assures me, that a little before the commencement of the late war with
the Cheerake, when the _Buck_, a native of Nuquose-town, died, none of
the warriors would help to bury him, because of the dangerous
pollution, they imagined they should necessarily contract from such a
white corpse; as he was begotten by a white man and a half-breed
Cheerake woman—and as the women are only allowed to mourn for the
death of a warrior, they could not assist in this friendly duty. By
much solicitation, the gentleman (my author) obtained the help of an
old friendly half-bred-warrior. They interred the corpse; but the
savage became unclean, and was separate from every kind of communion
with the rest, for the space of three days.
The Cheerake, notwithstanding they have corrupted most of their
primitive customs, observe this law of purity in so strict a manner, as
not to touch the corpse of their nearest relation though in the woods.
The fear of pollution (not the want of natural affection, as the
unskilful observe) keeps them also from burying their dead, in our
reputed unsanctified ground, if any die as they are going to
Charles-town, and returning home; because they are distant from their
own holy places and holy things, where only they could perform the
religious obsequies of their dead, and purify themselves according to
law. An incident of this kind happened several years since, a little
below _Ninety-six_, as well as at the Conggarees, in South-Carolina:—at
the former place, the corpse by our humanity was interred; but at the
latter, even the twin-born brother of an Indian christian lady well
known by the name of the _Dark-lanthorn_, left her dead and unburied.
The conversion of this _rara avis_ was in the following extraordinary
manner.—There was a gentleman who married her according to the manner of
the Cheeràke; but observing that marriages were commonly of a short
{126} duration in that wanton female government, he flattered himself of
ingrossing her affections, could he be so happy as to get her sanctified
by one of our own beloved men with a large quantity of holy water in
baptism—and be taught the conjugal duty, by virtue of her new christian
name, when they were married a-new. As she was no stranger in the
English settlements, he soon persuaded her to go down to the Conggarees,
to get the beloved speech, and many fine things beside. As the priest
was one of those sons of wisdom, the church sent us in her maternal
benevolence, both to keep and draw us from essential errors, he readily
knew the value of a convert, and grasping at the opportunity, he changed
her from a wild savage to a believing christian in a trice.
He asked her a few articles of her creed, which were soon answered by
the bridegroom, as interpreter, from some words she spoke on a trifling
question he asked her. When the priest proposed to her a religious
question, the bridegroom, by reason of their low ideas, and the idiom of
their dialects, was obliged to mention some of the virtues, and say he
recommended to her a very strict chastity in the married state. “Very
well, said she, that’s a good speech, and fit for every woman alike,
unless she is very old—But what says he now?” The interpreter, after a
short pause, replied, that he was urging her to use a proper care in
domestic life. “You evil spirit, said she, when was I wasteful, or
careless at home?” He replied, “never”: “Well then, said she, tell him
his speech is troublesome and light.—But, first, where are those fine
things you promised me?” He bid her be patient a little, and she should
have plenty of every thing she liked best; at this she smiled. Now the
religious man was fully confirmed in the hope of her conversion;
however, he asked if she understood, and believed that needful article,
the doctrine of the trinity. The bridegroom swore heartily, that if he
brought out all the other articles of his old book, she both knew and
believed them, for she was a sensible young woman.
The bridegroom had a very difficult part to act, both to please the
humour of his Venus, and to satisfy the inquisitive temper of our
religious son of Apollo; he behaved pretty well however, till he was
desired to ask her belief of the uni-trinity, and tri-unity of the
deity; which the beloved man endeavoured to explain. On this, she
smartly asked him the subject of their long and crooked-like discourse.
But, as his patience was now exhausted, {127} instead of answering her
question, he said with a loud voice, that he believed the religious man
had picked out all the crabbed parts of his old book, only to puzzle and
stagger her young christian faith; otherwise how could he desire him to
persuade such a sharp-discerning young woman, that one was three, and
three, one? Besides, that if his book had any such question, it belonged
only to the deep parts of arithmetic, in which the very Indian beloved
men were untaught. He assured the priest, that the Indians did not mind
what religion the women were of, or whether they had any; and that the
bride would take it very kindly, if he shortened his discourse, as
nothing can disturb the Indian women so much as long lectures.
The _Dark-lanthorn_, (which was the name of the bride) became very
uneasy, both by the delay of time, and the various passions she
attentively read in the bridegroom’s face and speech, and she asked him
sharply the meaning of such a long discourse. He instantly cried out,
that the whole affair was spoiled, unless it was brought to a speedy
conclusion: but the religious man insisted upon her belief of that
article, before he could proceed any farther. But by way of comfort, he
assured him it should be the very last question he would propose, till
he put the holy water on her face, and read over the marriage ceremony.
The bridegroom revived at this good news, immediately sent the bowl
around, with a cheerful countenance; which the bride observing, she
asked him the reason of his sudden joyful looks.—But, what with the
length of the lecture, the close application of the bowl, and an
over-joy of soon obtaining his wishes, he proposed the wrong question;
for instead of asking her belief of the mysterious union of the tri-une
deity, he only mentioned the manly faculties of nature. The bride
smiled, and asked if the beloved man borrowed that speech from his
beloved marriage-book? Or whether he was married, as he was so waggish,
and knowing in those affairs.—The priest imagining her cheerful looks
proceeded from her swallowing his doctrine, immediately called for a
bowl of water to initiate his new convert. As the bridegroom could not
mediate with his usual friendly offices in this affair, he persuaded her
to let the beloved man put some beloved water on her face, and it would
be a sure pledge of a lasting friendship between her and the English,
and intitle her to every thing she liked best. By the persuasive force
of his promises, she consented: and had the constancy, though so
ignorant a {128} novitiate in our sacred mysteries, to go through her
catechism, and the long marriage ceremony,—although it was often
interrupted by the bowl. This being over, she proceeded to go to bed
with her partner, while the beloved man sung a psalm at the door,
concerning the fruitful vine. Her name he soon entered in capital
letters, to grace the first title-page of his church book of converts;
which he often shewed to his English sheep, and with much satisfaction
would inform them how, by the co-operation of the Deity, his earnest
endeavours changed an Indian _Dark-lanthorn_ into a lamp of christian
light. However, afterward to his great grief, he was obliged on account
of her adulteries, to erase her name from thence, and enter it anew in
some of the crowded pages of female delinquents.
When an Israelite died in any house or tent, all who were in it, and the
furniture belonging to it contracted a pollution, which continued for
seven days. All likewise who touched the body of a dead person, or his
grave, were impure for seven days. Similar notions prevail among the
Indians. The Choktah are so exceedingly infatuated in favour of the
infallible judgment of their pretended prophets, as to allow them
without the least regret, to dislocate the necks of any of their sick
who are in a weak state of body, to put them out of their pain, when
they presume to reveal the determined will of the Deity to shorten his
days, which is asserted to be communicated in a dream; by the time that
this theo-physical operation is performed on a patient, they have a
scaffold prepared opposite to the door, whereon he is to lie till they
remove the bones in the fourth moon after, to the remote bone-house of
that family: they immediately carry out the corpse, mourn over it, and
place it in that dormitory, which is strongly pallisadoed around, lest
the children should become polluted even by passing under the dead.
Formerly when the owner of a house died, they set fire to it, and to all
the provisions of every kind; or sold the whole at a cheap rate to the
trading people, without paying the least regard to the scarcity of the
times. Many of them still observe the same rule, through a wild
imitation of a ceremonial observance of the Israelites, in burning the
bed whereon a dead person lay, because of its impurity. This is no copy
from the ancient heathens, but from the Hebrews. {129}
ARGUMENT XII.
Like the Jews, the greatest part of the southern Indians _abstain_ from
most things that are either in themselves, or in the general
apprehension of mankind, loathsome, or _unclean_: where we find a
deviation from that general rule among any of them, it is a
corruption—either owing to their intercourse with Europeans, or having
contracted an ill habit from necessity. They generally affix very
vicious ideas to the eating of impure things; and all their prophets,
priests, old warriors and war-chieftains, before they enter on their
religious duties, and while they are engaged in them, observe the
strictest abstinence in this point. Formerly, if any of them did eat in
white people’s houses, or even of what had been dressed there, while
they were sanctifying themselves, it was deemed a dangerous sin of
pollution. When some of them first corrupted their primitive virtue, by
drinking of our spirituous liquors, the religious spectators called it
_ooka hoome_, “bitter waters;” alluding, I conjecture, to the bitter
waters of jealousy, that produced swelling and death to those who
committed adultery, but had no power over the innocent. That this name
is not accidental, but designedly pointed, and expressive of the bitter
waters of God, seems obvious, not only from the image they still retain
of them, but likewise when any of them refuse our invitation of drinking
spirituous liquors in company with us, they say _Ahiskola Awa, Ooka
Hoomeh Ishto_, “I will not drink, they are the bitter waters of the
great One.” Though _Ishto_, one of the names of God, subjoined to nouns,
denotes a superlative degree, in this case they deviate from that
general rule—and for this reason they never affix the idea of bitter to
the spirituous liquors we drink among them. _Hoomeh_ is the only word
they have to convey the meaning of bitter; as _Aneh Hoomeh_, “bitter
ears,” or pepper.
They reckon all birds of prey, and birds of night, to be unclean, and
unlawful to be eaten. Not long ago, when the Indians were making their
winter’s hunt, and the old women were without flesh-meat at home, I shot
a small fat hawk, and desired one of them to take and dress it; but
though I strongly importuned her by way of trial, she, as earnestly
refused it for {130} fear of contracting pollution, which she called the
“accursed sickness,” supposing disease would be the necessary effect of
such an impurity. Eagles of every kind they esteem unclean food;
likewise ravens (though the name of a tribe with them) crows, buzzards,
swallows, bats, and every species of owls: and they believe that
swallowing flies, musketoes, or gnats, always breeds sickness, or worms,
according to the quantity that goes into them; which though it may not
imply extraordinary skill in physic, shews their retention of the
ancient law, which prohibited the swallowing of flies: for to this that
divine sarcasm alludes, “swallowing a camel, and straining at a gnat.”
Such insects were deemed unclean, as well as vexatious and hurtful. The
God of Ekron was _Beelzebub_, or the God and ruler of flies.
None of them will eat of any animal whatsoever, if they either know, or
suspect that it died of itself. I lately asked one of the women the
reason of throwing a dung-hill-fowl out of doors, on the corn-house; she
said, that she was afraid, _Oophe Abeeka Hakset Illeh_, “it died with
the distemper of the mad dogs,” and that if she had eaten it, it would
have affected her in the very same manner. I said, if so, she did well
to save herself from danger, but at the same time, it seemed she had
forgotten the cats. She replied, “that such impure animals would not
contract the accursed sickness, on account of any evil thing they eat;
but that the people who ate of the flesh of the swine that fed on such
polluting food, would certainly become mad.”
In the year 1766, a madness seized the wild beasts in the remote woods
of West-Florida, and about the same time the domestic dogs were attacked
with the like distemper; the deer were equally infected. The Indians in
their winter’s hunt, found several lying dead, some in a helpless
condition, and others fierce and mad. But though they are all fond of
increasing their number of deer-skins, both from emulation and for
profit, yet none of them durst venture to slay them, lest they should
pollute themselves, and thereby incur bodily evils. The head-man of the
camp told me, he cautioned one of the _Hottuk Hakse_, who had resided a
long time at Savannah, from touching such deer, saying to him
_Chehaksinna_, “Do not become vicious and mad,” for _Isse Hakset
Illehtàhah_, “the deer were mad, and are dead;” adding, that if he acted
the part of _Hakse_, he would cause both himself,{131} and the rest of
the hunting camp to be spoiled; nevertheless he shut his ears against
his honest speech, and brought those dangerous deer-skins to camp. But
the people would not afterward associate with him; and he soon paid dear
for being _Hakse_, by a sharp splintered root of a cane running almost
through his foot, near the very place where he first polluted himself;
and he was afraid some worse ill was still in wait for him.
In 1767, the Indians were struck with a disease, which they were
unacquainted with before. It began with sharp pains in the head, at the
lower part of each of the ears, and swelled the face and throat in a
very extraordinary manner, and also the testicles. It continued about a
fortnight, and in the like space of time went off gradually, without any
dangerous consequence, or use of outward or inward remedies: they called
it _Wahka Abeeka_, “the cattle’s distemper,” or sickness. Some of their
young men had by stealth killed and eaten a few of the cattle which the
traders had brought up, and they imagined they had thus polluted
themselves, and were smitten in that strange manner, by having their
heads, necks, &c. magnified like the same parts of a sick bull. They
first concluded, either to kill all the cattle, or send them immediately
off their land, to prevent the like mischief, or greater ills from
befalling the beloved people—for their cunning old physicians or
prophets would not undertake to cure them, in order to inflame the
people to execute the former resolution; being jealous of encroachments,
and afraid the cattle would spoil their open corn-fields; upon which
account, the traders arguments had no weight with these red Hebrew
philosophers. But fortunately, one of their head warriors had a few
cattle soon presented to him, to keep off the wolf; and his reasoning
proved so weighty, as to alter their resolution, and produce in them a
contrary belief.
They reckon all those animals to be unclean, that are either
carnivorous, or live on nasty food; as hogs,[49] wolves, panthers,
foxes, cats, mice, rats. And if we except the bear, they deem all beasts
of prey unhallowed, and polluted food; all amphibious quadrupeds they
rank in the same class. Our old traders remember when they first began
the custom of eating beavers: and to this day none eat of them, except
those who kill {132} them; though the flesh is very wholesome, on
account of the bark of trees they live upon. It must be acknowledged,
they are all degenerating apace, insomuch, that the Choktah Indians, on
account of their scantiness of ammunition while they traded with the
French, took to eat horse-flesh, and even snakes of every kind; though
each of these species, and every sort of reptiles, are accounted by the
other neighbouring nations, impure food in the highest degree. And they
ridicule the Choktah for their cannibal apostacy, and term them in
common speech, “the evil, ugly, Choktah.”
They abhor moles so exceedingly, that they will not allow their children
even to touch them, for fear of hurting their eyesight; reckoning it
contagious. They believe that nature is possest of such a property, as
to transfuse into men and animals the qualities, either of the food they
use, or of those objects that are presented to their senses;[50] he who
feeds on venison, is according to their physical system, swifter and
more sagacious than the man who lives on the flesh of the clumsy bear,
or helpless dunghill fowls, the slow-footed tame cattle, or the heavy
wallowing swine. This is the reason that several of their old men
recommend, and say, that formerly their greatest chieftains observed a
constant rule in their diet, and seldom ate of any animal of a gross
quality, or heavy motion of body, fancying it conveyed a dullness
through the whole system, and disabled them from exerting themselves
with proper vigour in their martial, civil, and religious duties.
I have already shewn their aversion to eating of unsanctified fruits;
and in this argument, that they abstain from several other things,
contrary to the usage of all the old heathen world. It may be objected,
that now they seldom refuse to eat hogs flesh, when the traders invite
them to it; but this proceeds entirely from vicious imitation, and which
is common with the most civilized nations. When swine were first brought
among them, they deemed it such a horrid abomination in any of their
people to eat that filthy and impure food, that they excluded the
criminal from all religious communion in their circular town-house, or
in their quadrangular holy ground at the annual expiation of sins,
equally as if he had eaten unsanctified fruits. After the yearly
atonement was made at the temple, he was indeed readmitted to his usual
privileges. Formerly, none of their beloved {133} men, or warriors,
would eat or drink with us on the most pressing invitation, through fear
of polluting themselves, they deemed us such impure animals. Our eating
the flesh of swine, and venison, with the gravy in it, helped to rivet
their dislike, for this they reckon as blood.
I once asked the _Archimagus_, to sit down and partake of my dinner; but
he excused himself, saying, he had in a few days some holy duty to
perform, and that if he eat evil or accursed food, it would spoil
him,—alluding to swine’s flesh. Though most of their virtue hath lately
been corrupted, in this particular they still affix vicious and
contemptible ideas to the eating of swine’s flesh; insomuch, that
_Shúkàpa_, “swine eater,” is the most opprobious epithet they can use to
brand us with: they commonly subjoin _Akanggàpa_, “eater of dunghill
fowls.” Both together, signifying “filthy, helpless animals.” By our
surprising mismanagement in allowing them a long time to insult, abuse,
rob, and murder the innocent British subjects at pleasure, without the
least satisfaction, all the Indian nations formerly despised the
English, as a swarm of tame fowls, and termed them so, in their set
speeches.
The Indians through a strong principle of religion, abstain in the
strictest manner, from eating the BLOOD of any animal; as it contains
the life, and spirit of the beast, and was the very essence of the
sacrifices that were to be offered up for sinners. And this was the
Jewish opinion and law of sacrifice, Lev. xvii. 11. “for the life of the
flesh is in the blood, and I have given it to you upon the altar, to
make an atonement for your souls; for it is the blood, which maketh an
atonement for the soul.” When the English traders have been making
sausages mixt with hog’s blood, I have observed the Indians to cast
their eyes upon them, with the horror of their reputed fore-fathers,
when they viewed the predicted abomination of desolation, fulfilled by
Antiochus, in defiling the temple.
An instance lately happened, which sufficiently shews their utter
aversion to blood. A Chikkesah woman, a domestic of one of the traders,
being very ill with a complication of disorders, the Indian physician
seemed to use his best endeavours to cure her, but without the least
visible effect. {134} To preserve his medical credit with the people, he
at last ascribed her ailment to the eating of swine’s flesh, blood, and
other polluting food: and said, that such an ugly, or accursed sickness,
overcame the power of all his beloved songs, and physic; and in anger,
he left his supposed criminal patient to be punished by Loak
Ishtohoollo. I asked her some time afterwards, what her ailments were,
and what she imagined might have occasioned them? She said, she was full
of pain, that she had _Abeeka Ookproo_, “the accursed sickness,” because
she had eaten a great many fowls after the manner of the white people,
with the _Issish Ookproo_, “accursed blood,” in them. In time she
recovered, and now strictly abstains from tame fowls, unless they are
bled to death, for fear of incurring future evil, by the like pollution.
There is not the least trace among their ancient traditions, of their
deserving the hateful name of cannibals, as our credulous writers have
carefully copied from each other. Their taste is so opposite to that of
the Anthrophagi, that they always over-dress their meat whether roasted
or boiled.[51]
The Muskoghe who have been at war, time out of mind, against the Indians
of Cape-Florida, and at length reduced them to thirty men, who removed
to the Havannah along with the Spaniards; affirm, they could never be
informed by their captives, of the least inclination they ever had of
eating human flesh, only the heart of the enemy—which they all do,
sympathetically (blood for blood) in order to inspire them with courage;
and yet the constant losses they suffered, might have highly provoked
them to exceed their natural barbarity. To eat the heart of an enemy
will in their opinion, like eating other things, before mentioned,
communicate and give greater heart against the enemy. They also think
that the vigorous faculties of the mind are derived from the brain, on
which account, I have seen some of their heroes drink out of a human
skull; they imagine, they only imbibe the good qualities it formerly
contained.
When speaking to the _Archimagus_ concerning the Hottentots, those
heterogeneous animals according to the Portuguese and Dutch accounts, he
asked me, whether they builded and planted—and what sort of food they
{135} chiefly lived upon. I told him, I was informed that they dwelt in
small nasty huts, and lived chiefly on sheep’s guts and crickets. He
laughed, and said there was no credit to be given to the far-distant
writers of those old books, because they might not have understood the
language and customs of the people; but that those, whom our books
reported to live on such nasty food, (if they did not deceive us) might
have been forced to it for the want of better, to keep them from dying;
or by the like occasion, they might have learned that ugly custom, and
could not quit it when they were free from want, as the Choktah eat
horse-flesh, though they have plenty of venison: however, it was very
easy, he said, to know whether they were possessed of human reason, for
if they were endued with shame to have a desire of covering their
nakedness, he concluded them to be human. He then asked me, whether I
had been informed of their having any sort of language, or method of
counting as high as the number of their fingers, either by words or
expressive motion; or of bearing a nearer resemblance to _Yáwe_, the
human creature, in laughter, than _Shawe_ the ape bore; or of being more
social and gregarious than those animals of the country where they
lived. If they were endued with those properties, he affirmed them to be
human creatures; and that such old lying books should not be credited.