Lives of Famous Indian Chiefs: From Cofachiqui, the Indian Princess, and Powhatan; down to and including Chief Joseph and Geronimo. Also an answer, from the latest research, of the query, Whence came the Indian? Together with a number of thrillingly interesting Indian stories and anecdotes from historyWood, Norman B. (Norman Barton)
History
Lives of Famous Indian Chiefs: From Cofachiqui, the Indian Princess, and Powhatan; down to and including Chief Joseph and Geronimo. Also an answer, from the latest research, of the query, Whence came the Indian? Together with a number of thrillingly interesting Indian stories and anecdotes from history
Wood, Norman B. (Norman Barton)
Indians -- Origin; Indians of North America -- Anecdotes; Indians of North America -- Biography
Dr. Breckenridge continues: "Red Jacket was about sixty years old at this
time, and had a weather-beaten look, which age, and more than all,
intemperance, had produced; but his general appearance was striking, and
his face noble. His lofty and capacious forehead, his piercing black eye,
his gently curved lips, fine cheek and slightly aquiline nose--all marked
a great man; and as sustained and expressed by his dignified air, made a
deep impression on all who saw him. All these features became doubly
expressive, when his mind and body were set in motion by the effort of
speaking--if effort that may be called which flowed like a stream from his
lips. I saw him in the wane of life, and heard him only in private, and
through a stupid and careless interpreter. Yet, notwithstanding these
disadvantages, he was one of the greatest and most eloquent orators I ever
knew. His cadence was measured, and yet very musical; and when excited he
would spring to his feet, elevate his head, expand his arms and utter with
indescribable effect of manner and tone, some of his noblest thoughts."
General Porter speaks of him as a man endowed with great intellectual
powers, and who, as an orator, was not only unsurpassed, but unequaled by
any of his contemporaries. Although those who were ignorant of his language
could not fully appreciate the force and beauty of his speeches, when
received through the medium of an interpreter--generally coarse and
clumsy--yet such was the peculiar gracefulness of his person, attitudes and
action, and the mellow tones of his Seneca dialect, and such the
astonishing effects produced on that part of the auditory who did fully
understand him, and whose souls appeared to be engrossed and borne away by
the orator, that he was listened to by all with perfect delight. His
figures were frequently so sublime, so apposite and so beautiful that the
interpreter often said the English language was not rich enough to allow of
doing him justice.
Another gentleman says: "It is evident that the best translations of Indian
speeches must fail to express the beauty and sublimity of the
originals--especially of such an original as Red Jacket. It has been my
good fortune to hear him a few times, but only in late years, when his
powers were enfeebled by age and intemperance; but I shall never forget the
impression made on me the first time I saw him in council. The English
language has no figures to convey the true meaning of the original, but
though coming through the medium of an illiterate interpreter, I saw the
dismembered parts of a splendid oration."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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