proportion to the contiguity of the object.

By obtaining--what these legends give--a sight of the inner man, we are
better able to set a just estimate on his character, and to tell what
means of treatment are best suited for his reclamation. That
forbearance, kindness, and teaching are best adapted to the object,
there is no doubt. We are counselled to forgive an erring brother
seventy and seven times. If, as some maintain, wrongfully, we believe,
the Indian is not, in a genealogical sense, of the same stock, yet is
he not, in a moral sense, a brother? If the knowledge of his
story-telling faculty has had any tendency to correct the evils of
false popular opinion respecting him, it has been to show that the man
talks and laughs like the rest of the human family; that it is fear
that makes him suspicious, and ignorance superstitious; that he is
himself the dupe of an artful forest priesthood; and that his cruelty
and sanguinary fury are the effects of false notions of fame, honor,
and glory. He is always, and at all times and places, under the strong
influence of hopes and fears, true or false, by which he is carried
forward in the changing scenes of war and peace. Kindness never fails
to soften and meliorate his feelings, and harshness, injury, and
contempt to harden and blunt them. Above all, it is shown that, in the
recesses of the forest, he devotes a portion of his time to domestic
and social enjoyment, in which the leading feature is the relation of
traditionary legends and tales. Heroes and heroines, giants and dwarfs,
spirits, Monetos or local gods, demons, and deities pass in review. It
is chiefly by their misadventures and violations of the Indian
theories, that the laugh is sought to be raised. The _dramatis personae_
are true transcripts of Indian life; they never rise above it, or
express a sentiment or opinion which is not true to Indian society; nor
do they employ words which are not known to their vocabulary. It is in
these legends that we obtain their true views of life and death, their
religion, their theory of the state of the dead, their mythology, their
cosmogony, their notions of astrology, and often of their biography and
history--for the boundaries between history and fiction are vaguely
defined. These stories are often told, in seasons of great severity in
the depth of the winter, to an eagerly listening group, to while away
the hour, and divert attention from the pressing claims of hunger.
Und