Personal Memoirs of a Residence of Thirty Years with the Indian Tribes On The American Frontiers Part 55

"The Big Cloud has required his two children to attend regularly to instruction; others occasionally. The Elder Brother has procured him a comfortable log house to be built--bought a horse and cow. I have bought a calf of Mr. A. for him.

"I am making the experiment whether I can keep cattle here. They have wintered and pa.s.sed the spring, and we are now favored with milk, which is a rarity and luxury here.

"Mr. Aitkin is establis.h.i.+ng a permanent post at Otter Tail Lake. G.

Bonga had gone with a small a.s.sortment of goods to build and pa.s.s the summer there. The Indians are divided in opinion and feeling with regard to the measure. Those who belong to this lake, or who make gardens in this vicinity, are opposed to the measure. Those who pa.s.s the summer in the deer country and make rice towards the height of land, are in its favor. It is on the line dividing us and our enemies--some say, where we do not wish to go. Whether he has consulted the agent on the subject, I know not.

"The past winter has been severe--the depth of snow greater, by far, than has fallen for several years. Feb. 1 the mercury fell to 40 below zero. This is the extreme. Graduated on the scale I have--it fell nearly into the ball."

_9th_. The Secretary of War writes me a private letter, suggesting the employment of Mr. Ryly, of Schenectady, in carrying out the large deliveries of goods ($150,000) required by the late treaty, and speaking most favorably of him, as a former resident of Michigan, and a patriotic man in days when patriotism meant something.

_14th_. My brother James writes in his usual frank and above-board manner: "If the Indians are to audit accounts against the Indians (agreeably to the Senate's alteration of the treaty), there will be a pretty humbug made of it; then he that has most _whisky_ will get most _money_."

_July 5th_. Dr. Follen and lady, of Cambridge, Ma.s.s., accompanied by Miss Martineau, of England, visited me in the morning, having landed in the s.h.i.+p Milwaukee. They had, previously, visited the chief curiosities and sights on the island. Miss Martineau expressed her gratification in having visited the upper lakes and the island. She said she had, from early childhood, felt an interest in them. I remarked, that I supposed she had seen enough of America and the Americans, to have formed a definite opinion, and asked her what she thought of them? She said she had not asked herself that question. She had hardly made up an opinion, and did not know what it might be, on getting back to England. She thought society hardly formed here, that it was rather early to express opinions; but she thought favorably of the elements of such a mixed society, as suited to lead to the most liberal traits. She spoke highly of Cincinnati, and some other places, and expressed an enthusiastic admiration for the natural beauties of Michilimackinack. She said she had been nearly two years in America, and was now going to the seaboard to embark on her return to England.

_9th_. Instructions were issued at Was.h.i.+ngton for the execution of the treaty, which had been ratified, with amendments, by the Senate.

_10th_. The admission of Michigan as one of the States, had left the office of Superintendent of Indian Affairs, for the region, vacant. An Act of Congress, pa.s.sed near the close of the session, had devolved the duties of this office on the agent at Michilimackinack. Instructions were, this day, issued to carry this act into effect.

_12th_. The chiefs in general council a.s.sembled by special messengers at the Agency at Mackinack, this day a.s.sented to the Senate's alterations of the treaty. Its principles were freely and fully discussed.

_13th_ and _14th_. Signatures continue to be affixed to the articles of a.s.sent.

_15th_. I notified the various bands of Indians to attend in ma.s.s, the payments, which were appointed to commence on the 1st of September.

_27th_. A friend writes from Detroit: "Lord Selkirk, from Scotland, is on his route to Lake Superior, and, as he pa.s.ses through Mackinack, I write to introduce him to you, as a gentleman with whom you would be pleased to have more than a transient a.s.sociation. The name of his father is connected with many north-western events of much interest and notoriety, and a most agreeable recollection of his mother, Lady Selkirk, has recommended him strongly to our kindness. I feel a.s.sured you will befriend him, in the way of information, as to the best means of getting on to the Sault St. Marie."

I found the bearer an easy, quiet, young gentleman, with not the least air of pretence or superciliousness, and one of those men to whom attentions ever become a pleasure.

_Aug. 2d_. Hon. John Norvell, U.S.S., calls my attention to the recent annexation to Michigan of the vast region north of the Straits of Michilimackinack.

"Your personal knowledge," he observes, "of the country on Lake Superior, which, by a late act of Congress has been annexed to, and made a part of the State of Michigan, induces me respectfully to request of you information concerning the nature and extent of the territory thus attached to the State; the qualities of its various soils; the timber and water-powers embraced in it; its minerals and their probable value; the extent of lake-coast added to Michigan; the fisheries and their probable value and duration; the capabilities and conveniences of Lake Superior and the northern Michigan sh.o.r.es, and the cheapness and facility with which a communication may be opened with the lower lakes; together with such other information as it may be in your power to furnish, and as may enable the people of Michigan duly to appreciate the importance of the acquisition." _Vide_ Letters of Albion in reply.

_16th_. Mr. Daniel B. Woods, of New York, announces the project of the publication of "a religious and missionary souvenir," and solicits my aid in the preparation of an article.

_26th_. The citizens, merchants, and traders of the town agree not to sell or furnish whisky or ardent spirits to the Indians during the payments and preliminary examinations--a conclusive evidence this that, where the _interests_ of the population combine to stop the traffic in ardent spirits, it requires no Congressional or State laws.

_Sept. 26th_. John G. Palfrey, Esq., editor of the _North American Review_, wishes me to review Mr. Gallatin's forthcoming paper on the Indian languages, which is about to appear in the second volume of the collections of the American Antiquarian Society.

_28th_. A busy business summer, replete with incident and excitement on the island, closes this day by the termination of the several cla.s.ses of payments made under the treaty of March 28th, 1836. Upwards of four thousand Indians have been encamped along the pebbly beaches and coves of the island, and subsisted by the Indian Department for about a month.

To these an annuity of $42,000 has been paid _per capita_. Of these there were 143 chiefs, namely, 25 of the first cla.s.s, 51 of the second, and 67 of the third cla.s.s, who received an additional payment of $30,000. In addition to the provisions consumed, two thousand dollars worth of flour, pork, rice, and corn were delivered to the separate villages in bulk prior to their departure, and one hundred and fifty thousand dollars in the best quality of Indian goods and merchandise, cutlery, and other articles of prime necessity, systematically divided amongst the ma.s.s. The sum of two hundred and twenty thousand dollars has been paid on accounts exhibited to the agent, and approved by the creditors of the two tribes. One hundred and fifty thousand dollars have also been paid to the half-breed relatives of the two tribes on carefully prepared lists.

These several duties required care and involved responsibilities of no ordinary character. They have been shared by Major H. Whiting, the Paymaster of the Northern Department, by whom the funds were exclusively paid, and John W. Edwards, Esq., of New York, who divided the half-breed fund, to both of whom I am indebted for the diligence with which they addressed themselves to the duty, and the kindness and urbanity of their manners.

So large an a.s.semblage of red and white men probably never a.s.sembled here before, and a greater degree of joy and satisfaction was never evinced by the same number. The Indians went away with their canoes literally loaded with all an Indian wants, from silver to a steel trap, and a practical demonstration was given which will shut their mouths forever with regard to the oft-repeated scandal of the stinginess and injustice of the American government.

Not a man was left, of any caste or shade of nativity, to utter a word to gainsay or cavil with the n.o.ble and high public manner in which these proceedings were done. The blood-relatives of the Indian found that the two nations, actuated by a sense of their kindness and real friends.h.i.+p for years, had remembered them in the day of their prosperity. The large number of Indian creditors, who had toiled and suffered and lost property in a trade which is always hazardous, were glad in seeing the ample provision for their payment.

The agents of the government also rejoiced in the happy termination of their labors, and the drum, whose roll had carried away the troops who had been present to preserve order, now converted to a symbol of peace, was never more destined to be beaten to a.s.semble white men to march in hostility against these tribes. They were forever our friends. What war had not accomplished, the arts of peace certainly had. Kindness, justice, and liberality, like the "still small voice" at Sinai, had done what the whirlwind and the tempest failed to do.

Fourteen years before, I had taken the management of these tribes in hand, to conduct their intercourse and to mould and guide their feelings, on the part of the government. They were then poor, in a region denuded of game, and without one dollar in annuities. They were yet smarting under the war of 1812, and all but one man, the n.o.ble Wing, or Ningwegon, hostile to the American name. They were now at the acme of Indian hunter prosperity, with every want supplied, and a futurity of pleasing antic.i.p.ation. They were friends of the American government. I had allied myself to the race. I was earnest and sincere in desiring and advancing their welfare. I was gratified with a result so auspicious to every humane and exalted wish.

War, ye wild tribes, hath no rewards like this; 'tis peaceful labors that result in bliss.

_29th_. Baron de Behr, Minister of Belgium, presented himself at my office. He was cordially received, although bringing me no letter to apprize me of his official standing at Was.h.i.+ngton. He had been to the Sault Ste. Marie, and visited the entrance into Lake Superior. He presented me a petrifaction picked up on Drummond Island, and looked at my cabinet with interest.

The troops under Major Hoffman embarked in a steamer for Detroit. Also Major Whiting, the U.S. Paymaster, and Mr. Edmonds, my adjuncts in official labor.

_Oct. 17th._ Old friends from Middlebury, Vermont, came up in a steamer bound to Green Bay, among whom I was happy to recognize Mrs. Henshaw, mother of the bishop of that name of Rhode Island.

_18th_. Alfred Schoolcraft, who had commenced the study of ornithology with decided ability, hands me the following list of birds, which have been observed to extend their visits to this island and the basin of Lake Huron.

_________________________________________________________________________ | | | | Common Name. | Order. | Family. | Genus. | ___________________|__________|_____________|___________|________________ | | | | Brown Thrush |Pa.s.seres |Canori |t.u.r.dus |T. Rufus.

Cedar Bird | " |Sericati |Bonelycilla|B. Carolinensis.

Canada Jay | " |Gregarii |Corvus |C. Canadensis.

Crow | " | " | " |C. Corone.

House Wren | " | " |Trylodites |T. Edom.

Blue Jay | " | " |Corvus |C. Vociferus.

Raven | " | " | " |C. Corax.

Snow Bird | " |Pa.s.serini |Fringilla |F. Hyemalis.

Sing Cicily | " | " | " |F. Melodia.

Robin | " |Canori |t.u.r.dus |T. Migratoria.

| " |Pa.s.serini |Loxia |L. Corvurostra.

Red Winged Starling| " |Gregarii |Icterus |I. Phoenicus.

Goldfinch | " |Pa.s.serini |Fringilla |F. Tristis.

Little Owl |Accipetres|Stapaces |Stryx |S.

Sparrow Hawk | " | " |Falco |F. Sparverius.

Golden Plover |Gralle |Pressirostre |Charadrus |C. Plurailis.

Woodc.o.c.k | " |Semicole |Scolipax |S. Minor.

Green Winged Teal | |Lamelasodenta|Anas |Anas Crecca.

Wood Duck | | " | " |A. Sponsa.

Golden Eyed Duck | | " |Fatigula |F. Clengula.

Hooping Crane | |Herodii |Grus |G. Americana.

Kingfisher |Pa.s.seres |Augubrostres |Alcedo |A. Alcyon.

Loon | |Pygopodes |Colymbus |C. Glacialis.

Partridge | |Galinacia |Perdix |P. Virginiana.

Of their habits he appends the following remarks:--

"The Canada Jay (_C. Canadensis_) preys upon smaller birds of the sparrow kind. This fact has been related to me by persons of undoubted veracity, and I have myself seen one of them in pursuit of small birds.

"There is a small species of sparrow, that inhabits the forests near the settlements in this region, of a very interesting character. It matters not how intense the cold, it never deserts our woods, but remains hunting for insects in the cavities and among the branches of the trees with the most a.s.siduous caution. They hatch their young in holes, which they perforate in decayed trees with their sharp bills. If a person happens to come near their nests during the time of incubation, it vociferates most strenuously against the intrusion, while its feathers expand, its eyes sparkle with rage, and it darts from branch to branch with the most astonis.h.i.+ng rapidity. It is frequently to be seen near our houses in the winter, and in the most severe and inclement weather they will tend, by their chirping and gambols, to amuse and enliven our minds, while at the same time they afford us an entertaining study.

"Their wants are very small. If a piece of meat, weighing two or three pounds, is hung against some tree or fence near to our houses in the winter, we can have the pleasure of witnessing them merrily banqueting on it every day for several weeks.

"Sandpipers of the smaller kinds can swim on the surface of the water, dive beneath and remain under it with the same facility as the duck and other aquatic birds, although they do not make use of this property unless driven to extremity. This fact I can pledge my veracity on from personal observation. They need not use this power of swimming for the purpose of procuring food, as the substances on which they subsist are found on the margin of the water."