252 The Winning of the West 



capable of doing more harm because it is written in 

 good English, and because the author, who had 

 lived a pure and noble life, was intensely in earnest 

 in what she wrote, and had the most praiseworthy 

 purpose to prevent our committing any more in- 

 justice to the Indians. This was all most proper; 

 every good man or woman should do whatever is 

 possible to make the government treat the Indians 

 of the present time in the fairest and most generous 

 spirit, and to provide against any repetition of such 

 outrages as were inflicted upon the Nez Perges and 

 upon part of the Cheyennes, or the wrongs with 

 which the civilized nations of the Indian Territory 

 are sometimes threatened. The purpose of the 

 book is excellent, but the spirit in which it is writ- 

 ten can not be called even technically honest. As 

 a polemic, it is possible that it did not do harm 

 (though the effect of even a polemic is marred by 

 hysterical indifference to facts). As a history it 

 would be beneath criticism, were it not that the high 

 character of the author and her excellent literary 

 work in other directions have given it a fictitious 

 value and made it much quoted by the large class of 

 amiable but maudlin fanatics concerning whom it 

 may be said that the excellence of their intentions 

 but indifferently atones for the invariable folly and 

 ill effect of their actions. It is not too much to say 

 that the book is thoroughly untrustworthy from 

 cover to cover, and that not a single statement it 

 contains should be accepted without independent 

 proof; for even those that are not absolutely false, 



