"Adieu a heart-warm fond adieu."

29th. I encamped last night, at the foot of the Winnebago Rapids, one mile below Winnebago Lake. I found the rapids of Fox River, which begin here, more difficult to pass than on our ascent, the water being much lower. We were necessarily detained many hours, and most of the men compelled to walk. About six o'clock, P.M. we reached the upper part of the settlement of Green Bay. I stopped a few moments at Judge Doty's, and also a little below at Major Brevoort's, the Indian agent of the post. We then proceeded to the lower settlements, and encamped near the fort at Arndt's. Dr. Wheaton met me on the beach, with several others. I supped and lodged at Arndt's, having declined Dr. Wheaton's polite invitation to sup, and take a bed with him. At tea I saw Mrs. Cotton, whom you will recollect as Miss Arndt, and was introduced to her husband, Lieutenant Cotton, U.S.A. I was also introduced to the Rev. Mr. Nash, a clergyman of the Protestant Episcopal order, on missionary duty here. I went to my room, as soon as I could disentangle myself from these greetings, with a bundle of papers, to read up the news, and was truly pained to hear of the death of my early friend Colonel Charles G. Haines of New York, an account of which, with the funeral honors paid to him, I read in the papers.

30th. The repair of my canoe, and the purchase of provisions to recruit my supplies, consumed the morning, until twelve o'clock, when I embarked, and called at the fort to pay my respects to Dr. Wheaton. I found the dinner-table set. He insisted on my stopping with Mr. H. to dinner, which, being an old friend and as one of my men had absconded, and I was, therefore, delayed, I assented to. The doctor and family evinced the greatest cordiality, and he sent down to my canoe, after dinner, a quantity of melons, some cabbages, and a bag of new potatoes. Before I could obtain another man and set out again, it was three o'clock. I was obliged to forego the return of some visits. We continued our voyage down the bay about 40 miles, and encamped at 8 o'clock, having run down with a fair wind.

31st. Soon after quitting our camp this morning, a heavy wind arose. It was partly fair, so as to permit our hoisting sail for a few hours, but then shifted ahead, and drove us ashore. We landed on a small island called Vermilion, off the south cape of Sturgeon Bay. Here we remained all the remainder of the day and night. While there detained I read "China, its Arts, Manufactures, &c.," a work translated from the French, and giving a lively, and apparently correct account of that singular people.

About two o'clock, P.M., we cut some of the water and musk-melons presented by Dr. Wharton, and found them delicious. About 6 o'clock, P.M., my cook informed me that he had prepared a supper, agreeably to my directions, and we found his skill in this way by no means despicable. Such are the trifles which must fill up my journal, for did I only write what was fit for grave divines, or the scrutinizing eye of philosophy to read, I fear I should have but a few meagre sheets to present you on my return, and perhaps not a single syllable witty or wise.

Sept. 1st. The wind abated during the night, and we were early on the waters, and went on until eleven o'clock, when we landed for breakfast. At twelve o'clock we went forward again, with a fair wind. I read another volume of "China." "The Chinese ladies," says the author, "live very retired, wholly engaged in their household affairs, and how to please their husbands. They are not, however, confined quite so closely as is commonly supposed. The females visit entirely amongst each other. There is no society or circles in China to which the women are admitted. Marriages are a mere matter of convenience, or, to speak with greater propriety, a kind of bargain settled between the parents and relatives."

We came on very well, and encamped at the Little Detroit, or strait, so called, in the Grand Traverse. This traverse separates Green Bay from Lake Michigan. It is computed to be twenty miles over. A cluster of islands enables canoes to pass. There are some hieroglyphics on the rocks.

2d. We embarked at three o'clock, A.M., and went on very well, until ten, when we stopped on one of the islands for breakfast, having nearly completed the traverse. In the meantime the wind arose in our favor, and we went on along the north shore of Lake Michigan gayly. We passed the mouth of the Manistee River, which interlocks with the Tacquimenon of Lake Superior, where some of our St. Mary's Chippewas make their gardens. An aft wind and light spirits are inseparable, whether a man be in a frigate or a canoe. There is something in the air exhilarating. I have been passing in retrospect, the various journeys I have made, but during none has my anxieties to return been so great as this. What a wonderful destiny it is that makes one man a traveler and another a poet, a mathematician, &c. We appear to be guided by some innate principle which has a predominating force. No man was more unlikely to be a traveler than myself. I always thought myself to be domestic in my feelings, habits, and inclinations, and even in very early youth, proposed to live a life of domestic felicity. I thought such a life inseparable from the married state, and resolved, therefore, to get married, as soon as prudence and inclination would permit. Notwithstanding this way of thinking my life has been a series of active employment and arduous journeyings. I may say my travels began even in childhood, for when only six or seven years old, I recollect to have wandered off a long distance into the pine plains of my native town, to view Honicroisa Hill, a noted object in that part of the country, to the great alarm of all the family, who sent out to search for me. My next journey was in my eleventh year, when I accompanied my father, in his chaise, he dressed out in his regimentals, to attend a general court-martial at Saratoga. I had not then read any history of our Revolution, but had heard its battles and hardships, told over by my father, which created a deep interest, and among the events was Burgoyne's surrender. My mind was filled with the subject as we proceeded on our way, and I expected to see a field covered with skulls, and guns, and broken swords.

In my fifteenth year I accompanied my father, in his chaise, up the Valley of the Mohawk to Utica. This gave me some idea of the western country, and the rapid improvements going on there. I returned with some more knowledge of the world, and with my mind filled with enthusiastic notions of new settlements and fortunes made in the woods. I was highly pleased with the frank and hospitable manners of the west. The next spring I was sent by a manufacturing company to Philadelphia, as an agent to procure and select on the banks of the Delaware, between Bristol and Bordentown, a cargo of crucible clay. This journey and its incidents opened a new field to me, and greatly increased my knowledge of the world; of the vastness of commerce; and of the multifarious occupations of men. I acquitted myself well of my agency, having made a good selection of my cargo. I was a judge of the mineralogical properties of the article, but a novice in almost everything else. I supposed the world honest, and every man disposed to act properly and to do right. I now first witnessed a theatre. It was at New York. When the tragedy was over, seeing many go out, I also took a check and went home, to be laughed at by the captain of the sloop, with whom I was a passenger. At Philadelphia I fell into the hands of a professed sharper; He was a gentleman in dress, manners, and conversation. He showed me the city, and was very useful in directing my inquiries. But he borrowed of me thirty dollars one day, to pay an unexpected demand, as he said, and that was the last I ever saw of my money. The lesson was not, however, lost upon me. I have never since lent a stranger or casual acquaintance money.

3d. I was compelled to break off my notes yesterday suddenly. A storm came on which drove us forward with great swiftness, and put us in some peril. We made the land about three o'clock, after much exertion and very considerable wetting. After the storm had passed over, a calm succeeded, when we again put out, and kept the lake till eight o'clock. We had a very bad encampment—loose rough stones to lie on, and scarcely wood enough to make a fire. To finish our misery, it soon began to rain, but ceased before ten. At four o'clock this morning we arose, the weather being quite cold. At an early hour, after getting afloat, we reached and passed a noted landing for canoes and boats, called Choishwa (Smooth-rock.) This shelter, is formed by a ledge of rock running into the lake. On the inner, or perpendicular face, hundreds of names are cut or scratched upon the rock. This cacoethes scribendi is the pest of every local curiosity or public watering-place. Even here, in the wilderness, it is developed.

Wise men ne'er cut their names on doors or rock-heads, But leave the task to scribblers and to blockheads; Pert, trifling folks, who, bent on being witty, Scrawl on each post some fag-end of a ditty, Spinning, with spider's web, their shallow brains, O'er wainscots, borrowed books, or window panes.

At one o'clock the wind became decidedly fair, and the men, relieved from their paddles, are nearly all asleep, in the bottom of the canoe. While the wind drives us forward beautifully I embrace the time to resume my narrative of early journeyings, dropt yesterday.

In the year 1808, my father removed from Albany to Oneida County. I remained at the old homestead in Guilderland, in charge of his affairs, until the following year, when I also came to the west. The next spring I was offered handsome inducements to go to the Genesee country, by a manufacturing company, who contemplated the saving of a heavy land transportation from Albany on the article of window-glass, if the rude materials employed in it could be found in that area of country. I visited it with that view; found its native resources ample, and was still more delighted with the flourishing appearance of this part of the Western country than I had been with Utica and its environs. Auburn, Geneva, Canandaigua, and other incipient towns, seemed to me the germs of a land "flowing with milk and honey."

In 1811, I went on a second trip to Philadelphia, and executed the object of it with a success equal to my initial visit. On this trip I had letters to some gentlemen at Philadelphia, who received me in a most clever spirit, and I visited the Academy of Arts, Peale's Museum, the Water Works, Navy Yard, &c. I here received my first definite ideas of painting and sculpture. I returned with new stores of information and new ideas of the world, but I had lost little or nothing of my primitive simplicity of feeling or rustic notions of human perfection. And, as I began to see something of the iniquities of men, I clung more firmly to my native opinions.

My personal knowledge of my native State, and of the States of New Jersey and Pennsylvania, was now superior to that of most men with whom I was in the habit of conversing, and I subsequently made several little journeys and excursions that furthered me in the knowledge.

As yet, I knew nothing by personal observation of New England. In the early part of 1813, having completed my nineteenth year, I went to Middlebury, in Vermont, on the banks of Otter Creek, where, I understand, my great-grandfather, who was an Englishman, to have died. Soon after I accompanied Mr. Ep. Jones, a man of decided enterprise, but some eccentricities of character, on an extensive tour through the New England States. We set out from Lake Dunmore, in Salisbury, in a chaise, and proceeding over the Green Mountains across the State of Vermont, to Bellows' Falls, on the Connecticut River, there struck the State of New Hampshire, and went across it, and a part of Massachusetts, to Boston. Thence, after a few days' stop, we continued our route to Hartford, the seat of government of Connecticut, and thence south to the valley of the Hudson at Rhinebeck. Here we crossed the Hudson to Kingston (the Esopus of Indian days), and proceeded inland, somewhat circuitously, to the Catskill Mountains; after visiting which, we returned to the river, came up its valley to Albany, and returned, by way of Salem, to Salisbury. All this was done with one horse, a compact small-boned animal, who was a good oats-eater, and of whom we took the very best care. I made this distich on him:—

Feed me well with oats and hay, And I'll carry you forty miles a-day.

This long and circuitous tour gave me a general idea of this portion of the Union, and enabled me to institute many comparisons between the manners and customs and advantages of New York and New England.

I am again compelled to lay my pencil aside by the quantity of water thrown into the canoe by the paddles of the men, who have been roused up by the increasing waves.

4th. We went on under a press of sail last evening until eight o'clock, when we encamped in a wide sandy bay in the Straits of Michigan, having come a computed distance of 80 miles. On looking about, we found in the sand the stumps of cedar pickets, forming an antique enclosure, which, I judged, must have been the first site of the Mission of St. Ignace, founded by Pierre Marquette, upwards of a hundred and eighty years ago. Not a lisp of such a ruin had been heard by me previously. French and Indian tradition says nothing of it. The inference is, however, inevitable. Point St. Ignace draws its name from it. It was afterwards removed and fixed at the blunt peninsula, or headland, which the Indians call Peekwutino, the old Mackinac of the French.

Leaving this spot at an early hour, we went to Point St. Ignace to breakfast, and made the traverse to the Island of Michilimackinac by eleven o'clock. We were greeted by a number of persons on the beach; among them was Mr. Agnew, of the Sault, who reported friends all well. This was a great relief to my mind, as I had been for a number of days under the impression that some one near and dear to me was ill. It was Sunday morning; many of the inhabitants were at church, and appearances indicated more respect for the day than I recollect to have noticed before. The good effect of the mission established in the island, under the auspices of the Rev. Mr. Ferry, are clearly visible. Mr. Robert Stuart invited me to take a room at the company's house, which I declined, but dined and supped there.



CHAPTER XXV.

Journey from Mackinac to the Sault Ste. Marie—Outard Point—Head winds—Lake Huron in a rage—Desperate embarkation—St. Vital—Double the Detour—Return to St. Mary's—Letters—"Indian girl"—New volume of travels—Guess' Cherokee alphabet—New views of the Indian languages and their principles of construction—Georgia question—Post-office difficulties—Glimpses from the civilized world.

1825. Sept. 5th. I arose at seven, and we had breakfast at half-past seven. I then went to the Company's store and ordered an invoice of goods for the Indian department. This occupied the time till dinner was announced. I then went to my camp and ordered the tent to be struck and the canoe to be put into the water; but found two of my men so ill with the fever and ague that they could not go, and three others were much intoxicated. The atmosphere was very cloudy and threatening, and to attempt the traverse to Goose Island, under such circumstances, was deemed improper. Mr. Robert and David Stuart, men noted in the Astoria enterprise; Mr. Agnew, Capt. Knapp, Mr. Conner, Mr. Abbott, Mr. Currey, &c., had kindly accompanied me to the beach, but all were very urgent in their opinion that I should defer the starting. I ordered the men to be ready at two o'clock in the morning should the weather not prove tempestuous.

6th. I arose at three o'clock, but found a heavy fog enveloping the whole island, and concealing objects at a short distance. It was not till half-past six that I could embark, when the fog began to disperse, but the clearing away of the fog introduced a light head wind. I reached Goose Island, a distance of ten miles, after a march of three hours, and afterwards went to Outard Point, but could go no further from the increased violence of the wind.

Outard Point, 8 o'clock P.M. Here have I been encamped since noon, with a head wind, a dense damp atmosphere, and the lake in a foam. I expected the wind would fall with the sun, but, alas! it blows stronger than ever. I fondly hoped on quitting Mackinac this morning, that I should see home to-morrow, but that is now impossible. How confidently do we hope and expect in this life, and how little do we know what is to befall us for even a few hours beyond the present moment. It has pleased the All-wise Being to give me an adverse wind, and I must submit to it. I, doubtless, exulted too soon and too much. On reaching Mackinac, I said to myself: "My journey is accomplished; my route to the Sault is nothing; I can go there in a day and a half, wind or no wind." This vanity and presumption is now punished, and, I acknowledge, justly. I should have left it to Providence. Wise are the ways of the Almighty, and salutary all His dispensations to man. Were we not continually put in mind of an overruling Providence by reverses of this kind, the human heart, exalted with its own consequence, would soon cease to implore protection from on high.

I feel solitary. The loud dashing of the waves on shore, and the darkness and dreariness of all without my tent, conspire to give a saddened train to my reflections. I endeavored to divert myself, soon after landing, by a stroll along the shore. I sought in vain among the loose fragments of rock for some specimens worthy of preservation. I gleaned the evidences of crystallization and the traces of organic forms among the cast-up fragments of limestone and sandstone. I amused myself with the reflection that I should, perhaps, meet you coming from an opposite direction on the beach, and I half fancied that, perhaps, it would actually take place. Vain sport of the mind! It served to cheat away a tedious hour, and I returned to my tent fatigued and half sick. I am in hopes a cup of tea and a night's rest will restore my equipoise of mind and body. Thus

"Every pang that rends the heart, Bids expectation rise."

7th. Still detained on this bleak and desolate Point. A heavy rain and very strong gale continued all night. The rain was driven with such violence as to penetrate through the texture of my tent, and fall copiously upon me. Daybreak brought with it no abatement of the storm, but presented to my view a wide vista of white foaming surge as far as the eye could reach. In consequence of the increasing violence of the storm, I was compelled to order my baggage and canoe to be removed, and my tent to be pitched back among the trees. How long I am to remain here I cannot conjecture. It is a real equinoxial storm. My ears are stunned with the incessant roaring of the water and the loud murmuring of the wind among the foliage. Thick murky clouds obscure the sky, and a chill damp air compels me to sit in my tent with my cloak on. I may exclaim, in the language of the Chippewas, Tyau, gitche sunnahgud (oh, how hard is my fate.)

At two o'clock I made another excursion to view the broad lake and see if some favorable sign could not be drawn, but returned with nothing to cast a gleam on the angry vista. It seemed as if the lake was convulsed to its bottom.

OUTARD POINT.

What narrowed pleasures swell the bosom here, A shore most sterile, and a clime severe, Where every shrub seems stinted in its size, "Where genius sickens and where fancy dies."

If to the lake I cast my longing view, The curling waves their noisy way pursue; That noise reminds me of my prison-strand, Those waves I most admire, but cannot stand.

If to the shore I cast my anxious eye, There broken rocks and sand commingled lie, Mixed with the wrecks of shells and weeds and wood, Crushed by the storm and driven by the flood.

E'en fishes there, high cast upon the shore, Yet pant with life and stain the rocks with gore. Would here the curious eye expect to meet Aught precious in the sands beneath his feet, Ores, gems, or crystals, fitting for the case, No spot affords so poor, so drear a place. Rough rounded stones, the sport of every wind, Is all th' inquirer shall with caution find. A beach unvaried spreads before the eye; Drear is the land and stormy is the sky.

Would the fixed eye, that dotes on sylvan scenes, Draw pleasure from these dark funereal greens, These stunted cedars and low scraggy pines, Where nature stagnates and the soil repines—

Alas! the source is small—small every bliss, That e'er can dwell on such a place as this. Bleak, barren, sandy, dreary, and confined, Bathed by the waves and chilled by every wind; Without a flower to beautify the scene, Without a cultured shore—a shady green— Without a harbor on a dangerous shore, Without a friend to joy with or deplore. He who can feel one lonely ray of bliss In such a thought-appalling spot as this, His mind in fogs and mists must ever roll, Without a heart, and torpid all his soul.

About three o'clock P.M. there was a transient gleam of sunshine, and, for a few moments, a slight abatement of wind. I ordered my canoe and baggage taken inland to another narrow little bay, having issue into the lake, where the water was calm enough to permit its being loaded; but before this was accomplished, a most portentous cloud gathered in the west, and the wind arose more fierce than before. Huron, like an offended and capricious mistress, seemed to be determined, at last, on fury, and threw herself into the most extravagant attitudes. I again had my tent pitched, and sat down quietly to wait till the tempest should subside; but up to a late hour at night the elemental war continued, and, committing myself to the Divine mercy, I put out my candle and retired to my pallet.

8th. The frowning mistress, Lake Huron, still has the pouts. About seven o'clock I walked, or scrambled my way through close-matted spruce and brambles to get a view of the open lake. The force of the waves was not, perhaps, much different from the day before, but they were directly from the west, and blowing directly down the lake. Could I get out from the nook of a bay where I was encamped, and get directly before them, it appeared possible, with a close-reefed sail, to go on my way. My engagees thought it too hazardous to try, but their habitual sense of obedience to a bourgeoise led them to put the canoe in the water, and at 10 o'clock we left our encampment on Outard Point, got out into the lake, not without imminent hazard, and began our career "like a racehorse" for the Capes of the St. Mary's. The wind blew as if "'twad blawn its last." We had reefed our sail to less than four feet, and I put an extra man with the steersman. We literally went "on the wings of the wind." I do not think myself ever to have run such hazards. I was tossed up and down the waves like Sancho Panza on the blanket. Three hours and twenty minutes brought me to Isle St. Vital, behind which we got shelter. The good saint who presides over the island of gravel and sand permitted me to take a glass of cordial from my basket, and to refresh myself with a slice of cold tongue and a biscuit. Who this St. Vital may have been, I know not, having been brought up a Protestant; but I suppose the Catholic calendar would tell. If his saintship was as fond of good living as some of his friends are said to be, I make no doubt but he will freely forgive this trespass upon his territory. Taking courage by this refreshment, we again put out before the gale, and got in to the De Tour, and by seven o'clock, P.M., were safely encamped on an island in St. Mary's Straits, opposite St. Joseph's. The wind was here ahead.

On entering the straits, I found a vessel at anchor. On coming alongside it proved to be the schooner Harriet, Capt. Allen, of Mont Clemens, on her way from the Sault. A passenger on board says that he was at Mr. Johnston's house two days ago, and all are well. He says the Chippewa chiefs arrived yesterday. Regret that I had not forwarded by them the letter which I had prepared at the Prairie to transmit by Mr. Holliday, when I supposed I should return by way of Chippewa River and Lake Superior.

I procured from the Harriet a whitefish, of which I have just partaken a supper. This delicious fish is always a treat to me, but was never more so than on the present occasion. I landed here fatigued, wet, and cold, but, from the effects of a cheerful fire, good news from home, and bright anticipations for to-morrow, I feel quite re-invigorated. "Tired nature's sweet restorer" must complete what tea and whitefish have so successfully begun.

9th. My journal has no entry for this day, but it brought me safely (some 40 miles) to my own domicil at "Elmwood." The excitement of getting back and finding all well drove away almost all other thoughts.

The impressions made on society by our visit to New York, and the circles in which we moved, are given in a letter from Mr. Saml. C. Conant, of the 19th July, which I found among those awaiting my arrival. To introduce a descendant of one of the native race into society, as had been done in my choice, was not an ordinary event, and did not presuppose, it seems, ordinary independence of character. Her grandfather, by the maternal side, had been a distinguished chief of his nation at the ancient council-fire, or seat of its government at Chegoimegon and Lapointe. By her father, a native of Antrim, in the north of Ireland, she was connected with a class of clergy and gentry of high respectability, including the Bishop of Dromore and Mr. Saurin, the Attorney-General of Ireland. Two very diverse sources of pride of ancestry met in her father's family—that of the noble and free sons of the forest, and that of ancestral origin founded on the notice of British aristocracy. With me, the former was of the highest honor, when I beheld it, as it was in her case, united to manners and education in a marked degree gentle, polished, retiring, and refined. No two such diverse races and states of society, uniting to produce such a result, had ever come to my notice, and I was, of course, gratified when any persons of intellect and refinement concurred in the wisdom of my choice. Such was Mr. Conant and his family, a group ever to be remembered with kindness and respect. Having passed some weeks in his family, with her infant boy and nurse, during my absence South, his opportunities for judging were of the best kind.

"If you will suffer me to indulge the expression of both my own and Mrs. Conant's feelings, I am sure that you cannot but be pleased that the frankness and generosity of one, and the virtues and gentleness of the other of you, have made so lively an impression on our hearts, and rendered your acquaintance to us a matter of very sweet and grateful reflection. Truly modest and worthy persons often exhibit virtues and possess attainments so much allied to their nature as to be themselves unconscious of the treasures. It does not hurt such ones to be informed of their good qualities.

"When I first visited Mr. Schoolcraft, I looked about for his Indian girl. I carried such a report to my wife that we were determined to seek her acquaintance, and were not less surprised than recompensed to find such gentleness, urbanity, affection, and intelligence, under circumstances so illy calculated, as might be supposed, to produce such amiable virtues. But all have learned to estimate human nature more correctly, and to determine that nature herself, not less than the culture of skillful hands, has much to do with the refinement and polish of the mind.

"Mr. S.'s book ('Trav. Cent. Ports. Miss. Valley') has also received several generous and laudatory notices; one from the U.S. Literary Gazette, printed at Boston. I saw Gov. Clinton, also, who spoke very highly both of the book and the author. He thought that Mr. W.'s ill-natured critique would not do any injury either here or in Europe."

Oct. 23d. C.C. Trowbridge, Esq., sends me a copy of "Guess' Cherokee Alphabet." It is, with a few exceptions, syllabic. Eighty-four characters express the whole language, but will express no other Indian language.

Maj. John Biddle communicates the result of the delegate election. By throwing out the vote of Sault Ste. Marie, the election was awarded by the canvassers to Mr. Wing.

New views of Indian philology. "You know," says a literary friend, "I began with a design to refute the calumnies of the Quarterly respecting our treatment of the Indians, and our conduct during the recent war. This is precisely what I have not done. My stock of materials for this purpose was most ample, and the most of the labor performed. But I found the whole could not be inserted in one number, and no other part but this could be omitted without breaking the continuity of the discussion. I concluded, therefore, it would be better to save it for another article, and hereafter remodel it."

28th. Mr. C. writes that he has completed his review, and transmits, for my perusal, some of the new parts of it. "I also transmit my rough draft of those parts of the review which relate to Hunter, to Adelang's survey, and to ——. These may amuse an idle hour. The remarks on —— are, as you will perceive, materially altered. The alteration was rendered necessary by an examination of the work. The 'survey' is a new item, and I think, you will consider, the occasion of it, with me, a precious specimen of Dutch impudence and ignorance. Bad as it is, it is bepraised and bedaubed by that quack D. as though it were written with the judgment of a Charlevoix."

This article utters a species of criticism in America which we have long wanted.

It breaks the ice on new ground—the ground of independent philosophical thought and inquiry. Truth to tell, we have known very little on the philosophy of the Indian languages, and that little has been the re-echo of foreign continental opinions. It has been written without a knowledge of the Indian character and history. Its allusions have mixed up the tribes in double confusion. Mere synonyms have been taken for different tribes, and their history and language has been criss-crossed as if the facts had been heaped together with a pitchfork. Mr. C. has made a bold stroke to lay the foundation of a better and truer philological basis, which must at last prevail. It is true the prestige of respected names will rise up to oppose the new views, which, I confess, to be sustained in their main features by my own views and researches here on the ground and in the midst of the Indians, and men will rise to sustain the old views—the original literary mummery and philological hocus-pocus based on the papers and letters and blunders of Heckewelder. There was a great predisposition to admire and overrate everything relative to Indian history and language, as detailed by this good and sincere missionary in his retirement at Bethlehem. He was appealed to as an oracle. This I found by an acquaintance which I formed, in 1810, with the late amiable Dr. Wistar, while rusticating at Bristol, on the banks of the Delaware. The confused letters which the missionary wrote many years later, were mainly due to Dr. Wistar's philosophical interest in the subject. They were rewritten and thoroughly revised and systematized by the learned Mr. Duponceau, in 1816, and thus the philological system laid, which was published by the Penn. Hist. Soc. in 1819. During the six years that has elapsed, nobody has had the facts to examine the system. It has been now done, and I shall be widely mistaken if this does not prove a new era in our Indian philology.

Whatever the review does on this head, however, and admitting that it pushes some positions to an ultra point, it will blow the impostor Hunter sky high. His book is an utter fabrication, in which there is scarcely a grain of truth hid in a bushel of chaff.

Nov. 4th. Difficulties have arisen, at this remote post, between the citizens and the military, the latter of whom have shown a disposition to feel power and forget right, by excluding, except with onerous humiliations, some citizens from free access to the post-office. In a letter of this date, the Postmaster-General (Mr. McLean) declines to order the office to be kept out of the fort, and thus, in effect, decides against the citizens. How very unimportant a citizen is 1000 miles from the seat of government! The national aegis is not big enough to reach so far. The bed is too long for the covering. A man cannot wrap himself in it. It is to be hoped that the Postmaster-General will live long enough to find out that he has been deceived in this matter.

29th. Mr. Conant, of New York, writes: "I hope you will not fail to prosecute your Indian inquiries this winter, getting out of them all the stories and all the Indian you can. I conclude you hear an echo now and then from the big world, notwithstanding your seclusion. The Creek Delegation is at Washington, unfriendly to the late treaty, and I expect some changes not a little interesting to the aboriginal cause. Mr. Adams looks at his 'red children' with a friendly eye, and, I trust, 'the men of his house,' as the Indian orator called Congress, will prove themselves so. I have been charmed with the quietude and coolness manifested in Congress in reference to the Georgia business."

And with these last words from the civilized world, we are prepared to plunge into another winter, with all its dreary accompaniments of ice and snow and tempests, and with the consoling reflection that when our poor and long-looked-for monthly express arrives, we can get our letters and papers from the office after duly performing our genuflections to a petty military chief, with the obsequiousness of a Hindoo to the image of Juggernaut.



CHAPTER XXVI.

General aspects of the Indian cause—Public criticism on the state of Indian researches, and literary storm raised by the new views—Political rumor—Death of R. Pettibone, Esq.—Delegate election—Copper mines of Lake Superior—Instructions for a treaty in the North—Death of Mr. Pettit—Denial of post-office facilities—Arrival of commissioners to hold the Fond du Lac treaty—Trip to Fond du Lac through Lake Superior—Treaty—Return—Deaths of John Adams and Thomas Jefferson.

1826. Feb. 1st. The year opens with unfavorable symptoms for the Indian cause. The administration is strong in Congress, and the President favorable to the Indian view of their right to the soil they occupy east of the Mississippi until it is acquired by free cession. But the doctrine of state sovereignty contended for by Georgia, seems to be an element which all the States will, in the end, unite in contending for. And the Creeks may settle their accounts with the fact that they must finally go to the West. This is a practical view of the subject—a sort of political necessity which seems to outride everything else. Poetry and sympathy are rode over roughshod in the contest for the race. We feel nothing of this here at present, but it is only, perhaps, because we are too remote and unimportant to waste a thought about. Happy insignificance! As one of the little means of supporting existence in so remote a spot, and keeping alive, at the same time, the spark of literary excitement, I began, in December, a manuscript jeu d'esprit newspaper, to be put in covers and sent from house to house, with the perhaps too ambitious cognomen of "The Literary Voyager."

6th. The author of a leading and pungent critique for the North American Review writes in fine spirits from Washington, and in his usual literary tone and temper about his review: "Dr. Sparks' letter will show you his opinion. He altered the manuscript in some places, and makes me say of—what I do not think and what I would not have said. But let that pass. I gave him carte blanche, so I have no right to find fault with his exercise of his discretion. W. is in a terrible passion. He says that the article is written with ability, and that he always entertained the opinion expressed in the review of Heckewelder's work. But he is provoked at the comments on ——'s work, and, above all, at the compliment to you. Douglass, who is here, says this is merely Philadelphia versus New York, and that it is a principle with the former to puff all that is printed there, and to decry all that is not."

This appears to have been known to Gov. Clinton, and is the ground of the opinion he expressed of W. to Mr. Conant.

March 6th. Col. De Garmo Jones writes from Detroit that it is rumored that McLean is to leave the General Post-office Department, and to be appointed one of the United States Judges.

Mr. L. Pettibone, of Missouri, my companion in exploring the Ozark Mountains in 1818 and 1819, writes from that quarter that his brother, Rufus Pettibone, Esq., of St. Louis, died on the 31st July last. He was a man of noble, correct, and generous sentiments, who had practiced law with reputation in Western New York. I accompanied him and his family on going to the Western country, on his way from Olean to Pittsburgh. His generous and manly character and fair talents, make his death a loss to the community, and to the growing and enterprising population of the West. He was one of the men who cheered me in my early explorations in the West, and ever met me with a smile.

7th. My sister Maria writes, posting me up in the local news of Detroit.

9th. Mr. Trowbridge informs me that Congress settled the contested delegate question by casting aside the Sault votes. We are so unimportant that even our votes are considered as worthless. However that may be, nothing could be a greater misrepresentation than that "Indians from their lodges were allowed to vote."

14th. Col. Thomas H. Benton, of the Senate, writes that an appropriation of $10,000 has been granted for carrying out a clause in the Prairie du Chien treaty, and that a convocation of the Indians in Lake Superior will take place, "so that the copper-mine business is arranged."

17th. Maj. Joseph Delafield, of New York, says that Baron Lederer is desirous of entering into an arrangement for the exchange of my large mass of Lake Superior copper, for mineralogical specimens for the Imperial Cabinet of Vienna.

April 16th. A letter from the Department contains incipient directions for convening the Indians to meet in council at the head of Lake Superior, and committing the general arrangements for that purpose to my hands, and, indeed, my hands are already full. Boats, canoes, supplies, transportation for all who are to go, and a thousand minor questions, call for attention. A treaty at Fond du Lac, 500 miles distant, and the throwing of a commissariat department through the lake, is no light task.

27th. A moral question of much interest is presented to me in a communication from the Rev. Alvan Coe. Of the disinterested nature and character of this man's benevolence for the Indian race, no man knowing him ever doubted. He has literally been going about doing good among them since our first arrival here in 1822. In his zeal to shield them from the arts of petty traders, he has often gone so far as to incur the ill-will and provoke the slanderous tongues of some few people. That he should deem it necessary to address me a letter to counteract such rumors, is the only thing remarkable. Wiser, in some senses, and more prudent people in their worldly affairs, probably exist; but no man of a purer, simpler, and more exalted faith. No one whom I ever knew lives less for "the rewards that perish." Even Mr. Laird, whose name is mentioned in these records, although he went far beyond him in talents, gifts, and acquirements of every sort, had not a purer faith, yet he will, like that holy man, receive his rewards from the same "Master."

May 2d. Mr. Trowbridge writes me of the death of Wm. W. Pettit, Esq., of Detroit, a man respected and admired. He loaned me a haversack, suitable for a loose mineral bag, on my expedition in 1820.

8th. Difficulties between the military and citizens continue. The Postmaster-General declined, on a renewed memorial of the citizens, to remove the post-office without the garrison. He says the officers have evinced "much sensibility" on the subject, and denied that "any restraints or embarrassments" have been imposed, when every man and woman in the settlement knows that the only way to the post-office lies through the guard-house, which is open and shut by tap of drum. Restraints, indeed! Where has the worthy Postmaster-General picked up his military information?

June 6th. Definite information is received that the appropriation for the Lake Superior treaty has passed Congress.

10th. Mr. John Agnew, designated a special agent for preliminaries at Fond du Lac, writes of his prompt arrival at that place and good progress.

Gov. C. writes: "We must remove the copper-rock, and, therefore, you will have to provide such ropes and blocks as may be necessary."

22d. The citizens on this frontier, early in the season, petitioned the Legislative Council for the erection of a new county, embracing the Straits of St. Mary's and the Basin of Lake Superior, proposing to call it Chippewa, in allusion to the tribe occupying it. Maj. Robert A. Forsyth, of Detroit, M.C., writes of the success of the contemplated measure.

July 4th. The proposed treaty of Fond du Lac has filled the place with bustle for the last month. At an early hour this morning expectation was gratified by the arrival of His Excellency, Gov. Cass, accompanied by the Hon. Thomas L. McKenney, Commissioner of Indian Affairs. They reached the village in boats from Mackinac.

These gentlemen are appointed by the President to hold the conferences at Fond du Lac.

10th. Everything has been put in requisition for the last six days to facilitate the necessary embarkation. Jason could not have been more busy in preparing for his famous expedition to Argos. The military element of the party consisted of a company of the 2d Infantry, with its commissariat and medical department, numbering, all told, sixty-two men. It was placed under the command of Capt. Boardman. They embarked in three twelve-oared barges, and formed the advance. The provisions, presents of goods, and subsistence supplies of the commissioners' table, occupied four boats, and went next. I proceeded in a canoe allege with ten men, with every appendage to render the trip convenient and agreeable. Col. McKenney, struck with "the coach-and-six" sort of style of this kind of conveyance, determined to take a seat with me, and relying upon our speed and capacity to overtake the heavy boats, we embarked a day later. The whole expedition, with flags and music, was spread out over miles, and formed an impressive and imposing spectacle to the natives, who saw their "closed lake," as Superior was called in 1820, yield before the Anglo-Saxon power. The weather was fine, the scenery enchanting, and the incidents such as might fill a volume.[45] We were eighteen days in traversing the lake by its shores and bays. The distance is about 530 miles, which gives an average of thirty miles per day.

[Footnote 45: Vide "Sketches of a Tour to the Lakes, of the Character and Customs of the Chippewa Indians, and of Incidents connected with the Treaty of Fond du Lac, by Thomas L. McKenney." Baltimore, Fielding Lucas, 1827; one vol. 8vo., 493 pp.]

On reaching the post of Fond du Lac, of St. Louis, near the point where that bold stream deploys below the Cabotian Mountains,[46] we found a large assemblage of Indians from every part of the wide-spread Chippewa territories. It embraced delegations from the extreme sources of the Mississippi, the Rainy Lake borders, and Old Grand Portage, besides the entire American borders of Lake Superior and the Rice Lake region, the sources of the Wisconsin, Chippewa, and St. Croix valleys. The negotiations were held under a large bower, supported by posts, and provided with rude seats. The principles of the treaty of Prairie du Chien, of 1825, were fully explained and assented to. They ceded the right to explore and take away the native copper and copper-ores, and to work the mines and minerals in the country. They agreed to surrender the murderers still inland, who belonged to the misguided war party of 1824. They fully acknowledged the sovereign authority of the United States, and disclaimed all connection whatever with foreign powers. They stipulated that the boundary lines of the treaty of Prairie du Chien should be carried out in 1827 with the Menomonies and Winnebagoes, in the region of the sources of the Fox, Wisconsin, and Menomonee rivers. They provided for an Indian school at St. Mary's, and made some further important stipulations respecting their advance in the arts and education, through the element of their half-breeds. The effects of this treaty were to place our Indian relations in this quarter on a permanent basis, and to ensure the future peace of the frontier. My agency was now fixed on a sure basis, and my influence fully established among the tribes. During the treaty I had been the medium of placing about forty silver medals, of the first, second, and third classes, on the necks of the chiefs. A list of their names is appended.

[Footnote 46: From Cabot.]

While the Commissioners were engaged in the treaty, an effort was made, under their direction, to get out the large copper-boulder on the Ontonagon. It was entrusted to Col. Clemens, of Mount Clemens, and a Mr. Porter. The trucks and ropes taken inland by them proved inadequate. They then piled up the dry trees in the valley on the rock, and set them on fire. They found this effort to melt it inefficacious. They then poured on water from the river on whose brink it lays. This cracked off some of the adhering rock. And this attempt to mutilate and falsify the noblest specimen of native copper on the globe was the result of this effort.

The whole expedition re-embarked on the 9th of August, and being now relieved of its heavy supplies and favored with winds, returned to the Sault St. Marie on the 18th of that month.

No sooner were we arrived at St. Mary's than we were informed of the remarkable coincident deaths, on the 4th July, 1826, of John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, the second and third Presidents of the United States.

Among the letters accumulated during my absence, was one of Aug. 2d, from Gov. Clinton, requesting some wild rice for foreign distribution.

Another one was from my excellent friend Conant, of N.Y., who, with a fine sensitive mind, just appreciation of facts, and no ordinary capacity, appears to be literally breaking down in health and spirits, although still a young man. In a joint letter to Mrs. S. and myself, he says: "It appears you do not escape afflictions and visitations to teach you 'how frail you are,' how liable at any moment to render up to Him who gave them, your spirit and your life. Mr. S.," he adds, in evident allusion to my excess of "hope," "firm in body and ambitious in his pursuits, does not, I suppose, give over yet, and can scarcely understand how anybody should tire of life, and look at its pursuits with disgust."

Among my unread letters was one, Aug. 28th, from a Mr. Myer and Mr. Cocke, of Washington, District of Columbia, who propose to establish a periodical to be called "The Potomac Magazine," and solicit contributions. These abortive attempts to establish periodicals by unknown men are becoming more frequent as population increases in the land. It is felt truly that the number of readers must increase, but it is a mistake to suppose that they will read anything but the very best matter from the first sources, European and American. It is, at any rate, a mistake to suppose that a man who has attained reputation in any branch of science, literature, or general knowledge, should not seek the highest medium of communicating it, or that he would throw away his time and efforts in writing for these mere idealities of magazines without the strong inducements of either fame, money, or, at least, personal friendship.

E.A. Brush, Esq., of Detroit, writes (Aug. 28th) from Mackinac, that honors were performed that day by the military authorities on the island, in commemoration of the deaths of Adams and Jefferson. "The obsequies have this morning commenced here; but at this moment it is rather difficult to select the report of a cannon, at intervals of half an hour, from the claps of thunder at those of half a minute."

Aug. 20th. Mr. Robert Stuart, agent of the A.M. Fur Co., writes a letter of congratulations on the good policy to result from placing a sub-agent at La Pointe, in Lake Superior, a location where the interior tricks of the trade may be reported for the notice of the government. The selection of the sub-agent appointed by Commissioner McKenney is gall and wormwood to him. He strives to conceal the deep chagrin he feels at the selection of Mr. George Johnston as the incumbent.



CHAPTER XXVII.

Epidemical condition of the atmosphere at Detroit—Death of Henry J. Hunt and A. G. Whitney, Esqrs.—Diary of the visits of Indians at St. Mary's Agency—Indian affairs on the frontier under the supervision of Col. McKenney—Criticisms on the state of Indian questions—Topic of Indian eloquence—State of American researches in natural science—Dr. Saml. L. Mitchell.

1826. September. Sickness, which often assumed a mortal type, broke out during this month at Detroit, and carried away many of its most esteemed citizens. Col. McKenney writes (Sep. 13th) that the Commissioners reached that place from Mackinac in ten days, and that an alarming sickness prevails—one hundred cases! Among the latter is Mrs. Judge Hunt, an esteemed lady.

Gov. C. (Sep. 14th) announces the death of Col. Henry J. Hunt, one of the most respectable citizens; a man who, for many years, has occupied a position of the highest respect and esteem. His honor, integrity, and general usefulness, urbanity of manners and kindness to all classes, have never been called in question, and his loss to society will create a vacancy which will long be felt. Called away suddenly, his death has produced a shock in all classes, from the highest to the lowest.

Edmund A. Brush, Esq., writes (Sept. 17th): "Our unhappy mortality prevails." On the 23d, he says: "Mr. Whitney has been lying at the point of death for the last ten or twelve days. We hope he begins to improve." These hopes were delusive. He died. Mr. Whitney had been abroad; he was an assiduous and talented advocate—a native of Hudson, N.Y.—was on the high road to political distinction—a moral man and a public loss.

I amused myself this fall by keeping notes of the official visits of my Indian neighbors. They may denote the kind of daily wants against which this people struggle.

Oct. 2d. Monetogeezhig complained that he had not been able to take any fish for several days, and solicited some food for himself and family, being five persons. The dress and general appearance of himself and wife and the children, nearly naked, bore evidence to the truth of his repeated expressions, that they were "poor, very poor, and hungry." He also presented a kettle and an axe to be repaired. I gave him a ticket on the Agency blacksmith, and caused sixteen rations of flour and pork to be issued to him.

3d. The petty chief, Cheegud, with his wife and two children, arrived from Lake Superior, and reported that since leaving the Taquimenon he had killed nothing. While inland, he had broken his axe and trap. This young chief is son-in-law of Shingauba W'ossin, principal chief of the Chippewas. He is one of the home band, has been intimate at the agency from its establishment, and is very much attached to the government. He attended the treaty of Prairie du Chien, in 1825, and the treaty of Fond du Lac, in 1826, and received at the latter a medal of the third size. He has always properly appreciated the presents given him, and by his temperate, consistent, and respectable course of life, merited attention. Directed a ticket on the shop and twenty rations.

6th. An Indian woman, wife of Sirdeland, a resident Canadian, in very low circumstances, and living in the Indian mode, requested a kettle to be mended. My rule, in cases of this sort, excludes Indian females who are under the protection of Canadian husbands from a participation in the presents distributed at the office. But it is proper to make exceptions, in some instances, where repairs of ironwork are solicited. Directed a ticket on the blacksmith.

13th. Issued to Waykwauking and family twelve rations.

16th. Shingwaukoance, The Little Pine (17th July, 1822, first visit), accompanied by twenty persons, visited the office. This is one of the signers of the Treaty of St. Mary of 1820, where his mark is prefixed to his French name, Augustin Bart. He told me he had come to visit me, attended with all his young men, and requested I would listen to what he had to say. He made a speech at great length, in which he recapitulated his good offices and exertions towards the Americans, from the time of Gov. Cass's arrival in 1820. He stated that a plot had then been formed to cut off the Gov.'s party, and that he and Mr. G. Johnston had been instrumental in thwarting the design. He was glad to see the fire I had lighted up here in 1822 was kept burning, that the Indians might come and warm themselves by it. He had now determined to come and live permanently on the American side of the river, and put himself under my protection.

He repeated his friendship, and gave a "parole" of blue wampum to confirm his words. One of his party then lighted a pipe and handed it to me to smoke in the usual manner. Caused tobacco and sixty rations of food to be distributed among his band.

20th. Oshawano solicited food, declaring that his boys had not been able to take any fish from the rapids for several days. This is an old man, and a chief resident at St. Mary's. I told him that it was not my practice, which he knew, to issue provision to the families of fishermen during the fishing season, and that I expected his children to supply him; that, besides, he was one of the persons who had visited the B. Post at D. Isd. during the last summer, and that he knew I made no presents of any kind to Indians who received presents there; that if he went to his B. father in the summer, when it was pleasant weather, he must also go in the fall and winter, when the weather was bad; that if they gave him presents of goods, they must also give him food. He looked very grave, and, after a short silence, said that he had got little or nothing at D.I. He said his home was here, and he was very poor, &c. Knowing, from personal observation, that he was suffering for food, I ordered twenty-six-rations.

21st. Cheegud came to say that he was about to go to his wintering grounds, and wished some provisions to commence the journey. This young chief has been welcomed at the agency, and is friendly to the American government. He attended the treaties of P.D.C. and F. du Lac; at the latter he received a medal. He has always appreciated attentions, and by his sober, consistent, and respectful course of life, merits the notice of the office. I gave him some necessary ironwork, a knife, tobacco, ammunition, provisions (18).

23d. Visited by Shingauwosh (4 p.)

24th. Akeewayzee (4 per.)

26th. Keewikoance and band, eleven persons. This is a chief residing on the lower part of the river St. Mary. Having visited him last spring, he gave me an ancient clay pot, such as the Indians used before the arrival of Europeans. He told me he was the seventh chief, in a direct line, since the French first arrived. He and his band plant some corn and potatoes upon an island. He appears a sensible discreet man, and has a good deal of the pride and dignity of the Indian character. He is in the British interest, and his feelings are all that way, being always received at D. I. with marked attention. He has a British medal, but wishes to keep on friendly terms here.

28th. Metosh came in the office and said: "My father, I am very poor; I have nothing, not even an axe to cut wood. Show me pity." Thirteen rations.

30th. Visited by Wayishkee, a chief, having a medal of the first class, formerly of La Pointe, in Lake Superior, and of an ancient line of chiefs, but for the last three years a resident of St. Mary's. He had a wife and nine children. Has been in the constant habit of visiting the office since its establishment; but it is only within the last year that he has given up visiting D. I. He is one of the signers of the treaty of St. Mary. He attended the treaty of F. du Lac last summer. Received a medal and flag from me in the spring. Is a good hunter and a kind and affectionate parent. Had all his children by one wife. Came to inform me that he was on his way to make his first hunt on Red Carp river, L. S. Gave him ironwork, &c.

30th. Neegaubeyun, The West Wind, a chief by descent of the home band; is a man about forty; has lost one eye; much given to intemperance, and generally badly clothed; will sometimes labor for whisky; visits D.I. every season. In consequence of his poor character and political bias, has never been recognized by me as a chief, nor honored with the marks of one. He said that he was poor, and did not come to trouble me often, and hoped I would show him charity. I told him he must not construe my charity into approbation of his conduct, particularly his visits to D.I., which were displeasing to me and had been forbidden by his American Father (3b.)

30th. Muckudaywuckooneyea. This is a young man about 18. His father was a steady friend to the American cause even during the late war, and many years before an Agent resided here. He had received a Jefferson medal at Detroit; was drowned in the St. Mary a few years ago. The son has been an irregular visitor at the office for the last four years, and is ambitious to be invested with the authority of his father, but possesses neither age, ability, or discretion. In consequence of his visiting D.I., contrary to my request and his promise, I took away his father's medal from him, in 1823, hanging it up in my office, and telling him when he was worthy of it, and not before, he should have it. His conduct of late has been more considerate, and his professions of friendship for the American government are profuse; but he has not ceased his Canada visits. Ten rations.

Nov. 5th. Ketuckeewagauboway. This being Sunday, I told him he knew very well that I never listened to Indians on the Prayer Day unless they were just come from a journey, &c. He went away, saying he had forgot, &c.

6th. Oshkinaway and brother, 18 p., of the British shore. Brought a present of some partridges.

7th. Metacosegay. This man resides the greater part of the time on the Canadian side of the river, but hunts often on the American shore. He resided many years ago with a French family at St. Mary, and has imbibed something of the French taste and manners, always wearing an ornamental hat, and making a bow on entering and leaving the office. He has been in the regular habit of visiting me from the year 1822, and generally applies for what is termed nwappo on setting out for his fall and winter hunts. His elder wife, for he has two, is a Sioux slave, taken in youth. (3, 12 r.)

7th. Nauwequay Wegauboway. (4, 20.)

9th. This day Bisconaosh visited me for the first time since my residence here. He came with his wife and two children. This man is of the ancient band of the Falls, but being strongly attached to the British government, has been shy of approaching me. This has been taken advantage of by Mr. E., a trader on the opposite shore, who told him the Americans would cause him to be whipped, with other idle stuff of that sort, if he came over. He stated these facts as the cause for his not coming earlier to see me, and said he was anxious to return to the seat of his forefathers, &c. Presented him with an axe, pair of spears, ice-chisel, knife, and a couple of flints, and with sixteen rations of flour, pork, and beans. 10th. Ketuckeewagauboway. This is a resident Indian of this place. He is a fisherman during the summer, and scarcely ever does more in the winter than to snare hares or kill partridges, which he exposes for sale. He also makes snow-shoes, &c. He is intemperate and improvident, wasting in liquor what would be useful to his family if laid out for provisions, &c. It is impossible to avoid issues to such persons occasionally. Advice and reproof he always takes well, acknowledges their justice with good nature, and is even facetiously pleasant. This man used formerly to come to the office intoxicated; but my undeviating rule of listening to no Indian in that state, has had good effect.

10th. Kewazee, a fisherman in the fall, a hunter in the winter, is the eldest son of the old hereditary chief Oshawano. Keeps himself well clothed, and supports his family of four persons comfortably in the Indian way. Having concluded to stop fishing for the season, he came to solicit some provision to go inland. This is one of the home band who adheres to the American government, and has entirely broken off all visits to D.I., even contrary to the practice of his father and all the other members of his family.

13th. Iawbeance, The Little Male, a young man.

14th. Margret, wife of Metakoosega, came in the name of her husband, confined by a sore hand and unable to work. 3, 10.

15th. Wabishkipenaysee, 6, 18, an Ontonagon Indian, who thinks he is abandoned by his Manito.

16th. Naugitshigome and band, 12, 48. This is an old man, a chief by descent, but has neither medal nor flag from the British or American government. His followers, consisting of some relations, entitle him to some respect, although his foreign attachments have prevented my receiving him as a chief. His visits are, however, constant, and he professes himself friendly. His prejudices have evidently given way a good deal, and the kindness and charity shown to him, mixed with admonition, have produced a sensible change in his feelings.

18th. Caubaonaquet, 6, 36.

21st. Moazomonee, 4, 14, of St. Croix, L.S., made a speech, stating the circumstances which brought him down, and imploring charity in clothes, &c. Presented a pipe to him; gave him an axe, spears, chisel, fire-steel, leggings, &c.

24th. Oaugaugee, Little Crow, 4, 12, a son-in-law of Naugitchigome, brought some hares as a present.

27th. Ochipway, a stout, athletic young Indian, having a wife and children. He said his youngest child was ill, and requested a physician to be sent to see him.

27th. Negaubeyun, 12, 36.

Oshawano. Told him to come some other time. Axe and spears.

29th. Akewaizee applied for provisions and an axe, saying his axe had been stolen; that he wished to go down the river. I taxed him with selling his axe for liquor, but he denied this, saying that he never sold what he received as presents, and that it was stolen while he was fishing. Gave him an axe, with an injunction that he must take better care of it than he did of the last. Ten rations.

30th. Metacosseguay and wife. Said he had not been able to hunt or fish for some time, and had been disappointed in getting flour for some fish he had sold; that the trader had promised him flour when the vessel came, but no vessel had come. This being the third visit of this man and family within three weeks, I told him that while he was unwell I had given him, but now he was able to hunt or trap or fish, he must do so; that he came to me too often, and sometimes after he had sold the avails of his hunt, and taken the whole in liquor, he relied upon me for provisions; that I saw clearly what was going on about me, and he could not deceive me by idle stories, &c.; that he was constantly calling me father, and entreating me to look upon him as a child, and I did so, not only in giving, but also in refusing; that reasonable children did not trouble their fathers too often, and never requested anything but when they were really in need, &c. I ordered him a plug of tobacco, and told him to go to his lodge and smoke upon my words, and he would find them good. He went away seemingly as well pleased as if I had met his requests, shaking me and my interpreter cordially by the hand, and his wife dropping a curtsey as she left the office.

30th. Moazomonee, nephew, and brother-in-law, came for some muskrat traps I had promised him on his last visit. As this man belongs to a band on the head of River St. Croix, 700 miles inland, and will return there in the spring, the opinions he may imbibe of our government may have an important influence with his relatives, and I therefore determined to make a favorable impression upon him by issuing some presents. In his lodge are four men, three women, and a number of children. Issued sixteen rations.

Decr. 1st. Cath. and Gikkaw applied for awls.

2d. Oshawano and his youngest son. Said he had three daughters who had to cut wood every day, and had no axe of their own; that he was in want of an ice-chisel; fever in family. Gave him twenty rations. Thanked me and bade me good-day.

4th. Caubamossa, nephew, wife, and child. Twelve rations.

4th. Odawau, Refused provisions. Elder brother to Oshawano, alias Weenekiz.

4th. Getsha Akkewaize. Refused provisions. Told him that on account of visits to D.I., &c.

4th. Moazonee came for traps promised him, also a knife and fire-steel. Told him to hunt assiduously, but if he could procure nothing, to come to me for provisions.

7th. Merchand. Old iron to mend.

7th. Nauwaquaygahig. 12, axe, &c.

9th. Namewunagunboway. 12.

9th. Merchand. Twenty rations, five persons.

9th. Meesho.

13th. Ketetckeewagauboway. Axe and spears.

13th. Gitshee Ojibway.

13th. Metackossegay.

17th. Naugitchigome called at house. Sent off with, a reprimand never to call on Sunday.

18th. Iaubence brought some birds. Gave rations.

My correspondence during the autumn was by no means neglected. Col. McKenney, Com. Ind. Affairs, writes (Oct. 17th) in his usual friendly vein. The official influence of his visit to this remote portion of the country is seen in several things. He has placed a sub-agent at La Pointe. He has approved the agent's course of policy pursued here, and placed the Indian affairs generally on a better basis.

In his "sketches" of his recent tour, he seeks to embody personal and amusing things which daily befell the party—matters upon which he was quite at home. I had mentioned to him, while here, that the time and labor necessary to collect information on Indian topics, of a literary character, imposed a species of research worthy of departmental patronage; that I was quite willing to contribute in this way, and to devote my leisure moments to further researches on the aboriginal history and languages, if the government would appropriate means to this end. I took the occasion to put these views in writing, and, by way of earnest, enclosed him part of a vocabulary.

Nov. 1st. The false views of Indian history and philology, engendered in some degree by the misapprehensions of Mr. Heckewelder and some other writers, which were exposed by a glowing article in the North American Review last year, have had the effect to provoke further discussion. C. is disposed to prepare another article for that paper, and is looking about him keenly for new facts. In a letter of this date, he says: "I am extremely anxious for your conjugation of the Chippewa substantive verb. Let nothing prevent you from sending it to me, as it is more essential than I have time to explain to you. Send me also your observations on the Chippewa language. Let them come as you had them. Take no time to copy them."

11th. Mr. R. S. writes one of his peculiar letters, in which the sentiments seem to be compressed, as if some species of finesse were at work—an attenuated worldly precaution which leads him perpetually to half conceal sentiment, purpose and acts, as if the operations and business of life were not ten times better effected by plain straightforwardness than by any other mode. He has, however, so long dealt with tricky fur-traders and dealers in interested sentiment, that it seems his intellectual habits are formed, to some extent, on that model. What annoys me is, that he supposes himself hid, when, like the ostrich, it is only his own head that is concealed in the sand. Yet this man is alive to general moral effort, unites freely in all the benevolent movements of the day, and has the general air of friendliness in his personal manners. It continually seems that all the outer world's affairs are well judged of, but when he comes to draw conclusions of moral men who have the power of affecting his own interests, there is apparent constraint, or palpable narrow-mindedness.

29th. Professor Chas. Anthon, of Columbia College, writes for specimens of Indian eloquence. The world has been grossly misled on this subject. The great simplicity, and occasional strength, of an Indian's thoughts, have sometimes led to the use of figures and epithets of beauty. He is surrounded by all the elements of poetry and eloquence—tempests, woods, waters, skies. His mythology is poetic. His world is replete with spirits and gods of all imaginable kinds and hues. His very position—a race falling before civilization, and obliged to give up the bow and arrow for the plough—is poetic and artistic. But he has no sustained eloquence, no continuous trains of varying thought. It is the flash, the crack of contending elements. It is not the steady sound of the waterfall. Such was the eloquent appeal of Logan, revised and pointed by Gibson. Such was the more sustained speech of Garangula to La Barrie, the Governor-General of Canada, with La Hontan as a reporter. Such were the speeches of Pontiac and the eloquent Sagoyawata, or Red Jacket, the readiest reasoner of them all, which were diluted rather than improved by admiring paragraphists. Many persons have purposed to write a volume of Indian eloquence. Mr. Conant's design on this subject is fresh. The present request is to supply Mr. Barker, the publisher of "Stephen's Greek Thesaurus," Cambridge, England. What under the sun do the learned world suppose the Indians are made of? A man spending his time painfully to catch a beaver, or entrap an enemy, without stores of thought, without leisure, with nothing often to eat, and nothing to put on but tatters and rags, and, withal, with the whole Anglo-Saxon race treading on his toes and burning out his vitals with ardent spirits. Such is the Indian.

I sent the learned professor some perfectly truthful specimens, recently delivered here on the occasion of a surgeon from the fort digging up the body of an Indian woman for dissection. They expressed plain truth without eloquence, and I never heard anything more of the professor.

30th. Science in America.—I received a friendly letter from Dr. Samuel L. Mitchell, N. Y. There are, of recent years, more purely scientific men in the land, no doubt, than the venerable doctor. But could this have been said truly even ten years ago? He is now, perhaps, the best ichthyologist in the Union. He is a well-read zoologist, an intelligent botanist and a general physiologist, and has been for a long series of years the focus of the diffusion of knowledge on a great variety of subjects. Gov. Clinton has well called him the "Delphic Oracle" in one of his Letters of Hibernicus, because every one who has a scientific question to ask comes to him.

"The Lyceum of Natural History," he writes, "is going on prosperously in the collection of articles and in the publication of intelligence. The museum is enlarging and the annals progressing. The intercourse of New York city with almost numberless parts of the globe, aided by the enterprise and generosity of our navigating citizens, is productive of an almost constant supply of natural productions, some familiar, some known to naturalists, but not before seen by us, and others new to the whole class of observers."

Dec. 1st. Much leisure during the four years I have been at this agency, added to an early developed distaste for the ordinary modes of killing time, has enabled me to give no little of my leisure to literary pursuits. The interesting phenomena of the Indian grammar have come in for a large share of my attention. This has caused me to revise and extend my early studies, and to rummage such books on general grammar and philology as I could lay my hands on. Every winter, beginning as soon as the navigation closes and the world is fairly shut out, has thus constituted a season of studies. My attention has been perpetually divided between books and living interpreters. This may be said to be my fourth year's course with the Johnstons on the languages.

I have also resumed, as an alternate amusement, "The Literary Voyager." I wrote this year "The Man of Bronze," an essay on the Indian character, which has contributed to my own amusement, nor have I determined to show it to a human eye.

Let others write what others deftly may, I aim with thought to fill my wintry day.



CHAPTER XXVIII.

Mineralogy—Territorial affairs—Vindication of the American policy by its treatment of the Indians—New York spirit of improvement—Taste for cabinets of natural history—Fatalism in an Indian—Death of a first born son—Flight from the house—Territorial matters—A literary topic—Preparations for another treaty—Consolations—Boundary in the North-west under the treaty of Ghent—Natural history—Trip to Green Bay—Treaty of Butte des Morts—Winnebago outbreak—Intrepid conduct of General Cass—Indian stabbing—Investment of the petticoat—Mohegan language.

1827. January 10th.—Mineralogy became a popular study in the United States, I believe, about 1817 or thereabouts, when Professor Cleveland published the first edition of his Elements of Mineralogy, and Silliman began his Journal of Science. It is true Bruce had published his Mineralogical Journal in 1814, but the science can, by no means, be said to have attracted much, or general attention for several years. It was not till 1819 that Cleveland's work first came into my hands. The professor writes me under this date, that he is about preparing a new edition of the work, and he solicits the communication of new localities. This work has been about ten years before the public. It was the first work on that subject produced on this side of the Atlantic, and has acquired great popularity as a text-book to classes and amateurs. It adopts a classification on chemical principles; but recognizes the Wernerian system of erecting species by external characters; and also Hany's system of crystallography, so far as it extends, as being coincident, in the respective proofs which these systems afford to the chemical mode of pure analysis. As such it commends itself to the common sense of observers.

20th. Territorial affairs now began more particularly to attract my attention. Robert Irwin, Jr., Esq., M.C. of Detroit, writes on territorial affairs, growing out of the organization of a new county, on the St. Mary's, and in the basin of Lake Superior. I had furnished him the choice of three names, Allegan, Algonac, and Chippewa.

Major R.A. Forsyth, M.C., says (Jan. 22d), "the new county bill passed on the last of December (1826). It is contemplated to tender to you the appointment of first judge of the new county. We have selected the name of 'Chippewa.'"

Mr. C.C. Trowbridge writes (25th) that "it is proposed in Congress to lay off a new territory, embracing all Michigan west of the lake. This territory, at first proposed to be called Huron, was eventually named Wisconsin."

25th. Mr. Cass has examined, in an able article in the North American Review, the policy of the American government in its treatment of the Indians, in contrast with that of Great Britain. In this article, the charges of the London Quarterly are controverted, and a full vindication made of our policy and treatment of these tribes, which must be gratifying to every lover of our institutions, and our public sense of justice. As between government and government, this paper is a powerful and triumphant one. As a legal question it is not less so. The question of political sovereignty is clear. Did our English Elizabeths, James', and Charles', ever doubt their full right of sovereignty? The public sense of justice and benevolence, the Republic, if not the parent monarchy, fully recognized, by tracing to these tribes the fee of the soil, and by punctually paying its value, as established by public treaties, at all times.

26th. Mr. T.G. Anderson, of Drummond Island, transmits a translation of the Lord's Prayer, in Odjibwa, which he requests to be examined.

Feb. 5th. No State seems comparable, for its enterprise and rapid improvements, to New York. Mr. E.B. Allen, who recently removed from this remote village to Ogdensburgh, New York, expresses his agreeable surprise, after seven years' absence in the West, at the vast improvements that have been made in that State. "There is a spirit of enterprise and energy, that is deeply interesting to men of business and also men of science."

March 1st. Dr. Martyn Paine, of New York, proposes a system of philosophic exchanges. The large and fine collection of mineralogical and geological specimens which I brought from Missouri and other parts of the Mississippi valley in 1819, appears to have had an effect on the prevalent taste for these subjects, and at least, it has fixed the eyes of naturalists on my position on the frontiers. Cabinets of minerals have been in vogue for about nine or ten years. Mr. Maclure, of Philadelphia, Colonel Gibbs, of New Haven, and Drs. De Witt, Bruce and Mitchill, of New York, and above Profs. Silliman and Cleveland, may be said to have originated the taste. Before their day, minerals were regarded as mere "stones." Now, it is rare to find a college or academy without, at least, the nucleus of a cabinet. By transferring my collection here, I have increased very much my own means of intellectual enjoyment and resistance to the power of solitariness, if it has not been the means of promoting discovery in others.

* * * * *

4th. Fatalism,—An Indian, called Wabishkipenace, The White Bird, brings an express mail from the sub-agency of La Pointe, in Lake Superior. This proved to be the individual who, in 1820, acted as one of the guides of the exploring expedition to the Copper Rock, on the Ontonagon River. Trifles light as air arouse an Indian's suspicions, and the circumstance of his being thus employed by the government agents, was made use of by his fellows to his prejudice. They told him that this act was displeasing to the Great Spirit, who had visited him with his displeasure. Whatever influence this idea had on others, on Wabishkipenace it seemed to tell. He looked the image of despair. He wore his hair long, and was nearly naked. He had a countenance of the most melancholy cast. Poverty itself could not be poorer. Now, he appears to have taken courage, and is willing once more to enter into the conflicts of life. But, alas! what are these conflicts with an Indian? A mere struggle for meat and bread enough to live.

13th. This is a day long to be remembered in my domestic annals, as it carried to the tomb the gem of a once happy circle, the cherished darling of it, in the person of a beloved, beautiful, intellectually promising, and only son. William Henry had not yet quite completed his third year, and yet such had been the impression created by his manly precocity, his decision of character, perpetual liveliness of temper and manners, and sweet and classic lineaments, and attachable traits, that he appeared to have lived a long time. The word time is, indeed, a relative term, and ever means much or little, as much or little has been enjoyed or suffered. Our enjoyment of him, and communion with him, was intimate. From the earliest day of his existence, his intelligence and quick expressive eye was remarkable, and all his waking hours were full of pleasing innocent action and affectionate appreciation.

We took him to the city of New York during the winter of 1824-25, where he made many friends and had many admirers. He was always remembered by the youthful name of Willy and Penaci, or the bird—a term that was playfully bestowed by the Chippewas while he was still in his cradle. He was, indeed, a bird in our circle, for the agility of his motions, the liveliness of his voice, and the diamond sparkle of his full hazel eyes, reminded one of nothing so much. The month of March was more than usually changeable in its temperature, with disagreeable rains and much humidity, which nearly carried away the heavy amount of snow on the ground. A cold and croup rapidly developed themselves, and no efforts of skill or kindness had power to arrest its fatal progress. He sank under it about eleven o'clock at night. Such was the rapidity of this fatal disease, that his silver playful voice still seemed to ring through the house when he lay a placid corpse. Several poetic tributes to his memory were made, but none more touching than some lines from his own mother, which are fit to be preserved as a specimen of native composition.[47]

[Footnote 47: Who was it nestled on my breast, And on my cheek sweet kisses prest, And in whose smile I felt so blest? Sweet Willy.

Who hail'd my form as home I stept, And in my arms so eager leapt, And to my bosom joyous crept? My Willy.

Who was it wiped my tearful eye, And kiss'd away the coming sigh, And smiling, bid me say, "good boy?" Sweet Willy.

Who was it, looked divinely fair, Whilst lisping sweet the evening pray'r, Guileless and free from earthly care? My Willy.

Where is that voice attuned to love, That bid me say "my darling dove?" But, oh! that soul has flown above, Sweet Willy.

Whither has fled the rose's hue? The lily's whiteness blending grew Upon thy cheek—so fair to view, My Willy.

Oft have I gaz'd with rapt delight, Upon those eyes that sparkled bright, Emitting beams of joy and light! Sweet Willy.

Oft have I kiss'd that forehead high, Like polished marble to the eye, And blessing, breathed an anxious sigh, For Willy.

My son! thy coral lips are pale— Can I believe the heart-sick tale, That I thy loss must ever wail? My Willy.

The clouds in darkness seemed to low'r, The storm has past with awful pow'r, And nipt my tender, beauteous flow'r! Sweet Willy.

But soon my spirit will be free, And I my lovely son shall see, For God, I know did this decree! My Willy. ]

17th. This being St. Patrick's day, we dined with our excellent, warm-hearted, and truly sympathizing friend, Mr. Johnston, in a private way. He is the soul of hospitality, honor, friendship, and love, and no one can be in his company an hour without loving and admiring a man who gave up everything at home to raise up a family of most interesting children in the heart of the American wilderness. No man's motives have been more mistaken, no one has been more wronged, in public and private, by opposing traders and misjudging governments, than he, and no one I have ever known has a more forgiving and truly gentle and high-minded spirit.

28th. I began housekeeping, first on my return from the visit to New York, in the spring of 1825, in the so-called Allen House, on the eminence west of the fort, having purchased my furniture at Buffalo, and made it a pretty and attractive residence. But after the death of my son, the place became insupportable from the vivid associations which it presented with the scenes of his daily amusements.

I determined this day to close the house, and, leaving the furniture standing, we took refuge at Mr. Johnston's. Idolatry such as ours for a child, was fit to be rebuked, and the severity of the blow led me to take a retrospect of life, such as it is too common to defer, but, doubtless, wise to entertain. Why Providence should have a controversy with us for placing our affections too deeply on a sublunary object, is less easy at all times to reconcile to our limited perceptions than it is to recognize in holy writ the existence of the great moral fact. "I will be honored," says Jehovah, "and my glory will I not give to another." It is clear that there is a mental assent in our attachments, in which the very principle of idolatry is involved. If so, why not give up the point, and submit to the dispensations of an inevitable and far-seeing moral government, of affairs of every sort, with entire resignation and oneness of purpose? How often has death drawn his dart fatally since Adam fell before it, and how few of the millions on millions that have followed him have precisely known why, or been entirely prepared for the blow! To me it seems that it has been the temper of my mind to fasten itself too strongly on life and all its objects; to hope too deeply and fully under all circumstances; to grapple, as it were, in its issues with as "hooks of steel," and never to give up, never to despair; and this blow, this bereavement, appears to me the first link that is broken to loosen my hold on this sublunary trust. My thoughts, three years ago, were turned strongly, and with a mysterious power, to this point, namely, my excessive ardor of earthly pursuits, of men's approbation. Here, then, if these reflections be rightly taken, is the second admonition. Such, at least, has been the current of my thoughts since the 13th of the present month, and they were deeply felt when I took my Bible, the first I ever owned or had bought with my own money, and requested that it might be placed as the basis of the little pillow that supported the head of the lifeless child in his coffin.