INDIANS OF NORTH AMERICA.

THE North American Indians are impelled to war by passions which acknowledge no control, and death and desolation are the objects of their military expeditions. From infancy they are taught to inflict cruelties upon their enemies, and to bear, with stern fortitude, whatever may befal them. They are equally prepared to endure and to torture, and, in either situation, without the slightest symptom of human frailty or feeling. They have not only no principles of religion or morality to repress their passions, but they are urged on in their career of blood, by all around them, by the examples of their fathers, and by the deeds of their companions. He is the most renowned warrior, whose tomahawk flies swiftest and sinks deepest. There is a horrible institution among some of the tribes, which furnishes a powerful illustration of this never-tiring love of vengeance. It is called the Man-Eating Society, and it is the duty of its associates to devour such prisoners as are preserved and delivered to them for that purpose. The members of this society belong to a particular family, and the dreadful inheritance descends to all the children, male and female. Its duties cannot be dispensed with, and the sanctions of religion are added to the obligations of immemorial usage. The feast is considered a solemn ceremony, at which the whole tribe is collected, as actors or spectators. The miserable victim is fastened to a stake and burned at a slow fire, with all the refinements of cruelty which savage ingenuity can invent. There is a traditionary ritual which regulates, with revolting precision, the whole course of procedure at these ceremonies.

There are but two serious occupations connected with the ordinary business of life to which an Indian willingly devotes himself: these are war and hunting. Labour is performed exclusively by the women; and this distribution of duties is a marked characteristic of all barbarous nations. The passion for war is fostered and encouraged by institutions which are admirably adapted to make the warrior brave and enterprizing. Nothing in the systems of the ancient republics was better devised to stimulate the ardour of their citizens; and when assembled Greece proclaimed the victor at the Olympic Games, and crowned him with the olive wreath, she furnished no more powerful motive for exertion and distinction than is provided in the institutions of the aborigines of America. It is the same love of distinction which impels the warrior to tear from the head of the writhing and reeking victim the bloody trophy of savage victory, and at the next war-dance, in his distant village, to strike the post and recount the atrocities which he has committed.

An Indian war-dance is an important incident in the passing events of a village. The whole population is assembled, and a feast provided for all. The warriors are painted and prepared as for battle. A post is firmly planted in the ground, and the singers, the drummers, and the other instrumental musicians, are seated within the circle formed by the dancers and the spectators. The music and the dance begin. The warriors exert themselves with great energy. Every muscle is in action, and there is perfect concord between the music

and their movements. They brandish their weapons, and with such apparent fury that fatal accidents seem unavoidable. Presently a 'warrior leaves the circle, and strikes the post with his tomahawk. The music and dancing cease, and profound silence ensues. He then recounts, with a loud voice, his military achievements. He describes the battles he has fought, the prisoners he has captured, the scalps he has taken. He points to his wounds, and produces his trophies. He accompanies his narrative with the actual representation of his 'exploits, and the mimic engagement, the advance and the retreat, are exhibited to his nation as they really occurred. There is no exaggeration, no misrepresentation. It would be infamous for a warrior to boast of deeds which he never performed. If the attempt were made, some one would approach, and throw dirt in his face, saying— "I do this to cover your shame, for the first time you see an enemy you will tremble." But such an indignity is rarely necessary, and, as the war-parties generally contain many individuals, the character and conduct of every warrior are well known. Shouts of applause accompany the narrative, proportioned in duration and intensity to the interest that it excites. The actor then returns to the circle, and the dance proceeds till it is interrupted in a similar manner.

The inordinate indulgence of the Indians in spirituous liquors is one of the most deplorable consequences which has resulted from their intercourse with civilized man. Among other nations, civilized and barbarous, excessive ebriety is an individual characteristic sometimes indulged and sometimes avoided. But the Indians in immediate contact with the United States, old and young, male and female, the chief and warrior, all give themselves up to the most brutal intoxication, whenever this mad water, as they call it, can be procured. There is no reason to believe that, prior to the discovery of America, the Indians north of Mexico used any artificial liquor whatever. We can find no trace of any preparation similar to the cava of the Polynesian Islands, or to the intoxicating liquor of the Mexicans. This remarkable abstinence, of which few examples can be found, has been succeeded by a melancholy re-action equally unprecedented. As long as the stimulus can be obtained, the Indian abandons himself to its indulgence with the recklessness of desperation.

At the treaty of Chicago, in 1821, the U. S. commissioners ordered that no spirits should be issued to the Indians, and informed them, in their own manner, that the bungs were driven into the barrels. A deputation of the chiefs was sent to remonstrate against this precautionary measure, and at its head was Topnibe, the principal chief of the Potawatomie tribe, a man upwards of eighty years of age. Every argument was used to convince them that the measure was indispensable; that they were exposed to daily murders, and that while in a state of intoxication they were unable to attend to the business for which they were convened. All this was useless, and the discussion was only terminated by the peremptory refusal of the commissioners to accede to the request. Father," said the hoaryheaded chief, when he was urged to remain sober, and make a good bargain for his people-" father, we care not for the money, nor the land, nor the goods. We want the whiskey. Give us the whiskey!"

66

ADVENTURES OF A NIGHT.

I HAVE no doubt that the year 1796 had many a terrible night, especially for the Italians and the Germans. It was the first of the victorious career of Napoleon Bonaparte, and the year of Moreau's celebrated retreat. I had just then finished my academical studies at the university of my native city: I was doctor of both faculties, and should not have shrunk from the task of deciding the quarrel between all the emperors and kings in the world and the then French republic, if they would but have taken Grotius, Puffendorf, and myself, for umpires.

Meanwhile, however, I was selected to be nothing more than the commissary of justice of a small town in East Prussia: and for me this was no mean honour. To step with one foot into office while the other is yet in the academical lecture-room is a rare piece of good-fortune. For my appointment I was indebted to the fall of Kosziusko, and to the erection of the Prussian conquests in Poland into a new province. His late Majesty, of blessed memory, is accused of having taken part in a crying injustice, when he lent a hand to subjugate an independent people; but let those who would fix this imputation upon him consider, that, had it not been for this injustice, many thousands of Prussian students would have remained without appointments. Throughout all nature, the death of the one is the life of the other: the herring exists for the stomach of the whale, and the whole animal and vegetable kingdom, ay, and the mineral too, only that in some cases the latter is rather indigestible, for the craving appetite of man. For the rest, it would be easy to demonstrate that a female who loses her honour and a nation deprived of its independence have themselves to blame for their misfortune: for they who are not afraid to die are sure to be invincible.

My mother gave me her warmest blessing, together with a supply of linen and money for the journey, and thus I set out for New East Prussia, a country not to be found in the modern systems of geography, though it was not a fairy-land, arising and disappearing at the nod of an Oberon. I shall not tire the reader with a long account of my journey. What, indeed, could I say about it were I ever so well disposed! A flat country, dull people, wretched carriages, rude postmasters, detestable roads—and yet every one as proud upon his dunghill as a Shah of Persia upon his throne. It was one of the most admirable ideas of Nature to allot to each of her creatures a peculiar element in which it is capable of enjoying itself. The fish languishes in the air, the Polish Jew in the elegance of a boudoir.

To cut the matter short, then, I arrived one evening before sunset at a pleasant-looking little town-I believe they call it Brczwczmcisl -I say pleasant-looking, though its houses were dingy with smoke, its streets unpaved and muddy, and its inhabitants not a whit more cleanly in their appearance. Still, a chimney-sweeper can look as pleasant in his way as the most fascinating opera-dancer, whose pirouettes call down thunders of applause from admiring connoisseurs. Now this Brczwczmcisl was the place of my destination: Fancy

had pictured it to me as a most frightful spot; and probably for this very reason I found it more agreeable than it had appeared to be at a distance. The name of the town, the first time that I tried to pronounce it, had nearly dislocated my jaw, and hence perhaps my secret horror of the place itself might have originated. People may say what they please, but I am persuaded, with my Uncle Toby, that names have always considerable influence upon our conceptions of things; and, as the good and evil in this world lie not so much in things themselves as in our conceptions of them, the ennobling of names tends to the real embellishment of life.

Another circumstance might have contributed in no small degree to increase my horror of the New East Prussian theatre of my jurisprudence, and this was, that in the whole course of my life I had never been far enough from my native place to be out of sight of its church steeple. Though I well knew from the books out of which I had learned geography that the cannibal nations dwelt at a considerable distance from me, still I could not sometimes help feeling surprise that I had not been dispatched by the way, considering the many excellent opportunities that were constantly presenting themselves in places where not a creature would have cared a pinch of snuff about my sudden disappearance from the face of the earth. I will venture to affirm, that a man knows not how to place confidence in his fellow-creatures, till he commits himself as a stranger to their kindness or ill-will. Misanthropes are the most consummate, the most narrow-minded, egotists: selfishness is a disease of the soul, arising from permanence of abode. To cure an egotist, you must make him travel. Change of air is quite as beneficial to the mind as to the body.

When I surveyed my Brczwczmcisl for the first time from my postwaggon, it looked at a distance for all the world like a mud-heap protruding above the plain; but to the aëronaut sailing among the clouds London or Paris, Berlin or Petersburg, with their palaces and public buildings, would not appear a jot more magnificent. My heart throbbed vehemently. There, then, was the end of my journey, the beginning of my public career, perhaps too its termination, if the Poles, transformed into New East Prussians, should take it into their heads to rise and cut my throat as one of the hirelings of their oppressors. I knew not a soul there, excepting a quondam comrade at the university, named Burkhardt, who had been appointed, though but recently, to the post of receiver-general of taxes at Brczwczmcisl. He was apprized of my coming; and I was aware that he had at my request taken a temporary lodging for me, and provided what was necessary for my reception. This Burkhardt, who had formerly been to me one of the most indifferent of men, and with whom I had associated but very little at the university, nay, indeed whom I had shunned at the desire of my mother, because he was notorious among the students as a drunkard, a gambler, and a duellist, rose higher and higher in my esteem the nearer I approached Brczwczmcisl. I vowed by the way constant friendship and regard for him as long as I lived. He was the only creature I knew in this utterly strange

Polish town, the only one who had, as it were, escaped with me from shipwreck, and been wafted upon a plank by the waves to this desert island.

Though not superstitious at bottom, yet I cannot refrain now and then from putting faith in omens. When none present themselves I sometimes coin them. Such things are done, I presume, by way of mental pastime: it is an amusement that may prove extremely entertaining for the moment. Thus, on this occasion, I resolved to take particular notice of the first person who should meet us on entering the gate of the town. I predetermined that a young damsel should be a favourable and a man a sinister omen. I had not yet arranged with myself all the different signs that might be applicable, when I saw the gate just before me, and a female, apparently of good figure, young and handsome, advancing from it. I could have flown, with my bumped and bruised limbs, from my rumbling Prussian post-waggon, and worshipped the Polish Venus. I fixed my eyes intently on her to scrutinize her features, at the same time wiping my quizzing-glass clean from dust-for I am rather nearsighted.

As we approached one another, I soon perceived that this Venus of Brczwczmcisl was not exactly a model of beauty. She was slender to be sure, but it was the slenderness of a consumptive person, with a haggard look and a flat bosom. Her face too was flat, that is to say, it exhibited very little appearance of that prominent feature, the nose. I could have sworn that it was a death's head, but for a piece of flesh protruding in a singular manner from between the teeth. I could scarcely trust my eyes. On looking still more closely through the glass, I perceived that this Polish she-patriot was putting out her tongue at me in token of abhorrence. I immediately pulled off my hat, and made her a polite return for the compliment. Mine was probably as unexpected by the lady as hers was by me. She drew back her tongue, and laughed so immoderately that she well nigh choked herself with coughing.

Such were the circumstances under which I entered the town. The driver drew up before the post-house. The Prussian eagle over the door, which had been quite fresh painted, was speckled with spots of mud, probably thrown by the juvenile patriots of the town. Its talons were buried in dirt, either because this renowned bird of prey is accustomed to sin as much with his claws as with his beak; or because the Poles meant to denote that our king had got no more by New East Prussia, than this emblem of his power bore between its claws.

I enquired, in the civilest manner, of the postmaster, where Mr. Receiver-general Burkhardt resided. The man seemed to be rather hard of hearing, for he gave me no answer. As, however, he presently began talking to a letter-carrier, I concluded that his inattention was merely designed to convince me that I was in one of the best regulated of post-offices. At the third repetition of my question, he asked angrily what I wanted. I repeated it the fourth time, with all the politeness of which I was capable.

"In the old Starosty," said he, snarlingly.