History, Manners, and Customs of the North American IndiansOld Humphrey
History
History, Manners, and Customs of the North American Indians
Old Humphrey
Indians of North America
_Hunter._ Not very long: but you shall hear. "In order to assist the
officers of the Indian department, in their arduous duty of persuading
remote tribes to quit their lands, it has been found advisable to
incur the expense of inviting one or two of their chiefs some two or
three thousand miles to Washington, in order that they should see with
their own eyes, and report to their tribes, the irresistible power of
the nation with which they are arguing. This speculation has, it is
said, in all instances, more or less effected its object. For the
reasons and for the objects we have stated, it was deemed advisable
that a certain chief should be invited from his remote country to
Washington; and accordingly, in due time, he appeared there."
_Austin._ Two or three thousand miles! What a distance for him to go!
_Hunter._ "After the troops had been made to manoeuvre before him;
after thundering volleys of artillery had almost deafened him; and
after every department had displayed to him all that was likely to add
to the terror and astonishment he had already experienced, the
President, in lieu of the Indian's clothes, presented him with a
colonel's uniform; in which, and with many other presents, the
bewildered chief took his departure."
_Brian._ He would hardly know how to walk in a colonel's uniform.
_Hunter._ "In a pair of white kid gloves; tight blue coat, with gilt
buttons, gold epaulettes, and red sash; cloth trowsers with straps;
high-heeled boots; cocked hat, and scarlet feather; with a cigar in
his mouth, a green umbrella in one hand, and a yellow fan in the
other; and with the neck of a whiskey bottle protruding out of each of
the two tail-pockets of his regimental coat; this 'monkey that had
seen the world' suddenly appeared before the chiefs and warriors of
his tribe; and as he stood before them, straight as a ramrod, in a
high state of perspiration, caused by the tightness of his finery,
while the cool fresh air of heaven blew over the naked, unrestrained
limbs of the spectators, it might, perhaps not unjustly, be said of
the costumes, 'Which is the savage?' In return for the presents he had
received, and with a desire to impart as much real information as
possible to his tribe, the poor jaded traveller undertook to deliver
to them a course of lectures, in which he graphically described all
that he had witnessed."
_Austin._ An Indian in white kid gloves, blue coat, high-heeled boots,
and cocked hat and feather! Why his tribe would all laugh at him, in
spite of his lectures.
_Hunter._ "For a while he was listened to with attention; but as soon
as the minds of his audience had received as much as they could hold,
they began to disbelieve him. Nothing daunted, however, the traveller
still proceeded."
_Austin._ I thought they would laugh at him.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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