New Orleans daily crescent. [volume] ([New Orleans, La.]) 1851-1866, 1857-02-02

Il Apart from the pr0fessed antiquarian and pro-
Found scholar there are very few persons acquainted
cords Of their manners and chronological peenliarities
IA great interest is supposed by the partially educa
xed to attach to any oil the races of the Old World
dhut the Indian iss to them rsorus homoa parrenu
history, creature with very little scientific value
md concerning whom nothing definite can be KNOWN
Our romance writers have, with rare exceptions
neglected the singular and mysterious child of our
forests that they might elevate themselves to the
xDr1reut, hacknied " combinations y Of European
Gety and even those who have depicted the Indian
Mase confined themselves to the man Of the scapng
knife and torturng stake quite negectful Of deeper
and more wonderful myths connected with him which
"a little study would render incredibly fascinating But
even Longellow, himself scholar, in his Hiawatha-
the hrst attempt to weave ancient Indian myths into
poetry shows no appreciation of their Hydrologic
character Of their apparent meaning or other start
Gng identity with ancient Oriental Arkite and Sabaan
ffegends-an identity which is carried out in manner
calculated to almost awe the scholar who finds in
western mounds and relics proofs clear az daylight
that in the far morning time OF the early world the
strange hierarchy, which had but one language and
ono great religion, held under its grasp not only all
tie Old World but the New Whether it was the an
pped the and the serpent the reproductive prin
rple OF all nature and the embems OF agriculture or
whether it was some inconceivably ancient race which
preceded them, we know not What we do know is,
that all which can tend to throw light upon the sin
gular subject is Of very great importance, and that
m Rury few men indeed have taken pains to collect
information relative to our Indians which throws
Light lyon it.
sFseni this accusation we must, however, exempt
Henry r. Schoolcraft, whose chronological Research
es Respecting the Red Man Of America is monu-
nsnf Of genius rejecting honor on the country, and
placing It's author amsng the very highest scholars of
the age and Of the world. IN il we ind accumu-
laks5 with research that dees appreciation, an IN
credible and quick, piercing genius which reads the
value of every feet at glance mass OF maternal
which viii in future ages reveal to the scholar facts
which We are as vet far from being able to develop.
Va know that tie work and the author have been
raised ere now but we have never heard the one or
Size other estimated as they deserve Tor certain we
ne that Germany has no better reason 70 noasb OF
MANNER Purgstall, Kaiser or Grimm France OF
NIchefet or Lajard or England Of any of her long
array Of antiquities from Leland to Palsgrave than
re have to boast Of Schoolcrat as shown in the great
work in question.
4 THAT man should be a thorough phiologst and
liacust, speaking fuently many Indian tongues, is
s.fedtable bnt not wonderful. That he should have
he unerrng glance for everything that could by any
paAbiIity be III use in future researches, and thus
SHOW himself gifted with the mysterious intuition Of
value which oaly genius displays, is wonderful and
yet not without parallel, for Faber and Wlnckleman
sem to have both possessed this singular seventh
sense; but that a man, singlehanded, without the
advantage Of previous researches Of any solid value,
should have collected aud reduced to scientific order
the vast array Of facts given in the chronological re-
searches in question is perhaps unparalleled and will
he recognized assdch at some future day.