TRACES OF AN INDIAN LEGEND.
It has been said of our energetic republic that it had no infancy; that it sprang into a vigorous and complete existence at a bound. However true this may be with respect to its material structure in the hands of the remarkable men who first planted colonies on American soil, there is another view of the picture which presents widely different features.
To the eye of the Christian philosopher the religious and moral aspects of our country to this day afford subjects for anything but satisfactory reflection.
The pioneers of civilization along the northeastern borders of our territory were—whatever their professions to the contrary may have been—worshippers of material prosperity. The worship of God and the claims of religion were indeed important and proper in their place for a portion of the seventh part of each week, but the moment they came in conflict with Mammon there was little question which should yield. It was not to be expected that the saints whom the Lord had specially chosen, and unto whom “He had given the earth,” should be diverted from their pursuit of the great “main chance” by precepts which were applicable only to ordinary and less favored mortals.
Whatever progress the church has yet achieved in this region is the result of appalling labors and sacrifices. The foundation was laid in sufferings, fatigues, and perils, from the contemplation of which the self-indulgent Christians of our day would shrink aghast; laid long before the so-called Pilgrim fathers landed at Plymouth, while the savage still roamed through the unbroken forests of New England, and disputed dominion with wild beasts hardly more dangerous than himself to the messengers of the Gospel of peace. Amid the wonderful beauty and variety of the panorama which her mountains, lakes, and valleys unfold to the tourists and pleasure-seekers of to-day, there is scarcely a scene that has not been traversed in weariness, in hunger, and cold by those dauntless servants of God who first proclaimed the tidings of salvation to the wild children of the forest.
Futile, and even foolish, as the toils of these early fathers may appear to the materialist and utilitarian of this day, because of their tardy and apparently inadequate fruits, the designs of Heaven have not been frustrated, and its light reveals a very different history. We read therein how He who causes “the weak and foolish things of this world to confound the wise” and to proclaim his praise, sent his ministering angels to hover over the pathway moistened with the tears and blood of his servants, to note each footprint through the dreary wilderness, to gather the incense of each prayer, and to mark each pain and peril of their sacrificial march for record in the archives of eternity, as an earnest for future good to those regions, and as enduring testimony before the high court of heaven to their fitness for the crown—far surpassing in glory all earthly crowns—which they won by their burning zeal and unwavering patience.
Nor were their efforts in the field of their earthly labors so vain as some of our modern historians would have us suppose. Prayer and exertion in the service of God are never fruitless. If it is true—as the great Champlain was wont to say—“that one soul gained for heaven was of more value than the conquest of an empire for France,” they gained from the roving tribes of the desert many sincere and steadfast adherents to the faith—whose names are recorded in the book of life—and scattered benedictions along their painful pathway which have shed their beneficent influences over the scenes they traversed down to the present day. We hope to illustrate and sustain this assertion in the following sketch, drawn from our memory, of traditions—preserved among the Indians of St. Regis—to which we listened many years ago.
Scattered along the southern shores of the St. Lawrence, from the foot of Lake Ontario to the village of St. Regis—while St. Lawrence County, N.Y., was yet for the most part covered with primitive forests—were many encampments of these Indians. That whole region abounded in game and furnished favorite hunting-grounds, to which they claimed a right in connection with their special reservation in the more immediate neighborhood of St. Regis. At each of these encampments an aged Indian was sure to be found, who, without the title of chief, was a kind of patriarch among his younger brethren, exercised great influence in their affairs, and was treated with profound respect by them. He was their umpire in all disputes, their adviser in doubtful matters, and the “leader of prayer” in his lodge—always the largest and most commodious of the wigwams, and the one in which they assembled for their devotions.
One of the oldest of these sages—called “Captain Simon”—must have been much more than a hundred years of age, judging from the dates of events of which he retained a distinct remembrance as an eye-witness, and which occurred in the course of the French and Indian wars, over a century previous to the time when we listened to his recital. His head was an inexhaustible store-house of traditions and legends, many of them relating to the discovery and settlement of Canada and the labors of the first missionaries. He was very fond of young people, and, gathering the children of the white settlers around him, he would hold them spell-bound for hours while he related stories of those early days in his peculiarly impressive and figurative language. He claimed that his grandfather was one of the party who accompanied Champlain on his first voyage through the lake which bears his name, and that he afterwards acted as guide and interpreter to the first priest who visited the valley of Lake Champlain. When he heard that we were from Vermont, he asked for a piece of chalk, and, marking on the floor an outline of the lake and the course of the Richelieu River, he proceeded to narrate the voyage of Champlain and his party in the summer of 1609.