Page images
PDF
EPUB

ов

LIFE IN THE WIGWAM;

BEING

TRUE NARRATIVES OF CAPTIVES WHO HAVE BEEN CARRIED AWAY
BY THE INDIANS, FROM THE FRONTIER SETTLEMENTS

OF THE UNITED STATES, FROM THE

EARLIEST PERIOD TO THE
PRESENT TIME.

[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors]

NEW YORK AND AUBURN:

MILLER, ORTON & MULLIGAN.

New York: 25 Park Row.-Auburn: 107 Genesee-st.

1855.

Entered, according to act of Congress, in the year 1839,

BY SAMUEL G. DRAKE,

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of Massachusetts.

AUBURN:
MILLER, ORTON & MULLIGAN,

STEREOTYPERS AND PRINTERS.

READER

THIS volume consists of entire Narratives; that is to say, I have given he originals without the slightest abridgment; nor have I taken any iberties with the language of any of them, which would in the remotest degree change the sense of a single passage, and the instances are few in which I have ventured to correct peculiarities of expression; yet I designed that, with regard to grammatical accuracy, there should be as few faults as the nature of such a performance would allow. All expressions of an antiquated date are not attempted to be changed. Some redundancies have been dropped, which could only have been retained at the expense of perspicuity.

I am not unaware that there may be persons who will doubt of the propriety of laying before all classes of the community a work which records so much that is shocking to humanity; but the fashion of studying the book of Nature has now long obtained, and pervades all classes. I have done no more than to exhibit a page of it in this collection. To observe man in his uncivilized or natural state offers an approach to a knowledge of his natural history, without which it is hardly obtained.

We find volumes upon volumes on the manners and customs of the Indians, many of the writers of which would have us believe they have exhausted the subject, and consequently we need inquire no further; but whoever has travelled among distant tribes, or read the accounts of intelligent travellers, do not require to be told that the most endless variety exists, and that the manners and customs of uncultivated nations are no more stationary, nor so much so, as are those of a civilized people. The current of time changes all things. But we have elsewhere observed* that similar necessities, although in different nations, have produced similar customs; such as will stand through ages with very little, if any, variation. Neither is it strange that similar articulations should be found in languages having no other affinity, because imitations of natural sounds must everywhere be the same. Hence it follows that customs

are as various as the face of nature itself.

A lecturer on the manners and customs of certain tribes of Indians may assure us that no others observe certain barbarous rites, and that, as they by some sudden mortality have become extinct, the knowledge of those rites is known to none others save himself, and that therefore he is the

*Book of the Indians, Book i. p. 10.

20

only person living who can inform us of them. But he may be assured that captives and other travellers have witnessed eustoms and ceremonies, which, together with their performers, have passed away also. And there is another view of the matter. Many a custom, as it existed fifty or a hundred years ago, has become quite a different affair now. From these reflections it is easy to see what an endless task it would be to describe all of the manners and customs of a single tribe of Indians, to say nothing of the thousands which have been and still exist.

These observations have been thrown out for the consideration of such as may be looking for some great work upon Indian manners and customs, to comprehend all they have been taught to expect, from those who have, perhaps, thought no deeper upon the subject than themselves. When the reader shall have perused the following narratives, I doubt not he will be 'convinced of the truth of what has here been delivered.

This is truly an age of essay writing, and we have them in abundance upon every thing and nothing, instead of facts which should be remembered. If a new work upon travels or history appears, we shall doubtless be delighted with descriptions of elegant scenery and splendid sketches about general matters, but arise from its perusal about as ignorant of the events of the history we desire as before. Compositions of this description form no part of these pages.

I have on other occasions stood out boldly in favor of the oppressed Indian, and I know that a book of INDIAN CAPTIVITIES is calculated to exhibit their character in no very favorable light; but the reader should remember that, in the following narratives, it is not I who speak; yet I believe that, with very small allowances, these narratives are entirely true. The errors, if any, will be found only crrors of judgment, which affect not their veracity.

A people whose whole lives are spent in war, and who live by a continual slaughter of all kinds of animals, must necessarily cultivate ferocity. From the nature of their circumstances they are obliged always to be in expectation of invasion; living in small communities, dispersed in small parties of five or ten upon hunting expeditions, they are easily surprised by an enemy of equal or even a lesser force. Indians, consequently, are always speaking of strange Indians whom they know not, nor do they know whether such are to appear from one direction or another. When New England was first settled, the Indians about Massachusetts Bay were in a miserable fright from fear of the Tarratines; skulking from copse to copse by day, and sleeping in loathsome fens by night, to avoid them. And all the New England Indians were in constant expectation of the Mohawks; and scarce a tribe existed in any part of the country who did not constantly expect to be attacked by some other. And such was the policy of those people that no calculation could be made upon their operations or pretensions, inasmuch as the honor of an action de

« ՆախորդըՇարունակել »