A Treatise on the Six-Nation Indians

by J. B. Mackenzie

Though a white team can often boast of two or three individual runners, whose fleetness will outstrip the capacity of an equal number on the side of the Indians, I think, perhaps, that it will be allowed that the Indian team, as a rule, will comprehend the greater number of fleet members. While the Indian, then, can scarcely be said to yield to the white in this respect, he lacks obviously that mental quick-sightedness which, with the latter, defines, as it were, intuitively, the exact location on the field, of a friend, and, with unerring certitude, calculates the degree of force that shall be needed to propel the ball, and the precise direction its flight shall take, in order to insure its reposing on the net of that friend. In the frequently recurring mêlees, begotten of the struggle amongst a number of contestants for the possession of the ball, the Indian exhibits, perhaps, in more marked degree than the white, the qualities of stubborn doggedness, and utter disregard of personal injury.

The worsting of the Indian by the white in the majority of competitions of this kind is due to the latter submitting to be governed by system, and to his recognizing a directing power in the captain. The Indian, on the other hand, will not bend to such controlling influence, but chafes under direction of any kind. He has good facilities for practice at this game, and, I believe, really tries to excel in it, often, indeed, the expense of duties, which imperatively call him elsewhere than to the lacrosse-field.

The Indian is a proficient canoeist, and will adventure himself with confidence in a canoe of the frailest construction, which he will guide in safety, and with surpassing skill. He will dispel the fears of his disquieted and faithless fellow-voyager (for the motion at times in canoeing is, unmistakably, perturbing and discomposing; indeed, in this unsettling experience, the body is a frequent, if not an inevitable, sharer) who, in view of his sublime disregard of danger, will quickly re-assert the courage that had waned. If, however, there be a second Indian in the canoe, he usually strives to counteract the reassuring effect that the pilot's bearing has upon you. He stands up in the bottom, and sways, to and fro, and, with fell and malignant intent proceeds to evolve out of the canoe a more approved see-saw action than a priori and inherently attaches to that order of craft. On that really "Grand" river, which was his sometime heritage, the Indian can well improve his skill in this modest branch of nautical science.

HIS TRADING RELATIONS WITH WHITES.

The consciousness of unsatisfied pecuniary obligation does not, as a rule, weigh heavily on the Indian mind, nor does it usually awaken, or offer food for, burdensome reflection.

The Indian Act, which decrees his minority, disables him from entering into a contract of any kind, though it scarcely needs any statement from me to assure my hearers that the law does not secure, nor does the majestic arm of that law exact, from him, the most rigid compliance.

The Indian will make and tender to a white creditor his promissory note with a gleeful complacency. There are usually two elements contributing, in perhaps equal degree, to produce in him this complacent frame of mind: The first, that, for removing from his immediate consideration a debt, he is adopting a temporizing expedient, which in no way vouches for, and in no sense bespeaks, the ultimate payment of the debt; the other, that his act records his sense of rebellion against a restrictive law, ever welling up in his breast, and seeking such-like opportune vent for its relief.

In trading with a merchant, who, appreciating the wiliness of his customer, felt a natural concern about trading upon as safe a basis as might be secured, it was, until quite recently, customary with the Indian to anticipate his interest-money, in paying for his goods. That the merchant might have a guarantee that previous instances of the setting on foot of this plan in the individual Indian's case, had not effected the entire appropriation or exhaustion of his allowance, or that in the immediate transaction with him, the Indian's allowance would not be exceeded, a chief of the particular tribe to which the Indian belonged, who was assumed to keep track of the various amounts that at different times impaired the interest-fund, signed an order for him to tender to the merchant; and in order that the Superintendent might properly award and pay the balance coming, these orders would go into his possession, before he should proceed with the season's payments. Now, however, the place and times at which interest payments are made, are not allowed to be viewed by merchants and others as a collection depôt, or as occasions on which their orders from Indians may be confirmed, or debts from those Indians made good.

The merchant, foreseeing that a large proportion of the debts from Indians that he books are not recoverable, will frequently—and I presume there is nothing savoring of dubious dealing in the matter—add, perhaps, thirty or forty per cent. to the usual retail price of the goods sold to them, that the collection of some of the debts may, as it were, offset the loss from those that are irrecoverable.

It is not pleasant to impugn the character of the Indian for uprightness and probity, but that there is no conspicuous prevalence of these qualities with him, I fear, can be sufficiently demonstrated. I am disposed to ascribe this state of things, to a large extent, to the operation of the Indian Law. If the Indian who buys, and does not pay, and who never intends to pay, were not exempted from the salutary lesson which the distraint, at suit of a creditor, upon his goods, teaches, he would not seek to evade payment of his debts.