forty, lest their tracks should be discovered by being too numerous:
{384} but if the warring nations are contiguous to each other, the
invading party generally chuses to out-number a common company, that
they may strike the blow with greater safety and success, as their art
of war is chiefly killing by surprise; confident that in case of a
disappointment, their light heels will ensure their return to their own
country. When a small company go to war, they always chuse to have a
swamp along side of them, with a thick covert for their shelter, because
a superior number will scarcely pursue them where they might reasonably
expect to lose any of their warriors. When they arrive at the enemies
hunting ground, they act with the greatest caution and policy. They
separate themselves, as far as each can hear the other’s travelling
signal, which is the mimicking such birds and beasts as frequent the
spot. And they can exactly imitate the voice and sound of every
quadruped and wild fowl through the American woods. In this way of
travelling, they usually keep an hundred yards apart on the course
agreed upon at camp. When the leader thinks it the surest way of
succeeding against the enemy, he sends a few of the best runners to form
an ambuscade near their towns: there, they sometimes fix the broad hoofs
of buffalos, and bear’s paws upon their feet, to delude the enemy: and
they will for miles together, make all the windings of these beasts with
the greatest art. But, as both parties are extremely wary and sagacious,
I have known such arts to prove fatal to the deluders. At other times, a
numerous company will walk in three different rows, by way of a decoy,
every one lifting his feet so high, as not to beat down the grass or
herbage; and each row will make only one man’s track, by taking the
steps of him who went before, and a gigantic fellow takes the rear of
each rank, and thereby smooths the tracks with his feet. When they are
convinced the enemy is in pursuit of them, at so considerable a distance
from the country, as for themselves not to be over-powered by numbers,
they post themselves in the most convenient place, in the form of an
half-moon, and patiently wait a whole day and night, till the enemy runs
into it; and in such a case, the victory at one broad-side is usually
gained.
When they discover the tracks of enemies in their hunting ground, or in
the remote woods, it is surprising to see the caution and art they use,
both to secure themselves, and take advantage of the enemy. If a small
company be out at war, they in the day time crawl through {385} thickets
and swamps in the manner of wolves—now and then they climb trees, and
run to the top of hills, to discover the smoke of fire, or hear the
report of guns: and when they cross through the open woods, one of them
stands behind a tree, till the rest advance about a hundred yards,
looking out sharply on all quarters. In this manner, they will proceed,
and on tiptoe, peeping every where around; they love to walk on trees
which have been blown down, and take an oblique course, till they
inswamp themselves again, in order to conceal their tracks, and avoid a
pursuit. As we can gain nothing by blows, with such warriors, it is
certainly our interest, as a trading people, to use proper measures to
conciliate their affections; for whether we are conquerors, or
conquered, we are always great losers in an Indian war.
When the invaders extend themselves cross the woods, in quest of their
prey, if they make a plain discovery, either of fresh tracks, or of the
enemy, they immediately pass the war-signal to each other, and draw
their wings toward the center. If the former, they give chace, and
commonly by their wild-cat-method of crawling, they surround, and
surprise the pursued, if unguarded—however, I have known them to fail in
such attempts; for the Indians generally are so extremely cautious, that
if three of them are in the woods, their first object is a proper place
for defence, and they always sit down in a triangle, to prevent a
surprise. When enemies discover one another, and find they can take no
advantage, they make themselves known to each other; and by way of
insulting bravado, they speak aloud all the barbarities they ever
committed against them;—that they are now, to vindicate those actions,
and make the wound for ever incurable; that they are their most bitter
enemies, and equally contemn their friendship and enmity. In the mean
while, they throw down their packs, strip themselves naked, and paint
their faces and breast red as blood, intermingled with black streaks.
Every one at the signal of the shrill-sounding war-cry, instantly covers
himself behind a tree, or in some cavity of the ground where it admits
of the best safety. The leader, on each side, immediately blows the
small whistle he carries for the occasion, in imitation of the ancient
trumpet, as the last signal of engagement. Now hot work begins—The guns
are firing; the chewed bullets flying; the strong hiccory bows a
twanging; the dangerous barbed arrows whizzing as they fly; the
sure-shafted javelin striking death wherever it reaches; and the
well-aimed tomohawk killing, or disabling its enemy. Nothing scarcely
can be heard {386} for the shrill echoing noise of the war and
death-whoop, every one furiously pursues his adversary from tree to
tree, striving to incircle him for his prey; and the greedy jaws of pale
death are open on all sides, to swallow them up. One dying foe is
intangled in the hateful and faltering arms of another: and each party
desperately attempts both to save their dead and wounded from being
scalped, and to gain the scalps of their opponents. On this the battle
commences anew—But rash attempts fail, as their wary spirits always
forbid them from entering into a general close engagement. Now they
retreat: then they draw up into various figures, still having their dead
and wounded under their eye. Now they are flat on the ground loading
their pieces—then they are up firing behind trees, and immediately
spring off in an oblique course to recruit—and thus they act till winged
victory declares itself.
The vanquished party makes for a swampy thicket, as their only asylum:
but should any of them be either unarmed, or slightly wounded, the
speedy pursuers captivate them, and usually reserve them for a worse
death than that of the bullet. On returning to the place of battle, the
victors begin, with mad rapture, to cut and slash those unfortunate
persons, who fell by their arms and power; and they dismember them,
after a most inhuman manner. If the battle be gained near home, one hero
cuts off and carries this member of the dead person, another that, as
joyful trophies of a decisive victory. If a stranger saw them thus
loaded with human flesh, without proper information, he might conclude
them to be voracious canibals, according to the shameful accounts of our
Spanish historians. Their first aim however is to take off the scalp,
when they perceive the enemy hath a proper situation, and strength to
make a dangerous resistance. Each of them is so emulous of exceeding
another in this point of honour, that it frequently stops them in their
pursuit.
This honourable service is thus performed—They seize the head of the
disabled, or dead person, and placing one of their feet on the neck,
they with one hand twisted in the hair, extend it as far as they
can—with the other hand, the barbarous artists speedily draw their long
sharp-pointed scalping knife out of a sheath from their breast, give a
slash round the top of the skull, and with a few dexterous scoops, soon
strip it off. {387} They are so expeditious as to take off a scalp in
two minutes.[226] When they have performed this part of their martial
virtue, as soon as time permits, they tie with bark or deer’s sinews,
their speaking trophies of blood in a small hoop, to preserve it from
putrefaction, and paint the interior part of the scalp, and the hoop,
all round with red, their flourishing emblematical colour of blood.
They are now satiated for the present, and return home. Tradition, or
the native divine impression on human nature, dictates to them that man
was not born in a state of war; and as they reckon they are become
impure by shedding human blood, they hasten to observe the fast of three
days, as formerly mentioned, and be sanctified by the war-chieftain, as
a priest of war, according to law. While they are thus impure, though
they had a fair opportunity of annoying the common enemy again, yet on
this account they commonly decline it, and are applauded for their
religious conduct, by all their countrymen. Indeed, formerly, when the
whole combined power of the French, and their Indians, was bent against
the warlike Chikkasah, I have known the last sometimes to hazard their
martial virtue and success, and to fight three or four companies of
French Indians, before they returned home; but the leaders excused
themselves, by the necessity of self-defence. They have no such phrase
as the “fortune of war.” They reckon the leader’s impurity[227] to be
the chief occasion of bad success; and if he lose several of his
warriors by the enemy, his life is either in danger for the supposed
fault, or he is degraded, by taking from him his drum, war-whistle, and
martial titles, and debasing him to his boy’s name, from which he is to
rise by a fresh gradation. This penal law contributes, in a good
measure, to make them so exceedingly cautious and averse to bold
attempts in war, and they are usually satisfied with two or three scalps
and a prisoner.
It has been long too feelingly known, that instead of observing the
generous and hospitable part of the laws of war, and saving the
unfortunate who fall into their power, that they generally devote their
captives to death, with the most agonizing tortures. No representation
can possibly be given, so shocking to humanity, as their unmerciful
method of tormenting their devoted prisoner; and as it is so contrary to
the standard of the rest of {388} the known world, I shall relate the
circumstances, so far as to convey proper information thereof to the
reader. When the company return from war, and come in view of their own
town, they follow the leader one by one, in a direct line, each a few
yards behind the other, to magnify their triumph. If they have not
succeeded, or any of their warriors are lost, they return quite silent;
but if they are all safe, and have succeeded, they fire off the Indian
platoon, by one, two, and three at a time, whooping and insulting their
prisoners. They camp near their town all night, in a large square plot
of ground, marked for the purpose, with a high war-pole fixed in the
middle of it, to which they secure their prisoners. Next day they go to
the leader’s house in a very solemn procession, but stay without, round
his red-painted war-pole, till they have determined concerning the fate
of their prisoners. If any one of the captives should be fortunate
enough to get loose, and run into the house of the archi-magus, or to a
town of refuge, he by ancient custom, is saved from the fiery
torture—these places being a sure asylum to them if they were invaded,
and taken, but not to invaders, because they came to shed blood.
Those captives who are pretty far advanced in life, as well as in
war-gradations, always atone for the blood they spilt, by the tortures
of fire.—They readily know the latter, by the blue marks over their
breasts and arms; they being as legible as our alphabetical characters
are to us.[228] Their ink is made of the soot of pitch-pine, which
sticks to the inside of a greased earthern pot; then delineating the
parts, like the ancient Picts of Britain, with their wild hieroglyphics,
they break through the skin with gair-fish-teeth, and rub over them that
dark composition, to register them among the brave; and the impression
is lasting. I have been told by the Chikkasah, that they formerly erazed
any false marks their warriors proudly and privately gave themselves—in
order to engage them to give real proofs of their martial virtue, being
surrounded by the French and their red allies; and that they degraded
them in a public manner, by stretching the marked parts, and rubbing
them with the juice of green corn, which in a great degree took out the
impression.
The young prisoners are saved,[229] if not devoted while the company
were sanctifying themselves for their expedition; but if the latter be
the case, {389} they are condemned, and tied to the dreadful stake, one
at a time. The victors first strip their miserable captives quite naked,
and put on their feet a pair of bear-skin maccaseenes, with the black
hairy part outwards; others fasten with a grape-vine, a burning
fire-brand to the pole, a little above the reach of their heads. Then
they know their doom—deep black, and burning fire, are fixed seals of
their death-warrant. Their punishment is always left to the women; and
on account of their false standard of education, they are no way
backward in their office, but perform it to the entire satisfaction of
the greedy eyes of the spectators. Each of them prepares for the
dreadful rejoicing, a long bundle of dry canes, or the heart of fat
pitch-pine, and as the victims are led to the stake, the women and their
young ones beat them with these in a most barbarous manner. Happy would
it be for the miserable creatures, if their sufferings ended here, or a
merciful tomohawk finished them at one stroke; but this shameful
treatment is a prelude to future sufferings.
The death-signal being given, preparations are made for acting a more
tragical part. The victims arms are fast pinioned, and a strong
grape-vine is tied round his neck, to the top of the war-pole, allowing
him to track around, about fifteen yards. They fix some tough clay on
his head, to secure the scalp from the blazing torches. Unspeakable
pleasure now fills the exulting crowd of spectators, and the circle
fills with the Amazon and merciless executioners—The suffering warrior
however is not dismayed; with an insulting manly voice he sings the
war-song![230] and with gallant contempt he tramples the rattling gourd
with pebbles in it to pieces, and outbraves even death itself. The women
make a furious on-set with their burning torches: his pain is soon so
excruciating, that he rushes out from the pole, with the fury of the
most savage beast of prey, and with the vine sweeps down all before him,
kicking, biting, and trampling them, with the greatest despite. The
circle immediately fills again, either with the same, or fresh persons:
they attack him on every side—now he runs to the pole for shelter, but
the flames pursue him. Then with champing teeth, and sparkling
eye-balls, he breaks through their contracted circle afresh, and acts
every part, that the highest courage, most raging fury, and blackest
despair can prompt him to. But he is sure to be overpower’d by numbers,
and after some time the fire affects his tender parts.—Then they pour
over him a quantity of cold water, and allow him a proper time of
respite, {390} till his spirits recover, and he is capable of suffering
new tortures. Then the like cruelties are repeated till he falls down,
and happily becomes insensible of pain. Now they scalp him, in the
manner before described: dismember, and carry off all the exterior
branches of the body, (pudendis non exceptis) in shameful, and savage
triumph. This is the most favourable treatment their devoted captives
receive: it would be too shocking to humanity either to give, or peruse,
every particular of their conduct in such doleful tragedies—nothing can
equal these scenes, but those of the merciful Romish inquisition.
Not a soul, of whatever age or sex, manifests the least pity during the
prisoner’s tortures: the women sing with religious joy, all the while
they are torturing the devoted victim, and peals of laughter resound
through the crowded theatre—especially if he fears to die. But a warrior
puts on a bold austere countenance, and carries it through all his
pains:—as long as he can, he whoops and out-braves the enemy, describing
his own martial deeds against them, and those of his nation, who he
threatens will force many of them to eat fire in revenge of his fate, as
he himself had often done to some of their relations at their cost.[231]
Though the same things operate alike upon the organs of the human body,
and produce an uniformity of sensations; yet weakness, or constancy of
mind derived from habit, helps in a great measure, either to heighten,
or lessen the sense of pain. By this, the afflicted party has learned to
stifle nature, and shew an outward unconcern, under such slow and acute
tortures: and the surprising cruelty of their women, is equally owing to
education and custom. Similar instances verify this, as in Lisbon, and
other places, where tender-hearted ladies are transformed by their
bloody priests, into so many Medeas, through deluded religious
principles; and sit and see with the highest joy, the martyrs of God,
drawn along in diabolical triumph to the fiery stake, and suffering
death with lingering tortures.
I cannot forbear giving another instance or two here of the constancy,
visible unconcern, and presence of mind, of the Indians, at the approach
of death, in its most alarming dress and terrors. {391}
About four years before the Shawano Indians were forced to remove from
the late Savanah town, they took a Muskohge warrior, known by the name
of “Old Scrany;” they bastinadoed him in the usual manner, and condemned
him to the fiery torture. He underwent a great deal, without shewing any
concern; his countenance and behaviour were as if he suffered not the
least pain, and was formed beyond the common laws of nature. He told
them, with a bold voice, that he was a very noted warrior, and gained
most of his martial preferment at the expence of their nation, and was
desirous of shewing them in the act of dying, that he was still as much
their superior, as when he headed his gallant countrymen against
them.—That although he had fallen into their hands, in forfeiting the
protection of the divine power, by some impurity or other, when carrying
the holy ark of war against his devoted enemies; yet he had still so
much remaining virtue, as would enable him to punish himself more
exquisitely than all their despicable ignorant crowd could possibly do,
if they gave him liberty by untying him, and would hand to him one of
the red hot gun-barrels out of the fire. The proposal, and his method of
address, appeared so exceedingly bold and uncommon, that his request was
granted. Then he suddenly seized one end of the red barrel, and
brandishing it from side to side, he forced his way through the armed
and surprised multitude, and leaped down a prodigious steep and high
bank into a branch of the river, dived through it, ran over a small
island, and passed the other branch, amidst a shower of bullets from the
commanding ground where Fort-Moore, or New Windsor-garrison stood; and
though numbers of his eager enemies were in close pursuit of him, he got
to a bramble swamp, and in that naked, mangled condition, reached his
own country. He proved a sharp thorn in their side afterwards to the day
of his death.
The Shawano also captivated a warrior of the Anantooèah,[232] and put
him to the stake, according to their usual cruel solemnities. Having
unconcernedly suffered much sharp torture, he told them with scorn, they
did not know how to punish a noted enemy, therefore he was willing to
teach them, and would confirm the truth of his assertion, if they
allowed him the opportunity. Accordingly he requested of them a pipe and
some tobacco, which was given him: as soon as he lighted it, he sat
down, naked as he was, on the women’s burning torches, that were within
his circle, and continued smoking his pipe without the least
discomposure—on {392} this a head-warrior leaped up, and said, they had
seen plain enough, that he was a warrior, and not afraid of dying; nor
should he have died, only that he was both spoiled by the fire, and
devoted to it by their laws: however, though he was a very dangerous
enemy, and his nation a treacherous people, it should appear they paid a
regard to bravery, even in one, who was marked over the body with war
streaks, at the cost of many lives of their beloved kindred. And then by
way of favour, he, with his friendly tomohawk, instantly put an end to
all his pains:—though the merciful but bloody instrument was ready some
minutes before it gave the blow, yet I was assured, the spectators could
not perceive the sufferer to change, either his posture, or his steady
erect countenance, in the least.