HISTORY OF VERMONT. 193 



lenting cruelty : Far from pitying, sparing, or 

 forgiving, the savage aims at the ruixi, destruc- 

 tion, and utter extermination of his enemies. 

 Hence the method of carrying on his war, was 

 to destroy men, women, and children . To plun- 

 der and bm-n their towns, and villages : To 

 torture and torment their prisonei s : And to 

 sweep off whole tribes, with an universal and un- 

 disiingidshed carnage. This seems to have 

 been the wish and aim of every tribe, when they 

 engaged in war. A barbarous, unrelenting 

 cruelty, distinguished^ and marked all their 

 steps. 



The cruelty of the Indian seems to have 

 arisen from the passions of anger and revenge. 

 It is not to be denied but that there are other pas- 

 sions, which have carried civilized nations, to 

 the same dreadful extremes in cruelty. Ava- 

 rice led the Spaniards to perpetrate more enor- 

 mous crimes and cruelty upon the Indians, than 

 the Indians were ever capable of returning. 

 The scene of promiscuous calamity, destruction, 

 murder, and butchery, which the Spaniards car- 

 ried through all parts of South America, in the 

 number, design, degree, duration, variety, and 

 enormity of its cruelties, far exceeded any thing 

 that was ever perpetrated by the Indians. If 

 we are to believe the declarations of a celebra- 

 ted modern Statesman,* the avarice of a com- 

 pany of merchants, has murdered millions and 

 millions of mankind, by starving them, to death 

 in Bengal. The spirit of superstition and big' 

 Ctrl/, is equally cruel and unreienting. The 



« Mr. £urkc. 



