NOTE BY THE EDITOR.
Perhaps even contrary to the wish of Mr. Franchere, I have left the above almost word for word as he wrote it. It is a part of the history of the affairs related as well in Mr. Irving's ASTORIA as in the present volume, that the reclamations of one of the clerks on that famous and unfortunate voyage of the Tonquin, against the disparaging description of himself and his colleagues given in the former work, should be fairly recorded. At the same time, I can not help stating my own impression that a natural susceptibility, roused by those slighting remarks from Captain Thorn's correspondence, to which Mr. Irving as an historian gives currency, has somewhat blinded my excellent friend to the tone of banter, so characteristic of the chronicler of the Knickerbockers, in which all these particulars are given, more as traits of the character of the stern old sea-captain, with his hearty contempt for land-lubbers and literary clerks, than as a dependable account of the persons on board his ship, some of whom might have been, and as we see by the present work, were, in fact, very meritorious characters, for whose literary turn, and faithful journalizing (which seems to have especially provoked the captain's wrath), now at the end of more than forty years, we have so much reason to be thankful. Certainly Mr. Irving himself, who has drawn frequently on Mr. Franchere's narrative, could not, from his well-known taste in such matters, be insensible to the Defoe-like simplicity thereof, nor to the picturesque descriptions, worthy of a professional pen, with which it is sprinkled.
THE END.
FOOTNOTES:
[A] McKenzie's Travels.
[B] Lewis and Clark's Report.
[C] This place is famous in the history of Canada, and more particularly in the thrilling story of the Indian missions.—ED.
[D] This gentleman was really chargé d'affaires.
[E] Bougainville calls it "Calf-foot root."
[F] The Tootoos and all the women, the wives of the king and principal chiefs excepted, are eternally condemned to the use of fruits and vegetables; dogs and pigs being exclusively reserved for the table of the Eris.
[G] Some Indian tribes think that women have no souls, but die altogether like the brutes; others assign them a different paradise from that of men, which indeed they might have reason to prefer for themselves, unless their relative condition were to be ameliorated in the next world.
[H] These facts, if they were authenticated, would prove that the Spaniards were the first who discovered the mouth of the Columbia. It is certain that long before the voyages of Captains Gray and Vancouver, they knew at least a part of the course of that river, which was designated in their maps under the name of Oregon.
[I] This schooner was found too small for the purpose. Mr. Astor had no idea of the dangers to be met at the mouth of the Colombia, or he would have ordered the frame of a vessel of at least one hundred tons. The frames shipped in New York were used in the construction of this one only, which was employed solely in the river trade.
[J] Mr. Thompson had no doubt been sent by the agents of the Northwest Company, to take possession of an eligible spot at the mouth of the Columbia, with a view of forestalling the plan of Mr. Astor. He would have been there before us, no doubt, but for the desertion of his men. The consequence of this step would have been his taking possession of the country, and displaying the British flag, as an emblem, of that possession and a guarantee of protection hereafter. He found himself too late, however, and the stars and stripes floating over Astoria. This note is not intended by the author as an after-thought: as the opinion it conveys was that which we all entertained at the time of that gentleman's visit.
[K] One of these men bad been left with him by Mr. Thompson, in exchange for a Sandwich-islander whom that gentleman proposed to take to Canada, and thence to England.
[L] A thoroughly savage and lazy tribe, inhabiting the plains of the Columbia, between the 43d and 44th degrees of latitude.
[M] These caches are famous in all the narratives of overland travel, whether for trade or discovery. The manner of making them is described by Captains Lewis and Clarke, as follows: they choose a dry situation, then describing a circle of some twenty inches diameter, remove the sod as gently and carefully as possible. The hole is then sunk a foot deep or more, perpendicularly; it is then worked gradually wider as it descends, till it becomes six or seven feet deep, and shaped like a kettle, or the lower part of a large still. As the earth is dug out, it is handed up in a vessel, and carefully laid upon a skin or cloth, in which it is carried away, and usually thrown into the river, if there be one, or concealed so as to leave no trace of it. A floor of three or four inches thick is then made of dry sticks, on which is thrown hay or a hide perfectly dry. The goods, after being well aired and dried, are laid down, and preserved from contact with the wall by a layer of other dried sticks, till all is stowed away. When the hole is nearly full, a hide is laid on top, and the earth is thrown upon this, and beaten down, until, with the addition of the sod first removed, the whole is on a level with the ground, and there remains not the slightest appearance of an excavation. The first shower effaces every sign of what has been done, and such a cache is safe for years.—ED.
[N] We were apprized of this unfortunate rencontre by natives from up the river, on the 15th of April, but disbelieved it. [It is curious to observe the want of military sagacity and precaution which characterized the operations of these traders, compared with the exact calculations of danger and the unfailing measures of defence, employed from the very outset by Captains Lewis and Clarke in the same country. There was one very audacious attempt at plunder made upon the latter; but besides that it cost the Indians a life or two, the latter lost property of their own far exceeding their booty. It is true that the American officers had a stronger force at their disposal than our merchants had, and that, too, consisting of experienced western hunters and veteran soldiers of the frontier; but it is not less interesting to note the difference, because it is easy to account for it.—J.V.H.]
[O] The profits of the last establishment were slender; because the people engaged at it were obliged to subsist on horse-flesh, and they ate ninety horses during the winter.
[P] It being understood, of course, that I render into civilized expressions the language of this barbarian, and represent by words and phrases what he could only convey by gestures or by signs. [The naïveté of those notes, and of the narrative in these passages, is amusing.—ED.]
[Q] A great village or encampment of Indians, among whom the Spaniards had sent missionaries under the conduct of Signor Quadra; but whence the latter were chased by Captain Vancouver, in 1792, as mentioned in the Introduction.
[R] It is equally evident that even at the time when Captain Thorn was first notified of the dangerous crowd and threatening appearance of the natives, a display of firearms would have sufficed to prevent an outbreak. Had he come on deck with Mr. M'Kay and Mr. Lewis, each armed with a musket, and a couple of pistols at the belt, it is plain from the timidity the savages afterward displayed, that he might have cleared the ship, probably without shedding a drop of blood.—ED.
[S] However, some cases of guns and kegs of powder were thrown into the falls, before the party retreated.
[T] This Indian returned some time after to the factory, but in a pitiable condition. After the departure of the canoe, he had concealed himself behind a rock, and so passed the night. At daybreak, fearing to be discovered, he gained the woods and directed his steps toward the fort, across a mountainous region. He arrived at length at the bank of a little stream, which he was at first unable to cross. Hunger, in the meantime, began to urge him; he might have appeased it with game, of which he saw plenty, but unfortunately he had lost the flint of his gun. At last, with a raft of sticks, he crossed the river, and arrived at a village, the inhabitants of which disarmed him, and made him prisoner. Our people hearing where he was, sent to seek him, and gave some blankets for his ransom.
[U] Some of my readers would, no doubt, desire some scientific details on the botany and natural history of this country. That is, in fact, what they ought to expect from a man who had travelled for his pleasure, or to make discoveries: but the object of my travels was not of this description; my occupations had no relation with science; and, as I have said in my preface, I was not, and am not now, either a naturalist or a botanist.
[V] Plumbago.
[W] Horses are abundant up the river; but they are not indigenous to the country. They will be spoken of in a future chapter.
[X] This appears improbable, and is, no doubt, overstated; but so far as it is true, only shows the degradation of these women, and the absence of moral love on both sides. The indifference to virgin chastity described by Mr. F., is a characteristic of barbarous nations in general, and is explained by the principle stated in the next note below; the savage state being essentially one in which the supernatural bond of human fellowship is snapped: it is (as it has been called) the state of nature, in which continence is practically impossible; and what men can not have, that they soon cease to prize. The same utter indifference to the past conduct of the girls they marry is mentioned by MAYHEW as existing among the costermongers and street population of London, whom he well likens to the barbarous tribes lying on the outskirts of more ancient nations.—ED.
[Y] It is Coleridge who observes that every tribe is barbarous which has no recognised public worship or cult, and no regular priesthood as opposed to self-constituted conjurors. It is, in fact, by public worship alone that human society is organized and vivified; and it is impossible to maintain such worship without a sacerdotal order, however it be constituted. No culture without a cult, is the result of the study of the races of mankind. Hence those who would destroy religion are the enemies of civilization.—ED.
[Z] It seems clear that this Indian mythology is a form of the primitive tradition obscured by symbol. The creation of man by the Supreme Divinity, but in an imperfect state ("his eyes not yet opened"), his deliverance from that condition by an inferior but more beneficent deity (the Satan of the Bible), and the progress of the emancipated and enlightened being, in the arts of industry, are clearly set forth. Thus the devil has his cosmogony as well as the Almighty, and his tradition in opposition to the divine.—ED.
[AA] There can not be a doubt that the existing tribes on the N.W. coast, have reached that country from the South, and not from the North. They are the debris of the civilization of Central America, expelled by a defecating process that is going on in all human societies, and so have sunk into barbarism.—ED.
[AB] Turcotte died of King's Evil. De Launay was a half-breed, of violent temper, who had taken an Indian woman to live with him; he left Mr. Reed in the autumn, and was never heard of again.
[AC] The process of boiling employed by the Indians in this case, extracts from the moss its gelatine, which serves to supply the waste of those tissues into which that principle enters; but as the moss contains little or none of the proximates which constitute the bulk of the living solids and fluids, it will not, of course, by itself, support life or strength.—ED.
[AD] A snag of course, of the nature of which the young Canadian seems to have been ignorant.
[AE] Mr. Franchere uniformly mentions the direction from which a stream appears to flow, not that toward which it runs; a natural method on the part of one who was ascending the current.
[AF] This is interesting, as the rough calculation of an unscientific traveller, unprovided with instruments, and at that date. The real height of the Rocky Mountains, as now ascertained, averages twelve thousand feet; the highest known peak is about sixteen thousand.—ED.
[AG] Mr. Franchere, not having the fear of the Abbé Gaume before his eyes, so wrote in his Journal of 1814; finding consolation in a thought savoring, we confess, more of Virgil than of the catechism. It is a classic term that calls to our mind rough Captain Thorn's sailor-like contempt for his literary passengers so comically described by Mr. Irving. Half of the humor as well as of the real interest of Mr. Franchere's charming narrative, is lost by one who has never read "Astoria."
[AH] Pemican, of which I have already spoken several times, is the Indian name for the dried and pounded meat which the natives sell to the traders. About fifty pounds of this meat is placed in a trough (un grand vaisseau fait d'un tronc d'arbre), and about an equal quantity of tallow is melted and poured over it; it is thoroughly mixed into one mass, and when cold, is put up in bags made of undressed buffalo hide, with the hair outside, and sewed up as tightly as possible. The meat thus impregnated with tallow, hardens, and will keep for years. It is eaten without any other preparation; but sometimes wild pears or dried berries are added, which render the flavor more agreeable.
[AI] A Spanish mission or presidency, in about the 36th degree of latitude.
[AJ] Another Spanish presidency, in about the 38th degree of latitude, and the first European establishment to be met with south of the Columbia. [These now obsolete notes are interesting as indicative of the period when they were written.—ED.]
[AK] The N.W. Company having raised a regiment composed of their own servants, and known as the voyageur corps, and having also instigated to war, and armed, the Indian tribes, over which they had influence, had brought on themselves this act of retaliation. Mr. Johnston also had engaged actively in the war against the United States.
[AL] "Far-famed and so well described," adds Mr. Franchere, in his own translation, but I prefer to leave the expression in its original striking simplicity, as he wrote it before he had heard of MOORE. Every reader remembers:—
"Soon as the woods on shore grow dim,
We'll sing at St. Ann's our parting hymn."
Canadian Boatman's Song.
[AM] We have thought it best to give this Appendix, excepting some abbreviations rendered necessary to avoid repetition of what has been stated before, in Mr. Franchere's own words, particularly as a specimen of his own English style may be justly interesting to the reader.