THE GEORGE' CATLIN INDIAN GALLERY. 413 



an enemy is killed in battle, by grasping the left hand into the hair on the crown of 

 the head and passing the knife around it through the skin, tearing off a piece of the 

 skin with the hair as large as the palm of the hand or larger, which is dried, and 

 often curiously ornamented and preserved, and highly valued as a trophy. The 

 scalping is an operation not calculated of itself to take life, as it only removes the 

 skin without injuring the bone of the head ; and, necessarily, to be a genuine scalp, 

 must contain and show the crown or center of the head, that part of the skin which 

 lies directly over what the phrenologists call " self-esteem, "where the hair divides 

 and radiates from the center, of which they all profess to be strict judges, and able to 

 decide whether an effort has been made to produce two or more scalps from one head. 

 Besides taking the scalp, the victor generally, if he has time to do it without endan- 

 gering his own scalp, cuts off and brings home the rest of the hair, which his wife 

 will divide into a great many small locks, aud with them fringe off the seams of his 

 shirt and his leggings, as will have been seen in many of the illustrations, which also 

 are worn as trophies and ornaments to the dress, and then are familiarly called " scalp- 

 locks." Of these there are many dresses in my collection, which exhibit a continu- 

 ous row from the top of each shoulder, down the arms to the wrists, and down the 

 seams of the leggings from the hips to the feet, rendering them a very costly article 

 to buy from the Indian, who is not sure that his success in his military exploits will 

 ever enable him to replace them. 



The scalp, then, is a patch of the skin taken from the head of an enemy killed in 

 battle, and preserved and highly appreciated as the record of a death produced by 

 the hand of the individual who possesses it, and may oftentimes during his life be of 

 great service to a man living in a community where there is no historian to enroll 

 the names of the famous — to record the heroic deeds of the brave— who have gained 

 their laurels in mortal combat with their enemies ; where it is as lawful and as 

 glorious to slay an enemy in battle as it is in Christain communities, and where 

 the poor Indian is bound to keep the record himself, or be liable to lose it and 

 the honor, for no one in the tribe will keep it for him. As the scalp is taken, then, 

 as the evidence of death, it will easily be seen that the Indian has no business or 

 inclination to take it from the head of the living, which I venture to say is never 

 done in North America unless it bo, as it sometimes has happened, where a man 

 falls in the heat of battle, stunned with the blow of a weapon or a gunshot, and the 

 Indian, rushing over his body, snatches off his scalp, supposing him dead, who after- 

 wards rises from the field of battle and easily recovers from this superficial wound 

 of the knife, wearing a bald spot on his head during the remainder of his life, of 

 which we have frequent occurrences on our western frontiers. The scalp must be 

 from the head of an enemy also, or it subjects its possessor to disgrace and infamy 

 who carries it. There may be many instances where an Indian is justified, in the es- 

 timation of his tribe, in taking the life of one of his own people, and their laws are such 

 as oftentimes make it his imperative duty, and yet no circumstances, however ag- 

 gravating, will justify him or release him from the disgrace of taking the scalp. 



There is no custom practiced by the Indians for which they are more universally 

 condemned than that of taking the scalp ; and, at the same time, I think there is 

 some excuse for them, inasmuch as it is a general custom of the country, and founded, 

 like many other apparently absurd and ridiculous customs of these people, in one of 

 the necessities of Indian life, which necessities we are free from in the civilized world, 

 and which customs, of course, we need not and do not practice. From an ancient cus- 

 tom, "time out of mind," the warriors of these tribes have been in the habit of going 

 to war, expecting to take the scalps of their enemies whom they may slay in battle, 

 and all eyes of the tribe are upon them, making it their duty to do it; so from cus- 

 tom it is every man's right, and his duty also, to continue and keep up a regulation of 

 his society which it is not in his power as an individual to abolish or correct, if he 

 saw fit to do it. 



