"
Thus impartially looks the old trader. I meant to have inserted other
passages, that of the encampment at Yowanne, and the horse race to which
he challenged them, to show how well he could convey in his garrulous
fashion the whole presence of Indian life. That of Yowanne, especially,
takes my fancy much, by its wild and subtle air, and the old-nurse
fashion in which every look and gesture is detailed. His enjoyment, too,
at outwitting the Indians in their own fashion is contagious. There is a
fine history of a young man driven by a presentiment to run upon his
death. But I find, to copy these stories, as they stand, would half fill
this little book, and compression would spoil them, so I must wait some
other occasion.
The story, later, of giving an Indian liquid fire to swallow, I give at
full length, to show how a kind-hearted man and one well disposed
towards them, can treat them, and view his barbarity as a joke. It is
not then so much wonder, if the trader, with this same feeling that they
may be treated, (as however brutes should not be,) brutally, mixes red
pepper and damaged tobacco with the rum, intending in their fever to
fleece them of all they possess.
Like Murray and Henry, he has his great Indian chief, who represents
what the people should be, as Pericles and Phocion what the Greek people
should be. If we are entitled to judge by its best fruits of the
goodness of the tree, Adair's Red Shoes, and Henry's Wawatam, should
make us respect the first possessors of our country, and doubt whether
we are in all ways worthy to fill their place.
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