Chief Joseph.
Courtesy of The American Bureau of Ethnology.
BOYS' BOOK OF
INDIAN WARRIORS
AND
HEROIC INDIAN WOMEN
BY
EDWIN L. SABIN
PHILADELPHIA
GEORGE W. JACOBS & COMPANY
PUBLISHERS
Copyright, 1918, by
George W. Jacobs & Company
All rights reserved
Printed in U. S. A.
Alas! for them, their day is o'er,
Their fires are out on hill and shore;
No more for them the wild deer bounds,
The plough is on their hunting grounds;
The pale man's axe rings through their woods,
The pale man's sail skims o'er their floods,
Their pleasant springs are dry;
* * * * * *
CHARLES SPRAGUE.
FOREWORD
When the white race came into the country of the red race, the red racelong had had their own ways of living and their own code of right andwrong. They were red, but they were thinking men and women, not mereanimals.
The white people brought their ways, which were different from theIndians' ways. So the two races could not live together.
To the white people, many methods of the Indians were wrong; to theIndians, many of the white people's methods were wrong. The whitepeople won the rulership, because they had upon their side acivilization stronger than the loose civilization of the red people,and were able to carry out their plans.
The white Americans formed one nation, with one language; the redAmericans formed many nations, with many languages.
The Indian fought as he had always fought, and ninety-nine times out ofone hundred he firmly believed that he was enforcing the right. Thewhite man fought after his own custom and sometimes after the Indian'scustom also; and not infrequently he knew that he was enforcing a wrong.
Had the Indians been enabled to act all together, they would have heldtheir land, just as the Americans of today would hold their landagainst the invader.
Of course, the Indian was not wholly right, and the white man was notwholly wrong. There is much to be said, by either, and there werebrave chiefs and warriors on both sides.
This book is written according to the Indian's view of matters, so thatwe may be better acquainted with his thoughts. The Indians now livingdo not apologize for what their fathers and grandfather