d to convivial
habits to an extent that injured his business, and began to cripple his
resources. Unlike most of his race, however, he did not become wildly
excited when under the influence of liquor.

Se-quo-yah, who never saw his father, and never could utter a word of
the German tongue, still carried, deep in his nature, an odd compound
of Indian and German transcendentalism; essentially Indian in opinion
and prejudice, but German in instinct and thought. A little liquor only
mellowed him--it thawed away the last remnant of Indian reticence. He
talked with his associates upon all the knotty questions of law, art,
and religion. Indian Theism and Pantheism were measured against the
Gospel as taught by the land-seeking, fur-buying adventurers. A good
class of missionaries had, indeed, entered the Cherokee Nation; but the
shrewd Se-quo-yah, and the disciples this stoic taught among his
mountains, had just sense enough to weigh the good and the bad
together, and strike an impartial balance as the footing up for this
new proselyting race.

It has been erroneously alleged that Se-quo-yah was a believer in, or
practiced, the old Indian religious rites. Christianity had, indeed,
done little more for him than to unsettle the pagan idea, but it had
done that.

It was some years after Se-quo-yah had learned to present the bottle to
his friends before he degenerated into a toper. His natural industry
shielded him, and would have saved him altogether but for the vicious
hospitality by which he was surrounded. With the acuteness that came of
his foreign stock, he learned to buy his liquor by the keg. This
species of economy is as dangerous to the red as to the white race. The
auditors who flocked to see and hear him were not likely to diminish
while the philosopher furnished both the dogmas and the whisky. Long
and deep debauches were often the consequence. Still it was not in the
nature of George Gist to be a wild, shouting drunkard. His mild,
philosophic face was kindled to deeper thought and warmer enthusiasm as
they talked about the problem of their race. All the great social
questions were closely analyzed by men who were fast becoming
insensible to them. When he was too far gone to play the mild, sedate
philosopher, he began that monotonous singing whose music carried him
back to the days when the shadow of the white man never darkened the
forests, and the Indian canoe alone rippled the tranquil waters.

Should this man