Western Characters Part 7

The distinction between the two races is as clear in their personal appearance and bearing, as in the aspect of their plantations. The Frenchman is generally a spruce, dapper little gentleman, brisk, obsequious, and insinuating in manner, and usually betraying minute attention to externals. The American is always plain in dress--evincing no more taste in costume than in horticulture--steady, calm, and never lively in manner: blunt, straightforward, and independent in discourse.

The one is amiable and submissive, the other choleric and rebellious.

The Frenchman always recognises and bows before superior rank: the American acknowledges no superior, and bows to no man save in courtesy.

The former is docile and easily governed: the latter is intractable, beyond control. The Frenchman accommodates himself to circ.u.mstances: the American forces circ.u.mstances to yield to him.

The consequence has been, that while the American has stamped his character upon the whole country, there are not ten places in the valley of the Mississippi, where you would infer, from anything you see, that a Frenchman had ever placed his foot upon the soil. The few localities in which the French character yet lingers, are fast losing the distinction; and a score or two of years will witness a total disappearance of the gentle people and their primitive abodes. Even now--excepting in a few parishes in Louisiana--the relics of the race bear a faded, antiquated look: as if they belonged to a past century, as, indeed, they do, and only lingered now, to witness, for a brief s.p.a.ce, the glaring innovations of the nineteenth, and then, lamenting the follies of modern civilization, to take their departure for ever!

Let them depart in peace! For they were a gentle and pacific race, and in their day did many kindly things!

"The goodness of the heart is shown in deeds Of peacefulness and kindness."

Their best monument is an affectionate recollection of their simplicity: their highest wish

----"To sleep in humble life, Beneath the storm ambition blows."

FOOTNOTES:

[70] _History of the United States_, vol. iii., p. 336. Enacted in Ma.s.sachusetts.

[71] A detailed and somewhat tedious account of these savage inroads, may be found in Warburton's _Conquest of Canada_, published by Harpers.

New-York. 1850.

[72] This is the estimate of Bancroft--and, I think, at least, thirty thousand too liberal. If the number were doubled, however, it would not weaken the position in the text.

[73] On the subject of naming towns, much might have been said in the preceding article in favor of French taste, and especially that just and unpretending taste, which led them almost alway to retain the Indian names. While the American has pretentiously imported from the Old World such names as Venice, Carthage, Rome, Athens, and even London and Paris, or has transferred from the eastern states, Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and New York, the Frenchman, with a better judgment, has retained such Indian names as Chicago, Peoria, Kaskaskia, Cahokia, Illinois, Wisconsin, Missouri, Wabash, and Mississippi.

[74] This word is a pregnant memento of the manner in which the vain words of flippant orators fall, innocuous, to the ground, when they attempt to stigmatize, with contemptuous terms, the truly n.o.ble.

"Squatter" is now, in the west, only another name for "Pioneer," and that word describes all that is admirable in courage, truth, and manhood!

[75] Perkins's _Western Annals_.

[76] "Sketches of the West," by Judge Hall, for many years a resident of Illinois.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE RANGER.]

IV.

THE RANGER.

"When purposed vengeance I forego, Term me a wretch, nor deem me foe; And when an insult I forgive, Then brand me as a slave, and live."

SCOTT.

In elaborating the character of the pioneer, we have unavoidably antic.i.p.ated, in some measure, that of the Ranger--for the latter was, in fact, only one of the capacities in which the former sometimes acted.

But--since, in the preceding article, we have endeavored to confine the inquiry, so as to use the term _Pioneer_ as almost synonymous with _Immigrant_--we have, of course, ignored, to some extent, the subordinate characters, in which he frequently figured. We therefore propose, now, briefly to review one or two of them in their natural succession.

The progress of our country may be traced and measured, by the representative characters which marked each period. The missionary-priest came first, when the land was an unbroken wilderness.

The military adventurer, seeking to establish new empires, and acquire great fortunes, entered by the path thus opened. Next came the hunter, roaming the woods in search of wild beasts upon which he preyed. Making himself familiar with the pathless forest and the rolling prairie, he qualified himself to guide, even while he fled from, the stream of immigration. At last came the pioneer, to drive away the savage, to clear out the forests, and reclaim the land.

At first, he was _only_ a pioneer. He had few neighbors, he belonged to no community--his household was his country, his family were his only a.s.sociates or companions. In the course of time others followed him--he could occasionally meet a white man on the prairies; if he wandered a few miles from home, he could see the smoke of another chimney in the distance. If he did not at once abandon his "clearing" and go further west, he became, in some sort, a member of society--was the fellow-citizen of his neighbors. The Indians became alarmed for their hunting grounds, or the nations went to war and drew them into the contest: the frontier became unsafe: the presence of danger drew the pioneers together: they adopted a system of defence, and the ranger was the offspring and representative of a new order of things.

Rough and almost savage as he sometimes was, he was still the index to a great improvement. Rude as the system was, it gave shape and order to what had before been mere chaos.

The ranger marks a new era, then; his existence is another chapter in the history of the west. Previous to his time, each pioneer depended only on himself for defence--his sole protection, against the wild beast and the savage, was his rifle--self-dependence was his peculiar characteristic. The idea of a fighting establishment--the germ of standing armies--had never occurred to him: even the rudest form of civil government was strange to him--taxes, salaries, a.s.sessments, were all "unknown quant.i.ties."

But, gradually, all this changed; and with his circ.u.mstances, his character was also modified. He lost a little of his st.u.r.dy independence, his jealousy of neighborhood was softened--his solitary habits became more social--he acknowledged the necessity for concert of action--he merged a part of his individuality into the community, and--became a ranger.

In this capacity, his character was but little different to what it had been before the change; and, though that change was a great improvement, considered with reference to society, it may safely be doubted whether it made the individual more respectable. He was a better _citizen_, because he now contributed to the common defence: but he was not a better _man_, because new a.s.sociations brought novel temptations, and mingling with other men wore away the simplicity, which was the foundation of his manliness. Before a.s.suming his new character, moreover, he never wielded a weapon except in his own defence--or, at most, in avenging his own wrongs. The idea of justice--claiming reparation for an injury, which he alone could estimate, because by him alone it was sustained--protected his moral sense. But, when he a.s.sumed the vindication of his neighbor's rights, and the reparation of his wrongs--however kind it may have been to do so--he was sustained only by the spirit of hatred to the savage, could feel no such justification as the consciousness of injury.

Here was the first introduction of the mercenary character, which actuates the hireling soldier; and, though civilization was not then far enough advanced, to make it very conspicuous, there were other elements mingled, which could not but depreciate the simple n.o.bility of the pioneer's nature. Many of the qualities which, in him, had been merely pa.s.sive, in the ranger became fierce and active. We have alluded, for example, to his hatred of the Indian; and this, habit soon strengthened and exaggerated. Nothing marks that change so plainly as his adoption of the barbarous practice of scalping enemies.

For this there might be some little palliation in the fact, that the savage never considered a warrior overcome, though he were killed, unless he lost his scalp; and so long as he could bring off the dead bodies of his comrades, not mutilated by the process, he was but partially intimidated. Defeat was, in that case, converted to a sort of triumph; and having gone within one step of victory--for so this half-success was estimated--was the strongest incentive to a renewal of the effort. It might be, therefore, that the ranger's adoption of the custom was a measure of self-defence. But it is to be feared that this consideration--weak as it is, when stated as an excuse for cruelty so barbarous--had but little influence in determining the ranger. Adopting the code of the savage, the practice soon became a part of his warfare; and the taking of the scalp was a ceremony necessary to the completion of his victory. It was a b.l.o.o.d.y and inhuman triumph--a custom, which tended, more forcibly than any other, to degrade true courage to mere cruelty; and which, while it only mortified the savage, at the same time, by rendering his hatred of the white men more implacable, aggravated the horrors of Indian warfare. But the only measure of justice in those days, was the _lex talionis_--"An eye for an eye," a scalp for a scalp; and, even now, you may hear frontiermen justify, though they do not practise it, by quoting the venerable maxim, "Fight the devil with fire."

But, though the warfare of the ranger was sometimes distinguished by cruelty, it was also enn.o.bled by features upon which it is far more pleasant to dwell.

No paladin, or knight, of the olden times, ever exhibited more wild, romantic daring, than that which formed a part of the ranger's daily action. Danger, in a thousand forms, beset him at every step--he defied mutilation, death by fire and lingering torture. The number of his enemies, he never counted, until after he had conquered them--the power of the tribe, or the prowess of the warrior, was no element in his calculations. Where he could strike first and most effectually, was his only inquiry. Securing an avenue for retreat was no part of his strategy--for he had never an intention or thought of returning, except as a victor. "Keeping open his communications," either with the rear or the flanks, had no place in his system; "combined movements" he seldom attempted, for he depended for victory, upon the force he chanced to have directly at hand. The distance from his "base of operations" he never measured; for he carried all his supplies about his person, and he never looked for reinforcements. Bridges and wagon-roads he did not require, for he could swim all the rivers, and he never lost his way in the forest. He carried his artillery upon his shoulder, his tactics were the maxims of Indian warfare, and his only drill was the "ball-practice"

of the woods. He was his own commissary, for he carried his "rations" on his back, and replenished his havresack with his rifle. He needed no quartermaster; for he furnished his own "transportation," and selected his own encampment--his bed was the bosom of mother-earth, and his tent was the foliage of an oak or the canopy of heaven. In most cases--especially in battle--he was his own commander, too; for he was impatient of restraint, and in savage warfare knew his duty as well as any man could instruct him. Obedience was no part of his nature--subordination was irksome and oppressive. In a word, he was an excellent soldier, without drill, discipline or organization.

He was as active as he was brave--as untiring as he was fearless.

A corps of rangers moved so rapidly, as apparently to double its numbers--dispersing on the Illinois or Missouri, and rea.s.sembling on the Mississippi, on the following day--traversing the Okan timber to-day, and fording the Ohio to-morrow. One of them, noted among the Indians for desperate fighting, and personally known for many a b.l.o.o.d.y meeting, would appear so nearly simultaneously in different places, as to acquire the t.i.tle of a "Great Medicine;" and instances have been known, where as many as three distinct war-parties have told of obstinate encounters with the same men in one day! Their apparent ubiquity awed the Indians more than their prowess.

General Benjamin Howard, who, in eighteen hundred and thirteen resigned the office of governor of Missouri, and accepted the appointment of brigadier-general, in command of the militia and rangers of Missouri and Illinois, at no time, except for a few weeks in eighteen hundred and fourteen, had more than one thousand men under his orders: And yet, with this inconsiderable force, he protected a frontier extending from the waters of the Wabash, westward to the advanced settlements of Missouri--driving the savages northward beyond Peoria, and intimidating them by the prompt.i.tude and rapidity of his movements.

Our government contributed nothing to the defence of its frontiers, except an act of Congress, which authorized them to defend themselves!

The Indians, amounting to at least twenty tribes, had been stirred up to hostility by the British, and, before the establishment of rangers, were murdering and plundering almost with impunity. But soon after the organization of these companies, the tide began to turn. The ranger was at least a match for the savage in his own mode of warfare; and he had, moreover, the advantages of civilized weapons, and a steadiness and constancy, unknown to the disorderly war-parties of the red men.

He was persevering beyond all example, and exhibited endurance which astonished even the stoical savage. Three or four hours' rest, after weeks of hardship and exposure, prepared him for another expedition. If the severity of his vengeance, or the success of a daring enterprise, intimidated the Indian for a time, and gave him a few days' leisure, he grew impatient of inactivity, and was straightway planning some new exploit. The moment one suggested itself, he set about accomplishing it--and its hardihood and peril caused no hesitation. He would march, on foot, hundreds of miles, through an unbroken wilderness, until he reached the point where the blow was to be struck; and then, awaiting the darkness, in the middle of the night, he would fall upon his unsuspecting enemies and carry all before him.

During the war of independence, the rangers had not yet a.s.sumed that name, nor were they as thoroughly organized, as they became in the subsequent contest of eighteen hundred and twelve. But the same material was there--the same elements of character, actuated by the same spirit.

Let the following instance show what that spirit was.

In the year seventeen hundred and seventy-seven, there lived at Cahokia--on the east side of the Mississippi below Saint Louis--a Pennsylvanian by the name of Brady--a restless, daring man, just made for a leader of rangers. In an interval of inactivity, he conceived the idea of capturing one of the British posts in Michigan, the nearest point of which was at least three hundred miles distant! He forthwith set about raising a company--and, at the end of three days, found himself invested with the command of _sixteen men_! With these, on the first of October, he started on a journey of more than one hundred leagues, through the vast solitudes of the prairies and the thousand perils of the forest, to take a military station, occupied by a detachment of British soldiers! After a long and toilsome march, they reached the banks of the St. Joseph's river, on which the object of their expedition stood. Awaiting the security of midnight, they suddenly broke from their cover in the neighborhood, and by a _coup de main_, captured the fort without the loss of a man! Thus far all went well--for besides the success and safety of the party, they found a large amount of stores, belonging to traders, in the station, and were richly paid for their enterprise--but having been detained by the footsore, on their homeward march, and probably delayed by their plunder, they had only reached the Calumet, on the borders of Indiana, when they were overtaken by three hundred British and Indians! They were forced to surrender, though not without a fight, for men of that stamp were not to be intimidated by numbers. They lost in the skirmish one fourth of their number: the survivors were carried away to Canada, whence Brady, the leader, escaped, and returned to Cahokia the same winter. The twelve remained prisoners until seventeen hundred and seventy-nine.

Against most men this reverse would have given the little fort security--at least, until the memory of the disaster had been obscured by time. But the pioneers of that period were not to be judged by ordinary rules. The very next spring (1778), another company was raised for the same object, and to wipe out what they considered the stain of a failure. It was led by a man named Maize, over the same ground, to the same place, and was completely successful. The fort was retaken, the trading-station plundered, the wounded men of Brady's party released, and, loaded with spoil, the little party marched back in triumph!

There is an episode in the history of their homeward march, which ill.u.s.trates another characteristic of the ranger--his ruthlessness. The same spirit which led him to disregard physical obstacles, prevented his shrinking from even direful necessities. One of the prisoners whom they had liberated, became exhausted and unable to proceed. They could not carry him, and would not have him to die of starvation in the wilderness. They could not halt with him, lest the same fate should overtake them, which had defeated the enterprise of Brady. But one alternative remained, and though, to us, it appears cruel and inhuman, it was self-preservation to them, and mercy, in a strange guise, to the unhappy victim--_he was despatched by the hand of the leader_, and buried upon the prairie! His grave is somewhere near the head-waters of the Wabash, and has probably been visited by no man from that day to this!