Another,
who was wounded, feigned death, keeping a knife ready to strike one
more fatal blow. My informer said, when he was pursuing an Indian,
the man cried out for mercy, at the same time that he was covertly
loosing the bolas from his waist, meaning to whirl it round his
head and so strike his pursuer. "I however struck him with my sabre
to the ground, and then got off my horse, and cut his throat with
my knife." This is a dark picture; but how much more shocking is
the unquestionable fact, that all the women who appear above twenty
years old are massacred in cold blood? When I exclaimed that this
appeared rather inhuman, he answered, "Why, what can be done? they
breed so!"
Every one here is fully convinced that this is the most just war,
because it is against barbarians. Who would believe in this age
that such atrocities could be committed in a Christian civilised
country? The children of the Indians are saved, to be sold or given
away as servants, or rather slaves for as long a time as the owners
can make them believe themselves slaves; but I believe in their
treatment there is little to complain of.
In the battle four men ran away together. They were pursued, one
was killed, and the other three were taken alive.
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