held, that those victims welcomed death with exultation, deeming it a recompence of their fidelity and a mark of distinction, to be selected to accompany their deceased master. Thus a perfect despotism, with its full train of superstition arrogance and cruelty, was established among the Natchez; and by a singular fatality, that people tasted of the worst calamities incident to polished nations, though they themselves were not far advanced beyond the tribes around them in civility and improvement.”[27] In the political institutions of the Natchez, however despotic and imperfect they may be considered, we discover a bond of union which did not exist among other tribes who trusted for subsistence to hunting and fishing without any species of cultivation. Their wants were few and simple; they therefore formed into separate tribes, and acted together from instinct or habit rather than from any formal concert or contract. Hence their political institutions were as simple as their wants; and hardly any appearance of regular government could be discerned among them. From the foregoing statements it may be inferred that the political institutions of the American Indians arise from the peculiarity of their condition. Their military tactics, their form of government, their peculiar religious opinions, and their unconquerable spirit of revenge, all spring out of their peculiar state of semi-civilization. That the circumstances around them determine the character of their political and other institutions will be fully proved by us when we come to speak of the efforts of the Quakers in civilizing the Oneidas and Senecas of the Five Nations. The Socialist will readily perceive how the foregoing statements, respecting the political institutions of the American Aborigines confirm and illustrate the truth of his principles. _Of the Military Tactics of the North American Indians._