The Works of Benjamin Franklin, Volume 4. Бенджамин Франклин
Читать онлайн книгу.
us. As a proof of that honor, I shall only mention one well-known recent fact. When six Catawba deputies, under the care of Colonel Bull, of Charlestown, went by permission into the Mohawk’s country, to sue for and treat of peace, for their nation, they soon found the Six Nations highly exasperated, and the peace at that time impracticable. They were therefore in fear of their own persons, and apprehended that they should be killed in their way back to New York; which being made known to the Mohawk chiefs by Colonel Bull, one of them, by order of the council, made this speech, to the Catawbas:
“Strangers and Enemies:
While you are in this country, blow away all fear out of your breasts; change the black streak of paint on your cheek for a red one, and let your faces shine with bear’s grease. You are safer here than if you were at home. The Six Nations will not defile their own land with the blood of men that come unarmed to ask for peace. We shall send a guard with you, to see you safe out of our territories. So far you shall have peace, but no farther. Get home to your own country, and take care of yourselves, for there we intend to come and kill you.”
The Catawbas came away unhurt accordingly.
It is also well known that just before the late war broke out, when our traders first went among the Piankeshaw Indians, a tribe of the Twigtwees, they found the principle of giving protection to strangers in full force; for, the French coming with their Indians to the Piankeshaw town, and demanding that those traders and their goods should be delivered up, the Piankeshaws replied the English were come there upon their invitation, and they could not do so base a thing. But the French insisting on it, the Piankeshaws took arms in defence of their guests, and a number of them, with their old chief, lost their lives in the cause, the French at last prevailing by superior force only.
I will not dissemble that numberless stories have been raised and spread abroad, against not only the poor wretches that are murdered, but also against the hundred and forty Christianized Indians, still threatened to be murdered; all of which stories are well known, by those who know the Indians best, to be pure inventions, contrived by bad people, either to excite each other to join in the murder, or since it was committed, to justify it, and believed only by the weak and credulous. I call thus publicly on the makers and venders of these accusations to produce their evidence. Let them satisfy the public that even Will Soc, the most obnoxious of all that tribe, was really guilty of those offenses against us which they lay to his charge. But, if he was, ought he not to have been fairly tried? He lived under our laws, and was subject to them; he was in our hands, and might easily have been prosecuted; was it English justice to condemn and execute him unheard? Conscious of his own innocence, he did not endeavour to hide himself when the door of the workhouse, his sanctuary, was breaking open. “I will meet them.” says he, “for they are my brothers.” These brothers of his shot him down at the door, while the word “brothers” was between his teeth.
But if Will Soc was a bad man, what had poor old Shehaes done? What could he or the other poor old men and women do? What had little boys and girls done? What could children of a year old, babes at the breast, what could they do, that they too must be shot and hatcheted? Horrid to relate! And in their parent’s arms! This is done by no civilized nation in Europe. Do we come to America to learn and practise the manners of barbarians? But this, barbarians as they are, they practise against their enemies only, not against their friends. These poor people have been always our friends. Their fathers received ours, when strangers here, with kindness and hospitality. Behold the return we have made them! When we grew more numerous and powerful, they put themselves under our protection. See, in the mangled corpses of the last remains of the tribe, how effectually we have afforded it to them!
Unhappy people! to have lived in such times, and by such neighbours. We have seen that they would have been safer among the ancient heathens, with whom the rites of hospitality were sacred. They would have been considered as guests of the public, and the religion of the country would have operated in their favor. But our frontier people call themselves Christians! They would have been safer, if they had submitted to the Turks; for ever since Mahomet’s reproof to Khaled, even the cruel Turks never kill prisoners in cold blood. These were not even prisoners. But what is the example of Turks to Scripture Christians? They would have been safer, though they had been taken in actual war against the Saracens, if they had once drank water with them. These were not taken in war against us, and have drunk with us, and we with them, for fourscore years. But shall we compare Saracens to Christians?
They would have been safer among the Moors in Spain, though they had been murderers of sons; if faith had once been pledged to them, and a promise of protection given. But these have had the faith of the English given to them many times by the government, and, in reliance on that faith, they lived among us, and gave us the opportunity of murdering them. However, what was honorable in Moors, may not be a rule to us; for we are Christians! They would have been safer, it seems, among Popish Spaniards, even if enemies, and delivered into their hands by a tempest. These were not enemies; they were born among us, and yet we have killed them all. But shall we imitate idolatrous Papists, we that are enlightened Protestants? They would even have been safer among the Negroes of Africa, where at least one manly soul would have been found, with sense, spirit, and humanity enough, to stand in their defence. But shall white men and Christians act like a Pagan Negro? In short, it appears, that they would have been safe in any part of the known world, except in the neighborhood of the Christian white savages of Peckstang and Donegall!
O, ye unhappy perpetrators of this horrid wickedness! reflect a moment on the mischief ye have done, the disgrace ye have brought on your country, on your religion and your Bible, on your families and children. Think on the destruction of your captivated countryfolks (now among the wild Indians) which probably may follow, in resentment of your barbarity! Think on the wrath of the United Five Nations, hitherto our friends, but now, provoked by your murdering one of their tribes, in danger of becoming our bitter enemies. Think of the mild and good government you have so audaciously insulted; the laws of your king, your country, and your God, that you have broken; the infamous death that hangs over your heads; for justice, though slow, will come at last. All good people everywhere detest your actions. You have imbrued your hands in innocent blood; how will you make them clean? The dying shrieks and groans of the murdered will often sound in your ears. Their spectres will sometimes attend you, and affright even your innocent children. Fly where you will, your consciences will go with you. Talking in your sleep shall betray you; in the delirium of a fever you yourselves shall make your own wickedness known.
One hundred and forty peaceable Indians yet remain in this government. They have, by Christian missionaries, been brought over to a liking, at least, of our religion; some of them lately left their nation, which is now at war with us, because they did not choose to join with them in their depredations; and to show their confidence in us, and to give us an equal confidence in them, they have brought and put into our hands their wives and children. Others have lived long among us in Northampton county, and most of their children have been born there. These are all now trembling for their lives. They have been hurried from place to place for safety, now concealed in corners, then sent out of the province, refused a passage through a neighbouring colony, and returned, not unkindly, perhaps, but disgracefully, on our hands. O Pennsylvania! Once renowned for kindness to strangers, shall the clamors of a few mean niggards about the expense of this public hospitality, an expense that will not cost the noisy wretches sixpence a piece (and what is the expense of the poor maintenance we afford them, compared to the expense they might occasion if in arms against us?),—shall so senseless a clamor, I say, force you to turn out of your own doors these unhappy guests, who have offended their own country-folks by their affection for you, who, confiding in your goodness, have put themselves under your protection? Those whom you have disarmed to satisfy groundless suspicions, will you leave them exposed to the armed madmen of your country? Unmanly men! who are not ashamed to come with weapons against the unarmed, to use the sword against women, and the bayonet against young children; and who have already given such bloody proofs of their inhumanity and cruelty.
Let us rouse ourselves, for shame, and redeem the honor of our province from the contempt of its neighbours; let all good men join heartily and unanimously in support of the laws, and in strengthening the hands of government; that justice may be done, the wicked punished, and the innocent protected; otherwise