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hawks, and the women were busied in making a garment for the Chief.

Among the whites was a young man of gigantic stature ; he was, perhaps, a head taller than any of the rest of the company. The old Indian could not but remark the lofty stature of the man; he seemed to eye him involuntarily; and, at length, rising from the ground, he went up to the giant stranger, and shook him by the hand. This raised a loud laugh from all the lookerson; but the Indians still maintained an inflexible ' gravity.

When I saw the squaws a second time, they were just come from their toilet. Woman throughout the world delights ever in finery; the great art is to suit the colours to the complexion.

The youngest girl would have attracted notice in any circle of Europe. She had fastened to her long dark hair a profusion of ribbons, which the bounty of the people of Occoquan had heaped upon her; and, the tresses of this Indian beauty, which before had been confined round her head, now rioted luxuriantly down her shoulders and back. The adjustment of her dress one would have thought she had learned from some English female of fashion; for she had left it so open before, that the most inattentive eye could not but discover the rise and fall of a bosom just beginning to fill.

The covering of this young woman's feet rivetted the eye of the stranger with its novelty and splendour. Nothing could be more delicate than her mocassins. They were each of them formed of a single piece of leather, having the seams ornamented with beads and porcupine quills; while a string of scarlet ribbon confined the mocassin round the instep, and made every other part of it sit close to the foot. The mocassin was of a bright yellow, and made from the skin of a deer, which had been killed by the arrow of one of the Indian youths. Let me be pardoned for having spoken of this lady's foot, with such minuteness of investigation. A naturalist will devote a whole chapter to the examination of a bird, count the feathers in its wings, and declaim with the highest rapture on its variegated plumage; and a Traveller may surely be forgiven a few remarks on the seducing foot of an Indian beauty. Utrum horum mavis accipe?

Of these Indians, the men had not been inattentive to their persons. The old Chief had clad himself in a robe of furs, and the young warriors had blacked their bodies with charcoal.

The Indians being assembled round the grave, the old Chief rose with a solemn mien, and, knocking his war-club against the ground, pronounced an oration to the memory of the departed warrior.

"Here rests the body of a Chief of our nation, "who, before his spirit took its flight to the

"country of souls, was the boldest in war, and "the fleetest in the chace. The arm that is now "mouldering beneath this pile, could once wield "the tomahawk with vigour, and often caused "the foe to sink beneath its weight. (A dread

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ful cry of Whoo! Whoo! Whoop! from the "bearers.) It has often grasped the head of the "expiring enemy, and often with the knife di"vested it of the scalp, (a yell of whoo! whoo! whoop!) It has often bound to the stake the prisoner of war, and piled the blazing faggots "round the victim, singing his last song of "death. (A yell of whoo! whoop!) The foot "that is now motionless, was once fleeter than "the hart that grazes on the mountain; and in "danger it was ever more ready to advance than "retreat. (A cry of whoo! whoo! whoop!) But "the hero is not gone unprovided to the coun

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try of spirits. His tomahawk was buried with "him to repulse the enemy in the field; and "his bow to pierce the deer that flies through "the woods."

No orator of antiquity ever exceeded this savage chief in the force of his emphasis, and the propriety of his gesture. Indeed, the whole scene was highly dignified. The fierceness of his countenance, the flowing robe, elevated tone, naked arm, and erect stature, with a circle of auditors seated on the ground, and in the open air, could not but impress upon the mind a lively

idea of the celebrated speakers of ancient Greece and Rome.

Having ended his oration, the Indian struck his war-club with fury against the ground, and the whole party obeyed the signal by joining in a war-dance;-leaping and brandishing their knives at the throats of each other, and accompanying their menacing attitudes with a whoop and a yell, which echoed with ten-fold horror from the banks of the river.

The dance took place by moon light, and it was scarcely finished, when the Chief produced a keg of whiskey, and having taken a draught, passed it round among his brethrem. The squaws now moved the tomahawks into the woods, and a scene of riot ensued. The keg was soon emptied. The effects of the liquor began to display itself in the looks and motions of the Indians. Some rolled their eyes with distraction; others could not keep on their legs. At length, succeeded the most dismal noises. Such hoops, such shouts, such roaring, such yells, all the devils of hell seemed collected together. Each strove to do an outrage on the other. This seized the other by the throat; that kicked with raging fury at his adversary. And to complete the scene, the old warrior was uttering the most mournful lamentations over the keg he had emptied; inhaling its flavour with his lips, holding it out with his hands in a supplicating attitude, and vociferating to the bye-standers Scuttawawbah!

Scuttawawbah! More strong drink! More strong

drink!.

A disquisition of Indian manners cannot but be interesting to a speculative mind. The discovery of America, independent of every other circumstance, is of vast importance to mankind, from the light it has enabled us to throw upon man in his savage state; and the opportunity it has afforded us to study him in his first degrees of civilization. It has even been advanced that before the discovery of the western continent, the natural history of the human species was very imperfect. The ancient philosophers had no other resource but to study the characters of the Scythians and Germans; but in the Indians of America, a much wider field is opened to investigation. The moral character of the Scythians and Germans was brutish insensibility; the moral character of the American Indians discovers little of that quality.

The Indians dwell in wigwams, which are formed of mats, or bark, tied about poles, that are fastened in the earth; and a hole is made at the top to let out the smoke. Their principal diet is Nokebick; parched meal diluted with water; but, where the woods invite hunting, they kill, and devour the deer, the bear, the moose and racoon. Their meat and fish they do not preserve by salting but drying.

Every man is his own physician; but in dangerous cases the patient requires the co-operation

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