[26. THE RED MEN.]
Red Men and White Men.
(From the picture by Cyrus Cuneo, R.I. By kind permission of the C.P.R. Co.)
1. Tom will not forgive me unless I tell you something about the Red men of America. He has often asked me about the picture of Red men which is in my room at home.
2. In the old days, before white men settled in America, the Red men were masters of the land. They were tall and strong, and their skin was of a dark copper colour. Their eyes were jet black, and their hair was long and straight.
3. They wore very little clothing, even though the winters in North America are very cold. From the time when they were babies they were trained to bear heat and cold, hunger, thirst, and pain without grumbling.
4. When the white men landed in America, the villages of the Red men were to be found all over the country. Each of these villages was the home of a tribe. The houses were tents made of skin or huts made of wood.
5. The women or squaws did all the hard work. They planted and tilled the fields, cooked the food, and made the clothes. The babies were put into little bark cradles, which were sometimes hung from the branches of trees, and were rocked to and fro by the wind.