382 
LETTERS FROM HIGH LATITUDES. 
auspices the settlement was conducted, appears to have 
remained more firmly established than ever, not only 
over the mass of the people, but also oyer the twelve 
subordinate chiefs who accompanied him; there never 
seems to have been the slightest attempt to question his 
authority, and—though afterwards themselves elevated 
into an order of celestial beings, every tradition which 
has descended is careful to maintain his human and 
Divine supremacy. Through the obscurity, the ex¬ 
aggeration, and the ridiculous fables, with which his 
real existence has been overloaded, we can still see that 
this man evidently possessed a genius as superior to his 
contemporaries, as has ever given to any child of man 
the ascendancy over his generation. In the simple 
language of the old chronicler we are told, “ that his 
countenance was so beautiful, that, when sitting among 
his friends, the spirits of all were exhilarated by it; 
that when he spoke, all were persuaded; that when he 
went forth to meet his enemies, none could withstand 
him.” Though subsequently made a god by the super¬ 
stitious people he had benefited, his death seems to have 
been noble and religious. He summoned his friends 
around his pillow, intimated a belief in the immortality 
