Produced by Julia Miller, Gary Rees and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from scans of public domain material produced by Microsoft for their Live Search Books site.) [Illustration: _Sarony & Major Lith._ _117 Fulton St. New York._ KING HENDRICK] THE AMERICAN INDIANS. THEIR HISTORY, CONDITION AND PROSPECTS, FROM ORIGINAL NOTES AND MANUSCRIPTS. BY HENRY R. SCHOOLCRAFT. TOGETHER WITH AN APPENDIX, CONTAINING THRILLING NARRATIVES, DARING EXPLOITS, ETC. ETC. NEW REVISED EDITION. ROCHESTER: WANZER, FOOT AND CO. 1851. Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1851, by GEO. H. DERBY & CO., In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Northern District of New York. JEWETT, THOMAS & CO., PRINTERS, BUFFALO. PERSONAL REMINISCENCES. It is now twenty-six years since I first entered the area of the Mississippi valley, with the view of exploring its then but imperfectly known features, geographical and geological. Twenty-two years of this period have elapsed since I entered on the duties of an Executive Agent for the United States Government in its higher northern latitudes among the Indian tribes in the west. Having devoted so large a portion of my life in an active sphere, in which the intervals of travel left me favourable opportunities of pursuing the languages and history of this branch of the race, it appears to be a just expectation, that, in sitting down to give some account of this people, there should be some preliminary remarks, to apprise the reader how and why it is, that his attention is recalled to a topic which he may have supposed to be well nigh exhausted. This it is proposed to do by some brief personal reminiscences, beginning at the time above alluded to.