Adventures of the Ojibbeway and Ioway Indians in England, France, and Belgium; Vol. 1 (of 2): being Notes of Eight Years' Travels and Residence in Europe with his North American Indian CollectionCatlin, George
History
Adventures of the Ojibbeway and Ioway Indians in England, France, and Belgium; Vol. 1 (of 2): being Notes of Eight Years' Travels and Residence in Europe with his North American Indian Collection
Catlin, George
England -- Description and travel; France -- Description and travel; Indians of North America
This collection is not only unique, as it concerns the particular
people whose state and character it illustrates; but, as throwing light
upon a grade and condition of the human race of which little has ever
been known, it possesses an importance novel and unparticipated: for it
has never happened, in the history of the world, that a savage people
has been approached and depicted with this intelligent completeness.
He who would learn what are the dispositions and the faculties which
belong to the mind and heart of man, in the mere rudeness of his
natural state, will find more satisfactory sources of information in
this Indian gallery than in the fullest descriptions of travellers or
the astutest schemes of metaphysicians.
----*----
THE PHILADELPHIA GAZETTE.
_Catlin's Indian Gallery._--It is a remarkable circumstance, and one
very characteristic of the energy of this age, that the same year
and almost the same month should have witnessed the completion of
three independent collections, each of which, after its way, gives
us a complete portraiture of the nation to which it refers. What
Mr. Dunn's figures have accomplished for China, and Mr. Wilkinson's
drawings have done for Egypt, Mr. Catlin's paintings have performed for
the Indian tribes. The first of these has excited the admiration of
America, the second has won the applause of Europe; if the last is less
brilliant than the one, it is more lively than the other, and it is
not less complete than either. It is not merely a minute and thorough
description of a nation whose situation and history render everything
that relates to it in the highest degree curious and personal to
Americans, but it addresses itself to the admiration and instruction
of every philosophic mind as an encyclopædia picture of the savage
state. While no histories present us with such copious information of
the characteristics of those particular tribes, which are intimately
and eternally connected with our annals, no speculative treatises
contain anything like the knowledge here garnered of the qualities and
attributes of that condition which is called the state of nature. The
eye of childhood and the mind of age are alike astonished and informed
by the spectacles here strikingly presented by this unrivalled work.
Mr. Catlin is a native of Pennsylvania, and has therefore peculiar
claims upon the attention of Philadelphians. We know and are persuaded
that when this Museum, after the very few days allotted to its
continuance here, is closed and removed for ever from our land, it will
be a matter of deep and permanent regret to all who now fail to visit
it, that they have lost the sight.
----*----
THE PHILADELPHIA EVENING STAR.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account