The Donaldsonville chief. [volume] (Donaldsonville, La.) 1871-current, 1873-05-10

coolest, most experienced officers OF
the army. With him have been asso-
ciated clergyman and civilians of
the highest repute for candor, intel
ligence, position, and worth of char
acter, who went upon the perilous
undertaking as the Peace Commits
sioners Of the Government.
They took with them, it is true,
men and weapons of war. But they
were seeking to negotiate with the
Modocs upon the principles Of peace.
The morning Of the 18th Of April
dawned. The day rolled on. There
came down from the rocks a white
flag. 1t lured away the General and
the commissioners from their place of
safety. 1t was indeed a Haunting lie.
1t covered the deepest atrocity Of hu-
man perti.ly. The meeting place was
fixed upon. Riddle, the interpreter,
it is said, warned them of treachery.
y" If they will co." he exclaimed, 81
wash my hands of their innocent
blood!"
Calmly and consciously they met
the willy chief and his associates. The
parley was brief. When the remorse-
less savage, running behind the Gen
eral, cried all ready" snapped his
pistol, cooked again and fired, Candy
fell, shot through the head Thomas,
the minister of peace, who had lived
only to proclaim salvation to his fellow
men, fell dead beside him. Meacham
fell fearfully wounded. Dyer escaped
as by miracle, and Riddle, with his
squaw-interpreter finally came back
to camp. A cry from the signal sta
ton, which had overlooked it all,
aroused the officers and men, who
rushed to the scene Of slaughter, which
was a mile away. But Captain Jack
and his tiendish comrades had already
stripped the General and the others,
and escaped among the rocks.
With hearts too full for utterance
and with streaming eyes, they lifted
the yet warm bodies, bloody and
soiled, and bore them away i'll anguish.
Then the tidings flew on the wings of
the wind. The lightnings have told
the story in the most distant hamlet
OF the country.
Intidelity has often snecred at the
records of the Old Testament. The
exploits of the Hebrews in wasting
and exterminating the doomed idola-
tors have been II standing theme of
mockery for ages yet we have to-day
in the midst Of the light of civilization,
and of all the advancing science OF the
nineteenth century, Il commentary OH
those records of antiquity, which the
touch Of one chord of outraged hu-
mauity proclaims as with Il universal
voice to be true and imperative. This
Modoc band of assassins must be ex-
terminated not to bring back the
noble and illustrious dead j; not to
sootlle the sorrows of private grief SD
poignant in the hearts OF loving kind
red; not to appease the offended
wrath Of a great nation, not even to
grind and crush a handful Of wretclled
savages infuriated and filled with the
spirit Of demons, who gloat over the
agonies they have caused; no, not for
any nor ill these provocations, but
only for the sake of outraged justice,
for the sake of IL public lesson OF warn
ing to teach those who are dealing on
both sides of this Indian question,
that good faith must be kept: that
treachcry is one of the foulest crimes
of humanity; that there is an out
lawry which must entail sure and
swift destruction and that when men,
savage or civilized, have been turned
into demons by whatever cause, they
can he suffered no longer to pollute
the earth by their presence.
1t may seem strange that such re-
suit should be wrought out by the
very course of good faith and amity !;
and yet there is no other conclusion.
And while we fully endorse the noble
sentiments of report made to the
President i'll 1868, and signed by
Messrs. Taylor, Henderson and Tap
pan, Generals Sherman, Harvey, San
born, Terry and Augur, we yet feel
that Il power lies back and over all
those noble thoughts Of charity, which
comes in unexpected ways to demand
stern justice. Still let us remember
this accurate description:
$50 little accustomed to kindness from
others, it may not be strange that he often
hesitates to confide Proud himself, yet con-
scious of the contempt Of the white man,
when suddenly rolsed by some new wrong,
the remembrance of old ones still stinging in
his soul, he seems to become, as expressed
by himself, blind with rage. Ii he fails to
see the olive branch or flag OF truce in the
hands Of the Peace Commissioners, and in
savage ferocity adds one more to his victims,
we should remember that for two and half
centuries he has been driven back from civ
ilization when his passions might have been
subjected to the influences of education and
softened by the lessons of Christian charity !"
All this is true; but when at last
maddened aud insensible to those last
Offices of friendship, he places himself
beyond the pale of forbearance, there
is but one fate and that is destruction.
The peace policy, therefore, which
the Administration is pursuing re-
quircs the determination Of the Mo-.
docs they have shown themselves ir-
reclaimable; they are no longer fit to
live!
But there is beside all this question
of economy of life and treasure which