A Treatise on the Six-Nation Indians by J. B. (James Bovell) Mackenzie
page 29 of 55 (52%)
page 29 of 55 (52%)
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compassed. Of course the white abettor in these cases risks trifling,
if any, publicity in the matter, and is inspired with the less fear of detection. There are some few hotel-keepers who, though they more than suspect the purpose to which the liquor these whites are demanding is to be applied, permit rapacity to overpower righteous compunction or scruple, and lend themselves, likewise, though indirectly, to the law's infraction. Happily, the penalty is now so heavy ($300) that the evil is, I think, being got under control. The effect of drink on the Indian is: to dethrone his; reason; cloud, even narcotize, his reasoning faculties; annul his self-control; confine and fetter all the gentler, enkindle and set ablaze, all the baser, emotions; of his nature, inciting him to acts lustful and bestial; and, with direful transforming power, to make the man the fiend, to leave him, in short, the mere sport of demoniac passion. It may be thought that this is an overdrawn picture, and that, even if it were true, which I aver that it is, to have withheld a part of its terribleness would be the wiser course. I wish, however, in exposing all its frightful features, to secure the pointing of a moral to all who lend themselves to the draughting of such a picture, or, in any way, hold in favor the draughts which lead to its draughting. Let not the Indian, then, resent this picturing of him in such unpleasing and repugnant light, but let him rather apply and use the lesson it is sought to teach, that it may turn to his enduring advantage. Let him overmaster the enslaving passion; let him foreswear the tempting indulgence; let him recoil from the envenomed cup, which savors of the hellish breath and the ensnaring craft of the Evil One, ever seeking to draw chains of Satanic forging about him. The Indian will plead utter obliviousness of the _fracas_, following some drunken bout, and during the progress of which the death-stroke has been dealt to some unhappy brother. He will disavow all recollection of |
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