John Tanner

“ An old Ojibbeway, called Crooked Finger, had been living in my lodge about a year; in all that time, having never killed any thing. When I started to hunt buffalo, he followed me, and we came at the same time in view of a large herd, when the old man endeavoured to raise a quarrel about my right to use those hunting grounds. “You Ottawwaws,” said he, “have no right in this part of the country, and though I cannot control all of you, I have you, at last, now in my power, and I am determined that if you do not go back to your own country from this very spot, I will kill you.” ”

“ In all her subsequent life, this excellent woman retained the confident assurance, that she should live to extreme old age, and often, in times of the greatest distress from hunger, and of apparent danger from other causes, she cheered her family by the assurance, that it was given to her to crawl on two sticks, and to have her head like the snow, and roused them to exertion by infusing some part of her own confident reliance upon the protection of a superior and invisible Power. ”

“ For my own part, I felt much irritated against Ta-bush-shish, inasmuch as I doubted whether he had not taken the present opportunity to wreak an old grudge upon Wa-me-gon-a-biew. I went into my brother’s lodge, and sat by him. His face and all his clothes were covered with blood. For some time he said nothing, and when he spoke, I found that he was perfectly sober. “To-morrow,” said he, “I will cry with my children, and the next day I will go and see Ta-bush-shish. We must die together, as I am not willing to live when I must always expect to be ridiculed.” ”

“ The Indians consider the moose shyer and more difficult to take than any other animal. He is more vigilant, and his senses more acute than those of the buffalo or caribou. He is fleeter than the elk, and more prudent and crafty than the antelope. In the most violent storm when the wind, and the thunder, and the falling timber are making the loudest and most incessant roar, if a man, either with his foot or his hand, breaks the smallest dry limb in the forest, the moose will hear it, and though he does not always run, he ceases eating, and rouses his attention to all sounds. ”

“ A man, an old and very distinguished warrior, who was some years ago at Red River, dreamed, when fasting in his childhood, that a bat came to him, and this little animal he chose for his medicine. To all the costly medicines for war or hunting, used by other Indians, he paid no attention. Throughout his life he wore the skin of a bat tied to the crown of his head, and in his numerous war excursions, he went into battle exulting in the confidence that the Sioux, who could not hit a bat on the wing, would never be able to hit him. ”

“ The conduct of the Indians in all these cases, however we may see fit to call it, is certainly not unnatural, being in strict and implicit obedience to that impulse of nature which prompts so irresistibly to self-preservation. How admirable is that complicated machinery which in so many instances avails to overcome and control this impulse—which postpones the interest, the happiness, or the life of the individual to the good of the associated whole! ”

“ The excitement which had kindled among them was maddening to rage, and the chiefs were running about in the utmost distress and fear, when an old man, whose head was white as snow, and who was so bent down with age that he walked on two sticks, and looking more like a dog than a man, came out, and though his voice was too feeble to be heard at any distance, he no sooner appeared, than all the Assinneboins desisted entirely from their violence, and the quarrel ended. ”

“ In all times of distress and danger, or when suffering under the apprehension of immediate starvation, or awaiting the approach of death in some more horrid form, the Indian expresses his anxiety, offers up his petition, or perhaps recalls some favourite and cherished idea, his boast in life, and his consolation in death, by a measured and monotonous chant, in which the ear of the stranger distinguishes principally the frequent repetition of the same word. ”

“ Instead of complaining that the similarity in the opinions of these people to ancient fables, is no stronger, we ought, perhaps, to be surprised that any resemblance exists. If any one would attempt a comparison between the opinions of the Americans and the Pagans of former ages, or of any other race, he should bear in mind how vague and mutable must be all such traditions, in an unwritten language. ”

“ At this time I was suffered to go entirely at large, being subjected to no manner of restraint, and might, at almost any time, have made my escape from the Indians; but I believed my father and all my friends had been murdered, and I remembered the laborious and confined manner in which I must live if I returned among the whites; where, having no friends, and being destitute of money or property, I must, of necessity, be exposed to all the ills of extreme poverty. ”

“ Other families beside my own being in distress for the want of food, the Indians called on me to make a medicine hunt. I accordingly told Me-zhick-ko-naum to go for my drum, and as preparatory to the commencement of my prayers and songs, I directed all my family to take such positions as they could keep for at least half the night, as, after I began, no one must move until I had finished. I have always been conscious of my entire dependence on a superior and invisible Power, but I have felt this conviction most powerfully in times of distress and danger. ”

“ You are driven out from your own country, and you come among us because you are too feeble and worthless to have a home or a country of your own. You have visited our best hunting grounds, and wherever you have been you have destroyed all the animals which the Great Spirit gave us for our sustenance. Go back, therefore, from this place, and be no longer a burthen to us, or I will certainly take your life. ”

“ When we had smoked, he remained a long time silent, but at last began to tell me he had come with a message from the prophet of the Shawneese. “Henceforth,” said he, “the fire must never be suffered to go out in your lodge. Summer and winter, day and night, in the storm, or when it is calm, you must remember that the life in your body, and the fire in your lodge, are the same, and of the same date. If you suffer your fire to be extinguished, at that moment your life will be at its end. You must not suffer a dog to live. You must never strike either a man, a woman, a child, or a dog. ”

“ We were all assembled one night in a long lodge, erected for the purpose, to dance and feast, and listen to the discourse of the chief, when suddenly we heard two guns, in quick succession, in the direction of the North West Company’s trading-house, now unoccupied, except by two Frenchmen who had that day arrived. The old men looked at each other in doubt and dismay. Some said the Frenchmen are killing wolves, but Esh-ke-buk-ke-koo-sa said, “I know the sound of the guns of the Sioux.” ”

“ Hunger may, and does, overcome the habit of bodily indolence, or, at least, sometimes interrupts it; but, in the Indian character, the tendency is always to quiescence. Instances are infinitely rare, among them, of that restlessness of mind so common in the European race, which is ever in quest of something beyond the complete gratification of the wants of the body, and which has been the true source of so many great and ennobling actions. ”

“ In no part of his narrative will he probably appear in a more unfavourable light than when he details his severity to an unfortunate captive girl, through whose negligence his lodge, and all his little property, was consumed by fire in the midst of winter. This kind of cruelty, as well as the abandonment of the sick, the aged, and the dying, practised so extensively by the Chippewyans, and other northern Indians, and more or less by all the tribes, remind us how much even in what seem spontaneous and natural courtesies, we owe to the influence of civilization. ”

“ If, while we give the rudiments of an education to a portion of their children, our selfish policy is thrusting back into a state of more complete barbarism the whole mass of the people, among whom we pretend to qualify them for usefulness, of what avail are our exertions, or our professions in their favour? ”

“ Hanie, and the skins belong to him but if this was not the case, you should not have one of them. You are a coward. You have not so much courage as a child. If you had the heart of a squaw, you would not have pointed your pistol at my breast, and have failed to shoot me. My life was in your power, and there was nothing to prevent your taking it, not even the fear of my friends, for you know that I am a stranger here, and not one among the Indians would raise his hand to avenge my death. ”

“ The whole animal, whether deer, bear, or moose, or whatever it may be, is cooked, and they are expected to eat it all; and, if it is in their power, they have a large bowl of bear’s grease standing by, which they drink in place of water. Notwithstanding that a man who fails to eat all his portion, is liable to the ridicule of his more gormandizing companions, it frequently happens that some of them are compelled to make a present of tobacco to their entertainer, and beg him to permit that they may not eat all he has given them. ”

“ Of what advantage could any degree of civilization have been to those unfortunate Seminoles, who were a few years since removed from their beautiful and fertile lands in Florida, to those deep and almost impassable swamps in the rear of Tampa Bay, where it has been found not only necessary to confine them by a military force, but to subsist them, from day to day, and from year to year, by regular issues of provisions? ”

“ By this firing the cows were so frightened that I perceived I should not be able to kill any in this quarter, so regaining my horse, I rode to a distant part of the herd, where the Indians had succeeded in killing a fat cow. But from this cow, as is usual in similar cases, the herd had all moved off, except one bull, who, when I came up, still kept the Indians at bay. “You are warriors,” said I, as I rode up, “going far from your own country, to seek an enemy, but you cannot take his wife from that old bull who has nothing in his hands.” ”

“ We have taken care to remove from you those evil minded white men who sought, for the sake of their own profit, to make you forget your duty to your great father; they will no more return to trouble you. We have also called to us the Sioux, who, though their skins are red, like your own, have long been your enemies. They are henceforth to remain in their own country. ”

“ One who hears an Indian orator without comprehending his language, would confidently suppose that his discourse abounded with meaning; but these speeches, like their tedious and monotonous chants, when clearly understood, appear so poor and jejune, that few white men would listen to either, were it not with the hope of extracting information, of which the speaker, or the singer himself, must be wholly unconscious. ”

“ Few will read it without some sentiments of compassion for a race so destitute, so debased, and hopeless; gladly would we believe it may have a tendency to call the attention of an enlightened and benevolent community to the wants of those who are sitting in darkness. In vain do we attempt to deceive ourselves, or others, into the belief that in whatever “relates to their moral condition and prospects, the Indians have been gainers by their intercourse [xxii] with Europeans.” ”

“ And last of all, in the extreme end of the camp, those with blacked faces, who are making their first excursion. All the warriors, both old and young, sleep with their faces towards their own country, and, on no consideration, however uneasy their position, or however great their fatigue, must make any change of attitude, nor must any two lie upon, or be covered by the same blanket. In their marches, the warriors, if they ever sit down, must not sit upon the naked ground, but must at least have some grass or bushes under them. ”

“ Complaints of whatever kind, are commonly among them, if not always, attributed to bad medicine, under which comprehensive term they include every thing, except open violence, which can be the consequence of human malice and envy. The medicine man will generally go much farther than to tell his patient that he is under the influence of the incantations of somebody; he will name some person, either his own or his patient’s enemy, as he may think most for his interest. This point is fully illustrated in the history of Ais-kaw-ba-wis, in the preceding narrative. ”

“ The old woman did not yield to the opinion of the hunter. Altercation and loud words followed; for Wa-me-gon-a-biew had little reverence for his mother, and as scarce any other Indian would have done, he ridiculed her pretensions to an intercourse with the Great Spirit, and particularly, for having said that the bear would not run if he saw hunters coming. The old woman was offended; and after reproaching her son, she went out of the lodge, and told the other Indians her dream, and directed them to the place where she said the bear would certainly be found. ”

“ When it was ascertained that the Sioux war party was not a very large one, many were disposed to pursue after it, but Esh-ke-buk-ke-koo-sha said, “not so, my brethren. Manito-o-geezhik, whose messenger I am to you, tells us we must no more go against our enemies. And is it not manifest that in this instance the Great Spirit has protected us. Had the Sioux come about our lodge when we were feasting in security, without our arms in our hands, how easily might they have killed all of us, but they were misled, and made to mistake a Frenchman’s horse for an Ojibbeway. ”

“ This large bird, whose open mouth indicates the power of his voice, is not one who inhabits the earth, or is ever seen; he lives in the clouds, and his voice is the thunder. He is more commonly called a-nim-me-kee, but here ke-kaun; our loud sounding medicine is strong to give us wind or rain, or whatever state of the air may be needful to ensure success in the hunt. ”

“ Your great father beyond the waters, who has ever, as you know, nearest his heart the interests of his red children, has sent me to remove the briars out of your path that your feet may no more bleed. ”

“ We learn how mischievous are these superstitions, when we are informed, that they are the principal men of the Metai, who thus wander about the villages, in the disguise of a bear, to wreak their hatred on a sleeping rival, or their malice on an unsuspecting adversary. But the customs of the Indians require of any one who may see a medicine man on one of these excursions, to take his life immediately, and whoever does so is accounted guiltless. ”