{inside front cover}
General Editors: Helen Jaskoski and Robert M. Nelson
Poetry/Fiction: Joseph W. Bruchac III
Editor Emeritus: Karl Kroeber
Assistant to the Editor: Lynn Poncin
SAIL - Studies in American Indian Literatures is the only scholarly journal in the United States that focuses exclusively on American Indian literatures. The journal publishes reviews, interviews, bibliographies, creative work including transcriptions of performances, and scholarly and theoretical articles on any aspect of American Indian literature including traditional oral material in dual-language format or translation, written works, and live and media performances of verbal art.
SAIL is published quarterly by the Association for the Study of American Indian Literatures. Individual membership rates for 1992 are $25 (regular) and $16 (limited income); the institutional rate is $35. All payments must be in U.S. dollars. Limited quantities of SAIL volume 1 (1989) and volume 3 (1991) are available to individuals at $16 the volume and to institutions at $24 the volume.
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Helen Jaskoski
SAIL
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California State University Fullerton
Fullerton, California 92634
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Joseph Bruchac, Poetry/Fiction Editor
The Greenfield Review Press
2 Middle Grove Avenue
Greenfield Center, New York 12833
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Copyright SAIL. After first printing in SAIL copyright reverts to
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ISSN: 0730-3238
Production of this issue supported by the University of Richmond.
{I}
SAIL
Studies in American Indian Literatures
Series 2
4.2 & 4.3
Summer/Fall 1992
CONTENTS
MIGHTIER THAN THE SWORD? AN INTRODUCTION
Helen Jaskoski
.
.
.
.
. 1
A COMPARISON OF THE ENGLISH TRANSLATIONS OF A MAYAN TEXT, THE
POPOL VUH
Denise Low
.
.
.
.
. 15
"HONORATISSIMI BENEFACTORES": NATIVE AMERICAN STUDENTS AND TWO
SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY TEXTS IN THE UNIVERSITY TRADITION
Wolfgang Hochbruck and Beatrix
Dudensing-Reichel
. 35
"PRAY SIR, CONSIDER A LITTLE": RITUALS OF SUBORDINATION AND
STRATEGIES OF RESISTANCE
IN THE LETTERS OF HEZEKIAH CALVIN AND DAVID FOWLER TO ELEAZAR
WHEELOCK, 1764-1768
Laura Murray
.
.
.
.
. 48
INTRODUCTION: SAMSON OCCOM'S SERMON PREACHED . . .
AT THE EXECUTION OF MOSES PAUL
A. LaVonne Brown Ruoff
.
.
.
. 75
A SERMON PREACHED BY SAMSON OCCOM . . . AT THE EXECUTION OF MOSES
PAUL, AN INDIAN
Samson
Occom .
.
.
.
. 82
SPACE AND FREEDOM IN THE GOLDEN REPUBLIC: YELLOW BIRD'S THE
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
JOAQUIN MURIETA,THE CELEBRATED CALIFORNIA BANDIT
John Lowe
.
.
.
.
. 106
{ii}
AN INTRODUCTION TO WYNEMA, A CHILD OF THE FOREST BY SOPHIA
ALICE CALLAHAN
Annette Van Dyke
.
.
.
. 123
TWO CHAPTERS FROM WYNEMA, A CHILD OF THE FOREST
Sophia Alice
Callahan .
.
.
. 129
EVOLUTION OF ALEX POSEY'S FUS FIXICO PERSONA
Daniel F. Littlefield, Jr.
.
.
.
. 136
AN INDIAN, AN AMERICAN: ETHNICITY, ASSIMILATION AND BALANCE IN
CHARLES EASTMAN'S
FROM THE DEEP WOODS TO CIVILIZATION
Erik Peterson
.
.
.
.
. 145
THE EVOLUTION OF MOURNING DOVE'S COYOTE STORIES
Alanna Kathleen Brown
.
.
.
. 161
RE-VISIONS: AN EARLY VERSION OF THE SURROUNDED
Birgit Hans
.
.
.
.
. 181
COMMENTARY
Copway on Cooper
.
.
.
. 196
According to Iktomi
.
.
.
. 197
From the Editors
.
.
.
. 200
SAIL Receives NEA
Grant .
.
.
. 200
Call for Papers on Critical
Approaches .
.
. 201
Call for Papers on Feminist and
Post-Colonial
Approaches .
201
Call for Papers on Film, Drama and
Theater
.
.
201
The Four Directions
.
.
.
. 202
REVIEWS
A Guide to Early Field Recordings at the Lowie Museum of Anthropology. Richard
Keeling
William Bright
.
.
.
.
. 203
On Our Ground: The Complete Writings of William Apess, A Pequot. Ed.
Barry O'Connell.
Jane Hipolito
.
.
.
.
. 205
To the American Indian: Reminiscences of a Yurok Woman. Lucy Thompson,
Che-Na-Wah Weitch-A-Wah
Helen Jaskoski
.
.
.
.
. 207
{iii}
Waterlily. Ella Cara Deloria
Alanna Kathleen Brown
.
.
.
. 210
John Rollin Ridge: His Life and Works. James W. Parins
Rodney Simard
.
.
.
.
. 212
American Indian Literature: An Anthology. Ed. Alan Velie
Andrew Wiget
.
.
.
.
. 215
Life Lived Like a Story: Life Stories of Three Yukon Elders. Julie
Cruikshank
James Ruppert
.
.
.
.
. 218
Talking Leaves: Contemporary Native American Short Stories. Ed. Craig
Lesley
Arlene Hirschfelder
.
.
.
. 220
Drawings of the Song
Animals. Duane Niatum
Roger Weaver
.
.
.
.
. 223
BRIEFLY NOTED . . . . . 225
CONTRIBUTORS . . . . . 227
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Glyphs from the Dresden Codex are reproduced from the drawings in Codices Mayas: Reproducidos y Desarrollados por J. Antonio Villacorta y Carlos A. Villacorta (De la Sociedad de Geografía e Historia de Guatemala) 2nd ed. Guatemala, C.A.: La Tipografia Nacional, 1977.
Reproduction of the manuscript page of the Popol Vuh is by courtesy of the Newberry Library, Chicago.
The passage from Popol Vuh: The Sacred Book of the Ancient Quiché Maya, from the translation of Adrián Recinos, coypright © 1950 by the University of Oklahoma Press, is reprinted with the permission of the University of Oklahoma Press.
SAIL acknowledges with gratitude permission from Munro Edmonson to reprint a passage from The Book of Counsel: The Popol Vuh of the Quiché Maya of Guatemala (New Orleans: Tulane University Press, 1971).
SAIL is also grateful to Dennis Tedlock for permission to reprint a portion of Popol Vuh: The Definitive Edition of the Mayan Book of the Dawn of Life and the Glories of Gods and Kings (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1985).
The editors express thanks for consultation on translations from Latin to Daniel A. Brown, Professor of Latin and Religious Studies, California State University Fullerton.
{iv}
1992 Patrons:
University College of the University of Cincinnati
English Department of Virginia Commonwealth University
Department of English, Western Washington University
University of Richmond
Firebrand Books
Karl Kroeber
[anonymous]
1992 Sponsor:
Robert F. Sayre, University of Iowa
{1}
MIGHTIER THAN THE SWORD? AN
INTRODUCTION
Helen Jaskoski
(Grant Foreman, Sequoyah 21)
This story, it is alleged, was told
to Sequoyah by his Cherokee neighbors in an effort to dissuade him from
developing and promoting his syllabary. If any such telling ever took place, it is easy to see how
it must have had an
effect opposite to the one intended. The facile moral tacked on to the tale reminds one of Natty
Bumppo in its naive
assumption of mutually exclusive "gifts" belonging to supposedly different races. What this
interesting story really
tells us is that writing has always already been here, simply waiting to be uncovered; that what
was lost--in a mere
moment of inattention--is not destroyed but rather momentarily missing, available and awaiting
recovery; that either
race is fit equally for pen or bow--and both; that only attentiveness and concentration will secure
what really matters.
The historical record tells us that
Sequoyah's view prevailed; indeed, if the reports of contemporaries are
accurate, once writing had been adopted the level of literacy among Cherokee speakers was
higher than that of the
country as a whole. If studies have been made of the nature and significance of texts published in
Cherokee, such
studies have not yet found their way into literary history. A systematic history of American
Indian literature will
include an account of texts published in tribal languages, as a comprehensive history of
American literature will
include the literature published in languages other than English. As of now, writings in Cherokee
(like literature in
German, Scandinavian languages, Japanese, Chinese and on down to the thriving Vietnamese
press of today) are part
of an invisible literature, absent generally from even the most inclusive discussions and
collections of American
literature. In some cases of Native American texts, notably the writings produced for Paul Radin
by Winnebago
authors, translations have remained in print and relatively well-known, while the existence of the
originals would
come as a surprise to many scholars who consider themselves well-versed in the texts. In other
cases, like that of the
{2} Wabanaki "Wampum Records" (Mitchell),
original-language written texts are only now being made readily
available. The opportunity is here. Scholarship in American literature in Spanish (e.g., Chicano,
Puerto Rican) and
Yiddish has begun to lead the way into this neglected side of the nation's culture. What kinds of
texts have been
written by Native authors in tribal languages? The question waits for investigators with the
knowledge, interest and
means to find out.
Sequoyah's achievement was not the
first indigenous writing system. In her study of La Cienega canyon
pictography, Carol Patterson-Rudolph reminds us that "American Indians have traditionally
referred to their
petroglyphs as `rock writings' or `writings' in the same sense they refer to any writing system.
There is a firm belief
that petroglyph images are intended to transmit information that is important, whether or not it
can still be `read' or
understood by contemporary people" (11). As she discusses the visual designs in relation to the
stories of Water Jar
Boy and of Uretsete and Naotsete, Patterson-Rudolph points out that elements of the rock
matrix--cracks, curves,
shoulders--are part of the sign system: the earth itself becomes part of the text.
She hated Chato . . . because he had taught her to sign her name. Because it was like the old ones always told her about learning their language or any of their ways: it endangered you.
(Leslie Silko, "Lullaby," Storyteller 47)
The earliest texts written by
American Indian authors in European languages enter into dialogue with a European
audience. The dialogue may be dysfunctional, as Leslie Silko's character Ayah finds; it may be
empowering; it may be
a matter of blind hope. When I lived in Poland in the early seventies, I learned of Polish visitors
to China who had
brought back jewels, furniture, and works of art; Chinese families, it was said, had given away
priceless artifacts
rather than see them destroyed in the cultural revolution. Some similar altruism must have
motivated the unknown
owner of the original Quiché version of the Popol Vuh to lend that precious
text to be copied and translated, to
trust--even in the bitter devastation of Spanish occupation--that this work of art would live. In her
paper on "A
Comparison of English Translations of a Mayan Text, the Popol Vuh" Denise Low
offers a glimpse of a document as
remarkable as the Rosetta stone.
Scholarship on these earliest texts in
European languages often reflects a fascination with curiosities, the location
of "firsts." Yet one of the reasons they are so curious, and that gives these writings intrinsic
value, is that they
contradict persistent stereotypes. The general picture of indigenous peoples is often likely to be
the noble {3}
foresters and plainsmen depicted by James Fenimore Cooper or Kevin Costner, or (less likely
now) the brutal
primitives popular in the romantic fiction of the early nineteenth century. In "`Honoratissimi
Benefactores': Native
American Students and Two Seventeenth-Century Texts in the University Tradition" Wolfgang
Hochbruck and
Beatrix Dudensing-Reichel offer an important alternative when they introduce us to Harvard
students assiduously
penning Latin verses.
Hochbruck and Dudensing-Reichel
also raise the question of whether these particular lines were actually written
by these specific students. The issue of authorship is frequently vexed in the study of American
Indian literatures,
especially in connection with collaborative works like translations and oral autobiographies. A
similar question is
related by the editor of To The American Indian by Lucy Thompson; Lucy
Thompson's authorship of her book has
been questioned because all the existing manuscripts are in her husband's hand. False attribution
has certainly
occurred, as in the case of "Seattle's Speech" (Kaiser). It is also true, however, that employment
of amanuenses is a
long tradition in European letters; Henry James, for instance, dictated his later novels to his typist
with no damage to
his standing as their author. Each collaborative relationship is unique.
Oratory of American Indians has
received a fair amount of notice, with several anthologies in and out of print
during the last thirty years--notwithstanding that the accuracy of such texts in representing what
was actually said is
often questionable. Epistolary forms, by contrast, have mostly been ignored. In "`Pray Sir,
Consider a Little . . .'"
Laura Murray introduces readers to some of the earliest writings in English by American Indians,
letters written to
Eleazar Wheelock by his pupils and their families. Murray points out the public purpose these
private documents were
made to serve, in supporting fundraising for Wheelock's missionary projects. This emphasis on a
public function of
writing continues in Native American writing, and Murray's study opens the way for examination
of other public
epistles, like the letters of John Ross and the many other leaders who tirelessly wrote message
after letter after
declaration after document on behalf of their people to government officials, newspapers and
public figures.
SAIL's publication of
Samson Occom's Sermon completes an undertaking begun over ten years ago:
LaVonne
Ruoff had prepared a text of the sermon along with an introduction, both to be printed in this
journal's first series, but
the project was never finished. Presentation of Ruoff's Introduction and Occom's sermon in these
pages offers an
opportunity to reflect on the problem of continuity in the history of American Indian literature.
As H. David Brumble
discovered when he came to study American Indian autobiographies, genetic lines of {4} descent in American Indian
texts can be illusory or nonexistent: "I was right in assuming that reading Indian autobiographies
had prepared me to
understand Momaday. I was wrong in assuming that Momaday had read them" (Brumble 17). If
The Names can
profitably be read in the context of earlier Indian autobiographies, can Occom's
Sermon help us understand a
contemporary temperance sermon, Michael Dorris's The Broken Cord? As
administrator of the American Indian
Studies program at Dartmouth University, Dorris is very likely to be familiar with a text written
by an American
Indian who was one of that university's founders. However, Dorris replaces Occom's strenuously
Christian appeal to
his listeners' sense of eternal salvation or damnation with the modern, secular gospel of
self-fulfillment and earthly
well-being; his approach through a personal, autobiographical account contrasts with Occom's
scholastic rhetoric and
itself probably owes something to the tradition of Indian autobiography. What is strikingly
similar in Dorris's and
Occom's writings is both authors' approach to a problem that has appeared intractable: both
respond to the same
phenomenon, whether seen as sin or social problem, with deep feeling that transcends, in the one,
a harsh and punitive
religion, and in the other the reductive banality of social science. Furthermore, both authors make
a conscious appeal
to a dual audience, most recently evidenced in Dorris's decision to have his book dramatized for
television rather than
in a feature film "in the hope that more people--particularly poor women--will see the movie and
better understand the
dangers of drinking during pregnancy" (Rhodes). It may be that lines of descent within American
Indian literary
history are more profitably traced in terms of function rather than of form. The condition of
colonization persists,
though specific terms and features may change, and succeeding writers continue to address it,
though they adapt
different forms to their purposes.
"They have a romance going with death, they
love it, and they want Indians to die for them."
Luther nodded. "Lucky thing most of us Indians
wasn't reading their stories."
"Lucky thing some of us were."
(Louis Owens, The Sharpest Sight 216)
The nineteenth century, a period
of territorial expansion on the north American continent, continued the process
of colonization. Again and again treaties contained provision for schools and teachers for tribes
as part of
compensation for land cessions; like other provisions, these obligations were frequently
unfulfilled by the United
States government. Schools for Indian children were poor, often damaging, {5} sometimes fatal: the mortality rate in
Indian boarding schools was scandalous. However, in spite of discouragement and often at
considerable sacrifice,
Indian students did become literate and schooled, and some became writers.
Fiction by nineteenth-century
American Indian authors is sparse. Littlefield and Parins' Supplement to their
Biobibliography cautions that the oft-reprinted Poor Sarah; or Religion
Exemplified in the Life and Death of an
Indian Woman, published in the 1820s, is "attributed to" Elias Boudinot. John Rollin
Ridge's The Life and Adventures
of Joaquin Murieta, first published in 1854 and generally cited as the first novel by an
American Indian author, is as
John Lowe notes an unduly neglected work of the mid-century "American Renaissance" of
Romantic writings. Lowe's
"Space and Freedom in the Golden Republic" introduces an outsider's perspective on the
exuberant expansionism
celebrated by mid-century writers like Walt Whitman. In California Joaquin Murietta is alive in
history as much as
Jean Laffite in New Orleans or Paul Revere in Boston; the latest search for his remains--physical
and literary--is
documented in Richard Rodriguez' account of the campaign to bury a head said to be Joaquin's
and preserved in a jar
by a rock salesman in Santa Rosa.
At the end of the century Sophia Alice
Callahan's Wynema: A Child of the Forest represents the first known
novel published by an American Indian woman. The selections from Wynema that are included
in this issue and
introduced by Annette Van Dyke show fiction and storytelling subordinated to the exposition of
political and
philosophical arguments, the depiction of Creek lifeways and the recording of history. At least
one episode in
Callahan's novel has resonated in recent history. In the last chapter of Wynema the
narrator describes three infants
found alive on the killing field at Wounded Knee and subsequently adopted; she goes on to
project an idealized,
successful future for the three children. In July 1991 the Los Angeles Times
reported the removal to South Dakota and
reinterment of the remains of Lost Bird, who as a baby girl four months old had been found alive
under the body of
her mother at Wounded Knee, and who was later adopted by the commander of a national guard
regiment. Callahan
might have been pleased to know that Clara Colby, adoptive mother of the real Lost Bird, was a
dedicated suffragist
leader (Harrison).
High valuation of non-fiction writing
is characteristic of nineteenth-century American Indian literature--and of
nineteenth-century literature in general. The prevailing view was that while fiction might be a
medium suitable for
entertaining the less-educated masses, serious literature comprised such forms as sermons,
essays, and histories.
Dickens, Trollope and Thackeray might entertain housewives and {6} clerks, but the life of the mind was more
properly engaged by writers like Ruskin, Macaulay or Newman. Recent critical theories that have
been fruitfully
applied to non-belletristic writings like ethnographies provide an access to non-fiction texts by
Native American
writers that can give a new view of American life and letters in the nineteenth century.
Histories, speeches and other political
writings by American Indians merit further study. As long ago as the
1950s David Levin showed how Romantic forms of tragedy and adventure had shaped the
histories that Bancroft,
Parkman and Prescott wrote of the colonizing of the western hemisphere; these New England
men of letters told the
story of the European conquest as a clash of forces personified in strong, complex characters. A
revision of that story
must include the vision of Native historians in works like David Cusick's Sketches of
Ancient History of the Six
Nations (1827), Andrew Blackbird's History of the Ottawa and Chippewa Indians
of Michigan (1887), George
Copway's Indian Life and Indian History (1851), and William Warren's
History of the Ojibways, completed in 1853
but only published posthumously in 1885 (Ruoff).
Again and again these writers were
motivated by an urgently felt need to correct the historical record, to counter
the kind of stereotype that Louis Owens' characters meet in their reading of the national
literature. These histories
could profitably be read in light of studies like Susan Paulson's of Latin American indigenous
colonial texts; in her
analysis of the Huarochiri Quechua manuscript Paulson maintains, among other things, that
polyvocality and
unconventional organization may not necessarily indicate multiple authorship or collaboration,
but rather strategies
for resistance and preservation. Whatever the individual circumstances of composition, in all
these cases, the authors'
trust--in the face of astounding destruction--in the power of language is a remarkable act of faith,
and their texts bear
examining for this reason alone if for no other.
Political writings and addresses have
also been neglected. The political writings of Jefferson, Crevecoeur, and
Lincoln, for instance, have long been studied as fundamental in the discourse that constitutes the
nation and its
literature. What could be learned from study of the writings of founding statesmen of Indian
Territory and, later, the
State of Oklahoma--individuals like Cherokee statesman John Ross, Choctaw Governor Green
McCurtain, or
Cherokee Robert Latham Owen, senator from Oklahoma?
The words, visible in tight formation, thrilled her, even in her unlovely scrawl. She imagined them in crisp print upon bound white leaves, the {7} margins justified, the spacing even, snowy webs running among the fabulous words.
(N. Scott Momaday, The Ancient Child 178)
The prospectus for this issue of
SAIL stretched the definition of "early" written literature through the first half of
the twentieth century. This period, which sees the flourishing of Wassaja and other
periodicals, is a new phase in the
use of writing: in addition to texts that educate and exhort, there is a sense--as Momaday's
character, Grey,
discovers--that writing in and of itself can give pleasure, entertain and inspire in a purely
imaginative realm. The
twentieth century finds the first widespread publication of fiction and poetry both in periodicals
and in novels and
anthologies. There is still an emphasis on non-fiction in the writings of American Indian authors,
with continued
experimentation and adaptation of literary forms to meet the specific expressive ends of the
writers.
Daniel F. Littlefield shows in
"Evolution of Alex Posey's Fus Fixico Persona" how Alexander Posey adapted the
epistolary form to social satire and political commentary. Littlefield's contextualization of Posey's
writing in the
tradition of American popular humor and Indian journalism offers a foundation for seeing Posey
in the context of later
American humorists as well. Posey's adaptation of epistolary modes anticipates Will Rogers'
"Letters," and the
character of Fus Fixico, with his dry, understated approach, suggests an affinity with Langston
Hughes's Jesse B. Semple.
Dialogue and collaboration continue
in twentieth century writings. In "An Indian, an American" Eric Peterson
dscribes how a theory of border-land, rather than margin and border, may be a more enlightening
approach to writers
defined as marginal. Peterson's analysis of the ways in which Charles Alexander Eastman dealt
with contradiction and
opposing ideas suggests fruitful lines of inquiry for the study of later writers; Vine Deloria in
particular may profitably
be read in light of these ideas.
Feminist criticism and interest in
women's writings in general has supported research in and reprinting of works
by several early Native women writers, notably Pauline Hopkins, Zitkala Sa and Mourning Dove.
The dialogue with
the colonizer, implicit in the earliest writings by Native authors, emerges again as a theme in the
correspondence of
Mourning Dove and Lucullus McWhorter; many of the features present in letters from students
of Eleazar Wheelock
persist in Mourning Dove's prose a century and a half later. However, as Alanna Brown shows in
"The Evolution of
Mourning Dove's Coyote Stories," hard work in the face of severe difficulties and
the idealism of both {8} Mourning
Dove and McWhorter resulted in a collaboration of genuine mutual esteem.
American Indian literature in English
during the first half of the twentieth century is dominated by the figure of
D'Arcy McNickle, who in the years since his fiction has been brought back into print has begun
to receive the critical
attention he and his work merit. Birgit Hans's "Re-Visions: An Early Version of The
Surrounded" suggests insight
into the process of recovering Indian identity that has become so important a theme in later
fiction by American
Indian writers. Her examination of an early manuscript version of McNickle's first novel details
how a conventional
romance was transformed into a naturalistic vision of human limitation and endurance.
The Surrounded, like the
novels of Zola, concedes little to wishful idealism, yet McNickle himself was like Zola in being
an idealist in his own
life, working tirelessly in public life on behalf of ideas he believed in. Now examined in relation
to McNickle's
personal history and contemporary American Indian life, The Surrounded (as well
as McNickle's other works) has yet
to be studied in the context of American naturalism, as part of a body of work that includes
Native Son, Quicksand,
Studs Lonigan and the novels of Sinclair Lewis.
This period up to 1950 offers other
works deserving attention. Some authors, like John Joseph Mathews, John
Milton Oskison and Ella Deloria, have already been the subjects of articles and dissertations.
Others remain
unstudied, though they raise tantalizing questions for both the scholar and the ordinary reader.
America Needs
Indians! is one such text. The book is puzzling through and through. For one thing, the
production is, if not
extravagant, certainly of high quality. The cloth cover is embossed with a two-color design,
half-tones are printed on
semi-glossy paper, and the text with its various fonts and illustrations is a veritable sampler of
the typesetter's art;
moreover, a pocket glued into the back cover contains two copies of an elaborate map in two
colors. The text, as
Marie Annharte Baker observes in her note, "According to Iktomi," is often biting, often
heartrending, satire: the
irrepressible word-play anticipates the verbal antics of Gerald Vizenor. Who is or was the
pseudonymous "Iktomi"?
By what other name was he (or she?) known? The copy before me is inscribed on the end page
with the signature
"Iktomi witko" and a small drawing. Danky and Hady list IKTOmi as editor of
Re-America (Restore America). The
annotation in Littlefield and Parins' guide to American Indian periodicals notes the conservation
emphasis of
Re-America's sponsor, the Association for the Restoration of Real "America" in Miniature; they
mention Archie
Phinney as author of articles on Indian mythology, and IKTOmi as responsible for articles on
Indians in sports. Other
identities {9} that Iktomi had remain a mystery, for the
moment.
"Chee's Daughter" by Juanita Platero
and Siyowin Miller is another neglected find. This fine short story,
although frequently reprinted, has received no critical attention. "Chee's Daughter" was first
published in 1948 in
Common Ground, and Beidler and Egge note its reprinting in the anthologies
edited by Natachee Momaday and by
Sanders and Peek; Jane Katz also included it in her collection of writings by American Indian
women. Sanders and
Peek note in their editorial comments that Juanita Platero is Navajo and Siyowin Miller
non-Indian and suggest a
long-term collaboration; Momaday mentions other short stories and a novel, The Winds
Erase Your Footprints; no
sources or other titles are given. No entry for Platero and/or Miller appears in the bibliographies
compiled by
LaVonne Ruoff, Jack Marken or Arlene Hirschfelder. Even if no further information exists about
the authors and their
other work, "Chee's Daughter" merits study in its own right.
Egas read the three words on the thin paper and discovered that his daughter had written the note to the trickster. His hands clenched, he shuddered and gathered the other notes on napkins before the trickster returned. Sammie remembered too late to recover the intimate message and the critical words she had written on the napkins.
(Gerald Vizenor, Griever: An American Monkey King in China 191)
It is hard to think of any
technology that has more profoundly changed human life than writing has. Expressions
like "literacy crisis" depend for their impact on profound belief in the value and necessity for
writing. For many
current thinkers, the matter is more ambiguous, and Bright reminds us that skepticism as to the
value of literacy goes
back to Socrates. Writing may liberate and preserve; it may also betray. As Vizenor's evil Egas
Zhang understands,
writing can make people vulnerable as well as powerful. The ambiguous or even deleterious
aspects of writing are a
recurrent theme in the works of contemporary American Indian writers--although it must be
pointed out that critics of
the written word tend to do their critiquing in published writings.
This issue of SAIL was
undertaken in the hope that bringing attention to some of these works by pioneering
Native American writers would encourage further research in the subject. The editors wish to
express their gratitude
first of all to the contributors here, for insight, generosity and patience. The process of editing the
issue generated
interest, and some pieces begun late in the cycle could not be completed in time for this deadline
and will be reserved
for future issues; we anticipate receiving additional papers on Occom and Eastman in the {10} coming months, and
invite submissions at any time on topics related to early written literature by American Indian
authors.
WORKS CITED
Beidler, Peter G. and Marion F. Egge. The American Indian in Short Fiction: An Annotated Bibliography. Metuchen, NJ & London: The Scarecrow Press, Inc., 1979.
Bright, William. American Indian Linguistics and Literature. Berlin, New York, Amsterdam: Mouton, 1984.
Brumble, H. David, III. American Indian Autobiography. Berkeley: U of California P, 1988.
Danky, James P., ed. Hady, Maureen E., comp. Native American Periodicals and Newspapers 1828-1982: Bibliography, Publishing Record, and Holdings. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1984.
Dorris, Michael. The Broken Cord. New York: Harper & Row, 1989.
Foreman, Grant. Sequoyah. Norman and London: U of Oklahoma P, 1938.
Harrison, Eric. "A Girl Called `Lost Bird' Is Finally at Rest." Los An geles Times 13 July 1991: A15.
Hirschfelder, Arlene B. American Indian and Eskimo Authors: A Com prehensive Bibliography. New York: Association on American Indian Affairs, Inc., 1973.
Iktomi. America Needs Indians! Denver: Bradford-Robinson, 1937.
Kaiser, Rudolf. "Chief Seattle's Speech(es): American Origins and Eu ropean Reception." Recovering the Word: Essays on Native American Literature. Ed. Brian Swann and Arnold Krupat. Berkeley: U of California P, 1987.
Katz, Jane B., ed. I Am the Fire of Time: The Voices of Native American Women. New York: E. P. Dutton, 1977.
Littlefield, Daniel F., Jr. and James W. Parins, eds. American Indian and Alaska Native Newspapers and Periodicals, 1925-1970. New York: Greenwood Press, 1984.
Littlefield, Daniel F., Jr. and James W. Parins. A Biobibliography of Native American Writers, 1772-1924. A Supplement. Native American Bibliography 5. Metuchen, NJ & London: The Scarecrow Press, 1985.
Marken, Jack W. The American Indian: Language and Literature. Arlington Heights, IL: AHM Publishing Corporation, 1978.
Mitchell, Lewis. Wapapi Akonutomakonol / The Wampum
Records: Wabanaki Traditional Laws. 1897. Ed. Robert M. Leavitt and
David A.
Francis. Fredericton: Micmac-Maliseet Institute, U of New Brunswick, 1990.
{11}
Momaday, Natachee S., ed. American Indian Authors. Boston: Houghton Mifflin,
1972.
Momaday, N. Scott. The Ancient Child. New York: Doubleday, 1989.
Owens, Louis. The Sharpest Sight. Norman: U Oklahoma P, 1992.
Patterson-Rudolph, Carol. Petroglyphs and Pueblo Myths of the Rio Grande. Albuquerque: Avanyu Publishing, 1990.
Paulson, Susan. "Double-talk in the Andes: Ambiguous Discourse as Means of Surviving Contact." Native Latin American Cultures Through Their Discourse. Ed. Ellen B. Basso. Bloomington: Indiana University Folklore Institute, 1990. 51-65.
Rhodes, Joe. "Smits' Tearful `Broken Cord.'" Los Angeles Times TV Times 28 February 1992: 77.
Rodriguez, Richard. "The Head of Joaquin Murrieta." California 10.7 (July 1985): 55-62, 89.
Ruoff, A. LaVonne Brown. American Indian Literatures: An Introduction, Bibliographic Review, and Selected Bibliography. New York: MLA, 1990.
Sanders, Thomas E. and Walter W. Peek. Literature of the American Indian. Beverly Hills: Glencoe Press, 1973.
Silko, Leslie Marmon. Storyteller. New York: Seaver, 1981.
Thompson, Lucy. To the American Indian: Reminiscences of a Yurok Woman. 1916. Berkeley: Heyday Books, 1991.
Vizenor, Gerald. Griever: An American Monkey King in China. New York: Fiction Collective, 1987.
{12}
{full-page graphic}
Illustration 1. Two glyphs from the Dresden Codex.
{13}
A COMPARISON OF ENGLISH TRANSLATIONS OF
A MAYAN TEXT,
THE POPOL VUH
Denise Low
I
Translation of the Popol
Vuh, a lengthy creation cycle, into English presents difficulties of cultural context as
well as language. This "Book of the Council" (Recinos 5) was originally hieroglyphic, as
deduced from accounts of
hieroglyphic Mayan books seen by Fray Diego de Landa from 1549 to 1566 in Guatemala. Also,
the surviving
alphabetic version of the Popol Vuh has vestiges of pictorial language in its
phrasing. But even if the hieroglyphic
original were extant, translation would pose problems, since Mayan literacy appears to be
radically different from
Western notions: "a number of signs are polyvalent, that is a particular sign may have more than
one phonetic reading,
and it may also he read for its ideographic value" (Coe 182). The glyphs can be visual puns that
lend themselves to an
improvisational reading, not word-for-word representation.
Hieroglyphs for the planet Venus or
the opossum god, for example, are depicted differently in different
media--codices, murals, or stone. Sequential drawings of the opossum god in the Dresden Codex
[Illustration 1] show
variant facial expressions, postures, and secondary glyph parts (Barbara Tedlock). A glyph that
denotes a cenote, or
sinkhole, is expanded to be a base underneath the opossum god in one depiction, and entirely
omitted in another. In
contrast, letters of the Roman alphabet, even when drawn by a fine calligrapher, are always
denotative; they do not
vary in meaning. Mayan script is a blend of denotative, ideographical and syllabic representation.
Even Mayan
numerals have two forms, like small and capital letters, where one is an abstraction of counting
(bars and dots), and
the other is a pantheon of faces with connotations that are only partially decoded. In a Newberry
Library lecture,
Barbara Tedlock noted that even today, more than four hundred years after contact with
Europeans, hieroglyphs are
only thirty to eighty percent understood, depending on which scholar is consulted. The Mayanist
Michael Coe
estimates that eighty-five percent can be read (178). In any case, a translation of the lost
hieroglyphic Popol Vuh is
impossible, and yet the ghost of that version stands behind any attempt to render it into
English.
II
The history of the surviving text of the Popol Vuh makes an interesting
narrative in itself. The primary copy comes
from the hand of a Dominican priest, Francisco Ximenez (1666-1730), who was in {14-15: 2-page graphic:
Illustration 2. Opening page of the manuscript of the Popol Vuh. Courtesy of the
Newberry Library, Chicago.}{16}
Guatemala most of his career, and in Chichicastenango from 1701 to 1703, when he
collected the text. He also wrote
a grammar of three dialects of Mayan in addition to a history of Guatemala. He apparently
transcribed the Popol Vuh
from a Quiché Mayan manuscript written between 1554 and 1556. Dennis Tedlock
(Popol Vuh 28-29) and Adrián
Recinos (31-35) give convincing evidence for this date from the manuscript itself. A Mayan
owned the manuscript,
and Ximenez apparently returned it to the owner.
Onto handmade paper, and with
handmade ink, Ximenez and his scribes copied the story in conventional
Spanish and a modified Latin-alphabet version of Quiché. Each page had a left-hand
column of Quiché and a
right-hand column of Ximenez' Spanish translation [Illustration 2]. The Ximenez manuscript
remained in the
Dominican library until the 1830s, when it was transferred to the Guatemalan national
archives.
This text was discovered in the San
Carlos University library by the German Carl Scherzer, who copied it in
1853 and 1854; he published his copy of Ximenez' Spanish in Vienna in 1857, but it contained
many errors because
of an inaccurate copyist and printers unfamiliar with Spanish (Recinos 40).
In 1858 the French Abbé
Charles Etienne Brasseur de Bourbourg also copied and translated the Ximenez text in
Guatemala, possibly two versions. He included a summary written by Ximenez as part of his
Historia, and the
complete Quiché and Spanish version. Brasseur de Bourbourg published a long
Quiché and French text in Paris,
Popol Vuh: Le livre sacré et les mythes de l'antiquité americaine
(1861) to great acclaim. It aroused in Europe and in
the United States an intense interest in pre-Hispanic Mesoamerican cultures and civilization
(Himelblau 1).
Bourbourg's translation was not a work that showed close attention to linguistic accuracy, but it
was a "long and
elaborated affair which frequently omitted some lines and paraphrased others" (McClear 29).
Nonetheless, it was a
popular success. For a century many translations were based on Brasseur de Bourbourg's French
and Quiché text.
The Abbé did make some
logical divisions of the manuscript into a preamble and four parts, then subdivided
these into chapters. Most subsequent versions have followed his scheme, which attests to an
inherent structure that
appealed to diverse translators. After working on the translation in the Guatemalan national
library, Brasseur de
Bourbourg spirited the manuscript away to France (Tedlock, Popol Vuh 30). The
text left the public view until it was
rediscovered at the Newberry Library in Chicago in the l940s.
The first translations of the
Popol Vuh into English were paraphras-{17}es based on Bourbourg's French and
Scherzer's publication of Ximenez' Spanish versions (Spence 9). Sir Arthur Helps published a
"brief synonsis" in The
Spanish Conquest, a four volume work published in London between 1955 and 1961
(Recinos 254). He apparently
worked from Karl Scherzer's copy of Ximenez' Spanish text published in Vienna in 1857. From
1905 to 1907 Dr.
Kenneth S. Guthrie published a synopsis of the Popol Vuh in an American
theosophist magazine, The Word. His
source is not clear, and the work is not considered serious scholarship (Spence, Popol
Vuh 1). A more reputable
version in English was by Lewis Spence in 1908, condensed from Bourbourg's French and
Ximenez' Spanish. It
appeared as a special publication of the London Folk-lore Society.
The Spence paraphrase was the only
available English translation until the middle part of this century. Then the
Newberry Library was the site of good fortune. In 1941 a former Guatemalan ambassador,
Adrián Recinos, found a
volume entitled Empiezan Las Historias del Origen de Los Indios de esta Provencia de
Guatemala, and bound with it
was the original Ximenez manuscript of the Popol Vuh. The smaller Popol
Vuh section had been overlooked because
it was bound within a volume of grammar and history.
Apparently, when Brasseur de
Bourbourg died, the Ximenez manuscript was sold to Alphonse Pinart, whose
bookplate is affixed to the inside cover, and somehow Edward Ayer acquired it for his collection
(McClear 29). Ayer
did not realize what was in the book, and it came to rest with the rest of his collection in the
Newberry Library. In
1946 Recinos found the work, and translated the Quiché of the Ximenez manuscript into
his native Spanish. Two
Americans, first Sylvanus Morley and then Delia Goetz, assisted Recinos in preparing a
translation of Recinos'
Spanish translation into English, published in 1950. This was the first complete version ever
available in English, four
hundred years after first contact between Mayans and Europeans.
In 1971 Munro S. Edmonson
published the first Quiché-to-English translation, a versified version. And finally,
in 1985 Dennis Tedlock published the second translation from Quiché into
English.
Various adaptations and excerpts have
been published by authors such as Kenneth Guthrie and Ralph Nelson,
but such publications are derived from earlier complete translations. Nelson has a popularized
adaptation of Part I
with extensive illustrations. Guthrie created a version to appeal to a specialized audience. His
Popol Vuh appeared in
The Word, which Recinos describes as "a monthly magazine devoted to
philosophy, science, religion, Eastern
thought, occultism, theosophy" (248). The Word was probably a religious tract, like
some of Guthrie's other
publications. Lewis Spence described it in 1930 as "couched in {18} scriptural language, and such treatment assists
the vulgar error that the Popol Vuh is merely a native travesty of portions of the
Old Testament" (Edmonson, Lore
270). Guthrie's sources are not clear, though he claimed to have worked independently except for
adding "some
felicitous terms" from another translation by James Pryse, which Guthrie claims was published in
a journal entitled
Lucifer in 1894 and 1895 (Recinos 59). Guthrie's translation is not commonly
available (Edmonson, Lore 27). Pryse's
version is also lost. Spence is the only scholar who refers to seeing it (Spence, Popul
Vuh 1).
The scholars who truly translated
complete texts of the Popol Vuh into English include only Spence; Recinos,
Morley and Goetz; Edmonson; and Tedlock. A comparison of English renditions of the opening
section of Part One
(after the Prologue) shows the range of approaches to translation in this century.
Translators reconcile themselves to
partial solutions. Allan Burns and Dennis Tedlock draw upon extant Mayan
oral tradition as an analogue to the original context. Some documentary records survive of Mayan
writings: a few
codices now in Dresden, Madrid and Paris (Recinos 10); an alphabetic Quiché Mayan
version of the Popol Vuh;
alphabetic Mayan (mostly Yucatec) versions of the Chilam Balam; the
Rabinal Achi (a theatrical piece); and
first-hand accounts of early Spaniards (Fray Diego de Landa, Fray Bernardino Sahagun and
others). Translators have
worked with clues from the past and the current Mayan culture, but of course no definitive
translation is possible of a
hieroglyphic, probably orally-based narration.
However, the original Popol
Vuh presents not only a problem of differing times, languages, and alphabets, it
represents a sacred worldview quite different from the Judaeo-Christian tradition of most Spanish
and
English-speaking people. Early translators had a problem seeing the Mayan narrative as a
document of a separate
religious system. Miguel Leon-Portilla notes the "manifestas interpolaciones de origen cristiano"
in the Spanish
translation of Recinos, and he goes on to assert the distinctively Mayan context (39-40).
Especially, a different
concept of deity from monotheism is apparent from the opening. Therefore, earlier translations
err by assuming a
complete assimilation of Biblical concepts, either consciously (Guthrie) or unconsciously
(Spence; Recinos, Goetz
and Morley).
Problems of translation go beyond linguistic
equivalence. The idea of literary procedure is different, the
cosmology is different, and the remaining people in Guatemala and the Yucatan are different
from their ancestors of
almost five centuries ago. Contemporary Quiché Mayans have lost the ability to read
hieroglyphs. The fact that
Spanish-speaking people now live in that area also removes the Popol Vuh from
the {19} American-English
mainstream of North America. The text is both from "far away and far ago" (Ortiz). Is any kind
of valid translation
even plausible?
Jacques Derrida writes about
untranslatability and about the impurity of all languages; he believes humankind
has been put into a "double bind" since Babel (100-103). Roman Jakobson also agrees that poetic
art is untranslatable
(232-9), but he offers an option: "Only creative transposition is possible: either intralingual
transposition--from one
poetic shape into another, or interlingual transposition--from one language into another" (239).
Writers who translate,
or transpose, the Popol Vuh into English produce works that are removed in many
ways from the original.
Further, in producing these new texts, the
translators produce information about themselves as much as about the
Popol Vuh. Walter Benjamin (and others) have written about the compromises of
translation:
The basic error of the translator is that he preserves the state in which his own language happens to be instead of allowing his language to be powerfully affected by the foreign tongue. Particularly when translating from a language very remote from his own he must go back to the primal elements of language itself and penetrate to the point where work, image, and tone converge. . . . It is not generally realized to what extent this is possible . . . . (81)
Benjamin proposes a receptivity to the translated language, in effect a dialogue with the
remote culture, with an
openness to new invention.
The English versions of the Popol
Vuh, whatever the method of translation, are all incomplete in some way, and
the lacunae reveal specific discrepancies between the two systems of knowledge. As time passes,
the gap between the
original Quiché and English widens, causing the need for repeated translation:
Only rarely however does the literary translation attain the stability of an original work (the Schlegel-Tieck translations of Shakespeare are such rarities); it is hardly ever handed down from one generation to another as a work of art in itself, more often it becomes ossified as merely a dated text. In other words, it loses its communicative function as a work of literature within a continually shifting cultural system. This explains why the need so often arises to create new translations of literary works. (Snell-Hornby 112)
The background information about English-language translations of the Popul
Vuh and their styles becomes as
informative as the foreground of text. Translations need to be read extra-textually, with
awareness of {20} the
motives of the translators. A complete reading includes the background of the translator's process
as well as the final
text itself.
Because there are few translations of the
Popol Vuh into English, a brief inventory is possible. The priority of
each translator as well as the produced text can be evaluated by three characteristics
distinguished by Margot Astrov
in her discussion of North American Indian verse: "linguistic fidelity," "poetic quality," and
"cultural matrix" (6).
Astrov's evaluative criteria, though published in 1946, still are contemporary. Recent translation
theory emphasizes
"the orientation towards cultural rather than linguistic transfer" (Snell-Hornby 43). Publication of
English translations
of the Popol Vuh began in 1908 (Spence) and the most recent is 1985 (Tedlock).
The emphasis of the English
translations does become more culturally based.
III
Lewis Spence's London version of 1909 is the first translation commonly available to the English-speaking world. However, it is a paraphrase from the French translation of Ximenez' Spanish translation of Quiché Mayan; it literally is, in Octavio Paz' term, "a translation of a translation of a translation" (9) (though Paz meant that the transfer of nonverbal experience to language conventions to a final text is the three-part translation of writing itself). Either literally or metaphorically, Spence proves Paz' point that "Every translation, up to a certain point, is an invention" (9). After a preamble, Spence's text begins:
Over a universe wrapped in the gloom of a dense and primeval night passed the god Hurakan, the mighty wind. He called out "earth," and the solid land appeared. The chief gods took counsel; they were Hurakan, Gucumatz, the serpent covered with green feathers, and Xpiyacoc and Xmucane, the mother and father gods. As a result of their deliberations animals were created. But as yet man was not. (Popol Vuh 9-10)
The whole translation is essentially a plot outline; all of the Popol Vuh is
reduced to eighteen pages of a small pamphlet.
This version of the narrative does not
exemplify any of Astrov's three considerations for translation--linguistic
accuracy, aesthetic style, or cultural context. Spence himself apologizes in the introductory
remarks for the limitations
he worked with: "Unfortunately both the Spanish and the French translations leave much to be
desired so far as their
accuracy is concerned, and they are rendered of little use by reason of the misleading notes which
accompany them"
(Spence, Popol Vuh 1). Spence cannot give a version that is linguistically accurate,
but he does clarify the lineage of
his work. He offers no explanatory notes {21} on details
of the translation. What cultural framework he attempts is a
very general discussion of Mayan gods and North American Indian mythology and poetics.
This version would make it appear that the
Popol Vuh is a simple plot line; the overall literary structure is
obliterated by reducing the text to a summary. Spence's vocabulary is formal and Latinate,
including terms like
"primeval" and "deliberations." The inversion of noun-verb order, as in the phrase "over a
universe . . . passed the god
Hurukan," lends a formal tone. Two of the five sentences have passive verb constructions: "were
Created," and "was
not [created]"; these make the tone ceremonial.
The singular, masculine, and abstract wind
god who calls for the creation of this Earth parallels the God of
Genesis ("and God said, Let there be Light: and there was light"). Spence lists the Quiché
gods, but the process of
creation is Biblical. Although a few specific Christian references are clear in the Spanish-era text,
the Mesoamerican
concept of deity is distinctive; "Theogonic multiplicity results in part from the gods having many
aspects. Firstly, each
was not only one but four individuals" (Coe 165). Mayan gods can also appear as consorts of the
opposite sex.
Spence's wind god is an anachronism in the text, appearing as a single male god. Spence does list
the names of the
four gods in the original Quiché, but this only suggests the complex pantheon of Mayan
theology.
In addition to the paraphrase of the
Popol Vuh, Spence includes commentary about the culture of the Mayans.
However, like his scholarship on Atlantis (Atlantis in America), much of the
background to the Mayan work is
speculative. Spence tries to assert a simplified pan-Indianism by comparing creation accounts of
Athapascans,
Muscokis (sic), Zunis, Iroquois, Mixtecs, and Guaymis; Spence claims the stories of these very
different tribes
illustrate "the fact of ethnological unity among the American tribes" (Popol Vuh
32). He also assumes the written
language is rudimentary, "still in a state of transition from the pictographic to the
phonetic-ideographic stage" (Popol
Vuh 31). Spence's background information is opinion with few substantiated
references.
Further, Spence imposes English poetics
upon the Quiché, despite not knowing the language. He writes that "like
most barbarous compositions which depended for their popularity upon the ease with which they
could be
memorized, the Popol Vuh was originally composed in metre" (Popol
Vuh 5). He claims that the first line "almost
scans in iambics" (Popol Vuh 5). He presumes that his own English versification
system is universal, and he
rationalizes any discrepancy as a problem of the Mayan informant: "the native compiler of the
Popol {22} Vuh
appears to have been unable to recollect the precise rhythm of the whole . . . many passages attest
its original odic
character" (Popol Vuh 55). Spence's chauvinism makes his work typical of a
Victorian translation style which Susan
Bassnett-McGuire describes as emphasizing "production of a text of second-rate literary merit for
an elite minority"
(73).
IV
The next translation into English, in
1950, was again twice removed from the original Quiché text. The
collaboration of Sylvanus Morley and Delia Goetz with Adrián Recinos resulted in a
large volume with an
introductory essay by Recinos, a brief comment by Morley, the English text (with extensive
footnotes), bibliography,
index, and a translation of a brief Quiché genealogy, "Paper Concerning the Origin of the
Lords." The English was
based on Recinos' Spanish translation of 1946. Extensive footnotes discuss Quiché
linguistics, Bourbourg's translation
for comparison, and some ethnological explanation of Mayan cultural references. The thorough
discussion of culture
is extra-textual. This translation requires the reader to scan the text at the top of the page with
constant interruptions
for footnotes; it is more a scholarly study than an aesthetic experience.
Although Recinos proposes in his
introduction that the Popol Vuh is literary, his translation is written in a
journalistic style. It is in prose form, like Ximenez' text, with no attention to poetic line. Because
Recinos, Morley,
and Goetz do not translate the proper names of Quiché deities, footnotes are crucial, and
the extensive pantheon in the
text becomes cumbersome. Aside from this, the diction is straightforward, but stylistic quality is
not a priority. The
static verb "to be" carries the meaning of most sentences, so a declamatory quality slows down
the narrative.
Copulatives such as "there was" and the use of passive voice also make the story less dramatic.
Passive voice is true
to the Quiché (Recinos 50-51), which gives this translation the advantage of mimicking
the original language. But in
English this sort of language does not lend a sense of mystery to the moments of creation;
"linguistic transfer"
(Snell-Hornby 43) is favored over elegant English style.
The Recinos-Goetz-Morley translation does
include some apparently intentional parallelism to reflect the
original Quiché poetics. Parallelism also corresponds to Biblical style, and even meaning
seems framed in Biblical
terms, such as "Then came the word," which is very close to the Gospel of St. John, "In the
beginning was the Word."
In the opening of this translation of the Popol Vuh, this sentence appears to be the
pivot of the narrative; after it, the
gods Tepeu and Gucumatz {23} "came together" in the
void to discuss creation.
The work of Recinos, Morley and Goetz
shows an interest in scholarly research about the Popol Vuh; the lack of
attention to poetic quality indicates that they do not present the work as an artistic creation.
V
About twenty years later, in 1971,
Munro Edmonson did the first English translation directly from Ximenez'
Quiché text. Edmonson, a serious linguist, continued on to translate one of the
Chilam Balam manuscripts and to
publish numerous articles about Mayan language and literature. His linguistic prowess is shown
to be conjoined with
a conviction that translation is a literary, not just an ethnographic, undertaking: "It is my
conviction that the Popol
Vuh is primarily a work of literature, and that it cannot be properly read apart from the
literary form in which it is
expressed" (Popol Vuh xi). He goes on to further justify his position that the work
is foremost a valid literature: "It is
a treasure of ethnograhic information. But it is first and most surprisingly a coherent literary
work, with scope and
unity" (Popol Vuh xiii-xiv). His tone is somewhat defensive, or at least it shows his
expectation of a challenge, when
he states "surprisingly" the Popol Vuh is a "coherent literary work."
Edmonson classifies the narrative in terms of
what is familiar to him and his audience; he compares the Popol
Vuh to the epic genre of Greek origins:
It would be inappropriate to call the Popol Vuh the epic of the Quiché. Although it belongs to a heroic (or near-heroic) type of literature, it is not the story of a hero: it is (and says it is) the story of a people . . . in the language and concepts available to him, the author has set down everything that "Quiché" means in its full mythic, historic, and ethnic ambiguity, from the origin of the world. (Popol Vuh xiii)
Edmonson sets the Mayan text on a level with Homer, Dante, and Milton, who all present
"full mythic, historic"
context. He stops short, however, of identifying the serious religious nature of the Popol
Vuh. Although he does not
present the Mayans as "savages" as Spence does (Popol Vuh 9), neither does he
credit their text with a sacred status.
What Edmonson achieves in his translation
is a transformation of the unparagraphed prose from the Ximenez
manuscript into a verse form of parallel couplets. Walter Ong notes that such parallelism is a
common feature of
orally transmitted literature (34-36). Tedlock (Spoken Word 220-27) and Burns
argue that the "couplets" of the Popol
{24} Vuh are a characteristic
feature of Mayan oral literature: "A common feature in Mayan oral literature is the use
of parallel construction. Sometimes a sentence or phrase is repeated word for word in a line or
two lines" (Burns 28).
Recinos, although his translation is prose, still is aware of parallelism in the original syntax, "its
frequent repetitions"
(xiii). Recinos admits that he sacrifices aesthetics for "the fidelity which must be the translator's
guide" (xiii). His
decison not to versify is, therefore, a conscious compromise of his translation.
The first versification of the Popol
Vuh was a set of excerpts published in 1969, before Edmonson's translation,
by Miguel Leon-Portilla (49-51, 69-91,120). A Nahuatl scholar and student of Angel Maria
Garibay K, Leon-Portilla
accepted Garibay's idea of difrasismo in Nahuatl verse: "a parallel couplet
containing a pair of metaphors that together
expresses a single thought" (19, 65-7). Leon-Portilla applied the Nahuatl model of couplets to
some selections from
the Popol Vuh.
Edmonson published his translation after
Leon-Portilla's experiments with the Popol Vuh. His translation of the
complete Popol Vuh emphasizes poetics. Edmonson explains his understanding of
semantic couplets or "keying":
The form itself, however, tends to produce a kind of "keying," in which two successive lines may be quite diverse but must share key words which are closely linked in meaning. Many of these are traditional pairs: sun-moon, day-light, deer-bird, black-white. Sometimes the coupling is opaque in English, however clear it may be in Quiché, as in white-laugh. ("White" also means to throw white bone dice; "laugh" also means to play ball.) (Popol Vuh xii)
A look at the Edmonson translation
shows that his decision to use poetic lines has advantages and some
problems. He accurately represents the "keying," an authenticated Quiché form.
However, cultural context is not
possible in the verse of short lines, so footnotes are crucial. Quetzal Serpent, Mothers and
Fathers, and Heart of
Heaven, all deities, are not explained by the text, and few English speakers are familiar with
them. The Mayan
concept of godliness is quite unlike monotheism. However, extensive footnotes that break up the
visually patterned
stanzas are more often linguistic comment than cultural explanation. Mayan gods are not
described beyond their
association with the calendar (Popol Vuh 6). This translation is not easy for
beginning students of Mayan culture to follow.
The verse is lean, reminiscent of the work of
Robert Creeley. In one passage, lines consist of one word:
{29}
(Deer),
Bird,
Fish,
Crab,
Tree,
Rock,
Hole,
Canyon,
Meadow
Or forest.
(Popol Vuh 9)
This sparse list is hardly poetic in English. When generic terms are combined--"Tree" "Hole"
"forest"--the effect is
limited. "Hole" is translated as "cave" by Recinos and "hollow" by Tedlock; both words refer
more specifically to
landscape than does "hole."
The spacing suggests a rhythm, even for
these short lines, and throughout, the couplets reinforce a rhythmic, not
prose reading of the work. At times the repetition of phrases becomes uninteresting, as in "Truly
it was yet quiet/
Truly it was yet stilled./ It was quiet/ Truly it was calm" (8-9). This compares to Recinos, Goetz
and Morley: "all was
in suspense, all calm, in silence; all motionless, still . . ." (82). Edmonson does sustain the
integrity of the semantic
couplets, but at times there is an aesthetic cost.
Edmonson's translation is essential to
students of the Popol Vuh to show its original verse format with roots in
the oral tradition and the Mayan hieroglyphics, which were often written in pairs (Tedlock,
Popol Vuh 31). This
exercise of "linguistic fidelity" (Astrov), however, presupposes familiarity with culture.
VI
In 1985 Dennis Tedlock published a
translation based on fieldwork in Guatemala during the summer of 1975 and
all of 1976. His prose rendition attempts to reestablish a link between contemporary Mayan
Indians and the Popol
Vuh. Tedlock collected Quiché oral texts and studied contemporary oral patterns
of discourse. In addition, he trained
as a Quiché diviner, or daykeeper, in the indigenous shamanistic tradition. He brings to
his translation the concept of
"upstreaming" (Fenton 71-85); that is, he uses contemporary culture as a starting point for
recovering historic culture.
Tedlock uses contemporary field research into Quiché oral tradition to reconstruct the
spirit of the hieroglyphic Popol
Vuh manuscript.
Cultural authenticity is the guiding principle
of Tedlock's translation. He explains his apprenticeship to a
daykeeper, and he still returns to Guatemala every 260 days for religious observances. Also, he
{26} establishes the
divining system as a valid link to the act of reading the Popol Vuh:
Diviners are by profession interpreters of difficult texts. They can even start from a nonverbal sign, such as the crossing of a road by a coyote or the hatching of an egg in a dream, and arrive at a "reading," as we would say. (Popol Vuh 15)
Not only does Tedlock assert that a diviner reads signs in a fashion similar to that of a reader
of a book, but also the
geographic locale in its entirety becomes a text, an enlarged page upon which objects move like
letters. He includes a
map that shows Mayan citadels, and mountains and volcanoes where contemporary rites take
place. He discusses the
importance of geography to ritual in "Walking the World of the Popol Vuh"
(69-97).
Tedlock correlates the epic directly with
contemporary oral tradition. He acknowledges Burns in his preface as
"the first to reveal that conversation is the root of all Mayan discourse" (Popol Vuh
19). In An Epoch of Miracles,
Burns explains how the storytelling mode of Yucatec Mayan discourse requires that two
conversational roles be
filled: "The person who does the main telling of the story, the narrator, shares the central stage of
story performance
with a respondent" (19). Burns points out that the Popol Vuh creation scene shows
the gods Tepeu and Gucumatz
creating the world through a conversation, not through the word of a single god. Tedlock models
his translation after
the oral conversation-stories that Burns identifies. He explains that his daykeeper-mentor, Andres
Xiloj, is the
respondent to the text, which is a "three-way dialogue among Andres Xiloj, the Popol
Vuh text, and myself" (Popol
Vuh 16). An example of Tedlock's modus operandi is an early translation of the
Popol Vuh (section XIV), first
published in the literary magazine Conjunctions (176-85). He shows an actual
dialogue between Xiloj and himself as
they study a section of the story.
The other justification for relying on an oral
tradition to supplement a written text is the probability that the
original hieroglyphic version of the Popol Vuh was read through a more
improvisational performance than a literal
reading. Burns describes a contemporary Yucatec scribe who reads aloud from a book during a
religious observance:
"He elaborated what was written down, and so his verbal expression was much longer than the
words contained on
the written pages" (72). De Landa gives a sixteenth century account of a ritual reading of
hieroglyphic books by a
Mayan priest: "The most learned of the priests opened a book, and observed the predictions for
that year, declared
them to those present, preached to them a little, enjoining the necessary {27} observances" (71). The "declaring" does
not seem to be a rote reading of a text. Further, Tedlock sees remnants of the hieroglyphic
original in the alphabetic
Ximenez manuscript in phrasing that seems to describe pictures, such as "This is the great tree of
Seven Macaw, a
name" (31). Tedlock proposes that an oral performance is a more authentic approach than a
conventional
word-for-word reading.
Tedlock's translation expands the original
text to include a compendium of divination, contemporary Mayan
ways, and the Popol Vuh text; he exemplifies Jakobson's notion of "creative
transposition" (239). On the other hand,
his expansion of the original violates one of Hilaire Belloc's six rules for the translator, "the
translator should never
embellish" (311). He does create a readable narration with no footnotes. Endnotes include
linguistic options and
background information, but the text can stand on its own. All together the volume includes
translator's preface,
introduction, maps, photographs, glossary, notes and commentary, and a bibliography. Only an
index is omitted. So
Tedlock's book is a resource for Mayan studies as well as a translation.
What is missing? By choosing to use a
predominantly prose form, Tedlock presents the work as a story rather
than the poem suggested by the structure of the language. Edmonson's versified translation shows
an inherent poetic
structure corroborated by Leon-Portilla and other scholars. Tedlock does occasionally resort to
similar short-lined
verse, but "only where the parallelism is both strongly marked and sustained" (Popol
Vuh 245). He does not explain
his choice of prose, though it is a reversal of his previous publications, especially of Zuni
narratives in Finding the
Center. In his preface he discloses only that his translation required "multiple trial runs"
(Popol Vuh 16).
The choice to use prose does not
compromise the aesthetic quality of the translation. Tedlock is a gifted stylist.
The opening of Part I reads well because of his use of verbs such as "murmurs," "ripples,"
"sighs," and "hums" (Popol
Vuh 72). He chose these to be onomatopoetic: "In translating this passage I have chosen
quiet sounds that can be
expressed as verbs . . ." Popol Vuh 26). Tedlock integrates the use of couplets into
the prose style as parallel clauses.
He uses commas, not periods or semicolons, between the clauses to show close relationship, and
parallel repetitions
gain momentum. The recurrence of "only murmurs, ripples, in the dark, in the night"
(Popol Vuh 72) builds up to the
mysterious emergence of Sovereign Plumed Serpent, "in the water, a glittering light"
(Popol Vuh 73). Tedlock adds
dialogue among the gods to make his version read more like a story than an archaic religious
text.
The names of the gods are translated into
English, so unfamiliar Quiché names do not slow down the narrative.
The metaphor "Heart of {28} Sky" for Hurricane
suggests multidimensional aspects of a Mayan deity, as does the
listing of the three other aspects of Hurricane: "Thunderbolt Hurricane," "Newborn Hurricane,"
and "Raw
Thunderbolt." Such complexity is finessed fluently in English, and the monotheistic concept is
sidestepped.
Tedlock expands the text of the Popol
Vuh so that it incorporates cultural associations. All in all, Tedlock
epitomizes the current trend of translators to favor "the orientation towards cultural rather than
linguistic transfer"
(Snell-Hornby 3). Additionally, Tedlock takes advantage of his facility with language, also
demonstrated in his recent
book of poetry, Days from a Dream Almanac. His may not be a strictly true
translation, but Tedlock's version of the
Popol Vuh achieves poetic quality.
VII
In conclusion, the stories behind
translations of the Popol Vuh become a summary of Mayan studies. Read
sequentially as a chronology, the stories of translation reflect changes in scholarship from 1908 to
1985. The
relationship between translator and text begins as a remote observer, Spence, explains Mayan
culture in terms of
British poetics. In 1985 the observer, Tedlock, immerses himself in the Mayan point of view as
much as he can. His
translation elevates cultural authenticity over faithful replication of "keying."
The poetic quality of translation is secondary
at first, with Spence's abridged version and then the plain-spoken
work of Recinos, Morley and Goetz. Edmonson, using ideas of Garibay K and Leon-Portilla
about Nahuatl as well as
Mayan poetic structures, creates a modified couplet form for his version. Tedlock's prose
translation, less faithful to
the original, does show attention to stylistic quality while incorporating some parallelism. Both
Edmonson and
Tedlock treat the Mayan text as significant literature.
The Popol Vuh is especially
difficult to translate because of the gap between the source language, including
cultural context and time lapse, and the target language of contemporary English. This inherent
discrepancy makes the
priorities of the translators especially transparent. This distance also challenges the translators to
stretch the English
language to encompass unfamiliar ideas and poetic forms. Their successes, even if partial,
contribute new possibilities
to readers and writers of English, and the compelling history of the Mayan civilization is made
less obscure.
{29}
APPENDIX:
THREE ENGLISH VERSIONS OF THE BEGINNING OF POPOL
VUH
Version 1:
This the account of how all was in suspense, all calm, in
silence; all motionless, still, and the expanse of the sky was empty.
This is the first account, the first narrative. There was
neither man, nor animal, birds, fishes, crabs, trees, stones, caves, ravines, grasses, nor
forests; there was only the sky.
The surface of the earth had not appeared. There was only
the calm sea and the great expanse of the sky.
There was nothing brought together, nothing which could
make a noise, nor anything which might move, or tremble, or could make noise in the sky.
There was nothing standing; only the calm water, the placid
sea, alone and tranquil. Nothing existed.
There was only immobility and silence in the darkness, in
the night. Only the Creator, the Maker, Tepeu, Gucumatz, the Fore-fathers, were in
the water surrounded with light. They were hidden under green and blue feathers, and were
therefore called Gucumatz. By nature they were great
sages and great thinkers. In this manner the sky existed and also the Heart of Heaven, which is
the name of God and thus He is called.
Then came the word. Tepeu and Gucumatz came together in
the darkness, in the night, and Tepeu and Gucumatz talked together. They talked
then, discussing and deliberating; they agreed, they united their words and their thoughts.
Then while they meditated, it became clear to them that
when dawn would break, man must appear. Then they planned the creation, and the
growth of the trees and the thickets and the birth of life and the creation of man. Thus it was
arranged in the darkness and in the night by the Heart
of Heaven who is called Huracán.
The first is called Caculhá Huracán. The
second is Chipi-Caculhá. The third is Raxa-Caculhá. And these three are the
Heart of Heaven.
Then Tepeu and Gucumatz came together; then they
conferred about life and light, what they would do so that there would be light and dawn,
who it would be who would provide food and sustenance.
Thus let it be done! Let the emptiness be filled! Let the
water recede and make a void, let the earth appear and become solid; let it be done. Thus
they spoke. Let there be light, let there be dawn in the sky and on the earth! There shall be neither
glory nor grandeur in our creation and formation
until the human being is made, man is formed. So they spoke.
--Sylvanus Morley and Delia Goetz with Adrián Recinos
{30}
Version 2:
Here is the description
Of these things:
Truly it was yet quiet,
Truly it was yet stilled.
It was quiet.
Truly it was calm.
Truly it was solitary,
And it was also still empty, the
womb of heaven.
III
These are truly then the first words,
The first utterances.
There was not one person yet,
One animal,
(Deer,)
Bird,
Fish,
Crab,
Tree,
Rock,
Hole,
Canyon,
Meadow
Or forest.
All by itself the sky existed.
The face of the earth was not yet visible.
All by itself the sea lay dammed,
And the womb of heaven,
Everything.
There was nothing whatever
Silenced
Or at rest.
Each thing was made silent,
Each thing was made calm,
Was made invisible,
Was made to rest in heaven.
There was not, then, anything in fact
That was standing there.
Only the pooled water,
Only the flat sea.
All by itself it lay dammed.
There was not, then anything in fact that might
have existed.
It was just still.
It was quiet
In the darkness,
In the night.
All alone the Former
And Shaper,
Majesty,
And Quetzal Serpent,
The Mothers
And Fathers
Were in the water.
Brilliant they were then,
And wrapped in quetzal
And dove feathers.
Thence came the name
Of Quetzal Serpent.
Great sages they were
And great thinkers in their
essence,
For indeed there is Heaven
And there is also the Heart of
Heaven.
That is the name
Of the deity, it is said.
IV
So then came his word here.
It reached
To Majesty
And Quetzal Serpent
There in the obscurity,
In the nighttime.
It spoke to Majesty
And Quetzal Serpent, and they spoke.
Then they thought;
Then they pondered
Then they found themselves;
They assembled
Their words,
Their thoughts.
Then they gave birth--
Then they heartened themselves--
Then they caused to be created
And they bore man.
{31}
Then they thought about the birth,
The creation
Of trees
And shrubs,
And the birth of life
And humanity
In the obscurity,
In the nighttime
Through him who is the Heart of Heaven,
I Leg by name.
I Leg Lightning is the first,
And the second is Dwarf Lightning.
Third then is Green Lightning,
So that the three of them are the Heart of Heaven.
Then they came to Majesty
And Quetzal Serpent, and then was the invention
Of light
And life.
"What if it were planted?
Then something would brighten--
A supporter,
A nourisher.
So be it.
You must decide on it.
There is the water to get rid of,
To be emptied out,
To create this,
The earth
And have it surfaced
And levelled
When it is planted,
When it is brightened--
Heaven
And earth.
But there can be no adoration
Or glorification
Of what we have formed,
What we have shaped,
Until we have created a human form,
A human shape," so they said.
So then this the earth was created by them.
Only their word was the creation of it.
To create the earth, "Earth," they said.
--Munro Edmonson
{32}
Version 3:
This is the account, here it is:
Now it still ripples, now it still murmurs,
ripples. it still sighs, still hums, and it is empty under the sky.
Here follow the first words, the first
eloquence:
There is not yet one person, one animal, bird,
fish, crab, tree, rock, hollow, canyon, meadow, forest. Only the sky alone is there; the face of the
earth is not clear. Only the sea alone is pooled under all the sky; there is nothing whatever
gathered together. It is at rest; not a single thing stirs. It
is held back, kept at rest under the sky.
Whatever there is that might be is simply not
there: only the pooled water, only the calm sea, only it alone is pooled.
Whatever might be is simply not there: only
murmurs, ripples in the dark, in the night. Only the Maker, Modeler alone, Sovereign Plumed
Serpent, the Bearers, Begetters are in the water, a glittering light. They are there, they are
enclosed in quetzal feathers, in blue-green.
Thus the name, "Plumed Serpent." They are
great knowers, great thinkers in their very being.
And of course there is the sky, and there is
also the Heart of Sky. This is the name of the god, as it is spoken.
And then came his word, he came here to the
Sovereign Plumed Serpent, here in the blackness, in the early dawn. He spoke with the
Sovereign Plumed Serpent, and they talked, then they thought, then they worried. They agreed
with each other, they joined their words, their
thoughts. Then it was clear, then they reached accord in the light, and then humanity was clear,
when they conceived the growth, the generation of
trees, of bushes, and the growth of life, of humankind, in the blackness, in the early dawn, all
because of the Heart of Sky, named Hurricane.
Thunderbolt Hurricane comes first, the second is Newborn Thunderbolt, and the third is Raw
Thunderbolt.
So there were three of them, as Heart of Sky,
who came to the Sovereign Plumed Serpent, when the dawn of life was conceived:
"How should it be sown, how should it
dawn? Who is to be the provider, nurturer?"
"Let it be this way, think about it: this water
should be removed, emptied out for the formation of the earth's own plate and platform, then
comes the sowing, the dawning of earth. But there will be no high days and no bright praise for
our work, our design, until the rise of the human
work, the human design," they said.
And then the earth arose because of them, it
was simply their word that brought it forth. For the forming of the earth they said "Earth." It
arose
suddenly, just like a cloud, like a mist, now forming, unfolding. Then the mountains were
separated from the water, all at once the great mountains
came forth. By their genius alone, by their cutting edge alone they carried out the conception of
the mountain-plain whose face grew instant groves
of cypress and pine.
--Dennis Tedlock
{33}
WORKS CITED
Astrov, Margot. The Winged Serpent: American Indian Prose and Poetry. 1946. New York: Capricorn Books, l962.
Bassnett-McGuire, Susan. Translation Studies. London and New York: Methuen, 1990.
Benjamin, Walter. Illuminations: Essays and Reflections. Trans. Harry Zohn. New York: Schocken Books, 1969.
Belloc, Hilaire. "On Translation." Selected Essays by Hilaire Belloc. Ed. John Edward Dineen. Philadelphia and London: J. B. Lippincott, 1936. 281-89.
Brasseur de Bourbourg, Charles Etienne. Popol Vuh: Le livre sacré et les mythes de l'antiquité americaine. Paris: 1861.
Burns, Allan. An Epoch of Miracles: Oral Literature of the Yucatec Maya. Austin: U of Texas P, 1983.
Coe, Michael D. The Maya, 4th ed. London: Thames and Hudson Ltd, 1967.
Derrida, Jacques. The Ear of the Other: Otobiography, Transference, Translation. New York: Schocken Books, 1985.
Edmonson, Munro S., trans. The Book of Counsel: The Popol Vuh of the Quiché Maya of Guatemala. New Orleans: Tulane U P, 1971.
------. Lore: An Introduction to the Science of Folklore and Literature. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1971.
Fenton, William N. "Fieldwork, Museum Studies, and Ethnohistorical Research." Ethnohistory 13 (1965): 71-85.
Guthrie, Kenneth S., trans. "The Popol Vuh or Book of the Holy Assembly." The Word 4-8 (1905-1907).
Helps, Sir Arthur. The Spanish Conquest. 4 vols. London: 1855-61.
Himelbau, Jack. Quiché Worlds in Creation: The Popol Vuh as a Narrative Work. Culver City, CA: Labyrinthos, 1989.
Jakobson, Roman. "On Linguistic Aspects of Translation." On Translation. Ed. R.A. Brower. Cambridge: Harvard U P, 1959.
de Landa, Fr. Diego. Yucatan: Before and After the Conquest. Trans. William Gates. New York: Dover Publications, Inc., 1978.
Leon-Portilla, Miguel. Literaturas de Mesoamerica. Mexico: Secretaria de Educacion Publica, 1984.
------. Pre-Columbian Literatures of Mexico. Norman: U of Oklahoma P, 1969.
McClear, Margaret. "Popol Vuh: Structure and Meaning." Thesis St. Louis University, 1970.
Nelson, Ralph. Popol Vuh: The Great Mythological Book of the Ancient Maya. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1974.
Ong, Walter. Orality and Literacy: The Technologizing of the Word. London and New York: Methuen, 1962.
{34}
Ortiz, Alfonso. "Problems of Translation in Oral Narratives." Lecture. NEH Summer Institute.
Newberry Library, Chicago, 22 June 1990.
Paz, Octavio. Traducción: Literatura y Literalidad. Barcelona: Tusquets Editor, 1971.
Recinos, Adrián, Delia Goetz, and Sylvanus G. Morley, trans. Popol Vuh: The Sacred Book of the Ancient Quiché Mayas. Norman: U of Oklahoma P, 1950.
Sahagun, Fr. Bernardino de. Historia General de las Cosas de Nueva España. 3 vols. Mexico: 1829.
Snell-Hornby, Mary. Translation Studies: An Integrated Approach. Amsterdam and Philadelphia: John Benjamins Pub. Co., 1988.
Spence, Lewis. Atlantis in America. London: E. Benn, 1925.
------. An Introduction to Mythology. London: G.G. Harrap, 1921.
------. The Popol Vuh: The Mythic and Heroic Sagas of the Kiches of Central America. London, 1908.
Tedlock, Barbara. "The Nature of Time Among the Highland Maya." Lecture. NEH Summer Institute. Newberry Library, Chicago, 26 June 1990.
Tedlock, Dennis. Finding the Center: Narrative Poetry of the Zuñi Indians. New York: Dial, 1972.
------, trans. Popol Vuh: The Definitive Edition of the Mayan Book of the Dawn of Life and the Glories of Gods and Kings. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1985.
------. "Reading the Popol Vuh over the Shoulder of a Diviner and Finding Out What's So Funny." Conjunctions 3 (1982): 176-85.
------. The Spoken Word and the Work of Interpretation. Philadelphia: U of Pennsylvania P, 1983.
------. "Walking the World of the Popol Vuh." Recovering the Word: Essays on Native American Literature. Ed. Arnold Krupat and Brian Swann. Berkeley: U of California P, 1987. 469-97.
{35}
"HONORATISSIMI BENEFACTORES":
NATIVE AMERICAN STUDENTS AND TWO
SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY TEXTS IN THE UNIVERSITY
TRADITION
Wolfgang Hochbruck and Beatrix Dudensing-Reichel
Some of the earliest literary texts written
in European languages by Native American authors were written in the
17th century by students at Harvard's Indian College.1 The fact that they were
written in Latin and Greek, the
languages of University education, as well as their limited accessibility,2
probably explains why these pieces have so
far received next to no critical attention.3 Two texts by Harvard Indian students
have survived. The main purpose of
this article is to reprint them together with approximate translations as well as observations on
the form, structure, and
grammaticality of the texts and their background in literary tradition. In addition, the problem of
their authorship will
be discussed. Finally, an attempt will be made to position them historically and ideologically
within the context of
17th century colonial discourse.
In 1656, some twenty years after its
foundation, Harvard College incorporated the first institution of higher
education for the aboriginal population in the English colonies. The aim of the "Indian
College"4 was the education of
Indian youths who appeared to be promising proselytes and who could later propagate the gospel
as well as European
civilization among their tribes. In this the Puritans were following the example of the Spanish
colonizers, whose
attempts at training Native Americans as teachers and preachers, however, proved more
successful. The comparable
success of the Spanish (and, to a lesser degree, the French Jesuits) can be attributed to their
relative flexibility in
regard to their students' needs and wants. They shaped their training accordingly, whereas the
Puritans, utterly
convinced of the singular rightfulness of their ways and methods, made their Indian students
adhere to the same rigid
code to which they subjected themselves.5 What awaited the student at Harvard
becomes apparent from the 1665 code
of College Laws:
In the first yeare after admission for four dayes of the weeke all Students shall be exercised in the Study of the Greeke and Hebrew Tongues, onely beginning Logicke in the Morning towardes the latter end of the yeare unlesse the Tutor shall see Cause by reason of their ripenesse in the Languages to read Logicke sooner. Also they shall spend the second yeare in Logicke with the exercise of the former Languages, and the third yeare in the principles of Ethickes and the fourth in metaphisicks and Mathematicks still {36} carrying on their former studies of the weeke for Rhetoricke, Oratory and Divinity.6
Descriptions of the College and the number of its students given in the primary and secondary sources vary.7 Apparently only a small number of Indian students attended regularly, and few of those lived to tell the tale. The unfamiliar system of education as well as the living conditions and the diet appear to have taken a deadly toll. Of those who did not fall victim to disease, at least two were murdered,8 and "only one Indian, Caleb Cheeshateaumuck, class of 1665, completed the four year program."9
I. Caleb Cheeshateaumauk: "Honoratissimi Benefactores"
(1663)
Walter Meserve, probably following Drake's
Biography and History of the Indians of North America (1834),
spells the name of this Indian College graduate "Chaesahteaumuk." Meserve believed that the
piece of writing in the
archive of the Royal Society, London, was the Indian's "graduation address to his `most honored
benefactors,' written
and delivered in Latin."10 The single paragraph on Caleb
Cheeshateaumauk11 in Meserve's article served as an
unquestioned basis for information for scholars up to the present. To quote just one example,
Andrew Wiget writes:
"Caleb Chaesahteamuk [sic], a Natick and the first Native American college graduate, was fluent
in English, Hebrew,
Greek, and Latin when he gave his 1665 Harvard commencement address in the latter
tongue."12
Unfortunately, most of this is assumption. In
fact, John Winthrop the Younger sent Cheeshateaumauk's
"Honoratissimi Benefactores" to Robert Boyle, "together with a similar piece by another
American Indian whose
Christian name was Joel."13
To Robert Boyle, whose purview embraced
both the Royal Society and the Propagation of the Gospel, he
forwarded two papers in Latin, warranted the work of two young aboriginals, who had been
Hebraically redesignated
Joel and Caleb and enrolled at Harvard. Winthrop had been so impressed (as he seldom was by
Indians) that he
wondered if the Royal Society might not be interested also.14
The date and contents of the letter provide
two important pieces of information which suggest that
"Honoratissimi Benefactores" was not written or even intended as a graduation address. The
`Joel' to whom Winthrop
refers must have been Joel Hiacoomes or "Iacoomis as he signs himself on a fly-leaf of a
Comenius Janua
Linguarum."15 He and Caleb were in the same class, but Joel was killed
before his graduation.16 More conclusive is
the date on the letter: according to the {37} Harvard
records Caleb graduated in 1665 whereas Winthrop's letter is
dated November 3rd, 1663. Not many students write their graduation address two years in
advance, and it becomes
obvious that in conjunction with Winthrop's letter the text was meant to be an address expressing
appreciation and
gratitude towards persons like Boyle, who raised and donated funds for the education of the
Indian students and were
in a very economical sense "Honoratissimi Benefactores."
The manuscript attributed to Cheeshateaumauk17 reads as follows:
Honoratissimi Benefactores
Referunt historici de Orpheo musico et insigni Poeta quod ab Appolline Lyram acceperit eaque tantum valuerit, ut illius Cantu sylvas saxumque moverit et Arbores ingentes post se traxerit, ferasque ferocissimas mitiores rediderit imo, quod accepta Lyrâ ad inferos descenderit et Plutonem et Proserpinam suo carmine demulserit, et Eurydicen uxorem ab inferis ad superos evexerit: Hoc symbolum esse statuunt Philosophi Antiquissimi, ut ostendant quod tanta et vis et virtus doctrinae et politioris literaturae ad mutandum Barborum Ingenium: qui sunt tanquam arbores, saxa, et bruta animantia: et eorum quasi matephorisin efficiendam, eosque tanquam Tigres Cicurandos et post se trahendos.
Deus vos delegit esse patronos nostros, et cum omni sapientiâ intimâque Commiseratione vos ornavit, ut nobis paganis salutiferam opem feratis, qui vitam progeniemque a majoribus nostris ducebamus, tam animo quam corporeque nudi fuimus, et ab omni humanitate alieni fuimus, in deserto huc et illuc variisque erroribus ducti fuim[us].
O terque quaterque ornatissimi, amantissimique viri, quas quantasque quam maximas, immensasque gratias vobis tribuamus: eo quod omnium rerum Copiam nobis suppetitaveritis propter educationem nostram, et ad sustentationem corporum nostrorum: immensas maximasque expensas effudistis.
Et praecipuè quas quantasque, Gratias Deo Opt.[imo] M[a]x.[imo] dabimus qui sanctas scripturas nobis revelavit, Dominumque Jesum Christum nobis demonstravit, qui est via veritatis et vitae. Praeter haec omnia, per viscera miserecordiae divinae, aliqua spes relicta sit, ut instrumenta fiamus, ad declarandum et propogandum evangelium Cognatis nostris Conterraneisque: ut illi etiam Deum Cognoscant: et Christum.
Quamvis non posumus par pari redere vobis, reliquisque Benefactoribus nostris, veruntamen speramus. nos non defuturos apud Deum supplicationibus importunis exorare pro illis pijs miserecordibus viris, qui supersunt in vetere Angliâ, qui pro nobis tantam vim auri, argentique effuderunt ad salutem animarum nostrarum procurandam et pro vobis etiam, qui instrumenta, et quasi aquae ductus fuistis omnia ista beneficentia nobis Conferendi.
Vestre Dignitati devotissimus: Caleb Cheeshateaumauk
{38}
The Latin text contains several minor
grammatical mistakes. Some are spelling errors; e.g. "posumus," "redere,"
"miserecordibus," "propogandum," "veruntamen," and, repeatedly, "tanquam" instead of
possumus, reddere,
misericordibus, propagandum, verumtamen, and tamquam. In "Barborum"
the second syllable to spell Barbarorum
was omitted. A problematic spelling is "Tigres Cicurandos" (obviously not
Citurandos as Morison has it), for
cicurare is a Latin word very rarely used. The only source that Cheeshateaumauk
could have known is Varro, De
Lingua Latina, 7, 91. The meaning, however, is the same as in securare, so
"Cicurandos," if not from Varro, could be
a misspelling (substitution of "c" for "s" can occasionally be found in Puritan texts) or the word
was misheard--which
would imply that the text was dictated. This could also account for the other spelling mistakes in
the text.
The most puzzling phrase in the manuscript
is "quasi matephorisin efficiendam" near the end of the first
paragraph. Along with Latin, Greek was part of the curriculum at Harvard, and the author of the
text obviously meant
to include here a word borrowed from the Greek, probably metamorphosis--which
would make sense. Winthrop told
Boyle that he "had questioned the Indians in Latin and received good answers in the same
language, and heard them
both express several sentences in Greek also."18 If one of the two Indian students
actually spoke Greek, it certainly
wasn't Cheeshateaumauk. In order to mistake metamorphosis so as to spell
something like `metaphorisin' the author
cannot have been too familiar with Greek. To use a word and not be able to spell it at all would
again indicate that the
text may have been dictated rather than composed in written form. This possibility will be
considered again later on.
In English, the text reads approximately as
follows:
Most honored benefactors,
Historians tell about Orpheus the musician and outstanding poet, that he received a lyre from Apollo, and that he was so excellent on it that the forests and the rocks were moved by his song. He made huge trees follow behind him, and indeed rendered the most ferocious beasts tamer. Because of the lyre he accepted, he descended into the nether world, lulled Pluto and Proserpina with his song and led Eurydice, his wife, out of the nether world into the upper world. The ancient philosophers state that this serves as a symbol to show how powerful the force and virtue of education and of refined literature are in the transformation of the barbarians' nature. They are like the trees, the rocks, and the brute beasts, and a substantial change (metamorphosis) has to be effected on them. They have to be secured like tigers and {39} must be induced to follow.
The Lord delegated you to be our patrons, and he endowed you with all wisdom and intimate compassion, so that you may perform the work of bringing blessing to us pagans, who derive our life and origin from our forebears. We were naked in our souls as well as in our bodies, we were aliens from all humanity, and we were led around in the desert by various errors.
Oh threefold and fourfold most illustrious and most loving men, what kind of thanks, if not the greatest and most immense, should we give to you, for that you have supported us with an abundance of all things for our education and for the sustenance of our bodies. You have poured forth immense, the greatest, resources.
And we will especially give great thanks to God the most excellent and highest, who has revealed the sacred scriptures to us, and who has shown to us our Lord Jesus Christ, who is the way of truth and of life. Besides all this, another hope has been left us through the depths of divine mercy: that we may be instruments to spread and propagate the gospel among our kin and neighbours, so that they also may know the Lord and Christ.
Even though we can not commensurately reciprocate your kindness and that of our other benefactors, we do hope, however. We are not left alone praying before the Lord with importunate supplications for those pious and merciful men who are still in the old England, who disbursed so much gold and silver for us to obtain the salvation of our souls, and for you as well, who were instruments like aquaeducts in bestowing all these benefits on us.
Most devoted to your dignity: Caleb Cheeshateaumauk
The five paragraphs of the letter can be roughly divided into two parts. The first part
compares certain aspects of the
Orpheus myth to the present situation of the students; the second part, following up this
demonstration of learnedness,
is an expression of gratitude to the benefactors combined with a tribute of thanks to the Lord and
Christ. The use of
the Orpheus myth is of particular interest both for its function as a documentation of scholastic
achievements and for
the way in which a classical myth was coopted to the needs of the author. During the Middle
Ages and the
Renaissance, respectively, Orpheus had been interpreted as the unhappy lover and as a bringer of
humanism. The
Orpheus figure in this text accesses an older tradition; the figure combines the classical position
in which Orpheus
acts as a bringer of civilization with the typical early Christian topos in which Orpheus plays the
similar role of priest
and harbinger of Christianity.19 Logically enough, this Christian interpretation
specifically omits the loss of Eurydice
and the final failure of Orpheus' rescue attempt, and {40} concentrates on the poet's ability to transform the spirits of
nature and its inhabitants. The analogies the author draws are obvious: the teachers and, for the
purpose of this letter,
the financial donors like Boyle are likened to Orpheus; their efforts and missionary work to the
lyre; and, lastly, the
wildness of the stones, forests and animals to the savageness of nature's human inhabitants,
among which were the
Indian students themselves. This analogy between Indian students and "bruta animantia" is not,
as it may initially
appear, a Puritan device comparable to Cotton Mather's dictum about an Indian who warned his
tribesmen against
attacking the colony: "Thus was the tongue of a dog made useful to a feeble and sickly
Lazarus."20 Within the text of
"Honoratissimi Benefactores," "Philosophi Antiquissimi" are given as a source of this
interpretation. More probably
the author drew from the so-called Fathers, notably Clement of Alexandria and Eusebius:
Clement was the first who
dared to typify Christ through the Orpheus figure of Greek mythology,21 while
Eusebius considered Christian man an
instrument like Orpheus' lyre to pacify the fierce and angry passions of the
barbarians.22 The curriculum at Harvard
explicitly contained the study of "theology . . . from the sources: the Bible, the Fathers, and the
great commentators,"23
so Cheeshateaumauk would have been exposed to Clement and Eusebius.
Other passages and formulae in the text can
also be traced to classical and biblical sources: "terque quaterque"
with or without the "O" is used by Vergil on four occasions in the Aeneid, and "via
veritatis et vitae" is obviously
biblical (John, 14:6). All of these references serve the same purpose as the text itself: they exhibit
the capacities and
achievements of the Indian student and convey to financiers like Boyle that their donations were
productively
invested.
II. Eleazar: "In obitum Viri verè Reverendi D. Thomae Thacheri"
(1679)
The other surviving text by a Native
American Harvard student is a reverence to his late teacher Thomas
Thacher.24 It is written in a classical form: an elegy in Latin distichs with the
four closing lines in Greek. Cotton
Mather used this poem as an epitaph for Thacher in the third book of his Magnalia Christi
Americana, which contains
biographical essays on a number of New England priests and preachers. Introducing the poem,
Mather writes:
An epitaph must now be sought for this Worthy Man. And because the Nation and the Quality of the Author, will make the Composure to become a Curiosity, I will here, for an Epitaph insert an Elegy, which was composed upon this Occasion, by an Indian Youth, who was then Student of {41} Harvard Colledge. (His name was, Eleazar.)
In obitum Viri verè Reverendi
D. Thomae Thacheri
Qui Ad
Dom. ex hâc Vitâ migravit, 18.8.1678
Tentabo Illustrem, tristi memorare dolore
Quem Lacrymis repetunt Tempora, nostra, Virum.
Memnona sic Mater, Mater ploravit Achillem,
Justis cum Lacrymis, cumque Dolore gravi
Mens stupet, ora silent, justum nunc palmo recusat
Officium: Quid? Opem Tristis Apollo negat?
Ast Thachere Tuus conabor dicere laudes
Laudes Virtutis, quae super Astra volat.
Consultis Rerum Dominis, Gentique togatae
Nota fuit virtus, ac tua Sancta Fides.
Vivis post Funus; Faelix post Fata; Jaces Tu?
Sed Stellas inter Gloria nempe Jaces
Mens Tua jam caelos repetit; Victoria parta est:
Iam Tuus est Christus, quod meruitque tuum.
Hic Finis Crucis; magnorum haec meta malorum;
Ulterius non quo progrediatur erit.
Crux jam cassa manes; requiescunt ossa Sepulchro;
Mors moritur; Vitae Vita Beata redit
Quum tuba per Densas sonitum dabit ultima Nubes,
Cum Domino Rediens Ferrea Sceptra geres.
Caeles tum scandes, ubi Patria Vero piorum
Praevius hanc patriam nunc tibi Jesus adit.
Illic vera Quies; illic sine fine voluptas;
Gaudia & Humanis non referenda sonis
' , ' ' ' ,
'{Greek}
' , ,
' .
Training in the Greek classics appears to
have improved between 1663 and 1679. A mistake like
Cheeshateaumauk's ominous "matephorisin" is not repeated. The form "{Greek}" should read "{Greek}," but
"{Greek}" as a poetic sub-form can be found in Homer's
Iliad 18:23 and in Theocritus 24:93. The orthographical
mistakes ("palmo," "vero" instead of palma and vera) in a text revised
by Cotton Mather are surprising, but could be
attributed to the printer.
Translation:26
On the death of that truly venerable man/ D.Thomas Thacher/ who/ went to the Lord from this life, 18.8.1678
{42}
I seek to commemorate this illustrious man with sad grief,/ Whom our times reclaim with tears, this man./ Thus Memnon's mother, thus the mother wept for Achilles/ with justified tears, and with grieving pain/ the mind is stunned, the mouth silent. Now the hand refuses its proper/ service: What? Grieving Apollo refuses his help?/ Nonetheless, Thacher, I, one of yours,27 will try to speak praise/ praise of virtue, which ascends higher than the stars./ To the men of high learning, and to the people of standing28/ your virtue was known, also your holy faith./ You live after the funeral, happy after fate; you lie [dead?]/ But among the stars you lie indeed as glory/ your spirit already returns to the heavens; victory has been achieved:/ Yours already is Christ, yours what he merited/ Here is the end of the cross [of life's sorrow]; here the end of great evil;/ Further than that there is nowhere whence he could proceed./ You, cross, already stand empty; the bones rest in the grave;/ death dies; Blessed life returns to life/ when the last trumpet will send its sound through the dense clouds./ With the Lord returning, you bear iron sceptres./ Then you will ascend into the skies,29 where the home of the truly pious is/ Jesus precedes you now on the way to this homeland./ There is true rest, there is delight without end;/ joys human voices cannot describe.
Dust receives your corpse, but your name will never perish on earth, famous in our own and in future times; and the spirit, flying from your limbs, climbs up to steep heaven, immortal, mingling with immortal spirits.
The name of the author is given as "Eleazar Judus Senior Sophista."30 Although the text is far from being a masterpiece, form and meter are rather regular. As in "Honoratissimi Benefactores" some passages evoke classical models. In this poem, these allusions serve the same purpose as in Cheeshateaumauk's letter, i.e., to demonstrate learnedness. The results are sometimes puzzling. For example: the third line is a direct quotation from Ovid, Amores IX, 1. The Amores seem an unlikely text for a Puritan school, and they certainly are not exactly appropriate for use in an obituary elegy. Also, Cheeshateaumauk's use of Orpheus as mythological intertext seems more fitting than Eleazar's use of the warriors Memnon and Achilles of Homeric tradition in an eulogy on a man of the cloth. An interesting parallel emerges, though, in that both texts operate along a similar model. Eleazar, like Caleb, begins his text with an allusion to Greek mythology and then switches to biblical motifs, concentrating on aspects of salvation.
III. Indian students and the question of authorship
Eleazar's poem was edited for reprint. This
raises the question of {43} authorship again: could both
texts
discussed in this article possibly have been designed, dictated, or even written by somebody other
than the signed
authors? The answer is yes, possibly, but the problem cannot be solved easily, if at
all. As was said before,
"Honoratissimi Benefactores" bears some traces indicating that the text may have been dictated.
In his letter to Boyle,
John Winthrop, Junior, claimed that Caleb Cheeshateaumauk and Joel Hiacoomes wrote "with
their owne hands,"31
which does not necessarily imply that the texts were their own idea, even though this may be
pushing the argument
too far.
On the whole, it would not come as a
surprise if the texts by Cheeshateaumauk and Hiacoomes (the latter of
which was lost) were falsifications. Both texts were expressions of gratitude for received
funding, and when it came
to fund-raising campaigns, the Puritans showed remarkably little hesitation to make the end
justify the means. The
seal of the colony, depicting an Indian saying "Come Over and Help Us," was adopted for the
sole purpose of
instigating additional funding.32 If fundraising was the purpose of Winthrop's
letter, the effort was successful, for
Boyle not only supported missions among the Indians during his lifetime but also willed the
substantial amount of
ú5400 to pious and charitable uses--money that went into "a school for Indians at Virginia's new
college."33 There is
more reason to be sceptical. Some Puritan officials apparently took a rather selective position
when it came to
preserving documents relating to Indian affairs:
. . . one can say with confidence that the interpretations provided in Winthrop's History are unlikely to be accurate representations of the vanished texts. . . . Winthrop probably rewrote the substance of the Indian treaties to meet the Puritans' political and ideological needs, and then he or a devoted descendant destroyed the originals.34
Even though Francis Jennings concedes
that "the case cannot be proved because the essential evidence is gone,"
he presents a strong argument that John Winthrop Senior falsified records. Jennings
records another occasion when
John Eliot, the famous missionary, tried to conceal that he had attempted to take the credit for
missionary efforts that
were not his and made some changes in an application for funds, writing that "`his earlier
statement had a great (I)
redundant which maketh the sence untrue,' brightly adding that everything would read quite
accurately if only the
name of the Indian Hiacoomes was substituted for the first person singular pronoun that Eliot has
used as the subject
of his credit-grabbing sentence." Jennings goes on to remark that "this must be the only time that
the term redundant
has been used {44} to mean
`substituted.'"35 The aim was to gain money: "Winslow used Eliot's letters,
including the
`I-Hiacoomes' one, to win Parliament's authorization for a nationwide collection of missionary
funds, and the New
England Company was established to transmit the funds to Eliot's mission."36 All
this may serve to illustrate why the
authorship of Cheeshateaumauk and Hiacoomes must be seen as doubtful. If a "substitution" like
the one described
above happened once, why not twice? This is after all obviously the same Joel Hiacoomes whose
letter went via
Winthrop to Boyle.
On the other hand, none of this can
conclusively prove that Cheeshateaumauk and Eleazar were not the authors
of the respective texts attributed to them. To discount their authorship on the basis of the
ideological content of the
texts is not possible. As a matter of fact missionary zealots like Eliot and Winthrop would not
have needed to dictate
or falsify their students' literary efforts. These young Indians were educated under a system which
aimed at the erasure
of their tribal identities. If the system was effective, the results were texts like "Honoratissimi
Benefactores"--self-deprecating and abounding in exuberant praise for the "benefactors."
From the perspective of those of their
contemporaries who adhered to the traditional beliefs and values, the
Indian students had forsaken their cultural identity.37 "The Indian who embraced
Christianity was compelled, in effect,
to commit cultural suicide. He was required to renounce not only his own personal past, but that
of his forefathers as
well, forsaking--and despising--all traditional beliefs."38 The position held by the
Indian students was at best one
between the cultures. As authors, however, Joel, Caleb, and Eleazar even became contributors to
the Puritan colonial
master narrative and could be used as part of the colonial discourse.39 To try to
ascribe undercurrents of traditional
meaning to these works does not make sense.
Within the context of an incipient literature
written by Native Americans, the Harvard Indian college for several
reasons turned out to be a dead-end road. One reason is, of course, that the most promising
students died
prematurely--Joel Hiacoomes, as stated before, was murdered; Eleazar died shortly before his
graduation; and Caleb
survived his graduation to live just one more year--and the school itself was abandoned after
King Philip's war.
Secondly, Latin and Greek were rapidly going out of use as the standard languages of education.
Assimilationist
sentiments, however, remained the rule rather than the exception with early Native American
texts well into the 19th
century.
{45}
NOTES
1The authors are grateful to Prof. Dr. Paul G. Schmidt, specialist for mediaeval Latin at Freiburg University, for his help with the texts discussed in this article, also to E. Stein, and especially to Beth Satre for her comments and the revision of the manuscript. The authors take responsibility for any remaining mistakes.
2After most of the research for this article had been completed the authors obtained a copy of Samuel G. Morison, Harvard College in the Seventeenth Century, Vol. 1, Cambridge: Harvard UP 1936, and found that it contained on p. 355 one of the texts the authors had assumed to be unpublished. The one-page manuscript, starting `Honoratissimi Benefactores' and signed `Caleb Cheeshateaumauk,' is in the Boyle correspondence (BL 2.12) in the archive of the Royal Society, London.
3Walter T. Meserve, "English Works of Seventeenth-Century Indians," American Quarterly, 8, 1956, 264-76, focused on English texts of the period.
4Gert Raeithel, Geschichte der nordamerikanischen Kultur, Vol. l: Vom Puritanismus bis zum Bürgerkrieg, Weinheim/Berlin: Quadriga, 1987, p. 98.
5Cf. James Axtell, The European and the Indian. Essays in the Ethnohistory of Colonial North America, New York/Oxford: Oxford UP, 1981, p. 66.
6Laws as set by President Charles Chauncey, quoted after Morison, Harvard College in the 17th C., p. 144f.
7Cf. e.g., Francis Jennings, The Invasion of America: Indians, Colonialism, and the Cant of Conquest, Chapel Hill: U of North Carolina P, 1975, p. 247f.; Neal Salisbury, "Red Puritans: The `Praying Indians' of Massachusetts Bay and John Eliot," William and Mary Quarterly, 31, 1974, 27-54, p. 46f. The most extensive and probably the most reliable account is to be found in Morison, Harvard in the 17th C., pp. 342ff.
8For more detailed accounts see Morison, pp. 352ff.; James Axtell, The Invasion Within. The Contest of Cultures in Colonial North America, New York/Oxford: Oxford UP, 1985, pp. 182ff.; Alden T. Vaughan, New England Frontier. Puritans and Indians 1620-1675, Boston/Toronto: Little, Brown, 1965, pp. 282ff.
9Vaughan, New England Frontier, p. 284. In a recent article Margaret C. Szasz and Carmelita Ryan have claimed that "two (Joel Hiacoomes and Caleb Cheeshahteaumuck) completed their education," but all sources and data available to the authors indicate that in fact only the latter graduated. Szasz/Ryan, "American Indian Education," in Wilcomb Washburn, ed., History of Indian-White Relations (William Sturtevant, ed., Handbook of the American Indian, Vol. 4), 284-300, p. 286.
10Meserve, "English Works of Seventeenth-Century Indians," p. 264.
11This is the spelling of the name on the manuscript, which therefore will be used in this article.
{46}
12Andrew Wiget,
Native American Literature, Boston: Twayne, 1985, pp. 48-49.
13Alan J. Clark, Deputy Librarian, The Royal Society, London; letter to W.H., 16.5.1989. The letter by Joel (Hiacoomes) has not survived (letter to W.H., 7.3.1991). We are grateful to Mr. Clark, who not only provided a copy of the manuscript but also added information both helpful and enlightening to our task.
14Robert C. Black III, The Younger John Winthrop, New York/London: Columbia UP, 1966, pp. 307-08.
15Morison, Harvard in the 17th C., p. 354.
16He survived a shipwreck off the coast of Massachusetts only to be murdered by local Indians; ibid., p. 356; Meserve, "English Works," p. 274.
17This is a transcript of the original manuscript. The version printed in Morison, p. 355, does contain several mistakes corrected here.
18Louis B. Wright, The Cultural Life of the American Colonies, 1607- 1763, New York: Harper & Brothers, 1957, p. 117; see also Morison, Harvard in the 17th C., p. 354.
19Cf. the article on "Orpheus" in Elizabeth Frenzel, Stoffe der Weltliteratur, Stuttgart: Kröner, 1983, pp. 573-79; also Emmet Robbins, "Famous Orpheus," in John Warden, ed., Orpheus. A Metamorphosis of a Myth, Toronto: U of Toronto P, 1982, pp. 3-23.
20C. Mather, Magnalia Christi Americana (1702), quoted after Elemire Zolla, The Writer and the Shaman, New York, 1973, p. 35.
21Eleanor Irwin, "The New Song of Orpheus and the New Song of Christ," in Warden, Orpheus, pp. 51-62, p.51.
22Ibid., p. 56.
23Morison, Harvard College in the 17th C., p. 276.
24Reverend Thomas Thacher, *1.5.1620, came to Boston in 1635.
25Cotton Mather, Magnalia Christi Americana, or the Ecclesiastical History of New-England, London: Parkhurst, 1702, Vol. III, p. 153.
26An early English rendition of this poem by a "Philo Muses" in the American Magazine & Historical Chronicle not only changes the meter into (rather badly rhyming) heroic couplets but deletes the Greek part. Instead of the original 28 lines the poem is almost doubled in size (50 lines). For example: the first two lines turn into: "While weeping Friends around thy Funeral mourn/ And pay their last sad Honours to thine Urn/ The Muse officious to attend the Hearse/ Offers her Tribute in Elegiac Verse." "Philo Muses," "Poetical Essays," American Magazine & Historical Chronicle, 1, 1743/44, 166-70, p. 166.
27The original possibly had "tuas," to read "your praise."
{47}
28The phrase
consultus iuris, "knowledgeable in matters of law," is common; "rerum" sounds a
bit awkward. "Gentique togatae" could also
mean "ordained people."
29Probably "caelos."
30And not "Indus" as Morison writes in Harvard College in the 17th C., p. 196.
31Ibid., p. 354
32Axtell, The Invasion Within, p. 134.
33Ibid., p. l90.
34Jennings, The Invasion of America, p. 182.
35Francis Jennings, "Goals and Functions of Puritan Missions to the Indians," Ethnohistory, 18, 1971, 197-212, p. 208.
36Ibid., p. 209.
37The voices of some traditionalists and dissenters are also preserved in, for example, John Eliot's Indian Dialogues, in Roger Williams' Key into the Language of America, and in the Jesuit Relations. Eliot and Williams present typical dialogues with obstinate Indians in order to equip fellow missionaries and teachers with material against possible questions from their students and congregations, and the Jesuits document many cases of Indians defending their traditions with skill and cunning. For more detail, cf. James P. Ronda, "`We Are Well As We Are': An Indian Critique of Seventeenth-Century Christian Missions," William and Mary Quarterly, 34, 1977, 66-82.
38Ibid., p. 67.
39The first Native American author who successfully used English for his own purposes (and personal advantage) rather than for the aims pursued by his instructors was also the only Harvard student to survive longer; one "John Wompow-ess" or "Wampus" (also Wompas and Wampas), who changed professions several times during his life and, after King Philip's war, was in jail for debt. In this situation he used his freshman English to write a "`humble Peticion . . . to the King's most excellent Majesty,' . . . praying his gracious Sovereign to issue a royal command to `Sir John Leveritt Knight Governor of Massij Chussit Bay' that he be released forthwith." Morison, Harvard College in the 17th C., pp. 356-57.
{48}
"PRAY SIR, CONSIDER A LITTLE":
RITUALS OF SUBORDINATION AND STRATEGIES OF
RESISTANCE IN THE LETTERS OF
HEZEKIAH CALVIN AND DAVID FOWLER TO ELEAZAR
WHEELOCK, 1764-1768
Laura Murray
The most wise, righteous, and gracious God doth oftentimes leave for a season his own children to manifold temptations, and the corruptions of their own hearts, to chastise them for their former sins, or to discover unto them the hidden strength of corruption, and deceitfulness of their hearts, that they may be humbled; and to raise them to a more close and constant dependence for their support upon himself, and to make them more watchful against all future occasions of sin, and for sundry other just and holy ends.
Church of Scotland, The Confession of Faith, 1756
...the best way in which the master can serve his own interests is to work away, day in, day out, with constant care and attention, weaving the ethical and affective, as well as economic, bonds which durably tie his khammes to him . . . if the master wants to persuade the khammes to devote himself over a long period to the pursuit of the master's interests, he has to associate him completely with those interests, masking the dyssymetry of the relationship by symbolically denying it in his behaviour. The khammes is the man to whom one entrusts one's goods, one's house, and one's honour. . . . And just as [the khammes] never feels entirely freed from his obligations towards his former master, so, after what he calls a `change of heart' he may accuse his master of `treachery' in abandoning someone he had `adopted.'
Pierre Bourdieu, Outline of a Theory of Practice, 1977
I
In 1754, Eleazar Wheelock opened his
Indian Charity-School in Lebanon, Connecticut, with the goal of
educating Indians to be missionaries and schoolteachers among their own people. He began with
an endowment of
land and a couple of buildings, two small Delaware boys for students, and unbounded optimism.
Not only did he
expect Indians from various tribes and of various ages to be amenable to religious, linguistic, and
cultural conversion,
but, as he explains in his Plain and Faithful Narrative of the Indian Charity-School,
he expected that training these
Indians in obedience and humility would both fulfill his duty to God and the King, and reduce
Indian violence against
English settlers. In the same narrative, the first of several accounts of the school written for
fundraising purposes,
Wheelock also {49} justifies his idea of educating Indian
men rather than white men to be missionaries:1 Indians do
not trust the English, he reminds his patrons, but they will trust other Indians. Furthermore, he
claims that Indian
missionaries cost less, will be more culturally compatible, will not "scorn to be advised or
reproved" by their
superiors, and will not need interpreters (15-23).
Like other white educators of Native peoples
before him and since, Wheelock believed that he had to remove
Indian students from their families in order to "cure them of such savage and sordid Practices, as
they have been
inured to from their Mother's Womb" (25) and he set about "curing" them with great fervor and
rigor. As the years
went by, however, almost all of Wheelock's assumptions at this early stage of his project in
Indian education turned
out to be false, and during a period of intense disillusionment with his work with the Indians, he
turned most of his
attentions instead to educating white boys when he founded Dartmouth College in 1769.
Among the documents of Wheelock's work
in Indian education are the letters and confessions written to him by
nineteen of his Indian students,2 which were collected and published, along with
related letters and speeches, as part
of the Dartmouth College Manuscript Series in 1932. In this paper, I will discuss the letters of
two of Wheelock's
students, Hezekiah Calvin and David Fowler. Their letters are more numerous than those of most
of Wheelock's
Indian students,3 and because they span several years (two and a half years in
Calvin's case, and four in Fowler's), the
letters of these two students in particular allow us insight into the nature of Wheelock's
relationships with his students
and the role of writing within those relationships.
Calvin and Fowler wrote letters for various
purposes and on various occasions. At the school, Wheelock required
students to write up or sign obsessively detailed confessions of sins. Calvin and Fowler in
particular also used writing
to ask permission and register complaints even when they were in Lebanon with Wheelock;
perhaps they did so
because Wheelock required it, or perhaps writing allowed them to broach subjects they did not
feel they could discuss
with Wheelock face to face. When they were posted to teach away from Wheelock, both Calvin
and Fowler wrote to
him about many matters, both spiritual and material. However, they were not often rewarded
with replies. Wheelock
may have written more letters to his Indian students than have been preserved, but among the
thousands of letters
Wheelock laboriously copied out for his records only a small number are addressed to his Indian
students, and as we
shall see, the letters of Calvin and Fowler (and other students) contain many complaints about
Wheelock's lack of
response: it appears that it was common for {50}
Wheelock to leave the students' letters unanswered. While the
students were trying to encourage or maintain a correspondence with him, Wheelock was
directing more of his
correspondence to British benefactors and missionary colleagues, sometimes enclosing some of
his students' letters as
proof of his success in producing literate Indians. Thus Calvin's and Fowler's letters had a dual
audience rather than a
single correspondent: we can think of them as part of a collaborative text in which Wheelock's
part, expected by his
students and promised by his claims to fatherly dedication, was never fulfilled. Wheelock's
silence intensified Calvin's
and Fowler's dependence on him--in the same way that the Confession of Faith, my epigraph,
understands the effect
of God's silence on the faithful--but Wheelock's silence also increased his students' resistance to
his authority.
James Scott, in his important study of the
subtle manifestations of resistance in conditions of domination, writes
that "each and every inference about the attitude behind an act of deference must . . . be based on
evidence external to
the act itself" (24). Neither the deference nor the defiance in the letters of Calvin and Fowler can
be interpreted
without considering the context of their silent dual audience, and also the intensity and
complexity of the relationships
between the Indian students and Wheelock. For although the students went to Wheelock's school
voluntarily or were
sent by their parents, they soon found themselves enmeshed in powerful bonds of duty and debt
which were difficult
for them to escape. Hezekiah Calvin's language of bondage and obligation in the following letter
to Wheelock richly
evokes this situation:
Your goodness binds me to you in all thankfulness, but how shall I, or in what Language or words shall I express the sense of Gratitude due to your care & tenderness who have all along laid so many obligations on me, so many & in so high degree, that I may as well Number them, which is impossible . . . . (52)4
The ever-multiplying obligations were not only emotional. For example, when James Simon wanted to leave the school, Wheelock wrote the student's mother5 an angry letter:
I received your James not to please myself but at your earnest Desire by your Daughter Sarah, who told me you had given him to me to bring up and despose of as my own Son, and only upon such Considerations I took him . . . & when he is fit for it I designd to put him into good Business as I would a Child of my own . . . but if I have not understood you right . . . I insist upon it that you let me know it now, before I spend any more Money to be thrown {51} away upon him, there are hundreds who would be glad to come into his Room and be at my dispose as much my own Children are-- (225-26)
Financial factors clearly enter into this
part of the letter--"Money to be thrown away upon him" is a rather strong
phrase--but Wheelock does not spell things out until the postscript, where he directly threatens
that Sarah the elder,
James's mother, will have to pay back the full cost of her son's education if he leaves the school.
Before and between
these bluntly-stated financial concerns, the letter bears a tone of injured generosity and insulted
fatherly love.
The language of emotion and the business
dimension of the relationship would not have been contradictory to
Wheelock; legally and customarily, English children in the eighteenth century were considered to
be property of their
parents or guardians, with the attendant duties and constraints. Thus when Wheelock claims that
his students are like
his own children, their likeness is based on the fact that like Wheelock's children they are "at
[his] dispose," or as he
puts it elsewhere, available for "special Usefulness" (Narrative 26). The students'
parents, on the other hand, cast a
different light on the ways in which their children have become Wheelock's children. They
expect Wheelock to treat
their children as his own, "according to which they are wont to treat their Captives"
(Narrative 41, my italics): there is
a certain nice irony in this assertion, as the parents accuse Wheelock of capturing their children,
and use that
accusation to ensure his good treatment of them.6 But as James Axtell points out,
"what the Indians . . . soon
discovered . . . was that English children were treated much differently from children in the
longhouse" (209), and
they learned, furthermore, that Wheelock's fatherly affection for his Indian students was distorted
by racist
expectations of failure and backsliding.
The father-child metaphor used by all parties
in describing the relationship between Wheelock and his students
was a conception which harmonized with both Christian doctrine and Indian expectations;
although defined variously,
it was mutually agreed upon. The collective definition of this relationship is in many ways
similar to Pierre Bourdieu's
formulation of the master-khammes relationship in rural Algeria, sketched out in an
epigraph to this paper, in which
"there is neither deceiver nor deceived" (196). Bourdieu puts forth a general thesis about the
intimate and
ever-labour-intensive ways in which hierarchy is maintained in societies lacking mechanisms to
guarantee and
objectify it:7
. . . the system contains only two ways (and they prove in the end to be just one way) of getting and keeping a lasting {52} hold over someone: gifts or debts, the overtly economic obligations of debt, or the `moral,' `affective' obligations created and maintained by exchange, in short, overt (physical or economic) violence, or symbolic violence--censored, euphemized, i.e. unrecognizable, socially recognized violence. There is an intelligible relation--not a contradiction--between these two forms of violence, which coexist in the same social formation and sometimes in the same relationship: when domination can only be exercised in its elementary form, i.e. directly, between one person and another, it cannot take place overtly and must be disguised under the veil of enchanted relationships, the official model of which is presented by relations between kinsmen; in order to be socially recognized it must get itself misrecognized. (191)
Like the Algerian masters studied by
Bourdieu, Wheelock manipulated two sorts of obligations, gifts and debts,
invoking debt obligations only in extreme situations (such as James Simon's crisis of confidence
in him), because this
"overt violence," as Bourdieu would call it, threatened the stability of his "affective" authority
over his students.
"Symbolic violence"--"the gentle, invisible form of violence, which is never recognized as such,
and is not so much
undergone as chosen, the violence of credit, confidence, obligation, personal loyalty, hospitality,
gifts, gratitude,
piety" (192) was more effective for Wheelock than direct economic violence.8
But the affective relation of father and
son was also sought by some Indians who willingly sent their children to Wheelock's school,
thinking that by
encouraging ties with the missionaries they would have more bargaining power and influence.
The students, once
ensconced in this affective relationship with Wheelock, worked strenuously within
it to gain concessions from
Wheelock before they considered ending the relationship.9
Eventually, however, the Indian students did
consider ending the relationship; in fact every one of them who
lived long enough or studied long enough to take up a post in the field eventually broke with
Wheelock, although
many of them remained Christians. The limits of the applicability of Bourdieu's model to
missionary-Christian Indian
relations in colonial America are thus instructive. Bourdieu is thinking about an essentially
closed system:
Agents lastingly `bind' each other, not only as parents and children, but also as creditor and debtor, master and khammes, only through the dispositions which the group inculcates in them and continuously reinforces, and which render unthinkable practices which would appear as legitimate and even be taken for granted in the disenchanted economy of {53} `naked self-interest.' (196)
Colonial New England, however, was part of extensive networks of culture, capital, and communication which rendered more things "thinkable" than Bourdieu's model would indicate. The Indian students, even while enmeshed in relationships with Wheelock, still maintained circles in which they could speak and act outside of Wheelock's knowledge or control, as we shall see particularly in Hezekiah Calvin's case. These circles, "sequestered social sites at which . . . resistance can be nurtured and given meaning" (Scott 20) permitted the development of what James Scott terms "hidden transcripts," discourses of resistance that operate in all but the most atomizing conditions of domination. Another set of "transcripts" was also operating alongside the discourse of Wheelock's relations with his students: Wheelock, despite his authority over his Indian students, was a participant in an economy of gifts and debts with his patrons in Britain. When he dedicated his Narrative to the Marquis of Lothian, Wheelock had to abase himself rhetorically almost as much as his students were required to do for him: he was indebted to British benefactors for their charity as his students were to him. Thus Wheelock's participation in dual economies of debts and gifts provided an opening for his students to subvert his authority over them, while their relations with their people gave them the exteriority to dare to "recognize" their relationship with Wheelock and refuse its "enchantment."
II
Hezekiah Calvin, a Delaware, came to
Wheelock's school as a small boy in 1757, arriving on the same horse that
had carried one of the school's first two students home to die. To Wheelock--whose
Presbyterianism did not preclude
an enthusiastic component of superstition--this replacement of one student lost with one gained,
arriving on the very
same horse, was a sign of divine favor (Narrative 30). But Calvin did not turn out
to be the miraculous purveyor of
Christianity his arrival may have augured for Wheelock. The twelve letters Calvin wrote to
Wheelock between
February 1766 and the fall of 1768, as well as several letters about him from others, tell of his
loneliness, doubts,
drinking, and general cultural dislocation. Posted in 1766 as a schoolteacher to Fort Hunter, New
York, Calvin found
himself burdened with complicated community demands, persistent discipline problems in his
school, and chronic
headaches (51). He did not speak the language-- later he described himself among the Mohawks
as a "dumb stump
that has no tonnge to use" (58)--and he felt isolated both from his family and from
Wheelock.
{54}
One bright spot in Calvin's life around this
time was his courtship of Mary Secutor, another Indian student at
Wheelock's school, but his hope for marriage was soon quashed when her father wrote to
Wheelock asking him to
prevent the match (for unspecified reasons), which Wheelock did. Devastated by this decision,
Calvin's reaction was
to lay out in a letter to Wheelock several ideas about what he might do next: go to sea, return to
the Mohawks even
though he doubted he would "be likely of doing them any good" (58), farm, or go home "that I
might learn somwhat
of my own Native Language" (58).10 As for Mary Secutor, Calvin had his
conditions: "I can leave her if you will let
me go home & never to return again" (58), he wrote. But in the very next sentence he is all
acquiescence: "I leave the
affair wholly with you to conclude; for thou canst advise as a father, &c" (58). The
"&c" here indicates that Calvin
was rehearsing a ritual well-known to both him and Wheelock (it is tempting to read it also as a
hint that Calvin had
in mind some other labels for Wheelock besides "father"); the entire letter is full of such switches
between complex
emotion or negotiation and formulaic obedience. However, the rhetorical balancing act is
impossible to sustain for
very long: "My Mind is full. I cant express myself," Calvin concludes, "And thus I End
Subscribing myself to be your
Dutiful Pupil . . ." (58).
All of Calvin's letters, hardly ever pausing
for periods, have a breathless quality that echoes what he calls his
"uneasiness." He uses the word "uneasy" with great frequency,11 and it evokes
not only a mood but a cultural
contradiction: nothing was easy for Calvin, not even leaving the school which made him
miserable. Calvin kept
returning to Lebanon even after he was finished at the school, and in October 1767 he wrote to
Wheelock from there:
I am uneasy, & it seems to me if Dr Wheelock does not give me leave to go, I must go without leave but I had rather go with a Dismission, not without Liberty, but I am uneasy enough to do either of them. . . . I am uneasy, Sir I shal turn out as Jacob Wolley did if I tarry much longer, so I should rather go before the Docr sees that time so I end
Your Undutiful Pupil Hezekiah Calvin (59, my italics)
Calvin may have made such a request in writing because writing allowed him to control the
balance of complaints and
gratitude better than he could in person. In writing, he may have had more courage to stand up to
Wheelock.
However, writing was also an intrinsic part of the "symbolic violence" that constituted the
relationship between
Wheelock and Calvin, a bond consisting in a large degree of distance, discomfort and discipline
both represented by
and guaranteed by {55} writing. Bourdieu defines
"symbolic violence" as "that form of domination which,
transcending the opposition usually drawn between sense relations and power relations,
communication and
domination, is only exerted through the communication in which it is disguised"
(237): that is, the concrete details of
a hierarchical relation are not only representations or signs of that relation, but are constitutive of
it. Thus, paradoxical
as it is that Calvin's own letters announcing his dissatisfaction could be tools in maintaining the
relationship which
disciplines him, his writing both disguised and ensured Wheelock's authority.
One of the things that disempowered Calvin
was the absence of reply from Wheelock to his letters, even when
they resonated relentlessly with the word "home" and begged for response:
There is somthing that makes me want to go home, what, I cant tell, Home is in my Mind all the time I want to go Home soon & see my Relations, & it seems to me to Tarry home a while or all the Time, & let me see if that I am able to support myself. I have tarryed upon Charity long enough . . . . (63)
In July 1767, Wheelock suggested in a letter to the missionary John Brainerd that Calvin go to work with him at his mission, saying "Hezekiah must do or I have done with him" (55); there exists, however, no communication with Calvin himself on this or any other subject. Perhaps Wheelock met with Calvin or sent messages refusing Calvin's demands for freedom. In any case, by May 1768 Calvin's rhetoric has escalated to a degree that strongly indicates that his previous letters have not drawn responses:
My mind is full of such bad thoughts, so that I cant relate all my bad thoughts, & when my thoughts are off this my Mind is Home continually laying out work for me to do. . . . But I beleive I should soon be tired of Home & yet my Mind is all the while Cleaving to go home, & somtimes it excite a motion in my Breast to to go without leting the Doctor know of my Intentions, when I am alone I am almost crazy I will catch my hair & pull & Cry, for to go Home . . . hopeing the Docter will give me Leave to go home I subscribe myself . . . . (64)
Whether or not Calvin went home, we do know that he visited the Narragansetts in Rhode
Island, and here, as we
move to documentary evidence beyond Calvin's own letters, we see Calvin's independence from
Wheelock assert
itself more fully. A letter written to Wheelock in June 1768 by Edward Deake, a white
schoolmaster at Charleston,
Rhode Island, reports a whole string of accusations Calvin had levelled against Wheelock,
including charges of
stealing from students, stealing {56} from the
commissioners, mistreating pupils, and failing to provide adequate
education; the list ends with the statement that "ye Indians are ready to conclude,
that their Fellow-Indians will never
receive any great Benefit of ye Large sums of Money contributed by good People,
to promote so good a Caise" (65).
The charges are so numerous, and the written list of them such a convincing document, that
Deake, having written
them out but taken aback by their force, adds as an afterthought "P.S. The above has not enter'd
my Heart as Truth. I
write in hast, Hope you'll excuse me" (65). Deake's indirect report of Calvin's clear and
unabashed criticism reminds
us, limited as we are by scanty documentation of Calvin's opinions, to refrain from assuming
Calvin's letters to
Wheelock to reflect his broader thoughts and statements: writing may have helped Calvin to
express what he was
afraid to say directly to Wheelock, but Calvin did feel comfortable speaking directly to his
Narragansett friends and
acquaintances. This communication usually went unrecorded; Deake's letter provides us with
only one window into
the "hidden transcripts" of resistance to power, a window into an alternate narrative to set beside
Wheelock's
Narratives of the Indian Charity-School which claim a "Plain and Faithful"
evenhandedness.12
The last document of Hezekiah Calvin's life
is a brief report from Wheelock that Calvin had been arrested for
"forging a pass for a Negro" (47). Calvin did, then, put his literacy to use in his larger network of
relations,
appropriating the tool Wheelock--his master and a slave master too--had given him. Calvin's aid
to an escaped slave is
also surely evidence of how he conceptualized his own relationship with Wheelock, a
relationship Calvin did not feel
he could terminate unilaterally: at least six times in writing he had sought a formal guarantee of
his freedom from
Wheelock, without which he felt he could only remain an "undutiful servant." Not only did
Calvin seek to be freed
from symbolic obligations "so many & in so high degree" (52) he had deemed them too
numerous to be counted, but
he also no doubt wanted to be released from a more quantifiable financial debt to Wheelock as
well. Calvin sought, in
effect, "free papers" to affirm the cancellation of all debts, just as a slave needed written
confirmation of manumission.
If such a comparison seems extreme, we can
consider that with his slaves Wheelock was known to be
affectionate; he was even "on occasion ready to give a slave his freedom if the slave proved
competent and
law-abiding" (McCallum, Eleazar Wheelock 68). Wheelock's Indian students,
however, were only granted freedom if
Wheelock deemed them selfish ingrates or incompetent drunkards and apostates, and even then,
they had to run away
to escape humiliation {57} and financial debts. Not one
of Wheelock's Indian students left Wheelock's service by
mutual agreement. For example, when Samson Occom, Wheelock's star student, broke off
relations with Wheelock
because of Wheelock's misappropriation of funds Occom had raised for Indian education,
Wheelock laid the blame on
Occom; a more common situation was Samuel Ashpo's suspension from his post for "Quarrellg,
Indecent, unChristian
behaviour" (46). Only students who died very young, such as Joseph Wooley or Tobias Shattock,
remained in
Wheelock's good graces to the end of their lives.
For using his literacy for his own ends
Calvin was punished--it is not known what his sentence was, but there are
no further records of his life. "I hear that poor Hezekiah Calvin has got into Prison at Littleease . .
. & that it is
probable he will fare badly. I hope God will humble him & do him Good by it" (47),
Wheelock wrote, with his usual
habit of blaming all of his students' misfortunes on their inherent pride.13 Pride
may seem to be precisely what is in
short supply in Calvin's letters, which sound like the words of a man who has barely been
allowed to retain the
minimum level of pride needed to survive. But the pride Wheelock feared was the independence
and self-esteem
which did not derive from or represent itself in letters directed to him. Wheelock encouraged his
students to write
letters in order to reveal this thing he called "pride" so it could be attacked and refuted point by
point, but since he
was not the only source of his students' self-esteem and critical thought, and since the letters were
not their only
avenue of communication, such containment was not possible.
Paradoxically, only through mobilizing his
education in a way that suited him and got him thrown in prison did
Calvin free himself from Wheelock once and for all. Once Calvin's letters cease we can read the
silence they leave
behind as Calvin's unequivocal statement of independence from Wheelock.
III
In contrast to Hezekiah Calvin, David
Fowler, a Montauk from Long Island, was rather a teacher's pet at
Wheelock's school. While Calvin tended to sign his letters "your unworthy servant," sometimes
adding "undutiful and
ungrateful" for good measure, Fowler's standard concluding phrase was "your affectionate though
unworthy pupil,"
which within the standard self-abasements of eighteenth-century style is quite noticeably more
confident. Fowler
wrote to Wheelock about a young woman he was courting, Amy, saying "I believe I may venter
to write my secrets to
you as I wont to do. since I have so often seen and felt your tender Cares and Affections" (102).
He even turned his
difficult relations with the Oneidas into a confirmation of his closeness {58} to Wheelock. Comments like "I live like
a Dog here, my Folks are poor & nasty, I eat with Dogs, for, they eat & drink out of the
same as I do" (91) not only
evoke cultural and linguistic alienation as Calvin's complaints about the Mohawks do, but imply
ties to the English
way of life that Fowler aspired to.14 When Fowler says of the Oneidas that "they
are lazy and inhuman pack of
Creatures as I ever saw in the World" (98) he is strategically invoking rhetoric that he might have
heard used against
himself in order to make himself seem more like Wheelock. Fowler was also very adept at the
necessary skills of
flattery, as one of his outbursts of thankfulness--which shows not only abjection but the pride of
being distinguished
from other Indians demonstrates: "O that my Heart would melt with Gratitude both to God and
Man for his wonderful
goodness to me," he wrote to Wheelock, "for he has distinguishd me from many of my poor
Brethren, in seting me up
to be their Instructor" (106). The conflation of God and "Man" through the pronoun "his" has the
effect of equalizing
Fowler's gratitude to Wheelock and his gratitude to his more heavenly
Father.15
The earliest letter we have from Fowler,
despite his favored status, is a confession. Several such confessions
exist from several students, so Fowler's is only one example of Wheelock's most undisguised use
of his students'
writing (or ventriloquisms of it) to enforce discipline, and to establish his own credibility in the
eyes of his superiors.
Wheelock was certain that he and his students were always being watched from above, and he
was as concerned about
earthly benefactors as he was about Godly omniscience; in his Narratives he
anxiously reports the tactics of various
enemies of the school such as "letters sent abroad to be concealed from the injured party"
(Continuation 1771: 41),
and he links political with spiritual trouble-making by tending to consider all interference as "the
work of the great
enemy indeed" (Continuation 1765: 15). Thus for reputation's sake as well as
religious rigor, Wheelock insisted that
students' misdemeanors be fully and publicly reported and reprimanded.
Discipline of other students was also an
issue. Fowler's misstep was to leave the school without Wheelock's
permission, an act of independence that could have sparked imitation in other students if it were
not abjectly
confessed, as the wording of the confession makes clear:
I David Fowler acknowledge, that while Mr. Wheelock was abroad on a Journey, I being in a bad State of Health and not able to pursue my Studies, and understanding that my aged Father was much in Debt and reduced to great Difficulty thereby which moved my Compassion towards him, and made me earnestly Desire to contribue to his Releif which I supposed I was able to do tho' my Indisposition was {59} such as would not allow me to prosecute my Studies. I went away without Mr Wheelocks Leave, and continued absent till yesterday. In doing which I acknowledge I acted Disorderly, and gave a bad Example to others which if they Should follow must Terminate in the Disgrace and ruin of this School, and restrain charitably Disposed Persons from further Expressions of their Charity towards it, or Endeavours to promote it.
I did not doubt but my Reasons were Such as Mr Wheelock would have thought Sufficient if I had Submitted them to his Judgment and Determination. and I acknowledge that in my neglecting to do it as I did I have treated Mr Wheelock unworthily. I ask his Forgiveness . . . and promise by divine grace I will walk orderly, and Shew proper Respect to the Authority of the School for Time to come. And I earnestly Desire that my late conduct may not encourage Others to do the like . . . . (87)
This is a dramatization of hierarchy, an unequivocal statement that even if an Indian man
thinks through a problem
and comes up with the same conclusion as a white man, his response is not correct until
"submitted . . . to [the]
Judgment and Determination" of the white man. Wheelock and Fowler do not disagree here
about Fowler's action:
this is not a confession of drunkenness or blasphemy or fornication, but purely a matter of
insubordination. It shows
the white teacher/Indian student relationship in its pure "disenchanted" form.
Fowler's confession is in Wheelock's hand,
which means either that Wheelock wrote it or that he copied it. If
Wheelock wrote the confession, he went to great lengths to show both the validity and humanity
of Fowler's actions
as well as their inadmissibility: the combination is strikingly sadistic, but it clarifies for us the
fact that
insubordination was only considered dangerous if it occurred publicly. Because other students
might have known of
Fowler's initiative in leaving the school, he had to make a public apology--to pay his "symbolic
taxes" through
presentation of a "simulacrum of sincere obedience" (58), as Scott puts it. If Fowler wrote the
confession, we might
see the juxtaposition of justification of private motivations versus disavowal of public actions as
recalcitrance: he was
going along with the required ritual of subordination, but not without justifying his actions first.
In either case, the
writing down of Fowler's actions was itself a punishment, reminding the confessor of the
inferiority of his judgement
and causing him to relive the embarrassment of misconduct reproved.16 Most of
the letters of Fowler and his
classmates contain an element of confession or apology, and even when full of good news they
shared the
performance element of the confession. Letters detailing {60} conscientious work and Christian spirit were the
positive counterpart of the confessions, because when Wheelock sent them or reports of them to
Britain, the credit
went to him or to God, not to the students' own hard work and devotion; thus these letters also
insisted on the
students' inferior and dependent status.
The first serious break between Fowler and
Wheelock took place when Fowler bought wedding clothes for a
price Wheelock thought unreasonable. In August 1766, Fowler wrote from Lebanon--perhaps he
wrote this statement
down in order to give it more weight or to give himself courage to be clear--revising his
assessment of their
relationship:
I think it very hard that I must be blam'd so much as I have been since my Return from home, and all for taking up those things at Mr Breeds, when I have Orders from Mr Wheelock to get them, for which I am now accounted a Devil or Proude as the Devil. . . . You know, Sir, I have always been governd and advis'd by you with all ease imaginable.
This brings into my mind what Treatment I met since I came here. yea it is shameful, when I have been so faithful to you as if I was your Negro, yea I have almost kill'd myself in Labouring. . . . I am greiv'd that I have troubled you so much as I have. I am sorry those things were not denied me at first and then it would been allwell and easy before now.--But asure you, Sir, you shall receive Payment from me yearly till every Fathing be paid, it shall not be said all that Money and Pains which was spent for David Fowler on Indian was for nought. I can get Payment as well as white Man. O Dear me! I cant say no more, I am
your unworthy Servant David Fowler. (103)
Fowler had thought himself to be a son, as is evident in his earlier letters ("I . . . ask a favour
as a Child from kind
Father or Benefactor" [102], he had written just three months earlier), but he found out rather
abruptly as he was
cheerily planning for his wedding that this was not at all the case.
Of course Fowler knew that he was not in
any irrevocable sense a son of Wheelock's; what he really discovered
was that Wheelock was unwilling to maintain the mutually-agreed-upon fiction of the father-son
relationship. Thus it
was Wheelock, not Fowler, who broke the "enchantment" of the relationship, to use Bourdieu's
term, by denying trust
and breaking promises to Fowler. But it was Fowler who then dared to "recognize" his
relationship to Wheelock for
what it was. Bourdieu writes that "if the system [of exchange of gifts and debts] is to work, the
agents must not be
entirely unaware of the truth of their {61} exchanges . . .
while at the same time they must refuse to know and above
all to recognize it" (6). Fowler broke this compact in his letter when, like Hezekiah Calvin, he
likened himself to a
slave, and then proceeded to bring the financial dimensions of the relationship into the open.
Furthermore, by calling
himself "David Fowler on Indian," and insisting he could "get Payment as well as white man,"
Fowler revealed his
hitherto unspeakable knowledge of Wheelock's racist expectations that Indians could not and
would not pay back debts.
For his part, Wheelock could not allow
Fowler to reduce their relationship to financial terms. As James Scott
explains, "any particular refusal to comply is not merely a tiny breach in a symbolic wall; it
necessarily calls into
question all the other acts that this form of subordination entails" (205). Not only did Wheelock
need to make sure
that his patrons always "misrecognized" his enterprise, which he preferred to present exclusively
in terms of Christian
love, but Wheelock too was caught up in the symbolic enchantment and too accustomed to
thinking in terms of
kinship and emotion to give that discourse up easily. Thus his reply to Fowler, one of the few
replies to his Indian
students in McCallum's collection, masterfully attempts to restore the veneer to their relationship,
and it vividly
demonstrates what David Murray describes as "the way decorum, and all the arsenal of a
Christian gentleman, can be
used as a way of keeping social inferiors off balance and aware of their inferiority" (55). "Now
David consr a little,"
Wheelock writes with a condescending weariness, "Is this Just comely and reasonable Treatment
of me" (104). He
goes on to reiterate, oozing sympathy and patience, his version of events, the fact that both of
them have to be careful
because "ye Eyes of all Europe & America wre Upon yo and me too," and his faith that if
Fowler goes his own way he
will not "feal very Easie" until he returns to the fold.
Although he continued to work for
Wheelock for a short time after this dispute, Fowler was no more "Easie"
within the relationship than Wheelock thought he would be without it. Like Calvin and others of
Wheelock's Indian
students, Fowler received replies to his letters much less frequently than he expected. As
schoolteacher to the
Oneidas, while working and sharing a house with Samuel Kirkland--a non-Indian missionary
who had also been a
student of Wheelock's--Fowler was frustrated that Kirkland got more attention from Wheelock,
and he complained to
Wheelock about it:
I take it very hard that I have not receiv'd one Line when others have received Folio's after Folio's.--But since I am forsaken--I now beg the Favour of you to bury my Name entirely and never mention it no more to any one abroad but {62} bury into oblivion though you may hear of my good Behaviour my Managments and my Prospects and what soever you may hear from me that is worthy to be reported let it never go out off your Doors,--But I shall always remember my obligations to you till the Day my of Death--My Scholars learn very fast some of them have got to the twenty fourth Chapter of Matthew (108)
We know that Wheelock required his students to report back to him from their posts; here we
learn from Fowler that
the students also required Wheelock to write to them.17 Fowler clearly regards
Wheelock's silence as a breach of
obligation ("But I shall always remember my obligations to you till
the Day of my Death," he writes).
Fowler knew that Wheelock needed model
students to people the narratives he sent overseas to solicit funding;
one of Fowler's letters written the previous spring apparently replies to Wheelock's request for a
letter to be used for
fundraising, saying "I am very sorry I cain't write you a Letter, which can be seen abroad. because
Mr Kirtland is so
much hurrid to get down: but he can give you a proper Idea of my School and my own Affairs"
(102). By refusing
Wheelock the right to write about him because he would not write to
him, Fowler exposed the falsity of any ideal of
dialogue that we might associate with letter-writing. As we saw in Calvin's case, when Wheelock
heard from a
student, his reaction was often not to write back to that student, but to write to Britain or to
non-Indian colleagues
about that student. Thus while Fowler needed letters from Wheelock for emotional and material
reasons, Wheelock
too gained not only gratitude and information from them but used them to raise his status as well
as
money--"symbolic capital" as well as "economic capital" in Bourdieu's terms--on the other side
of the Atlantic.
Hezekiah Calvin's repeated pleas for a written dismissal from Wheelock demonstrated that
students needed to
establish dialogue with Wheelock before they could reestablish dialogue with their families;
likewise, the students'
letters, particularly polite and correct letters such as David Fowler's, gave Wheelock grounds on
which to establish
dialogue with England and Scotland. Fowler understood the dynamics of these interconnected
dialogues. The pièce de
resistance in the letter in which he refuses Wheelock the privilege of displaying his
successes is his offhand comment
that "My Scholars learn very fast some of them have got to the twenty fourth Chapter of
Matthew," a remark that
flaunts with devastating bravado Wheelock's dependence on such information.
Fowler soon felt the need to apologize for
this brazen, and quite unenforceable, disciplining of Wheelock. The
letter which follows short on the heels of the challenge is an intense and abject apology. It
does,{63} however,
register some sort of excuse through a complaint about Kirkland's authoritarianism--"As I am an
Instructor I am able
to act for myself, without having a master over me"and an odd solution to the problem of his
receiving no letters from
Wheelock: Fowler asks Wheelock to ask Kirkland not to "mention one Syllable" about any letter
he receives from
Wheelock (109).
Forsaking Wheelock's "design" for
Christianizing the Iroquois some time in 1767, Fowler returned to Long
Island to teach. In his last letter to Wheelock, written from Long Island, Fowler claims that
Wheelock has not dealt
with him justly in granting to Samuel Kirkland certain tools that were rightly Fowler's. He recalls
that Wheelock had
given the tools to him, quotes Wheelock's saying that "to give Gifts is like casting them into the
Sea" (113) and then,
having set up his argument, asks Wheelock how he could grant to Kirkland things he had
previously given to another.
Furthermore, Fowler says, he considers these things to be not gifts, but payment for "Hunger,
Cold, Heat, and
Weariness." He refuses to consider himself indebted to Wheelock, and thus attacks a source of
Wheelock's power
over him. Fowler continues:
Pray Sir, consider a little what I have done for Mr Kirtland. I helpd to build his House and cleared two Fields, all this work I give him freely, as you would give a meal of Victuals to a perishing man. (113)
A diligent schoolboy, Fowler has learned to imitate his schoolmaster, but now he has turned
that mimicry to his own
ends, imitating the condescending phrasing he had heard from Wheelock: "Now David consider a
little" (104), he was
told when he compared himself to Wheelock's slave and threatened to leave Wheelock, and "Pray
Sir, consider a
little," he writes back.
As Homi Bhabha points out, mimicry
encouraged by the colonizer has its price. When the colonizer indulges a
"desire for a reformed, recognizable Other, as a subject of a difference that is almost the
same, but not quite" (126),
he allows for an "area between mimicry and mockery, where the reforming, civilizing mission is
threatened by the
displacing gaze of its disciplinary double" (127). Not only does Fowler appropriate Wheelock's
rhetoric: he also
mobilizes the dynamics of debts and gifts--usually controlled by Wheelock--to put himself in the
superior position
with respect to Kirkland. The "perishing man" is now reduced to the pitiful place usually
occupied by the "poor
Indian," while the Indian is now in the place of charitable benefactor. Wheelock might have
considered Fowler's gifts
of labor to Kirkland to be not gifts but payment of always already incurred debts--a lowly Indian
could not give gifts
because he was infinitely indebted--and thus {64}
Fowler's equation of his own gift of labour with Wheelock's gift of
tools is an aggressive refusal of Wheelock's understanding of the symbolic economy between
master and student.
Fowler demands the right to "give . . . freely" and to assume the corresponding status and
allegiance in symbolic
exchange. "Now I call for my own propety" (113), he writes.
At this point in the letter, Fowler abruptly
switches style: the tone of the last two paragraphs is strikingly blunt
and rushed compared to the measured cadences of the first two. "Dont fail of geting Money and
send it down to Sister
Occom. if you dont allow me but three Pound I shall be glad of it because I shall be troubled if I
dont get the Money,"
he writes; "I write in utmost hast for my company are waiting." We can read this sudden switch
two ways: either it
was a conscious strategy of Fowler's to lay his requests out with absolute clarity and urgency
after drawing Wheelock
in with rhetorical mimicry and elegant argument, or else the switch was indeed the product of a
moment of haste and
desperation. If the latter is the case, the letter illuminates the material differential between
Wheelock and Fowler: it
contrasts the rhetoric of which Fowler was capable with the language afforded by his conditions
as a poor and hungry
man who had to get the letter out by the first opportunity because he desperately needed the
money.
However, the shift in style could also
represent a shift in strategy on Fowler's part. By switching to a blunt and
apparently careless style, Fowler "ruined" his letter so that Wheelock could not display it to
benefactors as a fine
example of his student's linguistic facility. Fowler flies in the face of "appropriate" rhetorical
form and formal
etiquette that, according to Bourdieu, are the crux of the mutual misrecognition that constitutes
hierarchical
relationships:
What distinguishes the gift from mere `fair exchange' is the labour devoted to form: the presentation, the manner of giving, must be such, that the outward forms of the act present a practical denial of the content of the act, symbolically transmuting an interested exchange or a simple power relation into a relationship set up in due form for form's sake, i.e. inspired by pure respect for the customs and conventions recognized by the group. (194)
In the second half of his last letter to Wheelock, David Fowler refuses to follow the form of prior relations with Wheelock: he departs from decorum, and he abandons the obsequiousness usually attendant on requests for money. He has thus reduced Wheelock's generosity to self-interest, and reduced a father-son relationship to an undisguised power relationship.18
{65}
IV
The letters of both David Fowler and
Hezekiah Calvin demonstrate an elaborate combination of deference and
defiance which is determined by the specific and immediate conditions of their writing as well as
the overall lines of
their relationship with Wheelock. Upon first reading, Calvin's letters in particular may seem to
present a picture of a
pitiful Indian man grovelling at the feet of a white man. However, even moments of apparently
transparent
acquiescence in the letters may not be what they claim to be, since members of subordinate
groups often learn "in
situations short of those rare all-or-nothing struggles, to clothe their resistance and defiance in
ritualisms of
subordination that serve both to diguise their purpose and to provide them with a real route of
retreat that may soften
the consequences of a possible failure" (Scott 96).
This is not to say that all obsequiousness in
the letters is simply a disguise for "real" feelings hidden beneath the
surface; the different levels of discourse all infuse and complicate each other so that above all the
letters are
characterized by ambivalence and ambidexterity between discourses. Did we not know that both
Calvin and Fowler
ultimately broke away from Wheelock's authority, we might not be able to read resistance in so
much of their writing.
Neither am I arguing that there was no option other than subtle resistance for Indians in New
England in the 1760s; on
the contrary, of course, violence, retreat, and cautious diplomacy were all options exercised by
the majority of Indians
at that time. The number of Indians "adopted" by Wheelock and his missionary colleagues was
exceedingly small.
Rather, I would argue that it was the availability of those other paths of action more dangerous to
the colonizers which
infused the textual resistance of Calvin and Fowler with real possibility, to Wheelock's
uneasiness and to their own
advantage. They were thus in a position to negotiate within and without Wheelock's strictures to
retain or regain some
degree of autonomy from his authority.19
In closing, I would like to sketch out a more
recent context for the reading of these letters--that is, the Dartmouth
College Manuscript Series in 1932--which sets my own reading off in relief, and leads to
comparison between these
letters and later texts produced by American Indians in collaborative situations with white
Americans. James
McCallum edited the Letters of Eleazar Wheelock's Indians--the possessive here
speaks volumes about McCallum's
approach--as part of a series of books devoted to illuminating Dartmouth's early history. The first
few sentences of his
introduction show with breathtaking clarity the kind of response he expected the letters to
evoke:
{66}
In this volume the Indian scholars who attended Moor's Charity School during the lifetime of Eleazar Wheelock have been allowed to speak for themselves. At times the editor has been obliged to prompt them by means of footnotes, but his ambition has been to gather these contemporaries of Pontiac around a council fire (which to them would have been quite novel), that they might by themselves confess their sins, carry on their courtships, and express their religious convictions. Many of the letters are quaint; some are humorous; a few are of importance historically--all are misspelled. The reader who is not accustomed to such material will be amused at first as though he were watching some captive animal performing his tricks . . . . (11)
This passage epitomizes white attitudes towards Indian writing over the whole span of time
between the writing of the
letters--which are among the earliest preserved texts actually written down by Indians
themselves--and the era of their
republication, another period of intense interest in Indian writing. The condescending
magnanimity of McCallum's
first statement that "Eleazar Wheelock's Indians" have "been allowed to speak for themselves"
comes up again and
again in white authors' or editors' or amanuenses' commentary on Indian texts.
In fact, there was very little charity involved
in letting Hezekiah Calvin, David Fowler, and their classmates
speak for themselves through their letters: Arnold Krupat, David Murray and other scholars of
Native American
writing have noted that as the Indians began to "vanish," by massacre, disease, displacement, or
ideological erasure,
there was a great demand for their re-appearance on paper, and a special premium on having
them directly address a
white audience. As Krupat explains it, white guilt demanded statements of forgiveness and
justification from
representative Indians: "the production of an Indian's own statement of his inevitable
disappearance required that the
Indian be represented as speaking in his own voice" (35).
Although Krupat is speaking of nineteenth
century Indian autobiographies, I would argue that the need on the
part of white Americans to hear American Indians themselves say that their demise was
inevitable is also manifested
in autobiographies as late as the 1930s, such as John Neihardt's rendition of Black Elk's
autobiography;20 these texts
have played a supporting role within the dominant ideology even while representing resistance to
and subversion of
that ideology. In a move ideologically analogous to Neihardt's transformation of Black Elk's
narrative into an elegy for
a lost race, McCallum attempts to contain any critical or disruptive content in the letters of
Wheelock's students {67}
by reducing the letters to a token of his own generosity. As Wheelock sought to subject his
Indian students through
the gift of Christianity and the corresponding debt they would incur to him, McCallum offers
permission to speak and
invokes the debt of gratitude in order to permit him (or his ideal readers) to discount as
ungrateful any defiance the
letters may bear.
McCallum's offer of freedom of speech to
the Indian letter-writers, carefully circumscribed as it is, is
immediately utterly undermined by his perversely cute notion of his being "obliged to prompt
them" from some
hundred and fifty years' distance, and by his admittedly inappropriate metaphor of having them
sit around a council
fire and chat with each other. In trying to locate the source of McCallum's burdensome
obligation, we can rule out
David Fowler, certainly, as well as other students who asked that their writing not be made
public. For example,
Joseph Johnson explicitly requested confidentiality: "please sir to overlook my hast, and the
many Blunders which I
suppose are in this paper. I have no time to write it over or correct it. dont Expose it. so I remain
your Humble
Servant" (133). McCallum's sense of obligation comes, rather, from his own desire to enhance
the importance of his
editorial role, and from the Dartmouth College Manuscript Series' inclination to uphold a rosy
view of Dartmouth's
history in Indian education.21 Furthermore, we might say that McCallum is
ideologically obliged to confirm that, as he
puts it, "the Indian . . . is a dullard, often a drunkard, an unwilling pupil . . . a consumptive,
simple, and
simple-minded" (11), even when educated and Christianized. Thus, like Wheelock, McCallum
implies that his
primary obligation is to the Indians, when in fact he is invoking this obligation in order to fulfill
other obligations to
various networks of institutional, racial, and personal politics.
In later texts produced by whites and Indians
in collaboration, similar distortion of the agency and obligations
involved in the production of the work often takes place. A white person in charge of publication
or dissemination can
make an Indian text into something very much like a confession by remaining silent about his or
her involvement in
the material, when in fact the Indian who spoke or wrote it meant it to be an argument, a
meditation, part of a
dialogue, or a protest. From the letters between Wheelock and his students-- which I take as a
whole to be a
collaborative text albeit a dysfunctional one--through autobiographies of Black Hawk, Black Elk,
Sam Blowsnake,
Don Talayesva,22 and so on, white mediators efface their own presence, while
exercising considerable influence over
the material by asking questions, editing, writing responses, or inventing. Like Wheelock, who
used his students'
writing to raise his own status in the {68} eyes of
benefactors and peers, the journalists, poets, and anthropologists
who have "collected" so many Indian autobiographies are being disingenuous if they claim that
their only obligation is
to their Indian collaborator.
Many contemporary cross-cultural
collaborative projects are much more self-conscious about the interplay of
differing or conflicting obligations and intentions, and much work is currently attempting to
restore the context of
production to early Indian writing produced with white mediation or collaboration. David Murray
writes that
only in this way, paradoxically, does the subject have a chance of not becoming totally
object, since what we then
become aware of is the interplay of two or more voices. If the white voice which is asking the
questions and eliciting
and guiding the story by means of them is suppressed in the final text, the effect is not, as often
claimed, to allow the
speaking subject to appear in his own right, but to give a false, because incomplete, account of
the production of the
text. (67)
The letters of Hezekiah Calvin and David
Fowler to Eleazar Wheelock will not let us forget the dysfunctional
dialogue of which they are a part, and thus they are a valuable companion-piece for later
collaborative texts which are
less obviously askew. Even when Wheelock absents himself from dialogue with the students, we
are constantly
aware, through their demands or mimicry or argument, of his presence. The letters
simultaneously demonstrate
constraints on the conditions of production and a determination to resist those constraints; they
force us to come up
with complex readings by continually frustrating both celebratory readings of resistance and
bleaker readings of total
subjection to the ideology of the colonizer.23
NOTES
1Wheelock educated girls as well as boys at his school, but he trained the girls to be not schoolteachers or missionaries themselves but helpmates to the male graduates. For a discussion of these female students, see Szasz, Chapter 9, "Indian Women Between Two Worlds: Moor's School and Coeducation in the 1760s." Few letters from female students exist; however, the letters and confessions of Sarah Simon and Mary Secutor do merit more attention. Wheelock also educated non-Indian boys; I do not discuss their writings in this paper.
2McCallum lists eighty-nine names of Indians who attended the charity-school during Wheelock's lifetime, but notes that Macclure, Wheelock's first biographer and a student at the school, puts the number at one hundred and fifty (298). Of the total, many students left the school for either personal,{69} medical, or political reasons after only a short stay, and many died extremely young.
3Most students are represented only by one or two letters or confessions; Joseph Johnson and Samson Occom are the only profuse letter-writers besides Hezekiah Calvin and David Fowler. Johnson's letters span over seven years and are especially rich in their manipulation of the idea of the "poor Indian" and in their depiction of Johnson's development from wayward student to important Indian leader. I cannot do his writings justice here. Samson Occom was Wheelock's first and best-documented Indian student; he studied with Wheelock before the establishment of the charity-school, however, and discussion of his extensive writings and complex dealings with Wheelock is not within the purview of this paper. Blodgett's biography provides an outline of Occom's life and excerpts from letters and sermons, and Occom's letters from England are included in Richardson.
4All quotations from the letters of Wheelock and his Indian students are from McCallum; I will indicate only page numbers. I have not changed spelling or punctuation that may seem erratic to twentieth-century readers.
5The mother, Sarah Simon (the elder), must have heard Hezekiah Calvin's claims that her daughter and another female student had "been kept as close to work, as if they were your Slaves. . . . Jeams Simon is to be Bound to a Farmer" (65), and she probably also heard her other son's complaint that "if we poor Indians Shall work as much as to pay for our learning, we Can go Some other pace as good as here from learning . . ." (21). Wheelock's authority was less complete when family networks remained close; Sarah Simon evidently kept close watch on Wheelock's treatment of her children and they reported back to her as well as to Wheelock.
6Contrary to some settler mythology, Indians treated captive children well, formally adopting them in the place of those who died from disease or warfare. Indians even adopted missionaries: Samuel Kirkland, a white student of Wheelock's, remembered Sir William Johnson telling him when he arrived to establish a mission among the Senecas in 1764 that "if I was cordially received by the Seneka's, I should in a week or two be adopted in some one of the principal families and that I must pay particular attention to my new relations. It would give me the liberty of applying to them for any thing I wanted" (Journals 4). Kirkland had to obey his adoptive Indian father's counsel in return for protection from hostile factions in the community. Thus the Indian parents' comparison of residential education and captivity did not necessarily carry the same violent valence for them as it would have for Wheelock. On the other hand, Indians were indeed sometimes captured-- literally rather than metaphorically--to be educated: students at the College of William and Mary in the eighteenth century were forcibly held in order to ensure the peaceful behavior of their kin (Axtell 191). Much later in the history of Indian education, the first Indian students to be admitted to Hampton School in the late nineteenth century were prisoners of war.
7Bourdieu is speaking here of pre-capitalist formations, such as rural Algeria; he is also speaking of authority structures within one society whereas {70} I am discussing the interaction between two societies. I would argue, however, that the early colonial situation in America can be lluminated by his paradigm since the authority of white settlers over Indians was clearly desired but not at all secure, and had to be continually reinforced by a combined strategy of economic violence (land grabs), physical violence, and symbolic violence (encouragement of dependency relationships through religious conversion).
8Wheelock had the luxury to make this choice of symbolic violence because he was supported by other types of violence. The colony as a whole preferred physical and economic violence as a strategy to subdue the Indians, and we saw that Wheelock justified his project in Indian education in terms of community security: he was certainly aware of the power of subtle juggling of strategies described by Bourdieu.
9In his article about the diaries of the Virginia planter Colonel Landon Carter (written between 1752 and 1778), Rhys Isaac analyses the ways in which slaves took advantage of Carter's inconsistent deployment of two models of authority--the patriarchy of governance versus a more sentimental paternalism--to gain concessions from their master. Isaac argues that "the plantation organization was a framework . . . within which a struggle for advantage was relentlessly pursued" (287) and thus finds even in slavery a space for power for the slave; his study serves as a useful companion-piece for my analysis of the (perhaps surprisingly) similar dynamics between Wheelock and his students.
10Wheelock taught his students Latin, Greek, Hebrew, and English, but Calvin learned soon enough that the neglect of his native language and languages that he would need among the Iroquois left him unable to communicate with people at home and in his work. Calvin's thoughts of "home," expressed so passionately in his letters, must have been intensified by this sense of loss.
11The word "uneasy" comes up in other students' writing as well. Sarah Simon (the younger), for example, writes "my being So unwell it make me unesa" (228), and her letter dramatizes this uneasiness in its many "buts" and convoluted syntax as she tries to get Wheelock to permit her to leave the school.
12James Scott might make an even larger claim for Calvin's criticism of Wheelock: "as long as the elite treat such assaults on their dignity as tantamount to open rebellion," he writes, "symbolic defiance and rebellion do amount to the same thing" (196). I would not equate these acts, but considering that Edward Deake clearly did consider Calvin's intercourse with the Narragansetts to be threatening, the importance of spheres of communication among the Indians which allowed Calvin to think beyond the strictures of his relationship with Wheelock is clear.
13
Axtell points out that "When Jacob Wooley, a twenty-year-old Delaware, got drunk,
threw a clench-fisted tantrum, cursed God, and tried to
throw his bed out the window, Wheelock judged him not culturally disoriented or personally
frustrated but simply guilty of `Pride of Heart'" (211).
Confessions of
misdemeanors of all sorts, often written by Wheelock and signed by the student in question,
always include abject apologies
for "Pride"; {71}
Wheelock never missed a chance to warn his star student Samson Occom of "that Indian
distemper, Pride," even when there was
no particular evidence of such a sin to provoke his concern (Blodgett 95). On the other hand,
Wheelock allowed himself considerably more pride
than he allowed his students; in his narratives he alternates between giving all the credit for the
successes of the school to God, and taking some of
it himself, and he did not repudiate the fulsome praises in his students' letters.
14Fowler repeats the story about eating with dogs in three different letters (pages 91, 94, 99), and Murray notes (56-57) that he sounds not unlike an ethnographer undergoing rites of passage into an alien culture.
15Wheelock's students not infrequently compare, conflate or simply juxtapose God with Wheelock in their letters, but Wheelock's dependence on the favor of British benefactors and colleagues makes this association seem ironically inappropriate. Whereas God, according to the Confession of the Faith, "is alone and unto himself all sufficient, nor standing in need of any creatures that he hath made, nor deriving any glory from them, but only manifesting his own glory, in, by, unto, and upon them" (31), Wheelock did indeed stand in need of the "creatures" he had made. Not only reputation was at stake; Samson Occom, Wheelock's first Indian student, raised the money on which Dartmouth College was built, and Axtell claims (204) that Wheelock was initially prompted to open the Charity-School by a need to supplement his ministerial salary.
16The confessions certainly merit more attention. For example, if Jacob Wooley's confession (254, see also note 13) was written by Wheelock--it surely was, since Wooley was not so literate under other circumstances--it is an obsessively vivid reenactment of Wooley's violent display of temper. Wheelock forced Wooley to describe his own actions from the point of view of a judge: the disgust Wooley was forced to display towards himself is excruciating when compared with the disgust and anger that he must have already felt in order to behave so violently in the first place. Further study of these confessions might discover whether they can be considered, in Scott's terms, mere "rituals of subordination," or whether they had more profound effects on the subjectivities of the students.
17Joseph Johnson wrote to Wheelock acknowledging that ". . . it is not only your Order, but my Indispensable Duty to write to you at every opportunity . . ." (127). Sometimes, however, Johnson emphasized his duty in order to allude to Wheelock's neglect of his reciprocal duty, as did Jacob Wooley in his correspondence with Samuel Kirkland (Journals 17). If Wheelock neglected to respond to his students' letters, he was burdened by other writing duties: his Narratives were written to fulfill his obligations to the Commissioners and their funding sources. Samuel Kirkland, the apparent recipient of "Folio's after Folio's" from Wheelock, kept a journal only because he was required to by his employers. He recalled in his later years that "reviewing, correcting, and transcribing these documents . . . is certainly an irksome & disagreeable task, as it affords very little intellectual improvement of the understanding or pleasure to the heart. . . . Yet I am conscious it is a part of my duty" (Journals 43). All in all, then, the writing of the white missionaries, which I do not treat {72} in this paper, was constrained by obligation like the writing of their students and can be read with similar dynamics in mind.
18Although I have not located later letters from Fowler to Wheelock, Fowler continued his selective appropriation of tools and strategies taught him by Wheelock. Fowler became a leading citizen of Brothertown, a Christian Indian settlement among the Oneida; the Brothertown Indians explained to Samuel Kirkland that they intended to "move up and collect the remnant of their scattered Tribes to one place and become a people" (Journals 162), escaping the land-grabbing and liquor-trading settlers in the East. Although the Brothertown project was never easy or widely popular, it did demonstrate a conscious strategy to resist assimilation or eradication; from their years with Wheelock, Indians such as Fowler were well practiced at the day-to-day maintenance of this type of strategy.
19Wheelock's Indian students have a few pages of notice in Louise Erdrich and Michael Dorris's novel, The Crown of Columbus, when Vivian, a professor at Dartmouth College, comes across their letters and declares the students "totally brainwashed" (137). As should be evident, I do not concur with this reading. However, more serious studies of Indian education have presented similar portraits of educated Indians. In his excellent survey of the colonizing function of American Indian Education from the early 1600s to the 1980s, Jorge Noriega writes that "Indian students targeted for training in the early stages of U.S. colonialist education were used essentially as a virus, a medium through which to hurry along a calculated process of sociocultural decay `from within'" (379). Although this description of colonialist strategy is painfully apt when applied to Indian education from the nineteenth century and on, the students educated by Wheelock were perhaps not very successful as "viruses"; most of them did not actively participate in the colonizing and Christianizing project for long. Furthermore, those who did become prominent diplomats or leaders--Tobias Shattock, Joseph Johnson, Joseph Brant, and Samson Occom, for example--may have been imbued with colonizer ideology to some extent, but they came to Wheelock as agents seeking tools (literacy, and familiarity with the culture, goals, and methods of the colonizer) to use to their own ends; I would like to avoid the lack of agency the metaphor "virus" may suggest.
20Michael Staub puts Black Elk's autobiography and other 1930s Native American texts in the context of the politically progressive documentary trend of this period, and claims that editors of these collaboratively-produced texts are self-conscious about their project. It is a welcome argument among many articles representing these texts as wholly transparent tools of dominant ideology, but it is ultimately not convincing, particularly with respect to Black Elk, especially when we take into account the way Black Elk's autobiography was and has been read by large popular audiences--that is, as a message from a dying culture.
21In his Foreword to the Letters, Dartmouth College Manuscript Series General Editor Leon B. Richardson claims that "The history of Dartmouth College, during its period of inception and during the earlier years of its existence, differs markedly from that of its contemporary institutions" since Dartmouth was "founded primarily to promote the christianizing of the {73} Indians." This is a myth, since it was in fact the founding of Dartmouth that marked the waning of Wheelock's interest in educating Indians. Despite the college's motto, "Vox Clamantis in Deserto," and the Indian man bearing a book on its crest, the history of Dartmouth's commitment to Native American education is clearly equivocal: money raised by Samson Occom for the education of Indians was absorbed by the Dartmouth budget, but Dartmouth graduated only three Indians in the eighteenth century and eight in the nineteenth (Axtell 215).
22Black Hawk originally dictated his autobiography to Antoine Le Clair, who translated it and passed it on to John B. Patterson for editing and rewriting. Black Elk Speaks was substantially changed by its editor, John G. Neihardt, as has been shown by Raymond DeMallie, Sally McCluskey, G. Thomas Couser, and others. Paul Radin published Crashing Thunder: The Autobiography of an American Indian as an autobiography of Sam Blowsnake, but it is in fact a compilation of writings and oral testimony given by both Sam and his brother Jasper (Krupat 95-106). Like Blowsnake, Don Talayesva wrote down many of his reminiscences (some eight thousand pages of diary, in fact); what is presented to the reader of Sun Chief is a highly edited selection of this writing (Brumble 106). Talayesva is particularly interesting in comparison with Fowler and Calvin because of the way his writing was solicited and directed by the anthropologist Leo Simmons. See Krupat and Brumble for discussion of further examples of collaborations misrepresented by white editors.
23Thanks to Oliver Buckton, Mary Chapman, Annette Jaimes, Shalini Puri, Katheryn Rios, and Charlotte Sussman, who provided incisive and wide-ranging comments on earlier drafts of this paper.
WORKS CITED
Axtell, James. The Invasion Within: The Contest of Cultures in Colonial North America. New York: Oxford U P, 1985.
Bhabha, Homi. "Of Mimicry and Man: The Ambivalence of Colonial Discourse." October 28, 1984.
Blodgett, Harold. Samson Occom. Hanover: Dartmouth College Publications, 1935.
Bourdieu, Pierre. Outline of a Theory of Practice. Trans. Richard Nice. Cambridge: Cambridge U P, 1977.
Brumble, H. David III. American Indian Autobiography. Berkeley: U of California P, 1988.
Church of Scotland. The Confession of Faith, the Larger and Shorter Catechisms, with the Scripture-Proofs at Large . . . of Public Authority in the Church of Scotland. Edinburgh: 1756.
Erdrich, Louise, and Michael Dorris. The Crown of Columbus. New York: Harper Collins, 1991.
Isaac, Rhys. "Communication and Control: Authority, Metaphors and Power Contests on Colonel Landon Carter's Virginia Plantation, {74} 1752-1778." Sean Wilentz, ed. Rites of Power: Symbolism, Ritual, and Politics Since the Middle Ages. Philadelphia: U of Pennsylvania, 1985.
Jackson, Donald, ed. Ma-Ka-Tai-Me-She-Kia-Kiak: Black Hawk, An Autobiography. 1833. Urbana: U of Illinois P, 1955.
Krupat, Arnold. For Those Who Come After: A Study of Native American Autobiography. Berkeley: U of California P, 1985.
McCallum, James Dow, ed. The Letters of Eleazar Wheelock's Indians. Hanover: Dartmouth College Publications, 1932.
------. Eleazar Wheelock, Founder of Dartmouth College. Hanover: Dartmouth College Publications, 1939.
Murray, David. Forked Tongues: Speech, Writing, and Representation in North American Indian Texts. Bloomington: Indiana U P, 1991.
Neihardt, John G., ed. Black Elk Speaks. 1932. Lincoln: U of Nebraska P, 1979.
Noriega, Jorge. "American Indian Education in the United States: Indoctrination for Subordination to Colonialism." M. Annette Jaimes, ed. The State of Native America. Boston: South End Press, 1992.
Pilkington, Walter, ed. The Journals of Samuel Kirkland. Clinton, New York: Hamilton College, 1980.
Radin, Paul. Crashing Thunder. 1926. Lincoln: U of Nebraska P, 1983.
Richardson, L.B. An Indian Preacher in England. Hanover: Dartmouth College Publications, 1933.
Scott, James C. Domination and the Arts of Resistance: Hidden Transcripts. New Haven: Yale U P, 1990.
Simmons, Leo, ed. Sun Chief: The Autobiography of a Hopi Indian. 1942. New Haven: Yale U P, 1974.
Staub, Michael. "(Re)Collecting the Past: Writing Native American Speech." American Quarterly 43.3 (1991): 425-56.
Szasz, Margaret Connell. Indian Education in the American Colonies, 1607-1783. Albuquerque: U of New Mexico P, 1988.
Wheelock, Eleazar. A plain and faithful Narrative of the Original Design, Rise, Progress and present State of the Indian Charity-School at Lebanon, in Connecticut. Boston: Richard and Samuel Draper, 1763.
------. A Continuation of the Narrative. . . . From the Year 1768 to the Incorporation of it with Dartmouth-College, and Removal and Settlement of it in Hanover, in the Province of New Hampshire. 1771.
------. A Continuation of the Narrative. . . . With a Dedication to the Honorable Trust in London . . . . Hartford: Ebenezer Watson, 1775.
{75}
INTRODUCTION:
SAMSON OCCOM'S SERMON PREACHED BY SAMSON OCCOM . . . AT THE
EXECUTION OF
MOSES PAUL, AN INDIAN
A. LaVonne Brown Ruoff
I. Background
Occom (1723-92) was raised as a traditional
Mohegan, the northernmost branch of the Pequots and fiercest of
the New England tribes. For a brief period in the mid-seventeenth century, the Mohegans, then
numbering 2,000,
greatly expanded their territory. By the end of the seventeenth century, this territory had been
greatly decreased by
land cessions. Because the settlers regarded the nomadic Mohegans as idle thieves, they issued
orders to remove the
Indians from the towns. By the end of the seventeenth century, Mohegans were no longer
independent. The first
successful attempt to gather Mohegans into villages was made in 1717. Eight years later, the tribe
numbered only 351
and was split into two opposing camps, located one-half mile apart on the west side of the
Mohegan river between
New London and Norwich, Connecticut.
Born in a wigwam, Occom was the son of
Joshua Tomocham and Sarah, who was reputed to be descended from
Uncas, the famous Mohegan chief. Joshua's father, "Tomockham alias Ashneon," had settled near
Uncas Hill (later
Mohegan) late in the seventeenth century (Love 21-22). In his autobiographical sketch dated 17
September 1768,
Occom describes the life his parents and their fellow Mohegans led during his youth: "I was born
a Heathen and
Brought up in Heathenism, till I was between 16 & 17 years of age, at a place called
Mohegan, in New London,
Connecticut, in New England. My Parents Liv'd a wandering Life, as did all the Indians at
Mohegan; they Chiefly
Depended upon Hunting, Fishing, & Fowling for their Living and had no Connections with
the English, excepting to
Traffic with them, in their Small Trifles; and they Strictly maintained and followed their
Heathenish Ways, Customs,
& Religion, though there was some Preaching among them . . ."1
The preaching of evangelical missionaries
like George Whitefield aroused strong religious zeal in
sixteen-year-old Occom. After his conversion a year later, Occom longed to learn to read in order
to study the
scriptures. In 1743, he went to Lebanon, Connecticut, to study with the Reverend Eleazar
Wheelock, one of the
greatest of the New England evangelical preachers: "So I went up, thinking I should be back
again in a few Days:
when I got up there, he received me With kindness and Compassion and instead of Staying a
Fortnight or 3 weeks, I
Spent 4 years with him."2 Occom left when ill health and eye {76} strain prevented him from studying longer.
Occom then accepted the invitation of the
Montauk Indians of Long Island to become their schoolmaster. In
1751, over Wheelock's objections, he married Mary Fowler, a Montauk. After his marriage,
Occom was perpetually in
desperate financial straits because salary was always too small to support his rapidly increasing
family, which
eventually numbered ten children. He supplemented his income by working as a farmer,
fisherman, cooper, and
bookbinder. Ordained in 1759, Occom spent the next year as an itinerant minister in lower New
England.3 Occom
became a missionary to the Oneida Indians in 1761. Determined to work among his own people,
Occom moved his
family in 1764 to Mohegan, after his application to serve as missionary to the Niantics and other
neighboring tribes
was approved. That year he also assisted Whitefield in raising money for Wheelock's Indian
Charity School in
Lebanon, Connecticut.
Because of his success as a preacher and
fund-raiser, Occom was sent to Great Britain to raise money for the
school. Accompanied by the Reverend Nathanial Whitaker of Norwich, he set sail in December
1765. In Great
Britain, he found a culture far different from the white or Indian cultures of his native land. Both
awed and appalled,
Occom called London "such Confusion as I never Dreamt of--there was Some at Churches,
singing & Preaching, in
the Streets some Cursing Swaring & Damning one another, others was hollowing,
Whestling, talking gigling, &
Laughing, & Coaches and footmen passing and repassing. Crossing and Criss-Crossing, and
the Poor Begars Praying,
Crying, and Beging upon their knees . . ." (quoted in Blodgett 88).
Supported by Whitefield and his followers,
such as the second Earl of Dartmouth, Occom preached at least three
hundred sermons and raised over ú11,000 in two years. He impressed all he met with his
propriety, modesty, and
dignity. Less impressed were Whitaker and Wheelock, who prodded him lest his native pride get
out of hand
(Blodgett 94). Despite his increased sense of individual worth and pride in his Indianness,
Occom was beset by
worries about his family, which was totally dependent on Wheelock for sustenance. After
arriving home in 1768,
Occom was less inclined to follow Wheelock's advice or to accept low pay without protest.
Relations with Wheelock
worsened when Occom learned that his mentor had removed the Indian Charity School from
Lebanon, Connecticut, to
Hanover, New Hampshire, where it became present-day Dartmouth College. After hearing this
news and reports that
its Indian enrollment had shrunk to three, an angry Occom fired off a letter to Wheelock, dated
24 July 1771,
reminding his friend of the school's original purpose:
{77}
I am very jealous that instead of your Semenary Becoming alma Mater, she will be too alba mater to Suckle the Tawnees, for She is already aDorned up too much like the Popish Virgin Mary. She'll be Naturally ashamed to Suckle the Tawnees for she is already equal in Power, Honor and Authority to any College in Europe, I think your College has too much Worked by Grandeur for the Poor Indians, they'll never have much benefit of it, . . . .
But when we got Home behold all glory had Decayed and now I am afraid, we shall be Deem'd as Liars and Deceivers, in Europe, unless you gather Indians quickly to your College, in Great Numbers and not to have so many whites in the Charity, . . . . (quoted in Blodgett 122-23).
In 1774, Occom published A Choice Collection of Hymns and Spiritual Songs
(1774). Undoubtedly inspired by the
acclaim for his Sermon Preached by Samson Occom (1772), the volume was partly
prepared for use by Christian
Indians. New editions appeared in 1785 and 1792. A fine singer, Occom had met most of the
contemporary hymn
writers during his tour of Great Britain. Although the extent to which Occom wrote specific
hymns is difficult to
determine, authorities credit him with those not found in other hymnals or assigned to other
hymnologists. Most of
these reflect the subject matter and style of his sermons (Blodgett 144-45).
Occom became increasingly involved in
Indian affairs. Earlier he had helped the Mohegans try to settle their land
claims. He now enthusiastically supported the plan of Joseph Johnson, his Mohegan son-in-law,
to remove the
Christian Indians of New England to lands offered by the Oneida in western New York. The
Revolutionary War
halted these plans. A staunch believer in neutrality for Indians, Occom felt that the war was the
work of the devil. In
an address probably written in early 1776, Occom urged Indians "not to intermeddle in these
Quarrils among the
White People."4
Little is known of Occom's activities during
the war. For six years beginning in 1784 he traveled through New
England to raise funds for the settlement on the Oneida lands. He moved his own family there in
1789. Occom
devoted his last years to helping the Christian Indians defend their land claims against Oneida
efforts to reclaim the
land and white plots to lease Christian Indian land for much less than its value. When he died in
1792 at the age of 69,
his funeral was attended by more than three hundred Indians.
II. The Sermon
Probably the first book published in English
by an American Indian,{78} the Sermon Preached
by Samson
Occom . . . at the Execution of Moses Paul, an Indian (1772) was so popular that it was
reprinted at least nineteen
times and translated into Welsh in 1827. The occasion for the sermon was the murder of Moses
Cook, a respected
citizen of Waterbury, Connecticut, by Moses Paul, a Christian Mohegan who committed the act
while drunk. Held on
2 September 1772, the execution attracted a large audience of Indians and whites because it was
New Haven's first
hanging in twenty years, and because it afforded a unique opportunity to hear an Indian preach
against his people's alcoholism.
The theology of the sermon is based on New
Light Calvinism, which stressed dramatic conversion and held that
virtue was a characteristic present in all humankind.5 The appeal of this
evangelical theology for Indians, as it was for
African Americans, was the promise of racial equality under God and a standard of conduct
against which they might
judge the actions of white Christians. Its form is derived from the execution sermon, a once
popular genre that may
well make a comeback if proposals to televise executions are approved. In "True Confessions and
Dying Warnings in
Colonial New England," Lawrence Towner attributes the popularity of the genre to its
relationship to religious
practices in the early colonial period, when probing the depths of one's soul and confessing to
one's sinfulness were
part of private and church ritual. Confessions became as common in seventeenth and
eighteenth-century courts as they
were in churches. Towner argues that the genre's real significance is as "a form of hortatory
literature consciously
designed to make criminal acts detestable and to induce proper behavior in society as a whole"
(533). Whereas in the
seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, confessors were usually members from
within society, by the eighteenth
century they were more likely to be black, Indian, Irish, or foreign pirates. Between 1702 and
1776, eleven Indians
were executed (Towner 537 n. 6).
In "Early American Gallows Literature,"
Ronald A. Bosco indicates that the first example of gallows literature
published in America is Samuel Danforth's The Cry of Sodom Enquired Into
(1674). During the next 126 years, a total
of 163 execution-related titles were published. Several dealt with the execution of Indians,
including one published
just four years before Occom's: Timothy Pitkin's A Sermon Preached at . . . the Execution
of John Jacob, an Indian,
for Murder (81-82, 92). Wayne C. Minnick notes in "The New England Execution
Sermon, 1639-1800" that authors
of these sermons "ranked among the best educated, most influential men of their society." The
delivery of the
execution sermon, far from being a function which "attracted cheap showmen inclined to
capitalize upon grisly but
impelling circumstanc-{79}es," was "a serious
expression of religious impulse by some of New England's finest
minds" (78). Among the great practioners of this genre were Increase and Cotton Mather. The
execution sermon
followed a distinct structure: a text that was elaborated and paraphrased into a doctrine; the
delineation of a series of
propositions derived from the doctrine; and a general and specific application of the doctrine (79,
81).
In agreeing to deliver Paul's execution
sermon, Occom took on the delicate task of communicating with both
white and Indian audiences without alienating either one. The murder of a respected white citizen
by a drunken,
Christian Indian must have confirmed the worst suspicions of those whites convinced that
Indians were unsalvagable,
inhuman instruments of the devil who must be removed or exterminated. Occom is successful in
his threefold task: he
communicates to his mixed audience the universality of sin and redemption, urges the
condemned prisoner to accept
Christ, and exhorts his fellow Indians to change their ways. In his preface Occom states that he
deliberately uses
"common, plain, everyday talk" that little children, Negroes, and Indians can understand. The text
he selects is one
Minick notes among the most popular for execution sermons: Romans 6.23--"For the Wages of
sin is death, but the
gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord" (81). On the surface, the bulk of the
sermon seems to be just
a passionate discourse on the standard propositions common then and now in evangelical
preaching--the temptations
of sin, the unending horrors of hell that unrepentant sinners will endure after death, and the
eternal joys of heaven
awaiting those who are saved. However, because these propositions are delivered by an Indian,
they convey the
implicit message that human nature, not race, makes us susceptible to temptation and that God's
love of all people
makes redemption equally possible for us all.
Both his preface and his remarks to the
"reverend gentlemen and fathers in Israel" are cast in a humble tone.
After acknowledging his need for their guidance in understanding God's oracles and begging
them not to be offended,
Occom tactfully reminds the whites of their duty to encounter sin and fight the battles of the
Lord. Casting aside this
humility, Occom forcefully takes a "tough love" stance when he addresses Paul and the Indian
audience. His
comments to the condemned man are a balancing act. On the one hand, he tells Paul that the
murder of Moses Cook is
especially contemptible because the prisoner, as a Christian convert, committed the act with his
eyes open. On the
other, by urging Paul to repent, Occom reminds his audience that God can forgive the worst of
offenses, even the
murder of a white man by a drunken Indian. The great popularity of the sermon undoubtedly
stemmed from the
sections directed to Paul and "My poor {80} Kindred."
In the latter, Occom vividly describes how alcoholism has
destroyed Indian families. Occom does not specifically blame Indian alcoholism on whites,
though his Indian
audience would have been acutely aware of the fact that the problem did not exist before the
coming of whites.
Instead, he insists that Indians accept responsibility for their alcoholism and for the evils it has
brought to Indian
people: "God made us men, and we chuse to be beast and devils, God made us rational creatures,
and we chuse to be
fools" (101). To eradicate the problem, Occom exhorts them to "break off from your
drunkenness," repent, and accept
Christ as their savior (103).
One of the few temperance sermons
published during the late eighteenth century, Occom's sermon is a powerful
early statement of how alcohol devastated Indian families. It is also an important example of how
an Indian author
adapted Western European theology and a literary genre for his own purposes. In addition, it
reveals how early Indian
authors effectively communicated with a variety of audiences.6
NOTES
1Blodgett 31. Biographical information is derived from this source.
2Blodgett 27. The autobiographical statement and the sermon are included in the Heath American Literature Anthology, ed. Paul Lauter, 1. 730-51.
3Occom was ordained by the London Society, also known as the New England Company. Its Boston Commissioners represented the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in New England, which was controlled by the Church of England. Occom also had dealings with the Society in Scotland for Propagating Christian Knowledge, controlled by the Scotch Presbyterians and also called The Scotch Society. See Blodgett 37 n. 1, 51.
4Blodgett 163. The address is quoted in its entirety in Love 228-29.
5Alan Heimert analyzes New Light Calvinism in Religion and the American Mind.
6David Murray discusses Occom's rhetorical strategies in Forked Tongues 49-57.
SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY
Blodgett, Harold. Samson Occom. Dartmouth College Manuscript Ser. 3. Hanover: Dartmouth College Press, 1935.
Bosco, Ronald A. "Early American Gallows Literature: An Annotated Checklist." Resources for American Literary Study 8 (1978): 81-105.
Danforth, Samuel. The Cry of Sodom Enquired Into. Boston: Johnson, {81} 1674.
DeForest, John W. History of the Indians of Connecticut from the Earliest Known Period to 1850. Hartford: Hammersley, 1851. Rpt. Hamden: Archon, 1964.
Heimert, Alan. Religion and the American Mind: From the Great Awakening to the Revolution. Cambridge: Harvard U P, 1966.
Jennings, Francis. The Invasion of America: Indians, Colonialism, and the Cant of Conquest. 1975. New York: Norton, 1976.
Lauter, Paul, ed. The Heath Anthology of American Literature. 2 vols. New York: Heath, 1990.
Love, W. Deloss. Samson Occom and the Christian Indians of New England. Boston: Pilgrim, 1899.
Means, Carroll Alton. "Mohegan-Pequot Relationships as Indicated by the Events Leading to the Pequot Massacre of 1637 and Subsequent Claims in the Mohegan Land Controversy." Bulletin of the Archaeological Society of Connecticut 21 (1947): 26-34.
Minnick, Wayne C. "The New England Execution Sermon 1639-1800." Speech Monographs 35 (1968): 77-89.
Murray, David. Forked Tongues: Speech, Writing and Representation in North American Indian Texts. Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana U P, 1991.
Occom, Samson. A Choice Collection of Hymns and Spiritual Songs, Intended for the Edification of Sincere Christians of All Denominations. New London: Timothy Green, 1774.
------. A Sermon Preached by Samson Occom . . . at the Execution of Moses Paul, an Indian Who Was Executed at New-Haven, on the 2d of September 1772. . . . Bennington: William Watson, 1772. 10th ed., 1780.
Pitkin, Tomothy. A Sermon Preached at . . . the Execution of John Jacob, an Indian for Murder. Hartford: Green and Watson, 1768.
Richardson, Leon Burr. An Indian Preacher in England, Being Letters and Diaries Relating to the Mission of the Reverend Samson Occom and the Reverend Nathaniel Whitaker. . . . Dartmouth College Manuscript Ser 2. Hanover: Dartmouth College Press, 1938.
Towner, Lawrence W. "True Confessions and Dying Warnings in Colonial New England." Sibley's Heir: A Volume in Memory of Clifford Kenyon Shipton. Boston: Colonial Society of Massachusetts, 1982. 523-39. [No editor listed]
Wallace, Anthony F.C. "Political Organization and Land Tenure among the Northeast Indians, 1600-1830." Southwestern Journal of Anthropology 13 (1957): 301-21.
{82}
A
SERMON
Preached by
SAMSON OCCOM,
Minister of the Gospel, and Missionary to the Indians;
at the Execution of
MOSES PAUL,
AN INDIAN:
Who was executed at New-Haven, September 2, 1772, for the
murder
of MOSES COOK, late of Waterbury, on the seventh of December
1771; preached at the desire of said Paul.
Tenth edition. [n.d.]
Bennington: Printed for William Watson [c. 1780].
{83}
PREFACE.
THE world is already full of books; and
the people of God are abundantly furnished with excellent books upon
divine subjects; and it seems, that every subject has been written upon over and over again: And
the people in very
deed have had precept upon precept, line upon line, here a little and there a little; and so in the
whole, they have
much, yea very much, they have enough and more than enough. And when I come to consider
these things, I am ready
to say with myself, What folly and madness is it in me to suffer any thing of mine to appear in
print, to expose my
ignorance to the world.
It seems altogether unlikely that my
performance will do any manner of service in the world, since the most
excellent writings of worthy and learned men are disregarded. -- But there are two or three
considerations that have
induced me to be willing to suffer my broken hints to appear in the world. One, is, that the books
that are in the world
are written in very high and refined language; and the sermons that are delivered every sabbath in
general, are in a
very high and lofty stile so that the common people understand but little of them. But I think they
can't help
understanding my talk; it is common, plain, every-day talk: Little children may understand me.
And poor Negroes
may plainly and fully understand my meaning; and it may be of service to them. Again, it may in
a particular manner
be serviceable to my poor kindred the Indians. Further, as it comes from an uncommon quarter, it
may induce people
to read it, because it is from an Indian. Lastly, God works where and when he
pleases, and by what instruments he
sees fit, and he can and has used weak and unlikely instruments to bring about his great
work.
It was a stormy, and very uncomfortable day,
when the following discourse was delivered, and about one half of
it was not delivered as it was written, and now it is a little altered and enlarged in some places.
INTRODUCTION.
BY the melancholy providence of God,
and at the earnest desire and invitation of the poor condemned criminal, I
am here before this great concourse of people at this time, to give the last discourse to the poor
miserable object who
is to be executed this day before your eyes, for the due reward of his folly and madness, and
enormous wickedness. It
is an unwelcome task to me to speak upon such occasion; but since it is the desire of the poor
man himself, who is to
die a shameful death this day, in conscience I cannot deny him; I must endeavor to do the
{84} great work the dying
man requests.
I conclude that this great concourse of people
have come together to see the execution of justice upon this poor
Indian; and I suppose the bigest part of you look upon yourselves christians, and as such I hope
you will demean
yourselves; and that you will have suitable commiseration towards this poor object. Tho' you
can't in justice pray for
his life to be continued in this world, yet you can pray earnestly for the salvation of his poor soul,
consistently with
the mind of God. Let this be therefore the fervent exercise of your souls: For this is the last day
we have to pray for
him. As for you that don't regard religion, it cannot be expected, that you will put up one petition
for this miserable
creature: Yet I would entreat you seriously to consider the frailty of corrupt nature, and behave
yourselves as becomes
rational creatures.
And in a word, Let us all be suitably affected
with the melancholy occasion of the day; knowing, that we are all
dying creatures, and accountable unto God. Though this poor condemned creature will in a few
minutes know more
than all of us, either in unutterable joy, or in inconceivable wo, yet we shall certainly know as
much as he in a few
days.
SERMON.
THE sacred words that I have chosen to
speak from, upon this
undesirable occasion, are found written in the
Epistle of St. Paul to the
ROMANS, VI. 23.
For the Wages of Sin is Death, but the Gift of God is Eternal
Life
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
DEATH is
called the king of terrors, and it ought to be the subject of every man and woman's thoughts daily;
because it is that unto which they are liable every moment of their lives: And therefore it cannot
be unreasonable to
think, speak and hear of it at any time, and especially on this mournful occasion; for we must all
come to it, how soon
we cannot tell; whether we are prepared or not prepared, ready or not ready, whether death is
welcome or not
welcome, we must feel the force of it: Whether we concern ourselves with death or not, it will
concern itself with us.
Seeing that this is the case with every one of us, what manner of persons ought we to be in all
holy conversation and
godliness; how ought men to exert themselves in preparation for death, continually; for they
know not what a day or
an hour may bring forth, {85} with respect to them. But
alas! according to the appearance of mankind in general;
death is the least thought of. They go on from day to day as if they were to live here forever, as if
this was the only
life. They contrive, rack their inventions, disturb their rest, and even hazard their lives in all
manner of dangers, both
by sea and land; yea, they leave no stone unturned that they may live in the world, and at the
same time have little or
no contrivance to die well. God and their souls are neglected, and heaven and eternal happiness
are disregarded;
Christ and his religion are despised -- yet most of these very men intend to be happy when they
come to die, not
considering that there must be great preparation in order to die well. Yea there is none so fit to
live as those that are fit
to die; those that are not fit to die are not fit to live. Life and death are nearly connected; we
generally own that it is a
great and solemn thing to die. If this be true, then it is a great and solemn thing to live, for as we
live so we shall die.
But I say again, how do mankind realize these things? They are busy about the things of this
world as if there was no
death before them. Dr. Watts pictures them out to the life in his psalms:
See the vain race of mortals move,
Like shadows o'er the plain,
They rage and strive, desire and love,
But all the noise is vain.
Some walk in honour's gaudy
show,
Some dig for golden ore,
They toil for heirs they know not who,
And strait are seen no more.1
But on the other hand, life is the most
precious thing, and ought to be the most desired by all rational creatures. It
ought to be prized above all things; yet there is nothing so abused and despised as life, and
nothing so neglected: I
mean eternal life is shamefully disregarded by men in general, and eternal death is chosen rather
than life. This is the
general complaint of the bible from the beginning to the end. As long as Christ is neglected, life
is refused, as long as
sin is cherished, death is chosen. And this seems to be the woful case of mankind of all nations,
according to their
appearance in these days: For it is too plain to be denied, that vice and immorality, and floods of
iniquity are
abounding every where amongst all nations, and all orders and ranks of men, and in every sect of
people. Yea there is
a great agreement and harmony among all nations, and from the highest to the lowest to practice
sin and iniquity; and
the pure religion of Jesus Christ is turned {86} out of
doors, and is dying without; or, in other words, the Lord Jesus
Christ is turned out of doors by men in general, and even by his professed people. "He came to
his own, and his own
received him not."2 But the devil is admitted, he has free access to the houses and
hearts of the children of men: Thus
life is refused and death is chosen.
But in further speaking upon our text by
divine assistance, I shall consider these two general propositions.
I. That sin is the cause of all the miseries that
befall the children of men, both as to their bodies and souls, for
time and eternity.
II. That eternal life and happiness is the gift
of God through Jesus Christ our Lord.
In speaking to the first proposition, I shall
first consider the nature of sin; and secondly I shall consider the
consequences of sin or the wages of sin, which is death. First then, we are to describe the nature
of sin.
Sin is the transgression of the law:--This is
the scripture definition of sin.--Now the law of God being holy, just
and good; sin must be altogether unholy, unjust and evil. If I was to define sin, I should call it a
contrariety to God;
and as such it must be the vilest thing in the world; it is full of all evil; it is the evil of evils; the
only evil in which
dwells no good thing; and it is most destructive to God's creation, wherever it takes effect. It was
sin that transformed
the very angels in heaven, into devils; and it was sin that caused hell to be made. If it had not
been for sin, there never
would have been such a thing as hell or devil, death or misery.
And if sin is such a thing as we have just
described, it must be worse than the devils in hell itself.--Sin is full of
deadly poison; it is full of malignity and hatred against God; against all his divine perfections and
attributes, against
his wisdom, against his power, against his holiness and goodness, against his mercy and justice,
against his law and
gospel; yea against his very being and existence. Were it in the power of sin, it would even
dethrone God, and set
itself on the throne.
When Christ the Son of the Most High came
down from the glorious world above, into this wretched world of
sin and sorrow, to seek and to save that which was lost, sin or sinners rose up against him, as
soon as he entered our
world, and pursued him with hellish malice, night and day, for above thirty years together, till
they killed him.
Further, sin is against the Holy Ghost; it
opposes all its good and holy operations upon the children of men.
When, and wherever there is the out pouring of the Spirit of God, upon the children of men, in a
way of conviction
and conversion; sin will immediately prompt the {87}
devil and his children to rise up against it, and they will oppose
the work with all their power, and in every shape. And if open opposition will not do, the devil
will mimic the work
and thus prevent the good effect.
Thus we find by the scripture accounts, that
whenever God raises up men, and uses them as instruments of
conviction and conversion, the devil and his instruments will rise up to destroy both the
reformers and the reformed.
Thus it has been from the early days of christianity to this day. We have found it so in our day. In
the time of the
outpouring of the Spirit of God in these colonies, to the conviction and reformation of many;
immediately sin and the
devil influenced numbers to rise up against the good work of God, calling it a delusion, and work
of the devil. And
thus sin also opposes every motion of the Spirit of God, in the heart of every christian; this makes
a warfare in the
soul.
2. I shall endeavor to show the sad
consequences or effects of sin upon the children of men.
Sin has poisoned them, and made them
distracted or fools. The psalmist says, The fool hath said in his heart,
there is no God.3 And Solomon, through his proverbs, calls ungodly sinners
fools; and their sin he calls their folly and
foolishness.4 The apostle James says, But the tongue can no man tame, it is an
unruly evil, full of deadly poison.5 It is
the heart that is in the first place full of deadly poison. The tongue is only an interpreter of the
heart. Sin has vitiated
the whole man, both soul and body; all the powers are corrupted; it has turned the minds of men
against all good,
towards all evil. So poisoned are they according to the prophet, Isa. v. 20. "Wo unto them that
call evil good and good
evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for
bitter." And Christ Jesus
saith in John iii. 19, 20. "And this is the condemnation, that light has come into the world, and
men have loved
darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For every one that doeth evil hateth the
light, neither cometh
to the light lest his deeds should be reproved." Sin hath stupified mankind, they are now ignorant
of God their Maker;
neither do they enquire after him. And they are ignorant of themselves, they know not what is
good for them, neither
do they understand their danger; and they have no fear of God before their eyes.
Further, sin hath blinded their eyes, so that
they cannot discern spiritual things; neither do they see the way that
they should go, and they are as deaf as adders, so that they cannot hear the joyful sound of the
gospel that brings glad
tidings of peace and pardon to the sinners of mankind. Neither do they regard the charmer
charming never so wisely.
-- Not only so, but sin has made man proud, though he has nothing to be proud of; for he has lost
his excellency, his
beauty and {88} happiness; he is a bankrupt and is
excommunicated from God; he was turned out of paradise by God
himself, and became a vagabond in God's world, and as such he has no right or title to the least
crumb of mercy, in the
world: Yet he is proud, he is haughty, and exalts himself above God, though he is wretched and
miserable, and poor
and blind and naked. He glories in his shame. Sin has made him beastly and devilish; yea, he is
sunk beneath the
beasts, and is worse than the ravenous beasts of the wilderness. He is become ill-natured, cruel
and murderous; he is
contentious and quarrelsome. I said he is worse than the ravenous beasts, for wolves and bears
don't devour their own
kind, but man does; yea, we have numberless instances of women killing their own children;
such women I think are
worse than she-tygers.
Sin has made man dishonest, and deceitful,
so that he goes about cheating and defrauding and deceiving his
fellow-men in the world: Yea, he has become a cheat himself, he goes about in vain shew; we do
not know where to
find man.--Sometimes we find as an angel of God; and at other times we find as a devil, even one
and the same man.
Sin has made a man a liar even from the womb; so there is no believing nor trusting him. The
royal psalmist says,
"The wicked are estranged from the womb, they go astray as soon as they are born, speaking
lies."6 His language is
also corrupted. Whereas he had a pure and holy language, in his innocency, to adore and praise
God his Maker, he
now curses and swears, and profanes, the holy name of God, and curses and damns his fellow
creatures. In a word,
man is a most unruly and ungovernable creature, and is become as the wild ass's colt, and is
harder to tame than any
of God's creatures in this world.--In short, man is worse than all the creatures in this lower world,
his propensity is to
evil and that continually; he is more like the devil than any creature we can think of: And I think
it is not going
beyond the word of God, to say man is the most devilish creature in the world. Christ said to his
disciples, One of you
is a devil; to the Jews he said, Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will
do.7 Thus every
unconverted soul is a child of the devil, sin has made them so.
We have given some few hints of the nature
of sin, and the effects of sin on mankind.
We shall in the next place consider the
wages or the reward of sin, which is death.
Sin is the cause of all the miseries that attend
poor sinful man, which will finally bring him to death, death
temporal and eternal. I shall first consider his temporal death.
His temporal death then begins as soon as he
is born. Though it seems to us that he is just beginning to live, yet
in fact he is just {89} entered into a state of death; St.
Paul says "w[h]erefore, as by one man sin entered into the
world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have
sinned."8 Man is surrounded with ten
thousand instruments of death, and is liable to death every moment of his life; a thousand
diseases await him on every
side continually; the sentence of death has pass'd upon them as soon as they are born; yea they
are struck with death as
soon as they breathe. And it seems all the enjoyments of men in this world are also poisoned with
sin; for God said to
Adam after he had sinned, "Cursed is the ground for thy sake, in sorrow shall thou eat of it all the
days of thy life."9
By this we plainly see that every thing that grows out of the ground is cursed, and all creatures
that God hath made for
man are cursed also; and whatever God curses is a cursed thing indeed. Thus death and
destruction is in all the
enjoyments of men in this life, every enjoyment in this world is liable to misfortune in a thousand
ways, both by sea
and land.
How many ships, that have been loaded with
the choicest treasures of the earth, have been swallowed up in the
ocean, many times just before they enter their desired haven. And vast treasures have been
consumed by fire on the
land, &c. -- And the fruits of the earth are liable to many judgments. And the dearest and
nearest enjoyments of men
are generally balanced with equal sorrow and grief. -- A man and his wife who have lived
together in happiness for
many years; that have comforted each other in various changes of life, must at last be separated;
one or the other must
be taken away first by death, and then the poor survivor is drowned in tears, in sorrow, mourning
and grief. And when
a child or children are taken away by death, the bereaved parents are bowed down with sorrow
and deep mourning.
When Joseph was sold by his brethren unto the Ishmaelites, they took his coat and rolled it in
blood, and carried it to
their father, and the good old patriarch knew it to be Joseph's coat, and he concluded that his dear
Joseph was
devoured by evil beasts; and he was plunged all over in sorrow and bitter mourning, and he
refused to be comforted.
And so when tender parents are taken away by death, the children are left comfortless. All this is
the sad effects of sin
-- These are the wages of sin.
And secondly we are to consider man's
spiritual death, while he is here in this world. We find it thus written in
the word of God, "And the Lord God commanded the man, saying of every tree of the garden
thou mayst freely eat:
but of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it, for in the day thou eatest
thereof thou shalt
surely die."10 And yet he did eat of it, and so he and all his posterity are but dead
men. And St. Paul to the Ephesians
saith, "You hath he quickened who were dead in trespasses and sins."11 -- The
great Mr.{90} Henry says, in this place,
that unregenerate souls are dead in trespasses and sins.12 All those who are in
their sins, are dead in sins; yea, in
trespasses and sins; and which may signify all sorts of sins, habitual and actual; sins of heart and
life. Sin is the death
of the soul. Wherever that prevails, there is a privation of all spiritual life. Sinners are dead in
state, being destitute of
the principles and powers of spiritual life; and cut off from God the fountain of life: and they are
dead in law, as a
condemned malefactor is said to be a dead man. Now a dead man, in a natural sense, is unactive,
and is of no service
to the living: There is no correspondence between the dead and the living: There is no agreement
or union between
them, no fellowship at all between the dead and the living. A dead man is altogether ignorant of
the intercourse
among the living: -- Just so it is with men that are spiritually dead; they have no agreeable
activity. Their activity in
sin, is their deadness and inactivity towards God. They are of no service to God; and they have
no correspondence
with heaven; and there is no agreement or fellowship between them and the living God; and they
are totally ignorant
of the agreeable and sweet intercourse there is between God and his children here below: and
they are ignorant, and
know nothing of that blessed fellowship and union there is among the saints here below. They are
ready to say indeed,
behold how they love one another! But they know nothing of that love, that the children of God
enjoy. As sin is in
opposition to God; so sinners are at enmity against God; there is no manner of agreement
between them.
Let us consider further. God is a living God,
he is all life, the fountain of life; and a sinner is a dead soul; there is
nothing but death in him. And now judge ye, what agreement can there be between them? God is
a holy and pure
God, and a sinner is an unholy and filthy creature; -- God is a righteous Being, and a sinner is an
unrighteous creature;
God is light, and a sinner is darkness itself, &c. Further, what agreement can there be
between God and a liar, a thief,
a drunkard, a swearer, a profane creature, a whoremonger, an adulterer, an idolater, &c. No
one that has any sense,
dare say that there is any agreement. Further, as sinners are dead to God, as such, they have no
delight in God, and
godliness; they have no taste for the religion of Jesus Christ: they have no pleasure in the holy
exercise of religion.
Prayer is no pleasant work with them; or if they have any pleasure in it, it is not out of love to
God, but out of
self-love, like the Pharisees of old; they loved to pray in open view of men, that they might have
praise from them.
And perhaps, they were not careful to pray in secret. These were dead souls, they were unholy,
rotten hypocrites, and
so all their prayers and religious exercises were cold, dead, and abominable services to God.
Indeed they are dead to
all the duties that God requires {91} of them: they are
dead to the holy bible; to all the laws, commands, and precepts
thereof; and to the ordinances of the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. When they read the book of
God, it is like an old
almanack to them, a dead book. But it is because they are dead, and as such, all their services are
against God, even
their best services are an abomination unto God; yea, sinners are so dead in sin, that the
threatnings of God don't
move them. All the thunderings and lightnings of Mount-Sinai don't stir them. All the curses of
the law are out against
them; yea, every time they read these curses in the bible, they are cursing them to their faces, and
to their very eyes;
yet they are unconcern'd and go on in sin without fear. And lastly here, sin has so stupified the
sinner, that he will not
believe his own senses, he won't believe his own eyes, nor his own ears, he reads the book of
God, but he does not
believe what he reads. And he hears of God, and heaven, and eternal happiness, and of hell and
eternal misery; but he
believes none of those things; he goes on, as if there were no God, nor heaven and happiness;
neither has he any fear
of hell and eternal torments; and he sees his fellow-men dropping away daily on every side, yet
he goes on carelessly
in sin, as if he never was to die. And if he at any time thinks of dying, he hardly believes his own
thoughts. ---- Death
is at a great distance, so far off, that he dont concern himself about it, so as to prepare for it. God
mournfully
complains of his people, that they dont consider; -- O that they were wise, that they understood
this, that they would
consider their latter end.
The next thing I shall consider, is the actual
death of the body, or separation between soul and body. At the
cessation of natural life, there is no more joy or sorrow; no more hope nor fear, as to the body; no
more contrivance
and carrying on of business; no more merchandizing and trading; no more farming; no more
buying and selling; no
more building of any kind, no more contrivance at all to live in the world; no more honor nor
reproach; no more
praise; no more good report, nor evil report; no more learning of any trades, arts or sciences in
the world; no more
sinful pleasures, they are all at an end; recreations, visiting, tavern-hunting, musick and dancing,
chambering and
carousing, playing at dice and cards, or any game whatsoever; cursing and swearing, and
profaning the holy name of
God, drunkenness, fighting, debauchery, lying and cheating, in this world must cease forever.
Not only so, but they
must bid an eternal farewell to all the world; bid farewell to all their beloved sins and pleasures;
and the places and
possessions that knew them once, shall know them no more forever. And further, they must bid
adieu to all sacred and
divine things. They are obliged to leave the bible, and all the ordinances thereof; and to bid
farewell to preachers, and
all sermons, and all christian people, and {92} christian
conversation; they must bid a long farewell to sabbaths and
seasons, and opportunities of worship; yea an eternal farewell to all mercy and all hope; an
eternal farewell to God the
Father, Son and Holy Ghost, and adieu to heaven and all happiness, to saints and all the
inhabitants of the upper
world. At your leisure please to read the destruction of Babylon; you will find it written in the
18th of the Revelations.
On the other hand, the poor departed soul
must take up its lodging in sorrow, wo and misery, in the lake that
burns with fire and brimstone, where the worm dieth not and the fire is not quenched; where a
multitude of frightful
deformed devils dwell, and the damned ghosts of Adam's race; where darkness, horror and
despair reigns, or where
hope never comes, and where poor guilty naked souls will be tormented with exquisite torments,
even the wrath of the
Almighty poured out upon the damned souls; the smoke of their torments ascending up forever
and ever; their mouths
and nostrils streaming forth with living fire; and hellish groans, cries and shrieks all around them;
and merciless
devils upbraiding them for their folly and madness, and tormenting them incessantly. And there
they must endure the
most unsatiable, fruitless desire, and the most overwhelming shame and confusion and the most
horrible fear, and the
most doleful sorrow, and the most racking despair. When they cast their flaming eyes to heaven,
with Lives in
torments, they behold an angry GOD, whose eyes are as a flaming fire, and they are struck with
ten thousand darts of
pain; and the sight of the happiness of the saints above, adds to their pains and aggravates their
misery. And when
they reflect upon their past folly and madness in neglecting the great salvation in their day, it will
pierce them with ten
thousand inconceivable torments; it will as it were enkindle their hell afresh; and it will cause
them to curse
themselves bitterly, and curse the day in which they were born, and curse their parents that were
the instruments of
their being in the world; yea, they will curse, bitterly curse, and wish that very GOD that gave
them their being to be
in the same condition with them in hell torments. This is what is called the second death, and it is
the last death, and
eternal death to a guilty soul.
And O eternity, eternity, eternity! Who can
measure it? Who can count the years thereof? Arithmetic must fail,
the thoughts of men and angels are drowned in it; how shall we describe eternity? To what shall
we compare it? Were
it possible to employ a fly to carry off this globe by the small particles thereof, and to carry them
to such a distance
that it would return once in ten thousand years for another particle, and so continue
till it has carried off all this globe,
and framed them together in some unknown space, till it has made just such a world as this is:
{93} After all, eternity
would remain the same unexhausted duration. This must be the unavoidable portion of all
impenitent sinners, let them
be who they will, great or small, honorable or ignoble, rich or poor, bond or free. Negroes,
Indians, English, or of that
nation soever; all that die in their sins must go to hell together; for the wages of sin is death.
The next thing that I was to consider is
this:
That eternal life and happiness is the free gift
of God through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Under this proposition I shall now endeavour
to show what this life and happiness is.
The life that is mentioned in our text is a
spiritual life, it is the life of the soul; from sin to holiness, from
darkness to light, a translation from the kingdom and dominion of satan, to the kingdom of God's
grace. In other
words, it is being restored to the image of God and delivered from the image of satan. And this
life consists in union
of the soul to God, and communion with God; a real participation of the divine nature, or in the
Apostle's words, is a
Christ formed within us; I live says he, yet not I but Christ liveth in me.13 And
the Apostle John saith God is love and
he that dwelleth in love, dwelleth in God, and God in him.14 This is the life of
the soul. It is called emphatically life,
because it is a life that shall never have a period, a stable, a permanent, and unchangeable life,
called in the scriptures
everlasting life, or life eternal. And the happiness of this life consists in communion with God, or
in the spiritual
enjoyment of God. As much as a soul enjoys of God in this life, just so much of life and
happiness he enjoys or
possesses; yea, just so much of heaven he enjoys. A true christian, desires no other heaven but
the enjoyment of God;
a full and perfect enjoyment of God, is a full and perfect heaven and happiness to a gracious soul.
-- Further, this life
is called eternal life because God has planted a living principle in the soul; and whereas he was
dead before, now he is
made alive unto God; there is an active principle within him towards God, he now moves
towards God in his religious
devotions and exercises; is daily comfortably and sweetly walking with God; he breathes towards
God, a living
breath, in praises, prayers, adorations and thanksgivings; his prayers are now heard in the
heavens, and his praises
delight the ears of the Almighty, and his thanksgiving are accepted, so alive is he now to God,
that it is his meat and
drink, yea more than his meat and drink, to do the will of his heavenly Father. It is his delight, his
happiness and
pleasure to serve God. He does not drag himself to his duties now, but he does them out of
choice, and with alacrity of
soul. Yea, so alive is he to God, that he gives up himself and all that he has entirely to God, to be
for him and no
other; his whole aim is to glorify God, in all things, whether by life or death, {94} all the same to him.
We have a bright example of this in St. Paul.
After he was converted, he was all alive to God; he regarded not his
life but was willing to spend and be spent in the service of his God; he was hated, revil'd,
despised, laughed at, and
called all manner of evil names; was scourged, stoned and imprisoned; and all could not stop his
activity towards
God. He would boldly and courageously go on in preaching the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ,
to poor lost and
undone sinners; he would do the work God set him about, in spite of all opposition he met with
either from men or
devils, earth or hell; come death or come life, none of these things moved him, because he was
alive unto God.
Though he suffered hunger and thirst, cold and heat, poverty and nakedness by day and by night,
by sea, and by land,
and was in danger always; yet he would serve God amidst all these dangers. Read his amazing
account in 2 Cor. 11.
23, and on.
Another instance of marvellous love towards
God, we have in Daniel. When there was a proclamation of
prohibition, sent by the king to all his subjects forbidding them to call upon their gods, for 30
days; which was done
by envious men, that they might find occasion against Daniel the servant of the most high God;
yet he having the life
of God in his soul regarded not the king's decree, but made his petition to his God, as often as he
used to do though
death was threatened to the disobedient. But he feared not the hell they had prepared; for it
seems, the den resembled
hell, and the lions represented the devils. And when he was actually cast into the lions den, the
ravenous beasts
became meek and innocent as lambs, before the prophet, because he was alive unto God; the
spirit of the Most High
was in him, and the lions were afraid before him. Thus it was with Daniel and Paul; they went
through fire and water,
as the common saying is, because they had eternal life in their souls in an eminent manner; and
they regarded not this
life for the cause and glory of God. And thus it has been in all ages with true Christians. Many of
the fore-fathers of
the English, in this country, had this life and are gone the same way, that the holy Prophets and
Apostles went. Many
of them went through all manner of sufferings for God; and a great number of them are gone
home to heaven, in
chariots of fire. I have seen the place in London, called Smithfield,15 where
numbers were burnt to death for the
religion of Jesus Christ. And there is the same life in true christians now in these days; and if
there should
persecutions arise in our day, I verily believe, true christians would suffer with the same spirit
and temper of mind, as
those did, who suffered in days past.--This is the life which our texts speaks of.
We proceed in the next place to show, that
this life, which we have described, is the free gift of God, through
Jesus Christ our Lord.
{95}
Sinners have forfeited all mercy into the
hands of divine justice and have merited hell and damnation to
themselves; for the wages of sin is everlasting death, but heaven and happiness is a free gift; it
comes by favor; and all
merit is excluded: and especially if we consider that we are fallen sinful creatures, and there is
nothing in us that can
recommend us to the favour of God; and we can do nothing that is agreeable and acceptable to
God; and the mercies
we enjoy in this life are altogether from the pure mercy of God; we are unequal to them. Good
old Jacob cried out,
under the sense of his unworthiness, "I am less than the least of all thy mercies," and we have
nothing to give unto
God if we essay to give all the service that we are capable of, we should give him nothing but
what was his own, and
when we give up ourselves unto God, both soul and body, we give him nothing; for we were his
before; he had a right
to do with us as he pleased, either to throw us into hell, or to save us.16--There is
nothing that we can call our own, but
our sins; and who is he that dares to say, I expect to have heaven for my sins? for our texts says,
that the wages of sin
is death. If we are thus unequal and unworthy of the least mercy in this life, how much more are
we unworthy of
eternal life? Yet God can find it in his heart to give it. And it is altogether unmerited; it is a free
gift to undeserving
and hell deserving sinners of mankind: it is altogether of God's sovereign good pleasure to give
it. It is of free grace
and sovereign mercy, and from the unbounded goodness of God; he was self-moved to it. And it
is said that this life is
given in and through our Lord Jesus Christ. It could not be given in any other way, but in and
through the death and
suffering of the Lord Jesus Christ; Christ himself is the gift, and he is the christian's life. "For
God so loved the world
that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believed in him should not perish but have
everlasting life."17 The
word says further, "For by grace ye are saved, through faith, and that not of yourselves it is the
gift of God."18 This is
given through Jesus Christ our Lord; it is Christ that purchased it with his own blood; he
prepared it with his divine
and almighty power; and by the same power, and by the influence of his spirit, he prepares us for
it; and by his divine
grace preserve us to it. In a word, he is all in all in our eternal salvation; all this is the free gift of
god.
I have now gone through what I proposed
from my text. And I shall now make some application of the whole.
First to the criminal in particular; and then to
the auditory in general.
My poor unhappy Brother MOSES,
As it was your own desire that I should
preach to you this last discourse, so I shall speak plainly to you.--You are
the bone of my {96} bone, and flesh of my flesh. You
are an Indian, a despised creature, but you have despised
yourself; yea you have despised God more; you have trodden under foot his authority; you have
despised his
commands and precepts; And now as God says, be sure your sins will find you out. And now,
poor Moses, your sins
have found you out, and they have overtaken you this day; the day of your death is now come; the
king of terrors is at
hand; you have but a very few moments to breathe in this world.--The just law of man, and the
holy laws of Jehovah,
call aloud for the destruction of your mortal life; God says, "Whoso sheddeth man's blood of man
shall his blood be
shed."19 This is the ancient decree of heaven, and it is to be executed by man; nor
have you the least gleam of hope of
escape, for the unalterable sentence is past: The terrible day of execution is come; the unwelcome
guard is about you;
and the fatal instruments of death are now made ready; your coffin and your grave, your last
lodging are open ready to
receive you.
Alas! poor Moses, now you know by sad, by
woful experience, the living truth of our text, that the wages of sin
is death. You have been already dead; yea, twice dead: By nature spiritually dead. And since the
awful sentence of
death has been passed upon you, you have been dead to all the pleasures of this life; or all the
pleasures, lawful or
unlawful, have been dead to you: And death, which is the wages of sin, is standing even on this
side of your grave
ready to put a final period to your mortal life; and just beyond the grave, eternal death awaits
your poor soul, and
devils are ready to drag your miserable soul down to their bottomless den, where everlasting wo
and horror reigns; the
place is filled with doleful shrieks, howls and groans of the damned. Oh! to what a miserable,
forlorn, and wretched
condition has your extravagance folly and wickedness brought you! i.e. if you die in your sins.
And O! what manner
of repentance ought you to manifest! How ought your heart to bleed for what you have done!
How ought you to
prostrate your soul before a bleeding God! And under self-condemnation, cry out ah Lord, ah
Lord, what have I
done?--Whatever partiality, injustice and error there may be among the judges of the earth,
remember that you have
deserved a thousand deaths, and a thousand hells, by reason of your sins, at the hands of a holy
God. Should God
come out against you in strict justice, alas! what could you say for yourself; for you have been
brought up under the
bright sunshine, and plain, and loud sound of the gospel; and you have had a good education; you
can read and write
well; and God has given you a good natural understanding: And therefore your sins are so much
more agg[r]avated.
You have not sinned in such an ignorant manner as others have done; but you have sinned with
both your eyes open
as it were, under the light even the glorious light of the gospel of the Lord {97} Jesus Christ.--You have sinned
against the light of your own conscience, against your knowledge and understanding; you have
sinned against the pure
and holy laws of God, the just laws of men; you have sinned against heaven and earth; you have
sinned against all the
mercies and goodness of God; you have sinned against the whole bible, against the Old and New
Testament; you have
sinned against the blood of Christ, which is the blood of the everlasting covenant. O poor Moses,
see what you have
done! And now repent, repent, I say again repent; see how the blood you shed cries against you,
and the avenger of
blood is at your heels. O fly, fly, to the blood of the Lamb of God for the pardon of all your
aggravated sins.
But let us now turn to a more pleasant
theme.--Though you have been a great sinner, a heaven-daring sinner; yet
hark and hear the joyful sound from heaven, even from the King of kings, and Lord of lords; that
the gift of God is
eternal life, through Jesus Christ our Lord. It is the free gift offered to the greatest sinners, and
upon their true
repentance towards God and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ they shall be welcome to the life they
have spoken of: it is
offered upon free terms. He that hath no money may come; he that hath no righteousness, no
goodness may come, the
call is to poor undone sinners; the call is not to the righteous, but sinners calling them to
repentance. Hear the voice of
the Son of the Most High God, Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will
give you rest.20 This is a
call, a gracious call to you poor Moses, under your present burden and distresses. And Christ
alone has a right to call
sinners to himself. It would be presumption for a mighty angel to call a poor sinner in this
manner; and were it
possible for you to apply to all God's creatures, they would with one voice tell you, that it was not
in them to help you.
Go to all the means of grace, they would prove miserable helps without Christ himself. Yea,
apply to all the ministers
of the gospel in the world, they would all say, that it was not in them, but would only prove as
indexes, to point out to
you, the Lord Jesus Christ, the only Saviour of sinners of mankind. Yea, go to all the angels in
heaven they would do
the same. Yea, go to God the Father himself without Christ, he could not help you, to speak after
the manner of men,
he would also point to the Lord Jesus Christ, and say this is my beloved Son, in whom I am well
pleased hear ye him.
Thus you see, poor Moses, that there is none in heaven, or earth, that can help you, but Christ; he
alone has power to
save, and to give life.--God the eternal Father appointed him, chose him, authorized and fully
commissioned him to
save sinners. He came down from heaven into this lower world, and became as one of us, and
stood in our room. He
was the second Adam. And as God demanded correct obedience of the first Adam; the second
fulfil'd it; and as the
{98} first sinned and incurred the wrath and anger of
God, the second endured it; he suffered in our room. As he
became sin for us, he was a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief; all our stripes were laid
upon him; yea, he was
finally condemned, because we were under condemnation; and at last was executed and put to
death, for our sins; was
lifted up between the heavens and the earth, and was crucified on the accursed tree; his blessed
hands and feet were
fastened there; there he died a shameful and ignominious death; There he finished the great work
of our redemption:
There his hearts blood was shed for our cleansing: There he fully satisfied the divine justice of
God, for penitent,
believing sinners, though they have been the chief of sinners.--O Moses! this is good news to you
in this last day of
your life; here is a crucified Saviour at hand for your sins; his blessed hands are outstretched, all
in a gore of blood for
you. This is the only Saviour, an Almighty Saviour, just such as you stand in infinite and
perishing need of. O, poor
Moses! hear the dying prayer of a gracious Saviour on the accursed tree. Father forgive them for
they know not what
they do. This was a prayer for his enemies and murderers; and it is for you, if you will now only
repent and believe in
him. O, why will you die eternally, poor Moses, since Christ has died for sinners? Why will you
go to hell from
beneath a bleeding Saviour as it were? This is the day of your execution, yet it is the accepted
time, it is the day of
salvation if you will now believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. Must Christ follow you into the prison
by his servants and
there intreat you to accept of eternal life, and will you refuse it? Must he follow you even to the
gallows, and there
beseech of you to accept him, and will you refuse him? Shall he be crucified hard by your
gallows, as it were, and will
you regard him not. O poor Moses, now believe on the Lord Jesus Christ with all your heart, and
thou shalt be saved
eternally. Come just as you are, with all your sins and abominations, with all your filthiness, with
all your
blood-guiltiness, with all your condemnation, and lay hold of the hope set before you this day.
This is the last day of
salvation with your soul; you will be beyond the bounds of mercy in a few minutes more. O
`what a joyful day[']
would it be if you would now openly believe in and receive the Lord Jesus Christ; it would be the
beginning of
heavenly days with your poor soul; instead of a melancholy day, it would be a wedding day to
your soul: It would
cause the very angels in heaven to rejoice, and the saints on earth to be glad; it would cause the
angels to come down
from the realms above, and wait hovering about your gallows, ready to convey your soul to the
heavenly mansions.
There to taste the possession of eternal glory and happiness, and join the heavenly choirs in
singing the songs of
Moses and the Lamb: There to set down forever with Abraham, Isaac and {99} Jacob in the kingdom of God's glory;
and your shame and guilt shall be forever banished from the place, and all sorrow and fear
forever fly away, and tears
be wiped from your face; and there shall you forever admire the astonishing and amazing and
infinite mercy of God in
Christ Jesus, in pardoning such a monstrous sinner as you have been; there you will claim the
highest note of praise,
for the riches of free grace in Christ Jesus. But if you will not except of a Saviour so freely
offered to you this last day
of your life, you must this very day bid a farewell to God the Father Son and holy Ghost, to
heaven and all the saints
and angels that are there; and you must bid all the saints in this lower world an eternal farewell,
and even the whole
world. And so I must leave you in the hands of God; and I must turn to the whole auditory.
Sirs.--We may plainly see,
from what we have heard, and from the miserable object before us, into what a
doleful condition sin has brought mankind, even into a state of death and misery. We are by
nature as certainly under
the sentence of death from God, as this miserable man is by the just determination of man; and
we are all dying
creatures, and we are, or ought to be sensible of it: and this is the dreadful fruit of sin. O let us
then fly from all
appearance of sin; let us fight against it with all our might; let us repent and turn to God, and
believe on the Lord
Jesus Christ, that we may live forever: Let us all prepare for death, for we know not how soon,
nor how suddenly we
may be called out of the world.
Permit me in particular, reverend gentlemen
and fathers in Israel, to speak a few words to you, though I am very
sensible that I need to be taught the first principles of the oracles of God, by the least of you. But
since the Providence
of God has so ordered it, that I must speak here on this occasion, I beg that you would not be
offended nor be angry
with me.
God has raised you up from among your
bretheren, and has qualified and authorized you to do his great work;
and you are the servants of the Most High God, and ministers of the Lord Jesus Christ; you are
Christ's ambassadors;
you are called shepherds, watchmen overseers, or bishops, and you are rulers of the temples of
God, or of the
assemblies of God's people; you are God's angels, and as such you have nothing to do but to wait
on God, and to do
the work that the Lord Jesus Christ your blessed Lord and Master has set you about, not fearing
the face of any man,
nor seeking to please men, but your Master. You are to declare the whole counsel of God, and to
give a portion to
every soul in due season; as a physician gives a potion to his patients, according to their diseases,
so you are to give a
portion to every soul in due season according to their spiritual maladies: Whether {100} it be agreeable or not
agreeable to them, you must give it to them; whether they will love you or hate you for it, you
must do your work.
Your work is to encounter sin and satan; this was the very end of the coming of Christ into the
world, and the end of
his death and sufferings; it was to make an end of sin and to destroy the works of the devil. And
this is your work still,
you are to fight the battles of the Lord. Therefore combine together, and be as terrible as an army
with banners; attack
this monster sin in all its shapes and windings, and lift up your voices as trumpets and not spare,
call aloud, call your
people to arms against this common enemy of mankind, that sin may not be their ruin. Call upon
all orders ranks and
degrees of people, to rise up against sin and satan. Arm yourselves with fervent prayer
continually, this is a terrible
weapon against the kingdom of satan. And preach the death and sufferings, and the resurrection
of Jesus Christ; for
nothing is so destructive to the kingdom of the devil as this is. But what need I speak any more?
Let us all attend, and
hear the great Apostle of the Gentiles speak unto us in Eph. 6 ch. from the tenth verse and
onward. Finally my
bretheren, be strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might; put on the whole armour of God,
that ye may be able
to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against
principalities, against
powers, against the rulers of darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.
Wherefore take unto
you the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand in the evil day, and having done all, to
stand. Stand
therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breast-plate of righteousness;
And your feet shod
with the preparation of the gospel of peace: Above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith ye
shall be able to quench
all the fiery darts of the wicked: And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the spirit,
which is the word of
God: Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the spirit, and watching thereunto with
all perserverance, and
supplication for all saints.
I shall now address myself to the Indians, my
bretheren and kindred according to the flesh.
My Poor Kindred,
You see the woful consequences of sin, by
seeing this our poor miserable countryman now before us, who is to
die this day for his sins and great wickedness. And it was the sin of drunkenness that has brought
this destruction and
untimely death upon him. There is a dreadful wo denounced from the Almighty against
drunkards; and it is this sin,
this abominable, this beastly and accursed sin of drunkenness, that has stript us of every desirable
comfort in this life;
by this we are poor miserable and wretched; by this sin we have no name nor credit {101} in the world among polite
nations, for this sin we are despised in the world, and it is all right and just, for we despised
ourselves more: and if we
don't regard ourselves, who will regard us? And it is for our sins and especially for that accursed,
that most devilish
sin of drunkenness that we suffer every day. For the love of strong drink we spend all that we
have, and everything we
can get. By this sin we can't have comfortable houses, nor any thing comfortable in our houses;
neither food nor
raiment, nor decent utensils. We are obliged to put up with any sort o[f] shelter just to screen us
from the severity of
the weather, and we go about with very mean, ragged and dirty clothes, almost naked. And we
are half-starved, for the
most of the time obliged to pick up anything to eat. And our poor children are suffering every day
for want of the
necessaries of life; they are very often crying for want of food, and we have nothing to give them;
and in the cold
weather they are shivering and crying, being pinched with cold. All this is for the love of strong
drink. And this is not
all the misery and evil we bring on ourselves in this world; but when we are intoxicated with
strong drink we drown
our rational powers, by which we are distinguished from the brutal creation we unman ourselves,
and bring ourselves
not only level with the beasts of the field, but seven degrees beneath them; yea we bring
ourselves level with the
devils; I don't know but we make ourselves worse than devils, for I never heard of drunken
devils.
My poor kindred, do consider what a
dreadful abominable sin drunkenness is. God made us men, and we chuse
to be beast and devils, God made us rational creatures, and we chuse to be fools. Do consider
further, and behold a
drunkard and see how he looks when he has drowned his reason; how deformed and shameful
does he appear? He
disfigures every part of him, both soul and body, which was made after the Image of God. He
appears with awful
deformity, and his whole visage is dis-figured; if he attempts to speak he cannot bring out his
words distinct, so as to
be understood; if he walks he reels and staggers to and fro, and tumbles down. And see how he
behaves, he is now
laughing, and then he is crying, he is singing, and the next minute he is mourning, and is all love
with every one, and
anon he is raging and for fighting, and killing all before him, even the nearest and dearest
relations and friends: Yea,
nothing is too bad for a drunken man to do. He will do that which he would not do for the world,
in his right mind; he
may lie with his own sister or daughter as Lot did.
Further, when a person is drunk, he is just
good for nothing in the world; he is of no service to himself, to his
family, to his neighbours, or his country; and how much more unfit is he to serve God: Yet we
are just fit for the
service of the devil.
{102}
Again, a man in drunkenness is in all manner
of dangers, he may be killed by his fellow-men, by wild beasts, and
tame beasts; he may fall into the fire, into the water, or into a ditch; or he may fall down as he
walks along, and break
his bones or his neck; and he may cut him-self with edge-tools. Further if he has any money or
anything valuable, he
may lose it all, or may be robbed, or he may make a foolish bargain and be cheated out of all he
has.
I believe you know the truth of what I have
just now said, many of you by sad experience; yet you will go on still
in your drunkenness. Though you have been cheated over and over again, and you have lost your
substance by
drunkenness, yet you will venture to go on in this most destructive sin. O fools, when will ye be
wise?--We all know
the truth of what I have been saying, by what we have seen and heard of drunken deaths. How
many have been
drowned in our rivers, and how many frozen to death in the winter season! yet drunkards go on
without fear and
consideration: Alas, alas! What will become of all such drunkards? Without doubt they must all
go to hell, except
they truly repent and turn to God. Drunkenness is so common amongst us, that even our young
men, (and what is still
more shocking) young women are not ashamed to get drunk. Our young men will
get drunk as soon as they will eat
when they are hungry.--It is generally esteemed among men more abominable for a woman to be
drunk than a man;
and yet there is nothing more common amongst us than female drunkards. Women ought to be
more modest than
men; the holy scriptures recommend modesty to women in particular;-- But drunken women have
no modesty at all. It
is more intolerable for a woman to get drunk, if we consider further that she is in great danger of
falling into the hands
of the sons of Belial, or wicked men and being shamefully treated by them.
And here I cannot but observe, we find in
sacred writ, a wo denounced against men who put their bottles to their
neighbors mouth to make them drunk, that they may see their nakedness: And no doubt there are
such devilish men
now in our days, as there were in the days of old.
And to conclude, Consider my poor kindred,
you that are drunkards, into what a miserable condition you have
brought yourselves. There is a dreadful wo thundering against you every day, and the Lord says,
That drunkards shall
not inherit the kingdom of heaven.
And now let me exhort you all to break off
from your drunkenness, by a gospel repentance, and believe on the
Lord Jesus and you shall be saved. Take warning by this doleful sight before us, and by all the
dreadful judgments that
have befallen poor drunkards. O let us reform our lives, and live as becomes dying creatures, in
time to come. Let us
{103} be persuaded that we are accountable creatures to
God, and we must be called to an account in a few days. You
that have been careless all your days, now awake to righteousness, and be concerned for your
poor never-dying souls.
Fight against all sins, and especially the sin that easily besets you, and behave in time to come as
becomes rational
creatures; and above all things receive and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you shall have
eternal life; and when
you come to die, your souls will be received into heaven, there to be with the Lord Jesus in
eternal happiness, with all
the saints in glory: Which God of his infinite mercy grant, through Jesus Christ our Lord.--Amen.
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH.
As it is expected that the inquisitive Public will be desirous to know some particulars of Moses Paul, the following sketch of his Life and character, were collected chiefly from his own mouth.
MOSES PAUL, was born in the town of
Barnstable, and province of the Massachusetts-Bay, about the year 1742.
His Father, (as he has been told) died at the
Siege of Louisbourg, in the year 1745.--He remembers but little of
his Mother, only that she was a constant attendant on Divine Worship, in the Presbyterian
Meeting House in Barnstable.
When about five years old, he was bound an
apprentice to Mr. John Manning, of Windham, in this Government,
with whom he lived fourteen or fifteen years, and in whose family he learnt to read and write,
and where he was
instructed in many important articles of the Christian Religion.
After he left Mr. Manning's family, he
inlisted in the Provincial Army, in Col. Putnam's company and regiment.
He says, that he contracted many sinful habits in the Army, which before his enlistment he was a
stranger to the
practice of.
Soon after the campaign was over, he
engaged in the seafaring business, which he followed for several years, as
well in ships of war, as in Merchants service, where he got confirmed in those evil habits which
he too easily imbibed
in the Army, which almost entirely eradicated from his mind, those good principles in which he
had been instructed,
while he liv'd in Mr. Manning's family.
For these three or four years, (since he has
left the sea) he has resided in this Government, living but a little while
in a place.--In the {104} month of September last, he
went to New-Haven, and living in a very unsteady way, often
getting intoxicated with strong drink, and following other dissolute practices, till on the seventh
of December last, in
the evening, at Mr. Clark's Tavern, in the Parish of Bethany, he wounded Mr. Moses Cook of
Waterbury, (who put up
at Mr. Clark's as a lodger) with a club, and of which wound he died on Thursday night
following.--The murderer was
the same evening pursued and taken, and the next day he was committed to Goal in
New-Haven.
On the twentieth of the same month, his trial
came on in this county before the Honorable Superior Court, when
after a fair and impartial hearing, which lasted a whole day, he was found guilty of the murder of
said Cook, and
sentenced to be hanged.
He has been accused of committing other
Murders; particularly of killing a Sailor in the West Indies, of which
charges as a dying person he declares his innocency, and that he has ben guilty of no murder, but
that for which he is
condemned to die.
He gratefully acknowledges the kindness of
the Ministers in the town, for their unwearied attendance on him, in
his imprisonment and hopes that their endeavors to promote his spiritual and eternal welfare, has
been attended with
some good effect.
He earnestly wishes that his untimely
end, may be a means of detering others, from following those sinful
practices which has made him so Public an Example for his sin and folly.
NOTES
1One
of the most popular British writers of his day, Isaac Watts (1674- 1748) was especially acclaimed
for his hymns, which were the first in
England to express spiritual emotions and to make hymn-singing a powerful devotional force.
Occom quotes from Watts's Psalms of David Imitated
in the Language of the New Testament (1719), #613.
Occom's spellings are retained. [ ] indicates the addition of
a letter obviously omitted in error.
2John 1.11
3Psalms 14.1
4For Solomon's comments on fools, see especially Proverbs 12.13, 14.8, 14.24, 15.2
5James 3.8
6Psalms 58.3
7John 6.70, 8.44
8Romans 5.12
{105}
9Genesis
2.16-17
10Genesis 2.16-17
11Ephesians 2.1
12Mathew Henry (1662-1714), a British non-conformist divine and commentator, is best known for his Exposition of the Old and New Testament (1710). Occom cites his commentary on Ephesians 2.1.
13Galatians 2.20.
14Occom paraphrases 1 John 4.8, 12-13.
15Smithfield was an open area in London where jousts, tournaments, executions, burnings were held. In the nineteenth century it was the location of a great cattle market.
16Genesis 32.10
17John 3.16
18Ephesians 2.8
19Genesis 9.6
20Mathew 11.28
{106}
SPACE AND FREEDOM IN THE GOLDEN
REPUBLIC:
YELLOW BIRD'S THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF JOAQUIN
MURIETA, THE CELEBRATED
CALIFORNIA BANDIT
John Lowe
Christopher Newman, that quintessential
American abroad, opens James's The American by occupying a huge
circular divan at the Louvre; he sits, spreads his arms and legs, and fills up all the space he
possibly can. He is, of
course, from the West (where else?) and his WASP identity puts him on the interior of the
American dream. A French
aristocrat quite rightly nominates him for the title of "Duke of California."
The word California has always had a certain
magical poetic resonance for Americans, partly because of the
state's tremendous size, but also because of its unique and abundant beauty. It is the original
dream of the New World
garden magnificently magnified and gilded. Indeed, the term "golden republic" refers to the
native grasses, themselves
emblematic of the state's general fecundity, but also to the mother-lodes of gold discovered in the
mid-l800s, facts that
underline the tensions inherent in the state's identity. Aware of these ironies, Yellow Bird (John
Rollin Ridge), in The
Life and Adventures of Joaquin Murieta, the Celebrated California Bandit, gives us a saga
of space and freedom set
in the Golden Republic's halcyon days of the l850s. It is, to be sure, a story with a didactic
purpose that pushes a
moral message, and much of it is mediocre and slack; at its best, however, it is a powerful
reminder of how both the
interior and the exterior of the American dream have always depended on the appropriation of
space for the concept
of identity, and how the politics of displaced and relocated peoples can give rise to heroic and
sometimes mythical
folk literature. Increasingly, it has been the important task of those denied the benefits of
American life--the poor, the
dispossessed, blacks, Native Americans, and immigrants--to remind all Americans of who they
are, and what America
says it is. Fighting a battle for equality, armed with an awareness of our stated national principles
and the demand that
they be extended to all, they keep a national dynamic alive.
John Rollin Ridge (Yellow Bird was his
tribal name) was born in Georgia to one of the most powerful families
in the Cherokee Nation. The Ridges saw the inevitability of the Federal Government's plan to
relocate the Nation, and
urged a negotiated acceptance, thus pitting themselves against the equally powerful Ross family.
The issue had really
been resolved, however, when gold was discovered in north Georgia.
{107}
When the Rosses killed both
Yellow Bird's father and grandfather, the family fled. Yellow Bird killed a man
himself in a dispute, and went to California to mine gold. Failing, he embarked on a literary
career, but remained
fixated on finding a way to exact revenge. Meanwhile, he vented his spleen by indirectly
damning U.S. imperialism in
California when he dramatized the contemporary and compelling legend of Joaquin Murieta,
seeing an affinity
between their wronged ethnic, familial, and sexual honor. His publishers obviously saw it, too;
the "Publishers'
Preface" to the original edition, in its insistence that the author is "a `Cherokee Indian' born in the
woods--reared in
the midst of the wildest scenery--and familiar with all that is thrilling, fearful, and tragical in a
forest life" (2), seems
intent on establishing a romantic yet forbidding association between the author and the
pre-existing tradition of the
Noble Savage. This figure connected, in the popular imagination, with the mastery of treacherous
space: the forest,
forever linked in the Eurocentric mind with the moral "wood of error," the labyrinth, and the
abode of the devil. The
physical Western counterpart of these images could easily be found in the desert, the plains, the
mountains, and all of
these function in Joaquin's narrative; indeed, the expulsion from Eden/home is a constant
theme.
Joaquin Murieta, unlike Christopher
Newman, but like Ridge himself, is on the exterior of the American dream,
a Mexican whose homestead in California has been snatched from under him by the Anglo
government. And yet, we
must be careful in building this parallel; as his biographer notes, Ridge paradoxically favored
assimilation as the
ultimate answer to the "Indian question," and eagerly pursued wealth and position in Anglo
America for himself and
his family (Parins 2). Ridge seems to have been caught in limbo, neither inside nor outside, and
his writing resonates
with that tension, which helps account for what seems his exuberant relief in the expansive
spatial metaphors of
Murieta's story.
The Joaquin myth was a composite of
several bandits' careers. In Joaquin, Ridge faithfully follows the basic
facts, but interweaves them with details suggested by his own life; as noted, his family was
originally driven, along
with most other Cherokees, from Northern Georgia, where the discovery of gold led to a land
rush for Indian property.
Ridge arrived in California in 1850, the same year that Joaquin rides up from Mexico. As his
family was in Georgia,
Joaquin is driven from his gold field claim, by both predatory Anglo marauders and an equally
unjust set of laws
which persecuted foreign-born miners with an outrageous tax. Unlike Ridge, however, Murieta
terrorizes most of
California and is pursued and finally killed by a crude gang of deputies under the leadership of
Captain Harry Love.
His head and the {108} hand of Three-Fingered Jack, his
sidekick, are preserved in alcohol, and then go on display
for years in the sideshows and "museums" of the state as a warning to others. Rumor has it that
they were lost in the
great San Francisco fire and earthquake, which would seem to be an appropriate coda to a heroic
and brutal tale that
takes much of its power from that of Nature.
We might further note the metonymy
involved here, and the hidden intent of Anglo society. The spatial
confinement of the robbers' bodily parts backfires, for as their subsequent display across the state
portrays, they are
rather considered icons, retaining tremendous power. What makes Ridge's Joaquin story different
from its many other
variants, and adds to the residual power of the myth, is its romantic and poetic evocation of
Joaquin and his enchanted
progress through the edenic spaces of the Golden Republic. This aspect of the text perhaps
accounts for its popularity
in California, for in addition to providing the state with a heroic myth, it sets it against what
Gaston Bachelard calls
images of "felicitous space," which grow out of a kind of "topophilia," a mapping of space we
love, space "that may
be defended against adverse forces," and also space that may thus also be "eulogized" and
therefore further
"poeticized" (Bachelard xxxi).
The concept of space and poetics has been
given its most impressive treatment by Bachelard, a French
phenomenologist and scientist, who led a rather obscure academic life in the crowded ambiance
of Paris. In La
Poetique de l'espace (1958), Bachelard traces our childhood identification of our psychic
lives with areas in the
houses we inhabit. He goes on to make profound links between the way we conceptualize the
broader world of nature
and our interior selves. Anyone familiar with the similar "topophilia" of Native American
literatures will see the
usefulness of Bachelard here, and the centrality of Joaquin Murieta to that pattern. I
shall make broad use of his
theories here in an attempt to portray the meaning of Ridge's apparently random semiotics of
landscape, and to
demonstrate their metaphysical and political implications.
Joaquin begins traditionally but
significantly with the narrator's words, "I sit down to write somewhat concerning
the life and character of Joaquin Murieta" (7). The sedentary stance of the author, a
trite commonplace, here becomes
an effective contrast to an extraordinarily mobile hero, whom the narrator then refers to as a
"truly wonderful man"
who was nothing more nor less than the "natural production of the social and moral condition of
the country in which
he lived, acting upon certain peculiar circumstances favorable to such a result, and consequently,
his individual
history is a part of the most valuable history of the State" (7). The narrator is interested in
establishing {109}
Joaquin's amazing ability to range freely and quickly through the vast spaces of California; he
therefore claims that
although there were supposedly at least five "sanguinary devils" named Joaquin ranging the
country at one and the
same time, there was really only one Joaquin Murieta.
Our omniscient guide then quickly sketches
in the series of outrages that transformed Joaquin into an outlaw.
Here the story has much in common, in a symbolic sense, with more current explorations of
imperialism and empire,
such as The Jewel in the Crown and David Lean's film of A Passage to
India, for all three feature a cry of rape to
signify what has been done to a country and a people. Daphne Manners, in Crown,
actually is gang-raped, but the
crime is falsely ascribed to Harry Kumar, an Indian; in Passage, the hysterical
Adela Quested accuses her Indian
friend, Dr. Aziz, of attempting to rape her in the Malabar caves. Both novels, written by
Englishmen, ironically focus
on unjust charges against men who represent whole cultures that have been "raped" by the British
Raj. In Ridge's
novel, the rape of Rosita (Joaquin's mistress) by Anglos similarly and ironically comments on the
"rape" of displaced
Hispanics in California, and obliquely on the "rape" of the Cherokees, whose tragic story of
displacement and
disintegration is surely on Ridge's mind as he maps out parallel events in California.
In Joaquin, after the title figure
has been ousted from successful ventures in mining and farming, he is forced to
witness Rosita's rape, which is soon followed by the murder of his half-brother by a crazed
vigilante mob of Anglos.
These events have a catastrophic affect upon Joaquin, which is expressed in a spatial metaphor:
"His soul swelled
beyond its former boundaries, and the barriers of honor, rocked into atoms by the strong passion
which shook his
heart like an earthquake, crumbled around him. Then it was that he declared . . . he would live
henceforth for revenge
and that his path should be marked with blood" (12-13). Joaquin's circle of self, thwarted in its
effort to grow via the
traditional American way (hard work, enterprise, and democratic comradeship), has burst through
into a new and
larger circle through the passion of anger. His vow to cut a "bloody path" through the state as he
avenges the wrongs
done to him and his family presages ever widening circles of spatial/criminal conquest. His path
echoes several
principles set down in the 1840s by Ralph Waldo Emerson in his seminal essay "Circles." In one
of literary
transcendentalism's prime expressions, Emerson gives space and confinement elemental circular
forms, first in the
human eye, and then, significantly, in nature, for "the horizon" formed by the eyes is the second
circle man knows, a
"primary figure" that is repeated "without end" in nature (263). Here {110} and in his other essays Emerson maps out
an imperial self that properly seeks expansion and power, a process generated from, and
paralleled by, Nature itself.
The concept of the self expressed by ever-expanding concentric circles has a demonic side as
well; at one point in
"Circles," Emerson relates his expanding circles of self to the explosive anger expressed by
Joaquin: "But the heart
refuses to be imprisoned; in its first and narrowest pulses it already tends outward with a vast
force and to immense
and innumerable expansions" (265).
Theories of "self-reliance" and the "imperial
self" fed into the ideology of manifest destiny; better manifestations,
however, had much in common with the desires and aspirations of the people whose ethnic
identity marked them as
barriers--and therefore enemies--to Anglo dreams. These ideas would find magnificent
expression in other key works
of the period, particularly in Hawthorne's exploration of the "magic circles" of the self in
The Scarlet Letter (1850)
and in Melville's critique of unleashed darker elements of Emersonian and capitalist ideology,
Moby-Dick (1851),
books published only a few years before Joaquin. Although it is beyond the scope of this paper,
The Life and
Adventures of Joaquin Murieta surely demands to be studied alongside these books and
other masterworks of what
we have called the "American Renaissance," as well as with newer members of the canon such as
Frederick Douglass,
Harriet Beecher Stowe, and Harriet Jacobs. As in many of those narratives, in Joaquin
Murieta we follow a somewhat
romantic and poetic evocation of a hero through edenic spaces, but it is a vision that co-exists
with a gruesome litany
of murders, robberies and tortures. Yellow Bird was able to achieve this fusion, perhaps, because
he was taking
folkloric materials and transforming them into narrative virtually at their moment of formation.
Bakhtin has
demonstrated that the novel's roots must ultimately be sought in folklore, where the object of
artistic representation is
degraded to the level of a contemporary reality, and the fluid periods of history are ideal for
furnishing such material
(Bakhtin 39).
Furthermore, as is often the case with an
American "classic," Joaquin's narrative charts a key moment in
American history, a time when prospectors from all over the world converged on the mother
lode. The folklore that
developed quickly became the stuff of legend and literature, with Mark Twain, Bret Harte, and
others mining it. What
has been left out of the literature, however, is the displacement of Mexican-Americans. The
United States victory over
Mexico in 1848 coincided almost exactly with the discovery of California gold. Two years later
the state's legislature
passed a "Foreign Miners' Tax Law"; ironically, Germans, French, and for a time, Chinese were
permitted to stay, but
Latino miners were forced out. The great Mexican ranches {111} in the state, with their hundreds of dependents,
contributed a vast displaced population; some became outlaws who were supported by many in
the Hispanic community.
The force of history seemed to accelerate
drastically during these years, and Joaquin's hectic narrative keeps
fictional pace. As the narrator points out, one of the most amazing things about the ensuing and
terrifying
assassinations of the men who had brutalized Joaquin and his family is the swiftness with which
the miscreants are
dispatched. Throughout the tale, the banditti act swiftly; celerity works hand in hand with
mastery of space. Joaquin's
apparent ability to be everywhere is partially explained in the text, as the narrator conflates
another Joaquin story by
having the actual Joaquin Valenzuela (one of the five Joaquins) function as Joaquin Murieta's
lieutenant. This also
implies that Joaquin operates as part of a long line of Mexican bandits, for Valenzuela, we are
told, rode with the
famous guerilla chief, Padre Jurata, in Mexico, and presumably has schooled Joaquin in the
tricks of the trade.
Physical security, often expressed in terms of
spatial refuge, frequently set as Nature's bosom, also finds
illustration in material goods that answer immediate temporal needs. Joaquin's only safety is said,
for instance, to lie
"in a persistence in the unlawful course which he had begun. It was necessary that he should have
horses and that he
should have money" (13-14). Soon the local newspapers are full of attacks on ranchers, coaches,
and travelers:
The scenes of murder and robbery shifted with the rapidity of lightning. At one time, the northern countries would be suffering slaughters and depredations, at another the southern, and, before one would have imagined it possible, the east and the west, and every point of the compass would be in trouble . . . the country . . . was so well adapted to a business of this kind--the houses scattered at such distances along the roads, the plains so level and open in which to ride with speed, and the mountains so rugged with their ten thousand fastnesses in which to hide. (15)
As Joaquin's mastery of space expands, that of the public at large shrinks, for "all dreaded to
travel the public roads"
(22), a circumstance that contributes powerfully to the Anglo community's growing anger and
resentment.
Joaquin's most impressive feat comes when
he is surprised by a band of men in a canyon:
His only practicable path was a narrow digger-trail which led along the side of a huge mountain, directly over a ledge of rocks a hundred yards in length, which hung beatling over the rushing stream beneath in a direct line with the hill {112} . . . It was a fearful gauntlet for any man to run . . . [there was] danger of falling 100 feet . . . [he] must run in a parallel line with his enemies . . . with their revolvers drawn. He dashed along that fearful trail as if he had been mounted upon a spirit-steed, shouting as he passed, "I am Joaquin! Kill me if you can!" (87)
It is hardly surprising that this is the moment in the book that artists have most often depicted
(it appears on the cover
of the current Oklahoma Press edition), for as Ridge remarks, "It was perfectly sublime to see
such super-human
daring and recklessness" (87). We may read the scene's spatial semiotics both ethnically and
politically: Murieta,
belonging to neither the Indian nor the Anglo world, nor even to the community of law-abiding
but oppressed
Mexicans, rides a razor thin ridge (also the author's last name) of marginality throughout the
book, boldly outlined
against nature, riding on it, across it, against it, supported by it yet threatened by it (the abyss) as
well. Politically, he
is alien, outlaw, racial and religious other; but all this becomes transcended through his
"sublime" mastery of
American space(s), much of it forbidden. Again and again, the narrator refers to Joaquin's
lightning-like ability to
range across the land as "magical." He is also careful, however, to provide a counterpoint of
realistic reasons for
Joaquin's success, such as the general support and encouragement the protagonist receives from
the rest of the
Mexican community, the unsettled condition of the country, the isolation of the mining regions,
and so forth. Joaquin
also, like Robin Hood, deals gently with those who support him, and many ranchers buy
protection by sheltering the
band for the night and keeping quiet about it later.
Yellow Bird takes care to authenticate space.
He understands the value time has in setting the boundaries of
place, and when Joaquin is in a specific vicinity, the narrator frequently gives the precise date,
quotes local
newspapers for details of the location, and annotates towns, rivers, mountains, and even gullies.
One may easily chart
Joaquin's course across the state by following Yellow Bird's narrative mapping. Arroyos, rocks,
prominent features in
the terrain are also added, not for scenic effect but to reify the landscape. Two men are traveling
on a road,
specifically the one "that leads up Feather River, near to the Honcut Creek, which puts into that
stream" (21).
Similarly, the complementary grid of temporal reality is overlaid on the natural. When Joaquin is
said to be in a
specific locale, Ridge includes sentences supposedly taken from newspapers in passages like this:
"The Marysville
Herald of November 15, 1851, speaking of the horrible state of affairs, has the following
remarkable paragraph:
`Seven men have been murdered within three or four days in a region of country not {113} more than twelve miles in
extent'" (21). All this is necessary; Joaquin's mastery of space will not be magical unless the land
itself is realistic and believable.
The most important statement of this central
theme comes when Joaquin relocates to a spot near Mount Shasta in
the northern part of the state. The mountain, Ridge maintains, "serves at a distance of two
hundred miles to direct the
course of the mountain-traveler, being to him as the polar star to the mariner" (23). Mount Shasta
"rears its white shaft
at all seasons of the year high above every other peak . . . in its garments of snow like some
mighty archangel, filling
the heaven with his solemn presence" (23). This rather trite description nevertheless parallels
Yellow Bird's main
themes, for like Joaquin, Mount Shasta towers above its peers, is unassailable and unavoidable,
and extends into
space both horizontally and vertically.
The mountain creates a peak of sorts in the
narrative as well, for Yellow Bird inserts his two and a half page
poem, "Mount Shasta, Seen from a Distance." At first the mountain is personified as a proud
blasphemer, a tower of
pride that defies the storms of heaven which beat against it in wrath. Mount Shasta, however, is
not static; age by age,
it is still "rising higher/ Into Heaven!" (23). In an astonishing turn, Yellow Bird reveals that the
mountain, far from
being the blasphemous rebel that it seems to be, was created by God and symbolizes the higher
law of God that man
should strive to attain. "And well this Golden State shall thrive, if, like/ Its own Mount Shasta,
sovereign law shall
lift/ Itself in purer atmosphere--so high/ That human feeling, human passion, at its base shall lie
subdued . . . Its pure
administration shall be like/ The snow, immaculate upon that mountain's brow!" (25). In his
poem Ridge points to the
discrepancy between what the law should be and what it actually is.
This long apostrophe to the mountain
enables Yellow Bird to take us as readers high above the state to share this
lofty monarch's view of "the fertile/ Vale, and undulating plains below, the grass . . . ." From this
vantage point we
understand the purifying effect that Shasta has on the land, for from its flanks come cool breezes
and vapors which
"guarantee . . . health and happiness" to the farms and farmer below. Even better, and more
romantically, the
mountain inspires "loftier feelings . . . nobler thoughts" for the humble plowman; little children,
asking who made the
mountain, learn from their mothers it is God's creation. We thus, like the spotted hawk in Walt
Whitman's similarly
conceived Song of Myself (1855), aspire to "the eagle's cloudless height" and the
clear-eyed perspective on American
nature and the law that should proceed from the continent's grandeur and majestic space. The
poem ends, in fact, by
transforming this "blasphemous" babel-like {114}
natural phenomenon into a symbol of law, a pure white shaft that
towers above man's activities as a moral guide. It is in the shadow of this peak that Joaquin and
his men take refuge
for several months, descending at intervals into the valley below to steal horses with the aid of
the Indians.
How does all this work in the overall scheme
of the novel? Mount Shasta suggests the doubled nature of Joaquin,
who as rebel against an unjust set of laws that discriminate against Mexicans, actually represents
a purer law. Like
Mount Shasta, his freedom in space gives him a kind of vertical presence in the society of men as
well; like most
mythical bandits, his actions, which take place during hard times for many people, offer heroic
and poetic imaginative
space and freedom for the oppressed and the weak who lack Joaquin's resourcefulness and
courage. The fact that the
mountain's base in earthly nature is frequently obscured by clouds aligns with Joaquin's mythical
stance, one much
like trickster's, between God and man. Moreover, the cooperation with California Indians
underlines Yellow Bird's
doubled role as narrator, and begins a long skein of references to the shameful treatment Native
Americans had
received in the Golden State, both as victims and as scapegoats. Ridge will charge, in fact, "The
ignorant Indians
suffered for many a deed which had been perpetrated by civilized hands. It will be recollected by
many persons who
resided at Yreka and on Scott's River in the fall and winter of 1851 how many `prospecters' [sic]
were lost in the
mountains and never again heard from; how many were found dead, supposed to have been killed
by the Indians, and
yet bearing upon their bodies the marks of knives and bullets quite as frequently as arrows"
(27).
Joaquin's role as trickster and his alignment
with Indians dovetail in the episode in which he and his men are
robbed by the Tejons. The trickster, as mediator between God and man, usually has his way, but
if he did so always he
would be all too close to the status of God; therefore, he too must occasionally come to grief, as
Coyote, Raven, and
Brer Rabbit all do from time to time. Moreover, it is often true that a weaker creature does the
tricking of the trickster,
and that is precisely how the Tejons function here. As masters of the region's terrain and as silent,
superb hunters, the
Tejons have little difficulty surprising Joaquin and his band, stripping them naked, and beating
them soundly with
willow rods. The episode is a version of the "trickster tricked" motif that Paul Radin has
identified in trickster
narratives, one also found in African American folktales, and confirmed by Ridge's statement
that "The robbers were
robbed" (40). Joaquin, however, laughs off the episode, and refuses to take revenge on Old Chief
Sapatarra and his
band. He knows, as we do, that they {115} were inspired
to this mischief by a wealthy white rancher, who sought
their aid in retrieving stock the bandits had stolen. Moreover, when Joaquin's band, men and
women alike, are
stripped naked by the Tejons the men find new clothing, while the women hide themselves in the
brush, "like mother
Eve"; the phrase points both to the regenerative nature all around them and to the parallels
between their retreats and
the Garden of Eden/Mythical Nest.
It should not be supposed, however, that
Ridge is in tight consort with California Indians; his portraits of them
are quite mixed, perhaps because of his own ancestry in a supposedly more "civilized" tribe, the
Georgia Cherokees,
who had their own alphabet, had adopted white modes of production, and had established
thriving business
enterprises before the forced march to the West. In a later scene, he paints the Tejon Nation in
lazy poses, as they eat
acorns and worms, and charges them with treachery and cowardice. When they succeed in
robbing Joaquin and his
band, Ridge comments, "The poor, miserable, cowardly Tejons had achieved a greater triumph
over them than all the
Americans put together!" (38). Nor are the Tejons the only Native people who operate against
Joaquin; later, some
Cherokees aid the Anglo pursuers, and kill two of Murieta's band. Presumably, Ridge had in
mind those renegades
who sided with the Ross faction rather than his own family; there were no good
Indians, per se, for Ridge, even in his
own tribe.
Similarly, Ridge's verdict on the Digger
Indians is mixed; like the Mark Twain of Roughing It, he has contempt
for their supposedly low standards of living and their employment in menial positions by Anglos,
but he admits that in
their capacity as runners bearing mail, they are "very expeditious on foot and willing to travel a
considerable distance
for a small piece of bread, fresh meat, or a ragged shirt. I have known them to swim rivers when
the waters were high
and dangerous in order to carry a letter to its destination. They are exceedingly faithful in this
business, having a
superstitious dread of that mysterious power which makes a paper talk without a
mouth" (130). Although they are
admired for their mastery over time and space, their ignorance, superstition, and servile natures
undercut this quality.
In short, Joaquin's ability to achieve his own rough version of justice in an unjust world is a
beacon of hope for all
oppressed Californians--exemplified in his frequent, but sometimes problematic, alliance with
the Indians.
Joaquin and his band cannot be continually
in motion; such a plot would be as exhausting to the reader as it
would be to the men, and would violate the traditional pattern in the Robin Hood genre that
Ridge follows. Like
Robin, Joaquin has a mistress, Rosita, who travels with {116} him, like Maid Marian; his gang is full of idiosyncratic
desperadoes; and most important for this discussion, Murieta's band has an abundance of natural
hideouts to return to
for rest and recuperation: the rugged arroyos are their Sherwood Forest. Bachelard would term
these hidden
strongholds "nests," and indeed, that is the way Yellow Bird describes them. The most beautiful
is the Arroyo
Cantoova, fenced in by impenetrable mountains. It contains rich pasturage for the many animals
Joaquin and his band
steal from the ranchers. Entrance is limited to a narrow pass which can be guarded and defended
by only a handful of
men; even better, the arroyo is at least one hundred and fifty miles from any human habitation.
Despite these
forbidding characteristics, the "nest" is attractive. "Embosomed" by the mountains, the retreat
abounds in wild game
and features a luxurious grove of evergreen oaks which Joaquin and his "still blooming
companion" Rosita inhabit;
the refuge is the band's bower of bliss, roofed by "rich foliage," "carpeted" with grass and flowers
(28).
The various nests/sanctuaries of the novel
operate as many other features of Yellow Bird's poetic landscapes do;
as Bachelard would say, they give us back the situations of our dreams, in this case, the dream of
security. This idea is
as old as Theocritus and the pastoral tradition, where a simplification of setting and character
enables the poet/writer
to reduce complex ideas to essences. Attic shepherds and shepherdesses, whether inhabiting
Virgil's Eclogues,
Shakespeare's Arden Forest, or Faulkner's bucolic Mississippi, may introduce probing aesthetic
and moral arguments
and propositions effortlessly and clearly against the untroubled rural backdrop, whose "bosom"
shelters but also
nourishes the body and the spirit. An alternate to the tradition has always been the hidden refuge
of the bandit, which
popular novels and operas often feature; Blackmoore's Lorna Doone, Scott's
Rob Roy, Bizet's Carmen and Verdi's Il
Trovatore all feature hidden banditti mountain paradises. They are places to go when
someone cries, "Flee! All is
discovered!" All readers can relate to this; as Bachelard notes, nests are the imaginative and
supremely safe childhood
spaces we yearn for in daydreams (99). In political terms (and we should not forget that Murieta
represents a
persecuted and exiled minority and a proto-guerilla movement), the retreats are reminiscent of
those of the
montagnards of Vietnam or the freedom fighters in Afghanistan.
Yellow Bird, however, makes this "nest"
uniquely and unforgettably American. The thrust of Nature, the
interplay between Mexicans and Indians, the guns and horses and sweeping rides over vast plains
of western
narrative--all these qualities and several more, linked with American republican iconology and
transcendentalism,
stimulate shocks of recognition for the American reader. It is here, in this natural {117} "house," that Joaquin
promises Rosita that one day he will soon complete his revenge, take his booty and retire to a
peaceful ranch, where
he will build her a "pleasant home," the ultimate sacred space for Yellow Bird's domestic readers.
Just three years
earlier in Uncle Tom's Cabin, Harriet Beecher Stowe had created parallel domestic
"nests" for runaway slaves in
properly Victorian American homes--homes purposely delineated as identical to those of her
readers.
Part of Joaquin's revenge lies in the invasion
of precisely this domestic space: many of the murders he commits
take place in the homes of his victims, and he delights in secret penetration of other social spaces
as well. In one of
the novel's most famous scenes, Joaquin, in disguise, is playing monte in a saloon in Mokelumne
Hill when his fellow
players begin a discussion about the dreaded Joaquin. One of them boasts that he would "just like
once in his life to
come across Joaquin, and that he would kill him as quick as he would a snake," whereupon
Joaquin jumps up on the
table, brandishes his pistol and shouts "I am Joaquin! if there is any shooting to do, I am in" (31).
He has impishly
"become the game," and as so often happens in the book, his action ruptures the narrative: it
precipitates a chase,
hurling the reader into yet another whirlwind across the landscape. But Joaquin's escape into vast
space is underlined
by his preceding ability to puncture the restricted space, the "temple" of the profane Anglo world,
the saloon. Murieta
is not content merely to penetrate this sanctum sanctorum of the patriarchs; the poker table, a
doubled altar, with the
gods of money above and guns below, is literally trampled and profaned by Joaquin's muddy
boots. However, Joaquin
is not a blasphemer of the truly sacred. He and his colleagues are befriended by the Catholic
Church and take shelter
for weeks at a time at places like the mission of San Gabriel, thereby appropriating sacred as well
as secular space and
adding yet another "nest" for rest and recuperation. More often, however, Joaquin returns to the
maternal embrace of
the arroyos, moving back and forth between his multi-directional raids and his secret mountain
dens, "so rugged with
their ten thousand fastnesses in which to hide" (15).
Who can stop this "outrageous" bandit?
Clearly, only a man such as Captain Harry Love, who is as masterful as
Joaquin in transcending space and time. That is exactly how the bandit's ultimate nemesis is
introduced, quite early in
the book, long before he is to kill Joaquin:
Love had served as an express rider in the Mexican war and had borne dispatches from one military post to another over the most dangerous tracts of Mexico. He had traveled alone for hundreds of miles over mountains and deserts . . . Riding fleet horses and expert in the use of the lasso, it {118} required a well-mounted horseman to escape [bandits] on the open plains, and many a hard race with them has the Captain had to save his neck and the valuable papers in his charge. (34)
Similarly, the real Love's men succeed in tracking Murieta partly because, as Edwin Corle
has observed, they are
"expert horsemen, superb marksmen and perfectly capable of handling themselves in any terrain,
be it the coastal
valleys, the dry deserts or the High Sierras" (Corle 270). Furthermore, Love comes from a
pioneer background, and is
thus suited to the hardships and dangers of border life. Finally, in his role as Deputy Sheriff of
Los Angeles County,
he is a representative of the law that Joaquin scorns.
Still, Love has difficulty finding the charmed
Murieta. Throughout the book Ridge creates the impression that
Joaquin is enclosed in a magical space, making him immune to legal retribution, no matter how
close the situation has
become. This theme frequently becomes interwoven with the concepts of moral space as well.
One evening, Joaquin,
riding alone, meets Joe Lake, a friend of his "more happy and honest days." After the men
exchange greetings, the text
quickly becomes sentimental: Joaquin weeps, confesses that he is not the man he once was,
admits that he hates
almost all Americans but still loves Joe, and implores Joe not to betray him. "Lake assured him
there was no danger,
and the two parted, for the wide gulf of dishonor yawned between them, and they could never
again be united" (51).
Lake, unaware of Joaquin's uncanny ability to be everywhere at once, immediately betrays his
friend to Americans in
Ornetas while a serape-clad Mexican listens; this bystander, Joaquin's spy, reports to the master
himself, who is just
outside. Charging "you have lied to me," Murieta shoots Lake dead. An instant later, Joaquin is
seen on top of a
nearby hill with fifty men, once again protected by "the magical luck which pursued this man,
following him like an
invisible guardian fiend in every hour of his peril" (51). The passage reaffirms our sense of
Joaquin's "magical" space
and mastery of space, but adds the sense of moral distance that divide men, especially those
"gulfs" dictated by
ethnicity and imperialist history.
Such passages--and there are several--are
more than merely adventures. They exemplify the ballooning myth of
Joaquin in the state that Ridge was chronicling; as Joseph Henry Jackson has stated, "Hardly a
town along the Mother
Lode is without its cavern, cellar, or tunnel, in or through which Murieta dodged the law," and
the tales that relate
these episodes are repeated "solemnly as truth," as genuine myths always are (Jackson 110-111).
Harry Hansen's
Guide to the Golden State lists many "shrines" to Joaquin across the state,
including a resort called Murietta [sic] Hot
Springs, a museum claiming to have his red {119} sash,
and various others, typified by the town of Murphys: "The
town has the usual Joaquin Murrieta [sic] legend: here the ubiquitous bad man is said to have
been a three-card monte
dealer in 1851 and to have begun his bloody career when his brother, unjustly . . . was hanged"
(Hansen 446, 447,
491-494, 524). Although the various versions of the tale over the years have taken many liberties,
there is one quality
they all share: mastery of space. When Edwin Corle published his study of banditry in 1949, he
emphasized that
Joaquin's "forays ranged throughout the gold towns in the High Sierras and up and down the
Royal Highway, and
nobody could be sure just where he was, what he was planning or where he would strike next"
(Corle 267).
One explanation for this magical space
comes from the concept of banditti solidarity. Together, the band is
strong, but if their principle of e pluribus unum falters, disaster ensues. For
instance, when Joaquin and his band need
to move through the Los Angeles section of the state, Love's home territory, they separate so as
not to be detected. It
is here that Reyes, Joaquin's friend and Rosita's brother, is captured and hanged, shortly after
Love has found and
murdered Gonzalez. As Joaquin's band fragments and is reduced, it seems, so are his powers; it
seems important that
this process begins in an area where land has been massively appropriated from Hispanics and
where pre-modern life
presents obstacles, both physical, social, and psychic, to the unfettered movements of the
banditti. Twenty men are
lost in one fight alone, including the valued lieutenant Claudio. Soon afterward, Mountain Jim is
hanged in San Diego.
The differing locales for these events
indicate the sweep of Joaquin's network across the state once again, but
also demonstrate the menace increasing settlement and urbanization pose to space and
freedom--and not just for
outlaws. Joaquin astutely sees these events as an evil omen, one dictating the need to act swiftly
and conclusively.
Once back in Arroyo Cantoova, he announces a master plan of destruction that will end his days
as a bandit. Now that
he commands 2,000 men spread over the state, he intends to make a clean sweep of the southern
counties, killing and
burning as he goes on toward the refuge of Sonora. "When I do this, I shall wind up my career.
My brothers, we will
then be revenged for our wrongs, and some little, too, for the wrongs of our poor, bleeding
country. We will divide
our substance and spend the rest of our days in peace" (75). This last campaign begins in earnest
with a strategic
attack by Joaquin's full forces on Calaveras County, which is described by Ridge in edenic terms.
The gang's
terrifying assault brings on the final conflict with Captain Love, which is made possible by
Joaquin's inexplicable
decision to travel apart from his band and with only three followers.
Joaquin in these last pages is not the man he
was, as is suggested {120} earlier in the scene with
Lake. His
decision to leave a trail of scorched earth behind him actually masks what amounts to his
surrender. What causes this
change? Bachelard suggests that a true poetics of space is based in simple images of felicitous
space; he also stresses
the concepts of interiority and exteriority that exist in the human imagination, depending on the
type of reaction the
person in question has to the spaces that surround him. Joaquin, an outcast in the world of man,
initially poeticizes the
world of nature positively, in the mode of Bachelard's "topophilics"; he has not been "cast into
the world" since he has
opened it through his actions. As a master of space, he is a master of nature, and in its
subservience it is beautiful
proof of his identity. In his interior daydreams, the vast landscapes of California which he
effortlessly covers are
corresponding symbols of his interior immensity. Like a poet cited by Bachelard, Joaquin might
say, "As I stood in
contemplation of the garden of the wonders of space I had the feeling that I was looking into the
ultimate depths, the
most secret regions of my own being; and I smiled, because it had never occurred to me that I
could be so pure, so
great, so fair! My heart burst into singing . . . All these constellations are yours, they exist in you"
(189). It would be
easy to find similar passages in Ridge's contemporaries, Cooper, Emerson, Whitman and
Thoreau, and in other Native
American writings, but let us continue in a French vein: Baudelaire writes, "In certain almost
supernatural inner
states, the depth of life is entirely revealed in the spectacle, however ordinary, that we have
before our eyes, and
which becomes the symbol of it," thereby permitting intimate grandeur to unfold (cited in
Bachelard 195). Moreover,
as Bachelard suggests, movement within vastness magnifies this feeling: "When the dreamer
really experiences the
word immense, he sees himself liberated from his cares and thoughts, even from his dreams. He
is no longer shut up
in his weight, the prisoner of his own being" (195).
Unfortunately, perceptions can change.
Joaquin's transcendence of his sense of being on the outside eventually
becomes a trap; the originally authenticating sense of identification with the powers of vast
landscapes pales.
Bachelard quotes the poet Jules Supervielle's reactions to similarly endless rides on the South
American pampas:
"Precisely because of too much riding and too much freedom, and of the unchanging horizon, in
spite of our desperate
gallopings, the pampa assumed the aspect of a prison for me, a prison that was bigger than the
others" (cited in
Bachelard 221). Joaquin, however, as I have suggested, seems to understand that even the vast
sweep of wild
California will have to submit to the empire of the Anglos; his "pampas," unlike Supervielle's,
are not "unchanging."
Moreover, no matter how big the space, if it offers no sanctuary except in hidden {121} enclaves, is it not still a
prison, no matter how vast? Finally, of course, the ever-constricting wild landscape, always a
metaphor for the mind
itself, mirrors the internal constriction of identity, and the possibilities of topographic
transcendence collapse.
We can only go so far, however, in reading
Murieta's sensibilities; Ridge created a composite hero to command
our attention, but was unable to satisfactorily develop his psychology. To Ridge's credit,
however, our interest in, and
frustrations with, the narrative relate to more important issues than the psychology of Joaquin;
Murieta's story,
calculated for popular appeal, has more to tell us than we suspect. A parallel version, the 1936
movie The Robin Hood
of El Dorado (which ironically and predictably cast the Anglo Warner Baxter in Joaquin's
role), was made in an
escapist mode. It was also crafted, however, to speak to "mainstream" American concerns during
a grim economic
decline, when crime, be it Bonnie and Clyde's or Joaquin Murieta's, sometimes seemed justified,
romantic, and
peculiarly American. The movie was based on Walter Noble Burns's history/novel by the same
title (1932); as Kent
Steckmesser notes, Burns was following the same formula he had used in his wildly successful
and historically
inaccurate Saga of Billy the Kid (1926). Although the topic is outside the scope of
this essay, one must be struck by
the way in which Ridge inserts into the American outlaw narrative the assertion that ethnicity
constitutes an affront to
society, as surely as do broken laws. Joaquin speaks not only for the poor but also for the racially
and ethnically
oppressed, all denied "space" at the feast of America. He becomes a necessary mythic hero who,
like Robin Hood and
Rob Roy, has been generated from and supported by the folk. As Lukacs has noted, both Goethe
and Scott were
interested in this kind of figure, as demonstrative of the possibilities for "human upsurge and
heroism" that are
widespread among the masses (Lukacs 52-53); the ruptures of history and their consequent
patterns of dislocation and
relocation thus provide revolutionary possibilities for heroic behavior.
The Joaquin legend is in many ways the
chief mythic nugget from the mother lode created by the birth of the
state of California. For Californians, Murieta's story has become more than folklore; we may
surely call it an epic.
Bakhtin felt that the epic genre echoed a world of beginnings and peak times, a shared heroic past
that speaks to the
present. Joaquin also seems generated and nurtured by a threatened but still untamed Nature. His
very exteriority and
marginality ironically locate him in the magical realm of spatial and imaginative freedom, and he
thus personifies the
dream that was felt but rarely experienced by actual miners, whose faces were averted into the
mud as they panned for
gold. The Chilean Pablo Neruda, one of the more recent writers to set this tale, ends his lyric
poem "Splendor and
Death of Joaquin {122} Murieta" with a passage highly
redolent of both Joaquin's link to the people and Bachelard's
formulations. Neruda seems to suggest that Joaquin's poetic spaces still exist, most particularly in
the souls of people
still yearning to be free:
Joaquin, return to your nest: gallop the air toward the south on your blood-colored stallion.
The streams of the country that bore you sing out of silvery mouths. Your poet sings with them.
Your fate mingled bloodshed and gall, Joaquin Murieta; but its sound
is still heard. Your people repeat both your song and your grief, like a tolling bell struck underground. The people are millions. (Neruda 175)
sources
Bachelard, Gaston. The Poetics of Space. Trans. Maria Jolas. Boston: Beacon P, 1969.
Bakhtin, Mikhail. The Dialogic Imagination: Four Essays by Mikhail Bakhtin. Ed. Michael Holquist and Caryl Emerson. Austin: U of Texas P, 1981.
Corle, Edwin. The Royal Highway. Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1949.
Emerson, Ralph Waldo. Selected Writings of Emerson. Ed. Donald McQuade. New York: Modern Library, 1981.
Hansen, Harry, ed. A Guide to the Golden State. New York: Hastings House, 1969.
Jackson, Joseph Henry. Anybody's Gold: The Story of California's Mining Towns. San Francisco: Chronicle Books, 1970.
James, Henry. The American. 1877. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1962.
Lukacs, Georg. The Historical Novel. Trans. H. and S. Mitchell. London: Merlin, 1962.
Neruda, Pablo. The Splendor and Death of Joaquin Murieta. Trans. Ben Belitt. New York: Farrar, Strauss and Giraux, 1972.
Parins, James W. John Rollin Ridge: His Life and Works. Lincoln: U of Nebraska P, 1991.
Radin, Paul. The Trickster: A Study in American Indian Mythology. New York: Schocken Books, 1972.
Ridge, John Rollin (Yellow Bird). The Life and Adventures of Joaquin Murieta, The Celebrated California Bandit. 1954. Norman: U of Oklahoma P, 1955.
Stecknesser, Kent. The Western Hero in History and Myth. Norman: U of Oklahoma P, 1963.
{123}
AN INTRODUCTION TO WYNEMA, A CHILD
OF THE FOREST,
BY SOPHIA ALICE CALLAHAN
Annette Van Dyke
Not only is Sophia Alice Callahan's Wynema, A Child of the Forest believed to be the first novel written by a Native American woman, but it is also thought to be the first novel written in Oklahoma, then Indian Territory. Published in 1891, Wynema received notice in Our Brother in Red, Muskogee Indian Territory, June 6, 1891:
Wynema, a child of the Forest, is the title of a book just received. It is published by H.E. Smith & Co., of Chicago, and is on sale at C.B. Gilmore's book Store. The author, Miss Alice Callahan, is a teacher in Harrell's Institute and a Creek Indian by birth. She is an intelligent, Christian lady and we look forward with pleasure to the time when our other duties will permit us to read the book. It is certainly cheap at 25ó per copy.
According to an article about the death of her father, Captain S.B. Callahan, the novel "had a
great run for a year or
so, after it was placed on the market."1 After that mention, in 1911, the novel
seemed to languish until 1955 when
Carolyn Thomas Foreman, a scholar of Oklahoma writers, read the accounts of Captain
Callahan's death. She then
discovered a copy of Wynema in the Library of Congress and wrote an article for
the Chronicles of Oklahoma.
Foreman noted that remaining members of the Callahan family had lost their copies of the book
in moves from
Oklahoma to California. Foreman also noted that mention of Wynema had
"escaped all Oklahoma bibliographers" (306).
From 1955 until its listing in Daniel F.
Littlefield, Jr., and James W. Parins' Biobibliography of Native American
Writers 1772-1924 in 1981, the novel received little notice. Rayna Green mentioned it in
her 1984 anthology of
Native American women writers, That's What She Said, but the copy which the
Library of Congress held was
misplaced, only to be recently recovered. With the expanding interest in Native American
writing, it seems
appropriate to bring back this long neglected first novel to set it in its rightful place in literary
history.
Sophia Alice Callahan
S. Alice Callahan was born January 1, 1868,
in Sulpher Springs, Texas, and died January 7, 1894 in
Muskogee--only twenty-six years old. She was the daughter of Samuel Benton Callahan, who
was of Scotch, Irish,
and Creek descent, and Sarah Elizabeth Thornberg Callahan, daughter of a Methodist minister in
Sulpher Springs.
One of eight children, Callahan had been part of what a newspaper account {124} called the "Creek Aristocracy"
(Barde Collection). The Creek Nation to which Callahan belonged had incorporated "part of the
Europeans' material
culture" (Wright xii) by the eighteenth century. Without European goods, they "risked
extermination, starvation, and
enslavement" (Wright 41).
The Creek (actually an amalgamation of
Muskogee and non-Muskogee speaking groups) had been
agriculturalists who were matrilineal and matrilocal in their original southeast territories. Steadily
driven inland until
the Trail of Tears in the 1830s when many ended up in what is now Oklahoma, they had survived
competing
European groups by political savvy and by exploiting the Europeans' love of fur and
leather.2
Callahan's father, a prominent and influential
man, was the representative of the Creek and Seminole nations to
the Confederate Congress during the Civil War; he had a large cattle ranch and farm in what
became Oklahoma. His
parents had been forced from Alabama to Indian Territory in 1833 along with others of the Creek
Nation. Captain
Callahan was clerk of the Creek Nation's Senate in the Creek National Council for four years,
and clerk and later
Justice of the Supreme Court of the Creek Nation. He was a Creek delegate to Washington and
executive secretary to
a number of Creek chiefs, and he also served as editor of the Muskogee Indian
Journal, official organ of the Creek
Nation. His involvement in Indian education included serving as Superintendant of the Wealaka
Boarding School, a
position he held the year his daughter died.
Sophia Alice Callahan attended a women's
school in Staunton, Virginia, and took an examination for a teacher's
certificate in the subjects of grammar, arithmetic, geography, history, and physics in 1892.
Callahan taught at Wealaka
Mission School from 1892 to 1893, and at Harrell Institute (a high school) in Muskogee in 1893.
She had planned to
finish her own education in Staunton that year, but she had been called back to Muskogee
because of the illness of
several teachers at Harrell. She contracted pleurisy December 26, 1893, and died two weeks later.
A tribute in Our
Brother in Red, January 11, 1894, said that "Miss Callahan was of a literary turn of mind
and was much superior to
the average intellectuality. Her abilities as a teacher have never been excelled in this territory"
(Foreman 313).
Callahan wrote Wynema when
she was twenty-three years old, the year before she began her duties at Wealaka
Mission school. What can be discovered in the records so far says nothing beyond the dedication
in Wynema as to the
circumstances surrounding the writing and the publishing of the book. She may have been
attending school in
Virginia during the actual writing. The title, Wynema, was a popular name in
{125} Native American country at that
time, and many young women bore it. According to Foreman, "`Winema' . . . was a sub-chief of
the Modoc Tribe,
who saved the Indian Commissioner, A.B. Meacham, from death in 1872 during the tragic fight
at the Lava Beds"
(307). Creek poet Alexander Posey's daughter also was called Wynema. In the novel, the town
that is created is named
Wynema, also indicating the name's honorific or generic use.
Wynema, A Child of the Forest
Wynema traces the education
of a young Creek girl, Wynema, from the coming of a young Methodist woman
teacher from the South, Genevieve Weir, to Wynema eventually becoming a teacher herself.
Wynema is portrayed as
an extremely able student, and it is at her request that a school is set up in her village with her
parents' support. The
romantic plot has as love interest the affection between Miss Weir and Gerald Keithly, the
minister from the nearby
Methodist mission school, and eventually a romance involving Wynema herself and Miss Weir's
brother, Robin. The
story is told through an outside narrator, and the first few chapters focus on Genevieve Weir's
reactions to her alien
environment, often corrected by Keithly, who takes the part of the Creeks since Wynema is too
young to be a
spokesperson. This, perhaps, is unfortunate, because the story is seldom told by the Native
American characters, and
when they do tell the story, it seems somewhat disruptive. It appears that Callahan had difficulty
weaving into her
romantic plot serious factual material about the important issues of the time. However, it is clear
that the real
intention of the novel is to do just that. Her dedication reads:
TO THE INDIAN TRIBES OF NORTH AMERICA
Who have felt the wrongs and oppression of their palefaced brothers, I lovingly dedicate this work, praying that it may serve to open the eyes and heart of the world to our afflictions, and thus speedily issue into existence an era of good feeling and just dealing toward us and our more oppressed brothers.
In spite of the drawbacks of the framework she has selected, Callahan comments on allotment (the Dawes Act 1887), which was being argued heavily in the Territory at the time, on how the Creek were cheated out of their per capita payment in Indian Territory and on how they had passed a law in 1811 "imposing death upon any chief who subscribed to the sale of their country" when they still lived in the Southeast (Thompson 309). She includes the 1890 massacre at Wounded Knee and a temperance argument as well as an argument for {126} women's suffrage. She also records Creek culture, including "blue dumplings," a favorite food, the busk or green corn ceremony, and the death chant.
Wynema and Nineteenth Century Writing
Wynema was written, like
other reform novels of the era such as Uncle Tom's Cabin, for a white audience.
While
it has romance woven into the plot, it does not follow the pattern of popular "women's fiction,"
which, as Nina Baym
comments, usually "chronicle the `trials and triumphs' . . . of a heroine who, beset with hardships,
finds within herself
the qualities of intelligence, will, and resourcefulness, and courage sufficient to overcome them"
(2). Although the
name of the novel would lead the reader to expect Wynema herself to be the focus of the plot,
Wynema actually faces
few hardships, and it is the white character, Genevieve Weir, who must face her stereotypes and
misconceptions about
Native Americans in Callahan's novel of social commentary and criticism.
In what little is known about Callahan's
reading interests, she indicates in a letter to a friend that she had been
reading Thackeray's Vanity Fair, but that she did not like his portrayal of women in
such comments as "It's only
women who get together and hiss and shriek and cackle," or "The best of women are
hypocrites--A good housewife is
of necessity humbug . . ." (quoted in Foreman 312). Callahan was particularly interested in
Thackeray's satirical
treatment of the world and the way "in which the words, actions and feelings of the dramatis
personae are exhibited
without excuse or comment" (312). It appears that she attempted some satire in her own work;
her use of words such
as "savage" and "uncivilized" seems to be in a sarcastic vein. Certainly the women's rights issue
was one she was
particularly concerned with. Wynema says:
[Genevieve Weir] and I hold many opinions in common, and doubtless, I have imbibed some of hers, as I have the greatest respect for her opinions, but the idea of freedom and liberty was born in me. It is true the women of my country have no voice in the councils; we do not speak in any public gathering, not even in our churches, but we are waiting for our more civilized white sisters to gain their liberty, and thus set us an example which we shall not be slow to follow. (80)
One might speculate that, since the Creeks were originally matrilocal and matrilineal, women
originally might have
had more public say and power before European contact, and that contact with Europeans had
steadily eroded the
power of women among the Creeks. In any case,{127}
Callahan also mentions reading Lytton and Dickens, which
would add to her background in the novel of social commentary.
Like Harriet Beecher Stowe (whom there is
no evidence she read), Callahan is very interested in Christian
education and represents the Christian ministers and educators in the best light in her novel. Her
publisher comments
in the introduction that Wynema shows "the magnificent results accomplished by
those who have gone among them
[Native Americans] to teach and to preach." She herself was Correspondence Secretary,
Conference Officers of
Parsonages & Home Mission Society in 1893. Like Stowe, Callahan "propose[s] a maternal,
loving ethic in
opposition to prevailing patriarchal values" (Baym 15). The enemies of the Native Americans are
those who do not
practice the loving values of Christianity. It is to her great credit that she was able somehow to
balance her Christian
beliefs and still serve as an advocate of non-Christian Native Americans, as she does in
Wynema. Unlike Stowe's
Black characters, Callahan's Native American characters do not try to convert other Native
Americans, but rather
attempt to stop slaughter and unfair treatment so that their lives can be lived in peace, albeit side
by side with the Euro-Americans.
The publisher's preface introduces the novel
by explaining that "the fact that an Indian, one of the oppressed,
desires to plead her cause at a tribunal where judge and jury are chosen from among the
oppressors is our warrant for
publishing this little volume." The publisher feels certain that "whoever reads these pages will be
convinced that this
protest against the present Indian policy of our government is sincere, earnest, and timely."
However, unlike the case
with Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin, there is no evidence that Wynema
made an appreciable difference in government
policy or entered the public's consciousness.
Introduction to Chapters XXI and XXII
The Chapters which follow are unusual in
the context of the novel because the focus is on the stories of Native
American characters rather than the white characters' perceptions of Native Americans. In
Chapter XX, several of the
white men from the mission near Wynema's home, including Carl Peterson and Robin Weir
(Wynema's husband),
have gone to the South Dakota area to consult with the Native Americans who have left the
reservation. The
delegation hopes to convince the Plains Indians that the government agents who have squandered
the supplies and
goods which the Native Americans were to have received and who are responsible for their
starving plight have been
fired. To avoid more trouble, the Native Americans should go back to the reservation, and
supplies will be
forthcoming. They are not successful and the reader is introduced to the rebellious Native
American leaders,{128}
Great Eye, Wildfire, and Wildfire's wife, Miscona. The elderly, Miscona, and the other women
and their children
return to the reservation while Wildfire and his followers prepare for conflict. Chapter XXI opens
as Miscona and
other women, some with their babies, return to the rebel camp against the wishes of the men. In
Chapter XXII, Robin
Weir, who has returned to Wynema back in the Oklahoma area, brings with him a Sioux woman,
a survivor of the
atrocities in the South Dakota area, and she tells her story.
NOTES
1Historical materials concerning S. B. Callahan can be found in the Frederick S. Barde Collection, Oklahoma Historical Society. See "Last Confederate Congressman Dies," 17 Feb. 1911.
2For further discussion of this idea see Wright.
WORKS CITED
Barde, Frederick S. Barde Collection. Oklahoma Historical Society.
Baym, Nina. Women's Fiction: A Guide to Novels by and about Women in America, 1820-1870. Ithaca: Cornell U P, 1978.
Callahan, Sophia Alice. Wynema, A Child of the Forest. Chicago: H. E. Smith & Co., 1891.
Foreman, Carolyn Thomas. "S. Alice Callahan: Author of Wynema, A Child of the Forest." Chronicles of Oklahoma 33 (Autumn 1955D): 306-15.
Green, Rayna, ed. That's What She Said: Contemporary Poetry and Fiction by Native American Women. Bloomington: Indiana U P, 1984.
Littlefield, Daniel F., Jr., and Jame W. Parins. A Biobibliography of Native American Writers, 1772-1924. Native American Bibliography 2. Metuchen: Scarecrow, 1981.
"Last Confederate Congressman Dies." 17 February 1911. Article held in Frederick S. Barde Collection, Oklahoma Historical Society.
Wright, J. Leitch. Creeks and Seminoles: The Destruction and Regeneration of the Muscogulge People. Lincoln: U of Nebraska P, 1986; rpt. 1990.
{129}
TWO CHAPTERS FROM
WYNEMA, A CHILD OF THE FOREST
Sophia Alice Callahan
Chapter XXI
Civilization or Savage Barbarity
A dark figure with a babe in her arms
creeps stealthily from a tent into the dark night. Softly and stealthily it
steps until it reaches the outskirts of the reservation, where it is met by other dark figures, some
with the papoose,
some without. When these figures are out of hearing distance, they run rapidly and joyously
toward the tepees of the
defiant Indians. Sixteen miles! Ah, that is nothing to one going on a mission of love. Patriotism
has inspired men to
greater deeds. Paul Revere and Philip Sheridan have been made famous for a terrible ride; these
dark figures, running,
sliding and falling along the dark road in the bitter night will not be known to the world, for
theirs was only a walk for
love. They reached the tents of the rebels.
"Miscona," exclaimed her husband
reproachfully, hardly believing his eyes. "And the papoose! You must go
back, Miscona. It is not safe here," said he throwing his arms about them. "We are to battle
to-morrow. Yes,
to-morrow's sun, when he opens his great eyes will see the rebel band of Indians surrounding
their white tyrants, and
before he closes it the ground will be strewn with the dead bodies of our enemies, or of us. We
have arranged our
skirmish so that it will seem at first that our numbers are smaller than they are. Then when the
enemy engages this
brave few, the others will rush up from all sides, with a mighty whoop, and surround them. This
is our plan; whether
it is a good one remains to be proved. How many women came with you?"
"About forty, and many of them carried the
papoose." "Well, you must start back to-morrow. It will be dangerous
for you to remain here."
But "man proposes and God disposes,"--in
this instance, the Indian proposes, the Government disposes. It was
reported by scouts sent out for that purpose, to the commander of the troops stationed on the
reservation, that the
Indians were plotting war and were planning to surround them on the following day. So the
general sent a detachment
to meet the "hostiles," and surprise them, and to capture all unharmed if possible. But, instead of
this, the Indians
were slaughtered like cattle, shot down like dogs. Surprised at the sudden apparition of white
soldiers drawn up in line
of battle, when they supposed the soldiers to be in their camps miles distant, their presence of
mind deserted them,
and it was with difficulty that Wildfire rallied his forces. To add to this {130} consternation, on turning about toward
his camps he beheld the women who had followed them to battle, instead of going to the
reservation as they had
promised and started to do. It was useless to motion them back, for on they came, their faces
speaking with noiseless
eloquence. "We have lived with you; we will die with you." Up they rushed into the line of battle
where they more
unfitted the men for fighting.
"Good and gracious Father, Miscona! You
have lost the battle for me," groaned the chieftain.
"It is a lost cause. You will die and I will die
by your side, my husband," she replied resolutely.
Then came the dust and smoke and din of
battle, the hurrying forward of the foes to the onset.
"Indians, I command you to go into the
reservation quietly or, by God, you die here in your tracks!" shouted the commander.
"We shall die, then," shouted Wildfire in
return; "but we will never enter the reservation alive!"
Oh! the terrible, terrible battle! Old Chikena
in giving the circumstances relating it to Wynema, always closed
her eyes and shuddered. Everywhere could be seen Wildfire fighting and urging his troops on,
and everywhere, the
ironclad hand of the white soldiers beating down his Indian adversary--yes, and not only the men,
but the helpless,
defenseless women and children. The command was, "No quarter! Kill them every one."
In the midst of the one-sided battle, Wildfire
was slain, felled to the ground, and by his side, as was afterwards
found, his devoted Miscona --only an Indian squaw, so it did not matter.
The Indians, seeing their leader slain, fled
precipitately to the camps, followed for some distance by their
adversaries, who finally drew up in line and marched back to quarters. On the night following the
battle came a
terrible blizzard--wind so piercingly cold that it freezes the very marrow in the bones of one so
unfortunate as to be
exposed to it. Out on the battlefield, with no covering but the open sky lay the bodies of the
dying and dead Indians,
left there by friends and foes. Over here are the bodies of Wildfire and Miscona, free at last and
the little papoose
sweetly sleeping between them. Over there lies a warrior, groaning and murmuring--and
everywhere is blood, blood!
Over everything, around everything, on everything. Oh! the awful sight!
A dark form is seen presently gliding among
them administering to the wants of the dying as best she can. It is an
Indian squaw, watching over the battle-field, guarding the dead and dying. Like Rizpah of old, on
the Gibeah plain,
she took her distant station and watched to see that nothing came near to harm her beloved
dead.
{131}
During the forenoon of the following day,
two men rode on the ghastly scene, astonished at the almost
numberless dead and wounded bodies strewn over the plain; astonished to see women and
children slain among the
number, for it has ever been the policy of a strong, brave nation to protect the helpless, the weak,
the defenseless.
Alighting and walking among the dead, they
saw what at first they had not noticed, the form of the Indian
woman kneeling among the wounded. Carl Peterson walked up to where she knelt and addressed
her.
"Woman, why are you here, and whence did
you come?" She raised her head mournfully, her face dripping with
tears, and started as she recognized the speaker; "Carl Peterson!" she exclaimed.
"Yes, and is this Chikena, the happy wife of
the brave Great Wind, when I last saw her?" he asked. "What are
you doing on this field of battle?"
"Ah! The times have changed for poor
Chikena," she answered, weeping. "Here lies the dead body of the brave
Great Wind, and yonder lies his son. Dead! Dead! I am all alone in the world--the only one left of
my tribe. Why did
not the Great Father take me too?"
"How long have you been here, poor soul?"
Carl asked sympathetically. "And have you been here all alone?"
"Yes, all alone since they left me with my
dead. The palefaces killed our brave Wildfire and his beautiful
Miscona--yonder they lie in each other's arms--and then our people fled back to their tents, the
soldiers pursuing until
they reached the creek. I did not leave, for I did not care what became of me--my loved ones were
gone and I staid to
protect them. But, oh, the bitter, bitter night! The cold wind swept by me and tortured me with its
keen, freezing
breath; but I drew my blanket more closely about me and defiantly watched my dead. The wolves
came to take them
but I lighted a fire and kept the wolves at bay. Then the wounded groaned with their wounds and
the cold, and I
dragged as many of them together as I could and covered them with my blanket. Then,
uncovered, in the bitter cold,
how I walked and heaped the fire higher and longed for the coming of day! When day broke I
went about among the
dead, washed their wounds and ministered to their wants as I could; and so I have been doing
since. On my rounds I
found three little papooses, about three months old, all wrapped up snugly in their dead mothers'
bosoms. I took them,
wrapped them in the blankets of the ones they will never know, and yonder they lie, sleeping
sweetly."
Carl went to the tents of the Indians,
informed them concerning the state of affairs, gathered together wagons for
the dead and stretchers for the dying and wounded, and repaired to the scene we had just {132} quitted. There the
Indians gathered together their dead and buried them, and took the wounded back to their
tents.
The two friends with Chikena and the babies
returned to the reservation, there to await the termination of the
Indian war of the Northwest.
With a few slight skirmishes, the papers say,
only the death of a few "Indian bucks," the war of the Northwest ended.
"But," you ask, my reader, "did not the white
people undergo any privations? Did not the United States army lose
two brave commanders and a number of privates?" Oh, yes. So the papers tell us; but I am not
relating the brave (?)
deeds of the white soldier. They are already flashed over the world by electricity; great writers
have burned the
midnight oil telling their story to the world. It is not my province to show how brave it was for a
great, strong nation
to quell a riot caused by the dancing of a few `bucks'--for civilised soldiers to
slaughter indiscriminately, Indian
women and children. Doubtless it was brave, for so public opinion tells us, and it cannot err. But
what will the annals
of history handed down to future generations disclose to them? Will history term the treatment of
the Indians by the
United States Government, right and honorable? Ah, but that does not affect my story! It is the
Indian's story--his
chapter of wrongs and oppression.
Chapter XXII
Is This Right?
"Wynema, this is a friend of ours whom
we found in the Sioux country. Can you speak the language? If so, she
will tell you all, and I should like for you to interpret for my benefit. Ask her to tell you about the
`starving time,' as
the Indians call the time when they lived on one cent per day," said Robin one day, some weeks
after his return home.
He had been to Keithly College and had brought Chikena home with him that she might see the
"squaw and papoose,"
as he laughingly called Wynema and Genevieve.
"Very well, dear," Wynema replied. "I
learned to speak the Sioux language when quite a child. We had an old
Sioux woman who lived with us until I was almost grown, when she died. And thus I became
familiar with the language."
Then Wynema took the old woman's hand
and kissed her softly, remembering the dear ones she had left behind
in the burying-ground of the battle-field; and she spoke words of sympathy, leading her to talk of
her troubles.
"My husband wishes to hear of your
sufferings during the time you {133} came near starving,
before the Indian
war. Can you tell me while I interpret."
This is the story she told Wynema and Robin
as they sat by the window of the pleasant sitting-room of Hope Seminary.
"There was a time when my people had
plenty of land, plenty of cattle and plenty of everything; but after a while
the palefaces came along, and partly buying, partly seizing our lands by force, drove us very far
away from our fertile
country, until the Government placed us on a reservation in the Northwest, where the cold wind
sweeps away our
tents and almost freezes us. Then the great and powerful Government promised us to supply us
with bountiful rations,
in return for our lands it had taken. It was the treaty with us. But one day the agent told us the
Government was poor,
very poor, and could not afford to feed us so bountifully as in the past. So he gave us smaller
rations than before, and
every day the portion of each grew smaller, until we felt that we were being starved; for our crops
failed and we were
entirely dependent on the Government rations. Then came the days when one cent's worth daily
was issued to each of
us. How we all sickened and grew weak with hunger! I saw my boy, my Horda, growing paler
and weaker every day,
and I gave him my portion, keeping him in ignorance of it, for he would not have taken it had he
known. Our chiefs
and warriors gathered around the medicine man and prayed him to ask the Great Father what we
should do to avert
this evil. So the medicine man prayed to the Great Father all night, in his strange, murmuring
way; and the next
morning he told us to gather together and dance the holy dance to the Great Father and to sing
while we danced,
`Great Father, help us! By thy strong arm aid us! Of thy great bounty give us that we may not
die.' We were to dance
thus until dawn, when the Messiah would come and deliver us. Many of our men died dancing,
for they had become
so weak from fasting that they could not stand the exertion. Then the great Government heard of
our dances, and
fearing trouble, sent out troops to stop us."
"Strange the great Government did not hear
of your starving too, and send troops to stop that," remarked Robin,
per parenthesis.
"Then our great chief, Sitting Bull, told us
the government would starve us if we remained on the reservation; but
if we would follow him, he would lead us to a country teeming with game, and where we could
hunt and fish at our
pleasure. We followed him to the Bad Lands where we struck tents, as we were tired, intending
to resume our march
after we had rested. But one day we saw a cloud of dust, and there rode up a crowd of Indian
police with Buffalo Bill
at their head. They called out our chief and ordered him to surrender, then arrested him. Sitting
Bull fired several
shots, instructed his men how to proceed to {134}
recapture him, but all to no avail, for the police were backed by the
pale-faced soldiers; and they killed our chief, his son, and six of the bravest warriors. Thus began
the war of which
your husband has already told you. It ended in Indian submission--yes, a submission extorted by
blood."
"Buffalo Bill is the assumed name of the
man who went about everywhere, taking a crowd of Indians with him
and showing them, is he not?" asked Wynema of her husband.
"Yes, he was at the exposition at New
Orleans with a band of Indians who he was then `showing,' and thus
gaining means for subsistence for himself."
"It is strange he would lead a police force
against the people who have helped him to gain a livelihood. Do you
suppose the Indians who traveled with him became wealthy thereby?" ironically.
"Oh, yes. Very," he answered in the same
tone. "Some of the Indians went from near us, and when they came
back their friends and neighbors had to make up a `pony purse' to give them a start. One trip with
this `brave' man was
sufficient, though I never heard one of them express a desire to go again."
"There is an old man in the Territory, now, if
he has not died recently, who traveled a great deal with Buffalo
Bill, and I have never heard anything of the fortune he made. He is old and poor, and goes about
doing what odd jobs
he can get to do, and his friends almost entirely maintain him. It seems to me that gratitude,
alone, to this benighted
people who have served him would have rendered him at least neutral. If I could not have been
for them, I most
certainly would not have taken so prominent a part against them," Wynema said
indignantly.
"Robin, there was such a scathing criticism
of the part the United States Government has taken against the
Indians of the Northwest, in the St. Louis Republic. I put the paper away to show
you, but it has gotten misplaced. The
substance of the article was this: the writer commended the Government on its slaughter of the
Indians, and
recommended that the dead bodies of the savages be used for fertilizers instead of the costly
guano Mr. Blaine had
been importing. He said the Indians alive were troublesome and expensive, for they would persist
in getting hungry
and cold; but the Indians slaughtered would be useful, for besides using their carcasses for
fertilizers, the land they are
now occupying could then be given as homes to the `homeless whites.' I don't believe I ever read
a more sarcastic,
ironical article in any newspaper. I should like to shake hands with the writer, for I see he his a
just, unprejudiced,
thinking man, who believes in doing justice even to an Indian `buck.' But here are more papers
with dots from the
{135} battle-field; yet you know more and better about
this than the writers of these articles, for you were all around
and among the Indians, as well as the soldiers."
"Yes; but I should like to read their story and
know their opinion. Good!" said he, reading; "Hear this from the
Cherokee Telephone and interpret, for Chikena can understand."
"The papers of the states are discussing the
Indian war in the Northwest, its causes, etc. Here is what the matter is
in a nutshell: Congress, the Secretary of the Interior, the Army and the Indian agents, have vied
with each other in
shameful dealings with these poor creatures of the plains. They buy their lands--for half
price--make treaties and
compacts with them in regard to pay, provisions, etc., then studiously turn and commence to lay
plans to evade their
promise and hold back their money to squander, and withhold the provisions agreed to be
furnished. It must be
remembered that these Indians buy, aye more than pay for all the United States Government lets
them have-- they
have given the Government an acre of land for every pound of beef, sugar, coffee and flour they
have ever received.
The Government has neglected to comply with treaties with these people--hence the war. They
would rather die by the
sword and bullet than to see their wives and children perish be degrees. Remember, too, that for
every acre of land the
United States Government holds to-day, which it acquired from the Indians of any tribe, from the
landing of
Columbus, it has not paid five cents on an average. The Government owes the Indians of North
America justly to-day,
ten times more that it will ever pay them. Search history and you will find that these are facts and
figures and not mere
sentimentalism. Newspaper editors in the states, who speak so vainly of the kindness of the
Government to the
Indians of this country, should post themselves a little, and each and every one could write a page
of history on the
United States Government's treatment of the Indians, as black and damnable as hell itself."
"Phew! That's pretty strong isn't it?" said
Robin, finishing and looking up.
"What does Chikena say?"
"She says it is all so. I am glad the editors of
newspapers are denouncing the right parties."
{136}
EVOLUTION OF ALEX POSEY'S FUS FIXICO
PERSONA
Daniel F. Littlefield, Jr.
{145}
AN INDIAN, AN AMERICAN:
ETHNICITY, ASSIMILATION AND BALANCE IN CHARLES EASTMAN'S FROM
THE DEEP WOODS
TO CIVILIZATION
Erik Peterson
{161}
THE EVOLUTION OF MOURNING DOVE'S
COYOTE STORIES
Alanna Kathleen Brown
A mythology of critical description is
emerging that at once eulogizes Mourning Dove and dismisses her as a
significant Native American writer.1 A negative approach is established by
Charles Larson in "Appendix 1" of
American Indian Fiction (1978)2 when he discounts Mourning
Dove's novel, Cogewea, the Half-Blood, because of the
extensive collaboration with L. V. McWhorter. Larson argues that the novel is disrupted by
ethnographic inserts,
stilted language and the anti-white bias of Stemteema. Jay Miller, in his editorial comments for
the reprint of Coyote
Stories (1990) and the publication of Mourning Dove, A Salishan
Autobiography (1990),3 asserts that Mourning Dove
is an inaccurate narrator about her own life and Native American legends. Even a sympathetic
reader such as Paula
Gunn Allen (The Sacred Hoop 1986)4 who values the text for
bringing the anguish of the half-breed to the fore, and
for incorporating myth, tribal history and ritual into the story, sees the work as maimed because
of McWhorter's
intrusions, and because Mourning Dove tried to satisfy white and tribal literary requirements and
failed. Coyote
Stories, perhaps because it is addressed to a juvenile audience, has received little critical
commentary except for Jay
Miller's attack on ethnographic inaccuracies and omissions in his introduction to the 1990 reprint
of that work.
Nonetheless, Native American scholars feel compelled to mention Mourning Dove because she is
among the first
Indians to write fiction and to record the legends and the history of her people.
This ambivalent response to Mourning
Dove's work is counterbalanced by a mythology which highlights her
extraordinary ability to surmount overwhelming obstacles. American popular culture
romanticizes heroic effort in the
midst of poverty, and it is alluring to draw an image of a woman overcoming insurmountable
odds to write of her own
Indian culture. In Dexter Fisher's "Introduction" to Cogewea, the Half-Blood, she
describes Mourning Dove and her
husband working "as migrant laborers, traveling with the seasons, picking hops and thinning
apples, pitching tents
and camping out under every imaginable condition. And everywhere they traveled, Mourning
Dove took her battered
old typewriter and tried to work after long hours in the field or orchards."5 Jay
Miller repeats this story at the
beginning of his introduction to Coyote Stories. I also have taken Fisher's lead. But
Mourning Dove's letters refute the
heroic image. Her poverty was real. The need for money, for privacy, for space, impeded writing
and made daily
living an effort. She did not write after picking apples ten hours a day for six days a week. She
was too tired.
It is another story which must be told, a story
of hardships to be {162} sure, but also a story about
friendship,
about learning how to write about Indian experiences and culture for ethnocentric white
audiences, and of struggling
to open publishing house doors. The Mourning Dove/ L. V. McWhorter collaboration moves
from ignorance and
good-heartedness, through self-education and personal loyalty, to a professional triumph that
comes so late in their
lives that it cannot be fully relished.
Their story begins at the Walla Walla
Frontier Days in 1914. At this time Mourning Dove already had the draft
of a novel almost completed and the notes for twenty-two legends. She was between the ages of
twenty-six and
thirty-two;6 McWhorter was fifty-four. Mourning Dove was in a group of singers
that McWhorter hired for a
performance. On September 30, 1914, J. W. Langdon wrote to her:
Dear Madam:-
While you were here at the Frontier Days Celebration you mentioned in the presence of Mr. and Mrs. Williams and Mr. McWhorter that you had been collecting for some time past, reliable data on certain Indian history--I think you mentioned the "OKANOGAN SWEATHOUSE" as a title.
As I understood the matter, you were having some difficulty in arranging your manuscript and putting the data you have secured, in proper form for publication, and the thought has occurred to me that while you are at North Yakima you ought to take that matter up with Mr. McWhorter, who is perhaps the best versed individual in that section of the country on Indian tradition, and has had a large experience along this very line of work. I have read considerable of his writings and because of his past study and observation among the people of your race, and his deep interest and consideration of all that pertains to their welfare and protection, I felt that I should write you a line and urge you to take your manuscript to him and go over in detail the things that you feel are valuable. . . .
The average writer or publisher has had little experience in Indian tradition--they do not understand the things that mean much in Indian history, and as a rule they are not sufficiently careful nor willing to give the necessary time and thought and research to round out data such as I understand you have. (11;395)7
Okanogan Sweat House
was Mourning Dove's title for the collection that would become Coyote Stories.
Initially
there appears to be no mention of a novel manuscript. Mourning Dove must have entered into an
informal
conversation and, adopting the vocabulary of those around her, spoken of "collecting data." But
ethnographic work
and storytell-{163}ing are two diverse skills. They have
differing vocabularies and stances of approach although they
may address the same material. From the start, McWhorter and Mourning Dove were and were
not speaking the same
language. Issues of dominance and subordination inevitably cloud conversations of those of
unequal power. It is to
their credit that Mourning Dove and McWhorter ultimately moved to common ground. The
journey was a long one.
They did communicate at Langdon's urging,
and McWhorter immediately took on the role of prodder. To
Mourning Dove's request: "Let me live among my people a little bit longer, I love nature"
(February 9, 1915
[15-17;395]), McWhorter ultimately responded with an extraordinary invitation to come live in
Yakima and write, for
the Indian peoples faced oblivion: "I see many on this trail. They are bearing bundles which glow
and shine like the
gold that is washed from the river beds. These bundles are the traditions and history of the
tribes." But they "pass with
their bundles of light--the history of their people--into the cloud and are seen no more"
(November 29, 1915
[11-13;392]). McWhorter's enthusiasm for her work, his belief in its importance, and his sincerity
moved Mourning
Dove to trust him. It also is important to note that he chose the tone and the vocabulary of the
visionary Indian of
popular fiction to woo her. The path towards a language that would be real for them both, and
thus have bicultural
integrity, began with popularized scientific terms and the language of dime store Westerns.
However, there are degrees of trust. While
Mourning Dove shared her work with McWhorter, she did not
initially want to share her personal life:
Dearest Big Foot,8
Just a few short lines in answer to your last letter of the 22 which is at hand today. I am well but not able to get around yet[.] I can't possible walk yet, but I think it is past danger of blood poison, because it is almost healed. and you know I have no strength to use it, but I hope to be able to get around some time any how say in another week or so. and don't expect my M.S.S. to soon. and I will try to write about what you asked about my life or whatever it is. but I have no typewriter at the present[.] but will it be alright to use just pen and ink for the matter. You can easily cipher my writing. What you to use this for? You know. You must have forgot to tell me. excuse me for asking, but my womanly nature, has called to me. to be naturally, inquisitive. you understand. (April 26, 1915 [10;395])
There were also other hurdles to cross. A
dear friend of McWhort-{164} er's, J.
P.MacLean,9 was very
enthusiastic about their collaboration: "So far as the folkore is concerned, you will probably
never realize anything
financially out of it, but it will immortalize you and Morning Dove"10 (December
20, 1915 [41;392]). Believing the
legends were ready for publication, MacLean solicited possible publishers throughout 1916 and
even set up
arrangements for Mourning Dove to have a speaking tour from Ohio to Boston, and then possibly
New York City and
Washington, D.C. McWhorter urged Mourning Dove to go, and for a while it looked as if she
and her best friend,
Jenny Lewis, might make the trip, but Mourning Dove became ill and the trip was indefinitely
postponed.
I believe that Mourning Dove became ill
because of apprehension about the speaking tour. MacLean and
McWhorter had a direction that they wanted Mourning Dove to go, but her sense of the world
was not theirs. She
hesitated around her speaking abilities, her Indian English, her lack of clothes and economic
resources. She feared
disappointing MacLean, being humiliated in public, and possibly even being abandoned far from
home. McWhorter
and MacLean, on the other hand, imagined a representative Indian woman, one who would speak
for her people and
shake up the complacency of uninformed bureaucrats. Mourning Dove instinctually shrank from
such a role for it was
not one of her own choosing.
There were other problems of a technical
nature to contend with as well. The organization of the tales was of
concern from the very beginning. While a rough linear arrangement can be made for Native
American stories, and
there are vague references to earlier and later events, there is not a rigid ordering of the tales.
Mourning Dove wrote
the legends to record spiritual recollections of a people's beginnings and to examine states of
mind, to explore the
psychology of animal behaviors including that of human beings. Yet Mourning Dove was caught
up again in a
dominant world view that required her to present her stories with "linear" accuracy. Her
vocabulary reflects her
attempt to move towards McWhorter's frame of reference.
I am only waiting for Jennie's return from California and than I shall be ready to leave Spokane and go home and start my collection. I would much rather get my material together before I can arrange them in correct line for writing them. (March 9, 1916 [5-7;392])
She also feels pressed by MacLean and writes that same March:11
Dear Big Foot
I got a letter from McLean requesting me to at once start an interduction for the Okangan Sweat-House and I really {165} do not know what to do. I have not leased my place and have not the money to collect my traditions at once as McLean has asked[.] I will send you his letter and read it and write me what to say before I write him. I am only waiting for Jennie. I got a letter from Dad and he wants me to come home. as soon as possible[.]
Well I don't know what to do. Whether to go and start my field work or start my story. (58;391 )
The choice between "field work" and "story" was a tough one for Mourning Dove. While
McWhorter was editing
Cogewea, the Half-Blood at this time, his emphasis was on urging Mourning Dove
to preserve the legends of her
people, not on creative writing. Mourning Dove's primary goal had been to be a writer of fiction.
She was being
redirected and taught through her correspondence about the appropriate presentation of Indian
legends.
Two other textual issues were addressed in
1916. MacLean, an avid reader of bulletins from the Bureau of
Ethnography, wanted McWhorter and Mourning Dove to write legends in both the Native and
English tongues.
Moreover, teachers were asking that McWhorter write the legends for use in classrooms. On
December 3, 1916, in a
letter to MacLean, McWhorter responded:
It is difficult to estimate the number of pages which our present collection of Folklore will make. Morning Dove has not any of her field notes here, and she hardly feels justified in even making a guess. We both think that we each have about half of what we should have to make two nice sized volumes, of say, 250 pp. or more each. Some of the traditions are long, others very short. We have plenty for a good sized volume, but we both believe that it is desirable that the two tribal lore [sic] be kept separate. If arrangements can possibly be effected, we will collect the material and have both volumes ready for the press within, say, sixteen months, at the outside.
Neither of us believe that it is practicable to write the traditions in the native tongue. She tells me that the priests have attempted to write a prayer book in Okanogan, but it is far from being correct. Neither of us feel that we want to attempt it. There are so many gutterals and "throat-sounds" that the rendition would be understood and appreciated by only a very few. Our idea is that a well written work in plain english [sic] would meet with a recognized demand for pure native folklore stories. Many of our local teachers have spoken to me on this subject. It has been put up to me that a volume written especially for children would meet with a ready sale, but I am averse to engaging in such work, at the {166} present time especially. . . .
We would retain many native words and names in every legend. This we both have done so far; and it lends interest; but we do not believe it best to attempt writing in full native tongue. It would require years to complete as should be. (34;392)
McWhorter was concerned to maintain the oral integrity of Indian legends. He did not
dismiss them as the literature
of "children." He also envisioned a general public rather than a narrowly learned audience.
McWhorter was the
mediator between the Native American and Euro-American worlds on these technical
issues.
This first period of collaborative effort ended
abruptly when Mourning Dove became critically ill in the winter
months of 1916-17.12 At last, on February 20, 1917, Mourning Dove wrote to
McWhorter:
Dear Big Foot.
Must answer your letter, and honest Injun. You don't know how much effort this letter took before I could write it. I am so weak and I guess lazy.
It has been over six weeks, since I got sick. and I was feeling fine but had a relapse and thought a "goner" but an Indian aunt came along and doctored me up with Indian medcines so I am now just able to sit up again and can use. and only use my arms[.] Having pneumonia and inflamatory rheumatism is no joke. The doctor thinks it is wonderful that I lived, when I was a hopless case. Mere Injun luck and will power. I saw my father and brother crying at my bed side when I came to my senses and I felt sorry for them, and made up my mind I was going to live and I fought for it too. (3; 345B[4])
To completely recover she decided to go to Canada, to the Inkameep Reserve, and live with
her sister Margaret and
her family.
In that same letter Mourning Dove also
responds to McWhorter's announcement that Cogewea has a publisher: "I
am tickled to death, that Cogeawea is coming O.K. You failed to mention her last you wrote.
What is the contract. let
me know all the details" (3;345B[4]). The expectation of having Cogewea
published, and then facing disappointment
after disappointment when publishing plans fell through, also undercut Mourning Dove's desire
to work on the
legends:
I am far from been happy, and cannot say when I shall be ever again. That book has been a curse. God punished me I know for making an idol of the thing and throwing happiness to the four winds. You understand what I mean. I guess I figured too much on that little squaw "Cogeawea". hereafterwards I shall not think of her till she succeeds. {167} Success and happiness is not for this world but heaven. I am beganing to realize. I am beganing to think I am a minister. so I will just simple close my letter with my regards to you and yours[.] Write when you can[.] (April 18, 1917 [35- 36;366])
But McWhorter kept after her:
Yes Big Foot. I intend writing those stories in due time. As soon as I get my tent finished and can be strictly alone. I am going to start a few. I have been figuring on buying me a machine[,] than I can type it off. I get so nevrous whenever I write to any amount. and that is one draw back and I was discouraged at that squaw Cogeawea. "so hater bother any more." till I know where I "stand". Savey? (November 19, 1917 [101-102;467])
On February 1, 1918, she writes that she has a typewriter: "It is a dandy little machine. an Oliver" (41;366), and she has built a little shack of her own close to her sister's cabin in order to have privacy. By March 18, 1918, she is complaining about how tough it is to "collect" legends when anthropologists are passing out five dollar bills every time they hear a story. Her enthusiasm for writing also has markedly improved because it looks once again as if Cogewea will be published:
I will take the 100 copies of the little squaw, and do not worry I shall have the money, even if I have to borrow it from some of my relatives, but I expect some money before very long, and I was thinking of buying me a saddle horese so I can get around among the Indians, to gather some more work to put in shape soon as possible. They are such hard people to get anything out from and I am going to try my best to get a fine lot. They are some that are getting suspicious of my wanting folklores and if the Indians find out that their stories will reach print I am sure it will be hard for me to get any more legends without paying the hard cash for them, A Whiteman has spoiled my feild of work, He is a Canadian and lives at Spences-Bridge B.C. I wish you would write him and find out about his works, he claims he is a true friend to the Indians here and all of Canada but we are so suspicious of the Whiteman that to be frank with you, and I know you feel Injun so I will speak freely. I have some doubts about him. He has collected so much among the Indians in money matters and claims now he has a lawyer engaged to fight for the interest of the Indians for the rights to their land, or rather the Indian title. I have no interest in it and have not found out particulars.{168} What I started to tell you was, that this Mr. James Tait13 has collected folklores among the Indians and has been paying five dollars apiece for good Indian legends and naturally that has spoiled the natives and of course they wish the same price from me whether the story is worth a nickle to me, A lot of times the same stories are told to me a little differently from one party and another will say, that is not the true fact, but I know the straight of it and will tell me with a little addition which is no help but only waste of time of listening and taking note. Savey? (38-39;366)
The letters of 1917 and 1918 reflect a shift in attitude for Mourning Dove. As the letter referring to James Teit indicates, she was becoming more affectionate and open in her correspondence. The deaths of a brother and a daughter in McWhorter's family during 1917-1918 and her own near death experience had brought them closer together. His prodding also had come to be appreciated by her as an act of loyalty and commitment:
I certainly have thanked my "stars" many times that I have in you a kind friend and also McLean. I have very few friends and I count you among them. I think you have been kind to me on accounted of me been so disheartened with the work in which we both are in sympathy, and also for one who is gone and left us. She was a kind hearted, and I have lost one of my best friends and I have grieved over her many times, and hated to mention the subject to you, because I know it hurts the sad fatherly heart but why have I done it now, I couldn't hardly keep it any longer because as I have thought of it now, my heart grew sad again. But I think and know she is somewhere happier than what we are in our poor struggles in this world of ours. We may still all be where it is all goodness some day. (March 18, 1918 [38-39;366])
When bad news came about another Cogewea failure, Mourning Dove did not lose heart:
I was a little disappointed about the little squaw Cogeawea, but I have long got used to disappointments so I didn't care much to tell the truth. I never worry any more, I let the world come as it may. So Big Foot, let us not worry about it any more till after the war at least. We cannot do anything that will be of help to us, I am sure till this bloody struggle is over with, The people are war crazy, and our line of literature will never appeal to the public now as it would in times of peace. It is best to lay it aside for awhile. Whatcher think big Injun?. (April 25, 1918 [43-44;366])
{169}
She also began to share more anecdotes filled with a self-effacing humor:
It makes me chilled down the back, when I read where you spoke of rattle-snake hunting. I detest them. I have killed only two snakes in my life, and that was one last summer, a blue racer, and one this spring, a little water snake which I almost got my hand on, in fact I guess I touched the thing without knowing it. I was making a sweat-house and had a big bunch of boughs to use for the bedding, and I was singing, when I took some more of the greens and felt the thing moved under it. I jumped so far away before I knew it. It was frightened, but at an after thought I was so mad at the repitile. I killed the racel. And gave it a lecture before killing it for good. I threw it away and I guess the crows had a dandy supper. (April 25, 1918 [43-44;366])
Throughout 1918 and early 1919, Mourning Dove continued to solicit and record stories from those around her and she gained self-confidence in the enterprise: "I wrote the story without a dictionary, aint I getting smart" (December 23, 1918 [24;272]).14 She can even pass off the comments of others who find her passion for writing inexplicable:
Well I think I will close, everybody is in slumber-land where all decent country folks should be, but I think they think that I am looney or have too much company, because I use too much lamp oil. I fill my lamp every night. I write better at night, because my sister is asleep and the kid, and than no one talks to me, to make me nevrous. I do much better, and I am my own boss, and home is sweet when you are IT, I am much happier than when living with my sister, where the children worry me so much. My house is very small, but very happy place to rest, something like a den. but not so nice. (January 15, 1919 [11;272])
But during the autumn and winter of 1919 her attention turned elsewhere. She married Fred
Galler, a Wenatchee, and
moved to Omak, Washington to make a life with him. Her attention did not return to writing until
the winter of 1921,
when it was McWhorter who appeared to despair about getting their work published.
It was nothing they ever explicitly said to
one another, but in that evolving relationship, a profound bond had
formed. Mourning Dove needed McWhorter's belief in her and her work to keep her own inner
focus. There was no
one else who truly supported the author in her. When McWhorter flagged in energy, Mourning
Dove moved to {170}
rekindle his faith.
Big Foot. way down in my heart there is a great feeling that comes that success is not in the far distance ahead of us on the rough trail that you have pointed out to me some years ago. as to writing. I have great hope that we succeed, and it will not be long. The Great God knows what is best for us, and our hopes maybe blessed yet. The stoney trail has been hard and dreary for you and I. but let us hope against hope. I am so sure that we will succeed, . . . (November 4, 1921 [31-32a;365])15
They worked hard together from November 1921 through 1922, and completed the
manuscript for Okanogan Sweat House.
In this second round of collaboration a new
tone was set. The letters show McWhorter becoming more technical
about linguistic issues. He is paying attention to the Salish language for he wants the work to be
creditable among
scholars. He had become more aware of a world of experts with authority to judge their work. He
also was troubled
by language impurities that were creeping into the legends through translation and because of the
Indian interactions
with French and English speaking peoples. McWhorter wanted the tales to be as traditional as
possible:
In the legend: "The Great Spirit Names the Animal-people" there occurs this phrase, this sentence: En-pa-pah: (my papa) It is where Coyote's starving children accosted him when he entered the doorway of his tepee the evening before the naming of every one by the Great Spirit. You will recall it. Here is what I want:
It appears to me that "papa" is too modern a word in this case. Did the Indians use the term "papa?" Could not the word be changed to convey a name more in keeping with the true Indian vocabulary? How would "parent" or "father" do? You are the one to determine the true way. I only thought that "papa" perhaps is not the best word in the premises. I want you to get these legends in the very best shape possible. Did the Indians have a word for "sire?" You fix it. I have already written you relative to "monkey".
Well, this Injun is not nearly so blue as in former days. I can see that you are also feeling differently. Every thing will come out the very best for us in this work. I doubt if either of us realize its importance, the graet [sic] benefit we are rendering mankind, bit Indian and White. May we both live to see the end of our efforts crowned with success . . . Do not become annoyed if I write you often while typing your legends. I may find it necessary to address you constantly relative to words and meaning of phrases. I know {171} that you will be easy with the Wolf, not scalp him with your sho-mash powers. Say! which sylable do you emphasize in Sho-mash? Here is way to mark it. If accented on first sylable: Shó-mesh. If last sylable: Sho-mésh. If neither sylable is to be accented, no markings are wanted. Be sure and let me know about this. If you think that you can determine about this among the other Okanogan words and names, I will send them to you for marking.
Sho-pów-tan. (c. late 1921 [27;365])
These inquiries became typical of their correspondence. Mourning Dove not only came to think in terms of syllables and accents when considering her own language, she struggled with the difficulty of spelling words in an alphabet that does not have Salish sounds. Moreover, the meanings of some Indian words had changed over time, or she could not get at the original meaning of a word because a tribe had died out.
Spikst: is the word for "glove" in Okanagan, and I hardly think that the Indians used the fingered gloves in the early day, when they had no means of cutting them easily like we have in the present day. And a hand cover is hardly a word that would find correct meaning in the Indian language. So use speekist, with English diff..... will be all O.K.
Unless you want hand cover. I will try and write word. hard word to write[.] (c. late 1921 [57;269])There was even the further complication of multiple Indian languages and dialects. McWhorter asked: "In the Semteema's [sic] stories, and in these legends, the term `sun-down' is used in the sense of one `day' or `days.' Is this the way you want it? I like it, as different from the `sun' of the Yakimas and others. Tell me if O.K." Mourning Dove responded on the same sheet of paper:
In answer to this, you can use your own judgment. They are both correct in the Okanogan dialect. It seems that each is used, according to the speakers idea of speech. Usually the Indians call a day "light day" and night "dark night." According to what they are speaking off. And sun-down is used as well as sun, by one Indians that live in different locations on the Reservation. This Reserve have quite a few varied dialects, similar to one another, and yet not the same. There are Lakes. Colville. Lower and northren Okanogans. Wenatchees. Nes Perce. San Poils. Ketle River Indians. (c. late 1922 [211;1505])McWhorter's curiosity was insatiable. He hungered to understand distinctions that were not clear to him, and Mourning Dove became, at {172} times, McWhorter's teacher. In a long letter dated November 22, 1921, she explains that there is a difference between Coyote's squ-tenk power and the shoó-mesh of the other animals. A year later McWhorter was still asking questions. Why does grizzly-bear throw off his summer-coat and "don his shaggiest winter-coat" while "flashing his new, sharp summer teeth" (c. late 1922). Mourning Dove explains:
Summer teeth seems to be correct as far as Indian dilect is concerned in speech. It is supposed to be in legends that after a bear's winters rest he comes out with sharper teeth then in the fall, when he had used the teeth all summer. So naturally winter teeth would not be as sharp, not as sharp as summer teeth. You might change that, and put summer teeth with his summer coat. But it seems that the story teller wants to impress the idea that Grizzle bear wanted to be seen in his fiercest look. So it speaks of its shaggy winter coat, and summer new sharp teeth. You might make a note on this effect, and explain why it speaks thus. (c. late 1922 [6;1635D])Theirs had become a genuine dialogue. Mourning Dove and McWhorter spoke directly to one another. Their material was known by them both. They had created a common language and common goals. McWhorter did not move, as he had done with Cogewea, from editor into co-writer. The manuscript for Okanogan Sweat House includes 38 stories and is clearly Mourning Dove's work, with grammatical editing and notes by McWhorter, and Indian names and spellings which McWhorter and Mourning Dove agreed upon.16
There was, however, still one major problem. McWhorter continued to believe that Mourning Dove's public voice should sound as erudite as possible in order to confound the blatant racism that surrounded them. "The Red Cross and the Okanogans,"17 mistakenly reprinted as her own writing by Jay Miller in the Appendix to Mourning Dove, A Salishan Autobiography, is a good example of a McWhorter-written "Mourning Dove" piece. Her own "Foreword" for Okanogan Sweat House, mailed with a December 27, 1921 letter, is quite different in tone, and in vocabulary and command of English. She clearly was intimidated by the formality of the address:I have L. V. McWhorter of Yakima Wash, a man of whom has much interest in Indian life, to thank for this attempt of putting into words the tales and folk,lores of my people. My interests were to write novels of the Indian view point, but when this suggestion was made to me to preserve which is fast vanishing away from our reach, to forget the traditions of the Okanangons and Swa netk qha people with {173} the whirl of civilization[.] our young Indians are civilizing in their savage way so fastly that folklores are not of interest to them any more.
I first wrote my lines of these stories much against my will, but as I worked and gathered among the oldest Indians of my people I found a rich feild that had never been hardly touch with the hand of the whiteman, altho it has been attempted too several times. But a Whiteman cannot understand what an Indian will see and know which comes from the heart, and not from only the voice. The work got my great sympathy and interst of my fast vanishing people. . . .
If tho my people of today lose their confidence in me/ for exposeing their gaurded traditions, to be preserved for the future generations to be read, I will feel well rewarded for my poor attempt to interest my readers of these folklores of my ansestors. (204-205;1505)A year later she signed a "Prologue" written by McWhorter which begins:
It has been with the greatest reluctance that I consented to attempt this chronicling of the comparetively few legends now available of the once profuse oral philosophy of my tribe. None but those who have engaged in original research among the native Americans can realize the many intricate barriers to be surmounted. The secretive tendencies of the Indian and his well founded distrust of the white man, locks his bosom against a divulgence of the constructive conception of those ideals held to be sacred with the older tribesmen. . . . We have long since been made to realize that none of our ideals, as measured by the white man's standard of conception, are deserving of perpetuation; and but for the sympathetic urgings of one who has in many ways proven himself worthy of our inmost confidence as a heart to heart friend, I never could have found courage to face the possible displeasure of my tribesmen in this, to them holding up of our ancient beliefs to the ridicule of an alien people. . . . (December 1922 [198-200;1505])However, she did not sign the "Prologue" without comment:
I am sending you back the things you wished for me to sign. And finding nothing to correct I am sending it back to you. Don't, you think that it is rather a little too "high toned" language. I cannot understand it all. unless I go back to old--Webster" for help. (January 10, 1923 [2-3;363])18It may be that Mourning Dove's observations about the "high toned" {174} language were shared by publishers. Moreover, while at least two firms, Richard B. Badger, Publisher, and the Macmillan Company, did express interest, McWhorter had had such a bad experience with the Four Seas Company over the publication of Cogewea, the Half- Blood,19 that he was aggressive in his presentation and insisted that the publication of the legends be on a royalty basis only. Six long years went by without a successful nibble. Mourning Dove grew discouraged and, caught up in the events of her personal life, she stopped collecting traditional stories. They were at a standstill. Then three events occurred. Cogewea was finally published and in Mourning Dove's hands by June of 1928; McWhorter decided to involve Dean Guie20 in a reworking of the Okanogan Sweat House manuscript in early 1929; and McWhorter's wife, Annie, died in August of 1929. The death of McWhorter's wife devastated him. He was 69 years old, and Mourning Dove's correspondence clearly indicated her concern over his state of mind:
Kindly forgive me for intruding in your time of sorrow, but I am beganing to worry of your welfare.
Maybe you are away to Montana as you planned. But wherever you are I hope you are well and have health. Your works needs you. and hope that the Great Spirit spares you for sometime yet. (September 27, 1929 [14-15;441])McWhorter did throw himself back into his work, and Mourning Dove was quick to respond:
I think that I can write those dam words better than I use too, years ago when we first started to writing. Don't you think so, and I can hit the keys on this machine much faster than I use too. I have wrote this letter while the potatoes are cooking for our dinner. Savey?
I mean those blamed Indian words, gee I hater to write them, but I will do anything to please you in our work. (December 23, 1929 [61-62;269])Mourning Dove's commitment to McWhorter in his sorrow led her ultimately to participate in a far more intense linguistic inquiry initiated by Dean Guie, and to accommodate a number of changes which this new editor suggested.
Initially Dean Guie's involvement was presented to Mourning Dove as that of a proof-reader (February 18, 1929 [67-68;526]). But Guie saw opportunities for himself in the publication of the book. His role developed into that of an illustrator and an editor over time. By June 26, 1929 (90-91;386), he inquired about what percentage of the profits Mourning Dove might let him have, and by July 19,1930, he asked {175} McWhorter if he could be listed as the editor:I remember you saying that Mourning Dove wanted to get away from any indication that her book was edited. I would like to have her change her mind (women do) so I could get some recognition for any future work. Get my monicker before the publishers. I do not think it would reflect on M. Dove as author of the legends, as so many books and magazine articles are handled in that way. (8;322)He was accommodated because McWhorter had faith that Guie would get the book published when McWhorter's best efforts had failed.
Guie initiated a number of major changes. He suggested changing the title (63;526), limiting the number of legends to be included in the collection, and rearranging their order to better fit a white reader's expectations. He also quickly assessed that salability would be enhanced if the stories were directed to a juvenile audience (June 26, 1929 [90-91;386]). To do so, the raunchy parts, particularly of Coyote's doings, had to be deleted, and there were other modifications he made in light of the decorum of the day. His most insidious requests turned on pushing Mourning Dove to be ethnographically correct, for she should appear to be an expert about her culture, and that evidently meant reinforcing what social scientists believed.
The middle-aged McWhorter had refused to adapt the legends for school children for he thought that that would demean their significance and perpetuate the racial bias that Indians were "children." But the older McWhorter was tired and grieving. Moreover, it is clear that he was impressed by Guie's thorough questioning on technical issues involving translation, and he was grateful for the energy Guie brought to the project. Thus he cooperated as a second to Guie's initiation of actions. Mourning Dove, wanting to please McWhorter and ease his pain, said yes to whatever made McWhorter happy.
However altered the tales, McWhorter's faith in Guie proved sound for Coyote Stories, "[e]dited and illustrated by Heister Dean Guie, with notes by L. V. McWhorter (Old Wolf), and a forward by Chief Standing Bear," was published by Caxton Printers in 1933. It was so successful that it had a reprinting in 1934, and just this past year (1990) it was published again by the University of Nebraska Press. That Guie's version continues to be a success while the earlier manuscript has been by-passed except for Donald Hines' 1976 Tales of the Okanogans, raises serious questions about what we are willing to hear as representative of Indian voices.
But Mourning Dove and McWhorter did not raise that issue. Their friendship was deep and sure. The work that reflected two decades of {176} collaborative effort, at last, was at hand. On July 20th, 1933, Mourning Dove wrote to McWhorter:I quite remember that we met through Caesar Williams in 1915. I frequently think how fortunated that I met you. My book of "Cogeawea" would never had being anything but the cheap foolscap paper that was written on if you had not helped me get it in shape. I can never repay you back I am sure while we are here in this old planet. Too poor. I count, that we are in great luck to have the help of Mr Guie. I am anxious to see the new book. Another feather in our "cap" when that comes out of publication. (164-165;1547)The relationship that evolved between Mourning Dove and L. V. McWhorter reflects on something richer than the works that they finally published. These two people grew together as friends and co-workers in their commitment to write about their times and to preserve some of the Indian culture they watched disintegrating around them. Both were poor. Both had minimal frontier educations. But in the resilience of their spirits Mourning Dove and McWhorter chose to write what they could, to learn what they could, and to preserve what they could, when many around them, both Indian and white, believed that their efforts reflected a kind of madness. In reality, their choices demonstrated insight and courage. Their finest collaboration is the story that they made of their lives.
NOTES
1Three books by Mourning Dove are in print. Cogewea, the Half-Blood, first published by the Four Seas Co. of Boston, 1927 (ed. L. V. McWhorter), was reprinted by Nebraska U P in 1981 (ed. Dexter Fisher). Coyote Stories, first published by Caxton Printers, Ltd. of Idaho, in 1933, and reprinted in 1934 (ed. Dean Guie), has now been reprinted again by Nebraska U P, 1990 (ed. Jay Miller). The manuscript Mourning Dove was working on during the last years of her life is now in print as Mourning Dove, A Salishan Autobiography (Nebraska U P, 1990), and is edited by Jay Miller. Donald Hines edited a complete version of the legends collected by Mourning Dove, Tales of the Okanogans (WA: Ye Galleon Press, 1976). Unfortunately, this book is now out of print.
2(Albuquerque, New Mexico: U of New Mexico P) 173-80.
3My critiques of Jay Miller's treatment of Mourning Dove's texts are published in The Women's Review of Books 8.2 (November 1990): 19-20 and SAIL 3.2 (Summer 1991): 66-70.
4(Boston: Beacon P) 81-84, 151.
{177}
5(Lincoln: Nebraska U P) vii.6Mourning Dove always refers to 1888, the Tribal Enrollment Services records indicate 1887, and the Allotment records indicate 1882, 1886, and 1887, for her birth year. This information was gleaned from Mourning Dove's probate records which the family has generously shared with me.
7This letter is in the extensive twenty-year correspondence between Lucullus Virgil McWhorter and Mourning Dove which is housed at the Manuscripts, Archives and Special Collections Division of the Washington State Universities Libraries, Pullman, Washington 99164. The correspondence is kept in individual folders and each sheet of paper within a folder is numbered. Some folders have several files, and if so, further letters indicate the file within a given folder. Some sheets have the same number with additional letters to indicate their order in a file. This 30 September 1914 letter is sheet 11 of folder 395. All further correspondence from the L. V. McWhorter collection will be indicated by date, page numbers; folder number. The quoted material will maintain the writer's original spelling and grammar with the exception that a period or comma in brackets is my insertion in order to help reader clarity. Such additions have been kept to a minimum. There also may be explanatory notes about dates. Such dates reflect my best judgment on the placement of letters based on their content and other technical assessments. Approximately 15% of the Mourning Dove/McWhorter correspondence is partially dated or has no date at all. A few letters are dated incorrectly. The letters are published with the knowledge and permission of the family elders, Mary Lemery and Charles Quintasket.
8Big Foot was the affectionate name given to Lucullus Virgil McWhorter by his Indian friends. He also had an Indian name, Shopowtan (Old Wolf) which was given to him when he was adopted into the Yakima Tribe for all his efforts on their behalf. He was largely responsible for preventing the Yakimas from being dispossessed of millions of dollars worth of land and water rights. McWhorter is also known for his pamphlet, The Crime Against the Yakimas (Republic Print, 1913); and for his book, Border Settlers of Northwestern Virginia (Republican Publishing Co., 1915); for editing a reprint of The Wonders of Geyser Land by Frank D. Carpenter (1878), retitled Adventures in Geyser Land (Caxton Printers, 1935); and for privately publishing a pamphlet on the Tragedy of the Wahk-Shum (1937); followed by two books, Yellow Wolf: His Own Story (Caxton Printers, 1940), and posthumously, Hear Me, My Chiefs! Nez Perce History and Legend (Caxton Printers, 1952).
L. V. McWhorter was born in what became the state of West Virginia, January 29, 1860. His father was a Universalist minister. In 1903 he moved to the Yakima Valley in Washington and lived there until his death on October 10, 1944. Nelson A. Ault's "Introduction" to The Papers of Lucullus Virgil McWhorter, reprinted by the Friends of the Library, State College of Washington (Pullman, 1959), from Research Studies of the State College of Washington XXV1.2-4 and XXV11.1-2, gives a good overview of McWhorter's life and a listing of his extensive correspondence now housed at the {178} Holland Library, Washington State University, Pullman.9J. P. (John Patterson) MacLean, Ph.D., lived in Greenville, Ohio and was a recognized antiquarian and Americanist. He wrote a number of books on subjects such as the Manual of the Antiquity of Man (Universalist Publishing House, 1877); Mastodon, Mammoth and Man (R. Clarke and Co., 1880); The Mound Builders (R. Clarke & Co., 1887); "A Critical Examination of the Evidences Adduced to Establish the Theory of the Norse Discovery of America" (American Antiquarian Office, 1892); and A Bibliography of Shaker Literature (F. J. Heer, 1905). Shakers of Ohio: Fugitive Papers Concerning the Shakers of Ohio was posthumously published by Porcupine Press in 1975. J. P. MacLean was born March 12, 1847 and died in 1939. The last letter in the Mourning Dove, McWhorter and MacLean correspondence at Holland Library is dated June 11, 1933. That letter advises McWhorter not to publish Coyote Stories for the Depression will seriously impact sales. McWhorter chose to go ahead, and the book was surprisingly successful. It was in a second edition by 1934.
10Through 1921 Mourning Dove signed her name Morning Dove. Then on December 27, 1921, she visited a museum and discovered that she had been misspelling her name. The Okanogan word for the bird, Mourning Dove, is Humishuma. She published Cogewea, the Half-Blood and Coyote Stories using both the Indian name and its English translation. Her Christian name was Christine Quintasket. She was married twice, first to Hector McLeod (1908) and then to Fred Galler (1919).
11This note is undated, but clearly belongs to the March 1916, correspondence because of subject matter, handwriting, and the origin of the letter.
12For further discussion of Mourning Dove's illness and the immediate years following, read Alanna Brown, "Mourning Dove's Canadian Recovery Years, 1917-1919," Canadian Literature 124 & 125 (Spring-Summer 1990): 113-122. Reprinted in Native American Writers and Canadian Writing, ed. W. H. New (Vancouver, B.C.: U of British Columbia P, 1990): 113-22.
13The James Tait referred to in this letter is James Teit, a well-known student of Franz Boaz.
14The month of this letter was determined by the origin of the letter, the references to Christmas, and the typescript. The day and year are clearly indicated.
15The month and day are indicated on this letter as well as that it is a Friday. Referral to a yearly calendar for the Twentieth Century was used to determine the year for this important letter.
16Donald Hines realized the value of that 1922 manuscript and edited it into Tales of the Okanogans (Fairfax, WA: Ye Galleon Press, 1976). All 38 of the original tales Mourning Dove and McWhorter worked on are included. Just over twenty-seven are in Coyote Stories, for Guie collapsed a few stories together. Hines' "Dedication" to the work reads: "Humishumi, Mourning Dove. Because of her, the rich oral literature of her people has been preserved {179} for coming generations." The following list indicates the table of contents for Okanogan Sweat House:
1--the great spirit names the animal people
2--how coyote killed the monster whale of the swah-netk-qha
3--the whale monster of the swah-netk-qha
4--north wind monster
5--coyote kills wind
6--coyote subdues the man-eating monsters
7--coyote kills owl-woman
8--how coyote killed flint
9--how coyote broke the salmon dam
10--the first sun dance
11--the moon and sun gods
12--boy lynx and owl-woman
13--rattlesnake kills salmon
14--origin of mosquito
15--how crawfish whipped grizzlybear
16--how gartersnake scared thunderbird
17--the camas woman
18--coyote's son muskrat and grizzlybear
19--the sons of beaver and coyote
20--coyote and woodtick
21--how coyote imitated bear and kingfisher
22--chickadee kills elk
23--the arrow trail to the upper world-land
24--the three wolf brothers and three bear sisters
25--coyote and fox
26--how rabbit lost his tail
27--how skunk came by his tail
28--coyote and buffalo
29--fisher and martin
30--fisher and his brother skunk
31--coyote as a handsome woman
32--coyote and his daughter
33--how coyote lost and regained his eyes
34--how coyote drowned because of thirst
35--coyote devours his own children
36--coyote marries his own daughter
37--how spider came by his long legs
38--how disease came to the people (c. late 1921 [4;1505])While Hines' edition is closer to the original manuscript than Guie's (Miller's), both editors rearranged the order of the tales. Guie also altered the titles of many of the stories. The effect of those changes, combined with the exclusion of a number of the tales, is that the tables of contents of Okanogan Sweat House and Coyote Stories will appear to be different Salish collections with some duplication.
{180}
17Mourning Dove, A Salishan Autobiography, ed. Jay Miller (Lincoln: Nebraska U P, 1990): 189-92. "The Red Cross and the Okanogans" was written sometime in January 1919, and refers to the killer flu epidemic of that 1918-1919 winter. It can be found in the McWhorter letters (18-22; 272).18This letter was accidentally dated 1922 by Mourning Dove. The date was changed in accordance with the subject matter and because Mourning Dove had to resort to handwriting in early 1922 when her typewriter broke down. This letter makes a reference to that event.
19In June and July of 1925, McWhorter negotiated a contract to publish Cogewea, the Half-Blood with the Four Seas Company of Boston. Both McWhorter and Mourning Dove were asked to put up $200 each to initiate publication. They sent out flyers with the expectation that the book would be out by early 1926. The publishers did not get to the publication until late 1927 when McWhorter moved to sue the company for mail fraud. The publication was shoddily done, and to McWhorter's horror, he discovered that he had signed away the rights to the book.
20Heister Dean Guie was in his 20s when he began to work on Okanogan Sweat House. He had journalism experience from writing for his home town paper in Yakima, and social connections there undoubtedly brought McWhorter and Guie together. During their collaboration on the legends, Guie lived with his wife in Seattle, Washington. Guie corresponded with McWhorter. McWhorter corresponded with Mourning Dove and Guie.
{181}RE-VISIONS:
AN EARLY VERSION OF THE SURROUNDED
Birgit HansHas Morgan the right to take my child from me when I want to raise him as white man, and fit him for a better lot in Life, than the common indian. (Philomene McNickle)D'Arcy McNickle, who was born on the Flathead Reservation in 1904, was ten years old when his mother wrote the above letter to the Commissioner of Indian Affairs in a futile attempt to regain custody of her three children, especially of her son, after her divorce from her white husband William McNickle. Even though she was unsuccessful and D'Arcy McNickle had to remain in Chemawa, the Indian boarding school, for four years, her wish to "raise him as white man" determined his life until 1934 when financial necessity and a growing sense of his self as Indian led McNickle to apply for a position in John Collier's administration.
As a student in the English Department at the University of Montana (1921-25) McNickle began his career as a writer. He published several short stories and poems in the University's literary journal Frontier. When he left Montana in 1925 to attend Oxford University in England for a year, he took with him a letter of recommendation in which Professor Merriam expressed his hopes for his student: "He wrote prose of quiet energy and subtlety of expression. I can therefore recommend him to Oxford University as a student of sincere purpose, of considerable promise, and of devotion to literature" (Merriam, letter). McNickle had hoped to finish his degree at Oxford, but his funds, acquired by the sale of his allotment on the Flathead Reservation, gave out, and he settled in New York City in 1926 on his return from Europe. The journal entries of those New York years from 1926 to 1935 show that McNickle was well aware of the difficulties of establishing himself as a professional writer; however, he never doubted his ultimate success and even managed to publish at least two short stories during those years. To support himself, his wife and, later, his daughter, he did research, editorial work and manuscript reading, and also free lance writing. McNickle's secure and comfortable city life lasted until the Great Depression really settled in in 1934; the financial situation of the McNickle family then grew desperate at times. McNickle could no longer afford the luxury of waiting for success with The Surrounded. He accepted work with the Federal Writers Project in Washington D.C. in 1935. In 1936, shortly after his move to the capital, he was offered the position in the Bureau of Indian {182} Affairs that he had first applied for in 1934 and which he would hold until 1952. At this point his literary career was put on hold; after the publication of The Surrounded in 1936, McNickle applied his powers of writing to non-fiction, and his second novel Wind from an Enemy Sky was only published posthumously in 1978.
However, those years in New York City represent a crucial period in McNickle's personal development that found reflection in his writing. The earliest years in the city were marked by a reluctance to acknowledge his mixed-blood heritage. McNickle immersed himself completely in the life of the city, hoping that it would help him attain the goal that his mother had set for him at an early age: to become an American and to participate in what has been called the "American Dream."
The final break with this ambition occurred when he applied to the Bureau of Indian Affairs in 1934, but a journal entry of August 1932 shows that McNickle's disenchantment with mainstream American life and its stifling materialism had begun earlier:Naturally the first years were confusion. Scorning, instinctively the ways of the prudent and worldly-wise, I had no substitute for worldly wisdom. The instinct which led me away from one path, was not competent to stumble upon another. I knew that I wanted to write and that I did not want to return to the scenes from which I had fled. . . .
In my first job, selling automobiles, I went through a seven months' daily betrayal of my birthright in opposition. Everything I was called upon to do was a violation of instinct and desire. I continued the effort under the impression that my instincts and desires were untutored and therefore probably in error. . . . I should have learned this: instincts, right or wrong, cannot be abandoned without seriously impairing integrity, out of which rise self-possession, confidence, the very ability to act and think. (McNickle, Journal)McNickle's confidence in his ability as a writer, hinted at here and stated clearly in other journal entries of the New York years, was not shaken by publishers or their rejections of his first novel, The Surrounded. Manuscript versions were making the rounds of publishers by 1929, and a list among his papers at the Newberry Library in Chicago indicates that the manuscript must have passed through almost every publishing house in New York City until it was published by Dodd and Mead in 1936. Despite the rejections, the manuscript versions often received positive reviews that encouraged McNickle to revise the manuscript--which he did. Despite revisions, and revisions of {183} revisions, publishers kept rejecting the manuscript. By 1934 McNickle had reached the conclusion that publishing was merely a business for the publishers; it was not his writing they objected to but, in his opinion, they were afraid of the financial failure of a novel dealing in a new way with the theme of the American Indian.
McNickle probably returned from Europe with the first version of The Surrounded in his suitcase. However, the actual number of revisions the novel subsequently went through is unknown. The manuscript seems to have undergone three major structural stages, though, each marked by a different working title: The Hungry Generations, Dead Grass and, finally, The Surrounded. Today there is one earlier version of The Surrounded still in existence among the McNickle papers at The Newberry Library in Chicago. It is a longhand version, unfortunately undated and untitled, but a reader's review and McNickle's journals suggest that the manuscript version is one of the versions called The Hungry Generations. The manuscript version seems to be part of McNickle's earlier years of complete assimilation, and Archilde's journey of self-discovery reflects McNickle's own unquestioning acceptance of mainstream American values of that time. If McNickle had managed to get this early manuscript version published, it might have become the hoped-for popular success, since it was in accordance with the zeitgeist and followed patterns established by writers such as Ernest Hemingway and William Faulkner.
In 1934 McNickle began his most thorough revision of The Surrounded. As the chart on the following page indicates, this revision affected not only the plot structure but the entire focus of the novel: the thoroughly Americanized Archilde of the manuscript version became the Archilde who reluctantly rediscovers his mother's Indian heritage in The Surrounded. The deletion of the Paris episode from the manuscript version eliminates one of the major themes of the original novel, the confrontation of East and West, and thereby makes the plot more cohesive and unified in The Surrounded. At the same time the re-arrangement of scenes allowed McNickle to add material to the other major theme, the Flatheads' reservation life. A look at the chart makes it immediately apparent that McNickle places more emphasis on the "Indianness" of his characters in the published version; he added the story of Big Paul, elements of Flathead oral tradition, and stories of the missionaries' arrival and work on the Flathead Reservation.
While Archilde's, the main character's, relationship with his white father Max remains basically the same in the manuscript version and The Surrounded, Archilde's relationship with his Flathead mother changes drastically from one version to the other. Unable to forgive his mother her "Indianness" and her killing of the game warden, which{184}
Plot summary of The Surrounded
manuscript version and published version
MONTANA, Flathead Reservation
Archilde's return to father's ranch
- harvest
- hunting trip with his mother: death of Louis and the game warden
- Father Grepilloux's death
- Archilde's arrest and release
- reconciliation with and death of father
manuscript version PARIS
- Archilde practicing on his violin, interest in history, the city
- "friendship" with several young American musicians and Claudia Burness
- memories of Chemawa
- confrontation with Mrs. Burness about her sons who are among his new friends
- death of Archilde's mother
- departure for MontanaMONTANA
- Archilde's unsuccessful attempts to make nephews into white farmers after their return from Chemawa
- trouble with storekeeper Moser
- Archilde's arrest for murder of the game warden
- kangaroo court and weeks in jail
- trial with lengthy speeches of the prosecuting and defense attorneys
- Archilde's acquittal and return to
ranch
- announcement of Claudia's arrivalpublished version MONTANA
- recollections of missionaries' arrival by Archilde's mother
- return of his nephews from school
- dance and "covering the fault with the
whip"
- relationship with Elise
- "Badlands" episode
- death of Archilde's mother
- flight into the mountains to escape arrest for game warden's murder
- arrest in mountains after Elise has killed the sheriff
{185} forces him to lie to the white authorities, the Archilde of the manuscript version exiles himself from Montana to acquire the necessary knowledge to leave behind forever the Indian part of his character. Only his mother's death makes it possible for him to return to his father's land and to struggle for the agrarian paradise that is his father's heritage. Claudia's imminent arrival at the end of the manuscript version indicates that Archilde will find the happiness that Max claims was denied to him because of his marriage to an Indian woman. In The Surrounded, on the other hand, Archilde's initial resentment of his mother's retribution for her son Louis's death changes to understanding and a protective attitude. Because of Archilde's re-orientation toward the Indian part of his heritage in the published version, he, too, is "surrounded" at the end of the novel; McNickle holds out no hope to the reader that the Archilde of the published version will be acquitted like the Archilde of the manuscript version. The Big Paul story and the new priest show that, once "surrounded," there is no escape for either full-blood or half-blood.
The manuscript version of The Surrounded makes for heavy reading. Archilde, whose point of view is the only one given, is inarticulate to the very end, and his attempts to explain his feelings and thoughts, especially in the Paris part, come to nothing. There is too much interior monologue. Occasionally, McNickle spends too much time on descriptions of place and customs of Montana people. One instance is the kangaroo court that tries Archilde in jail. The descriptions of inmates and their sentencing are excellent, but they serve no purpose, since Archilde refuses from the first to have anything to do with the other prisoners and prefers isolation. Interesting though these examples of western realism are, they hold up the development of the plot, especially since McNickle has not achieved the same degree of mastery of the English language that is such a prominent characteristic of the published novel.
The chart shows that McNickle treated a variety of issues in the manuscript version, especially in the Paris episode, e.g., ambition and formal education, later explored in the short stories "In the Alien Corn" and "Six Beautiful in Paris." This paper will only deal with the central theme of the manuscript version, miscegenation and the destruction of the ideal of the Noble Savage to prove the need for assimilation.
The theme of miscegenation runs like a red thread through the manuscript version, since the protagonist Archilde himself is a half-blood, born to a Flathead mother and a white father. Despite his wish to become part of white Montana society, Archilde finds it most difficult to talk to his white father, due to Max's preconceptions about mixed-bloods. At the very beginning of the novel's earlier version {186} Archilde acknowledges that physically he is a part of both his parents. There is nothing in his outward appearance, however, to remind Max (whose older sons have become criminals despite the same educational advantages offered to them) of his mixed-blood status. "Distinct from his brothers, he had few of the features of the Indian; most people who were accustomed to see breeds were genuinely surprised when they learned that he was a half-breed. . . . It almost seemed that he was his father's sole inheritor" (Manuscript 265).
Initially, Max cannot see that difference, even though his youngest son's outward appearance sets him even physically apart from his brothers; Max simply generalizes his experiences with his mixed-blood older sons and decides that all mixed-bloods will return to their Indian heritage. Even though Indians are to be pitied for what the white man has done to them, they are lost beyond hope to alcohol, disease and lethargy. The future of both communities, the Indian as well as the white, is a dark one.He could not think of that yardful of energetic youngsters without a shudder. In his mind's eye he saw them as they would be in ten or fifteen years. He saw the misery they would bring to themselves and such of their relatives as had any sense. . . .
He was responsible for some part of the condition. In the enthusiasm of conquest he had turned squaw-man and now he could walk along the road and reflect on its consequences. Never had he seen a white man who was happy with his Indian wife and family. (Manuscript 57)Despite his resentment towards his family, Max feels an individual responsibility for what is happening in the Flathead Valley, but he is sure that nothing can be done to reclaim these children of mixed-blood marriages who are doomed to a criminal or at least unproductive life from birth. After Father Grepilloux's death he summarizes his feelings when talking to George Moser, the storekeeper:
Wives were makeshift too. A white man married a squaw in the same way that he put dirt on the roof of his cabin in place of shingles. . . .
A squaw was all right until she gave you a child. There he lay in front of you, ugly and black. What could you do? Give him the best Christian name you could think of and let it go at that. . . . For his squaw, he had no hard words. She worked, not hard and what she did was of little account, but she minded her own business and never asked for anything. . . .
"I tell you we've been fools. Did we think we could build {187} a paradise here? Did we think the Indians were lambs, free of sin and ready to be made into Christians? Look at them! They are diseased, many are born blind and crippled. The rest are drinking themselves to death and gambling away every penny, every shred of property that they get their hands on." (Manuscript 87-88)Max stereotypes the roles of the white man and the Indian here. The white man is seen as an idealist who believed in the natural purity of the Indian; the Indian would have had the ability to acquire civilization, i.e., to become a Christian and farmer, if he had chosen to do so. On their arrival in the Flathead Valley Max, the first generation American of European descent, and Father Grepilloux originally shared the idealistic views about the Indians of the French philosophers, Baron de Lahontan and Jean Jacques Rousseau. Of course their idealized image of the Noble Savage and the sense of their own loss that the members of the European community experienced could not survive the reality of the settlers' daily encounters with the American Indian. Max's ideas about an agrarian paradise in which the white settlers and the Noble Savage share remain nebulous in the manuscript version, just as his feeling of responsibility does not go beyond a generalized pity. There is no basic doubt in the manuscript version that they could have created an agrarian paradise in the Flathead Valley if there had been no mixing of blood.
McNickle comments much more critically on the agrarian paradise in the published version of The Surrounded. Max refers to Rousseau's Noble Savage very early in the novel: "It was not laziness, and it was not romanticism. He never thought the Indians were `noble' or children of a lost paradise, while it was true that the old life was much cleaner than the present existence, it was still hard for a white man to stomach" (The Surrounded 42). And Father Grepilloux shows Max in The Surrounded what the white pursuit of the agrarian paradise has done to the Flathead. "You have least to complain of. You lose your sons, but these people have lost a way of life, and with it their pride, their dignity, their strength" (The Surrounded 59). Here there is doubt in the validity of the French philosophers' ideals that is entirely lacking in the manuscript version. There, Max and Father Grepilloux, and later Archilde, pursue their dream of an agrarian paradise without ever critically examining its premise. Their failure to change the Noble Savages to contented farmers becomes, in their minds, the Flatheads' inability to be taught. There is no response from the full-blood or mixed-blood community; Archilde's brother Pete, for instance, has all the right tools, but they decay by the rich soil of the wheatfields because he does not know what to do with them. The General {188} Allotment Act (1887) gave Pete individual ownership of land and the Indian agent provided the tools, but neither can force him to become, by white standards, a productive member of the mainstream culture.
In the manuscript version the case is even more desperate, in Max's eyes, than mere failure of government policy or of his idealistic preconceptions about Indians: even the Christian names of his sons cannot conquer the "ugly" and "black" babies of the mixed-blood marriages. The good cannot overcome the evil, and his sons must be regarded as servants of the Devil. Max's final statement that he will never return to the Mission after Father Grepilloux's death indicates that the forces of evil, the children of these two worlds, have destroyed all possibilities of a Christian paradise in the valley as well. God, in Max's view, is the God of the Old Testament who has marked these children of the Devil with disease and deformity. Nothing honorable can be attributed to them, not even gratitude to their greatest benefactor, Father Grepilloux. "In the back of his brain he [Max] still heard the Indians wailing in that dismal tone and he wondered if, after all, they did have human feelings . . ." (Manuscript 8). In their possible ingratitude to Father Grepilloux Max finds his justification for his rejection of his sons.
In contrast to Max, Father Grepilloux attempts--in the manuscript version--to discredit the long perpetuated stereotype that Indians are children of the Devil. Max thinks, however, that even saintly Father Grepilloux has lost faith in the idealistic beliefs of the beginning, since he did not commit the "mistake" of leaving his order to marry a native woman. "Possibly Grepilloux had even thought of putting aside the robe and living what he thought was more powerful than the word. His wisdom was that he kept to the robe" (Manuscript 87). The dream that the mixed-blood children would inherit the best qualities of their parents has given way to reality; these children combine the worst qualities of both, and civilization has embarked on a course of self-destruction. Max summarily dismisses all dreams. "I came from Spain when I was a small boy and I don't remember the town in which I was born. If I hadn't married a squaw no doubt I should have been happy" (Manuscript 30).
McNickle's early view of the Indians' place in Christianity is neither new nor original, but is based on such colonial writings as William Bradford's Of Plymouth Plantation. The underlying belief was that Christianity would naturally lead to assimilation. The same idea is expressed in The Surrounded; however, McNickle chooses to contrast the old missionary with the new priest, Father Jerome, in the published novel. Father Grepilloux realizes that even the Christian faith does not make the Flatheads into partners of the white farmers. He withdraws {189} from reality and writes the mission's history in isolation, thereby living in a past where dreams of a Christian community seemed based on fact. Father Jerome is the opposite of Father Grepilloux. He represents a church that is no longer interested in the spiritual welfare of the Indian community. "Father Jerome was not really prejudiced; it could hardly be said that he looked down upon the Indians. . . . He was dull; he neither scolded nor exhorted; he dogmatized" (The Surrounded 263). This demand for blind adherence to the Catholic faith closes the door to all change in the published version; the church will not be able to help the Indian community adjust to the new life, and the Indians can no longer find help in the mission as they did during Father Grepilloux's time. McNickle uses the new rigidity of the church in The Surrounded to close the circle; the Flatheads are surrounded by whites, by physical boundaries, and by spiritual boundaries.
Father Grepilloux is one of McNickle's forceful characters that appear in both manuscript and published versions of the novel, and despite the numerous revisions of the novel his character remains the same. However, his role in the two versions differs. Being the only representative of the church in the manuscript version, Father Grepilloux serves to emphasize the hopelessness of the struggle to civilize the Flatheads. The juxtaposition of the old priest and the young priest in The Surrounded permits Father Grepilloux to assume some of the burden for the failure of the church to make assimilation work and to make the Indians full members of white Montana society. It is one of the major achievements of the revisions of the manuscript version, then, that McNickle manages to reverse the well-worn stereotypes of Christianity and civilization in The Surrounded without damaging the integrity of Father Grepilloux.
Other white characters in the manuscript version share Max's negative view of Indians and mixed-bloods. One of them is George Moser, the white storekeeper, who is only interested in financial gain. His exploitations extend to Flatheads and whites alike. McNickle's negative characterization throughout the manuscript version is explained by Moser's outsider position in Montana society; he is a Yankee. He remains a negative force to the end: he corrupts Archilde's nephews, he provides drink for Archilde's brothers, he accuses Archilde of murder, and he gives a damning character reference for Archilde during the trial. His desire for revenge, caused by Archilde's refusal to be taken advantage of, moves the plot of the manuscript version sluggishly along. His outsider position defeats him in the end, since the defense attorney uses his Yankee origin and its negative connotations to turn the court against him. He is not needed as a foil to Archilde's character in The Surrounded, and he basically disappears from the {190} published version after Max's death. His negative judgment of Archilde is taken up by the prosecuting attorney. Representing law and government, the prosecuting attorney rejects the Indians' right to self-determination and advocates forced assimilation. He is not only trying Archilde but the entire Indian and half-blood community in his indictment.We have labored under the theory that we are under debt to the Indians and we have permitted them privileges which we deny ourselves. I think it is high time we questioned the wisdom of such a course of action. If the Indian is to form a part of our state he must learn the duties and qualities of a citizen. How is he to get this knowledge? By granting him special privileges and dealing leniently with him when he defies our laws? Is that the way we treat our children when they disobey our wishes and wander from the straight path? . . . We come from a race of sturdy Pilgrim fathers who knew the virtues of discipline. They built for us a great nation on that very principle. Let us not give their work into the hands of a race undisciplined in either spirit or mind. (Manuscript 315-16)In the early manscript even Claudia, the young American girl Archilde had met in Paris, subscribes to stereotypes. Having met Archilde in France, the country of Lahontan and Rousseau, she regards Archilde in the light of their doctrine of the Noble Savage, despite the fact that she has come to know him first on a more personal basis through their day to day encounters. "Is it true that you are--Indian? . . . Do you know, I think that's too marvelous for words! It gives me the queerest thrill. Now I understand many things that puzzled me before--your reticence, directness, honesty, your genuine wonder--all that is so unusual and admirable" (Manuscript 199-200). The reality of her mother's illness forces her, however, to re-think her own past and future; in the end she sees Archilde as an individual rather than the representative of a noble race, and joins him in Montana.
There are two or three instances at the end of the manuscript version that give a glimpse of the character Archilde was to become in The Surounded. A chance encounter with Blind Michael after he is acquitted of murdering the game warden provides a more sympathetic picture of the disappearing full-bloods. Archilde's earlier evaluation of the full-bloods he encounters in the Indian agent's office after his first arrest is thoroughly negative. "He felt as if he were being vivisected, analysed and judged by the lowest stratum of society in the world" (Manuscript 90). During his jail time with its "Feelings of inexcusable guilt and shame" Archilde also feels kinship to his Salish mother for {191} the first time:He stood arm in arm with his mother those days, . . . the unhealthy mist of a hundred generations before his day. Inhabitant of a bleak world into which the sunlight had not yet penetrated, these were his people. They gazed into the sky and scanned the earth, picking their food from under the rocks and in the meadows. . . . When opposition and adversity overtook them and threatened death and starvation on the snowy flats of winter, they sat in a huddle before a [sick] fire and with blank eyes, awaiting the hand to fall. . . . Dull, naked savage, the breath of their nostrils was fatalism--there were the hundred generations who stood behind Archilde. (Manuscript 301-302)Archilde admires his ancestors' fortitude, their capability to sustain themselves in a basically hostile environment with which they nevertheless lived in harmony. Archilde's viewpoint is that of an educated white man, though; he understands his ancestors intellectually but, as his choice of words already indicates, does not share their "primitive" laws. His guilt feelings and his commitment to the white community do not permit him to go beyond a basic understanding. Significantly, it is a letter from Claudia that shakes him out of his state of suspension and renews his faith in the white man's world and his membership in it.
Archilde's mother is one of the handful of full-bloods to appear in the manuscript version. While Catherine is a vital force in The Surrounded, she remains flat and undeveloped in the manuscript version. For Archilde his mother, who remains nameless throughout the manuscript version, is merely a symbol for that negative side in himself that he intends to eradicate. Also, in contrast to The Surrounded, Archilde's mother is not seen in a tribal context and seems to be a self-contained individual like her husband Max. Archilde's rather indifferent memories of happy childhood days in her company turn to hatred when she kills the game warden.And at this moment he felt utterly detached from his mother. He felt no love, no hatred, no friendliness, nothing in particular at the thought of her. . . . But he couldn't even feel affection on principle. She was totally foreign and unappealing. . . . I wasn't ashamed of my blood to begin with because I never even thought about it. . . . It is only now that I have grown ashamed of it, now I have seen things, as it were, for the first time. (Manuscript 118-19)There is no recognition on Archilde's part that she is motivated by a mother's grief. Louis was her son, and she instinctively reacts to his unnecessary death by killing his murderer. However, neither Archilde {192} nor the prosecuting attorney recognizes the balance of death; the murder of the white man is regarded as the only true murder and the game warden and his family are represented as the victims of an irrational violence. Louis is barely mentioned in both the prosecuting and defense attorneys' speeches. Leaving Montana, Archilde simply puts her out of his mind; her death while he is in Paris causes him no grief but relieves him of his self-imposed exile. There is no reconciliation with his mother beyond that momentary feeling of kinship in jail.
At the end of the manuscript version Archilde is more than a supplicant for membership in the white community. Despite his increased sympathy for the Indians and mixed-bloods, Archilde is prepared to accept Max's preconceptions about mixed-bloods with only slight modifications. In contrast to his father, Archilde does not believe that every mixed-blood is predestined to an unproductive life from birth, but he believes that assimilation is a must. The effort rests with the individual mixed-blood, though. After his reconciliation with his nephews after the trial, Archilde expects them to make the effort to leave the negative Indian part of their characters behind, just as he did: "One thing he knew, he'd waste no more words on them here after. They could make their own choices and his shoe would be ready to boot them through the door the first time they strayed too far. He was standing now in the footprints his father had left twenty-five years ago. Already he had said in his mind: `If they will not live on my terms --then they will get out and stay out!'" (Manuscript 337-38). Throughout the manuscript version Archilde has striven for a voice, and he finally attains the voice of his father. At the end of the trial his unconditional acceptance into white Montana society is formalized by the judge: "Nor could he [Archilde] forget that the judge had shook his hand after the trial and commended his [stolid] qualities that would, no doubt, make him a splendid citizen. `I commend you!' were the judge's words and as Archilde passed through the corridors packed with people, everyone paused to let him pass and smiles and pleasant words met him on every hand" (Manuscript 335-36). His taking of his father's place in white Montana society makes it possible for Archilde to await Claudia's arrival with confidence. They are equals. The Archilde of the manuscript version is not "surrounded," i.e. "set upon and destroyed" (The Surrounded, epigraph).
The novel that grew out of this manuscript version was unusual for its time. Other American Indian novelists, for instance John Joseph Mathews, whose novel Sundown preceded D'Arcy McNickle's The Surrounded by two years, and Mourning Dove, who published Co-ge-we-a, the Half-Blood in 1927, were still advocating assimilation in their work, as McNickle had also done in his earlier manuscript version. {193} White writers dealing with Indian themes, on the other hand, turned "their interest on the most picturesque, least complex situations of the `blanket Indian' in the Southwest, or turn their faces towards the past," as Oliver LaFarge pointed out in his review of McNickle's novel ("Half-Breed Hero"). That is what LaFarge himself had done in his Pulitzer Prize-winning novel Laughing Boy. The Surrounded, however, fit into neither of the accepted two categories, the assimilated Indian of the present or the idealized Indian of the past.
Reviews of D'Arcy McNickle's The Surrounded were complimentary; LaFarge, for instance, says of McNickle that he "adds `The Surrounded' to the small list of creditable modern novels using the first American as theme" ("Half-Breed Hero"). A number of reviews stress the novel's epic quality, as for example Mary Heaton Vorse: "But the book is graver and deeper than the story of Archilde. It is also the account of the destruction of the Indian people" ("End of the Trail"). Despite the positive reception by critics, however, The Surrounded was not a financial success; neither the American Indian theme nor its realistic treatment catered to the taste of white American readers during the Great Depression. Public taste ran to sentimental fiction or realistic fiction set in cities and towns located primarily in the industrial areas of the United States. A novel of the West, as Long explains in American Literature, was read not as "a novel of character but as a yarn of adventure" (482). Throughout his literary history (1913; rev. ed. 1923), Long maintains that America lacks "ancient folklore, . . . settled traditions, . . . native population" for "the great American novel" (476-77). The rich oral traditions of the various Indian tribes are ignored: the American continent is considered to have been a vast, spiritually empty place at the time of the European settlers' advent.
And Long is one of the literary critics and historians who attempt to objectively evaluate the negative image of American Indians in American fiction in the first decades of the twentieth century. He blames the "fighting stories" of colonial literature for "hatred of the Indians . . . deeply ingrained in the popular mind. Even at the present day it is difficult to make the average American understand that the Indians were often actuated by noble motives and possessed some admirable native virtues" (Long 42). Pattee, a literary critic whose primary concern was not objectivity, mentions the American Indian theme only as an afterthought in his list of future American themes and claims that only the destruction of the tribes can lead to a mythologizing of their past. And of Whittier's poetry he says: "Whittier began his literary career under the impression that there was a rich mine of poetry and romance in the history and traditions of the Indians, a delusion that was widespread during the early years of the century" (A {194} History of American Literature 335). This was not a receptive climate in which to publish The Surrounded, and McNickle, whose journals show that he was an avid reader, was aware of this fact.
McNickle spent at least nine years writing and revising The Surrounded as well as writing some short fiction. Despite his problems with various publishers, he was certain of his craftsmanship, as becomes evident in his application letter to the Bureau of Indian Affairs, and not prepared to compromise this artistic integrity to the literary taste of his time.I have chosen the medium of fiction, first of all because I understand the storytelling art, and in the second place I know by rationalization that fiction reaches a wider audience than any other form of writing; and, if it is good fiction it should tell a man as much about himself as a text combining something of philosophy and psychology, a little physiology, and some history, and should send him off with the will to make use of his best quality, which is his understanding. (Letter to John Collier)Fiction, as McNickle understood it, combined most other fields in it and exerted more power than other disciplines. Surprisingly, he did not publish any more fiction, apart from a juvenile novel that does not deal with contemporary problems, until forty years later. It must be said, though, that his second novel, Wind from an Enemy Sky, published posthumously in 1978, shows fine literary craftsmanship, but it lacks the "descriptive power of The Surrounded" (Ruoff) and the personal involvement of the author. The later novel had a point to make, and its fictional tribe becomes the symbol of all other tribes. Otherwise, McNickle published several books of non-fiction and numerous articles on subjects related to Indian policy in those forty years. The idea suggests itself that McNickle considered The Surrounded his literary masterpiece and had condensed the personal and artistic development of a lifetime into those nine years of continuous revision work on The Surrounded. That would also explain how McNickle, no longer interested in popular taste, came to write a novel that anticipated the novels of the so-called American Indian Renaissance thirty years later.
WORKS CITED
LaFarge, Oliver. "Half-Breed Hero." Rev. of The Surrounded, by D'Arcy McNickle. The Saturday Review 14 March 1936.
Long, William J. American Literature. 1913. Boston et al: Ginn and Company, 1923.
{195}
McNickle, D'Arcy. Letter to John Collier. Exhibit C. 25 May 1934(?). D'Arcy McNickle Collection. The Newberry Library, Chicago.------. The Surrounded. 1936. Albuquerque: U of New Mexico P, 1978.
------. Manuscript of The Surrounded. D'Arcy McNickle Collection. The Newberry Library, Chicago.
------. Journal. 1932. D'Arcy McNickle Collection. The Newberry Li brary, Chicago.
McNickle, Philomene Parenteau. Letter to Commissioner of Indian Affairs. 27 October 1914. D'Arcy McNickle Collection. The Newberry Library, Chicago.
Merriam, H. G. Letter to Oxford University, England. 1925. D'Arcy McNickle Collection. The Newberry Library, Chicago.
Pattee, Fred Lewis. A History of American Literature. New York, Boston, Chicago: Silver, Burdett & Company, 1897.
Ruoff, A. LaVonne. Rev. of Wind from an Enemy Sky by D'Arcy McNickle. American Indian Quarterly 5.2 (1979): 167-69.
Vorse, Mary Heaton. "End Of the Trail." Rev. of The Surrounded by D'Arcy McNickle. The New Republic 15 April 1936: 795-96.
{196}COMMENTARY
Copway on Cooper
[Editor's Note: While James Fenimore Cooper's depictions of Indians have been the target of critics' scorn at least since Samuel Clemens' attack on Cooper's "literary offenses," Ojibwa writer George Copway, contemporary and friend of Cooper, held a different view. Birgit Hans has provided the following article, republished here from Copway's American Indian, 19 July 1851.]COOPER
Gratitude is one of the peculiar traits in the composition of the Indian character; and we would dishonor that attribute as an Indian, if we did not express our anxiety for the safety of one, whom, for the few days past we have seen paragraphs in the papers, that our friend Cooper was seriously and dangerously ill. We sometimes doubted of the correctness of the report, for it is not long since we heard from him by letter, yet when we know the uncertainty of life, we could but feel anxious for his safety; yet, the paragraph in last Friday's Tribune, relieved us from our suspense for a while, and still, we hope for his speedy recovery, and that such a man may be spared to the world and see many years of prosperity.
It has been our good fortune to know him personally for several years, and we have thought often when we read his life-like descriptions of Indian character, when it was in our power to do him justice we should endeavor to do so, for the exalted manner he has plead, of the wild and noble genius of the American Indians.
No living writer, nor historian has done so much justice to the noble traits of our people. The whole American feeling takes pride in such a man, as the author of "The Last of the Mohicans," and if the American, can but be proud of such a literary man, what must the man of the forest feel, when he reads of heroes (possessing all the noble traits of an exalted character,) as soon as he is brought to read, and finds in the pages of history penciled his forefather's features--yes! with us one word of commendation from the white man, either by his pen or in history, learns us to forget outrageous usages--and the sweet morsel of approbation outweighs all other wrongs, which have been inflicted on our races, in the country. It throws a rainbow of light around our heads and wins our hearts, when we hear one word of commendation, from a race who have been watching the gradual downfall of our ancestors.
We attribute this carelessness on the part of the Americans, for the salvation of the Red Man on the ground, that no feasible means have been used for the recovery of the first owners of American soil, and {197} not on the ground that they have no feeling for his good. In mentioning the name of our worthy and honored friend, we will here repeat what we have often said in our association with the learned sages of the old world last summer--"that Mr. Cooper's writings give a better idea of Indian character, that any man living or dead." For many questions of this nature were propounded to me, "Does Mr. Cooper give a true picture to the Indian character?" and our knowledge of his writings compelled us to answer, that "he did."
There may be many others in America who ought to receive the appellation as friends of the Indian with Cooper, we have not had the pleasure of knowing them personally, with exception, perhaps, of Col. T. L. McKenney, whose writings, and whole life and means, have been expended in promulgating the great and feasible doctrine, that the Indian is reclaimable, and can be make a worthy associate when polished by the refined influences of high-toned education. These men we adore for their love of our race--and may their lives be long spared to us for our special gratification, and if the prayers of the whole civilized race can be answered, they will.George Copway
According to Iktomi
The bible to me is America Needs Indians! by Iktomi (Denver: Bradford-Robinson, 1937). I found this rare book much too funny to put back on the bookshelf or to leave the bookstore without taking it home to be a welcome addition to my indigenous writers' resource library. It serves as both humorous inspiration and a panacea for whatever ails my writing. If ever my thinking is too dull or my conversations become too boring, I will return to this mystery author for a refreshing look at this gospel of contemporary Indian survival.
The true identity of Iktomi is unknown to most and will require vigorous research on my part. I want to make a pilgrimage to the Smithsonian Institution to hold in my hands the very file that reveals the name of this author who critiqued the John Collier administration of the Bureau of Indian Affairs in 1937.
For a writer of such a prophetic text, Iktomi is quite humble. He begins by describing America Needs Indians! as "doubtless the