Adair's History of the American Indians

by James Adair

The Indians, beyond all the rest of mankind, seem in this respect to be actuated with the Jewish spirit. They jeer, taunt, laugh, whoop, and rejoice at the inexpressible agonies of those unfortunate persons, who are under their butchering hands; which would excite pity and horror in any heart, but that of a Jew. When they are far from home, they keep as near to their distinguishing customs, as circumstances allow them: not being able formerly to cut off the heads of those they killed in war, for want of proper weapons; nor able to carry them three or four hundred miles without putrefaction, they cut off the skin of their heads with their flint-stone knives, as speaking trophies of honour, and which register them among the brave by procuring them war titles. Though now they have plenty of proper weapons, they vary not from this ancient barbarous custom of the American aborigines: which has been too well known by many of our northern colonists, and is yet shamefully so to South-Carolina and Georgia barriers, by the hateful name of scalping.

The Indians strictly adhere more than the rest of mankind to that positive, unrepealed law of Moses, “He who sheddeth man’s blood, by {147} man shall his blood be shed:” like the Israelites, their hearts burn violently day and night without intermission, till they shed blood for blood. They transmit from father to son, the memory of the loss of their relation, or one of their own tribe or family, though it were an old woman—if she was either killed by the enemy, or by any of their own people. If indeed the murder be committed by a kinsman, the eldest can redeem: however, if the circumstances attending the fact be peculiar and shocking to nature, the murderer is condemned to die the death of a sinner, “without any one to mourn for him,” as in the case of suicide; contrary to their usage toward the rest of their dead, and which may properly be called the death or burial of a Jewish ass.

When they have had success in killing the enemy, they tie fire-brands in the most-frequented places, with grape vines which hang pretty low, in order that they may be readily seen by the enemy. As they reckon the aggressors have loudly declared war, it would be madness or treachery in their opinion to use such public formalities before they have revenged crying blood; it would inform the enemy of their design of retaliating, and destroy the honest intention of war. They likewise strip the bark off several large trees in conspicuous places, and paint them with red and black hieroglyphics, thereby threatening the enemy with more blood and death. The last were strong and similar emblems with the Hebrews, and the first is analogous to one of their martial customs; for when they arrived at the enemies territories, they threw a fire-brand within their land, as an emblem of the anger of Ash, “the holy fire” for their ill deeds to his peculiarly beloved people. To which custom Obadiah alludes, when he says (ver. 18.) “they shall kindle in them and devour them, there shall not be any remaining of the house of Esau, &c.” which the Septuagint translates, “one who carries a fire-brand.” The conduct of the Israelitish champion, Sampson, against the Philistines, proceeded from the same war custom, when he took three-hundred Shugnalim, (which is a bold strong metaphor) signifying Vulpes, foxes or sheaves of corn; and tying them tail to tail, or one end to the other in a continued train, he set fire to them, and by that means, burned down their standing corn.

In the late Cheerake war, at the earnest persuasions of the trading people, several of the Muskohge warriors came down to the barrier-settlements of Georgia, {148} to go against the Cheerake, and revenge English crying blood: but the main body of the nation sent a running embassy to the merchants there, requesting them immediately to forbear their unfriendly proceedings, otherwise, they should be forced by disagreeable necessity to revenge their relations blood if it should chance to be spilt contrary to their ancient laws: this alludes to the levitical law, by which he who decoyed another to his end, was deemed the occasion of his death, and consequently answerable for it. If an unruly horse belonging to a white man, should chance to be tied at a trading house and kill one of the Indians, either the owner of the house, or the person who tied the beast there, is responsible for it, by their lex talionis; which seems to be derived also from the Mosaic precept,—if an ox known by its owner to push with its horn, should kill a person, they were both to die the death. If the Indians have a dislike to a person, who by any casualty was the death of one of their people, he stands accountable, and will certainly suffer for it, unless he takes sanctuary.

I knew an under trader, who being intrusted by his employer with a cargo of goods for the country of the Muskohge, was forced by the common law of good faith, to oppose some of those savages in the remote woods, to prevent their robbing the camp: the chieftain being much intoxicated with spirituous liquors, and becoming outrageous in proportion to the resistance he met with, the trader like a brave man, opposed lawless force by force: some time after, the lawless bacchanal was attacked with a pleurisy, of which he died. Then the heads of the family of the deceased convened the lesser judicatory, and condemned the trader to be shot to death for the supposed murder of their kinsman; which they easily effected, as he was off his guard, and knew nothing of their murdering design. His employer however had such a friendly intercourse with them, as to gain timely notice of any thing that might affect his person or interest; but he was so far from assisting the unfortunate brave man, as the laws of humanity and common honour obliged him, that as a confederate, he not only concealed their bloody intentions, but went basely to the next town, while the savages painted themselves red and black, and give them an opportunity of perpetrating the horrid murder. The poor victim could have easily escaped to the English settlements if forewarned, and got the affair accommodated by the mediation of the government. In acts of blood, if the supposed murderer {149} escapes, his nearest kinsman either real or adopted, or if he has none there, his friend stands according to their rigorous law, answerable for the fact. But though the then governor of South Carolina was sufficiently informed of this tragedy, and that it was done contrary to the treaty of amity, and that there is no possibility of managing them, but by their own notions of virtue, he was passive, and allowed them with impunity to shed this innocent blood; which they ever since have improved to our shame and sorrow. They have gradually become worse every year; and corrupted other nations by their contagious copy, so as to draw them into the like bloody scenes, with the same contempt, as if they had killed so many helpless timorous dunghill fowls, as they despitefully term us.

There never was any set of people, who pursued the Mosaic law of retaliation with such a fixt eagerness as these Americans.[^[57]] They are so determined in this point, that formerly a little boy shooting birds in the high and thick corn-fields, unfortunately chanced slightly to wound another with his childish arrow; the young vindictive fox, was excited by custom to watch his ways with the utmost earnestness, till the wound was returned in as equal manner as could be expected. Then, “all was straight,” according to their phrase. Their hearts were at rest, by having executed that strong law of nature, and they sported together as before. This observation though small in itself, is great in its combined circumstances, as it is contrary to the usage of the old heathen world. They forgive all crimes at the annual atonement of sins, except murder, which is always punished with death. The Indians constantly upbraid us in their bacchanals, for inattention to this maxim of theirs; they say, that all nations of people who are not utterly sunk in cowardice, take revenge of blood before they can have rest, cost what it will. The Indian Americans are more eager to revenge blood, than any other people on the whole face of the earth. And when the heart of the revenger of blood in Israel was hot within him, it was a terrible thing for the casual manslayer to meet him, Deut. xix. 6. “Lest the avenger of blood pursue the slayer while his heart is hot, and overtake him, because the way is long, and slay him; whereas he was not worthy of death, inasmuch as he hated him not in time past.”

I have known the Indians to go a thousand miles, for the purpose of revenge, in pathless woods; over hills and mountains; through large cane {150} swamps, full of grape-vines and briars; over broad lakes, rapid rivers, and deep creeks; and all the way endangered by poisonous snakes, if not with the rambling and lurking enemy, while at the same time they were exposed to the extremities of heat and cold, the vicissitude of the seasons; to hunger and thirst, both by chance, and their religious scanty method of living when at war, to fatigues, and other difficulties. Such is their over-boiling, revengeful temper, that they utterly contemn all those things as imaginary trifles, if they are so happy as to get the scalp of the murderer, or enemy, to satisfy the supposed craving ghosts of their deceased relations. Though they imagine the report of guns will send off the ghosts of their kindred that died at home, to their quiet place, yet they firmly believe, that the spirits of those who are killed by the enemy, without equal revenge of blood, find no rest, and at night haunt the houses of the tribe to which they belonged[^[XXXIII]]: but, when that kindred duty of retaliation is justly executed, they immediately get ease and power to fly away: This opinion, and their method of burying and mourning for the dead, of which we shall speak presently, occasion them to retaliate in so earnest and fierce a manner. It is natural for friends to study each others mutual happiness, and we should pity the weakness of those who are destitute of our advantages; whose intellectual powers are unimproved, and who are utterly unacquainted with the sciences, as well as every kind of mechanical business, to engage their attention at home. Such persons cannot well live without war; and being destitute of public faith to secure the lives of embassadors in time of war, they have no sure method to reconcile their differences; consequently, when any casual thing draws them into a war, it grows every year more spiteful till it advances to a bitter enmity, so as to excite them to an implacable hatred to one another’s very national names. Then they must go abroad to spill the enemy’s blood, and to revenge crying blood. We must also consider, it is by scalps they get all their war-titles, which distinguish them among the brave: and these they hold in as high esteem, as the most ambitious Roman general ever did a great triumph. By how much the deeper any society of people are sunk in ignorance, so much the more they value themselves on their bloody merit. This was {151} long the characteristic of the Hebrew nation, and has been conveyed down to these their supposed red descendants.

[XXXIII]. As the Hebrews supposed there was a holiness in Canaan, more than in any other land, so they believed that their bodies buried out of it, would be carried through caverns, or subterraneous passages of the earth to the holy land, where they shall rise again and dart up to their holy attracting centre.

However, notwithstanding their bloody temper and conduct towards enemies, when their law of blood does not interfere, they observe that Mosaic[Mosaic] precept, “He shall be dealt with according as he intended to do to his neighbour, but the innocent and righteous man thou shalt not slay.” I must observe also that as the Jewish priests[priests] were by no means to shed human blood, and as king David was forbidden by the prophet to build a temple because he was a man of war and had shed blood—so, the Indian Ishtohoollo “holy men” are by their function absolutely forbidden to slay; notwithstanding their propensity thereto, even for small injuries. They will not allow the greatest warrior to officiate, when the yearly grand sacrifice of expiation is offered up, or on any other religious occasion, except the leader. All must be performed by their beloved men, who are clean of every stain of blood, and have their foreheads circled with streaks of white clay.

As this branch of the general subject cannot be illustrated, but by well-known facts, I shall exemplify it with the late and long-continued conduct of the northern Indians, and those of Cape Florida, whom our navigators have reported to be cannibals. The Muskohge[Muskohge], who have been bitter enemies to the Cape Florida Indians, time immemorial, affirm their manners, tempers and appetites, to be the very same as those of the neighboring Indian nations. And the Florida captives who were sold in Carolina, have told me, that the Spaniards of St. Augustine and St. Mark’s garrisons, not only hired and paid them for murdering our seamen, who were so unfortunate as to be shipwrecked on their dangerous coast, but that they delivered up to the savages those of our people they did not like, to be put to the fiery torture. From their bigotted persecuting spirit, we may conclude the victims to have been those who would not worship their images and crucifixes. The Spaniards no doubt could easily influence this decayed small tribe to such a practice, as they depended upon them for the necessaries of life: and though they could never settle out of their garrisons in West-Florida, on account of the jealous temper of the neighboring unconquered Indians, yet the Cape-Floridans were only Spanish mercenaries, shedding blood for their maintenance. A seduced Indian {152} is certainly less faulty than the apostate Christian who instigated him; when an Indian sheds human blood, it does not proceed from wantonness, or the view of doing evil, but solely to put the law of retaliation in force, to return one injury for another; but, if he has received no ill, and has no suspicion of the kind, he usually offers no damage to those who fall in his power, but is moved with compassion, in proportion to what they seem to have undergone. Such as they devote to the fire, they flatter with the hope of being redeemed, as long as they can, to prevent the giving them any previous anxiety or grief, which their law of blood does not require.