Indians to our traders, “that about forty years since, there came from
Mexico some of the old Chikkasah nation, (the Chichemicas, according to
the Spanish accounts) in quest of their brethren, as far north as the
Aquahpah nation, about 130 miles above the Nachee old towns, on the
south side of the Missisippi; but through French policy, they were
either killed, or sent back, so as to prevent their opening a brotherly
intercourse, as they had proposed.” And it is worthy of notice, that the
Muskohgeh cave, out of which one of their politicians persuaded them
their ancestors formerly ascended to their present terrestrial abode,
lies in the Nanne Hamgeh old town,[88] inhabited by the
Missisippi-Nachee Indians, which is one of the most western parts of
their old-inhabited country.
I hope I shall be excused in reciting their ancient oral tradition, from
father to son to the present time. They say, that one of their cunning
old religious men finding that religion did not always thrive best,
resolved with himself to impose on his friends credulity, and alter in
some respects their old tradition; he accordingly pretended to have held
for a long time a continual intercourse with their subterranean
progenitors in a cave, above 600 miles to the westward of Charles-town
in South-Carolina, adjoining to the old Chikkasah trading path; this
people were then possest of every thing convenient for human life, and
he promised them fully to supply their wants, {195} in a constant
manner, without sweating in the field; the most troublesome of all
things to manly brisk warriors. He insisted, that all who were desirous
of so natural and beneficial a correspondence, should contribute large
presents, to be delivered on the embassy, to their brethren—terræ
filii,—to clear the old chain of friendship from the rust it had
contracted, through the fault of cankering time. He accordingly received
presents from most of the people, to deliver them to their beloved
subterranean kindred: but it seems, they shut up the mouth of the cave,
and detained him there in order to be purified.
The old waste towns of the Chikkasah lie to the west and south-west,
from where they have lived since the time we first opened a trade with
them; on which course they formerly went to war over the Missisippi,
because they knew it best, and had disputes with the natives of those
parts, when they first came from thence. Wisdom directed them then to
connive at some injuries on account of their itinerant camp of women and
children; for their tradition says, it consisted of ten thousand men,
besides women and children, when they came from the west, and passed
over the Missisippi. The fine breed of running wood horses they brought
with them, were the present Mexican or Spanish barbs. They also aver,
that their ancestors cut off, and despoiled the greatest part of a
caravan, loaded with gold and silver; but the carriage of it proved so
troublesome to them, that they threw it into a river where it could not
benefit the enemy.
If we join together these circumstances, it utterly destroys the fine
Peruvian and Mexican temples of the sun, &c.—which the Spaniards have
lavishly painted from their own fruitful imaginations, to shew their own
capacity of writing, though at the expence of truth; and to amuse the
gazing distant world, and lessen our surprise at the sea of reputed
heathenish blood, which their avaricious tempers, and flaming
superstitious zeal, prompted them to spill.
If any English reader have patience to search the extraordinary volumes
of the Spanish writers, or even those of his catholic majesty’s chief
historiographer, he will not only find a wild portrait, but a striking
resemblance and unity of the civil and martial customs, the religious
rites, and traditions, of the {196} ancient Peruvians and Mexicans, and
the North-Americans, according to the manner of their moresque
paintings: likewise, the very national name of the primitive Chikkasah,
which they stile Chichemicas, and whom they repute to have been the
first inhabitants of Mexico. However, I lay little stress upon Spanish
testimonies, for time and ocular proof have convinced us of the laboured
falshood of almost all their historical narrations concerning every
curious thing relative to South America. They, were so divested of those
principles inherent to honest enquirers after truth, that they have
recorded themselves to be a tribe of prejudiced bigots, striving to
aggrandise the Mahometan valour of about nine hundred spurious catholic
christians, under the patronage of their favourite saint, as persons by
whom heaven designed to extirpate those two great nominal empires of
pretended cannibals. They found it convenient to blacken the natives
with ill names, and report them to their demi-god the mufti of Rome, as
sacrificing every day, a prodigious multitude of human victims to
numerous idol-gods.
The learned world is already fully acquainted with the falsehood of
their histories; reason and later discoveries condemn them. Many years
have elapsed, since I first entered into Indian life, besides a good
acquaintance with several southern Indians, who were conversant with the
Mexican Indian rites and customs; and it is incontrovertible, that the
Spanish monks and jesuits in describing the language, religion, and
customs, of the ancient Peruvians and Mexicans, were both unwilling, and
incapable to perform so arduous an undertaking, with justice and truth.
They did not converse with the natives as friends, but despised, hated,
and murdered them, for the sake of their gold and silver: and to excuse
their own ignorance, and most shocking, cool, premeditated murders, they
artfully described them as an abominable swarm of idolatrous cannibals
offering human sacrifices to their various false deities, and eating of
the unnatural victims. Nevertheless, from their own partial accounts, we
can trace a near agreement between the civil and martial customs, the
religious worship, traditions, dress, ornaments, and other particulars
of the ancient Peruvians and Mexicans, and those of the present North
American Indians.[89] {197}
Acosta tells us, that though the Mexicans have no proper name for God,
yet they allow a supreme omnipotence and providence: his capacity was
not sufficient to discover the former; however, the latter agrees with
the present religious opinion of the English-American Indians, of an
universal divine wisdom and government. The want of a friendly
intercourse between our northern and southern Indians, has in length of
time occasioned some of the former a little to corrupt, or alter the
name of the self-existent creator and preserver of the universe, as they
repeat it in their religious invocations, YO HE A AH.[90] But with what
show of truth, consistent with the above concession, can Acosta describe
the Mexicans as offering human sacrifices also to devils, and greedily
feasting on the victims!
We are told also that the Nauatalcas believe, they dwelt in another
region before they settled in Mexico; that they wandered eighty years in
search of it, through a strict obedience to their gods, who ordered them
to go in quest of new lands, that had such particular signs;—that they
punctually obeyed the divine mandate, and by that means found out, and
settled the fertile country of Mexico. This account corresponds with the
Chikkasah tradition of settling in their present supposed holy land, and
seems to have been derived from a compound tradition of Aaron’s rod, and
the light or divine presence with the Israelites in the wilderness, when
they marched. And probably the Mexican number of years, was originally
_forty_, instead of _eighty_.
Lopez de Gomara tells us, that the Mexicans were so devout, as to offer
to the sun and earth, a small quantity of every kind of meat and drink,
before any of themselves tasted it; and that they sacrificed part of
their corn, fruits, &c. in like manner; otherwise, they were deemed
haters of, and contemned by their gods. Is not this a confused Spanish
picture of the Jewish daily sacrifice, and first-fruit-offering, as
formerly observed? and which, as we have seen, are now offered up by the
northern Indians, to the bountiful giver, the supreme holy spirit of
fire, whom they invoke in that most sacred and awful song, YO HE WAH,
and loudly ascribe to him _Hallelu-Yah_, for his continued goodness to
them.
The Spanish writers say, that when Cortes approached Mexico, Montezuma
shut himself up, and continued for the space of eight days in {198}
prayers and fasting: but to blacken him, and excuse their own diabolical
butcheries, they assert he offered human sacrifices at the same time to
abominable and frightful idols. But the sacrifices with more justice may
be attributed to the Spaniards than to the Mexicans—as their narratives
also are a sacrifice of truth itself. Montezuma and his people’s
fastings, prayers, &c. were doubtless the same with those of the
northern Indians, who on particular occasions, by separate fastings,
ablutions, purgations, &c. seek to sanctify themselves, and so avert the
ill effects of the divine anger, and regain the favour of the deity.
They write, that the Mexicans offered to one of their gods, a sacrifice
compounded of some of all the seeds of their country, grinded fine, and
mixed with the blood of children, and of sacrificed virgins; that they
plucked out the hearts of those victims, and offered them as
first-fruits to the idol; and that the warriors imagined, the least
relic of the sacrifice would preserve them from danger. They soon
afterwards tell us of a temple of a quadrangular form, called
_Teucalli_, “God’s house,” and _Chacalmua_, “a minister of holy things,”
who belonged to it. They likewise speak of “the hearth of God,—the
continual fire of God,—the holy ark,” &c. If we cut off the jesuitical
paintings of the unnatural sacrifice, the rest is consonant to what hath
been observed, concerning the North American Indians. And it is very
obvious, the North and South American Indians are alike of vindictive
tempers, putting most of their invading enemies that fall into their
power to the fiery torture. The Spaniards looking upon themselves as
divine embassadors, under the imperial signature of the HOLY LORD of
Rome, were excessively enraged against the simple native
South-Americans, because they tortured forty of their captivated people
by reprisal, devoting them to the fire, and ate their hearts, according
to the universal war-custom of our northern Indians, on the like
occasion. The Spanish terror and hatred on this account, their pride,
religious, bigotry, and an utter ignorance of the Indian dialects,
rites, and customs, excited them thus to delineate the Mexicans;—and
equally hard names, and unjust charges, the bloody members of their
diabolical inquisition used to bestow on those pretended heretics, whom
they gave over to be tortured and burnt by the secular power. But it is
worthy of notice, the Spanish writers acknowledge that the Mexicans
brought their human sacrifices from the opposite sea; and did not offer
up any of their own people: so that this was but the same {199} as our
North-American Indians still practice, when they devote their captives
to death; which is ushered in with ablutions, and other methods of
sanctifying themselves, as have been particularly described; and they
perform the solemnity with singing the sacred triumphal song, with
beating of the drum, dances, and various sorts of rejoicings, through
gratitude to the beneficent and divine author of success against their
common enemy. By the description of the Portuguese writers, the
Indian-Brasilian method of war, and of torturing their devoted captives,
very nearly resembles the customs of our Indians.
Acosta, according to his usual ignorance of the Indian customs, says,
that some in Mexico understood one another by whistling, on which he
attempts to be witty—but notwithstanding the great contempt and surprise
of the Spaniards at those Indians who whistled as they went; this
whistle was no other than the war-whoop, or a very loud and shrill
shout, denoting death, or good or bad news, or bringing in captives from
war. The same writer says they had three kinds of knighthood, with which
they honoured the best soldiers; the chief of which was the red ribbon;
the next the lion, or tyger-knight; and the meanest was the grey knight.
He might with as much truth, have added the turky-buzzard knight, the
sun-blind bat knight, and the night-owl knight. His account of the
various gradations of the Indian war-titles, shews the unskilfulness of
that voluminous writer, even in the first principles of his Indian
subject, and how far we ought to rely on his marvellous works.
The accounts the Spaniards formerly gave us of Florida and its
inhabitants, are written in the same romantic strain with those of
Mexico. Ramusius tells us, that Alvaro Nunes and his company reported
the Apalahchee Indians to be such a gigantic people, as to carry bows,
thick as a man’s arm, and of eleven or twelve spans long, shooting with
proportional force and direction. It seems they lived then a sober and
temperate life, for Morgues says, one of their kings was three hundred
years old; though Laudon reckons him only two hundred and fifty: and
Morgues assures us, he saw this young Indian Methusalah’s father, who
was fifty years older than his son, and that each of them was likely by
the common course of nature to live thirty or forty years longer,
although they had seen their fifth generation. Since that time they have
so exceedingly degenerated, in height of body, largeness of {200}
defensive arms, and ante-deluvian longevity, that I am afraid, these
early and extraordinary writers would scarcely know the descendants of
those Apalahche Anakim, if they now saw them. They are at present the
same as their dwarfish red neighbours; sic transit gloria mundi.
Nicholaus Challusius paints Florida full of winged serpents; he affirms
he saw one there, and that the old natives were very careful to get its
head, on account of some supposed superstition. Ferdinando Soto tells
us, that when he entered Florida, he found a Spaniard, (J. Ortez) whom
the natives had captivated during the space of twelve years,
consequently he must have gained in that time, sufficient skill in their
dialect to give a true interpretation and account—and he assures us,
that Ucita, the Lord of the place, made that fellow, “Temple-keeper,” to
prevent the night-wolves from carrying away the dead corpse; that the
natives worshipped the devil, and sacrificed to him the life and blood
of most of their captives;—who spoke with them face to face, and ordered
them to bring those offerings to quench his burning thirst. And we are
told by Benzo,[91] that when Soto died, the good-natured Cacique ordered
two likely young Indians to be killed according to custom, to wait on
him where he was gone.—But the Christian Spaniards denied his death, and
assured them he was the son of God, and therefore could not die. If we
except the last sentence, which bears a just analogy to the presumption
and arrogance of the popish priests and historians, time and opportunity
have fully convinced us, that all the rest is calumny and falshood. It
must be confessed however, that none, even of the Spanish monks and
friars, have gone so deep in the marvellous, as our own sagacious David
Ingram—he assures us, “that he not only heard of very surprising animals
in these parts of the world, but saw elephants, horses, and strange wild
animals twice as big as our species of horses, formed like a grey-hound
in their hinder parts; he saw likewise bulls with ears like hounds; and
another surprising species of quadrupeds bigger than bears, without head
or neck, but nature had fixed their eyes and mouths more securely in
their breasts.” At the end of his monstrous ideal productions, he justly
introduces the devil in the rear, sometimes assuming the likeness of a
dog; at other times the shape of a calf, &c. Although this legendary
writer has transcended the bounds of truth, yet where he is not emulous
of outdoing the jesuitical romances, it would require a good knowledge
of America to confute him in many particulars: {201} this shews how
little the learned world can rely on American narrators; and that the
origin of the Indian Americans, is yet to be traced in a quite different
path to what any of those hyperbolical, or wild conjectural writers have
prescribed.
The Spaniards have given us many fine polished Indian orations, but they
were certainly fabricated at Madrid; the Indians have no such ideas, or
methods of speech, as they pretend to have copied from a faithful
interpretation on the spot: however, they have religiously supported
those monkish dreams, and which are the chief basis of their Mexican and
Peruvian treaties.
According to them, the Mexican arms was an eagle on a tunal or stone,
with a bird in his talons,—which may look at the armorial ensign of Dan.
And they say, the Mexicans worshipped _Vitzliputzli_, who promised them
a land exceedingly plenty in riches, and all other good things; on which
account they set off in quest of the divine promise, four of their
priests carrying their idol in a coffer of reeds, to whom he
communicated his oracles, giving them laws at the same time—teaching
them the ceremonies and sacrifices they should observe; and directed
them when to march, and when to stay in camp, &c. So much might have
been collected from them by signs, and other expressive indications; for
we are well assured, that the remote uncorrupted part of the Mexicans
still retain the same notions as our northern Indians, with regard to
their arriving at, and settling in their respective countries, living
under a theocratic government, and having the divine war-ark, as a most
sacred seal of success to the beloved people, against their treacherous
enemies, if they strictly observe the law of purity, while they
accompany it. This alone, without any reflection on the rest, is a good
glass to shew us, that the South and North American Indians are
twin-born brothers; though the Spanish clergy, by, their dark but
fruitful inventions, have set them at a prodigious variance.
Acosta tells us, that the Peruvians held a very extraordinary feast
called _Ytu_,—which they prepared themselves for, by fasting two days,
not accompanying with their wives, nor eating salt-meat or garlic, nor
drinking Chica during that period—that they assembled all together in
one place, and did not allow any stranger or beast to approach them;
that they had clothes and {202} ornaments which they wore, only at that
great festival; that they went silently and sedately in procession, with
their heads veil’d, and drums beating—and thus continued one day and
night; but the next day they danced and feasted; and for two days
successively, their prayers and praises were heard. This is another
strong picture of the rites of the Indian North-Americans, during the
time of their great festival, to atone for sin; and with a little
amendment, would exhibit a surprising analogy of sundry essential rites
and customs of the Northern and South American Indians, which equally
glance at the Mosaic system.
Lerius tells us, that he was present at the triennial feast of the
Caribbians, where a multitude of men, women, and children, were
assembled; that they soon divided themselves into three orders, apart
from each other, the women and children being strictly ordered to stay
within, and to attend diligently to the singing: that the men sung in
one house, _He, He, He_, while the others in their separate houses,
answered by a repetition of the same notes: that having thus continued a
quarter of an hour, they all danced in three different rings, each with
rattles, &c. And the natives of Sir Francis Drake’s New Albion, were
desirous of crowning him _Hio_, or _Ohio_, a name well known in North
America, and hath an evident relation to the great beloved name. Had the
former been endued with a proper capacity, and given a suitable
attention to the Indian general law of purity, he would probably have
described them singing _Yo He Wah, Hallelu-Yah_, &c. after the present
manner of our North American red natives; and as giving proper names to
persons and things from a religious principle, to express the relation
they bore to the sacred four-lettered name.
These writers report also, that the Mexicans sacrificed to the idol
_Haloc_, “their God of water,” to give them seasonable rains for their
crops: and they tell us, that the high-priest was anointed with holy
oil, and dressed with pontifical ornaments, peculiar to himself, when he
officiated in his sacred function; that he was sworn to maintain their
religion, rights, and liberties, according to their ancient law; and to
cause the sun to shine, and all their vegetables to be properly
refreshed with gentle showers. If we throw down the “monkish idol god of
water,” we here find a strong parity of religious customs and
ceremonies, between the pretended prophets, and high-priests of the
present northern Indians, and the ancient Mexicans. {203}
Acosta tells us, that the Peruvians acknowledged a supreme God, and
author of all things, whom they called _Viracocha_, and worshipped as
the chief of all the gods, and honoured when they looked at the heavens
or any of the celestial orbs; that for want of a proper name for that
divine spirit of the universe, they, after the Mexican manner,[92]
described him by his attributes,—as _Pachacamac_, “the Creator of heaven
and earth.” But, though he hath described them possessed of these strong
ideas of God, and to have dedicated a sacred house to the great first
cause, bearing his divine prolific name; yet the Spanish priesthood have
at the same time, painted them as worshipping the devil in the very same
temple. Here and there a truth may be found in their writings, but if we
except the well-designed performance of Don Antonio de Ulloa, one
duodecimo volume would have contained all the accounts of any curious
importance, which the Spaniards have exhibited to the learned world,
concerning the genuine rites and customs, of the ancient Peruvians and
Mexicans, ever since the seisure of those countries, and the horrid
murders committed on the inhabitants.
But among all the Spanish friars, _Hieronimo Roman_ was the greatest
champion in hyperbolical writing. He has produced three volumes
concerning the Indian American rites and ceremonies;—he stretches very
far in his second part of the commonwealths of the world; but when he
gets to Peru and Mexico, the distance of those remote regions enables
him to exceed himself: beyond all dispute, the other writers of his
black fraternity, are only younger brethren, when compared to him in the
marvellous. His, is the chief of all the Spanish romances of Peru and
Mexico.[93]