From all these sources we derive the hope, that a more successful experiment is to be made respecting the aborigines of our country than has ever before been attempted, and that the time may soon arrive when they shall be allowed to form a State of this vast republic. The wrongs they have suffered demand the best reparation which a Christian nation can make; and the prayer of many a pious and sympathizing heart is daily breathed forth, that they may henceforth be permitted, without molestation, to learn and practise the virtues of peace, cheered and encouraged in every honest endeavour to do well.
Such, then, as we have attempted to sketch it, is the history of the aborigines of America. It is sad to reflect that so many pages of it have been written, as it were, in blood, and that such multitudes have perished in the vain attempt to resist outrage and oppression.
THE PROSPECTS OF THE WESTERN TRIBES.
Columbus, speaking of the American Indians, said:—“I swear to your Majesties that there is not a better people in the world; they love their neighbours as themselves; their language is the sweetest, softest, and most cheerful, for they always speak smiling; and, although they go naked, let your Majesties believe me, their customs are very becoming; and their king, who is served with great majesty, has such engaging manners, that it gives great pleasure to see him; and also to consider the great retentive faculty of that people, and their desire of knowledge, which incites them to ask the causes and effects of things.”
After the dark and bloody account we have given of the history of the Indians,—especially those within the compass of our own country,—we may smile at the flattering picture presented by the discoverer of the New World. But we must consider that the natives of the West Indies, of whom Columbus speaks, were the mildest portion of the great Indian family; and, besides, at the time to which he refers, they had not become exasperated by the repeated and cruel wrongs of the Europeans.
In estimating the native capacities of the aborigines, and especially their fitness for civilization, we must take into consideration the long train of influences which has been moulding them, for centuries, into their present condition. The history of Peru, as well as that of Mexico, abundantly proves that a portion of them had an aptitude for improvement, evinced by the progress they made in various arts; and it may be added, that, under the instructions of Eliot and Mayhew, even the tribes of New England, regarded as among the most savage and irredeemable, made rapid strides in Christianity and the peaceful arts of civilized life.
If, therefore, in our picture of these Northern nations, we have been called upon to delineate them chiefly as warriors, revelling in blood, and delighting in the terrific scenes of slaughter, pillage, and conflagration, it must not be inferred that such is their intrinsic and necessary character. An experiment is, indeed, now making, on a large scale, and under favorable auspices, having for its object to bring them into the family of civilized man; and in our view of the present condition of the Indians in the United States, we have exhibited the hopeful advances already made by some of the tribes in refinement and the Christian virtues.