George Catlin

Newcastle-on-Tyne—Indians’ alarms about jails—Kind visits from Friends—Mrs. A. Richardson—Advice of the Friends—War-Chiefs reply—Liberal presents—Arrive at Sunderland—Kindness of the Friends—All breakfast with Mr. T. Richardson—Indians plant trees in his garden—And the Author also—The Doctor’s superstition—Sacrifice—Feast—Illness of the Roman Nose—Indians visit a coalpit—North Shields—A sailors’ dinner and a row—Arrive at Edinburgh—A drive—First exhibition there—Visit to Salisbury Crag—To Arthur’s Seat—Holyrood House and Castle—The crown of Robert Bruce—The “big gun,”—“Queen Mab”—Curious modes of building—“Flats”—Origin of—Illness of Corsair, the little pappoose—The old Doctor speaks—War-chief’s speech—A feast of ducks—Indians’ remarks upon the government of Scotland—“The swapping of crowns”—The Doctor proposes the crown of Robert Bruce for Prince Albert—Start for Dundee—Indians’ liberality—A noble act—Arrival at Dundee—Death of little Corsair—Distress of the Little Wolf and his wife—Curious ceremony—Young men piercing their arms—Indians at Perth—Arrival in Glasgow—Quartered in the Town-hall—The cemetery—The Hunterian Museum—The Doctor’s admiration of it—Daily drives—Indians throw money to the poor—Alarm for Roman Nose—Two reverend gentlemen talk with the Indians—War-chief’s remarks—Greenock—Doctor’s regret at leaving.

Newcastle-on-Tyne was the next place where we stopped, and when I arrived there I found Mr. Melody and his friends very comfortably lodged, and all in excellent spirits. The Indians, he told me, had been exceedingly buoyant in spirits from the moment they left York, and the old Doctor sang the whole way, even though he had been defeated in his design of riding outside on the railway train, as he had been in the habit of doing on the omnibus in London. I told them I had remained a little behind them in York to enjoy a few hours more of the society of an excellent and kind lady of the Society of Friends,[29] whom they would recollect to have seen in the exhibition room when they had finished their last night’s exhibition, who came forward and shook hands in the most affectionate manner, and left gold in their hands as she bade them good bye, and commended them to the care of the Great Spirit.

I told them that this good lady had only returned from the country on the last evening of their exhibiting in York, and was exceedingly disappointed that she could not have the pleasure of their society at her house. I then sat down and amused them an hour with a beautiful manuscript book, by her own hand, which she had presented to me, containing the portraits of seven Seneca chiefs and braves, who were in England twenty-five years before, and whom she entertained for three weeks in her own house. This interesting work contains also some twenty pages of poetry glowing with piety, and written in a chaste and beautiful style; and an hundred or more pages in prose, giving a full description of the party, their modes, and a history of their success, as they travelled through the kingdom. This was a subject of much pleasure to them, but at the same time increased their regret that they had not seen more of this kind lady before they left the town of York.

Their first inquiries after their arrival in Newcastle were whether they would meet any of the “good people” in that town, and whether that was a place where they had prisons and a gallows like those in London and in York. I answered that they would no doubt find many of the Friends there, for I knew several very kind families who would call upon them, and also that the good lady who gave me the book in York had written letters to several of the Friends in Newcastle to call on them; and that, as to the jails, &c., I believed they were much the same.

In a sort of council which we held there, as we were in the Indian habit of convening one whenever we were leaving an old lodging or taking possession of a new one, it was very gravely and diffidently suggested by the Doctor, as the desire of the whole party, that they presumed Chippehola[30] had money enough left in London (in case they should fail in this section of the country to make enough to pay their debts) to keep them clear from being taken up and treated like white men who can’t pay what they owe. I approved this judicious suggestion, and assured them they might feel quite easy as long as they were in the kingdom. I told them I was quite sure they had a good and faithful friend in Mr. Melody, and, if anything happened to him, they would be sure to find me ready to take care of them, and that, if we were both to die, they would find all the English people around them their friends. This seemed to satisfy and to cheer them up, and our few days in Newcastle thus commenced very pleasantly. From their first night’s exhibition they all returned to their lodgings with peculiar satisfaction that they had observed a greater number of Friends in the crowd than they had seen in any place before, and many of these had remained until everybody else had gone away, to shake hands and converse with them. They found roast beef and beef-steaks and chickabobboo also, the same as in other places, and altogether there was enough around them here to produce cheerful faces.

I need not describe again to the reader the nature and excitement of the dances, &c., in their exhibitions, which were nightly repeated here as they had been in London; but incidents and results growing out of these amusements were now becoming exceedingly interesting, and as will be found in the sequel of much importance, I trust, to those poor people and their descendants. Very many of the Society of Friends were nightly attending their exhibitions, not so much for the purpose of witnessing or encouraging their war-dances and customs, as for an opportunity of forming an acquaintance with them, with a view to render them in some way an essential good. With this object a letter was addressed to me by Mrs. Anna Richardson (with whom I had formerly corresponded on the subject of the Indians), proposing that a number of the Friends should be allowed to hold a conversation with them in their apartments, on some morning, for the purpose of learning the true state of their minds relative to the subjects of religion and education, and to propose some efforts that might result to their advantage, and that of their nation. Mr. Melody and myself embraced this kind proposal at once, and the Indians all seemed delighted with it when it was made known to them. The morning was appointed, and this kind and truly charitable lady came with fifteen or twenty of her friends, and the Indians listened with patience and apparent pleasure to the Christian advice that was given them by several, and cheerfully answered to the interrogatories which were put to them.

The immediate appeal and thanks to the “Great Spirit, who had sent these kind people to them,” by the War-chief in his reply, seemed to impress upon the minds of all present the conviction of a high and noble sentiment of religion in the breasts of these people, which required but the light of the Christian revelation. His replies as to the benefits of education were much as he had made them on several occasions before, that, “as for themselves, they were too far advanced in life to think of being benefited by it, but that their children might learn to read and write, and that they should be glad to have them taught to do so.” Here seemed to dawn a gleam of hope, which that pious lady, in her conversation and subsequent correspondence with me, often alluded to, as the most favourable omen for the desire which the Friends had of rendering them some lasting benefit. Mr. Melody on this occasion produced a little book printed in the Ioway language, in the missionary school already in existence in the tribe, and also letters which he had just received from the Rev. Mr. Irvin, then conducting the school, giving an encouraging account of it, and hoping that the Indians and himself might return safe, and with means to assist in the noble enterprise. This information was gratifying in the extreme, and all seemed to think that there was a chance of enlightening these benighted people. The heart of this Christian woman reached to the American wilderness in a letter that she directed to this reverend gentleman, believing that there, where were the wives and children of the chiefs and warriors who were travelling, was the place for the efforts of the Society of Friends to be beneficially applied; and thus, I believe, formed the chain from which I feel confident the most fortunate results will flow.[31]

Several subsequent interviews were held with the Indians by these kind people, who took them to their houses and schools, and bestowed upon them many tangible proofs of their attachment to them, and anxiety for their welfare. The Indians left Newcastle and these suddenly made friends with great reluctance, and we paid a visit of a couple of days to Sunderland. Here they found also many of the “good people” attending their exhibitions, and received several warm and friendly invitations to their houses. Amongst these kind attentions there was one which they never will forget: they were invited to breakfast at the table of Mr. T. Richardson, in his lovely mansion, with his kind family and some friends, and after the breakfast was over all were invited into his beautiful garden, where a spade was ready, and a small tree prepared for each one to plant and attach his name to. This ceremony amused them very much, and, when they had all done, there was one left for Chippehola, who took the spade and completed the interesting ceremony. This had been kindly designed for their amusement, and for the pleasing recollections of his family, by this good man; and with all it went off cheerfully, except with the Doctor, who refused for some time, but was at length induced to take the spade and plant his tree. I observed from the moment that he had done it that he was contemplative, and evidently apprehensive that some bad luck was to come from it—that there was medicine in it, and he was alarmed. He was silent during the rest of the interview, and after they had returned to their rooms he still remained so for some time, when he explained to me that “he feared some one would be sick—some one of those trees would die, and he would much rather they had not been planted.” He said “it would be necessary to make a great feast the next day,” which I told him would be difficult, as we were to leave at an early hour. This puzzled him very much, as it was so late that, “if they were to try to give it that night, there would not be time for the ducks to be well cooked.” They all laughed at him for his superstition, and he got the charm off as well as he could by throwing some tobacco, as a sacrifice, into the fire.

We travelled the next day to North Shields, and the gloom that was still evidently hanging over the old man’s brow was darkened by the increased illness of the Roman Nose, who had been for some weeks slightly ailing, but on that day was attacked for the first time with some fever. The Doctor’s alarm was such that he stayed constantly by him, and did not accompany his friend Jim and one or two others with Daniel to the coalpit. This, from the repeated representations of Daniel and their old friend Bobasheela, was one of the greatest curiosities in the kingdom, and they were not disappointed in it. In this enterprise I did not accompany them, but from their representations ascertained that they descended more than two thousand feet and then travelled half a mile or so under the sea—that there were fifty horses and mules at that depth under the ground, that never will come up, drawing cars loaded with coal on railways, and six or seven hundred men, women, and children, as black as negroes, and many of these who seldom come up, but sleep there at nights. This scene shocked them even more than the sights they had seen in York, for they seemed to think that the debtors’ cells in a prison would be far preferable to the slavery they there saw, of “hundreds of women and children drawing out, as they said, from some narrow places where the horses could not go, little carriages loaded with coal; where the women had to go on their hands and knees through the mud and water, and almost entirely naked, drawing their loads by a strap that was buckled around their waists; their knees and their legs and their feet, which were all naked, were bleeding with cuts from the stones, and their hands also; they drew these loads in the dark, and they had only a little candle to see the way.” This surprising scene, which took them hours to describe to their companions, became more surprising when Daniel told them of “the vast number of such mines in various parts of the kingdom, and of the fact that many people in some parts have been born in those mines, and gone to school in them, and spent their lives, without ever knowing how the daylight looked.”

Daniel reminded them of the hundreds of mines he had pointed out to them while travelling by the railroads, and that they were all under ground, like what they had seen. Here was rich subject for Jim, for another entry in his book, of the statistics of England; and Daniel, always ready, turned to the page in his own note-book, and soon got for Jim’s memorandum the sum total of coalpits and mines in the kingdom, and the hundreds of thousands of human civilized beings who were imprisoned in them.

It happened, on the second day that we were stopping in North Shields, much to the amusement of the Indians, that there was a sailors’ dinner prepared for an hundred or more in the large hall of the hotel where we were lodging; and, from the rooms which the Indians occupied, there was an opportunity of looking through a small window down into their hall, and upon the merry and noisy group around the table. This was a rich treat for the Indians; and, commencing in an amusing and funny manner, it became every moment more and more so, and, finally (when they began to dance and sing and smash the glasses, and at length the tables, and from that to “set-to’s,” “fisticuffs,” and “knockdowns,” by the dozens, and, at last, to a general mÉlÉe, a row, and a fight in the street) one of the most decidedly exciting and spirited scenes they had witnessed in the country.

It afforded them amusement also for a long time after the day on which it took place, when they spoke of it as the “great fighting feast.”

Two days completed our visit to North Shields, and on the next we were in comfortable quarters in Edinburgh. The Indians were greatly delighted with the appearance of the city as they entered it, and more so daily, as they took their omnibus drives around and through the different parts of it.

The Doctor, however, who was tending on his patient, Roman Nose, seemed sad, and looked as if he had forebodings still of some sad results to flow from planting the trees; but he took his seat upon the bus, with his old joking friend Jim, by the side of the driver, smiling occasionally on whatever he saw amusing, as he was passing through the streets. Their novel appearance created a great excitement in Edinburgh; and our announcements filled our hall with the most respectable and fashionable people.

Their dances called forth great applause; and, in the midst of it, the War-chief, so delighted with the beauty of the city, and now by seeing so numerous and fashionable an audience before him, and all applauding, arose to make a speech. As he straightened up, and, wrapping his buffalo robe around him, extended his long right arm, the audience gave him a round of applause, occasioned entirely by the dignified and manly appearance he made when he took the attitude of the orator, and he commenced:—

“My friends, I understand by the great noise you have made with your hands and feet, that something pleases you, and this pleases us, as we are strangers amongst you, and with red skins. (Applause.) “My friends, we have but just arrived in your beautiful city, and we see that you are a different people from the English in London, where we have been. In going into a strange place, amongst strange people, we always feel some fear that our dances and our noise may not please—we are showing you how we dance in our own country, and we believe that is what you wish to see. (Applause and ‘How, how, how!’)

“My friends, we are delighted with your city, what we have seen of it—we have seen nothing so handsome before—we will try to please you with some more of our dances, and then we will be happy to shake hands with you. (‘How, how, how!’)

“This is all I have to say now.” (Great applause.)

We were now in the most beautiful city in the kingdom, if not one of the most beautiful in the world; and the Indians, as well as ourselves, observed the difference in the manners and appearance of the people. The Indians had been pleased with their reception in the evening, and, in their drive during the day, had been excited by the inviting scenery overtowering the city,—the castle, with its “big gun,” gaping over the town—the Salisbury Crag, and Arthur’s Seat—all of which places they were to visit on that day; and, having swallowed their breakfasts and taken their seats in their carriage, seemed to have entered upon a new world of amusement. Their views from, and runs over, these towering peaks afforded them great amusement; and the castle, with its crown of Robert Bruce, and other insignia of royalty—its mammouth gun, and the little room in which King James I. of England was born; and in Holyrood House,—the blood of Rizzio upon the floor, and the bed in which Queen Mary had slept—were all subjects of new and fresh excitement to them.

Nor was their amusement less whilst they were riding through the streets, at the constant variety and sudden contrasts—from the low and poverty-stricken rabble of High-street and its vicinity, to the modern and splendid sections of the city—of crossing high bridges over gardens, instead of rivers; of houses built upon the sides of the hills and on rocks; and many other amusing things that they talked about when they got back. To Mr. Melody and Jeffrey also, and to Daniel, all these scenes were new; and the Indians, therefore, had companions and guides enough, and enough, also, to explain to them the meaning of all they saw.

I had been in Edinburgh on a former occasion, and was now engaged in looking up and conversing with old friends, whose former kindness now claimed my first attention; and in hunting for one of them, I found his office had been removed to another part of the city; and, making my way towards it as well as I could, I was amused at the instructions given to me when I inquired of a man whom I met in the street, and who, it happened, was acquainted with my friend and his location, and who relieved me instantly from further embarrassment by the following most lucid and simple direction, as he pointed down the street:—“You have only to take the first turning to the right, Sir, and it is the top flat at the bottom.” This seemed queer and amusing to me, though not in the least embarrassing, for I had been long enough in Edinburgh before to learn that a “flat” was a “story” or floor; and long enough in London to know that one end of a street is the “top” and the other the “bottom.”

To a stranger, however, such an answer as the one I received might have been exceedingly bewildering, and increased his difficulties rather than diminished them.

The old law maxim of “Cujus est solum, ejus est usque ad coelum,” would scarcely apply to real estate in the city of Edinburgh; for houses are not only rented by floors or flats, but titles, in fee simple and by deed, are given for floor above floor, oftentimes in the same house; a custom that is difficult to account for, unless from the curious fact that so many of the houses in Edinburgh are built so high, by the sides of hills and precipitous ledges, that an adjoining tenant may oftentimes step from the surface of his cultivated fields into the tenth or twelfth story of his neighbour’s back windows, and, by this singular mode of conveyance, able to walk into a comfortable dwelling without the expense of building, and without curtailing the area of his arable ground. By thus getting, for a trifle, the fee simple for the upper story, and of course the privilege of building as many stories on the top of it as he should require, when he could afford the means to do it, his neighbour below was called a “flat.” The law, which is generally cruel to most flats, relinquished one of its oldest and most sacred maxims, to support the numerous claims of this kind which the side-hills and ledges in the building-grounds of the city had produced; and so numerous were the flats, and so frequent the instances of this new sort of tenure, that the term “flat” has become carelessly and erroneously applied to all the floors or stories of buildings in Edinburgh that are to be let or sold separately from the rest of the house.

It was arranged that our stay in Edinburgh was to be but for a few days; and, with this view, we had begun to see its sights pretty rapidly during the two first since our arrival. Many fashionable parties were calling on the Indians in their apartments, and leaving them presents; and at their second night’s exhibition the room was crowded to great excess with the fashion and nobility of the city. The Indians discovered at once that they never before were in the midst of audiences so intellectual and genteel. There was nothing of low and vulgar appearance in any part of the room; but all had the stamp of refinement and gentility, which stimulated their pride, and they did their utmost.

In the midst of their amusements on that evening there was a general call upon me from the ladies, to explain why the little “pappoose in its cradle” was not shown, as announced in the bills; to which I was sorry to reply that it was so ill that it could not be seen. This having been interpreted to the Indians by Jeffrey, and also heard by the Little Wolf’s wife, the mother of the child, and then nursing it in the room behind their platform, she suddenly arranged it, sick as it was, in its beautifully ornamented little cradle, and, having slung it upon her back, and thrown her pictured robe around her, walked into the room, to the surprise of the Indians, and to the great satisfaction of the gentlemen as well as the ladies of the whole house. Her appearance was such, when she walked across the platform, that it called forth applause from every quarter. Many were the ladies who advanced from their seats to the platform, to examine so interesting a subject more closely; and many presents were bestowed upon the mother, who was obliged to retire again with it, from the feeble state it was then in. This fine little child, of ten or twelve months old, and the manner in which it was carried in its Indian cradle upon its mother’s back, had formed one of the most interesting parts of the exhibition the whole time that the Indians were in London, and since they had left. Its illness now becoming somewhat alarming, with the increasing illness also of the Roman Nose, was adding to the old Doctor’s alarms, growing out of the planting of the little trees, which he had insisted was ominous of something that would happen, but what, he did not attempt to predict.

He was daily prescribing and attending his patients, but, being without the roots which he uses in his own country, he was evidently much at a loss; and the ablest advice was procured for both of the patients while in that city.

The Doctor, on this occasion, (though somewhat depressed in spirits, owing to his superstitious forebodings about the sick, seeing such a vast concourse of ladies present, and all encouraging him with their applause as he made his boasts in the eagle dance,) made an effort for a sensation, as he did on his first night in London. When the dance was done, he advanced to the edge of the platform, and, with his usual quizzical look and smile from under his headdress of buffalo horns and eagle quills, addressed the audience. His speech was translated by Jeffrey, and, though it was highly applauded, fell much short of the effect amongst the ladies which he had produced on former occasions. He sat down somewhat in a disappointed mood, when his cruel companion, Jim, told him that his attempt “was an entire failure, and that he would never take with the ladies in Edinburgh.” The old man replied to him that he had better try himself, and, if he would lie flat on his back and make a speech, perhaps he might please the ladies of Edinburgh. After another dance, and amidst the roar of applause, old Neu-mon-ya (the War-chief) arose, and, in the best of his humour, said,—

After this night’s exhibition, and the sights of the day which had pleased them so much, there was subject enough for a number of pipes of conversation; and to join them in this Mr. Melody and I had repaired to their room, where we found them in the midst of a grand feast of ducks, which they said it was always necessary to give when they entered a new country, and which in this case they had expended some of their own money in buying. Daniel and Jeffrey were seated with them, and we were obliged to sit down upon the floor, and take each a duck’s leg at least, and a glass of the Queen’s chickabobboo (champagne), which had been added at the expense of Daniel and Jeffrey, as the ordinary chickabobboo did not answer the object of a feast of that description. After the feast was over, and the War-chief had returned thanks to the Great Spirit, according to their invariable custom, the pipe was lit, and then the gossip for the evening commenced. They had already learned from Daniel that there were jails and poorhouses here as in other places, and were now remarking that they had not yet seen any of the “good people” here, and began to fear they had lost all chance of meeting any of them again. They seemed to be much at a loss to know how it was that here were the crowns and swords of kings and queens, and the houses they had lived in, and the beds they had slept on, and that there are none of them left. They believed, though they were not yet quite certain of it, that this country must have been conquered by England. These inquiries were all answered as nearly as I could explain them; and the result was, that “it was a great pity, in their estimations, that so fine a country and people should not continue to have a king of their own to put on the crown again, instead of leaving it in the castle to be shut up in a dark room.” They seemed to think it “very curious that the Scotch people should like to keep the crown for people to look at, when they could not keep the king to wear it;” and they thought “it would be far better to take out the beautiful red and green stones and make watch-seals of them, and melt the gold into sovereigns, so that some of it might get into poor people’s pockets, than to keep it where it is, just to be looked at and to be talked of.”

They thought “the crown was much more beautiful than the one they saw in London belonging to the Queen, and which was kept in the great prison where they saw so many guns, spears, &c.”[32] The joker, Jim, thought that “if he were the Queen he should propose to swap, for he thought this decidedly the handsomest crown.” The old Doctor said, that “if he were the Queen of England he should be very well suited to wear the one they had seen in London, and he would send and get this one very quickly, and also the beautiful sword they saw, for Prince Albert to wear.” In this happy and conjectural mood we left them, receiving from Daniel further accounts of the events and history of the country which they had seen so many evidences of during their visits in the early part of the day.

Our stay in this beautiful city was but four days, contemplating another visit to it in a short time; and at the close of that time the party took a steamer for Dundee, with a view to make a visit of a few days to that town, and afterwards spend a day or two in Perth. I took the land route to Dundee, and, arriving there before the party, had announced their arrival and exhibition to take place on the same evening. An accident however that happened on the steamer compelled it to put back to Edinburgh, and their arrival was delayed for a couple of days.

During this voyage there was an occurrence on board of the steamer, which was related to me by Mr. Melody and Daniel, which deserves mention in this place. It seems that on board of the steamer, as a passenger, was a little girl of twelve years of age and a stranger to all on board. When, on their way, the captain was collecting his passage-money on deck, he came to the little girl for her fare, who told him she had no money, but that she expected to meet her father in Dundee, whom she was going to see, and that he would certainly pay her fare if she could find him. The captain was in a great rage, and abused the child for coming on without the money to pay her fare, and said that he should not let her go ashore, but should hold her a prisoner on board, and take her back to Edinburgh with him. The poor little girl was frightened, and cried herself almost into fits. The passengers, of whom there were a great many, all seemed affected by her situation, and began to raise the money amongst them to pay her passage, giving a penny or two apiece, which, when done, amounted to about a quarter of the sum required. The poor little girl’s grief and fear still continued, and the old Doctor, standing on deck, wrapped in his robe, and watching all these results, too much touched with pity for her situation, went down in the fore-cabin where the rest of the party were, and, relating the circumstances, soon raised eight shillings, one shilling of which, the Little Wolf, after giving a shilling himself, put into the hand of his little infant, then supposed to be dying, that its dying hand might do one act of charity, and caused it to drop it into the Doctor’s hand with the rest. With the money the Doctor came on deck, and, advancing, offered it to the little girl, who was frightened and ran away. Daniel went to the girl and called her up to the Doctor, assuring her there was no need of alarm, when the old Doctor put the money into her hand, and said to her, through the interpreter, and in presence of all the passengers, who were gathering around, “Now go to the cruel captain and pay him the money, and never again be afraid of a man because his skin is red; but be always sure that the heart of a red man is as good and as kind as that of a white man. And when you are in Dundee, where we are all going, if you do not find your father as you wish, and are amongst strangers, come to us, wherever we shall be, and you shall not suffer; you shall have enough to eat, and, if money is necessary, you shall have more.”

Such acts of kindness as this, and others that have and will be named, that I was a witness to while those people were under my charge, require no further comment than to be made known: they carry their own proof with them that the Doctor was right in saying that “the hearts of red men are as good as those of the whites.”

As I was in anxious expectation of their arrival, I met the party with carriages when they landed, and I was pained to learn that the babe of the Little Wolf, which he had wrapped and embraced in his arms, was dying, and it breathed its last at the moment they entered the apartments that were prepared for them. My heart was broken to see the agony that this noble fellow was in, embracing his little boy, and laying him down in the last gasp of death, in a foreign land, and amongst strangers. We all wept for the heartbroken parents, and also for the dear little “Corsair,” as he was called (from the name of the steamer on which he was born, on the Ohio river in the United States). We had all become attached to the little fellow, and his death caused a gloom amongst the whole party. The old Doctor looked more sad than ever, and evidently beheld the symptoms of Roman Nose as more alarming than they had been.

A council was called, as the first step after their arrival, and a pipe was passed around in solemn silence; after which it was asked by the War-chief if I knew of any of the “good people” in that town; to which I answered that “I was a stranger there, and did not know of any one.” It seemed it was an occasion on which they felt that it would be an unusual pleasure to meet some of them, as the Little Wolf and his wife had expressed a wish to find some. It occurred then to Mr. Melody that he had a letter to a lady in that town, and, on delivering it, found she was one of that society, and, with another kind friend, she called and administered comfort to these wretched parents in the midst of their distress. They brought the necessary clothes for the child’s remains, and, when we had the coffin prepared, laid it out with the kindest hands, and prepared it for the grave; and their other continued and kind offices tended to soothe the anguished breasts of the parents while we remained there.

It is a subject of regret to me that I have lost the names of those two excellent ladies, to whom my public acknowledgments are so justly due. After they had laid the remains of the child in the coffin, each of the young men of the party ran a knife through the fleshy part of their left arms, and, drawing a white feather through the wounds, deposited the feathers with the blood on them in the coffin with the body. This done, the father and mother brought all they possessed, excepting the clothes which they had on, and presented to them, according to the custom of their country, and also all the fine presents they had received, their money, trinkets, weapons, &c. This is one of the curious modes of that tribe, and is considered necessary to be conformed to in all cases where a child dies. The parents are bound to give away all they possess in the world. I believe, however, that it is understood that, after a certain time, these goods are returned, and oftentimes with increased treasures attending them.

There now came another pang for the heart of this noble fellow, the Little Wolf, and one which seemed to shake his manly frame more than that he had already felt. His child he could not take with him, and the thought of leaving it in a strange burying-ground, and “to be dug up,” as he said he knew it would be, seemed to make his misery and that of his wife complete. However, in the midst of his griefs, he suggested that, if it were possible to have it conveyed to their kind friends in Newcastle-on-Tyne, he was sure those “good people,” who treated them so kindly, would be glad to bury it in their beautiful burying-ground which he had seen, where it would be at home, and he and his wife should then feel happy. Mr. Melody at once proposed to take it there himself, and attend to its burial, which pleased the parents very much, and he started the next day with it. He was received with the greatest kindness by Mrs. A. Richardson and their other kind friends, who attended to its burial in the society’s beautiful cemetery.[33]

Our visit to the delightful little town of Perth was made, where we remained, and the Indians astonished and pleased with their wild and unheard-of modes, for two days. We then were within fifteen miles of Merthyl Castle, the seat of Sir William Drummond Stewart, the well-known and bold traveller of the prairies and Rocky Mountains of America, whose friendly invitation we received to visit his noble mansion, but which I shall long regret came so late that other engagements we had entered into in Edinburgh and Glasgow prevented us from complying with it.

Our way was now back, and, having repeated their exhibitions a few nights longer in Edinburgh, and, as before, to crowded and fashionable houses, we commenced upon our visit to the noble city of Glasgow. On our arrival, the party were taken in an omnibus from the station to the town-hall, in which it was arranged their exhibitions were to be given, and in a private room of which the Indians were to lodge.

They were pleased with the part of the city they saw as they entered it, and were in good spirits and cheer, and prepared for the few days they were to stop there. The same arrangement was at once made by Mr. Melody, as in other places, to give them their daily ride in an omnibus for their health, and for the purpose of giving them a view of everything to be seen about the town. In their drives about the city of Glasgow there was not so much of the picturesque and change to amuse them as they saw in Edinburgh, yet everything was new and pleasing.

The beautiful cemetery attracted their highest admiration of anything they saw, with all the party but the Doctor, whose whole and undivided admiration was withheld from everything else to be centred in the noble Hunterian Museum: the vapour-baths, conservatories, &c., which had before arrested his attention, were all sunk and lost sight of in this. After each and every of his visits to it he returned dejected and cast down with the conviction of his own ignorance and white man’s superior skill. He wished very much to see the great man who made all those wonderful preparations of diseases, and the astonishing models in wax, as he would be so proud to offer him his hand; but, being informed that he had been dead for many years, he seemed sad that there was no way of paying him the tribute of his praise.

Their exhibitions, which were given nightly, as they had been given in the Egyptian Hall, were nightly explained by me in the same way, and fully and fashionably attended. The same kind of excitement was repeated—speeches were made, and rounds of applause—young ladies falling in love—Indians’ talks at night, and their suppers of beef-steaks and chickabobboo.

Another present of Bibles, equal in number to the number of Indians, was handed on to the platform from an unknown hand, and each one had the Indian name of its owner handsomely written in its front.

Scarcely a day or an evening passed but they received more or less Bibles from the hands of the kind and Christian people who were witnessing their amusements or inviting them to their houses; and from the continued access to their stock during their whole career, together with toys, with cloths and knives, and other presents, their baggage was becoming actually of a troublesome size.

In taking their daily drives about town they had several times passed through some of the most populous and at the same time impoverished parts of the city; and the great numbers of poor and squalid-looking and barefooted creatures they saw walking in the snow had excited their deepest pity, and they had got in the daily habit of throwing pennies to them as they passed along. The numbers of the ragged poor that they saw there they represented as surpassing all they had seen in their whole travels. They inquired whether there were any poor-houses there, and, being informed that there were a number, and all full, they seemed to be yet even more surprised. They were in the habit daily, until Mr. Melody and myself decided it was best to check it, of each getting some shillings changed into pennies before they started on their ride, to scatter among the poor that they passed. Their generosity became a subject so well known in a few days, that their carriage was followed to their door, where gangs of beggars were stationed great part of the day to get their pennies “when the savages went out.” Some pounds of their money they thus threw out into the streets of this great and splendid city, in spite of all we could do to prevent them.

Our apprehensions were now becoming very great, and of course very painful, for the fate of the poor Roman Nose: he seemed daily to be losing flesh and strength, and one of the most distinguished physicians, who was attending on him, pronounced his disease to be pulmonary consumption. This was the first decided alarm we had about him, and still it was difficult to believe that so fine and healthy a looking man as he appeared but a few months before should be thus rapidly sinking down with such a disease. He was able to be walking and riding about, but was weak, and took no part in the exhibitions.

About this time, as I was entering the Indians’ room one morning, I met two gentlemen coming down the stairs, who recognised me, and said they had proposed to the interpreter and the Indians to have had a little time with them to talk upon the subjects of religion and education, and to know whether missionaries could not be sent into their country to teach and christianise them; and they were afraid they might not have been understood, for they were answered that the Indians did not wish to see them. At that moment Jeffrey was coming up the stairs, and, as it could not have been him whom they saw, I presumed it might have been Daniel who refused them admittance, as he might have been unable to understand the Indians. Jeffrey told them that they had got almost tired of talking with so many in London, but still they could go up, and the Indians, he thought, would be glad to see them. Mr. Melody happened at the moment to be passing also, and he invited them up. They were introduced to the Indians and their object explained by Jeffrey. The War-chief then said to them, as he was sitting on the floor in a corner of the room, that he didn’t see any necessity of their talking at all, for all they would have to say they had heard from much more intelligent-looking men than they were, in London, and in other places, and they had given their answers at full length, which Chippehola had written all down.

The War-chief continued:—

Jim had evidently got ready to speak, and showed signs of beginning; but White-cloud spoke to him, and wished him not to say anything. It was decided by these gentlemen at once to be best not to urge the conversation with them; and Mr. Melody explained to them the number of times they had heard and said all that could be said on the subject while in London, and that they were out of patience, and of course a little out of the humour for it. These gentlemen, however, took great interest in them, and handed to each of the chiefs a handsome Bible, impressing upon them the importance of the words of the Great Spirit, which were certainly all contained in them, and which they hoped the Indians might have translated to them. And as I was descending the stairs with them, one of them said to me that he never in his life heard truer remarks, or a lesson that more distinctly and forcibly pointed out the primary duties of his profession.

A few days more, the incidents of which I need not name, finished our visit to the city of Glasgow; and an hour or more by the railway, along the banks of the beautiful Clyde, and passing Dumbarton Castle, landed us in the snug little town of Greenock, from which we were to take steamer to Dublin.

The Indians gave their dances and other amusements there for three or four evenings before we took leave. They were looked upon there as great curiosities, but scarcely formed any acquaintances or attachments, except in one branch of our concern. All were anxious to leave and be on the way to Dublin, except the Doctor, who thought it was bad policy to leave so quick; and though he got on to the steamer with all the rest, he did it very reluctantly, without assigning any reason for it until we were on the voyage, when he acknowledged to Daniel that the reason why he disliked to leave so soon was, that “one of the little maids in the hotel where they lodged used to come in every night, after all were asleep, and lie by the side of him on his buffalo robe.” For this simple acknowledgment all seemed rather to sympathise with the polite old gentleman; but it was now too late for a remedy, for we were near to the desired city of Dublin.