It certainly was a great step in the march of progress, that Red Jacket should abjure these pagan rites. After a life of sworn enmity to Christianity, that the example, the quiet unobtrusive example of a Christian woman in her household, should so influence him concerning Christianity, that he requested a Christian burial, and voluntarily and formally expressed to her his approbation of her religion, and his desire that she and her children should embrace it and live in accordance with its requirements. If he had come in contact with none but truly Christian men, he might in early life have been, not only a nominal, but an experimental Christian, and all his noble gifts consecrated to the elevation and redemption of his people.

The wife and daughter were the only ones to whom he spoke parting words or gave a parting blessing; but as his last hour drew nigh, his family all gathered around him, and mournful it was to think that the children were not his own—his were all sleeping in the little churchyard where he was soon to be laid—they were his step-children—the children of his favorite wife. It has been somewhere stated that his first wife died before him, but it is a mistake. She was living at the time of his death. He never went to see her but once after he left her, and that was about six months after their separation. He always asserted that he did not condemn her upon suspicion, that he was satisfied of her guilt before he deserted her. But he went once again to see her, thinking he might be able to forgive her, and receive her again as his companion for his children’s sake, but found it impossible. He revolted from the thought of again calling her wife, and turned away never to see her more.

So there were none around his dying bed but step-children. These he had always loved and cherished, and [[199]]they loved and honored him, for this their mother had taught them. The wife sat by his pillow and rested her hand upon his head. At his feet stood the two sons, who are now aged and Christian men, and by his side the little girl, whose little hand rested upon his withered and trembling palm. His last words were still, “Where is the missionary?” and then he clasped the child to his bosom, while she sobbed in anguish—her ears caught his hurried breathing—his arms relaxed their hold—she looked up, and he was gone. There was mourning in the household, and there was mourning among the people. The orator, the great man of whom they were still proud, while they lamented his degeneracy, was gone. He had been a true though mistaken friend, and who would take his place!

He had requested that a vial of cold water might be placed in his hand, when he was prepared for the burial, but the reason of the request no one could divine. It was complied with, however, and all his wishes strictly heeded. The funeral took place in the little mission church, with appropriate but the most simple ceremonies; and he was buried in the little mission burying-ground, at the gateway of what was once an old fort, around him his own people—aged men, sachems, chiefs and warriors, and little children.

A simple stone was erected to mark his grave, and the spot became a resort for the traveller from far and near. Soon it began to be desecrated, and his name disappeared from the marble, defaced by those who wished to carry away some memento of having visited the chieftain’s tomb. Some among those who knew and honored him, wished to remove his remains to the new cemetery at Buffalo; but knowing or understanding the tenacity of his friends concerning his being buried among white people, they caused him to be disinterred and placed in a leaden coffin, preparatory [[200]]to a burial in a new spot. But ere their desire was accomplished, his family had heard of what they considered the terrible sacrilege, and immediately demanded that he should be given up. They had removed from the Buffalo to the Cattaraugus reservation, and therefore did not wish to bury him again in the mission church-yard, so they brought every particle of the precious dust to their own dwelling, where it still remains unburied. They almost felt as if he would rise up to curse them, if they allowed him to lie side by side with those he so cordially hated. He did not wish to rise with pale-faces; and though, if we should meet him on the resurrection morn, we should probably be able to discover no marked difference between his complexion and our own, it is not strange he did not even wish to mingle his red dust with that of his white foes.

It was one of his most emphatic predictions, that the “craft and avarice of the white man would prevail;” and in less than nine years after his death, every foot of “the ancient inheritance of the Senecas was ceded to the white men, in exchange for a tract west of the Mississippi.” Through the intervention of the Friends, as I have elsewhere stated, this calamity was averted, and for the first and only time, the Indians recovered their land, after it had been fraudulently obtained.

There seemed for a time every prospect that the prophetic assertion of the historian would be fulfilled—that “Red Jacket was the last of the Senecas.” But there have been wise men and orators among them since, and the present just and liberal policy of the State of New York, will soon place education and cultivation within the reach of all, and they are abundantly disposed to improve and enjoy the good gifts which are bestowed upon them.

Schoolboys and collegians may find some other theme [[201]]for their eloquence, than “the last of the Mingoes wending his way towards the setting sun,” for there is no longer any room to fear this dire calamity.

The following is the inscription upon the stone at the head of his grave:

SA-GO-YE-WAT-HA,