were populous with fishes, and on whose placid bosoms innumerable wild fowl plumed their breasts-a region of marvelous beauty and fertility, the Genesee country has been aptly termed the paradise of the red men. The Indian's appreciation of its transcendent loveliness is embodied in the imperishable name which he bestowed upon it, Gennisheyo, the shining or beautiful valley.

The Senecas, at the middle of the eighteenth century, were slowly awakening from the spell of the hunter state. Their chief source of subsistence had ceased to be the precarious chase, and had become to a large extent the fruits of their own rude husbandry. From the early Jesuit missionaries they had obtained the seeds of the apple, peach and pear, and had surrounded their villages with thriving orchards. From the Dutch settlers on the distant Mohawk they had obtained cattle and horses, and had learned to prize these inestimable adjuncts of civilized life. They had imbibed from the same sources some rude notions of domestic architecture, and had learned to covet the comforts and conveniences of the dwellings reared by the pale-faces. A comparatively pure, spiritual, religious faith and the beneficent workings of their wonderful scheme of government, stimulated by their observation of the white manifold inventions, had begun to work a change in the condition and prospects of our indigenous population.

The Iroquois aimed at universal sovereignty, and one of the conditions of peace imposed by the haughty actors was a total abstinence from war. Acknowledged masters of the continent, the energies which had found exercise in war would naturally have turned to pursuits more consonant with peace. The progress of transformation would have required centuries. But think of the long ages which witnessed the evolution of the modern Englishman from the painted savage whom Cæsar met in Britain. Oratory was not alone a natural gift, but an art among the Iroquois. It enjoined painful study, unremitting practice, and sedulous observation of the style and methods of the best masters. Red Jacket did not rely upon his native power alone, but cultivated the art with the same assiduity that characterized the great Athenian orator. The Iroquois, as their earliest English historian observed, cultivated an attic or classic elegance of speech which entranced every ear among their red auditory.

Their language was flexible and sonorus, the sense largely depending upon the inflexion, copious in vowel sounds, abounding in metaphor, affording constant opportunity for the ingenious combination and construction of words to image delicate and varying shades of thought, and to express vehement manifestations of passion, admitting of greater and more sudden variations in pitch than is permissible in English oratory, and encouraging pantomimic gesture for greater force and effect. In other words, it was not a cold, artificial, mechanical medium for the expression of thought and emotion, or the concealment of either, but was constructed, as we may fancy, much as was the tuneful tongue spoken by our first parents, who stood in even closer relations to nature.

The great incentive to eloquence, patriotism, was not lacking to the Ciceros of the wilds. No nation of which we have a record was dominated in a larger degree by this lofty sentiment. They were proud of their history and their achievements, devotedly attached to their institutions, and enthusiastic at the mention of the long line of chieftians and sages who from the era of Hiawatha had assisted in erecting this grand Indian empire. The time will come when the institutions, policy, eloquence and achievements of this remarkable people will be the themes of study for the youth in our schools of learning. The unvarying courtesy, sobriety and dignity of their convocations led one of their learned Jesuit historians to liken them to the Roman senate.

We boast of our chivalric treatment and estimate of the feebler sex. We delight to measure our superiority over the nations of antiquity by this standard. The Indian woman cultivated the soil in a rude, primitive way, and performed a considerable amount of toil connected with their simple mode of life. She is represented in our popular histories as a drudge and slave to her haughty and lazy lord. The fact is far different. She was regarded as the only rightful owner of the soil. She was entitled to a voice in their councils when emergencies arose affecting the weal of the nation, represented by a speaker of her own selection, a voice that was respectfully heeded and often proved potential and decisive. The children born to her belonged to her clan, not to that of her husband. In the event of a vacant chieftainship it was the prerogative of the chief matron of the family to name the favored one who should be his successor. There is not an instance in history where the appeal which defenceless female virtue makes to the stronger sex was disregarded by her Iroquois captors. Has our boasted civilization paid greater homage to the character of woman than did these barbarians? The outbreak of the Revolution did not only

check the new impulse among the Senecas towards progress, it was the signal for the downfall of the whole Iroquois confederacy. The Senecas, denying their ancient traditions, had wisely resolved upon a position of neutrality at the beginning of the contest. Partly by artifice, partly by fervent appeals to that covenant chain which had so long bound them to the British, they were induced reluctantly to give their allegiance to the latter. They had no concern in the quarrel, and the issue, if unfavorable to Britain, involved irretrievable disaster to her humble allies. The long and bloody war, the desolating campaign of Sullivan, signalized by the merciless destruction of their dwellings, orchards, crops, domestic animals, and all their wealth, save the blackened soil, the winter of unexampled vigor that followed, and which rendered resource to the chase, as a means of subsistence, impossible, were fatal to the Seneca nation. The Mohawks and the bulk of the other confederate tribes, save the friendly Oneidas and the Senecas, followed the British flag to Canada. The remnant of the Senecas, through the humane intervention of Washington, were permitted to return and rake the ashes from their devasted hearths, but they returned as vassals and no longer a sovereign nation.

Red Jacket returned with them. He was young when the war commenced. We can easily conjure up the figure of the youthful warrior from the shreds of tradition which have come down to us-an Indian Apollo, graceful, alert, quick-witted, fleet of foot, the favorite messenger of British officers to convey intelligence from one military post to another, and who bestowed upon him the traditional scarlet tunic, and caused him to be christened Otetiani, or "Always Ready." He acquired no distinction as a warrior during the revolutionary struggle, for he was born an orator, and while morally brave, lacked the stolid insensibility to suffering and slaughter which characterized their war captains. We can imagine him at the end of the war, grown older, wiser in experience and reflection, more ambitious and crafty, with greater confidence in his rich, natural gifts of logic, persuasion and invective, and attaining by virtue of these attributes the chief place of power and influence in his nation-alas! a wronged and broken nation. The repose, however, so essential to the recuperation of this wasted people, was denied them. Every breeze wafted to the ears of the Indian hunter the ring of the white man's axe and the crashing of falling trees. The restless feet of the pale-faces were on their track, first a slender stream of traders and adventurers, many of them seeking the far woodland solitudes as a shelter from outraged and pursuing justice; then a tide of immigrants, ever waxing in volume, until the Seneca territory was islanded by a sea of covetous, hungry pale-faces.

Red Jacket was no longer the petted though humble Otetiani, but the Sagoyewatha of his tribe; the "keeper-sake" of a broken, war-wasted people, fast lapsing into a somnolent state which only by a little precedes dissolution. He loved his people, who were still the proprietors of a magnificent domain. He yearned over them as a hunted lion over its whelps. The efforts of the "gamblers," as he aptly termed the land speculators and the companies endowed with incomprehensible rights of pre-emption, to dispossess the ancient lords of the soil, lashed his soul into fury. He hated the enemies of his people with fierce and unrelenting hatred, and he consecrated the remaining years of his life to the work of baffling their mercenary schemes. Inconceivably difficult was the task. He could neither read nor speak English, nor any other language spoken by the whites, and yet his speeches in council, mutilated fragments of which remain, disclose an acute and lofty intellect, a vigorous understanding, a marvelous memory; an imagination and wit electric and phenomenal. His logic was as keen as a Damascus blade; he was a master of satire and invective; he thoroughly understood the windings and intricacies of what we term human nature. His denunciation had the terrible vehemence of the thunder bolt, and anon his oratory would be as graceful and caressing as a midsummer evening's breeze. Replying to Mr. Ogden, the head of the great Ogden land company, he exclaimed with ineffable scorn : "Did I not tell you the last time we met that whilst Red Jacket lived you would get no more land of the Indians? How, then, while you see him alive and strong," striking his hand violently on his breast, "do you think to make him a liar?"

Often the fierceness of his temper, the righteous indignation that swelled his bosom, impelled him to hurl defiance at his foes, and to use language the possible consequence of which caused the more timid and abject of his followers to tremble with apprehension. But Red Jacket would retract not a single word, although a majority of the chiefs would sometimes secretly deprecate the severity of his utterances. Again, on other occasions sorely beset and almost desparing, he would essay to melt the hearts of the

pitiless pursuers of his people, and gave utterance to such touching words as these: "We first knew you a feeble plant which wanted a little earth whereon to grow. We gave it you-and afterwards, when we could have trod you under our feet, we watered and protected you, and now you have grown to be a mighty tree, whose top reaches the clouds, and whose branches overspread the whole land; whilst we, who were then the tall pine of the forest, have become the feeble plant, and need your protection." Again, assuming the pleading tones of a suppliant, he said: 'When you first came here, you clung around our knee, and called us father. We took you by the hand and called you brothers. You have grown greater than we, so that we no longer can reach up to your hand. But we wish to cling around your knee and be called your children."

Anon, pointing to some crippled warriors of the war of 1812, among the Indian portion of his auditors, and blazing with indignation, he exclaimed: It was not our quarrel. We knew not that you were right. We asked not. We cared not. It is enough for us that you were our brothers. We fought and bled for you-and now (pointing to some Indians who had been wounded in the contest) dare you pretend that our father, the President, while he sees our blood running yet fresh from the wounds received while fighting his battles, has sent you with a message to persuade us to relinquish the poor remains of our once boundless possessions--to sell the birthplace of our children, and the graves of our fathers? No! Sooner than believe that he gave you this message, we will believe that you have stolen your commission, and are a cheat and a liar!"

In debate Red Jacket proved himself the peer of the most adroit and able men with whom he was confronted. He had the provisions of every treaty between the Senecas and the whites by heart. On a certain occasion, in a council at which Governor Tompkins was present, a dispute arose as to the terms of a certain treaty. "You have forgotten," said the agent, "we have it written down on paper." "The paper then tells a lie," rejoined Red Jacket. "I have it written down here," he added, placing his hand with great dignity upon his brow. "There is the book the Great Spirit has given the Indian; it does not lie!" A reference was made to the treaty in question, when, to the astonishment of all present, the document confirmed every word the unlettered statesman uttered. He was a man of irresolute, indomitable will. He never acknowledged a defeat until every means of defense was exhausted. In his demeanor towards the whites he was dignified and generally reserved. He had an innate refinement and grace of manner that stamped him the true gentleman, because with him these virtues were inborn and not simulated or acquired. He would interrupt the mirthful conversation of his Indian companies by assuring their white host that the unintelligible talk and laughter to which he listened had no relevancy to their kind entertainer or their surroundings.

At the outset Red Jacket was disposed to welcome civilization and Christianity among his people, but he was not slow to observe that proximity to the whites inevitably tended toward the demoralization of the Senecas; that to preserve them from contamination they must be isolated from the influence of the superior race, all of whom, good and bad, he indiscriminately classed as Christians. He was bitterly opposed by the missionaries and their converts. He could not always rely upon his constituency, torn as they were by dissensions, broken-spirited, careless of the future, impatient at the interruption of present gratification, and incapable of discerning, as he did, the terrible, inexorable destiny toward which they were slowly advancing.

In this unequal and mournful struggle to preserve the inheritance and nationality of his people, his troubled and unhappy career drew slowly to its close. That keen and subtle intellect, that resolute soul which, David-like, unpanoplied, without arms or armor save the simple ones that nature gave, dared encounter the Goliahs of the young republic, were dimmed and chilled at last; advancing years and unfortunate excess had accomplished their legitimate work. The end to that clouded and melancholy career was fast approaching. But until the close, when death was imminent, he had no concern or thought which did not affect his people. He visited them from cabin to cabin, repeating his warnings and injunctions, the lessons of a life devoted to their interests, and bade them a last and affectionate farewell. He died calmly, like a philosopher, in the arms of the noble Christian woman who has made this society the custodian of his sacred relics. He was a phenomenon, a genius, with all the frailties and all the fascination which that word implies, in natural powers equal to any of the civilized race.

Granted that he was vain, granted that he sometimes dissembled like one of our modern statesmen,

granted that toward the close of his unhappy life he partook too often of that Circean cup which has proved the bane of so many men of genius of every race, we cannot change our estimate of his greatness; he remains still, the consummate orator, the resolute, unselfish patriot, the forest statesman, centuries in advance of his race-the central figure in that little group of aboriginal heroes which stands out in lurid relief on the canvas of American history.

He has been fitly called "The last of the Senecas." His life was troubled and unhappy. There has been no rest allowed even to his bones in the lowly grave, which should have been sacred and unprofaned. We now commit the mouldering relics of his humanity, surrounded, as he wished, by those of kindred and friends, to their last resting place. And here the dust of our antagonistic races will commingle undisturbed, until the final summons shall call alike, from "the ostentatious mausoleum of the white man and the humble grave of the Indian," the innumerable dead to one common judgment. Though the occasion was a solemn one, the address was applauded. Chief John Buck, the hereditary "keeper of the wampum-belt," then arose, holding in his hand a belt of wampum kept by the nation for over three hundred years. The other Indians also arose. Chief Buck, then sang in long, low, mournful tones the following chant in the Onondaga language:

Then the other chiefs joined in the chorus as follows, which is also given in the Indian tongue:

Haih-haih!

Jig-ath-on-tek!

Ni-yon-Kha!

Haih-haih!
Te-jos-ka-wa-yen-ton.
Haih-haih!
Ska-hen-ta-hen-yon.
Haih!

Sha-tyher-arta-
Hot-yi-wis-ah-on-gwe—
Haih!

Ka-yan-een-go-ha.

Ne-ti-ken-en-ho-nen.

Ne-ne Ken-yoi-wat-at-ye

Ka-yan-een-go-ha.

Haih !

Wa-hai-wak-ay-on-nhe-ha.
Haih!

Net-ho wat-yon-gwen-ten-the.

The mourners then left the platform and took places at the heads of the graves. Chief Buck, who had been chosen to deliver the address of condolence, spoke in Onondaga for a few minutes, the other chiefs listening with bowed heads. The chant was again repeated. Many of the audience were moved to tears at the strange sight and melancholy sounds.

UNPUBLISHED LETTERS,

CONTRIBUTED FROM THE COLLECTION OF THE NORTHERN OHIO AND WESTERN RESERVE HISTORICAL SOCIETY.

JOHN GIBSON TO NATHANIEL APPLETON, COMMISSIONER OF THE CONTINENTAL LOAN OFFICE AT BOSTON.

SIR :

TREASURY OFFICE, Phila. 7 Aug. 1777.

Your of the 21st July is received. By Captain of the Light Dragoons you will receive a supply of certificates of the several denominations to the amount of dollars, by Mr. Hillegars account it should be but in counting over the number a sheet of the denomination of 600 appeared among those of three hundred which I have taken out to be returned to him in lieu of which he will forward you another to fill up the numbers he has marked on the cover.

The President of Congress has several times been applied to for his warrant on you to pay the cashier general the thirty-five thousand one hundred dollars, and there is a resolution of Congress for that purpose but it is to me unaccountably deferred, however sir, I will take care this matter shall soon be put to rights. I am sir,

By desire of my sister Mrs. Simpson, (who is rather unwell) I now enclose you a power of attorney, she says" she knows no other friend in Boston she can with freedom call on" and therefore begs your kind attention to her business, her situation is such that it would be dangerous for her at this season to undertake a journey, otherways she would have set off immediately for Boston on the receipt of your letter.

My particular friend Lieut. Col. William S. Livingston sets off for Boston in two or three days. Mrs Simpson has communicated many particulars to him which would be to tedious for a letter he will call on you-every civility shown him will add to the many conferred on the family. With my most affectionate compliments to Mrs. Bulfinch and little family, I am my dear sir, Your affect. Servant,

Doctr. THOMAS BULFINCH.

SAMUEL B. WEBB.