| 60ably, being feasted and feted by the inhabitants, whose esteem they gained to such an extent that their departure was marked by a general holiday, assisting hands and such public demonstrations of regret that many a rude cow-boy when once again careering o'er the pampas of Texas will rest his weary steed while memory reverts back to the pleasant days and whole-souled friendships cemented at the foot of the Vosges mountains in disputed Alsace-Lorraine.
In Alsace-Lorraine! whose anomalous position menaced the peace, not only of the two countries interested, but of the civilized world; whose situation makes it intensely--even sadly--interesting, as the theatre of the future human tragedy for which the ear of mankind strains day and night, ilistening for detonations from the muzzle of the acme of invented mechanisms of destruction. The lurid-garbed Angel of devestation hovers, careering through the atmosphere of the seemingly doomed valley, gaily laughing, shrieking exultingly at the white-robed Angel of Peace, as the latter gloomily wanders--prayerful, tearful--hopelessly hunting, ceaselessly seeking the return of modern man's boasted newly-created gods: Equity, Justice, Reason!
What a field for the vaunted champions of humanity, the leaders of civilization! What a neighborhood where in sow the seeds of "peace on earth and good will to all men," What a crucible for the universal panacea--Arbitration! What a test of the efficacy of prayer in damming up the conflicting torrents of Ambition. Cupidity, Passion, and Revenge, which threaten to color crimson the swift currants of the Rhine, until its renown as the home of wealth and luxury be eclipsed by eternal notoriety as the valley of Death!
Leaving the temporary coony under the charge of his director partner, Mr. Nate Salsbury 9whose eneergy found occupation in attending to the details of the future), Col. Cody, the Indians and your humble servant departed to America, arrivin safely; and after refuting satisfactorily, by the Indians themselves, the vase slanders that emanated in the imagination of notoriety-seeking busy bodies, proceeded to the seat of the Indian difficulties in the distant State of Dakota. The splendid action of the traveled Indians, and the record of the Wild West's representatives on the spot, in the mutual interests of an excusably excited (and, to a certain extent, unintentionally wronged, yet headstrong and misguided) warlike people, and of the Governmental authority, as well as of the peaceful solution of a serious situation--has been a matter of journalistic comment so recently as to need no reference here.
After a short, bloody, and mixed campaign, peace was restored, the government authority was secured, and a selected band of Indians--composed equally of the "active friendly," headed by Chiefs "Long Wolf," No Neck," "Yankton," "Charley," "Black Heart," and the "band of hostages" held by the military under Gen. Nelson A. Miles at Fort Sheridan, and headed by the reputable "Short Bull," "Scatter," and "Revenge"--were given special permission to come with "Buffalo Bill," for a short European tour, and left Philadelphia in the chartered Red Star Steamer "Switzerland." The significance of this fact should still forever the forked tongue of the human serpents, who without rhyme, truth, or reason, have tried to stain a fai record which has been justly earned, and by its very prominence, perhaps, difficult to maintain.
Coming direct from the snow-capped hills and blood-stained valleys of the Mauraise Terre of last winter's central point of interest, it cannot be denied that an added chapter to Indian history, and the Wild West's peculiar province of truthfully exhibiting the same, is rendered more valuable to the student of primitive man, and to the ethnologists' acquaintance with the strange people whose grand and once happy empire (plethoric in all its inhabitants needed) has been (rightfully or wrongfully) brought thoroughly and efficiently under the control of our civilization, or (possibly more candidly confessed) under the Anglo-Saxon's commercial necessities. It occurs to the writer that our boasted civilization has a wonderful adaptability to the good soils, the productive portions and the rich mineral lands of the earth, while making snail-like pace and intermittent efforts among the frigid haunts of the Esquimaux, the tangled swamps of Africa, and the bleak and dreary rocks of Patagonia.
A sentimental view is thus inspired, when long personal association has brought the better qualities of the Indian to one's notice, assisting somewhat to dispel the prefudices engendered by years of savage brutal wars (conducted with a ferocious vindictiveness foreign to our methods). The savageness of Indian warfare, born in the victim, and probably intensified by the instinctive knowledge of a despairinng weakness, renders desperate the fiery spirit of expiring resistance, which latter (in another cause) might be held up for courage and tenacity as bright as that recorded in the pages dedicated to the heros of Thermopylae. | 60ably, being feasted and feted by the inhabitants, whose esteem they gained to such an extent that their departure was marked by a general holiday, assisting hands and such public demonstrations of regret that many a rude cow-boy when once again careering o'er the pampas of Texas will rest his weary steed while memory reverts back to the pleasant days and whole-souled friendships cemented at the foot of the Vosges mountains in disputed Alsace-Lorraine.
In Alsace-Lorraine! whose anomalous position menaced the peace, not only of the two countries interested, but of the civilized world; whose situation makes it intensely--even sadly--interesting, as the theatre of the future human tragedy for which the ear of mankind strains day and night, ilistening for detonations from the muzzle of the acme of invented mechanisms of destruction. The lurid-garbed Angel of devestation hovers, careering through the atmosphere of the seemingly doomed valley, gaily laughing, shrieking exultingly at the white-robed Angel of Peace, as the latter gloomily wanders--prayerful, tearful--hopelessly hunting, ceaselessly seeking the return of modern man's boasted newly-created gods: Equity, Justice, Reason!
What a field for the vaunted champions of humanity, the leaders of civilization! What a neighborhood where in sow the seeds of "peace on earth and good will to all men," What a crucible for the universal panacea--Arbitration! What a test of the efficacy of prayer in damming up the conflicting torrents of Ambition. Cupidity, Passion, and Revenge, which threaten to color crimson the swift currants of the Rhine, until its renown as the home of wealth and luxury be eclipsed by eternal notoriety as the valley of Death!
Leaving the temporary coony under the charge of his director partner, Mr. Nate Salsbury 9whose eneergy found occupation in attending to the details of the future), Col. Cody, the Indians and your humble servant departed to America, arrivin safely; and after refuting satisfactorily, by the Indians themselves, the vase slanders that emanated in the imagination of notoriety-seeking busy bodies, proceeded to the seat of the Indian difficulties in the distant State of Dakota. The splendid action of the traveled Indians, and the record of the Wild West's representatives on the spot, in the mutual interests of an excusably excited (and, to a certain extent, unintentionally wronged, yet headstrong and misguided) warlike people, and of the Governmental authority, as well as of the peaceful solution of a serious situation--has been a matter of journalistic comment so recently as to need no reference here.
After a short, bloody, and mixed campaign, peace was restored, the government authority was secured, and a selected band of Indians--composed equally of the "active friendly," headed by Chiefs "Long Wolf," No Neck," "Yankton," "Charley," "Black Heart," and the "band of hostages" held by the military under Gen. Nelson A. Miles at Fort Sheridan, and headed by the reputable "Short Bull," "Scatter," and "Revenge"--were given special permission to come with "Buffalo Bill," for a short European tour, and left Philadelphia in the chartered Red Star Steamer "Switzerland." The significance of this fact should still forever the forked tongue of the human serpents, who without rhyme, truth, or reason, have tried to stain a fai record which has been justly earned, and by its very prominence, perhaps, difficult to maintain.
Coming direct from the snow-capped hills and blood-stained valleys of the Mauraise Terre of last winter's central point of interest, it cannot be denied that an added chapter to Indian history, and the Wild West's peculiar province of truthfully exhibiting the same, is rendered more valuable to the student of primitive man, and to the ethnologists' acquaintance with the strange people whose grand and once happy empire (plethoric in all its inhabitants needed) has been (rightfully or wrongfully) brought thoroughly and efficiently under the control of our civilization, or (possibly more candidly confessed) under the Anglo-Saxon's commercial necessities. It occurs to the writer that our boasted civilization has a wonderful adaptability to the good soils, the productive portions and the rich mineral lands of the earth, while making snail-like pace and intermittent efforts among the frigid haunts of the Esquimaux, the tangled swamps of Africa, and the bleak and dreary rocks of Patagonia.
A sentimental view is thus inspired, when long personal association has brought the better qualities of the Indian to one's notice, assisting somewhat to dispel the prefudices engendered by years of savage brutal wars (conducted with a ferocious vindictiveness foreign to our methods). The savageness of Indian warfare, born in the victim, and probably intensified by the instinctive knowledge of a despairinng weakness, renders desperate the fiery spirit of expiring resistance, which latter (in another cause) might be held up for courage and tenacity as bright as that recorded in the pages dedicated to the heros of Thermopylae. |
