قراءة كتاب The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 4, July, 1851
تنويه: تعرض هنا نبذة من اول ١٠ صفحات فقط من الكتاب الالكتروني، لقراءة الكتاب كاملا اضغط على الزر “اشتر الآن"
vocabulary with which I was provided created a great deal of merriment. I enjoyed it quite as much as any of them, for nothing could be more amusing than the discussions between the old men in respect to certain doubtful words and phrases. They sometimes quite forgot my presence, and rated each other soundly as ignoramuses, whereat Simon was greatly scandalized, and threatened to put them all in the stocks as "hombres sin verguenza" (men destitute of shame). 'Ah!' said he, 'these old sinners give me more trouble than the young ones'—a remark which created great mirth amongst the outsiders, and especially amongst the young vagabonds who clung like monkeys to the window bars. The group of swarthy, earnest faces, gathered round the little table, upon which was heaped a confused mass of ancient, time-stained papers, would have furnished a study for a painter. It was quite dark when I had concluded my inquiries, but I was not permitted to leave without listening to a little poem, 'Una Decima,' written by one of the school-masters, who read it to me by the light of a huge wax candle, borrowed, I am sure, from the church for the occasion. My modesty forbids my attempting a translation, and so I compromise matters by submitting the original:
DECIMA.
Cesara vuestro desvelo,
Ya levantara el vuelo
Hermoso, alegre, y triunfante;
Al mismo tiempo mirando
De este personage el porte,
Y mas sera cuando corte
Todos los gradeciamentos:
Diremos todos contentos
Viva el Gobierno del Norte.
"As I mounted my horse, Don Simon led off with three cheers for 'El Ministro del Norte,' and followed it with three more for 'El Amigo de los Indios' (the friend of the Indians), all of which was afterwards paraded by a dingy little Anglo-servile paper published in Costa Rica, as evidence that I was tampering with the Indians, and exciting them to undertake the utter destruction of the white population!"
THE CONSPIRACY OF PONTIAC.
A History of the Conspiracy of Pontiac and the Wars of the North American Tribes against the English Colonies after the Conquest of Canada, is the title of a new work to be published during the summer by Francis Parkman, Jr. of Boston. Mr. Parkman, in introducing himself to the public two or three years since, by a volume of sketches of western travel, The Oregon Trail, betrayed not alone his strong natural fancy for the wild life of the Indian, but a sensitive and sagacious eye for character and scenery, and a style of nervous simplicity which in the present undertaking have more perfect play in a much wider and worthier sphere. The narrative proceeds clearly, and with simple grace. Many figures, familiar by name, but by name only, pass sharply defined before the reader's eye. The author has not lost in the lore of the historian the feeling of the poet, but he does not compromise the dignity of history, nor mistake its purpose, by indulging too much in luxuriance of picturesque description. We congratulate Mr. Parkman that his tastes have led him to the exploration of a subject in which we are all so interested, a subject whose historical romance has never been before attempted. The consultation of all the authorities, personal observation, and the want of any unfair gilding of events or character, fix the reader's faith in the severe integrity and justice of the author's results. This history will materially mitigate the complaint that American literature has so little honored the singular charm of the aboriginal American race, and we cannot hesitate to predict for it a position of authority to the student and of honor to the author, which the works of few men so young in the literary career have attained. Little estimate of its value, or of the value of any history, can be formed from extracts, but the following will indicate the freshness and poetic simplicity of the style, the author's exact eye for characteristic life and scenery, and just appreciation of historical truth and character.
Here is a glance at the life of the Iroquois:
"The life of the Iroquois, though void of those multiplying phases which vary the routine of civilized existence, was one of sharp excitement and sudden contrast. The chase, the war-path, the dance, the festival, the game of hazard, the race of political ambition, all had their votaries. When the assembled sachems had resolved on war against some foreign tribe, and when, from their great council-house of bark, in the Valley of Onondaga, their messengers had gone forth to invite the warriors to arms, then from east to west, through the farthest bounds of the confederacy, a thousand warlike hearts caught up the summons with glad alacrity. With fasting and praying, and consulting dreams and omens, with invoking the war-god, and dancing the frantic war-dance, the warriors sought to insure the triumph of their arms; and, these strange rites concluded, they began their stealthy progress, full of confidence, through the devious pathways of the forest. For days and weeks, in anxious expectation, the villagers await the result. And now, as evening closes, a shrill wild cry, pealing from afar, over the darkening forest, proclaims the return of the victorious warriors. The village is alive with sudden commotion; and snatching sticks and stones, knives and hatchets, men, women, and children, yelling like fiends let loose, swarm out of the narrow portal, to visit upon the miserable captives a foretaste of the deadlier torments in store for them. And now, the black arches of the forest glow with the fires of death; and with brandished torch and firebrand the frenzied multitude close around their victim. The pen shrinks to write, the heart sickens to conceive, the fierceness of his agony; yet still, amid the din of his tormentors, rises his clear voice of scorn and defiance. The work is done; the blackened trunk is flung to the dogs, and, with clamorous shouts and hootings, the murderers seek to drive away the spirit of their victim.
"The Iroquois reckoned these barbarities among their most exquisite enjoyments; and yet they had other sources of pleasure, which made up in frequency and in innocence all that they lacked in intensity. Each passing season had its feasts and dances, often mingling religion with social pastime. The young had their frolics and merry-makings; and the old had their no less frequent councils, where conversation and laughter alternated with grave deliberations for the public weal. There were also stated periods marked by the recurrence of momentous ceremonies, in which the whole community took part—the mystic sacrifice of the dogs, the wild orgies of the dream feast, and the loathsome festival of the exhumation of the dead. Yet, in the intervals of war and hunting, these multiform occupations would often fail; and, while the women were toiling in the cornfields, the lazy warriors vainly sought relief from the scanty resources of their own minds, and beguiled the hours with smoking or sleeping, with gambling or gallantry."
A glimpse of Indian winter life:
"But when winter descends upon the north, sealing up the fountains, fettering the streams, and turning the green-robed forests to shivering nakedness, then, bearing their frail dwellings on their backs, the Ojibwa family wander forth into the wilderness, cheered only, on their dreary track, by the whistling of the north wind, and the hungry howl
