The San Francisco call. [volume], April 30, 1911, Image 9

About The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913

Image provided by: University of California, Riverside; Riverside, CA

                
In the Everglades
of Florida Live
the Remnants of
the Seminole
Tribe, With
Negro Slaves,
Who Have Never Heard of the Emancipation Proclamation.
A Seminole Warrior.
The LAST of OSCEOLA’S BRAVES
BraB I>MOST ready tor curtain up on a new and Intensely real
i^^A^M Indian drama, nature ? the stage-setting, woodland foliage
Ml th° wings, heaven's blue the flies, •glowing embers of a cere
£lßMJ monlal feast the footlights and the players sons and daugh
ters of a defiant sort of savagery which tolerates only so
much of civilization as may be contemplated from the security of the
distance of a thousand arrow flights.
An avenue Is being opened Into the primeval fastnesses of thp mys
terious .Everglades in Southern Florida. After two centuries—and,
mind, you, a century is a hundred years, with five generations of coo
ing babes and mumbling- age to the hurrdred—the furbelows of fashion
and the finery of the forest are to touch. The great steam dredges
are already eating their way toward the glades, their Iron fingers
clutching great liandsful of earth with eaah rumble of cogs and squeak
of cable along outstretched arm. Four thousand squ«<re miles and
more, a territory greater than present agricultural Florida, Is to be
drained, and, as they picture it, cotton will in time %c growing where
now waterfowl rest among the swaying green blades and alligators
drift like ancient felled logs on the sleepy lagoons.
Redeeming the Everglades is a problem In engineering, and it may
be easy: redeeming the Seminole Is a problem of another aort and it
may be difficult. Twice in a hundred years the United States has
• to open the eyes of the Seminoles to the wisdom end lasting
benefits of our form of civilization, but the Government talked with
powder and shot and the savages refused to be convinced, albeit some
of them were BUbdued and sent out to the Indian Territory. Others
bound up their battle wounds and silently paddled their cjnoes deeper
be Big Cypress morass, where they set up a new nation pat
terned after the old. And here they have lived since 1838, recognizing
no laws but their own,'holding steadfastly to the old totemic clan
system, making merry cmce a year at the green-corn dance, and be
coming spiritually clean by a ceremonial purification. They believe In
a future state—even as did Osceol*. their great chieftain c* eariy dayS",
who held his smooeh-bore »o true that an enemy died whenever he
pressed finger to trigger. The path to the hereafter Is tedious, with
tfce hurdles of temptations all along the w«y. To pass from the known
into the unknown to-mcrrow there Is a final test. A slippery
log bridges a stream. At its far end stands a dog with sharp fangs
an<\ a menacing growl. If entirely worthy to gain the peaceful shore
on the other side, the dog's tall wags a welcome; if unworthy the dog
forces the unhappy spirit off the log wnd into the stream, where the
path#ttc incident in transition ends in the open Jaws of a hungry aiii-
Most Seminoles see the dog's tail wag.
If you draw a line from Palm Beach to Tampa and another directly
trom a point equidlttant between the two, trie Everglades are
marked out to the east and south. They may be saia to extend from
>s point near Lake Okeechobee to Mangrox-e Swamp at the far end of
the penir.sula. Florida Is a State of distance. From north to couth
•long its greatest length is as great a distance a* that from Maine
Xew England. Xew Tork, Xer.- Jersey, Pennsylvania, Dela
ware and Maryland to Southern Virginia. Without departing greatly
■:ie fact fixe Everglades misht be called the Serc^sole State
Florid* has Governor, a Legislature and courts, but proclamations and
?nts and decisions are of less significance to this unregenerat*
trlbe than the Big* of the east winds. They are outlaws, but lnoffen-
They slaked their thirst from such fountains of youth as there
may be in this wonderland long before Ponce de Leon'a curving prow
scraped the sands. They bartered with the gold-loving Spaniards lo.ii"
before William Penn'B drab broadbrim was seen in the lanes of what
now is Philadelphia. They threw the weight of their influence to the
English during the American Revolution, and bent bow of defiance to
government In two wars. They matched O*ceol«, the half-breed
against Jackson *nd Scott. PontJac, the red Napoleon of the Ottawas'
Red Jacket, the orator of the Mohawks, and Massasolt, friend of the
.Puritans, knew .the Seminoles 'as a tribe of ancient craves.
■ Obviously at Boat Landing the ox cart ceases to be effective. If
wanting of a stranger's coming is not carried to the villages canoes
may be had; otherwise not. One does not receive Invitations to coma
where he isn't wanted. After Several days at the paddle, riding over
■water as <;:ear as that which bubbles from a spring, you touch the
Seminole "State." "Little Billy" Conapatchie's village appears first,
occupying the better part of an Island of several acres. "Little
Billy's" towns-people live in houses -which are sid,eiess, endless, win
dowless and doorless, touilt on stius, with the floor three feet up from
the ground, and roofed with palmetto thatch. The houses are on four
sides of a common, in the middle of which is a cook-house. The
larder is a community affair.
men wear calico shirts, linen trousers and, If possible,
derby hats. Why the derby none knows. On occasions of
tribal ceremony a small shaul is rolled into a turban,
which is held around the Jlea I | <*f hammered silver. Within
this band Is thrust the feathers of wiidlift-d?, particularly the delicule
Hi mP ftp Ih § I
■^v^v'v'■'•.■"^' •• V-»^ »/■'■'':-; v:'" ■■' ■ ';'S^. '■ ;i;"" '■ iv/.• tins • i
A Seminole Family.
Palm Beach. When C. Q. Livingston put a glass front in his i
the tetter's resort, Tiger Tail came to. town. He -was unaware that
glass could be used for store fronts, and having a desire to see the
display in 'the window, bumped his nose against the pane. Livingston
laughed, whereupon Tiger TuH pounded the ,glass front Into fragments
with a stick. Since this incident in his life Tlge:- Tail has found less
Interest In civilization than formerly. He bought a phonograph and
went back into his own country. His ownership of the instrument
was not approved by the tribesmen, who urged that he ought to be
content with the piping^of the wild birds, still he atuck to the phono
graph. As a last resort the slippery log and the growling dog- were
mentioned, and he forthwith deposited the tin born mechanism in
the deepest spot in the lagoon.
Somewhere in the Everglades there are a number of negro slaves
who fled thither years ago to escape cruel taskmasters. The Semin
o:es immediately made them tribal' chattels. When the Everglades
are dnained these black men will hear for the&rst {.me of the Eman
cipation Proclamation.
plumage of the egret. Feathered bu
and gorgeous calico coats go with I
dres=. The women wear calicoes and many
necklaces of beads as can convenient! y fct>
supported. Bangles of beaten silver hang
from the necklaces. The little folk go
without clothes.
In the glades one may see Mr.
Charlie Tiger Tail's village. This Sem
inole was once a famous hunter and a
tradesman of shrewdness and cunning
lie is not unknown at Miami, but avoids