CHAPTER XXXVIII.

FRIENDSHIP.

Those who believe that no faith is to be placed in the friendship of an Indian are egregiously mistaken, and know very little of the true character of those men of nature. They are, it is true, revengeful to their enemies, to those who wilfully do them an injury, who insult, abuse, or treat them with contempt. It may be said, indeed, that the passion of revenge is so strong in them that it knows no bounds. This does not, however, proceed from a bad or malicious disposition, but from the violence of natural feelings unchecked by social institutions, and unsubdued by the force of revealed religion. The tender and generous passions operate no less powerfully on them than those of an opposite character, and they are as warm and sincere in their friendship, as vindictive in their enmities. Nay, I will venture to assert that there are those among them who on an emergency would lay down their lives for a friend: I could fill many pages with examples of Indian friendship and fidelity, not only to each other, but to men of other nations and of a different colour than themselves. How often, when wars were impending between them and the whites, have they not forewarned those among our frontier settlers whom they thought well disposed towards them, that dangerous times were at hand, and advised them to provide for their own safety, regardless of the jealousy which such conduct might excite among their own people? How often did they not even guard and escort them through the most dangerous places until they had reached a secure spot? How often did they not find means to keep an enemy from striking a stroke, as they call it, that is to say from proceeding to the sudden indiscriminate murder of the frontier whites, until their friends or those whom they considered as such were out of all danger?

These facts are all familiar to every one who has lived among Indians or in their neighbourhood, and I believe it will be difficult to find a single case in which they betrayed a real friend or abandoned him in the hour of danger, when it was in their power to extricate or relieve him. The word “Friend” to the ear of an Indian does not convey the same vague and almost indefinite meaning that it does with us; it is not a mere complimentary or social expression, but implies a resolute determination to stand by the person so distinguished on all occasions, and a threat to those who might attempt to molest him; the mere looking at two persons who are known or declared friends, is sufficient to deter any one from offering insult to either. When an Indian believes that he has reason to suspect a man of evil designs against his friend, he has only to say emphatically: “This is _my friend_, and if any one tries to hurt him, I will do to him _what is in my mind_.” It is as much as to say that he will stand in his defence at the hazard of his own life. This language is well understood by the Indians, who know that they would have to combat with a spirited warrior, were they to attempt any thing against his friend. By this means much bloodshed is prevented; for it is sufficiently known that an Indian never proffers his friendship in vain. Many white men, and myself among others, have experienced the benefit of their powerful as well as generous protection.

When in the spring of the year 1774, a war broke out between the Virginians and the Shawanese and Mingoes, on account of murders committed by the former on the latter people, and the exasperated friends of those who had suffered had determined to kill every white man in their country, the Shawano chief _Silverheels_,[216] taking another Indian with him, undertook out of friendship to escort several white traders from thence to Albany,[217] a distance of near two hundred miles; well knowing at the time that he was running the risk of his own life, from exasperated Indians and vagabond whites, if he should meet with such on the road, as he did in fact on his return. I have already said how he was rewarded for this noble act of friendship and self-devotion.

In the year 1779, the noted Girty with his murdering party of Mingoes, nine in number, fell in with the Missionary Zeisberger, on the path leading from Goschacking to Gnadenhütten; their design was to take that worthy man prisoner; and if they could not seize him alive, to murder him and take his scalp to Detroit. They were on the point of laying hold of him, when two young spirited Delawares providentially entered the path at that critical moment and in an instant presented themselves to defend the good Missionary at the risk of their lives. Their determined conduct had the desired success, and his life was saved. His deliverers afterwards declared that they had no other motive for thus exposing themselves for his sake than that he was a friend to their nation, and was considered by them as a good man.

But why should I speak of others when I have myself so often experienced the benefits of Indian protection and friendship. Let me be permitted to corroborate my assertions on this subject by my own personal testimony.

In the year 1777, while the Revolutionary war was raging, and several Indian tribes had enlisted on the British side, and were spreading murder and devastation along our unprotected frontier, I rather rashly determined to take a journey into the country on a visit to my friends. Captain White Eyes, the Indian hero, whose character I have already described,[218] resided at that time at the distance of seventeen miles from the place where I lived. Hearing of my determination, he immediately hurried up to me, with his friend Captain Wingenund (whom I shall presently have occasion further to mention), and some of his young men, for the purpose of escorting me to Pittsburg, saying, “that he would not suffer me to go, while the Sandusky warriors were out on war excursions, without a proper escort and _himself_ at my side.” He insisted on accompanying me and we set out together. One day, as we were proceeding along, our spies discovered a suspicious track. White Eyes, who was riding before me, enquired whether I felt afraid? I answered that while he was with me, I entertained no fear. On this he immediately replied, “You are right; for until I am laid prostrate at your feet, no one shall hurt you.” “And even not then,” added Wingenund, who was riding behind me; “before this happens, I must be also overcome, and lay by the side of our friend _Koguethagechton_.”[219] I believed them, and I believe at this day that these great men were sincere, and that if they had been put to the test, they would have shewn it, as did another Indian friend by whom my life was saved in the spring of the year 1781. From behind a log in the bushes where he was concealed, he espied a hostile Indian at the very moment he was levelling his piece at me. Quick as lightning he jumped between us, and exposed his person to the musket shot just about to be fired, when fortunately the aggressor desisted, from fear of hitting the Indian whose body thus effectually protected me, at the imminent risk of his own life. Captain White Eyes, in the year 1774, saved in the same manner the life of David Duncan, the peace-messenger, whom he was escorting. He rushed, regardless of his own life, up to an inimical Shawanese, who was aiming at our ambassador from behind a bush, and forced him to desist.

I could enumerate many other similar acts, but I think I have shewn enough for my purpose. Mr. Zeisberger fully agreed with me in the opinion, that it is impossible to deny to the Indians the praise of firm attachment and sincere friendship. It is not meant to say, that all will carry that feeling to the same pitch of heroism; but it is certain that there are many among them, whose strong attachments and a manly pride will induce to risk their lives in the defence of their friends. And, indeed, there is no Indian, who would not blush at being reproached that after boasting that a particular person was his friend, he had acted the coward when his friendship was put to the test, and had shrunk from venturing his own life, when there was even a chance of saving that of the man whom he professed to love.

It is not true, as some have supposed, that an Indian’s friendship must be purchased by presents, and that it lasts only so long as gifts continue to be lavished upon them. Their attachments, on the contrary, are perfectly disinterested. I admit that they receive with pleasure a present from a friend’s hand. They consider presents as marks of the giver’s good disposition towards them. They cannot, in their opinion, proceed from an enemy, and he who befriends them, they think must love them. Obligations to them are not burdensome, they love to acknowledge them, and whatever may be their faults, ingratitude is not among the number.

Indeed, the friendship of an Indian is easily acquired, provided it is sought in good faith. But whoever chooses to obtain it must be sure to treat them on a footing of perfect equality. They are very jealous of the whites, who they think affect to consider themselves as beings of a superior nature and too often treat them with rude undeserved contempt. This they seldom forgive, while on the other hand, they feel flattered when a white man does not disdain to treat them as children of the same Creator. Both reason and humanity concur in teaching us this conduct, but I am sorry to say that reason and humanity are in such cases too little attended to. I hope I may be permitted to expatiate a little on this subject; perhaps it may be beneficial to some white persons hereafter.

The Indians are, as I have already observed before,[220] excellent physiognomists. If they are accosted by or engaged in business with a number of whites, though they may not understand the language that is spoken, they will pretty accurately distinguish by the countenance, those who despise their colour from those who are under the influence of a more generous feeling, and in this they are seldom mistaken. They fix their eyes on the whole party round, and read as it were in the souls of the individuals who compose it. They mark those whom they consider as their friends, and those whom they think to be their enemies, and are sure to remember them ever after. But what must those expect, if a war or some other circumstance should put them into the power of the Indians, who, relying on their supposed ignorance of our idiom, do not scruple even in their presence to apply to them the epithets of _dogs_, _black d--ls_, and the like? Will not these poor people be in some degree justifiable in considering those persons as decidedly hostile to their race? Such cases have unfortunately too frequently happened, and the savages have been blamed for treating as enemies those who had so cruelly wounded their most delicate feelings! Many white men have been thus put to death, who had brought their fate on themselves by their own imprudence. On the other hand, the Indians have not failed to mark those who at the time reprobated such indecent behaviour and reproached their companions for using such improper language. In the midst of war these benevolent Christians have been treated as friends, when, perhaps, they had forgotten the humane conduct to which they were indebted for this kind usage.

Their reasoning in such cases is simple, but to them always conclusive. They merely apply their constant maxim, which I believe I have already noticed, that “good can never proceed from evil or evil from good, and that good and evil, like heterogeneous substances, can never combine or coalesce together.” How far this maxim is founded in a profound knowledge of human nature, it is not my business to determine; what is certain is that they adhere to it in almost every occasion. If a person treats them ill, they ascribe it invariably to his bad heart; it is the bad spirit within him that operates; he is, therefore, a bad man. If on the contrary one shews them kindness, they say he is prompted so to act by “the good spirit within him,” and that he has a _good heart_; for if he had not, he would not do good. It is impossible to draw them out of this circle of reasoning, and to persuade them that the friendship shewn to them may be dissembled and proceed from motives of interest; so convinced are they of the truth of their general principle, “that good cannot proceed from an evil source.”

The conduct of the Europeans towards them, particularly within the last fifty or sixty years, has, however, sufficiently convinced them that men may dissemble, and that kind speeches and even acts of apparent friendship do not always proceed from friendly motives, but that the bad spirit will sometimes lurk under the appearance of the good. Hence, when they speak of the whites in general, they do not scruple to designate them as a false, deceitful race; but it is nevertheless true that with individuals, they frequently forget this general impression, and revert to their own honest principle; and if a white man only behaves to them with common humanity, it is still easy to get access to their simple hearts. Such are those brutes, those savages, from whom, according to some men, no faith is to be expected, and with whom no faith is to be kept; such are those _barbarous_ nations, as they are called, whom God, nevertheless, made the lawful owners and masters of this beautiful country; but who, at no very remote time, will probably live, partially live, only in its history.

My object in this chapter is to prove that those men are susceptible of the noblest and finest feelings of genuine friendship. It is not enough that by a long residence among them, I have acquired the most complete conviction of this truth; facts and not opinions, I know, are expected from me. Perhaps I might rest satisfied with the proofs that I have already given, but I have only shewn the strength and have yet to display the _constancy_ of their attachments; and although in the story which I am going to relate, a friend was forced to see his friend perish miserably without having it in his power to save him from the most terrible death that vengeance and cruelty could inflict, we shall not be the less astonished to see him persevere in his friendly sentiments, under circumstances of all others the most calculated, (particularly to an Indian) not only to have entirely extinguished, but converted those sentiments into feelings of hatred and revenge.

I am sorry to be so often obliged to revert to the circumstance of the cruel murder of the Christian Indians on the Sandusky[221] river[222] in the year 1782, by a gang of banditti, under the command of one Williamson. Not satisfied with this horrid outrage, the same band not long afterwards marched to Sandusky,[223] where it seems they had been informed that the remainder of that unfortunate congregation had fled, in order to perpetrate upon them the same indiscriminate murder. But Providence had so ordered it that they had before left that place, where they had found that they could not remain in safety, their ministers having been taken from them and carried to Detroit by order of the British government, so that they had been left entirely unprotected. The murderers, on their arrival, were much disappointed in finding nothing but empty huts. They then shaped their course towards the hostile Indian villages, where being, contrary to their expectations, furiously attacked, Williamson and his band took the advantage of a dark night and ran off, and the whole party escaped, except one Colonel Crawford and another, who being taken by the Indians were carried in triumph to their village, where the former was condemned to death by torture, and the punishment was inflicted with all the cruelty that rage could invent. The latter was demanded by the Shawanese and sent to them for punishment.

While preparations were making for the execution of this dreadful sentence, the unfortunate Crawford recollected that the Delaware chief Wingenund,[224] of whom I have spoken in the beginning of this chapter, had been his friend in happier times; he had several times entertained him at his house, and shewed him those marks of attention which are so grateful to the poor despised Indians. A ray of hope darted through his soul, and he requested that Wingenund, who lived at some distance from the village, might be sent for. His request was granted, and a messenger was despatched for the chief, who, reluctantly, indeed, but without hesitation, obeyed the summons, and immediately came to the fatal spot.

This great and good man was not only one of the bravest and most celebrated warriors, but one of the most amiable men of the Delaware nation. To a firm undaunted mind, he joined humanity, kindness and universal benevolence; the excellent qualities of his heart had obtained for him the name of _Wingenund_, which in the Lenape language signifies _the well beloved_. He had kept away from the tragical scene about to be acted, to mourn in silence and solitude over the fate of his guilty friend, which he well knew it was not in his power to prevent. He was now called upon to act a painful as well as difficult part; the eyes of his enraged countrymen were fixed upon him; he was an Indian and a Delaware; he was a leader of that nation, whose defenceless members had been so cruelly murdered without distinction of age or sex, and whose innocent blood called aloud for the most signal revenge. Could he take the part of a chief of the base murderers? Could he forget altogether the feelings of ancient fellowship and give way exclusively to those of the Indian and the patriot? Fully sensible that in the situation in which he was placed the latter must, in appearance, at least, predominate, he summoned to his aid the firmness and dignity of an Indian warrior, approached Colonel Crawford and waited in silence for the communications he had to make. The following dialogue now took place between them.

CRAWF. Do you recollect me, Wingenund?

WINGEN. I believe I do; are you not Colonel Crawford?

CRAWF. I am. How do you do? I am glad to see you, Captain.

WINGEN. (embarrassed) So! yes, indeed.

CRAWF. Do you recollect the friendship that always existed between us, and that we were always glad to see each other?

WINGEN. I recollect all this. I remember that we have drunk many a bowl of punch together. I remember also other acts of kindness that you have done me.

CRAWF. Then I hope the same friendship still subsists between us.

WINGEN. It would, of course, be the same, were you in your proper place and not here.

CRAWF. And why not here, Captain? I hope you would not desert a friend in time of need. Now is the time for you to exert yourself in my behalf, as I should do for you, were you in my place.

WINGEN. Colonel Crawford! you have placed yourself in a situation which puts it out of my power and that of others of your friends to do anything for you.

CRAWF. How so, Captain Wingenund?

WINGEN. By joining yourself to that execrable man, Williamson and his party; the man who, but the other day, murdered such a number of the Moravian Indians, knowing them to be friends; knowing that he ran no risk in murdering a people who would not fight, and whose only business was praying.

CRAWF. Wingenund, I assure you, that had I been with him at the time, this would not have happened; not I alone but all your friends and all good men, wherever they are, reprobate acts of this kind.

WINGEN. That may be; yet these friends, these good men did not prevent him from going out again, to kill the remainder of those inoffensive, yet _foolish_ Moravian Indians! I say _foolish_, because they believed the whites in preference to us. We had often told them that they would be one day so treated by those people who called themselves their friends! We told them that there was no faith to be placed in what the white men said; that their fair promises were only intended to allure us, that they might the more easily kill us, as they have done many Indians before they killed these Moravians.

CRAWF. I am sorry to hear you speak thus; as to Williamson’s going out again, when it was known that he was determined on it, I went out with him to prevent him from committing fresh murders.

WINGEN. This, Colonel, the Indians would not believe, were even I to tell them so.

CRAWF. And why would they not believe it?

WINGEN. Because it would have been out of your power to prevent his doing what he pleased.

CRAWF. Out of my power! Have any Moravian Indians been killed or hurt since we came out?

WINGEN. None; but you went first to their town, and finding it empty and deserted you turned on the path towards us? If you had been in search of warriors only, you would not have gone thither. Our spies watched you closely. They saw you while you were embodying yourselves on the other side of the Ohio; they saw you cross that river; they saw where you encamped at night; they saw you turn off from the path to the deserted Moravian town; they knew you were going out of your way; your steps were constantly watched, and you were suffered quietly to proceed until you reached the spot where you were attacked.

CRAWF. What do they intend to do with me? Can you tell me?

WINGEN. I tell you with grief, Colonel. As Williamson and his whole cowardly host, ran off in the night at the whistling of our warrior’s balls, being satisfied that now he had no Moravians to deal with, but men who could fight, and with such he did not wish to have anything to do; I say, as he escaped, and they have taken you, they will take revenge on you in his stead.

CRAWF. And is there no possibility of preventing this? Can you devise no way to get me off? You shall, my friend, be well rewarded if you are instrumental in saving my life.

WINGEN. Had Williamson been taken with you, I and some friends, by making use of what you have told me, might perhaps, have succeeded to save you, but as the matter now stands, no man would dare to interfere in your behalf. The king of England himself, were he to come to this spot, with all his wealth and treasures could not effect this purpose. The blood of the innocent Moravians, more than half of them women and children, cruelly and wantonly murdered calls aloud for _revenge_. The relatives of the slain, who are among us, cry out and stand ready for _revenge_. The nation to which they belonged will have _revenge_. The Shawanese, our grandchildren, have asked for your fellow-prisoner; on him they will take _revenge_. All the nations connected with us cry out _Revenge! revenge!_ The Moravians whom you went to destroy having fled, instead of avenging their brethren, the offence is become national, and the nation itself is bound to take REVENGE!

CRAWF. Then it seems my fate is decided, and I must prepare to meet death in its worst form?

WINGEN. Yes, Colonel!--I am sorry for it; but cannot do anything for you. Had you attended to the Indian principle, that as good and evil cannot dwell together in the same heart, so a good man ought not to go into evil company; you would not be in this lamentable situation. You see now, when it is too late, after Williamson has deserted you, what a bad man he must be! Nothing now remains for you but to meet your fate like a brave man. Farewell, Colonel Crawford! they are coming;[225] I will retire to a solitary spot.

I have been assured by respectable Indians that at the close of this conversation, which was related to me by Wingenund himself as well as by others, both he and Crawford burst into a flood of tears; they then took an affectionate leave of each other, and the chief immediately _hid himself in the bushes_, as the Indians express it, or in his own language, retired to a solitary spot. He never, afterwards, spoke of the fate of his unfortunate friend without strong emotions of grief, which I have several times witnessed. Once, it was the first time that he came into Detroit after Crawford’s sufferings, I heard him censured in his own presence by some gentlemen who were standing together for not having saved the life of so valuable a man, who was also his particular friend, as he had often told them. He listened calmly to their censure, and first turning to me, said in his own language: “These men talk like fools,” then turning to them, he replied in English: “If king George himself, if your king had been on the spot with all his ships laden with goods and treasures, he could not have ransomed my friend, nor saved his life from the rage of a _justly_ exasperated multitude.” He made no further allusion to the act that had been the cause of Crawford’s death, and it was easy to perceive that on this melancholy subject, grief was the feeling that predominated in his mind. He felt much hurt, however, at this unjust accusation, from men who, perhaps, he might think, would have acted very differently in his place. For, let us consider in what a situation he found himself, at that trying and critical moment. He was a Delaware Indian, and a highly distinguished character among his nation. The offence was national, and of the most atrocious kind, as it was wanton and altogether unprovoked. He might have been expected to partake with all the rest of his countrymen in the strong desire which they felt for _revenge_. He had been Crawford’s friend, it is true, and various acts of sociability and friendship had been interchanged between them. But, no doubt, at that time, he believed him, at least, not to be an enemy to his nation and colour, and if he was an enemy, he might have expected him to be, like himself, a fair, open, generous foe. But when he finds him enlisted with those who are waging a war of extermination against the Indian race, murdering in cold blood, and without distinction of age or sex, even those who had united their fate to that of the whites, and had said to the Christians: “Your people shall be _our_ people, and your God _our_ God,”[226] was there not enough here to make him disbelieve all the former professions of such a man, and to turn his abused friendship into the most violent enmity and the bitterest rage? Instead of this we see him persevering to the last in his attachment to a person who, to say the least, had ceased to be deserving of it; we see him in the face of his enraged countrymen avow that friendship, careless of the jealousy that he might excite; we see him not only abstain from participating in the national revenge, but deserting his post, as it were, seek a solitary spot to bewail the death of him, whom, in spite of all, he still loved, and felt not ashamed to call his _friend_.

It is impossible for friendship to be put to a severer test, and the example of Wingenund proves how deep a root this sentiment can take in the mind of an Indian, when even such circumstances as those under which the chief found himself, fail to extinguish it.