224 



INDIAN VILLAGE. 



courteously received by the Catholic priest, 

 who happened then to be resident among the 

 Indians. He showed me a small neat chapel, 

 where he officiated, a neat dwelling-house be- 

 longing to a chief called Saccho Beeson, and 

 about twenty-five huts, which were very inferior 

 and dirty in their arrangement. Near to these 

 buildings is a log-house of about fifty feet long, 

 where they meet to hold their ' Talk' on any 

 public question that concerns them, and which 

 is used also for their favourite amusement of 

 dancing. In the course of conversation, I 

 asked the Roman Catholic priest, whether he 

 had any school for the instruction of the Indian 

 children, and what he taught the Indians ? His 

 reply was, that he had no school ; but showing 

 me a manuscript copy of a prayer to the Virgin 

 Mary, and a form called c Confiteor,' in the 

 Indian language, he remarked, 6 These, Sir, 

 are what we teach the Indians. 1 It was grati- 

 fying to find that an experienced and zealous 

 Protestant missionary was making an effort to 

 improve the state of this tribe, who, like that 

 of Penobscot, were under the degrading in- 

 fluence of their religious creed. With a view 

 to effect this, he had erected a school-house in 

 the village, to afford gratuitous instruction in 

 English, to those Indian children or adults, 



