Hernando de Soto Describes the Cherokee, Choctaw Indians
In the narrative of the expedition of Hernando de Soto to Florida in 1539, by a gentleman of Elvas, there are references to the customs of the Indian tribes of South Carolina, the Cherokees, Choctas, and Chickasas, and of some of the tribes west of the Mississippi, whom the expedition visited one after another. They are brief and incomplete, but sufficiently indicate the point we are attempting to illustrate. It was a hostile rather than a friendly visitation, and the naturally free hospitality of the natives was frequently checked and turned into enmity, but many instances of friendly intercourse are mentioned in this narrative. "The fourth of April the governor passed by a town called Altamaca, and the tenth of the month he came to Ocute. The cacique sent him two thousand Indians with a present, to wit, many conies and partridges, bread of maize, two hens and many dogs." [Footnote: Historical Collections of Louisiana, part ii. A Narrative of the Expedition of Hernando de Soto into Florida, by a Gentleman of Elvas, p. 139.]
Again: "Two leagues before he came to Chiaha, there met him fifteen Indians loaded with maize which the cacique had sent; and they told him on his behalf that he waited his coming with twenty barns full of it." [Footnote: 3 ib. p. 147.] "At Cora the chief commanded his Indians to void their houses, wherein the governor and his men were lodged. There was in the barns and in the fields great store of maize and French beans. The country was greatly inhabited with many great towns and many sown fields which reached from one to the other". [Footnote: ib. p 152.]
After crossing the Mississippi, of which De Soto was the first discoverer, he "rested in Pacaha forty days, in all which time the two caciques served him with great store of fish, mantles, and skins, and strove who should do him greatest service". [Footnote: ib. p. 175.]
The justly celebrated Moravian missionary, John Heckewelder, obtained, through a long experience, an intimate acquaintance with the manners and customs of the Indian tribes. He was engaged in direct missionary labor, among the Delawares and Munsees chiefly, for fifteen years (1771-1786) on the Muskingum and Cuyahoga in Ohio, where, besides the Delawares and Munsees, he came in contact with Tuscaroras and other tribes of Iroquois lineage. He was conversant with the usages and customs of the Indian tribes of Pennsylvania and New York. His general knowledge justifies the title of his work, "History, Manners, and Customs of the Indian Nations, who once inhabited Pennsylvania and the neighboring States," and gives the highest credibility to his statements.
In discussing the general character of the Indians, he remarks as follows: "They think that he [the Great Spirit] made the earth and all that it contains for the common good of mankind; when he stocked the country that he gave them with plenty of game, it was not for the benefit of a few, but of all. Everything was given in common to the sons of men. Whatever liveth on the land, whatsoever groweth out of the earth, and all that is in the rivers and waters flowing through the same, was given jointly to all, and ever one is entitled to his share. From this principle hospitality flows as from its source. With them it is not a virtue, but a strict duty; hence they are never in search of excuses to avoid giving, but freely supply their neighbors' wants from the stock prepared for their own use. They give and are hospitable to all without exception, and will always share with each other and often with the stranger to the last morsel. They rather would lie down themselves on an empty stomach than have it laid to their charge that they had neglected their duty by not satisfying the wants of the stranger, the sick, or the needy. The stranger has a claim to their hospitality, partly on account of his being at a distance from his family and friends, and partly because he has honored them with his visit and ought to leave them with a good impression on his mind; the sick and the poor because they have a right to be helped out of the common stock, for if the meat they have been served with was taken from the woods it was common to all before the hunter took it; if corn or vegetables, it had grown out of the common ground, yet not by the power of man, but by that of the Great Spirit." [Footnote: Heckewelder, Indian Nations, Philadelphia ed., 1876, p. 101]
This is a clear and definite statement of the principle of hospitality as it was observed by the Indian tribes at the epoch of their discovery, with the Indians' reasons on which the obligations rested. We recognize in this law of hospitality a conspicuous virtue of mankind in barbarism.
