“the sexes indulge their propensities with each other promiscuously, unrestrained by law or custom, and without secrecy or shame.”  Powers, too, relates (55) that among the Californian Yurok “the sexes bathe apart, and the women do not go into the sea without some garment on.”  But Powers was not a man to be misled by specious appearances.  He fully understood the philosophy of the matter, as the following shows (412): 

“Notwithstanding all that has been said to the contrary by false friends and weak maundering philanthropists, the California Indians are a grossly licentious race.  None more so, perhaps.  There is no word in all their language that I have examined which has the meaning of ‘mercenary prostitute,’ because such a creature is unknown to them; but among the unmarried of both sexes there is very little or no restraint; and this freedom is so much a matter of course that there is no reproach attaching to it; so that their young women are notable for their modest and innocent demeanor.  This very modesty of outward deportment has deceived the hasty glance of many travellers.  But what their conduct really is is shown by the Argus-eyed surveillance to which women are subjected.  If a married woman is seen even walking in the forest with another man than her husband she is chastised by him.  A repetition of the offence is generally punished with speedy death.  Brothers and sisters scrupulously avoid living alone together.  A mother-in-law is never allowed to live with her son-in-law.  To the Indian’s mind the opportunity of evil implies the commission of it.”

WERE INDIANS CORRUPTED BY WHITES?

Having disposed of the modesty fallacy, let us examine once more, and for the last time, the doctrine that savages owe their degradation to the whites.

In the admirable preface to his book on the Jesuit missionaries in Canada, Parkman writes concerning the Hurons (XXXIV.): 

“Lafitau, whose book appeared in 1724, says that the nation was corrupt in his time, but that this was a degeneracy from their ancient manners.  La Potherie and Charlevoix make a similar statement.  Megapolensis, however, in 1644 says that they were then exceedingly debauched; and Greenhalgh, in 1677, gives ample evidence of a shameless license.  One of their most earnest advocates of the present day admits that the passion of love among them had no other than an animal existence (Morgan, League of the Iroquois, 322).  There is clear proof that the tribes of the South were equally corrupt. (See Lawson’s Carolina, 34, and other early writers.)”

Another most earnest advocate of the Indians, Dr. Brinton, writes (M.N.W., 159) that promiscuous licentiousness was frequently connected with the religious ceremonies of the Indians: