Aboriginal America

by Jacob S. C. Abbott

  The bovine races of Europe, however, have not been able to spread in a wild state northwardly into the prairies of North America, on account perhaps of the fact that the buffalo, a superior animal of the same kind - superior in respect to strength and ability to maintain his ground - has possession already. Nor were they or the horses able, unaided by man, to occupy the northern regions on the Atlantic; for although these regions were well adapted to produce their peculiar food, the winters were too long and cold for such animals to live through them without artificial aid. With this aid, however, they can do it, and thus, under the fostering charge of man, the green meadows and hill-sides, extending over many thousands of square miles between the lakes and the sea, have been covered with flocks of sheep and herds of horses and cows, while the bear and the moose that formerly had possession of them have passed away. A few lingering specimens only remain to roam in solitude within the narrow limits left to them, and to wonder where their companions can have gone.

  Changes in Respect to Plants

  Changes corresponding to these have taken place on a vast scale in the vegetable kingdom. Multitudes of plants that were introduced into America by the European colonists, either accidentally or by design, have since that time become very widely extended here, and have extirpated or displaced, to a corresponding degree, the original occupants of the soil. These changes have taken place sometimes with and sometimes without the aid of man. One of the most striking examples of the former class is that of the grasses and the cereal grains, such as wheat and rye, which now cover millions and millions of acres through all the central regions of the continent, where formerly brakes and bullrushes and wild wood-flowers, barren and useless, had complete possession.

  It is well that this should be so. Such changes are in fulfillment of the beneficent designs formed by the author of nature for the gradual improvement of the condition of the earth, and the advancement of it, in respect to its occupants, from lower to higher and nobler forms of life.

  Changes in the Races of Men

  A change exactly analogous to these has taken place in respect to man. The aboriginal inhabitants of the country were of races formed with constitutions, both physical and mental, adapting them to obtain their livelihood by fishing and the chase - modes of life by means of which North America might sustain perhaps twenty or thirty millions of inhabitants. The Caucasian race, which was introduced from Europe, is endowed with constitutions adapting them to gain their livelihood by agriculture, commerce, and the manufacturing arts, a mode of life by which the same territory is capable of supporting many hundred millions - we know not how many. Under these circumstances it was an inevitable, and as much in fulfillment of the designs of divine Providence, that the old races should be supplanted by the new, as that the horse and the cow should displace the alligator and the elk , and brakes and bulrushes yield their native ground to corn.

  And such has been the fact. It has been estimated that at the time America was discovered the number of Indians dwelling within the limits of the United States was about sixteen millions. Of the descendants of these sixteen millions only about two millions now remain.

  The Displacement of One Race By Another Not Necessarily Attended With Suffering

  Nor are we to suppose that such a change as this, by which a lower race is supplanted by a higher one, necessarily implies any violence or wrong on the part of the former against the latter, or any special suffering. It is the race and not the individuals that the extirpating process acts upon. That is to say, the effect is produced, not by the destruction of individuals already existing, but by a diminution in the numbers born to take the places of those ceasing to exist by natural causes. If the various aboriginal races had always been, and still continued to be, treated with the strictest justice and the most sincere and cordial good will, they would have none the less surely fulfilled the universal destiny of the lower to give way before the higher forms, in the great onward march of organization and life; but the change would have come slowly, quietly, and without suffering. Indeed, the very beings subject to it, with the exception of a few far-seeing minds that might discover it by a special and laborious study of the past and of the future, would have been unconscious that it was going on.

  Difficulties That Opposed the Amalgamation of the Two Races

  It might at first be supposed that when a superior and an inferior race were brought thus together upon the same territory, a process of amalgamation would have set in, by which, in the end, they would gradually be melted into one; but there are very deep-seated causes operating in all such cases to prevent such a union. In the first place, the mental and physical constitution of the Indian fits him specially for wandering as a hunter through the woods, and gaining his subsistence by the chase, and for no other mode of life. These qualities are innate and permanent. At least they are beyond the reach of any means of change that can be brought into operation in the course of any moderate number of generations. The whole history of the Indian tribes and of the almost fruitless attempts which have been made to civilize them, and induce them to live like white men, proves this quite conclusively. Missions were established among the Indians of New England for the purpose of instructing them in the arts of European life and in the truths of Christianity, and though for a time very remarkable results were produced, no radical or lasting change was usually effected. As soon as the external support to this new state of things, and in a certain sense unnatural, was withdrawn, everything slowly but irresistibly sank back into its former condition, and the hereditary instincts and propensities of the race returned in all their pristine vigor.

  In the same manner the experiment has several times been made of educating Indian Young men in the New England colleges, but the pupils thus taught have, almost without exception, when their prescribed course was finished, and they were left at liberty, as they arrived at manhood, to follow the impulses and instincts of their own hearts, very soon turned away from the arts and refinements of life to which they had thus been ushered, and have gone back into the woods, and relapsed hopelessly into their former condition.

  Fixedness of the Indian Tastes and Habits

  There are remnants of many of the ancient tribes existing at the present day in various parts of our country, but they live by themselves, a marked and separate race, with nothing changed except the external circumstances by which they are surrounded. They live in huts still, as their ancestors did three hundred years ago. it is only the covering that is changed - the birch bark, which has failed, being replaced with canvass, or with slabs obtained from the white men. They sit upon the ground around their wigwam fire, just as of old, and are occupied in the same species of employment, only that they make baskets instead of canoes, and bows and arrows to sell as toys, or to be used by children in shooting at coppers for a prize, instead of for the service of hunters in the chase. Even their garments retain in a great measure the forms of the old national costume, though made now of blankets and calico, instead of the skins of beasts, and adorned with glass beads instead of wampum. they come with the wares which they make to sell into the white man's kitchen, where they are kindly entertained, and where they have every opportunity to observe the conveniences and the comforts which civilization affords, but no kindling desire is awakened in their minds to imitate or share them. Silent, patient, impassible, they witness the advance of

  Essentially Unchanged

  the mighty wave which sweeps on so irresistibly over and around them, apparently without any regret for the past, or any emotion, either of hope or fear, in respect to the future. And thus in the heart of a country changing and advancing more rapidly than any other, they alone remain, from generation to generation, wholly unchanged.

  There are descendants from Indians residing in certain portions of the Southern States that have adopted a settled mode of life, and have attained to a considerable degree of refinement and civilizations, but in general, even among these, the degree in which they manifest the capaciti
es of the Caucasian race corresponds very nearly to the proportion of Caucasian blood that flows in their veins.

  Present Condition of the Western Tribes

  In the interior and western portions of the continent are vast tracts of land which remain almost entirely in possession of Indians; and although the United States government exercises a general jurisdiction over the whole country, still there are extended territories reserved for the exclusive occupancy of the native tribes. Within these reservations the tribes live in their own way, pursuing such modes of life and maintaining such systems of government as they themselves choose. This state of things has continued for more than a century, without any essential change taking place in the Indian habits or character. A very considerable trade has sprung up, it is true, between the natives and the whites, by which, in exchange for skins and furs which they obtain by trapping and the chase, the former procure a great many commodities that are produced by the arts and manufactures of civilized life. But the introduction of these commodities among them does not have the effect of changing their habits or modes of life in any appreciable degree, but rather, by facilitating the supply of their wants and the satisfaction of their desires, to fix and establish these habits more firmly than ever. They obtain from white men horses and guns and blankets, and gaudy trappings and decorations of all kinds. But they use all these things only as means to enable them the better to act their parts as huntsmen and warriors.

  The Mandan Lodges

  Some of the western tribes avail themselves of their commerce with the whites to procure the means of adding very materially to their domestic comfort, while still not essentially changing the system of life handed down to them from their forefathers. They built lodges of great size, sometimes fifty feet in diameter. The sides are formed, for four or five feet above the ground, of a bank of earth. Above this the walls are continued upward by a row of very stout poles or stems of trees, which are set close together on the top of the bank and meet in the center above. The roof is thatched with willow boughs and then plastered over with clay, so as to make it perfectly water-proof. In the center of the interior is a fire-place, which consists simply of a shallow depression in the ground. This fire-place can, of course, be approached on every side, and it is for the use in common of all the families that inhabit the lodge.

  The space at the circumference of the lodge, extending along the wall, is divided into separate compartments, like the cabins of a ship, for the several families. Sometimes very rich and showy curtains are used to separate these compartments from each other, and the posts which are set up to divide them are hung with arms and armor, and also with scalps, antlers and other trophies.

  Each family has a bedstead within its compartment. A buffalo skin stretched over it forms both sacking and bed. Another buffalo skin serves the combined purpose of sheets, blankets and counterpane; while a third, properly folded, fulfills the function of both bolster and pillows.

  Some of these Indians carry their luxury, in the matter of dress and decoration, very far. An American traveler once gave fifty dollars for the head-dress of a western Indian, which he wished to purchase as a specimen of Indian art, to add to his museum.

  Different Causes for the Aversion of the Indians to Live Like the Whites

  Great surprise has often been expressed at the total disinclination always manifested by Indians to imitate the modes of living adopted by the whites, after having once had an opportunity to observe the infinite superiority of them. And although the principal cause may be that they are endowed by the Creator with a mental and physical constitution that adapts them to a different course of life, there are other causes that have been combined with this in producing the effect. Among them one was the repulsion of race - a fixed principle of nature that manifests itself universally throughout all the realms of animal life, and has been ordained, as we shall presently see, for wise and beneficent ends, which prevented them from being cordially received into the same social and domestic system with the whites, and treated by them in it as friends and brothers. A great many curious anecdotes are related in books of Indian history illustrating the position which the poor Indian occupied among the whites, and the feelings with which he entertained the idea of living with them and becoming one among them.

  The Kennebec Indian and His Child

  Nothing can illustrate in a more touching manner the influence of this feeling than the story of the Kennebec Indian and his dead child. The tribe to which this poor man belonged lived on the banks of the Kennebec, in Maine, and when the State passed into the occupancy of white men, it became nearly or quite extinct. One man of the tribe who still remained, so recommended himself by his good behavior, and by his evident desire to adopt the habits of civilized life, that he received a grant of land from the State, in a certain township, and he settled upon this land with his wife and child, while the other farms in the neighborhood were settled by whites.

  The Indian was treated fairly enough by his neighbors in their ordinary dealings with him, but still he was an Indian in their view, and they felt no cordial sympathy with him or his family. They did not admit him to any intimate relations with them, or regard him with the kind and friendly feeling which they entertained for each other.

  At length his child fell sick and died. The neighbors did not come to see the family in their distress, and the poor Indian buried his child alone.

  Not long afterward he went to some of his neighbors, and said to them in his broken language as follows:

  "When white man's child dies, Indian man be sorry. He help bury him. When my child die, no one speak to me. I make his grave alone. I can't no live here any longer."

  He gave up his farm, dug up the body of his child, and carried it away with him, two hundred miles through the woods, to Canada, and joined a tribe of Indians living there, to share with them, for the rest of his days, the hardships and privations of barbarism.

  The Feeling of Repulsion That Exists Between the Different Races of Man Not Necessarily a Prejudice

  That peculiar feeling of repulsion which is seen universally in operation between the different races of men, and makes them mutually disinclined to live together in intimate domestic and social relations, is not, as is sometimes supposed, necessarily a prejudice. It results, as has already been intimated, from a wise and beneficent law of nature - one in universal operation throughout the whole animal world - the object of which is to preserve the distinction of species, and to maintain the purity, and secure the advancement, of the higher and nobler races of men. It is an instinctive principle implanted in the nature of every living being which draws him from those that are unlike himself in their physical conformation, and toward those that resemble him. In species that are entirely distinct from each other the aversion to domestic union is unconquerable. In the case of varieties, like those seen in the different races of men, the repulsive instinct by means of which nature intends to keep them separate from each other, in respect to the propagation of their kind, is less strong, but it is none the less real, and the design with which it has been implanted is beneficent in the highest degree. Thus the amalgamation of the Indian race with the Caucasian race coming to the new world from Europe, would have been against nature, and the instinctive principle, both in the heart of the Indian and of the white man, which leads each to love, and to seek domestic and social union with, those of their own race, and to avoid such union with those of the other, was one wisely implanted in the heart by the great author of nature, and one which both races were accordingly bound to obey.

  The Universal Brotherhood of Man

  These views, which it would seem impossible to gainsay, do not at all conflict with the sublime doctrine which the Christian religion teaches us, of the universal brotherhood of man, and the obligation which rests upon us all to regard every human being with sentiments of cordial and honest good will. They do not in the least excuse the acts of injustice and cruelty which have been perpetrated so extensively upon the Indian
tribes during the last two hundred years, in consequence of which the gradual displacement of the old race by the new, which might have proceeded quietly, peacefully, and without individual suffering, has been hurried onward with so much violence and wrong. Let us hope, however, that the period of this injustice is now over, and that the ancient race, though its days are numbered and are fast passing away, may be cheered in its decline by the kind and friendly regards of those that are to succeed to its heritage, and thus be permitted to spend the remainder of its old age in happiness and peace.

  The End.

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