570 INDIAN LAND CESSIONS IN THE UNITED STATES [eth. ans. 18 



says that Calvert "piircbased the rights of the aborigiues for a con- 

 sideration which seems to have given them satisfaction . . . and lived 

 with them on terms of perfect amity till it was interrupted by Clay- 

 borne.'' It does not appear, however, that the extent of territory was 

 indicated or that any metes and bounds were designated. 



It will perhaps not be considered out of place to insert here the some- 

 what strong defense of Maryland's justice and humanity in dealing with 

 the Indians, presented by her historian, Bozmau.^ It is given partly 

 because of its bearing on a question which will be alluded to in speaking 

 of the Pennsylvania policy: 



As pliilautbropists li.ive been excessively clamorous in the praises of William 

 Penn for his ostentatious purchase of the lands of the aborigiues, particularly at 

 the time of his supposed treaty with the Indians under the great elm at Shackamaxon, 

 (so brilliantly illustrated by the pencil of his Britannic majesty's historical painter,) 

 it is here thought, that the conduct of Leonard Calvert, on a similar occasion 

 will not shrink from a comparison with that of 'William Penn. It will not be fully 

 admitted, that William Penn, or any other European colonist, or even the United 

 States at this day, can with perfect honesty and iutegrity jji/cc/iasc the lands of the 

 aboriginal natives of America ; for several reasons ; — first, it is not a clear proposition, 

 that saea(jei> can, for any consideration , enter into a contract obligatory upon them. 

 They stand by the laws of nations, when tratflcking with the ci%'ilized part of man- 

 kind, in the situation of infants, incapable of entering into contracts, especially /or 

 the sale of their country. Should this be denied, it may be then asserted, that no 

 monarch of a nation, (that is no sachem, chief, or headmen, or assemblage of sachems, 

 &c.) h.as a power to transfer by sale the country, that is, the soil, of the nation over 

 which they rule. But neither did AVilliam Penn, make, nor has any other European 

 since made, a purchase of lands from any tribe or nation of Indians through the 

 agency of any others thiin their sachems or headmen ; who certainly could have no 

 more right to sell their country, than any Kurojiean monarch has to sell theirs. But 

 should it be contended, that savages are capable of entering into contracts, and that 

 their sachems have a power to transfer by sale the country of the people over whom 

 they rule, it may be safely asked, — what could William Penn, or at least what did he 

 give, which could be considered, in any point of view, .as a consideration or compen- 

 sation to those poor ignorant aborigines for their lands? If we .ire to follow Mr. 

 West's imagination, (in his celebrated picture of "Pe&n's treaty with the Indians ;") 

 for, history recognizes uo such treaty, and the late biographer of William Penn, 

 (Clarksou.) fairlj' acknowledges, that " in no historian could he find any account of 

 it;" but from "traditions in Quaker families," and "relations in Indian speeches," 

 it might be inferred, that there was such a treaty; if then, the pencil of the artist 

 is correctly warranted by "tradition," William Penn gave nothing more than some 

 English broad cloth, or perhaps some beads or other trinlcets, which might h.ave been 

 contaiued in the trunk displayed in the fore ground of the picture, for all the lauds, 

 on which be built his city, including also a large portion of his province; and this 

 he seems to have been induct-d to do, not from his own original perception of the 

 justice of the thing, but, as he acknowledges in his letter to the lords of the council 

 composing the committee of Plantations, dated August 14th, 1G83, "that he might 

 exactly follow the bishoj) of London's counsel, by buying, and not t.aking away, the 

 native's land." (See this letter at length in Chalmers's Annals, ch. xxi. note 38.) 

 Now, the presents of Leonard Calvert really seem to have been of greater value ; for, 

 besides broad cloth, history says, th.at he gave them "axes and hoes ;" therebj^endeav- 

 oriug to introduce among them, as it were the first rudiments of civilization — the 

 implements of agriculture. AVith this, it seems, they were as well satisfied to give 



'History of Maryland (1837), vol. n, pp. 569-79. 



