they participated.

They also practised in various athletic games, such as running, wrestling,
leaping, and playing ball, with a view that their bodies might be more
supple, or rather that they might not become enervated, and that they
might be enabled to make a proper selection of Chiefs for the councils of
the nation and leaders for war.

While the Indians were thus engaged in their round of traditionary
performances, with the addition of hunting, their women attended to
agriculture, their families, and a few domestic concerns of small
consequence, and attended with but little labor.

No people can live more happy than the Indians did in times of peace,
before the introduction of spirituous liquors amongst them. Their lives
were a continual round of pleasures. Their wants were few, and easily
satisfied; and their cares were only for to-day; the bounds of their
calculations for future comfort not extending to the incalculable
uncertainties of to-morrow. If peace ever dwelt with men, it was in former
times, in the recesses from war, amongst what are now termed barbarians.
The moral character of the Indians was (if I may be allowed the
expression) uncontaminated. Their fidelity was perfect, and became
proverbial; they were strictly honest; they despised deception and
falsehood; and chastity was held in high veneration, and a violation of it
was considered sacrilege. They were temperate in their desires, moderate
in their passions, and candid and honorable in the expression of their
sentiments on every subject of importance.

Thus, at peace amongst themselves, and with the neighboring whites, though
there were none at that time very near, our Indians lived quietly and