Page 194 - Confronting Race Women and Indians on the Frontier, 1815 - 1915

CHAPTER FIVE

include censure, as white women did.7 6 Given women's f e ar of drunk
men, women had f a r less tolerance than men f o r Indians who drank.
Instead of passing judgment on Indian drinkers, men condemned the
"unprincipled men" who "for the sake of gain, will supply them with
the means of drunkenness and destruction."77
Men's attitudes were not so flexible when they saw natives eating
vermin. T y pically, men f o und this a "disgusting practice." They were
f u rther repulsed by Indians' "apparent relish" and "evident gusto."78
One f o rty-niner who "saw a woman catching vermin f r om the head
of a little boy, with which she pieced out her supper" never again ate
Indian cooking. He said the woman had "fully satisfied his curiosity as
to their epicurianism."79
Concerning Indians' requests f o r gifts or appropriating goods f o r
their own use, men were almost as vitriolic as women. Epithets such as
"indolent," "thieving," and "begging" punctuated men's accounts.80
Coming f r om a Christian society that emphasized hard work, white men
could not countenance begging. In addition, they seemed unaware that
white migration had caused Indians' poverty. They made fr equent
derogatory references to panhandling and pilfering Indians. Only occa­
sionally would a man observe industry or ingenuity in American
Indians. But, unlike women, men refrained fr om praising the inventive­
ness of Native Americans. Although white men may have been slower
than women to condemn cultural practices and rituals, they were also
slower to recognize a spark of imagination, originality , or enterprise.81
Evidently, male evenhandedness worked both ways.
Men did, however,join women in learning to discriminate among
tribal groups of American Indians.82 Men's opinions demonstrated great
consensus. The Pawnees were "hostile." The Snake Indians were "the
greatest beggers in the world." California's "mission" Indians were
f r iendly to settlers. 83 Like white women, white men described the Sioux
as powerful, wealthy , and beautiful in f o rm, figure, and dress. The
"Diggers," however, were the target of universal opprobrium. Seen as a
"thievish and rascally race," they were considered to exist in "the lowest
,,
state of human existence. 84
White men who dealt with Indians or disguised themselves as
Indians fu rther upset migrants and settlers.Apparently, some white men,

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