the power and the determination to reclaim and occupy it. The colony of Massachusetts, in 1633, prohibited the purchase of lands from the natives, without license from the government; and the colony of Plymouth, in 1643, passed a similar law. Very strong and authentic evidence of the distinguished moderation and equity of the New-England governments towards the Indians, is to be found in the letter of Governor Winslow, of the Plymouth colony, of the 1st May, 1676, in which he states, that before King Philip's war, the English did not possess one foot of land in that colony, but what was fairly obtained, by honest purchase, from the Indian proprietors, and with the knowledge and allowance of the general court." The New-England annals abound with proofs of a just dealing with the Indians in respect to their lands. The people of all the New-England colonies, settled their towns upon the basis of a title, procured by fair purchase from the Indians, with the consent of government, except in the few instances of lands acquired by conquest, after a war deemed to have been just and necessary. Instances are to be met with in the early annals of New-England, of regular and exemplary punishment of white persons, for acts of injustice and violence towards the Indians." The Massachusetts Legislature, in 1633, threw the protection of its government over the Indians in the enjoyment of their improved lands, hunting grounds, and fishing places,

a Hazard's Collections of State Papers, vol. ii. 531-534. Holmes' American Annals, vol. i. 383.

b Holmes' Annals, vol. i. 166–169. 220. 231. note 4, 233. 245. 248. 259. 312. 317. Winthrop's History, vol. i. 259. Hazard's State Papers, vol. ii. passim. Massachusetts Historical Collections, passim. Trumbull's Hist. of Connecticut, vol. i. 113-117. Sullivan's Hist. District of Maine, 143-149. Dwight's Travels, vol. i. 167. Baylie's Hist. Memoir, vol. i. 287.

c Winthrop's Hist. of New-England, vol. i. 34. 267.269. Baylie's Hist. Memoir, vol. i. 245–248. Morton's New-England Memorial, p. 207.

by declaring that they should have relief in any of the courts as the English have."

The government of the colony of New-York, has a claim equally fair with that of any part of America, to a policy uniformly just, temperate, and pacific, towards the Indians within the limits of its jurisdiction. While the Dutch held and governed the colony, the Indian titles were always respected, and extinguished by fair means, and with the consent of the natives. This policy was continued by their conquerors, and on the first settlement of the English at New-York, in 1665, it was ordained, that no purchase of lands from the Indians. should be valid without the governor's license, and the execution of the purchase in his presence, and this salutary check to fraud and injustice, was essentially continued. Regulations of that kind have been the invariable American policy. The king, by proclamation, soon after the peace of 1763, prohibited purchases of Indian lands, unless at a public assembly of the Indians, and in the name of the crown, and under the superintendence of his colonial authorities. A prohibition of individual purchases of Indian lands without the consent of government, has since been made a constitutional provision in New-York, Virginia, and North Carolina. The colonists of New-York settled in the neighbourhood of the most formidable Indian confederacy known to the coun

a Holmes' Annals, vol. i. 217, 218.

b Smith's Hist. of New-York, vol. i. p. 39. Duke of York's Laws, in the collections of the New-York Historical Society, vol. i. Wood's Sketch of the First Settlement of Long-Island, p. 12. 22, 23. Collections of the New-York Hist. Society, vol. i. 171. 211. 224. 227. 239. As evidence of the just and friendly disposition of the Dutch towards the Indians, we have the interesting fact, that the Minesink valley, on the Delaware, was settled by Dutch emigrants as early as 1644 ; and being an industrious, quiet, and pious people, and baving purchased the lands from the Indians, they lived in uninterrupted peace and friendship with them for upwards of 100 years. Preston's Notices of Minesink, published 1829.

try, and came in contact with their possessions. But the six nations of Indians, of which the Mohawks were the head, placed themselves and their lands under the protection of the government of New-York, from the earliest periods of the colony administration. They were considered and treated as separate but dependent nations, and the friendship which subsisted between them and the Dutch, and their successors, the English, was cemented by treaties, alliances, and kind offices. It continued unshaken from the first settlement of the Dutch on the shores of the Hudson and the Mohawk, down to the period of the American war; and the fidelity of that friendship is shown by the most honourable and the most undoubted attestations." And when we consider the long and distressing wars in which the six nations were involved, on our account, with the Canadian French, and the artful means which were used, from time to time, to detach them from our alliance, it must be granted, that the faith of treaties has nowhere, and at no time, been better observed, or maintained with a more intrepid spirit, than by those generous barba

rians,

a Colden's History of the Five Nations, passim. Governor Pownal's Administration of the Colonies, p. 268–274. Journals of the Confederation Congress, vol. i. May 1, 1782.

The speech of the Indian Good Peter to the commissioners at Fort Schuyler, in 1788, is strong proof of the fact. He said that "when the white men first came into the country, they

were few and feeble,

and the five nations numerous and powerful. The Indians were friendly to the white men, and permitted them to settle in the country, and protected them from their enemies." Collections of the New-York Historical Society, vol. iii. 326.

e Colden's History of the Five Nations of Canada, dependent on the Province of New-York, vol. i. 84. et passim. Chalmers' Political Annals, p. 576. The confederacy of the five nations (and which was known as the confederacy of the six nations after the Tuscaroras were admitted into the union) might afford the subject of an historical sketch, in the hands of a master, replete with the deepest interest and curiosity. It was distinguished, from the time of the first discovery of the Hudson VOL. III.

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In New-Jersey, the proprietaries very early secured all their titles by Indian purchases; and all purchases to be made,

down to the war of 1756, for its power, policy, and martial spirit. At the close of the 17th century, that confederacy was computed to contain 10,000 fighting men. (Burke's Account of the European settlements in America, vol. ii. 193.) But this was a very exaggerated computation, for in 1677, an intelligent traveller, (Wentworth Greehalph,) who visited the five nations, computed the whole number of fighting men at 2150. In 1747 they were supposed not to exceed 1500. The great influence of Sir William Johnson is said to have collected only 1000 Indians for so exciting an expedition as that against Montreal, in 1760. (Douglass' Summary of the British Settlements in North America, vol. i. 185, 186. Annual Register for 1760. Chalmers' Political Annals, p. 609.) The five nations, during the time of their ascendancy and glory, extended their dominion on every side, and levied tribute on distant tribes. (Proud's Hist. of Pennsylvania, vol. ii. 294.) The Mohawks were the terror and scourge of all the New-England Indians, and those dwelling west of Connecticut river paid them tribute. (Trumbull's Hist. of Connecticut, vol. i.) Charlevoix (Travels in Canada, vol. i. 152. 167. 171,) speaks in strong terms of the power and fierceness of the Iroquois, who, as early as 1720, had almost extirpated the Algon- . quins, the Hurons, and other tribes of Canadian savages. Governor Colden was well acquainted with their history, and by means of his office of Surveyor General of the Province of New-York, he had access to the most authentic sources of information. He wrote the first part of his History of the Five Nations as early as 1727, and he says that they carried their arms to the Carolinas and the banks of the Mississippi, and entirely destroyed many Indian nations. The Chevalier Tonti accompanied M. de la Salle in his expedition and discoveries on the great Lakes and the Mississippi, in 1678-1684, and was appointed Governor of Fort St. Louis, on the west side of the Mississippi; and he mentions the remarkable fact, that in 1684 about 500 Iroquois warriors came and attacked his fort, being jealous of the new establishment. (Account of De la Salle's discoveries, by M. Tonti, inserted in the Collections of the New-York Historical Society, vol. ii. 286.) In 1684, Lord Howard, governor of Virginia, was under the necessity of meeting the chiefs of the five nations at Albany, in order, by negotiation, to check their excursions to the south. (Colden's History, vol. i. 44— 53.) In the Indian war in Virginia, which terminated in 1677, all the Indian tribes on the east side of the Alleghany ridge, became tributaries

without the consent of the government, were, by a law, in 1682, declared to be void. In West-New-Jersey, in 1676, the liberality of the Quaker influence went so far as to provide by law, that in all trials where Indians, being natives of the province, were concerned, the jury was to consist of six persons of the neighbourhood and six Indians. In 1758, the Indians, at a treaty at Easton, released, for a valuable consideration, all claims to lands in New-Jersey, and the legislature of Pennsylvania, in 1783, asserted it to have been their uniform practice, to extinguish Indian titles by fair purchase.

of the province, but protected by the whites in their persons and property. The five nations kept superior to any such subjection, and though their head quarters, or great council place, was at Onondaga, in the western part of New-York, they continued their hostile marches along the frontiers of Virginia. A treaty was at length made with them, in 1722, by which they stipulated not to cross the Potomac, or pass to the eastward of the great mountains; and the tributary Indians of Virginia agreed, on their part, not to pass the same to the north or west; and by a colony statute, any tributary Indians violating the treaty were to be transported and sold as slaves. (4 Randolph's Rep. 633.) But the ambitious spirit and daring enterprise of the six nations continued to a much later period. An intelligent old Mohawk Indian communicated the fact to General Schuyler, that in his early life he was one of a party of Mohawks who left their castles on an expedition against the Chickasaws, in Carolina. The expedition was disastrous, and the Chickasaws destroyed them by an attack in ambush, and only two, of which he was one, escaped. His companion fled to St. Augustine, but he returned home by land, and supplied himself on his long journey, with food, by his bow and arrow. He cautiously avoided all Indian settlements, and did not see the face of a human being from the time be fled from the battle, in Carolina, until be reached the Mohawk castles. This anecdote I received in the year 1803, from General Schuyler, who appeared to place implicit confidence in its accuracy; and no person was more competent to afford precise information on every subject connected with our colonial history, and Indian affairs, than that very intelligent and accomplished man.

a Leaming & Spicer's Collections, p. 273. 400, 401. 479. 667. b Annual Register for 1759, p. 191.