THE ENGLISH IN AMERICA TILL THE REVOLT OF THE COLONIES.
In Carolina’s palmy bowers,
Amid Kentucky’s wastes of flowers,
Where even the way-side hedge displays
Its jasmines and magnolias;
O’er the monarda’s vast expanse
Of scarlet, where the bee-birds glance
Their flickering wings, and breasts that gleam
Like living fires;—that dart and scream—
A million little knights that run
Warring for wild-flowers in the sun;—
His eye might rove through earth and sky,
His soul was in the days gone by.
We may pass rapidly over this space. The colonial principles of action
were established regarding the Indians, and they went on destroying
and demoralizing them till the reduction of Canada by the English.
That removed one great source of Indian destruction; for while there
was such an enemy to repulse, the Indians were perpetually called upon
and urged forward in the business of slaughter and scalping. It was
the same, indeed, on every frontier where there was an enemy, French
or Spanish. We have the history of Adair, who was a resident in the
south-western states for above forty years. This gentleman, who has
given us a very minute account of the manners, customs, and opinions
of the Choctaws, Cherokees, and Chickasaws, amongst whom he chiefly
resided in the Carolinas, and who is firmly convinced that they are
descended from the Ten Tribes of Israel, and, moreover, gives us many
proofs of the excellence of their nature—yet, most inconsistently, is
loud in praise of the French policy of setting the different Indian
nations by the ears; and condemnation of anything like conciliation
and forbearance. Speaking of some such attempts in 1736, he says—“Our
rivals, the French, never neglect so favourable an opportunity of
securing and promoting their interests. We have known more than one
instance wherein _their wisdom_ has not only found out proper means
to disconcert the most dangerous plans of disaffected savages, _but
likewise to foment, and artfully to encourage, great animosities
between the heads of ambitious rival families, till they fixed them in
an implacable hatred against each other, and all of their respective
tribes_.”[43]
That he was in earnest in his admiration of such a policy, he goes
on to relate to us, with the greatest _naiveté_ and in the most
circumstantial manner, how he recommended to the Governor of South
Carolina to employ the Choctaws to scalp and extirpate the French
traders in Louisiana, who, no doubt, interfered with his own gains. He
lets us know that he got such a commission; and informs us particularly
of the presents and flatteries with which he plied a great Choctaw
chief, called Red Shoes, to set him on this work; in which he was
successful. “I supplied each of them with arms, ammunition, and
presents in plenty; gave them a French scalping-knife, which had been
used against us, and even vermilion, to be used in the flourishing
way, with the dangerous French snakes, when they killed and scalped
them.... They soon went to work—they killed the strolling French
pedlars—turned out against the Mississippi Indians and Mobillians,
and the flame raged very high. A Choctaw woman gave a French pedlar
warning: he mounted his horse, but Red Shoes ran him down in about
fifteen minutes, and had scalped him before the rest came up.... Soon
after a great number of Red Shoes’ women came to me with the French
scalps and other trophies of war.”... “In the next spring, 1747,” he
tells us “a large body of Muskohges and Chickasaws embarked on the
Mississippi, and went down it to attack the French settlements. Here
they burned a large village, and their leader being wounded, they
in revenge killed all their prisoners; and overspread the French
settlements in their fury like a dreadful whirlwind, destroying all
before them, to the astonishment and terror even of those that were far
remote from the skirts of the direful storm.” This candid writer tells
us that the French Louisianians were now in a lamentable state—but,
says he, “they had no reason to complain; we were only retaliating
innocent blood which _they_ had caused to be shed by _their_ red
mercenaries!” He laments that some treacherous traders put a stop
to his scheme, or they would soon have driven all the French out of
Alabama.[44]
Who were the savages? and how did the English expect the Indians, under
such a course of tuition, to become civilized? This was the state
of things in the south. In the north, not a war broke out between
England and France, but the same scenes were acting between the English
American settlements and Canada. In 1692 we find Captain Ingoldsby
haranguing the chiefs of the Five Nations at Albany, and exhorting them
to “keep the enemy in perpetual alarm by the incursions of parties
into their country.” And the Indian orator shrewdly replying—“Brother
Corlear (their name for the governor of New York) is it not to secure
your frontiers? Why, then, not one word of your people that are to join
us? We will carry the war into the heart of the enemy’s country—but,
brother Corlear, how comes it that none of our brethren, fastened in
the same chain with us, offer their hand in this general war? Pray,
Corlear, how come Maryland, Delaware River, and New England to be
disengaged? Do they draw their arms out of the chain? or has the great
king commanded that the few subjects he has in this place should make
war against the French alone?”[45]
It was not always, however, that the Indians had to complain that the
English urged them into slaughter of the French and did not accompany
them. The object of England in America now became that of wresting
Canada entirely from France. For this purpose, knowing how essential
it was to the success of this enterprise that they should not only
have the Indians well affected, so as to prevent any incursions of the
French Indians into their own states while the British forces were
all concentrated on Canada, and still more how absolutely necessary
to have a large body of Indians to pioneer the way for them through
the woods, without which their army would be sure to be cut off by the
French Indians—great endeavours were now made to conclude treaties of
peace and mutual aid with all the great tribes in the British American
colonies. Such treaties had long existed with the Five Nations, now
called the Six Nations, by the addition of the remainder of the
Tuscarora Indians who had escaped from our exterminating arms in North
Carolina, and fled to the Five Nations; and also with the Delaware and
Susquehanna Indians. Conferences were held with the chiefs of these
tribes and British Commissioners from Pennsylvania, Maryland, New
York and Virginia, and, ostensibly, a better spirit was manifested
towards the Indian people. The most celebrated of these conferences
were held at Philadelphia in 1742; at Lancaster in Pennsylvania in
1744; and at Albany, in the state of New York, in 1746. The details
of the conferences developed many curious characteristics both of
the white and the red men. Canassateego, an Onondaga chief, was the
principal speaker for the Indians on all these occasions, and it would
be difficult to point to the man in any country, however civilized and
learned, who has conducted national negotiations with more ability,
eloquence, and sounder perception of actual existing circumstances,
amid all the sophistry employed on such occasions by European
diplomatists—
That lead to bewilder, and dazzle to blind.—_Beattie._
It had been originally agreed that a certain sum should be given to the
Indians, or rather its value in goods, to compensate them for their
trouble and time in coming to these conferences; that their expenses
should be paid during their stay; and that all their kettles, guns, and
hatchets should be mended for them; and the speakers took good care to
remind the colonists of these claims, and to have them duly discharged.
As it may be interesting to many to see what sort of goods were given
on these occasions, we may take the following as a specimen, which were
delivered to them at the conference of 1742, in part payment for the
cession of some territory.
500 pounds of powder.
600 pounds of lead.
45 guns.
60 Stroud matchcoats.
100 blankets.
100 Duffil matchcoats.
200 yards half-thick.
100 shirts.
40 hats.
40 pairs shoes and buckles.
40 pairs stockings.
100 hatchets.
500 knives.
100 hoes.
60 kettles.
100 tobacco tongs.
100 scissors.
500 awl blades.
120 combs.
2000 needles.
1000 flints.
24 looking-glasses.
2 pounds of vermilion.
100 tin pots.
1000 tobacco pipes.
200 pounds of tobacco.
24 dozen of gartering.
25 gallons of rum.
In another list we find no less than _four dozens of jew’s harps_.
Canassateego, on the delivery of the above goods, made a speech which
lets us into the real notions and feelings of the Indians on what was
going on in that day. “We received from the proprietor,” said he,
“yesterday, some goods in consideration of our release of the lands on
the west side of Susquehanna. It is true, we have the full quantity
according to agreement; but, if the proprietor had been here in person,
we think, in regard to our numbers and poverty, he would have made
an addition to them. If the goods were only to be divided amongst the
Indians present, a single person would have but a small portion; but if
you consider what numbers are left behind equally entitled with us to
a share, there will be extremely little. We therefore desire, if you
have the keys of the proprietor’s chest, you will open it and take out
a little more for us.
“We know our lands are now become more valuable. _The white people
think we don’t know their value; but we are sensible that the land is
everlasting, and the few goods we receive for it, are soon worn out and
gone._ For the future we will sell no lands but when Brother Onas is
in the country; and we will know beforehand the quantity of goods we
are to receive. Besides, we are not well used with respect to the lands
still unsold by us. Your people daily settle on our lands, and spoil
our hunting. We must insist on your removing them, as you know they
have no right to settle to the north of the Kittochtinny Hills.”
As it was necessary to conciliate them, more goods were given and
justice promised. On the other hand, the English complaining of the
Delawares having sold some land without authority from the Six Nations,
on whom they were dependent, Canassateego pronounced a very severe
reprimand to the Delawares, and ordered them to do so no more.
At the conference of 1744, the Indians gave one of those shrewd turns
for their own advantage to the boastings of the whites, which shew the
peculiar humour that existed in the midst of their educational gravity.
The governor of Maryland vaunting of a great sea-fight in which the
English had beaten the French; Canassateego immediately observed:
“In that great fight you must have taken a great quantity of rum, the
Indians will therefore thank you for a glass.” It was handed round to
them in _very small_ glasses, called by the governor _French glasses_.
The Indians drank it, and at the breaking up of the council that day,
Canassateego said, “Having had the pleasure of drinking a _French
glass_ of the great quantity of rum taken, the Indians would now,
before separating be glad to drink an English glass, to make us rejoice
with you in the victory.” It was impossible to waive so ingenious a
demand, and a _large glass_, to indicate the superiority of English
liberality, was now handed round.
In this conference, the Indians again complained of the daily
encroachments upon them, and of the inadequate price given for the
lands they sold. The Governor of Maryland boldly told them that the
land was in fact acquired by the English by conquest, and that they had
besides a claim of possession of 100 years. To this injudicious speech
the Indians replied with indignation, “What is one hundred years in
comparison of the time since _our claim_ began?—since we came out of
this ground? For we must tell you that long before one hundred years
_our ancestors came out of this very ground_, and their children have
remained here ever since. _You_ came out of the ground in a country
that lies beyond the seas; _there_ you may have a just claim; but
_here_ you must allow us to be your elder brethren, and the lands to
belong to us long before you knew anything of them.” They then reminded
them of the manner in which they had received them into the country. In
figurative language they observed, “When the Dutch came here, above a
hundred years ago, we were so well pleased with them that we tied their
ship to the bushes on the shore; and afterwards liking them better the
longer they stayed with us, and thinking the bushes too slender, we
removed the rope and tied it to the trees; and as the trees were liable
to be blown down, or to decay of themselves, we, from the affection
that we bore them, again removed the rope, and tied it to a strong and
high rock (here the interpreter said they mean the Oneido country); and
not content with this, for its further security, we removed the rope
to the big mountain (here the interpreter said, they mean the Onondaga
country), and there we tied it very fast, and rolled wampum about it,
and to make it still more secure, we stood upon the wampum, and sat
down upon it to defend it, and to prevent any hurt coming to it, and
did our best endeavours that it might remain for ever. During all this
time the Dutch acknowledged our right to the lands, and solicited us
from time to time, to grant them parts of our country. When the English
governor came to Albany, and we were told the Dutch and English were
become one people, the governor looked at the rope which tied the ship
to the big mountain, and seeing that it was only of wampum and liable
to rot, break, and perish in a course of years, he gave us a silver
chain, which he told us would be much stronger, and would last for ever.
“We had then,” said they pathetically, “room enough and plenty of
deer, which was easily caught; and though we had not knives, hatchets,
or guns, we had knives of stone, and hatchets of stone, and bows and
arrows, which answered our purpose as well as the English ones do now,
for we are now straitened; we are often in want of deer; we have to go
far to seek it, and are besides liable to many other inconveniences,
and particularly from that _pen-and-ink work that is going on at the
table_!” pointing to the secretary. “You know,” they continued, “when
the white people came here they were poor—they have got our lands, and
now _they_ are become rich, and _we_ are poor. _What little we get for
the land soon goes away, but the land lasts for ever!_”
It was necessary to soothe them—the governor had raised a spirit
which told him startling truths. It shewed that the Indians were not
blind to the miserable fee for which they were compelled to sell their
country. “Your great king,” said they, “might send you over to conquer
the Indians; but it looks to us that God did not send you—if he had,
he would not have placed the sea where he has, to keep you and us
asunder.” The governor addressed them in flattering terms, and added,
“We have a chest of new goods, and the key is in our pockets. You are
our brethren: the Great King is our common Father, and we will live
with you as children ought to do—in peace and love.”
The Indians were strenuously exhorted to use all means to bring the
western natives into the league. At the Conference of 1746, held
at Albany, it became sufficiently evident for what object all this
conciliation and these endeavours to extend their alliance amongst
the Indians were used. A great and decisive attack upon Canada was
planning: and it is really awful to read the language addressed to
the assembled Indians, to inflame them with the spirit of the most
malignant hatred and revenge against the French. Mr. Cadwallader
Colden, one of His Majesty’s Council and Surveyor-general of New York,
and the historian of the Five Nations, on whose own authority these
facts are stated, addressed the Indians, owing to the Governor’s
illness, in the speech prepared for the occasion. He called upon them
to remember all the French had done to them; what they did at Onondaga;
how they invaded the Senekas; what mischiefs they did to the Mohawks;
how many of their countrymen suffered at the fire at Montreal; how
they had sent priests amongst them to lull them to sleep, when they
intended to knock them on the head. “I hear,” then added he, “they
are attempting to do the same now. I need not remind you what revenge
your fathers took for these injuries, when they put all the isle of
Montreal, and a great part of Canada, to fire and sword. Can you think
the French forget this? No! they are watching secretly to destroy you.
But if your fathers could now rise out of their graves, how would their
hearts leap with joy to see this day, when so glorious an opportunity
is put into your hands to revenge all the injuries of your country,
etc. etc.” He called on them to accompany the English, to win glory,
and promised them great reward.
But these horrible fire-brands of speech,—these truly “burning words”
were not all the means used. English gentlemen were sent amongst the
tribes to arouse them by every conceivable means. The celebrated Mr.
William Johnson of Mohawk, who had dreamed himself into a vast estate
in that country,[46] and who afterwards, as Sir William Johnson, was
so distinguished as the leader of the Indians at the fall of Quebec,
and the conquest of Canada, now went amongst the Mohawks, dressed like
a Mohawk chief. He feasted them at his castle on the Mohawk river; he
gave them dances in their own country style, and danced with them; and
led the Mohawk band to this very conference.
This enterprise came to nothing; but for the successful one of 1759 the
same stimulants were applied, and the natives, to the very Twightwees
and Chickasaws, brought into the league, either to march against
the French, or to secure quiet in the states during the time of the
invasion of Canada. And what was their reward? Scarcely was Canada
reduced, and the services of the Indians no longer needed, when they
found themselves as much encroached upon and insulted as ever. Some of
the bloodiest and most desolating wars which they ever waged against
the English settlements, took place between our conquest of Canada
and our war against the American colonies themselves. It was the
long course of injuries and insults which the Indians had suffered
from the settlers that made them so ready to take up the tomahawk
and scalping-knife at the call, and induced by the blood-money, of
the mother-country against her American children. The employment and
instigation of the Indians to tomahawk the settlers brings down British
treatment of the Indians to the very last moment of our power in that
country. What were our notions of such enormities may be inferred
from their being called in the British Parliament “_means which God
and nature have put into our hands_,”—and from Lord Cornwallis, our
general then employed against the Americans, expressing, in 1780, his
“_satisfaction_ that the Indians had pursued and _scalped_ many of the
enemy!”
This was our conduct towards the Indians to the last hour of our
dominion in their country. We drove them out of their lands, or cheated
them out of them by making them drunk. We robbed them of their furs
in the same manner; and on all occasions we inflamed their passions
against their own enemies and ours. We made them ten times more
cruel, perfidious, and depravedly savage than we found them, and then
upbraided them as irreclaimable and merciless, and thereon founded
our convenient plea that they must be destroyed, or driven onward as
perishing shadows before the sun of civilization.
Before quitting the English in America, we need only, to complete our
view of their treatment of the natives, to include in it a glance at
that treatment in those colonies which we yet retain there; and that is
furnished by the following Parliamentary Report, (1837.)
NEWFOUNDLAND.
To take a review of our colonies, beginning with Newfoundland. There,
as in other parts of North America, it seems to have been, for a
length of time, accounted a “meritorious act” to kill an Indian.[47]
On our first visit to that country, the natives were seen in every
part of the coast. We occupied the stations where they used to hunt
and fish, thus reducing them to want, while we took no trouble to
indemnify them, so that, doubtless, many of them perished by famine;
we also treated them with hostility and cruelty, and “many were
slain by our own people, as well as by the Micmac Indians,” who were
allowed to harass them. They must, however, have been recently very
numerous, since, in one place, Captain Buchan found they had “run up
fences to the extent of 30 miles,” with a variety of ramifications,
for the purpose of conducting the deer down to the water, a work
which would have required the labour of a multitude of hands.
It does not appear that any measures were taken to open a
communication with them before the year 1810, when, by order of Sir.
J. Duckworth, an attempt was made by Captain Buchan, which proved
ineffectual. At that time he conceived that their numbers around
their chief place of resort, the Great Lake, were reduced to 400 or
500. Under our treatment they continued rapidly to diminish; and it
appears probable that the last of the tribe left at large, a man
and a woman, were shot by two Englishmen in 1823. Three women had
been taken prisoners shortly before, and they died in captivity. In
the colony of Newfoundland, it may therefore be stated that we have
exterminated the natives.[48]
CANADIAN INDIANS.
The general account of our intercourse with the North American
Indians, as distinct from missionary efforts, may be given in the
words of a converted Chippeway chief, in a letter to Lord Goderich:
“We were once very numerous, and owned all Upper Canada, and lived
by hunting and fishing; but the white men who came to trade with
us taught our fathers to drink the fire-waters, which has made our
people poor and sick, and has killed many tribes, till we have become
very small.”[49]
It is a curious fact, noticed in the evidence, that, some years ago,
the Indians practised agriculture, and were able to bring corn to
our settlements, then suffering from famine; but we, by driving them
back and introducing the fur trade, have rendered them so completely
a wandering people, that they have very much lost any disposition
which they might once have felt to settle. All writers on the Indian
race have spoken of them, in their native barbarism, as a noble
people; but those who live among civilised men, upon reservations
in our own territory, are now represented as “reduced to a state
which resembles that of gipsies in this country.” Those who live in
villages among the whites “are a very degraded race, and look more
like dram-drinkers than people it would be possible to get to do any
work.”
To enter, however, into a few more particulars.—The Indians of New
Brunswick are described by Sir H. Douglass, in 1825, as “dwindled in
numbers,” and in a “wretched condition.”
Those of Nova Scotia, the Micmacs (by Sir J. Kempt), as disinclined
to settle, and in the habit of bartering their furs, “unhappily, for
rum.”[50]
General Darling’s statement as to the Indians of the Canadas, drawn
up in 1828, speaks of the interposition of the government being
urgently called for in behalf of the helpless individuals whose
landed possessions, where they have any assigned to them, are daily
plundered by their designing and more enlightened white brethren.[51]
Of the Algonquins and Nipissings, General Darling writes, “Their
situation is becoming alarming, by the rapid settlement and
improvement of the lands on the banks of the Ottawa, on which they
were placed by the government in the year 1763, and which tract they
have naturally considered as their own. The result of the present
state of things is obvious, and such as can scarcely fail in time
to be attended with bloodshed and murder; for, driven from their own
resources, they will naturally trespass on those of other tribes,
who are equally jealous of the intrusion of their red brethren as
of white men. Complaints on this head are increasing daily, while
the threats and admonitions of the officers of the department have
been insufficient to control the unruly spirit of the savage, who,
driven by the calls of hunger and the feelings of nature towards
his offspring, will not be scrupulous in invading the rights of his
brethren, as a means of alleviating his misery, when he finds the
example in the conduct of his white father’s children practised, as
he conceives, towards himself.”[52]
The general also speaks of the “degeneracy” of the Iroquois, and
of the degraded condition of most of the other tribes, with the
exception of those only who had received Christian instruction. Later
testimony is to the same effect. The Rev. J. Beecham, secretary to
the Wesleyan Missionary Society, says he has conversed with the
Chippeway chief above referred to, on the condition of the Indians
on the boundary of Upper Canada. That he stated most unequivocally
that previously to the introduction of Christianity they were rapidly
wasting away; and he believed that if it had not been for the
introduction of Christianity they would speedily have become extinct.
As the causes of this waste of Indian life, he mentions the decrease
of the game, the habit of intoxication, and the European diseases.
The small-pox had made great ravages. He adds, “The information which
I have derived from this chief has been confirmed by our missionaries
stationed in Upper Canada, and who are now employed among the Indian
tribes on the borders of that province. My inquiries have led me to
believe, that where Christianity has not been introduced among the
aboriginal inhabitants of Upper Canada, they are melting away before
the advance of the white population. This remark applies to the
Six Nations, as they are called, on the Great River; the Mohawks,
Oneidas, Onondagas, Senacas, Cayugas, and Tuscaroras, as well as to
all the other tribes on the borders of the province.” Of the ulterior
tribes, the account given by Mr. King, who accompanied Captain
Back in his late Arctic expedition, is deplorable: he gives it as
his opinion, that “the Northern Indians have decreased greatly, and
decidedly from contact with the Europeans.”
Thus, the Cree Indians, once a powerful tribe, “have now degenerated
into a few families, congregated about the European establishments,
while some few still retain their ancient rights, and have become
partly allies of a tribe of Indians that were once their slaves.”
He supposes their numbers to have been reduced within thirty or
forty years from 8,000 or 10,000, to 200, or at most 300, and has
no doubt of the remnant being extirpated in a short time, if no
measures are taken to improve their morals and to cultivate habits
of civilization. It should be observed that this tribe had access to
posts not comprehended within the Hudson’s Bay Company’s prohibition,
as to the introduction of spirituous liquors, and that they miserably
show the effects of the privilege.
The Copper Indians also, through ill-management, intemperance, and
vice, are said to have decreased within the last five years to
one-half the number of what they were.
The early quarrels between the Hudson’s Bay and the North West
Companies, in which the Indians were induced to take a bloody
part, furnished them with a ruinous example of the savageness of
Christians.[53]
SOUTH AMERICA.
In South America, British Guiana occupies a large extent of country
between the rivers Orinoco and Amazons, giving access to numbers
of tribes of aborigines who wander over the vast regions of the
interior. The Indian population within the colony of Demerara and
Essequibo, is derived from four nations, the Caribs, Arawacks,
Warrows, and Accaways.
It is acknowledged that they have been diminishing ever since the
British came into possession of the colony. In 1831 they were
computed at 5096; and it is stated “it is the opinion of old
inhabitants of the colony, and those most competent to judge, that
a considerable diminution has taken place in the aggregate number
of the Indians of late years, and that the dimunition, although
gradual, has become more sensibly apparent within the last eight or
ten years.” The diminution is attributed, in some degree, to the
increased use of rum amongst them.[54]
There are in the colony six gentlemen bearing the title of
“Protectors of Indians,” whose office it is to superintend the
tribes; and under them are placed post-holders, a principal part
of whose business it is to keep the negroes from resorting to the
Indians, and also to attend the distribution of the presents which
are given to the latter by the British government; of which, as was
noticed with reprehension by Lord Goderich, rum formed a part.
It does not appear[55] that anything has been done by government for
their moral or religious improvement, excepting the grant in 1831, by
Sir B. D’Urban, of a piece of land at Point Bartica, where a small
establishment was then founded by the Church Missionary Society. The
Moravian Mission on the Courantin was given up in 1817; and it does
not appear that any other Protestant Society has attended to these
Indians.
In 1831, Lord Goderich writes,[56] “I have not heard of any effort to
convert the Indians of British Guiana to Christianity, or to impart
to them the arts of social life.”
It should be observed that no injunctions to communicate either are
given in the instructions for the “Protectors of Indians,” or in
those for the post-holders; and two of the articles of the latter,
(Art. 14 and Art. 15,) tend directly to sanction and encourage
immorality. All reports agree in stating that these tribes have been
almost wholly neglected, are retrograding, and are without provision
for their moral or civil advancement; and with due allowance for
the extenuating remarks on the poor account to which they turned
their lands, when they had them, and the gifts (baneful gifts some
of them) which have been distributed, and on the advantage of living
under British laws, we must still concur in the sentiment of Lord
Goderich, as expressed in the same letter, upon a reference as to
sentence of death passed upon a native Indian for the murder of
another. “It is a serious consideration that we have subjected these
tribes to the penalties of a code of which they unavoidably live in
profound ignorance; they have not even that conjectural knowledge of
its provisions which would be suggested by the precepts of religion,
if they had even received the most elementary instruction in the
Christian faith. They are brought into acquaintance with civilised
life not to partake its blessings, but only to feel the severity of
its penal sanctions.”
“A debt is due to the aboriginal inhabitants of British Guiana of a
very different kind from that which the inhabitants of Christendom
may, in a certain sense, be said to owe in general to other barbarous
tribes. The whole territory which has been occupied by Europeans,
on the northern shores of the South American Continent, has been
acquired by no other right than that of superior power; and I fear
that the natives whom we have dispossessed, have to this day received
no compensation for the loss of the lands on which they formerly
subsisted. However urgent is the duty of economy in every branch of
the public service, it is impossible to withhold from the natives
of the country the inestimable benefit which they would derive from
appropriating to their religious and moral instruction some moderate
part of that income which results from the culture of the soil to
which they or their fathers had an indisputable title.”[57]
CARIBS.
Of the Caribs, the native inhabitants of the West Indies, we need not
speak, as of them little more remains than the tradition that they
once existed.