Worcester daily spy. [volume] (Worcester [Mass.]) 1850-1888, 1859-07-22
0Qortester Daily Spp.
GREELEYs OVERLAND JOURNEY.
so! THE POOR INDIAN!u

and all this side belongs to and is parceled
among the Cheyennes, the Araphoes and the
Apaches-or perhaps among the two former
only, as Indian boundaries are not very well
defined AT all events, we have met or pass
ed bands of these three tribes, with occasional
visitors from the Sioux on the north and the
Camanches on the south-all these tribes hav
ing for the present good understanding. The
Utes, who inhabit the mountains, and are
stronger and Drawer than any one Of the three
tribes first named, though hardly match for
them all, are at war with them; the Arapho
Chief Left-Hand assures me that his peo-
pie were at,0dyS at war with the Utes-at least
he has no recollection, no tradition, of a time
when they were at peace. Some two or three
hundred lodges Of Arapahoes are encamped in
and about this log city, calculating that the
presence Of the whites will afford some protec-
tioE to their wives and children against a Ute
onslaught while the "braves" are off on any
Of their tghtng-that is, stealing-expedi-
tons. An equal or larger body Of Utes are
camped in the mountains, some forty or fifty
miles west, and the Arapaho warriors recently
returned IN triumph from war party on which
they managed to steal about a hundred horses
from the Utes, but were obliged to kill most of
them in their rapid flight, so that they only
brought home forty more than they took away.
They are going out again in day or two,
and have been for some days practicng secret
lncantationS and public observances with
reference thereto. Last midnight, they were
to have had grand war-dance, and to have
left on the war-path to-day but their men sent
out after their horses reported that they saw
three Utes on the plain, which was regarded
as premonltory OF an attack and the "braves"
stood to their arms all night, and were very
anxious for white aid in case of a Ute foray
on their lodges here in Denver. Such an at.
tack seems very improbable, and / presume
the three Utes who caused all this uproar were
simply scouts or spies, on the watch for Just
such marauding surprise parties as our Arapa-
no neighbors are constantly meditating. | do
not see why they need take even this trou-
bic. There are points on the mountain
range west of this city where a watch
man with sharp eye and good glass
would command the entire plain for fifty
miles north, south, and east of him, and might
hence give intelligence of any Arapahoin road
at least a day before brave entered the noun
talns. For, though it is true that Indians on
the war-path travel or ride mainly by night, |
find that the Arapahoes do this only after they
have entered on what they consider disputed
or dangerous ground-that they start from
their lodges In open day, and only advance I'M
der cover OF darkness after they are within the
shadows OF the mountains. Hence, the Utes,
VIM eAO SohASooSNliJ lilG SJTOUgcTs might ann
bush and destroy any Arapaho force that
should venture into their Rocky Mountain re-
cesses, by the help of good spy-glass and
little white forecast.
But the Indians are children. Their arts
wars, treaties, alliances, habitations crafts
properties, commerce, comforts, all belong to
the very lowest and rudest ages of human ex-
istence. Some few Of the chiefs have a mar
row and shortsighted shrewdness, and, very
rarely in their history, really great man, like
Pontiac or Tecumseh, has arisen among them;
but this does not shake the general truth that
they are utterly incompetent to cope III any way
with the European or Caucasian race. Any
band Of schoolboys from ten to fifteen years of
age are quite as capable of ruling their appe-
tites, devising and unfolding public policy,
constituting state or community, as an aver
age Indian tribe. And, unless they shall be
treated as truly Christian community, would
treat band of orphan children prOVidentially
thrown on its hands, the Ab0rignes of this
country will be practically extinct within the
next fifty years.
l have learned to appreciate better than
hitherto, and to make more allowance for, the
dislike, aversion, contempt wherewlth Indians
are usually regarded by their white neighbors,
and have been since the days OF the Purltans.
1t needs but little familiarity with the actual,
DalDdDlc ADOIlSiilGS 10 COHNllCG any OhS Iidb
the poetic Indian-the Indian of Cooper and
Longfellow-s only visible to the poets eye.
To the prosaic observer, the average Indian
of the woods and prairies is being who does
little credit to human nature--a slave OF appe-
tite and sloth, never emancipated from the ty-
ranny of one animal passion save by the more
ravenous demands of another. As l passed
over those magnificent bottoms of the Kansas
which form the Reservations of the Della
wares, Potawatamies, &C., constituting the
very best corn-lands on earth and saw their
owners sitting around the doors of their lodges
at the hight of the planting season, and In as
good, bright planting weather as sun and soil
ever made, | could not help saying =
"These people must die out-there is no
help for them. God has given this earth
to those who will subdue and cultivate
it, and it is in vain to struggle against
His righteous decree" And | yesterday tried
my powers of persuasion on Left Hand-the
only Arapho chief who talks English-in ia
vor of an Arapho Tribal farm-say of two
hundred acres for beginnng-to be broken
and fenced by the common efforts of the tribe,
and patch therein allotted to each head OF u
family who would agree to plant and till i'll
apprehend to very little purpose. For Left
Hand, though shrewd in his way, is an Indi-
an, and every whit as conservative as Bos-
knows that there is a certain way in which
his people have lived from time immemorial,
and in which they are content still to live,
knowing and seeking no better. lie may or
may not have heard that it is the common lot
of prophets to be stoned, and reformers to be
crucified but he probably comprehends that
squaws cannot fence and plow, and that
"braves" are disciplined to any such steady,
monotonous exercise of their muscles be-
lieve there is no essential difference in this re-
spect between GRAVES" of the red and those
of the white race, since even. our country's
bold defenders have not been accustomed to
manifest their intrepidity II the corn fields
along their line of march, save in the season
of roosting-ears and the verb "to soldiers" has
acquired, throughout Christendom and in all
its moods and lenses, a significance beyond
the need of glossary. Briefly, the "brave,"
whether civilized or savage, is not worker,
producer, and where the men are all "braves,"
with war always on hand, the prospect Tor
productive industry is gloomy, indeed II,
then, the hope of Indian renovation rested
mainly on the men, it would be slender, IN
deed, There is little probability that the
present generation of "braves" can be weaned
from the traditions and the habits in which
they hnd certain personal consequence and
immunity from daily toll which stands them
instead OF intelligence and comfort. Squalid
and conceited, proud and worthless, lazy and
louzy, they VIII strut out or drink out their
miserable existence, and at length afford the
world sensible relief by dying out of it.
But it is otherwise with the women. De-
graded and filthy as they are, beyond descrip-
ton or belief, they bear the germ of renoya-
ton for their race in that they are neither too
proud nor too indolent to labor. The squaw
accepts work as her destiny from childhood
In her fathers lodge, as in that wherein she
on,,,os Il, t,r IN hold fifth or sixth interest in