appearance; but excepting their fine hair, eyes, and
teeth, every external grace was soon banished by perpetual
drudgery, carrying burdens too heavy to be borne,
and other slavish employments considered beneath the
dignity of the men. These walked before erect
and graceful, decked with ornaments which set off
to advantage the symmetry of their well-formed persons,
while the poor women followed, meanly attired, bent
under the weight of the children and utensils, which
they carried everywhere with them, and disfigured
and degraded by ceaseless toils. They were very
early married, for a Mohawk had no other servant but
his wife, and, whenever he commenced hunter, it was
requisite he should have some one to carry his load,
cook his kettle, make his moccasons, and, above all,
produce the young warriors who were to succeed him
in the honors of the chase and of the tomahawk.
Wherever man is a mere hunter, woman is a mere slave.
It is domestic intercourse that softens man, and elevates
woman; and of that there can be but little, where the
employments and amusements are not in common; the ancient
Caledonians honored the fair; but then it is to be
observed, they were fair huntresses, and moved in
the light of their beauty to the hill of roes; and
the culinary toils were entirely left to the rougher
sex. When the young warrior made his appearance,
it softened the cares of his mother, who well knew
that, when he grew up, every deficiency in tenderness
to his wife would be made up in superabundant duty
and affection to her. If it were possible to
carry filial veneration to excess, it was done here;
for all other charities were absorbed in it. I
wonder this system of depressing the sex in their
early years, to exalt them when all their juvenile
attractions were flown, and when mind alone can distinguish
them, has not occurred to our modern reformers.
The Mohawks took good care not to admit their women
to share their prerogatives, till they approved themselves
good wives and mothers.”
The observations of women upon the position of woman
are always more valuable than those of men; but, of
these two, Mrs. Grant’s seems much nearer the
truth than Mrs. Schoolcraft’s, because, though
her opportunities for observation did not bring her
so close, she looked more at both sides to find the
truth.
Carver, in his travels among the Winnebagoes, describes
two queens, one nominally so, like Queen Victoria;
the other invested with a genuine royalty, springing
from her own conduct.
In the great town of the Winnebagoes, he found a queen
presiding over the tribe, instead of a sachem.
He adds, that, in some tribes, the descent is given
to the female line in preference to the male, that
is, a sister’s son will succeed to the authority,
rather than a brother’s son.
The position of this Winnebago queen, reminded me
forcibly of Queen Victoria’s.