nations, who made extensive conquests, and were again conquered or exterminated by some more powerful nation, or by a coalition of neighboring tribes. Notwithstanding this trait of character, which has been exhibited by some of the North American tribes, at different and distant periods, it is generally true of all, that as they are not anxious about the future, for the same reason they are almost wholly improvident. When not engaged in their favorite pursuits of war or hunting, they are too indolent to think of making an adequate provision against the inclemency of the seasons, or of any future want. As they have fewer vices, so they have fewer virtues than more civilized nations, and both are more prominent, more distinctly marked. This arises from the paucity of the objects. with which they are conversant. With them numerous passions, correcting and restraining each other, are not, as in a state of civilization, equally excited, by a multiplicity of objects. When any object rouses their attention, the whole force of the mind, the whole vigor of the soul is collected and exerted on one point. Hospitality is always a virtue, and is peculiarly so to a savage people, and the finest trait in their character. When we contemplate this virtue, among such a people, it strikes the mind with all the advantage of vivid sentiment, singularity of impression and contrast of manners. Every recollection is accompanied with an enthusiastic admiration, that makes us regret the loss of those manners, which are, alone, capable of giving lustre to this sublime virtue. Will it be thought strange to assert, that this virtue derives its origin and takes its principal lustre, from the barbarous manners of the age? and yet such is the fact. It does not, however, consist with the rudest state of society and of manners. Some advance in civilization, some progress in the arts of life, is necessary to give a relish for hospitality, and to supply the means of indulging it. Among a people in the hunter state it makes but little figure: depending on the fortune of the chase, or the gleanings of the forest, they find but a scanty and precarious subsistence. With neither the foresight, nor the means of making a secure provision for the future, they are frequently in want of necessary sustenance. Among such a people, the pressing demands of nature, leave little of their scanty stores for the uses of

hospitality. They have little curiosity, and no conception of any knowledge, which can be of use beyond that of forming the bow or some instrument of the chase. With such a people always exposed, and not unfrequently reduced to a famishing condition, what can compensate for an additional tax on their precarious and scanty means of subsistence? The North American natives have never been equally noted, for the practice of this virtue, with the ancient Germans, or the more ancient inhabitants of Greece. They draw but a small share of their subsistence from the earth; all the care of their tillage, consisting in the cultivation of maize, beans, and a few edible roots, is left to the women. The labor of these, spared from their attendance on the men in hunting, and other drudgeries of a domestic nature, without the assistance of useful animals, and with such rude implements as they can either form or procure, can yield but a scanty supply for one part of the year; the other is, for the most part, as scantily supplied by the fortune of the chase. They appear to have little relish for any new arts of life, unless they have some relation to their principal occupations of war and hunting; and very little curiosity for any information to be derived from an intercourse with strangers. Instances are not however, wanting, in which they have discovered all that fidelity to their guests, all that warmth of attachment, which gives such a charm to the patriarchal times of the old world. Although the instances are less frequent, they bear the same genuine character of heroic integrity.

The shepherd state supplies a more ready and abundant supply of food and domestic conveniences. Then, more at ease, conversation begins to acquire a charm; more arts become necessary. The useful and the convenient engage the attention. New objects afford gratification to an awakened curiosity; still they are divided into small tribes; their domestic manners are sincere, but rough; to strangers, they are fierce, cruel and faithless. So universal has always been the state of war, among such a people, that, in almost every language, the same word originally signified both foreigner and enemy. Disputed boundaries are often the occasion of wars: they are often waged to avenge a private quarrel; and to surprise and plunder the neighboring tribes of their herds is the principal object of

*

their hostile enterprises. Their whole history is a continued scene of war, pillage and reprisal. So frequent were these predatory expeditions, among the petty tribes of ancient Greece, that they were early honored with a particular name. In such a state of society and nations the use of coin is unknown. Their whole commerce, whatever they may have, consists in exchange of commodities in kind. These are usually bulky and unfit to attend the person of the owner, to answer his occasions in travelling; nor could they attend him with safety, among a people, who reckon the plundering of strangers a lawful means of acquisition. Inns for the accommodation of travellers are unknown. Were it not for the hospitality of individuals, there could be no passing from one country to another. There is something in the practice very congenial to the frank, rough and generous manners of a rude people. Their generosity, however, in this favorite instance rises, as it were, through a cloud. We find from Homer that strangers often applied to their intended hosts, in the posture of suppliants, and entreated the rights of hospitality as for their lives. His instances may, indeed, be considered as poetic fiction; but they were, undoubtedly, relative to the spirit and manners of the age. To grant the rights of hospitality was to grant protection. The host or patron was considered as the protector of his guest; an office which suited with a martial spirit. It gave the host consequence, in his own estimation and in the estimation of others. The practice of this virtue, among rude nations, affords not only a gratification to curiosity, but the opportunity of indulging in the exercise of humanity to strangers, without incurring the imputation of a want of attachment to the tribe. The advantages are national and reciprocal; in no other way can they acquire a knowledge of foreign nations, their arts and manners. Like the safety of heralds it passes into their law of nations. In ancient writers, we often read of the right of hospitality, and of wars to protect those rights or to avenge their violation. Indeed, it is to be considered no less a national, than a private virtue. In the present state of improvement, among civilized

*Bonhaσia, abactio bovum, præda taking cattle, prey.

nations, almost every reason, which, among savages, concurred to the establishment of hospitality, has ceased, and the practice, in the ancient sense, has ceased of course. The arts of writing and printing have furnished innumerable vehicles of intelligence always at command. Knowledge of all the arts of life is diffused with facility, safety, and accuracy, as far as the use of letters is known. The cultivation of the gentle passions, an improved sense of the duties of humanity, a knowledge of its rights, and the protection afforded to those rights, by the law of nations and the civil laws of most countries, have superseded the necessity of individual protection; and public accommodations have been much more convenient for travellers, than private hospitality. The universal introduction and currency of money, and the facilities of commerce, have given men the command of a kind of property, which may with ease and safety attend their persons, and provide for them in their peregrinations. Most men, who travel at this day, are engaged in pursuits of interests or gratifications of a private nature. In this state of things, hospitality, in the ancient practice, would be unnecessary, unjust, and intolerably burdensome. It has therefore been well exchanged for those courtesies, that better accord with the manners as well as the interests of civil society: and why should we regret the exchange? Let those who entertain such an enthusiastic veneration for hospitality and other ancient virtues of the same origin, reflect, that they cannot have the effect without the cause; and that those precious gems of savage virtues would lose their lustre and estimation without the foil of savage vices. This short sketch is sufficient to prove, that the first rude state of man, or if we choose the expression, the first simple state of society does not most abound in virtue and happiness. I have given, indeed, a short, but in a general view I believe, a true sketch of every uncivilized tribe on earth.

This opinion of a preference of the savage to a civilized state of society has been inculcated by some, who, irritated and disgusted with the numerous abuses of a corrupt government, have unjustly attributed to civilization those evils, which we always find aggravated, the nearer we approach to the savage state, their favorite state of nature; and by the glowing minds

of some whose zeal in the cause of virtue exceeded their information. Had they attended to the science of human nature, the development of the human mind, the powers, faculties, passions and appetites of man; had they studied attentively the history-not of battles and sieges only, the intrigues of statesmen, and the revolution of empires-but the history of man in society, the history of the human mind, they would have found reason for correcting their opinion. This science, so important to man, has been too much neglected. In the first stages, none are capable of making or recording proper observations, and one half of the progress has generally passed unnoticed. In the following ages, historians, hurried away by the more splendid events of history, have too much neglected to mark the progressive improvement of the mind; and readers have been equally inattentive to the few facts that have been recorded, throwing any light upon the subject. In America, the best opportunity that ever presented for supplying these deficiencies in the early history of man, by actual observation on real life and manners, has been too much neglected, and suffered to escape hitherto with but little improvement.