nearly, I should judge, recovered from the severe hardships and privations which attended his perilous journey across the Rocky Mountains, on the abandonment of Astoria, on the Pacific, in 1812.

_29th_. Texas and Florida continue to be the rallying points of Indian warfare. The frontier of Texas is hara.s.sed by wandering parties of Indians. A Mr. Morgan, who resided near the falls of Brazos, had been killed, and three women carried off by a band of fifteen savages. A company of rangers was sent in pursuit.

The Florida War still lingers, without decisive results. The _New Orleans Bee_ says that General Taylor has been very active, the past season, in trying to bring it to a close. A writer from Tampa Bay, of the 25th instant, who appears to have good knowledge of matters, states three causes, particularly as opposing a successful prosecution and consummation of it, namely:--

"1st. An ignorance of the topography of Florida--the position of the numerous swamps and hummocks, the usual hiding-places of the Indians.

"2d. A want of proper interpreters.

"3d. A countervailing influence from some unknown quarter."

He supports his view as follows: "It is a well known fact that, previous to the year 1836, the portion of Florida south of the Military Road from Tampa to Garey's Ferry was unexplored and unknown, and since that time the only information has been derived from the hasty reconnoissances of officers, made in the progress of the several divisions of the army through the country. Since the organization of the Corps of Topographical Engineers, several have been sent to this country, and are now actively engaged in making surveys and plotting maps. Could the information they are expected to give have been known even before the commencement of the last campaign, it would have aided materially in the subjugation of the enemy. A correct knowledge of this country is needed more especially because such another theatre of war probably has not a place on the earth; a theatre so peculiarly favorable to the Indians and disadvantageous to the white man. Swamps may be delineated as well perhaps as any other natural object; but _such_ swamps as are found in Florida, are not to be imitated in painting or described by words. As an instance, I may mention the Halpataokee or Alligator Water, which is made up of small islands, surrounded by water of various depths, through which for two miles the road of the army pa.s.sed during the winter of 1838."

"_2d_. The only Interpreters are Seminole negroes, who, for the most part, find it difficult to understand English. As an instance of the numerous mistakes occurring daily, may be mentioned the following: The General told the interpreter to say to Nettetok Emathla, that 'patience and perseverance would accomplish everything.' While he was speaking to the Indian, the remark was made that he did not know the meaning of the sentence. When questioned the following day, he said 'patience and 'suverance mean a little book,' Our laughter convinced him he was mistaken, and he said 'patience mean you must be patien; I don't zackly know what 'suverance do mean, sar!' Numerous errors of this nature are doubtless occurring daily, and among a people who are so scrupulously nice and formal in their 'talks,' such trifling mistakes may be injurious.

"_3d_. We are now to speak of the most important difficulty in the way of termination of hostilities, and the removal of the Seminoles to their new homes beyond the 'Muddy Water.' That the Indians are and have been supplied by whites, Americans or Spaniards, is a point so decisively settled that 'no hinge is left whereon to hang a doubt.' However shameless it may appear, proofs are not wanting to establish the fact, so much to the discredit of our patriotism. When Coacoochee escaped from St. Augustine he carried with him bolts of calico and factory cloths, which he afterwards sold to the Indians in the woods for three chalks (six shillings) per yard. It was reported to Colonel Taylor, then at Fort Ba.s.singer, by an Indian woman, who ran away from Coacoochee's camp, that he had one poney packed solely with powder; that he had plenty of lead, provisions, etc., and was determined never to come in or go to Arkansas. On several occasions when Indians have been killed or taken, or their camps surprised, new calico, fresh tobacco, bank bills, and other articles of a _civilized_ character, have been found in their possession. Besides, this, the Indians are constantly reporting in their talks that some persons on the other side of the territory prevent the hostiles from complying with the treaty. Ethlo Emathla, Governor of the Tallaha.s.sees, promised the general to be in with his people on a specified day. It is reduced almost to a certainty that he has been prevented from doing so by the representations of some person or persons in a quarter, the name of which charity alone forbids to mention. The only object is, and for a long time has been, to keep entirely out of the way, to hide themselves from the whites, and every effort to bring them to battle, either by sending small or large parties among them, has proved useless. _They will not fight_, and thirty thousand men cannot find them, broken up as they are into small parties. What then is to be done? Protect the inhabitants of the frontiers, gradually push the Indians south, and at no distant day, the necessary, unavoidable and melancholy consummation must arrive, viz., the expulsion of the last tribe of red men from the soil over which they once roamed the sole lords and possessors."

_30th_. The oldest man in the Ottawa nation, a chief called Nish-caud-jin-in-a, or the Man of Wrath, died this day at L'Arbre Croche, Michigan. He was between ninety and one hundred years of age, withered and dry, and slightly bent, but still preserving the outlines of a man of strength, good figure, and intellect. What a ma.s.s of reminiscences and elements of history dies with every old person of observation, white or red.

_Feb. 4th_. Mr. James H. Lanman writes respecting the prospects of his publishing a history of Michigan--a subject which I gave him every encouragement to go forward in, while he lived in that State. The theme is an ambitious one, involving as it does the French era of settlements, and the day for handling it effectively has not yet arrived. But the sketches that may be made from easily-got, existing materials, may subserve a useful purpose, with the hope always that some new fact may be elicited, which will add to the ma.s.s of materials. "I have been delayed here," he says, "in preparing the book, and the delay has been occasioned by my publishers having failed. It is now, however, stereotyped, and will be out in about a fortnight." [92]

[Footnote 92: He afterwards re-cast the work, and it was published by the Harpers as one of the volumes of their library.]

_21st_. Mr. Bancroft writes to me, giving every encouragement to bring forward before the public my collections and researches on Indian history and language, and expressing his opinion of success, unless I should be "cursed with a bad publisher."

"Father Duponceau," he says, "won his prize out of your books, and Gallatin owes much to you. Go on; persevere; build a monument to yourself and the unhappy Algonquin race."

Making every allowance for Mr. Bancroft's enthusiastic way of speaking, it yet appears to me that I should endeavor to publish the results of investigations of Indian subjects. My connection with the Johnston family has thrown open to me the whole arcanum of the Indian's thoughts.

I wrote an article for Dr. Absalom Peter's Magazine, expressing my dissent from the very fanciful explanations of the Dighton Rock characters, as given by Mr. Magrusen in the first volume of the Royal Society of Northern Antiquarians, published at Copenhagen. It appears to me that those characters (throwing out two or three) are the Indian _Kekewin_--a species of hieroglyphics or symbolic devices, still in vogue among them. To this view of the matter Mr. Bancroft a.s.sents. "If you have a proof-sheet of your article on the Daneschrift, send it me.

All they say about the Dighton Rock is, I think, the sublime of humb.u.g.g.e.ry."

What is said in the interpreted Sagas, of the Skroellings or Esquimaux being in New England at the date of Eric's voyage (A. D. 1001) is, I think, problematical. Those tribes are not known to have extended further south than the Straits of Belleisle, about 60, or to parts of Newfoundland. The term deduced from the old journals appear to belong to the Esquimaux proper, rather than to the New England cla.s.s of the Algonquins. The Esquimaux had the free use of the sound of the letter _l_, which was not used at all by the N.E. Indians.