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His Oratory
As it is at his meetings
of Council, and during the discussions that are there
provoked, that the Indian's powers of oratory come, for the
most part, into play, and secure their freest indulgence,
that will appropriately constitute my next head.
We are permitted to adjudge the manner and style of the
Indian's oratory, whether they be easy or strained; graceful or
stiff; natural or affected; and we may, likewise, discover, if
his speech be flowing or hesitating; but it is denied to us, of
course, to appreciate in any degree, or to appraise his
utterances. I should say the Indian fulfils the largest
expectations of the most exacting critic, and the highest
standard of excellence the critic may prescribe, in all the
branches of oratory that may (with his province necessarily
fettered) fitly engage his attention, or be exposed to his
hostile shafts.
The Indian has a marvelous control over facial
expression, and this, undeniably, has a powerful bearing upon
true, effective, heart-moving oratory. Though his "spoken"
language is to us as a sealed book, his is a mobility of
countenance that will translate into, and expound by, a language
shared by universal humanity, diverse mental emotions; and
assure, to the grasp of universal human ken, the import of those
emotions; that will express, in turn, fervor, pathos, humor;
that, to find its complete purpose of unerringly revealing each
passion, alternately, and for the nonce, swaying the human
breast, will traverse, as it were, and compass, and range over
the entire gamut of human emotion.
The Indian's grace and aptness of gesture, also, in a
measure, bespeak and proclaim commanding oratory. The power,
moreover, which with the Indian resides in mere gesture, as a
medium for disclosing and laying bare the thoughts of his mind,
is truly remarkable. Observe the Indian interpreter in Court,
while in the exercise of that branch of his duty which requires
that the evidence of an English-speaking witness or, at all
events, that portion of it which would seem to inculpate the
prisoner at the bar, or bear upon his crime, shall be given to
him in his own tongue; and, having been intent upon getting at
the drift of the testimony, mark how dexterously the interpreter
brings gesture and action into play, wherever the narration
involves unusual incident or startling episode, provoking their
use! What a reality and vividness does he not throw, in this
way, into the whole thing! It records, truly, a triumph of
mimetic skill. Again, the opportune gesture used by the Indian
in enforcing his speaking must seem so patent, in the light of
the after-revelation by the interpreter, that we can scarcely
err in confiding in it as a valuable aid in adjudging his
qualities of oratory. We are, often, indeed, put in possession
of the facts, in anticipation of the province of the
interpreter, who merely steps in, with his more perfect key, to
confirm our preconceived interpretation. It may be contended by
some gainsayer, that the Indian vocabulary, being so much less
full and rich than our own, gesture and action serve but to
cover up dearth of words, and are, in truth, well-nigh the sum
of the Indian's oratory; a judgment which, while, perhaps,
conceding to the Indian honor as a pantomimist, denies him
eminence as a true orator. This may or may not be an aptly taken
objection, yet I have no hesitation in assigning the Indian high
artistic rank in these regards, and would fain, indeed, accept
him as a prime educator in this important branch of oratory.
The attention of his hearers, which an Indian speaker
of recognized merit arrests and sustains, also lends its weight
to substantiate his claim, to good oratory; unless, indeed, the
discriminating faculties of the hearers be greatly at fault,
which would caution us not to esteem this the guide to correct
judgment in the matter that it usually forms.
The Indian enlivens his speaking with frequent
humorisms, and has, I should say, a finely-developed humorous
side to his character; and, if the zest his hearers extract from
allusions of this nature be not inordinate or extravagant, or do
not favor a false or too indulgent estimate, I would pronounce
him an excessively entertaining, as well as a vigorous, speaker.
There are in the Indian tongue no very complex, rules
of grammar. This being so, the Indian, pursuing the study of
oratory, needs not to undertake the mastery of un-elastic and
difficult rules, like those which our own language comprehends;
or to acquire correct models of grammatical construction for his
guidance; and, being fairly secure against his accuracy in these
regards being impeached by carping critics, even among his own
brethren, can better and more readily uphold a claim to good
oratory than one of ourselves, whose government in speaking, by
strict rules of grammar is essential, and whom ignorance or
contempt of those rules would betray into solecisms in its use,
which would attract unsparing criticism, and, indeed, be fatal
to his pretensions in this direction.
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A Treatise of the Six Nation Indians
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