Produced by Robert Cicconetti, Martin Pettit and the OnlineDistributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (Thisfile was produced from images generously made availableby The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
BUCKSKIN MOSE;
OR,
LIFE FROM THE LAKES TO THE PACIFIC,
AS ACTOR, CIRCUS-RIDER, DETECTIVE, RANGER,GOLD-DIGGER, INDIAN SCOUT, AND GUIDE.
WRITTEN BY HIMSELF.
"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,Than are dreamt of in your philosophy."--HAMLET.
_EDITED, AND WITH ILLUSTRATIONS_,BY C. G. ROSENBERG.
Logo]
NEW YORK:
HENRY L. HINTON, PUBLISHER, 744 BROADWAY.1873.
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1873, byCURTIS B. HAWLEY,In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington.
Stereotyped at theWOMEN'S PRINTING HOUSE,56, 58 and 60 Park Street,New York.
PREFACE.
As a young author, although scarcely what the world would consider ayoung man, I should scarcely feel inclined to say a word in presentingthis volume to it, were it not that I wish the public to comprehend oneof the two reasons which have induced me to write it. As it would beidle, even for a man of decided literary genius, to deny that pecuniaryprofit is, in most instances, the incentive to the exercise of hispower, so, in a humbler fashion (for I consider myself a man of nogenius), I will scarcely affirm that I do not look with a degree oflonging on the possible success of my first effort.
Let me, however, frankly say that I have another and a stronger reasonfor writing this work.
While hoping that I have not thrust this into undue prominence, as Ihave, in every case, made it secondary to the facts which are detailed,it is my wish to demonstrate to the public of the United States, thatthe manner in which the Government protects the settler is neither goodfor him nor for the Indian. It must equally fail in satisfying itschildren and its vassals. At times, it leaves the first totallyunprotected. When they grow accustomed to the habit of self-protection,it not infrequently represses the sturdy independence thus begotten,instead of guiding it by the ability, wisdom, and honesty of itsappointed officials. In like manner, it has no settled course of policywith the latter. At one time it bribes, and at another, it lashes theminto subjection.
Perhaps, the settler is not entirely elevated in character, nor theIndian thoroughly debased. But this wavering and uncertain line ofpolicy cannot do otherwise than lower the nature of the first, while itcertainly cannot raise that of the last.
That one considers his Government as weak and capricious, while this onebelieves it to be both tyrannical and asinine.
In addition to this, those who are selected to command the troopsemployed in the neighborhood of the Reservations, or to act as IndianAgents, are, in nine cases out of ten, utterly ignorant of the natureof the savage with whom they have to deal, the character of the countryin which they have to move; and, in the latter position, notinfrequently deficient in one of the cardinal virtues--that of honesty.In this last case, they will not only disgust the settler, but enragethe savage, who, on the score of his own dishonesty and treachery, isfar less disposed to smile at these vices in others, when he himselfsuffers from their exercise. The false philanthropy, also, is deeplyinjurious, which believes in the possibility of guiding uneducatednature without a due degree of compulsory restriction.
If in mentioning these few points in relation to the dealings of ourGovernment with the white settler and the red-skin, I awaken theattention of the public to the real obstacles for the preservation of asteady and creditable peace on the Indian territory and in theReservations, without the complete extermination of the originalinhabitants of my country, I shall be satisfied. Nor do I feel that Ihave said nearly as much, nor said it one-tenth as strongly, as thenecessity for plain speaking might have justified me in doing.
Before concluding, I would, however, call attention to one portion of myvolume which, without corroborative proof, might cause considerabledoubt as to my veracity. This is my positive mention of the existence ofMasonry, of my own knowledge, among the Cheyennes, and by hearsay fromthem, among other Western tribes.
If I am right, it was in 1854, that Judge Harrison, of Red Bluffs, inCalifornia, with his wife and children, was captured by the Cheyennes.Like myself, he was a Mason, and was indebted to that circumstance forthe liberation of himself and his family. This he told me in Susanville,where he afterwards died. When he mentioned this circumstance to me, heshowed me a war-club presented to him, which was almost identical in itsdecorative carving with my own, and which is now, or lately was, in thepossession of his widow. Nor have I any reason to doubt that there maybe others now living, who have also been indebted, for a similarimmunity, to the fact of their belonging to the Masonic order.
While touching upon this, I might also mention that Peter Lassen, killedby the Indians, at Black Rock, in 1859, was the first Mason who carrieda Charter to, and founded the first Masonic Lodge, on the Pacific coast.Peace be with the old man's ashes.
Buckskin Mose Page 1