great work of Gallatin[1]–says the number of the Cherokees is continually increasing. His argument is that at the time when Adair visited them, their warriors were estimated at 2300, while to-day the sum-total of their population is calculated to be 15,000; this figure includes, it is true, the 1200 negro slaves who have become their property. He also adds, however, that their schools are, like their churches, in the hands of the missionaries, and that these missionaries, being Protestants, are for the most part married men with white children or servants, and probably also a sort of general staff of Europeans, acting as clerks, and the like. It thus becomes very difficult to establish the fact of any real increase in the number of the natives, while on the other hand it is very easy to appreciate the strong pressure that must be exerted by the European race over its pupils. [2]
The possibility of making war is clearly taken away from them; they are exiled, surrounded on all sides by the American power, which is too vast for them to comprehend, and are, I believe, sincerely converted to the religion of their masters. They are kindly treated by their spiritual guides and convinced of the necessity for working, in the sense in which work is understood by their masters, if they are not to die of hunger. Under these conditions I can quite imagine that they will become successful agriculturists, and will learn to carry out the ideas that have been dinned into them, day in, day out, without ceasing.
- ↑ "Synopsis of the Indian Tribes of North America."
- ↑ I have discussed Prichard's facts without questioning their value. I might, however, have simply denied them, and should have bad on my side the weighty authority of A. de Tocqueville, who in his great work on " Democracy in America " refers to the Cherokees in these words: " The presence of half-breeds has favoured the very rapid development of European habits among the Indians. The half-breed shares the enlightenment of his father without entirely giving up the savage customs of his mother's race. He is thus a natural link between civilization and barbarism. Wherever half-breeds exist and multiply we see the savages gradually changing their customs and social conditions " (" Democracy in America," vol. iii). Do Tocqueville ends by prophesying that although the Cherokees and the Creeks are half-breeds and not natives, as Prichard says, they will nevertheless disappear in a short time through the encroachment of the white race.
