Newspaper Page Text
been overwhelraned by the tide ot
civilization. Civilized man lias pass
ed them in bis onward march to the
Pacific; and they have not proved vic
tims to a movement, which, like the
Car ot’Juggernaut, has crushed oth
ers into the earth. i hey have es
caped from most Of the frontier coU
liSio.is and conilicts, which are pro
duced by the advance of the pioneers
of civilization into the wilderness.
They have obtained a vantage ground,
from which they can s ee the promis
ed land; where, according to the words
of their American father, “they may
cultivate the soil, and increase their
little sparks to great tires, * 1 ’ under the
protecting arm ot this Republic.
Let them cling to it as to the ark ot
their salvation. It necessary, let
them resist to the death. Better,
a thousand times better, would be the
quiet of the grave, than protracting a
miserable existence, rendered wretch
ed by repealed and compulsory re
movals into the wilderness, before
the advancing footsteps ol the more
powerful people who occupy theii
country, and treat its ancient posses
sors with persecution and heartless
contempt. Tantalized with the hopes
of civilization which they are forbid
den to realize, deprived of the hard
vigor of the savage slate, and
then called upon to relinquish the
comforts of their improved condition,
if driven beyond the Mississippi, they
must share the late ol a race, whicii,
seemed doomed to he scattered !>y
every blast, hut to whom no spiing
brings renovation.
From this fate they have no hope
ol escaping, but through the justice
and integrity of the federal govern
ment. By an implicit (it is to he
hoped not an useless) reliance upon its
guod faith they have stripped them
selves of every other resource under
Heaven.—With the solemn guarantee
of the United States in their hands,
they demand the interposition of the
national arm to save them from deg
radation, exile and death.
This appeal cannot be answered by
a reference to idle distinctions be
tween the powei’3 of the stale and
federal governments. The Indian af
fairs are a common concern. The
faith of the nation is plighted to them,
and its character is pledged to the
world, that the Indian tribes within
the limits shall be treated with deli
cacy, kindness and humanity. '1 he
eye of Europe is upon us, and we
cannot escape from this responsibility.
These legal distinctions and constitu
tional subtleties, repugnant to the
common sense, and unpropit ions to
the common necessities of mankind,
will be regarded as mere inventions
for the purpose of covering our par
ticipation in the plunder of the abori
ginals. The world will not believe;
indeed it will not; that our constitu
tion interposes insupportable obstacles
to the preservation of national faith.
The whole distinction will be re
garded as a mere pretence, infidelity
more offensive to fair minds, than the
open avowal of injustice. Far bet
ter would it be for the President of
the United States to give to the com
plaining Clterokees the short answer
of the Dey of Algiers to some plun
dered merchants asking redress.—
“Do you not know that my people
are a hand of robbers, and that I am
their captain?” Far better, and far
more manly, would lie this bold avow
al, than a pretended distinction,
which, under an affected reverence
for legal observances and constitution
al forms, abandons a helpless and de
pendent community, to all the deso
lating consequences of arbitrary pow
er, stimulated to action by the most
intense and craving cupidity.
God forbid that the American peo
ple should sanction this distinction.—
I do not fear that they will. They
spring from a generous stock of an
cestors—from men who hazard all,
and suffer all, through a steadfast ad
herence to principle. The faulty
part of their character does not savor
of a spirit of selfish injustice, or of
grasping rapacity. It rather inclines
them to the opposito extremes.—
Their principles of government and
of State policy, are drawn from that
great reservoir of jurisprudence es
tablished by their English ancestors,
and enriched and liberalized by the
free discussions and masculine under
standings of their own revolutionary
fathers. These principles, their glo
ry and their protection; at once an or
nament and a safeguard; have sunk
deep into the hearts of the people of
the United States. They ave en-
•irw* ,
cleared to them by the associations of
childhood and the experience of ma
turity. They are the great results
of their past history—the fences and
muniments of their present liberties—
and the pledges of a long career of
future glory and prosperity. They
form the public sentiment of tlie coun
try—a principle which, like the grav
itation, prevailing apd omnipotent, at ,
once supports and controls their poli
tical system.
As long as they remain unchanged
and unchangeable, giving aliment and
life to public opinion;—as long as our
government shall continue to he the
embodying of the sentiments of an en
lightened people—the concentration
of the opinions of a free, educated,
and Christian community,—the House
of Representatives with its awful pow
er of impeachment bringing these o-
pinious into action;—the Senate, the
guardian of state sovereignly and ol
national faith—the body whose sanc
tion gave existence &. value to those
sacred guarantees, & the tribunal be
fore which all violations of these'
pledges must be arraigned,—as long
as these branches of our government I
shall continue to be guided by the will
of the nation, so long will onr plighted
faith guard the rights of the Chero-
kees and of all other dependents up
on our justice, “from the spoliation ol
rapacity and the iron hand of oppres
sion.”
The Indians have a right, a natural
right to the soil which they cultivate;
aright which as Colonies and States
we have universally admitted. By
treaty we have guaranteed to the
Cherokees the very land from which
General Jackson would forcibly eject
them. The treaty of 1701, conclud
ed at Holston, contains this article:—
“The United States solemnly guaran
tee to the Cherokee nation all their
land not hereby ceded.” The Presi
dent now tells that nation, that he is
unable to comply with his guarantee,
and absolves himself from the obliga
tion, with as much ease as Alexander
cut the Gordian knot. In the exer
cise of power, right is most shameful
ly forgotten, and the poor Indian is ex
pelled from bis property, bis home,
and his inheritance, without even the
ceremony of a mock trial. We pro
nounce this an act of tyranny unpre
cedented in the annals of our country;
an act of oppression that would dis
grace the most arbitrary despot. If
the Indians are expelled, what is to
become of their property? Shall we
parcel it out among us os sold.ers do
goods captured from their enemy?—
The various tribes of Indians now
own in the United Slates erst of the
Mississippi, seventy-seven millions of
acres of land, variously estimated at
from fifty cents to two dollars an n-
cre. It is hardly presumable that
the Government will purchase this
land of them at a fair price: it is hop
ed for the credit of the country that
we may not with the ruthless hand of
power seize and appropriate it to our
own use. The mandate has gone
forth, and the peaceable and friendly
Cherokees, are banished from their
sacred homes, their hunting grounds,
and the tombs of their ancestors.
Mass. Journal.
From the Christian Advocate & Journal.
Asbury Mission, (near the Creek A-
gency,) June 19, l&29.
Dear Brother:—The time has
arrived when I am required to make
my second quarterly report of the
Asbury mission. There is now no
thing extraordinary in operation at
this place. The school has increas
ed since my last report from seven to
twenty. They are improving as fast
as I could expect. This people tire
verily an oppressed people. I cannot
see that advancement in civilization
among them that I could wish. Vet
I hope they are improving. The re
lation of one circumstance, however,
will evince to the world the possibili
ty of their civilization and conversion
to God, and when they are thus
brought to its enjoyment their un
willingness to give it up:—A full
blooded Creek, a sister in the church,
(Mrs. Hard ridge,) came to the mis
sion house not long since to church,
and stayed all night, (Saturday night,)
as her usual custom was. Ou Sun
day evening, after meeting, she came
and knocked at the room door, and
let us know, myself and wife, that she
wished to come in. When admitted,
she said; through an interpreter, “I
have not got. much to say, but I wish
to tell you farewell, for I expect ne
Y
too
l
ver to co;to here again to meeting.”
I told her I was very sorry to hear
that,
sorry
When
said,
s,” she replied, “1 am
but 1 cannot help it.”
iked her the reason, she
‘my people are going to the
Arkansas, and 1 am obliged to go loo.
Ah,” said!she, “it makes my heart
ache whet 1 think about going to the
Arkansas, and hurst into tears, while
1 could not refrain from weeping.
While thus melted down and so
inseparably united to us by the strong
tics of Christianity, she inquired of
lie whether llieie were any persons
.hat prayed in the Arkansas. 1 re
plied that whether there were any or
iot, the Lord would never leave nor
forsake her as long as she put her
[rust in him; that he would be her
lielp and her shield; and that if
ive meet no more on earth, if faithful
to God, we;; should meet iii heaven,
where parting sounds will be heard no
more; that there the red, black, and
white men would meet together ere
long in harmony, to dwell for ever in
heaven. She then bid us farewell,
no more to meet, in all probability,
on this earth. But she, for one, bid
us farewell with a heart fraught with
sorrow. She who had tasted of the
sweets of civilization, and more, the
sweets of Christianity, now to be torn
away into a wilderness, again to spend
her life in solitude, (so far as it re-
lales.to the company of Christians) till
summoued by death to mingle with the
ran
iks of Christians and the saints of
jrol in heaven. There 1 expect to
ee many of the poor aborigines of
jitferent tribes of the forest surround
l!ic throne of God in heaven, while
many of the poor wretches of Chris-
sndom will be cast out into out er dark
less, where there shall b e weeping &.
flashing of teeth.
O could the world see the strug
gles that many of the poor aborigines
ire making towards civilization and
Christianity, and the many difficulties
tnd discouragements with which they
neet, they surely could not but sym-
latliize with and feel for them, and
iot only feel, but do for them that
vliich would advance them in the way
o its enjoyment.
This work we have no hesitancy in
saying is the work ol the Lord. O,
sirs, come up to the help ot the Lord
igainst the mighty, and of success ue
rssure you in the name of our God.—
flic desert shall blossom like the rose,
and the wilderness become a fruitful
soil, and mount Zion shall become the
beauty of the whole earth. Amen.
Yours in the kingdom and patience
of Jesus Christ,
N. IL RHODES.
INDIAN SAGACITY.
It would be a pity not to preserve
the following anecdote, which displays
so much of that accuracy of observa
tion which is known to be the eharac-
terestieks of our red brethren of the
West:—•
An Indian upon bis return home to
his hut one day, discovered that his
venison, which had been hung up to
dry, was stolen. After taking obser
vations upon the spot, lie set olf in
pursuit of the thief, whom he tracked
through tile woods. After going some
distance, lie met some persons, of
whom ho inquired, if they had not
seen it little, old, while man, with a
short gun and accompanied by a small
dog, with a bob tail? They replied
in the alfirmative,& upon the Indian as
suring them that them anlhusdescrib
ed had stolen bis venison, they desired
to be informed bow he was able to
give such a minute description of a
person whom be had not seen. The
Indian answered thus: “The thief
I know is a little man, by bis having
made a pile of stones to stand upon in
order to reach the venison from the
height I hung it, standing on the
ground;—that be is an old man I
know by his short step9, which I have
traced over the dead leaves in the
woods;—and that he is a toIdte man,
l know by his turning otrthis toes when
he walks, which an Indian never does.
His gun I know to be short, by the
mark which the muzzle made by
rubbing the hark of the tree on which
it leaned;—that his dog is small, I
knew by his tracks; and that he has a
bob tail I discovered by the mark it
made in the dust where he was sitting
at the time his master was taking down
the -meat.
By'the express provisions of an act
of congress, it is made a criminal of
fence to convey spirituous liquors into
the Indian country, and several of the
Indian nations have themselves pro
hibited, by their own Ians, the intro
duction of spirits among their people.
It is the duty of our government to
countenance this policy. The laws
regulating our intercourse with the
Indians will never be properly exe
cuted, unless enforced by their aid.
Instead of pursuing this course, we
have punished them for enforcing our
own laws, and have rewarded unprin
cipled individuals for carrying spirits
into the Indian country in violation of
these laws.
In December 1825, several per
sons without any license to trade with
the Indians, took eighty two barrels of
whiskey and two barrels of brandy
inlb the Cherokee Country, which
they were selling to these poor peo
ple. The whiskey and brandy were
seized by the proper officers of the
Cherokee nation and destroyed. For
this proceeding, So honorable to the
Indians, and marking in strong charac
ters their '-progress in civilization,
they should have received the ap
plause and support of bur Govern
ment; but instead of this, more than
one thousand dollars has been taken
from the Cherokees and paid over to
Miose who had thus wantonly violated
our laws and disregarded the rights
and happiness of the Indians. Let us
hear no more of our efforts to civilize
these people, of our humanity, or even
justice to them.— Hamilton (O.) Int.
WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 19, 1829.
Correction.—In our last, speaking of the
examination of the School at liraineni, we
said some of the Scholars were examined
in English Grammar. We should have
said Geography.
The unfounded report of the hostile iu J
tentions of the Creeks and Cherokee?; it
appears, has had the desired effect. The
two companies of the United Slates’ troops,
recently stationed at Augusta, have been
ordered to proceed to Foil Mitchell, where
also, several hundred additional troops
from Alabama and the Floridas have been
ordered by Ceti. M’Comb. This indeed
is a tine manoeuvre for nothing.
The Miiledgeville Statesman observes,
“Wetrust the Indians will see the necessity
of submitting in peace to their inevitable
destiny*” What destiny? To be sland
ered, and then butchered?
The Augusta Chronicle tells its readers,
(which, by thp way, is not so.) that the ed
itor of the Cherokee Phoenix is a half breed.
If this were true we know not to what good
purpose it would answer the Chronicle to
tell it. Upon reflection, however; our
readers will find it to be an ingenious turn
to get out of a difficulty. Some of the
Georgia papers have confidently asserted
that only the whites and half breeds in this
nation were opposed to emigration. It is
ascertained by the editor of the Chronicle,
that the editor of the Phoenix is opposed to
emigration, therefore he must be a half
breed;
The following extract of a letter was ad
dressed to a citizen of ibis place, by an old
acquaintance. We publish it verbatim
and by request. The writer intends to
be in season for a slice of the anticipated
spoil. We think his extreme devotedness
to General Jackson has greatly blinded
him when he says, “his will is the law of
the laud”—“the B.g man said it and it
must be so.” How many in these United
States will subscribe to such doctrines?—
In the view of the writer, if lie really be
lieved what he wrote, the government of
his country is farther from being republic
an than many of the monarchies in Europe.
I have not seen or scarcely heard
from you for the last seven years, but
seeing President Jackson’s talk to
your Nation, I have with pleasure
thought of and wrote you. I hove
been a warm supporter of General
Jacksons and feci the same sentiments
yet but think it hard for you and who
have been our friends in peace and
war to either come under our laws or
move to the Arkansas but so it is, his
will is the law of the Land, and he
has said to you that it must be done
and there is no alternative. Judge
Whites opinion I admire, But all is in
vain the Big man said it and it must
be so—write me on the receipt of
this and let me know what is thought
by your nation and you. and what will
be the course you intend to pursue I
mean the body of your nation if they
intend going to the Arkansas those
that intend staying will be allowed
rescervations, there can something he
done by fixing on sites that ivil» *
•• ue
valuable for a town &c let me he?"*
t roth you ou the receipt of this lev me
know what the creeks are doing
w hither there is not some good sel-
tlemeuts adjoining to your line and
give mo a description ol the soil and.
water of the best part of the creek
country.
Extract of a letter to the editor, from a
gentleman in Pennsylvania►
Respecting the oppressive conduct
ol the Slate of Georgia towards your
nation there is hut one sentiment here,
and (hat is of decided disapprobation.
Cruelties of this description towards
an innocent and interesting race can
not be viewed by any of us hut with
abhorrence—However they may suc
ceed in their nefarious designs to op
press you, you have a never failing
source of consolation; there is a day
of righteous retribution coni ng, and if
not in lime, in the eternal world a just
and righteous God will reward (lie
oppressor with the fruit of his own do
ings and amply recompense the op
pressed for all the injuries suffered
by them.
FROM TI1E SEAT OF WAR.
A Russian Bulletin dated at War
saw details the events of the war to
the 22d of May. A severe battle was
fought near Chounila on the 17th of
May,—the Turks being the assailants
—with nearly equal suceer.s. Tlu»
Russian Bulletin says, the loss of (lie
enemy was immense; 2000 remained
upon the field of battle. We have
also to lament the loss of Major Gen
eral Rinden, and our loss in killed and
wounded amounted to nearly 1000
men.
A Postcript to the Bulletin re
marks;—
A courier has arrived from Admiral
Greig, with news that the Turkish
fleet which had entered the Black
Sea, had hastened back to the Bos
phorus, ou learning that our fleet was
going to meet it.—Immediately after
the hasty retreat of the enemy, the
commander of the Russian fleet rein
forced the squadron stationed off the
Channel of Constantinople, and order
ed some ships to cruise on the coast ot'
Nalolia.
About 20 Turkish transports fell in
to out hands, and a new frigate w'lts
set on fire by our Squadron near
Sohilli, not far from the Bosphorus.
After this, Admiral Greig retired to
Sizeboli from which his report is
dated.
The Glasgow" Herald of the loth
June, States that another Russian bul
letin had been received, but no im
portant operations had taken place.
London, Wednesday Evening, June
13th.—The accounts from the Turk
ish capital are three days later than
those icccivcd yesterday. The ar
rival of the British ambassador to
re-open negotiations with the Porte
was anxiously looked for by all class
es, and a successful issue was helped'
for at Constantinople. More reliance
was placed on Great Britain than
France, though their uni'ed exertions*
were wished for. Trade was in a
more depressed state in consequence
of the great prepaiatipns for the
war against Russia.
Melancholy Shipwreck.—A few
weeks ago we had occasion to record
the melancholy shipwreck of the bark
Granicus, on the island of Anticosti in
(he St. Lawrence, in November last.
Another similar case has just come to
light, a full account of which is pub
lished in the Quebec Gazette. It
appears that the brig Betsey of
Whitehaven, which cleared at Que
bec for Ireland on the 15th of Octo
ber 1827, was cast away soon after
on the coast of Labrador. A large
part of the crew must have escaped
to the shore, but how long they sur
vived cannot be ascertained. On, the
Gth of November, 1828, some Esqui
maux hunting on the coast, seeing a
piece of rope on shore near the big Is
lands of Watawistick, landed, and
found a small wooden compass and a
scraper; on examining further, well
trodden paths in the moss showed that
persons had been living thereabout for
a considerable time. After search
ing for some time longer, one of the
Indians ascended a hill, and saw’ a hol
low" among some trees something like
a shelter, to which they went. The
skeletons of three men were lying
outside the door and three others in-'
side; on the top lay a box' containing
the log-hook of the Betsey, a v or i<
miviplion, U» o( |he , )rig ,
'. articles, nearly destroyed. There
| was no appearance that the people
