Exploration of the Red River of Louisiana, in the year 1852 / by Randolph B. Marcy ; assisted by George B. McClellan. Page: 122 of 368
xv, 286 p., [65] p. of plates (1 fold.) : ill., maps ; 24 cm.View a full description of this book.
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106
GIVfNG OF PRESENTS.
consist of a few articles of small value, such as tobacco, paint, knives,
calico, wampum, beads, but as they have no commodity for exchange that the
traders desire except horses and mules, they must necessarily give these
for the goods, and large numbers are annually disposed of in this manner.
As 1 have before mentioned, nearly all these animals are pilfered from
the Mexicans; and as the number they traffic away must be replaced by
new levies upon their victims, of course all that the traders obtain
causes a corresponding increase in the amount of depredations. Should
the government of the United States feel disposed to make the prairie
Indians annual donations of the same description of articles that the
traders now supply them with, (which I am most happy to learn is now
contemplated,) upon the express condition that they would continue
only so long as they adhered strictly to all the requirements of the
agents, it would in a measure obviate the necessity of their making
long expeditions into Mexico, and would most undoubtedly have the
effect of depreciating the value of the merchandise to such a degree
that the traders would no longer find the traffic profitable. The Indians
of the plains are accustomed, in their diplomatic intercourse with each
other, to exchange presents, and they have no idea of friendship unaccompanied
by a substantial token in this form: moreover, they measure
the strength of the attachment of their friends by the magnitude of the
presents they receive; and I am firmly convinced that a small amount
of money annually expended in this way, with a proper and judicious
distribution of the presents, would have a very salutary influence in
checking the depredations upon the Mexicans. In a talk which I held
with a chief of one of the bands of prairie Indians, I stated to him that
the President of the United States was their friend, and wished to live
in peace with them. He replied that he was much astonished to hear
this; for, judging from the few trifling presents I had made his people,
hJ was of opinion that the "Big Captain" held them in but little
estimation. Trained up, as the prairie Indians have been from infancy,
to regard the occupation of a warrior as the most honorable of all others,
and having no permanent abiding-places or local attachments, they can
without inconvenience move all their families and worldly effects from
one extremity of the buffalo range to the other. With their numerous
and hardy horses they travel with great rapidity; and possessing as
intimate a knowledge as they do of the localities, it would give them a
great advantage over any body of troops who should pursue them into
the country. War would not, therefore, be as great a calamity to them
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Marcy, Randolph Barnes. Exploration of the Red River of Louisiana, in the year 1852 / by Randolph B. Marcy ; assisted by George B. McClellan., book, 1854; Washington, DC. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth6105/m1/122/: accessed April 19, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting UNT Libraries Special Collections.