I Am Louis XIV - Chapter 542

  Chapter 542 Indians from Montreal and Jamestown (Part 1)

   Walking on the streets of Paris, the “horns” are still the focus of attention. Although he has taken off his feather crest and put on a French coat, shirt and leggings, the face that is very different from the Europa, the reddish-brown skin, the tall figure, the rough skin, still makes him feel the same as the surrounding. Personality out of character.

“Cowhorn” is not as nervous as when they first came to Paris-the first time they followed the Governor of Montreal to Paris to meet the king, “Cowhorn” and other companions’ heart strings have been tense, they had been At war with the British, and even with the white French – they couldn’t figure out the difference back then.

   Later, at the behest of the king, French officials and generals began to try to get along with the Indians in peace. The Indians knew that the white-skinned people also had their own tribes and chiefs. And just like them, they fought for the buffalo, the river, and the land.

  The “Horn” was willing to come to Paris after careful consideration. His companions and his father did not agree, because there was an Indian chief who said that he was going to sign a contract. As a result, as soon as he entered the white-skinned man’s barracks, he was immediately hanged. He was executed by them without seeing his face, but Cow Horn wanted to try it. He had used the weapons brought by the merchants of the “Sun Chief”. Although he did not understand the technology inside, whether it was Qualified, or mighty, later merchants were much more honest than the people they had dealt with in the first place.

Sure enough, they met the great chief of the French, a white-skinned man with sky-like eyes, covered with shining gold and gems, who lived in a great palace, but was kind to them, and the people around him Although people are a little curious, they haven’t looked at them as rudely and wantonly as if they were looking at animals like the people I saw before “Cow’s Horn”.

   They came and went in a hurry that time, but “Cow Horn” and the others were rewarded with a lot of money.

This time, the soldiers of the “Sun King Great Chief” drove away the “horns” and the white-skinned people who were not liked by the surrounding tribes. Some people said that they should also drive away these white-skinned people, but this statement was quickly dismissed. Chiefs or priests who knew the strength of the two sides, such as “Horn”, rebuked and suppressed them – there are always people who think that the Indians are a group of arrogant savages, but they are very wrong. In fact, these American people The Aboriginal people are very smart – their warriors are brave, but after so long and so many battles with those outsiders, they have also sensed it, and it is clear that since muskets, artillery, and human beings alone Flesh and blood cannot control the outcome of a war.

   Otherwise, how could the Indians be so keen to trade guns and ammunition with white-skinned merchants?

And there is no doubt that this weapon possessed by the “Sun Chief” is the strongest among all people-whether red-skinned, black-skinned or white-skinned, he also has soldiers who use this weapon, thousands of Tens of thousands, like bison running on the wasteland, the reason why they did not come to America is only because their chieftain is still fighting with other chiefs here for the ownership of a large tribe – this is the “horn” from his soldiers. learned there.

  Once they did something stupid like that, the blue-eyed warchief would be furious and pour those thunder-like cannonballs on their tent.

Therefore, after careful consideration, “Oxhorn” not only agreed to continue the contract with the French, but also thought that he should pay tribute and mourn to the “Great Chief” like a friend. He heard that the “Great Chief”‘s mother had passed away. The message—of course, such a request would not be refused, especially at this moment, so he and several other chiefs followed the governor of Montreal to Paris.

Compared with the calm “horns”, the other Indian beside him was a little restless, although he was probably lighter than any Indian, because his grandfather was not an Indian, but An Englishman, he even had an English name, Rolfe.

Rolfe was the chief of an Indian tribe in the Jamestown bay area, but despite his grandfather being British, with light brown skin and green eyes, he had a deep hatred for the British—a hatred that came from The inescapable contradiction between the Indians and the British.

   For the land.

People in later generations are very familiar with the story of the “Mayflower”. How did the British Puritans gain a foothold in the New World with the help of the local Indians, and how they began to avenge their kindness and revenge after gaining a firm foothold. mentioned, but they were indeed not the first British to come to America. The British began to try to build settlements in the New World as early as 1584, but they hadn’t learned how to disguise at that time, so they were in contact with the Indians. In the conflict, Anti was defeated by these wildlings they looked down on.

The British who came to Jamestown later learned this lesson. They tried their best to maintain a friendly appearance with the Indians, and even entered into a marriage contract with the daughter of the local tribal chief – Rolf’s grandfather, the British and the Indians in those years. The relationship can be said to be in the honeymoon period. Unfortunately, the illusion is an illusion after all. The British never considered the Indians to be the same human beings as them. The more intense it became, the British, who no longer needed the help of the Indians, turned against it – they were still in the primitive commune period, and they had not even entered the feudal stage. Bows and arrows, a handful of muskets, and even the Indians who were fighting each other couldn’t stand up to their former allies.

That’s why Rolfe is wary of all white people. “Our conflict with them is like the tangled roots of a tree in the ground,” he said. “Just trimming the branches and leaves on the ground doesn’t help , unless we die, or they die, there’s nowhere to go.”

   “But if the warchief here is willing…”

“He wouldn’t,” said Rolfe. “He named his son Montreal, and if a white man here had the same name as a place, he was the owner of that place, and he named the English People drove away, not for us.” He looked around, and the crowd suffocated him for a while: “His people also need to eat, clothe and build houses to live in, and on our land, they will hunt us. of bison, occupying our rivers, and perhaps robbing us of our corn.”

“But the warchief’s soldiers haven’t done that in a long time.” Bullhorn said: “His warriors swore to me that there would be laws to limit their actions in the future and that any crime would be punished properly. .”

   “This law is also against us.”

   “In your tribe, sinners will not be punished, and good people can only suffer innocently?” “Oxhorn” said: “As long as he is willing to give us justice.”

   “It is better to ask for justice from others than to take justice in your own hands.”

“The problem is that the Great Chief here has a pair of extremely powerful arms,” ​​said “Cow Horn”. “You don’t want to accept his gift, but you want to rob him of his power, and he will definitely beat you.” He squinted at Rolle The husband glanced at him: “And you must not be able to beat him, your tribe and my tribe, and even all the warriors of all tribes combined are not as many as his warriors, and he also has countless weapons, wheat and priests. “

   Rolfe was silent.

“Say, you have also taken his gift, and you will continue to take it from now on. Every Indian, from women to children, from old men to warriors, the plague brought by the white-skinned people, only his priests cast it. He is a great and good man, no matter what the future holds, and now I would like to express my heartfelt thanks to him for my tribe.”

   “horns” means smallpox.

Hearing this, Rolfe couldn’t help but sighed. Smallpox was brought to America by white-skinned people. As long as they contracted this disease, people in the tribe would die one by one, even priests and chiefs were not spared. , the survivors will also become weak and ugly, as terrible as a devil, and this cursed Indian will not be accepted by other tribes.

It was the high chiefs of the French who allowed their priests to bring the “cowpox” among them, and many tribes have been blessed with the blessings that surround Montreal today, but the Jamestown bay area, the first British settlement, was also The last evacuation point, where the tribes, although hostile to the British, did not know how to be immune to smallpox until the “horns” tribe had contact with them.

“Horn” said that if they were willing to ally with “Sun Chief”, then the benevolent chief would also be willing to let his priests cast spells, but he also knew that Rolfe was interested in retaking the Indians. Land—but Rolfe must have known it was almost impossible.

   No wolves are willing to give up the food in their mouths, and no chiefs are willing to give up the tribe’s land, not to mention that Jamestown was not recaptured by Rolf’s tribe.

   “Let’s go and discuss with the warchief,” said Bullhorn. “He may consider it carefully.”

   “If we can,” Rolfe said quietly: “We can also make concessions, you are right,” horns “, life and continuity are the most important.”

  ———

“Where is the contradiction of the Indians with us, or with all immigrants?” said Louis XIV. “Except for the overbearing or naive tribes, who, like our former enemies and friends, It’s all talkable and negotiable. The point is that Indian thought and belief are still at a very pure and simple moment.”

“I’ve heard that they don’t believe in a fixed god. They think that everything is a **** and should be respected. They believe in the sky, the wind, the water, the mountains, and even the bison. For this reason, brother,” The Duke of Orleans said: “They need us to follow the laws of nature, not to plunder too much, every inch of land to rest after a season of cultivation, every forest to have a respite after hunting, every fishing net cast by every river. It must also be limited to a certain number, and they are not allowed to cut down forests arbitrarily, blast rocks with gunpowder, or burn the wilderness to reclaim the land.”

   “And they’ve also learned to keep their property safe,” Bontang interjected: “It would have been more convenient to have everything in public.”

“It is sometimes easier to solve problems with private ownership,” Louis said. “It is easier to ask permission from one master than from a group of masters, but as Philip said, the biggest conflict is the conflict of ideas between immigrants and aboriginal people. superior.”

“That’s because of the number of immigrants,” the Duke of Orleans fiddled with the candy in the box. “Why are refugees so scary? Your Majesty, it’s not because as long as he is a human being, he cannot avoid food, clothing, shelter, and at least food. Too much concentrated in one place, like Jamestown, they were said to have gotten along well with the Indians at first, but it was swampy, and there wasn’t much arable land, and when the British finally reached a terrible number, they had to When it comes to fighting the Indians for corn, of course they will never die.”

   “So we must avoid this situation.” Louis said: “To avoid too much concentration, but also to beware of bad weather, to ensure sufficient supplies, and to ensure contact and contact with allies at all times.”

“It’s like a war.” The Duke of Orleans looked at his brother and said, “How merciful you are, Your Majesty, if it were Charles II, Leopold I, no, neither would it be that king. So devotedly thinking of such a useless group of natives,” he said with some sullenness: “You may not be quite aware that the cowpox vaccine you gifted to the Indians is eliminating a crisis that the British brought them. .”

“It’s not surprising what those people do.” Louis XIV would not say that every Englishman is a shameless thief and a brutal executioner, but who can abandon their hometown, wander thousands of miles, and go to the New World Woolen cloth? The peasants who lost their land, the workers who lost their jobs, the Puritans who had to leave because of religious persecution—the reality did not give them a chance to be noble, they could only become mean, cold, and unscrupulous.

   What is a blanket full of smallpox, typhoid, or dysentery? It’s better than dying for yourself or your relatives, and for the Puritans, those Indians who don’t want to convert are just some stubborn pagans, and we all know that the devout believers are sometimes the best. Ruthless thugs.

   (end of this chapter)