. With a view, therefore, to keep them from my room in the evening,
I sent some tea and sugar with a little flour, for the purpose of
taking my tea with them in one of their tents. I was accompanied by one
of the Indian boys from the school as an interpreter, who now acted
well in that capacity, from the great progress he had made in speaking
English, and found them all encircling a small fire, by the side of
which they had placed a buffaloe robe for me to sit down upon. The pipe
was immediately lighted by an Indian whom we generally call 'Pigewis's
Aid-de-Camp;' and having pointed the stem to the heavens and then to
the earth, he gave the first whiff to the Master of Life, and
afterwards handed it to me. Pigewis then delivered what I understood to
be an address to the Great Spirit, and the party seated around him used
an expression, apparently of assent, in the middle and conclusion of
his speech. Though addressing an unknown God, what a reflection does
his conduct, in returning thanks for his short and precarious supplies,
to the Master of Life, cast upon multitudes who profess Christianity
and the knowledge of the true God, and yet daily partake of the
bounties of his providence, without any expression of gratitude, or
whose only return, is to live in the known violation of his laws, and
to blaspheme his holy name, in the midst of his goodness towards them!

Pigewis breakfasted with me on the following morning; and his general
remarks in conversation gave me, as they had done before, a favourable
opinion of his penetration and mental ability. The active efforts of
his mind, however, are confined principally to those objects which
immediately affect his present wants or enjoyments. Savages talk of the
animals that they have killed, and boast of the scalps that they have
taken in their war excursions; but they form no arrangement, nor enter
into calculation for futurity. They have no settled place of abode, or
property, or acquired wants and appetites, like those which rouse men
to activity in civilized life, and stimulate them to persevering
industry, while they keep the mind in perpetual exercise and ingenious
invention. Their simple wants are few, and when satisfied they waste
their time in listless indolence; and are often seen lying on the
ground for whole days together, without raising their heads from under
the blanket, or uttering a single word. The cravings of hunger rouse
them; and the scarcity of animals that