s into every package, and sniffing up with his nose, till at last
his keen scent enabled him to discover the existence of the spirit cask,
which I had already broached. With a grunt of satisfaction, in which
the whole party joined, he dragged it forward, and made signs to his
followers that all should share in the much-prized fire-water. I
trembled at what would be the consequences. "They would have treated me
badly enough while they were sober, but with all their evil passions
inflamed by liquor, they will be perfect demons," I thought to myself.
"How wrong I was not to have let the dangerous spirit run out long ago."
How brightly their eyes glared, how eagerly they pressed forward to get
a share of the coveted fire-water, which the old chief was serving out.
I observed that he took care to help himself more largely than he did
anybody else. Scarcely had they drunk off what was first distributed to
them than they put forward their leathern drinking-cups to ask for more.
The old chief having helped himself, gave some to his followers. Then
their eyes began to glitter; the calm, sedate bearing of the Indian was
thrown off; they talked rapidly and vehemently, and laughed loudly, and
their fingers began to play with the handles of their tomahawks and
scalping-knives in a way that made my blood run cold. The red-skins,
when they take a captive for whom for any reason they have an especial
hatred, generally wait two or three days, that they may have the
satisfaction of tormenting him before they commence actually to torture
him to death. As I watched them, however, I felt that any moment they
might spring up and begin to torture me.

It is difficult to describe the horrible ingenuity they exhibit in
tormenting their victims. Talk of the virtues of the savage--I do not
believe in them. He may have some good qualities, but he is generally
the cruel, remorseless monster sin has made him. Civilisation has its
vices--I know that full well--and bad enough they are, but they are mild
compared to those of the true unadulterated savage, who prides himself
on his art in making his victims writhe under his tortures, and kills
merely that he may boast of the number of those he has slaughtered, and
may exhibit their scalps as trophies of his victories. It is a
convincing proof to me that the same spirit of evil, influenced by the
most intense hatred to the human race, is going continually about to
incite men to crime. The Dyak