sustenance, will always relapse into a state of barbarism; history is not wanting in examples of this truth. It was thus with the Indians of North America. Though the process was gradual, it was none the less sure; they found themselves involved in an unending contest for actual existence, and such a state is highly inimical to development along upward-tending lines. As has been inevitably the case in similar instances, they retrograded. It is to this cause--never perhaps sufficiently considered in studies of the Indian nature--that must be referred much that would otherwise appear inexplicable. Even though the early colonists were as a rule ill disposed toward the Indians, as was befitting those who desired a pretext for wholesale robbery of territory, yet their narratives stand in sharp contrast to the tales of Amerind nature as we have them of later date, and in still greater contrast to our present knowledge. Instead of the progress for which one might look, if he should be of those who are convinced of the admirable effects of the introduction of our civilization, there was steady retrogression. The early colonists found a species of civilization, however crude; but it did not advance, or even continue. The Indians of the East, of course, felt the effect of the influx of white men long before their brethren of the West; and we will first glance at the effect here upon the status of woman from the new conditions. While before the coming of the whites there was doubtless frequent warfare among the red men, and while the men were preeminently warriors, yet warfare was not their normal state. Tribal feuds there were in plenty, and these ever and again broke out into strife; but, as a rule, the tribes lived in general amity, and not infrequently, as in the case of the Iroquois, or Five Nations, there were treaties of alliance and support. With the evolution and progress of the new conditions, however, the Indian found himself an Ishmael indeed. Not only were tribal jealousies and feuds augmented, but the red men became again and again involved in the wars of the whites, so that strife became their constant condition of existence. Battling for very life,--and, in their bewilderment and lack of racial organization, often turning their weapons against each other instead of the common foe,--the Indians were soon reduced to the condition of mere wandering and militant tribes, their culture forgotten and indeed inapplicable to the changed conditions. In this state of affairs all that was not strictly military became worthless; and so woman, save as leader or Amazon, lost her rightful position in Indian society. She now became, indeed, a mere chattel, a slave, even a detriment, however necessarily tolerated. She was useful in producing warriors and in ministering to their physical needs; but there her functions ceased. Though in rare instances, as in the case of Catherine Montour, a woman might be heard at the council