“Indian, when he see industrious squaw, which he like, he go to him [her], place his two forefingers close aside each other, make two look like one—­see him [her] smile—­which is all he [she] say, yes! so he take him [her] home.  Squaw know too well what Indian do if he [she] cross!  Throw him [her] away and take another!  Squaw love to eat meat! no husband! no meat!  Squaw do everything to please husband! he do same to please squaw [??]! live happy.”

When that Indian said “he do the same to please the squaw,” he must have chuckled at his own sarcasm.  Heckewelder does, indeed, mention a few instances of kindness to a wife (e.g., going a great distance to get some berries which she, in a pregnant state, eagerly desired;) but these were obviously exceptional, as I have found nothing like them in other records of Indian life.  It must be remembered that, as Roosevelt remarks (97) these Indians, under the influence of the Moravian missionaries, had been

“transformed in one generation from a restless, idle, blood-thirsty people of hunters arid fishers into an orderly, thrifty, industrious folk; believing with all their hearts the Christian religion.”

It was impossible, however, to drive out the devil entirely, as the facts cited show, and as we may infer from what, according to Loskiel, was true a century ago of the Delawares as well as the Iroquois:  “Often it happens that an Indian deserts his wife because she has a child to suckle, and marries another whom he presently abandons for the same reason.”  In this respect, however, the women are not much better than the men, for, as he adds, they often desert a husband who has no more presents to give them, and go with another who has.  Truly Catlin was right when he said that the Indians (and these were the best of them) were “not in the least behind us in conjugal affection!”

Thus do even the apparent exceptions to Indian maltreatment of women—­which exceptions are constantly cited as illustrations of the rule—­melt away like mists when sunlight is brought to bear upon them.  One more of these exceptions, of which sly sentimentalists have made improper use, must be referred to here.  It is maintained, on the authority of Charlevoix, that the women of the Natchez Indians asserted their rights and privileges even above those of the men, for they were allowed to put unfaithful husbands to death while they themselves could have as many paramours as they pleased.  Moreover, the husband had to stand in a respectful posture in the presence of his wife, was not allowed to eat with her, and had to salute her in the same way as the servants.  This, truly, would be a remarkable sociological fact—­if it were a fact.  But upon referring to the pages of Charlevoix (264) we find that these statements, while perfectly true, do not refer to the Natchez women in general, but only to the princesses, or “female suns.”