Character of the Indians of North America. 169 eftimate of their genius and mental powers, more facts are wanting, and great allowance to be made for thofe circumftances of their fituation, which call for a display of particular talents only. This done, we fhall probably find that they are formed in mind as well as in body, on the fame module with Homo fapiens Europeus.' The principles of their fociety forbidding all compulfion, they are to be led to duty and to enterprize by perfonal influence and perfuafion. Hence eloquence in council, bravery and addrefs in war, become the foundations of all confequence with them. To thefe acquirements all their faculties are directed. Of their bravery and addrefs in war we have multiplied proofs, because we have been the fubjects on which they were exercised. Of their eminence in oratory, we have fewer examples, because it is displayed chiefly in their own councils. Some, however, we have of very fuperior luftre. I may challenge the whole orations of Demofthenes and Cicero, and of any more eminent orator, if Europe has furnished more eminent, to produce a fingle pasfage fuperior to the fpeech of Logan, a Mingo chief, to Lord Dunmore, when governor of Virginia, And, as a teflimony of their talents in this line, I beg leave to introduce it, firft ftating the incidents neceffary for understanding it. In the Spring of the year 1774, a robbery and murder were committed on an inhabitant of the frontiers of that ftate, by two Indians of the Shawanee tribe. The neighbouring whites, according to their custom, undertook to punish this outrage in a fummary way. Col. Crefap, a man infamous for the many murders he had committed on those muchinjured people, collected a party, and proceeded down the Kanhaway in queit of vengeance. ary and unexposed to accident, produce and raife as many children as the white women. Inftances are known, under thefe circumftances, of their rearing a dozen children. An inhuman practice once prevailed in this country of making flaves of the Indians. It is a fact well known with us, that the Indian women fo enflaved produced and raifed as numerous families as either the whites or blacks among whom they lived. It has been faid, that Indians have lefs hair than the whites, except on the head. But this is a fact of which fair proof can scarcely be had. With them it is difgraceful to be hairy on the body. They fay, it likens them to hogs. They therefore pluck the hair as faft as it appears. But the traders who marry their women, and prevail on them to difcontinue this practice, fay, that nature is the fame with them as with the whites. Nor, if the fact be true, is the confequence neceffary which has been drawn from it. Negroes have notorioufly less hair than the whites; yet they are more ardent. But if cold and moisture be the agents of nature for diminishing the races of animals, how comes fhe all at once to fufpend their operation as to the phyfical man of the new world, whom the Count acknowledges to be à peu près de mème ftature que l'homme de notre monde,' and to let loofe their influence on his moral faculties? How has this ' combination of the elements, and other phyfical caufes, fo contrary to the enlargement of animal nature in this new world, these obftacles to the developement and formation of great germs,' been arrefted and fufpended, fo as to permit the human body to acquire its juft dimenfions and by what inconceivable procefs has their action been directed on his mind alone? To judge of the truth of this, to form a juft U 2 Un fortunately fortunately a canoe of women and children, with one man only, was feen coming from the oppofite fhore, unarmed, and unfufpecting a hoftile attack from the whites. Crefap and his party concealed themselves on the bank of the river, and the moment the canoe reached the fhore, fingled out their objects, and, at one fire, killed every perfon in it. This happened to be the family of Logan, who had long been diftinguished as a friend of the whites, This unworthy return provoked his vengeance. He accordingly fignalized himself in the war which enfued. In the autumn of the fame year, a decifive battle was fought at the mouth of the Great Kanhaway, between the collected forces of the Shawanees, Mingoes, and Delawares, and a detachment of the Virginia militia. The Indians were defeated, and fued for peace. Logan, however, difdained to be feen among the fuppliants. But, left the fincerity of a treaty fhould be diftrufted, from which fo diftinguished a chief absented himself, he fent by a meffenger the following fpeech, to be delivered to Lord Dunmore: I appeal to any white man to fay, if ever he entered Logan's cabbin hungry, and he gave him not meat; if ever he came cold and naked, and he cloathed him not. During the courfe of the laft long and bloody war, Logan remained idle in his cabbin, an advocate for peace. Such was my love for the whites, that my countrymen pointed as they paffed, and faid, Logan is the friend of white men.' I had even thought to have lived with you, but for the injuries of one man. Col. Crefap, the laft fpring, in cold blood, and unprovoked, murdered all the relations of Logan, not iparing even my women and children. There runs not a drop of my blood in the veins of any living creature. This called on me for revenge.. I have fought it: I have killed many : I have fully glutted my vengeance. For my country, I rejoice at the beams of peace. But do not harbour a thought that mine is the joy of fear. Logan never felt fear. He will not turn on his heel to fave his life. Who is there to mourn for Logan?-Not one.' Before we condemn the Indians of this continent as wanting genius, we must confider that letters have not yet been introduced among them. Were we to compare them in their present state with the Eu; ropeans North of the Alps, when the Roman arms and arts first croffed thofe mountains, the comparison would be unequal; because, at that time, thofe parts of Europe were fwarming with numbers; because numbers produce emulation, and multiply the chances of improvement, and one improvement begets another. Yet I may fafely afk, How many good poets, how many able mathematicians, how many great inventors in arts or fciences, had Europe North of the Alps then produced? And it was fixteen centuries after this before a Newton could be formed. I do not mean to deny, that there are varieties in the race of man, diftinguished by their powers both of body and mind: I believe there are, as I fee to be the cafe in the races of other animals. I only mean to fuggeft a doubt, whether the bulk and faculties of animals depend on the fide of the Atlantic on which their food happens to grow, or which furnishes the elements of which they are compounded? Whether Nature has enlifted herself as a Cis or TransAtlantic partifan? I am induced to fufpect, there has been more eloquence than found reafoning dif played in fupport of this theory; that it is one of thofe cafes where the judgment has been feduced by 4 a glow Anecdote. a glowing pen and whilst I render every tribute of honour and efteem to the celebrated Zoologift, who has added, and is ftill adding, fo many precious things to the treafures of fcience, I muft doubt whether in this inftance he has not cherished error alfo, by lending her for a moment his vivid imagination and bewitching language. So far the Count de Buffon has carried this new theory of the tendency of Nature to belittle her productions on this fide the Atlantic. Its application to the races of whites, tranfplanted from Europe, remain ed for the Abbé Raynal. On doit etre etonné (he fays) que l'Amerique n'ait pas encore produit un bon poëte, un habile mathematicien, un homme de genie dans un feul art, ou une feule fcience.' 7. Hift. Philof. p. 92. ed. Maeftricht. 1774. America has not yet produced one good poet. When we fhall have existed as a people as long as the Greeks did before they produced a Homer, the Romans a Virgil, the French a Racine and Voltaire, the English a Shakespeare and Milton; fhould this reproach be ftill true, we will inquire from what unfriendly causes it has proceeded, that the other countries of Europe 371 and quarters of the earth, fhall not have infcribed any name in the roll of poets? But neither has America produced one able mathematician, nor one man of genius in a single art or a fingle fcience.' In war, we have produced a Washington, whofe memory will be adored while liberty fhall have votaries; whose name will triumph over time, and will in future ages affume its juft ftation among the most celebrated worthies of the world, when that wretched philofophy fhall be forgotten which would have arranged him among the degeneracies of nature. In phyfics, we have produ ced a Franklin, than whom no one of the prefent age has made more important difcoveries, nor has enriched philofophy with more, or more ingenious folutions of the phenomena of nature. We have fuppofed Mr Rittenhouse second to no aftronomer living that in genius he must be the firft, because he is felf-taught, As an artift, he has exhibited as great a proof of me chanical genius as the world has ever produced. He has not, indeed, made a world; but he has, by imitation, approached nearer its Maker than any man who has lived from the creation to this day t TH Anecdote.-From Riefbeck's Travels through Germany. HE caftle of Werfen, near Saltzburg, ftands by the fpot of this name, where the valley begins to widen remarkably, upon a detached rock of a conical form, which rifes in the middle of the gully. On one Has the world as yet produced more than two poets, acknowledged to be fuch by all nations? An Englishman, only, reads Milton with delight; an Italian, Taffo; a Frenchman, the Henriade; a Portuguese, Camouens; but Homer and Virgil have been the rapture of every age and nation: they are read with enthufiafm in their originals by those who can read the originals, and in tranflations by those who cannot. †There are various ways of keeping truth out of fight. Mr Rittenhouse's model of the planetary fyftem has the plagiary appellation of an Orrery; and the qua drant invented by Godfrey, an American alfo, and with the aid of which the European nations traverse the globe, is called Hadley's quadrant. one fide of it there is fcarcely room fhun any force on their confciences, for the road, and on the other and be unrestrained and free in fcarcely room for the river. The their faith, had fomething great front of the castle commands a prof- and affecting in it to me. This pect over the wide part of the made the remonftrances of my valley, which runs between hills, friends and acquaintances, who part of which are well cultivated, did not agree in opinion with and part covered with rich woods; 'the capuchins, find an eafy access and from the back you fee the nar- to my mind. I opened the Scriprow deep glen, through which the tures, compared the dorine I met traveller has come, the rocky points with there with the Pope's, and of which are fhining in the fun, formed my own religion, the while in the depth below perpetual principles of which I did not darkness fits encamped. In the keep very fecret, because I belie caftle many prifoners are confined, ved them true. As at that time who are sometimes obliged to work the capuchins, who wandered ain chains. I was ftruck peculiarly 'bout the whole country as mifwith the form and countenance of fionaries, had fpies every where; a man, of whom I had already they could not fail but hear at last heard much reported. He has the of fome affertions which escaped figure of a handsome elderly man, me in the heat of religious difpuof fomething more than fixty years, tation. They inftantly purfued who still preferves a fine ruddy and perfecuted me wherever I complexion. His ftrong, long beard, was. At laft they came into my and beautiful black hair, are here house, and infisted on a confeffion and there mixed with grey, very ' of my faith. I anfwered accordthinly fcattered. His carriage ising to my conviction, and laid my as light, and he holds himself as - ftraight as a youth in his full ftrength. His forehead, and the whole formation of his countenance 'doubts before them; however, this did not fignify. They conftantly went from the point; it was of no avail to interrogate them on is regular, and his large blue fpeak-matters of faith; faith must be ing eyes, must fix the attention of any one the leaft acquainted with implicit, and I must deliver a confeffion of faith. I told them it mankind upon him. An inexpref-was utterly impoffible to believe I fible ferenity of foul, and the pride infeparable from a great character, are pictured in his countenance. defired to hear him tell his history, and now give it you from his own words, as nearly as I can': what was contrary to the convic'tion of my mind; but all did not ' serve. When I faw that they could 'not convince me, and that they paid no regard to my internal conhe,viction, I told them to leave me I have been now,' faid twenty-four years a prifoner here. I still remember the emigration of the many thoufands of my countrymen, in which, though I was then but young, I took great concern. As I grew up, the memory of this event made the ftrongeft 'impreffion on me. The joy with 'which fo many of my neighbours quitted their native country, to Riefbeck's Travels through Germany. 173 impoffible. One day, as I return-to go to the church, but they told me I could not be permitted, unlefs it was for the purpose of changing my faith, and confeffing my errors. The inceffant importunity of the capuchins for a confeffion of faith from me was the most insufferable of all. All my folicitations to be indulged, and all my remonftrances of the futility of a verbal confeffion, unlefs the heart joined in it, were of no fervice. At laft I refolved to behave like a mute, and hold no more difcourfe with them; which refolution, for eighteen whole years, I have literally perfifted in: a few years ago they began to treat me more kindly, and fince that time I have refumedmyfpeech." 'ed fatigued from the field, and The conftable confirmed to us, that this extraordinary man had not uttered a fyllable for eighteen whole years; and that during that time no one had ever feen a cloud upon his brow, or a feature of illhumour in his countenance. Whatever was enjoined him to do, which did not concern religion, he complied with calmly and chearfully. A flight cast of disdain of the people about him is all that has been remarked. When one confiders that his clearness of head, his open nature, and good humour, muft very naturally and very strongly difpofe him to fociety and the communication of his fentiments, his voluntary dumbnefs must appear aftonishing. By his good behaviour during his captivity, he has induced the prince, who is a great lover of toleration, to let his chains be taken off, and at the request of the conftable a confiderable addition has been made to his daily allowance. He has gained fo much confidence, that they have made him a kind of fuperintendant over his fellow-prifoners. He has often been fent, entirely loofe and free, to work with them at places from whence it would have been easy, |