Noel M. Loomis.
Minneapolis, Minn., Aug. 25, 1956.
INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER
John Tanner, whose life and adventures are detailed in the following pages, is now about fifty years of age. His person is erect and rather robust, indicating great hardiness, activity, and strength, which, however, his numerous exposures and sufferings have deeply impaired. His face, which was originally rather handsome, bears now numerous traces of thought and passion, as well as of age; his quick and piercing blue eyes, bespeak the stern, the violent, and unconquerable spirit, which rendered him an object of fear to many of the Indians while he remained among them, and which still, in some measure, disqualifies him for that submissive and compliant manner which his dependent situation among the whites renders necessary. Carefully instructed in early youth, in all those principles and maxims which constitute the moral code of the unsophisticated and uncorrupted Indians, his ideas of right and wrong, of honourable and dishonourable, differ, of course, very essentially from those of white men. His isolated and friendless situation, in the midst of a community where the right of private warfare is recognized as almost the only defence of individual possessions, the only barrier between man and man, was certainly in the highest degree unfavourable to the formation of that enduring and patient submissiveness, which, in civilized societies, surrenders so great a share of individual rights to the strong guardianship of the law. Accordingly, to a correct sense of natural justice, he unites a full share of that indomitable and untiring spirit of revenge, so prominent in the Indian character. The circumstances into which he has been thrown, among a wild and lawless race, have taught him to consider himself, in all situations, the avenger of his own quarrel; and if, in the better regulated community into which he has been recently drawn, he has, by the consciousness of aggravated insult, or intolerable oppression, been driven to seek redress, or to propose it to himself, we cannot be surprised that he should have recurred to the method, which long habit, and the paramount influence of established custom, have taught him to consider the only honourable and proper one. He returns to the pale of civilization too late in life to acquire the mental habits which befit his new situation. It is to be regretted that he should ever meet among us with those so destitute of generosity as to be willing to take advantage of his unavoidable ignorance of the usages of civilized society. He has ever been found just and generous, until injuries or insults have aroused the spirit of hatred and revenge; his gratitude has always been as ardent and persevering as his resentment. But it would be superfluous to dwell on the features of his character, which are best displayed in his narrative of those events and scenes, to which he might, with so much propriety, apply the hackneyed motto,
quae que ipse miserrima vidi,
Et quorum pars magna fui.
The preceding remarks would not, perhaps, have been hazarded, had not some harsh imputations been made to rest on the character of our narrator, in the district where he has for some time past resided, in consequence of differences growing, as appears to us, entirely out of the circumstance of the Indian character, with many of its prominent peculiarities being indelibly impressed upon him. However such a character may, under any circumstances, excite our disapprobation or dislike, some indulgence is due where, as in this case, the solitary savage, with his own habits and opinions, is brought into contact with the artificial manners and complicated institutions of civilized men.
In an attempt to aid this unfortunate individual in addressing his countrymen, it seemed desirable to give his narrative, as nearly as possible, in his own words, and with his own manner. The narrator himself is not without a share of that kind of eloquence which we meet with among the Indians; but as this consists more in action, emphasis, and the expression of the countenance, than in words and sentences, he has been followed in the style of the humblest narration. This plainness, it is hoped, will render the history little less acceptable to the general reader, while the philosophic inquirer will undoubtedly prefer to trace, in the simplest possible guise, the operations of a mind subjected for so long a time to the influence of all the circumstances peculiar to savage life. It ought to be distinctly understood, that his whole story was given as it stands, without hints, suggestions, leading questions, or advice of any kind, other than “to conceal nothing.” The sentiments expressed in relation to the character and conduct of individuals on the frontiers, or in the Indian country, or on other subjects connected with the condition of the Indians, are exclusively his own. One liberty it has been found necessary to take, namely, to retrench or altogether to omit many details of hunting adventures, of travelling, and other events, which in the simple lives of the Indians have only a moderate share of importance, but on which, in the lack of other matter, they learn to dwell very much at length in those long narrative conversations with which it is their habit to amuse each other. It is probable the narrator might have proved more acceptable to many of his readers had this retrenchment been carried to a greater extent; but it is to be remembered that the life of the savage, like that of the civilized man, is made up of a succession of little occurrences, each unimportant by itself, but which require to be estimated in making up an opinion of the character of either.