Thomas Wentworth Higginson, Carlyle's laugh and other surprises

Fair words, the proverb says, butter no parsnips, but the fair words of the white men had provided the opportunity for performing that process. The description preserved of the Indian chief by an eye-witness is as follows: “In his person he is a very lusty man in his best years, an able body, grave of countenance and spare of speech; in his attire little or nothing differing from the rest of his followers, only in a great chain of white bone beads about his neck ; and at it, behind his neck, hangs a little bag of tobacco, which he drank, and gave us to drink (this being the phrase for that indulgence in those days, as is found in Ben Jonson and other authors). His face was painted with a sad red, like murrey (so called from the color of the Moors) and oiled, both head and face, that he looked greasily. All his followers likewise were in their faces, in part or in whole painted, some black, some red, some yellow, and some white, some with crosses and other antic works; some had skins on them and some naked: all strong, tall men in appearance.” ²

All this which Dr. Young tells us would have been a good description of an Indian party under