656 THE GEORGE CATLIN INDIAN GALLERY. 



and that a large military force was necessary to be kept in all the towns to keep the 

 people quiet, and to compel them to pay their taxes to the Government. They 

 thought the police were more frequent here also than they had seen them in London, 

 and laughed very much at their carrying clubs to knock them down with. They be- 

 gan to think that the Irish must be very bad people to want so many to watch them 

 with guns and clubs, and laughed at Daniel about the wickedness of his countrymen. 

 He endeavored to explain to them, however, that, if they had to work as hard as the 

 Irishmen did, and then had their hard earnings mostly all taken away from them, 

 they would require as strong a military force to take care of them as the Irish did. 

 His argument completely brought them over, and they professed perfectly to under- 

 stand the case j and all said they could see why so many soldiers were necessary. 

 The police, he said, were kept in all the towns, night and day, to prevent people from 

 stealing, from breaking into each other's houses, from fighting, and from knocking 

 each other down and taking away their property. The insatiate Jim then con- 

 ceived the idea of getting into his book the whole number of soldiers that were re- 

 quired in England, Scotland, and Ireland to keep the people at work in the factories 

 and to make them pay their taxes ; and also the number of police that were neces- 

 sary in the different cities and towns to keep people all peaceable, and quiet, and 

 honest. Daniel had read to them only a day or two before an article in the Times 

 newspaper, setting forth all these estimates, and, being just thing he wanted, copied 

 them into his book. 



These people had discernment enough to see that such an enormous amount of 

 soldiers and police as their list presented them would not be kept in pay if they were 

 not necessary. And they naturally put the question at once, " What state would the 

 country be in if the military and police were all taken away?" They had been 

 brought to the zenith of civilization that they might see and admire it in its best 

 form ; but the world who read will see with me that they were close critics, and agree 

 with mo, I think, that it is almost a pity they should be the teachers of such statis- 

 tics as they are to teach to thousands yet to be taught in the wilderness. As I have 

 shown in a former part of this work, I have long since been opposed to parties of 

 Indians being brought to this country, believing that civilization should be a gradual 

 thing, rather than open the eyes of these ignorant people to all its mysteries at a 

 glance, when the mass of its poverty and vices alarms them, and its luxuries and 

 virtues are at a discouraging distance— beyond the reach of their attainment. 



CONSUMPTION OF ARDENT SPIRITS. 



Daniel was at this time cutting a slip from the Times, which he read to Jim, and 

 it was decided at once to be an admissible and highly interesting entry to make, and 

 to go by the side of his former estimates of the manufacture and consumption of 

 chickdboJiboo. The article ran thus : 



" The consumption of ardent spirits in Great Britain and Ireland in the last year 

 was 23,200,000 gallons, and the poor-law commissioners estimate the money anuually 

 spent in ardent spirits at £24,000,000 ($120,000,000); and it is calculated that fifty 

 thousand drunkards die yearly in England and Ireland, and that one-half of the in- 

 sanity, two-thirds of the pauperism, and three-fourths of the crimes of the land are 

 the consequences of drunkenness." 



This, Jim said, was one of the best things he had got down in his book, because he 

 said that the black-coats were always talking so much about the Indians getting 

 drunk, that it would be a good thing for him to have to show ; and he said he thought 

 he should be able, when they were about to go home, to get Chippehola* to write by 

 the side of it that fourteen Iowas were one year in England and never drank any of 

 this fire-water, and were never drunk in that time. 



Daniel and Jeffrey continued to read (or rather Daniel to read, au.1 Jeffrey to in- 

 terpret) tho news and events in the Times, to which the Indians were all listening 



* Mr. Catlin. 



