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man species as man: he could show all this, hiss mated nature, stop in this channel, and flow back contempt upon his judges, and say, if you wish upon the heart: we feel the horrible curse of Alto find the deadliest enemy to man, search for mighty God in the presence of the serpent. On him amongst his own species, and not amongst || what other theory can we account for this astonrattle snakes. We submit it then to the decision ishing sensation? It is not allied to any other feelof every impartial man, whether this serpent is ing in the human heart, and is perfectly a phenot a hero, on the principles recognized by hu-nomenon in all our varieties of passions. Where man beings as heroic. Now, we will again revert danger exists in a ten-fold greater degree, we to the supposition, that the rattle snake and the feel nothing so shocking, nothing so repellent. I tiger were placed in two cages, side by side, for || have considered the case of the rattle snake, bepublic inspection; which of the two, we would cause he is found amongst the most venemous of ask, would excite the most horror and consterna- the serpentine species, to consider the question tion in the heart of the spectator? He shall be the more strongly on the side of those who would intimately acquainted with the properties of these endeavour to enrol this aversion in the class of two animals; he shall know the savage ferocity ordinary antipathies: but this is, by no means, of the latter, and the comparative clemency of doing justice to that side of the question that exthe former; he shall know that if these animals poses the curse of divine revelation; it is doing were suddenly enlarged, he must seek his own more than justice to our antagonists, for it is perdeath if he receives a wound from the serpent; fectly notorious, that many, and by far the greater whereas, from the emancipated tiger, he has no- part, of the serpentine race are not venemous, and thing to anticipate but instantaneous death. With the remainder are not only not venemous, but all these favourable properties of the serpent, absolutely innoxious. They claim only the liberty which of these two animals would a spectator of crawling upon the earth, and shunning by view with the most tranquility and indifference? flight the presence of their persecutor, man. Yet The tiger, undoubtedly. Now, from whence we find the same pervading horror and detestaarises this wondrous antipathy? for a wondrous tion against this harmless species implanted in antipathy it undoubtedly is. I believe it can be man; he pursues them to their obscure and humaccounted for on no other principle than from ble retreats with the same exterminating hostility the words of the Almighty-" And the Lord God that he does the rattle snake: he carries on an said unto the serpent, because thou hast done this, || Algerine hostility against the serpentine family; thou art cursed above all cattle and above every venemous or not venemous, mischievous or inbeast of the field; upon thy belly shalt thou go, and noxious, they are made the unsparing and indisdust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life. And I criminate victims of man's exterminating hate. will put enmity between thee and the woman, and be- || I appeal to this fact with emphasis, to show that tween thy seed and her seed." I think that every the hate which we feel towards the serpentine man is a living monument of the truth of these || family is not implanted in us by nature from a awful words; and I appeal, with entire confi- principle of self-preservation. On this plea, the dence, to the peculiarity of sensation that the preventive remedy infinitely transcends the missight of the serpent produces, in illustration of chief to be apprehended; it is wide, unsparing, this remark. The emotion is not, properly speak- and indiscriminate; whereas, if self-preservation ing, fear; for we feel an almost irresistible im- was the ultimate object, our antipathy would be pulse not to shun, but to destroy this reptile. It restricted to that portion of the serpentine family is a sickening, loathing, cold, heart-sinking, death- capable of inflicting mischief. We do not relike sensation; something that occasions an invo- cognize in this, that fine, visible, and perfect luntary shudder, and a chilly creeping of the economy; that nice adaptation of means to their blood in the veins: we look upon the reptile as ends, so legible in all the other works of nature. a sort of monster; as an outlaw of nature; some- Man, in this instance, and this solitary instance, thing that demands instant extirpation; something || forsakes his character of the sovereign of the that excites precisely the same sensation as we lower orders of creation, and unconsciously and should feel to behold a human being with two instinctively assumes the exterminating tyrant. heads; in short, we seem to feel to the bone, He is, towards the serpents, exactly the counterthat the serpent is writhing under an Almighty part of the tiger; if he does not destroy, if the curse; and he is regarded as an abhorred and poor reptile escapes from his pursuit, he feels a heaven-abandoned thing by all the human race. sense of disappointment; it seems as if a strong, With no other animal, in all nature's works, do imperious, and instinctive duty was left unperwe hold such deadly intercourse. All the cordial, formed. If man should harbour the same antipakindly, and benevolent sympathies for all ani- thy against other animals as capable, or more ca

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pable, of inflicting injuries as the serpent, there || external nature-they reposed on the lap of peace,
would be an almost indiscriminate carnage and and slumbered on the couch of tranquillity. The
slaughter of the subordinate classes of existence. elisium by which they found themselves sur-
Let us trace this altogether astonishing sensation rounded, offered, without labour, every object
yet more minutely. Sitting at ease at the writing necessary to supply their natural wants, and to
desk and accurately contemplating the properties gratify their limited inclinations. Love animated
of the reptile, I can safely say that I feel no fear, their simple bosoms, and harmony presided in
yet this undefinable impression, of which I have their societies. The observation of Madam de
spoken above, is so strong, that I write on this || Stael(6) would apply to those untutored children
subject with a sort of shuddering, loathing, and of nature with perhaps as much propriety as to
reluctance. Now, I have no doubt that this is the Sicilians-" On dirait que le souffle par du
a uniformly pervading sensation. It is no answer ciel et de la mer agit sur l'imagination des hom-
mes comme le vent sur les harpes eoliennes.”
to this hypothesis, that the serpent has, in hea-
then countries, received divine homage: he is Love was a powerful and permanent sentiment,
"it was not," as Edwards says, a transient or
worshipped on account of the mysterious horror
which he excites. Heathen nations, feeling the youthful passion, but the source of all their joys
force of the Almighty curse upon the reptile, and and the great object of their lives."(c) Without
an inclination for war, and without scarcely a
comparing his power of inflicting injury, with
the strange, mystérious, and indefinable charac- martial weapon, they devoted themselves to the
ter of the terror, unconscious of the cause, have preservation of social peace, and glided down
arrayed the serpent with supernatural properties, the current of life with unruffled serenity. That
and adored him as a God. This fact is an argu. they were inclined to sensuality, contrary to the
ment strongly in favour of our hypothesis, since opinion of Buffon, De Paw, and others, is, I think,
nothing but this impression could have trans- unquestionable; nor is it to be wondered at,
formed this reptile into a heathen deity. No: when we consider that their natural sensibility
was operated on and heightened by the influence
we read in his dark and mysterious evolutions,
of climate. From this, it has been asserted, ori-
in every movement of his body; we read even in
this worship, the curse of the Almighty; we see ginated that dreadful disease which has since in-
before us the representative of the being who fected the world. I shall aot pretend to say,
polluted the bowers of Paradise, brought sick. however, that this disease actually proceeded
from this people; it is still a subject of doubt,
ness, misery, death, on all the family of man-
which I am not able to renove.(d) In their dress
the wrath of an offended God, under which we
have suffered so long, and for which nothing but and amusements, the natives of the leeward
the blood which was shed on Mount Calvary islands observed that simplicity which nature
suggests; they wore nothing but a small piece
of cotton cloth round the waist, which, with the
females, extended to the knees; the rest of the
body being perfectly naked: their hair was of a
deep black, long, but not glossy: their complex.
ion brown; and their eyes languid, but beaming
with good nature. Their amusements were ex-

could atone. This I believe to be the true cause of the wonderful dread which we feel for the whole progeny of the serpentine species.

The following letter is from a friend in the West.

Indies.

was sometimes private and licentious, but most
frequently public, at which 50,000 men and wo-
men would assemble at a time, and dance the
whole night. These dances were accompanied,
says Martyr, with songs, called Areitos, which
recited the illustrious deeds of their ancestors,

(b) Corrinne, vol. i.

The aborigines of this and all the leeward isl-tremely limited, being confined to dancing, which ands are said to have been a race wholly distinct from the Charaibs of the windward islands. It is conjectured that they derived their origin from the Mexican hordes; but be this as it may, they were certainly unlike the natives of the windward || islands in many particulars. They are represented by all the early historians of the new world(a) as in an eminent degree meek, placid, gentle, and benevolent; destitute of that ferocity of disposition which distinguishes the savage of colder regions, and possessing all that softness and gen-hath the perilous infirmity of burning." Lanfrane, a Milanese, tleness of character that tends to excite affection or promote domestic happiness. There existed an intimate relation between their feelings and (a) P. Martyr-Henera-Oveida-F, Columbus.

(c) Edwards's West-Indies, vol. i.

(d) See Phil. Transactions, vols. 28 and 31. Stow's Survey of
London, vol. 2, by Dr. Sanches-and an anonymous Dissertation
on the Venereal. From Stow's Survey I extract the following re
gulation, made during the reign of Henry II. 330 years before the
discovery of America: "No stewholder to keep any woman that

quoted by Sanches, says, that cancers, buhoes, etc. proceed ex
commixione cum ca muliere quæ cum ægro talem habente morbum

de novo eoierat, and further prescribes a preventive for him, qui
recedit a muliere quam habet suspectum de immunditi. Lanfrane
existed in the 11th century.-I would, in addition, barely suggest,
that the custom of circumcision among the Jews might have origi
ated from this disease.

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both in peace and war. Their poetry seems to have been rude, but figurative; and in addition to their heroic ballads, they had also songs of love and lamentation; the former of which was always accompanied with rude instruments, made of shells, which were called maguei. "In their ballads left them by their ancestors," says Martyr, "they have prophecies of the coming of our men into their country. These they sing with mourning, and seem to bewail the loss of their liberty." There was another amusement, called Bato, which is described by the Spanish historians, and which bore some resemblance to the game of cricket.

from being heard, he stirred up the fire, that
they might roast more slowly, until they expired
I saw all these things, and infinitely more."(<)
"A Spaniard one day went into the mountains to
hunt; but being unsuccessful, and having nothing
to give his dogs to eat, he tore an Indian child
from its mother's breast, cut it in pieces, and
gave them to his voracious animals."

I must pause my feelings will not permit me to proceed-my heart shudders at the recitation of such atrocities, and the very Spanish name becomes loathsome to me. Adieu.

(c) Istoria della distructione dell' Indie occidentali, by Don Bart. las Cassas, page 15.

For the National Register.

Their government was monarchical; the power of their caziques being hereditary. There was but one sovereign in each district; who had also The communication of the governor of Newa number of sabaltern and tributary chieftains. Hampshire to the legislature of that State, is a These, according to Oviedo, were obliged to at-phenomenon of no small interest. To see an of tend the sovereign in peace and war, like the ficer, high in station, expose the oppressive acts vassals under the feudal system. Each island of former legislatures; to complain of the enorwas divided into numerous principalities or king-mous salary of his own office, as well as that of doms. The paramount lord, or principal cazi-several others, and recommend a reduction, is as que, was alone entitled to wear regal ornaments, extraordinary as it is just. Indeed, through the and to be attended with a vast retinue. He was whole of that address, with equal pleasure and pride, we recognize the enlightened, honest, American patriot.

borne on the shoulders of his attendants, like the nabobs of the east, and was regarded by his subjects with the extreme of reverence and respect.

On the subject of their religion, I can say but little. It was similar to the religion of all nations in the darkness of uncultivated nature, where the light of revelation has never shone. It was, as usual, blended with the grossest superstitions, and, as usual, only tended to augment the misery

This is as it should be. What a noble example for others to imitate? To ensure success, reformation should emanate from high stations; and the necessity of reform, it is presumed, will not be questioned. If a reform in the extravagant salaries of officers can be effected, we need not doubt the facility with which every salutary innovation may be introduced. If, in our repre

basis of equal rights and equal privileges could once be established and realized; that is, that all defenders and supporters of government should stand on equal footing, the time could not be far distant when every necessary reform would consequently follow.

of the human mind. The cruelty of the Spaniards to those unfortun-sentative governments, the only firm and broad ate beings it would be disgusting to detail. It is sufficient that every torture malignant ingenuity could devise was practised upon those simple children of nature, till the whole race became extinct. I would refer you to the history of the benevolent Las Cassas, for a full detail of those cruelties; and if, after its perusal, your soul is not tortured to agony, I shall confess myself unacquainted with your character. I will extract but two instances, as specimens of the barbarity of those wretches, whose names should be held up to everlasting infamy.

A NON-ELECTOR. Baton-Rouge, Louisiana, July, 1816.

PUBLIC DOCUMENTS.

Copy of a letter from Governor Shelby to Richard Bland Lee, Commissioner of Claims, and the answer thereto.

"I once saw," says Las Cassas, "four or five principal Indians roasted alive at a slow fire; and because they uttered dreadful screams, which FRANKFORT, K. July 6. disturbed the commanding officer in his slumbers, Sir-Having seen in the public prints, your nohe ordered them to be strangled; but the sub-tice in relation to the proof that will be necessary altern who burnt them would not consent, (I know late war, under the act of Congress, the 9th April to exhibit in the cases of lost property during the him and his relations in Seville,) and putting last, I consider it my duty to state to you, that the pieces of wood in their mouths to prevent them I horses belonging to the mounted volunteers, who

served under my command to Canada, in the year 1813, were all regularly appraised at New-Port, the place of general rendezvous, by men duly sworn for that purpose, acting under the immediate superintendence of Col. George Walker, the quarter master general, and entered on the rolls by which the men were mustered into the service of the United States.

Upon the return of the army to Limestone, on the Ohio, the men and horses were again mustered out of the service by Maj. William Trigg, an officer of the United States army, under a special order to him from Maj. Gen. Harrison, then commanding the North-Western army. Maj. Trigg made a note on the muster rolls of every lost horse, with the value thereof, against the owner's name.

Those muster rolls were transmitted about the month of March, 1814, to the office of the War Department, and they do contain the most indubitable proof that can be made in relation to the horses that were lost on that campaign-the sum each horse was valued to on the outward march, and the name of the owner.

If those muster rolls are not admitted as the best proof that can be adduced in support of the claims for lost horses, it will amount almost to a complete denial of justice, to compel the owners after a lapse of three years to make new proofs of their losses.

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I must request the favour of you to acknowledge
the receipt of this letter as early as convenient,
and that you will be pleased to inform me whether
the proofs contained on the muster rolls aforesaid
are not sufficient to authorize the payment for the
horses lost by the mounted militia, who served un-
der my command to Canada in the year 1813.
I have the honour to be,
With very great respect,
Your most obedient servant,
ISAAC SHELBY.

RICHARD BLAND LEE, ESQ.
Commissioner of Claims, &c.

OFFICE OF CLAIMS, &c.
Washington, August 2d, 1816.

His Excellency, ISAAC SHELBY,
Governor of the State of Kentucky.
SIR-I duly received your letter of the 6th ult.
and have delayed replying to it till I had ascer-
tained whether the rolls of Colonel George Walk-
er and Major William Trigg, to which you refer,
were to be found on the files of the Office of the
Pay Master. I have received from that office a
copy of the last, the former having been handed
over to Mr. Voorhies, a deputy pay-master.

However, it appears to me that the roll of Maj. Trigg, is sufficient to establish the actual losses of the Volunteers under your command on the Canadian expedition-and that all that will be necessary now to be done, is, that the claimants, or in case of their death, that their legal representatives authorize an attorney here to prosecute their claims and to receive any monies which may be awarded to them. It will be further necessary that each claimant make oath that he has not received compensation from any officer, agent or department pay-of the government, for the loss which he has sustained and where the loss has been in any other manner than by the death of an horse, each claimant must further swear, that he has not recovered the same.

Many of the men that lost their horses are dead, and their families know not by whom the proofs could be made that are now required; besides, many witnesses are also dead or moved away, so that it will be impossible to collect as substantial proof of the loss of horses upon that campaign, as those contained on the muster rolls to which I allude, and to which I beg leave to refer you. They are, I am informed, now in the office of the master-general of the United States army. The mustering and valuation of the horses into the service of the United States, as well as the proofs exhibited at Limestone in relation to those that were lost on the campaign, was all done very much under my own notice. That I have no hesitation to say the utmost reliance may be placed on the muster rolls aforesaid, as exhibiting the best proofs which can be made in relation to the lost horses, &c.

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Messrs. Lows and Wallach, Attornies in this place, are employed in most of the cases brought before me, and are every way trust-worthy.

passage of their claims will be very much facilitated. But in the cases of those to whom your letter alludes, the taking of separate certificates in each, will be unnecessary, as I have before me an authentic copy, of Maj. Trigg's roll.

I enclose to you copies of the notices which have been deemed necessary by the Executive Government from this office. These will enable If it should be thought that too many horses claimants to make out their cases in the most rehad been lost on that campaign, let it also be re-gular and explicit forms, by observing which, the collected, that those horses had been travelled upwards of 500 miles on a forced march to meet the enemy-the greatest part of the way without forage that the men were then dismounted by || order of general Harrison, and crossed over into Canada, while the horses remained five weeks in Be assured that I am not disposed to interpose an enclosure which (from their great number)||unessential forms to delay, or defeat the retribusoon became very bare of food to subsist upon- tion intended by the goverument to the sufferers That during all this time they did not receive one in the late arduous war. grain of forage. It will not seem strange that so many of them died of hunger, and mired in the || swamps on the side of Sandusky Bay, where they were enclosed-while those that survived became extremely weak, and many of them unable to return through the deep mud that lay on the way home; and on which there was no forage to be had to strengthen them-hence it may be truly said that the great loss of our horses was occasioned by their owners being dismounted and separated from them by the order of the commanding officer, and by not being furnished with sufficient forage by the United States.

With sentiments of the greatest respect, and consideration, I am, Sir, your most obedient servant. RICHARD BLAND LEE.

From the Nashville Whig.
NOTICE.

Brethren of the Whites, It is with the most unfeigned pleasure that we contemplate the long and steady friendship subsisting between our nation and our American white brethren; and the late hospitable and generous magnanimity mani

verse to the jurisdiction. The question was raised in the last court of common pleas in this county & a decision had averse to the jurisdiction. As this decision is upon a law question of much importance to the whole country, I have requested a copy of judge Tappan's opinion, and herewith enclose it to you for publication in the Herald. Yours,

B.

fested towards ourselves and our nation, as well diction in the state courts, to hear and deterby the government as by the citizens of the U.mine cases and infractions of the penal or revenue States, gives us an additional proof, that when we laws of the United States. The question was laterenounced the friendship of all other nations for ly raised in Virginia before the superior court of yours, on that day we obtained the surest guar-that commonwealth, and a determination had adantee for our happiness and our interest-the friendship of a nation too generous to do wrong, and too brave to oppress. We avail ourselves of the present opportunity to declare, on the part of our nation, that every friendly and hospitable at tention so strongly manifested on the part of the whites, is as strongly reciprocated on the part of Ourselves and our nation. Feeling ourselves perfectly secure in the enjoyment of all our rights, so far as they depend on the friendship and the justice of the American people, we consider it our greatest interest (as we know it to be our greatest pleasure) to cement by the most sincere interchange of friendly and hospitable attention, that friendship that so happily subsists between our respective nations, as well by promoting the interest as by administering to the wants of those whose chance and destiny may afford us the opportunity of manifesting by our practice what we now declare to be our profession.

United States, vs. Alex'r. Campbell. Information filed by J. C. Wright, collector of the revenue for the 6th collection district of Ohio, against Alexander Campbell for selling domestic distilled spirits without a license therefor from the collector, contrary to the act of congress in such case made and provided, and praying that the said Alexander Campbell may forfeit and pay to the United States the sum of 150 dollars penalty, and also the further sum of 15 dollars duty by law imposed upon a license to retail," &c. "according to the provisions of the acts of congress in such cases made and provided," &c.

Impressed with these sentiments, we feel it a duty incumbent on us to make known, that at a late council held by the Chickasaw nation, it has been unanimously decided, that the horde of straggling pedlars that have so long infested our nation, (and who, we presume, are unknown to any regulation of their own government and unauthorised by law) is dangerous to the good understanding that now subsists between our nation and the citizens of the U. S. Was any argument necessary to enforce this idea, it will be found in the history of the late transaction that has taken place in the Cherokee nation. The ignorant and unwary of our nation are continually imposed on by those peculators, who bear no more relation to merchants than "Jew brokers" do to bankers. And this is too often followed by violence on the part of our people, whose minds have not as yet undergone so radical a change, nor the early habits of their education sufficiently eradicated, as to feel themselves content with that redress which is drawn from the tardy (though certain) process Judge TAPPAN-This is a very important quesof the law. We therefore caution, in the strong- tion of jurisdiction, upon which, if I had doubts, est terms, all such persons from entering our na-I would take further time to deliberate before tion, for the purpose of carrying on their (here-giving an opinion: as I have none, I will not detofore) course of traffic, as the nation will not feel lay the cause by a continuance, but proceed to themselves responsible for the chances springing give my opinion, notwithstanding the pressure of from their transactions. business may prevent my adverting to many of the reasons and grounds whereon that opinion is founded.

The defendant filed the following exceptions to the jurisdiction of this court.

"And the said Alexander Campbell says, that the information filed against him by John C. Wright, collector, contains no matter or thing to which he the said Alexander Campbell is in this court bound to answer, for that the retailing li quor by the quart is not an offence against any of the laws of the state of Ohio, of offences against which laws only this court can take jurisdiction-and for that also by the constitution of the state of Ohio, no man can be held to answer any offence in the courts of the said state except upon indictment or presentment of a grand jury, wherefore the said Alexander Campbell prays that he may be discharged from answering said information, and that the same may be quashed. ||-C.Hammond, attorney for defendant."

Being now about to enter the limits of our own nation, we avail ourselves of this opportunity to acknowledge our sincere gratitude for the many There can be no hesitation in asserting that a kind and hospitable attentions that we have expe- proceeding by information is a criminal prosecu rienced from the people of Nashville, and all other tion, and that it hath always been used as such parts of the Union that we have visited; and we-4th Bl. Com. Chap. 23d, the king vs. Berchet would be happy of the opportunity of returning those friendly civilities at any time in our nation, WILLIAM COLBERT, Brig. Gen. of the Chickasaws. JAMES COLBERT, U. S. Interpreter to the Chickasaws.

August 7, 1816.

From the Western Herald.
IMPORTANT LAW CASE.

For some time since, doubts have been entertained as to the power of Congress to vest juris

and others, 1st Shower, 106.-I refer to these authorities as fully supporting both propositions.

The first question will then be, can the United States prosecute for offences against their laws in their state courts?

This will depend upon the constitution of the United States, and the constitution of this state.

The state of Ohio is a sovereign and independent state, not controlable by any earthly power in the making or administration of its laws, except only in such particulars as it hath delegated a portion of that sovereignty to the United States by the Federal Constitution, and as it hath limited it

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