gent traders who have resided a number of years among the various Indian tribes of the West and have become familiar with their manners and customs. I mention with gratitude and pleasure the names of my principal informers and kind friends, Messrs. [E. T.] Denig, [Robert] Meldrum and [Alexander] Culbertson.
Moral teachers have alwaysthought it worth their while to examine into and thoroughly understand the people whom they are called upon to instruct and to analyze their religion; superstitions, or moral code, if any, with a view to combat error effectively and to implant truth. There are no people amongst whom the Christian religion has yet been attempted more various and obstinate in their superstitions than the northwestern tribes of roving Indians, and notwithstanding much has been advanced by different writers and residents among them, we see but little that would serve to show a teacher in what their errors really consist, or how they may be successfully refuted. Most stories of travel among the Indians only exhibit some of their manners and customs at large without pointing out or revealing their motives of actions. Indeed, nothing but a long and continued intimacy with their camp and language, the lot of very few, would enable them to do so.
By most persons the capacity of the Indians has been greatly underrated. They are generally considered as low in intellect, wild men thirsting after blood, hunting for game or plunder, debased in their habits and groveling in their ideas. Quite the contrary is the case. They show order in their national government, order and dignity in the management of their domestic affairs, zeal in what they believe to be their religious duties, sagacity and shrewdness in their dealings and often a display of reasoning powers far above the medium of uneducated white men or Europeans. Their religion, as a system, is far superior to that of the inhabitants of Hindostan or Japan., therefore to overcome this and establish the truths of Christianity, both their reason and feelings must be wrought upon by teachers pur-