The Elbert County tribune., 1908-08-06

II America can lay claim to any
royalty it must go back to the original
possessors and rulers of this country,
and find in the descendants of the red
man those who are entitled undisput-
ably to the distinction and honor.
Two princesses of royal blood of the
American brand are to be found in
New England, and only two. and the
fact that these two are not living in
regal state or are not accorded any OF
the honors and distinction consonant
with their high birth, brings them into
notice especially 50 as at the present
time these princesses have fallen upon
evil days and are likely to lose the
little land they now possess out of all
the vast country to which their regal
ancestor. the great Indian king. Mas
sasoit, laid claim. With all the glory
of the past only disturbing memory
and with poverty pressing them upon
every side, Teweeleema and Wootone-
kanuske are living on the shores Of
Lake Assawampsett in Massachusetts
where once their kingly forefathers
ruled supreme.
a heritage which in the time of the
Pilgrim Fathers comprised whole
states the aged are facing possible
dispossession. They are subjected to
numberless prosecutions of petty
sort; but then they have grown used
to that. For as their mother once
said during a recital of the wrongs
of her race: There seems to be no
law for the Indian"
They have left us little." says Prin-
cess Teweeleema. They have made
us fight steadily for what we have
kept, and now they want the little
that we have"
An effort is being made to secure
for these last of the royal blood Of
the Wampanoags material recogni-
tion of their rights and of the services
which their ancestor, the mighty
sachem, Massasoit, performed for the
pioneers of New England. For with
out Massasoit's friendship and protec-
ton the struggling colonists would
have been swept from the land.
The royal Wampanoags lived con-
tinuously on the tract about Lake As
sawampsett from the time Tuspaquin,
the Black Sachem, son-in-law of Mas
sasoit, set aside about 500 acres for
his heirs. until 40 years ago, when
Mrs. Zerviah Gould Mitchell, the
mother of the princesses, moved to
Arlington that her children might be
educated in the white mans way. AS
the place was left without a caretaker,
1t was gradually encroached upon;
and the neighboring whites finally
went so far as to sell portions Of the
tract.
The eldest princess is suffering from
consumption. She is practically help
less, and upon Princess Wootone-
| kanuske falls the care of the house
hold and of the invalid. She bears
1t patiently, even uncomplainingly
with the fortitude that is the legacy
of her blood
She accepts the 'hardships that have
| followed their later life as a matter
| of course; she regards them as part
| of the blight that has pursued her race
and has doomed it and fears them all
as part of the great tragedy. Not sc
the elder sister. There is in her a
flash of the old naughty spirit of hel
ancestors, some of the unconquerable
pride OF race which made Massasoii
the autocrat of warning tribes ant
spurred King Philip to hopeless
struggle that swept the length ant
breadth of New England with deatf
and flames When Princess Tewee
leema speaks of her wrongs and the
injustices of the white intruders, hel