Page:The Red Man and the White Man in North America.djvu/160



have abundant and trustworthy means for informing ourselves of the qualities of character, the exterior life, the resources, employments, and practical capacities of the aboriginal tribes during the whole period since the first coming here of Europeans. The intercourse has always been close and continuous between the races; and though the relations in which they have stood to each other have been prevailingly hostile, there have been occasional and agreeable exceptions to this rule. As has already been said, though the Indians have a history profoundly interesting, especially in its tragic elements, they have no historian of their own race. The few and quite unsatisfactory specimens which we have of their way of telling their own story and fortunes for the record, are to be gathered from speeches delivered by some of their chiefs, in review of their history, at great councils with the whites; and we have to accept these as they have come through the medium of interpreters more or less intelligent, honest, and qualified for the office. Occasionally, too, we have had from whites who, as captives in their early youth, have lived long with the natives and been adopted by them, and also from some of their own youths who have been educated at our schools and colleges, what may serve as the Indian's own way of communicating to us the fortunes and experiences of his race. For the most part, however, — as in the case of the