But the difficult question was:--What the form should be? The maxim of Byron: “Truth is strange, stranger than fiction”--was perhaps never more applicable, than to the principal subject of these pages. The history of the American Indians is the _Romance of Fact_. It needs not a single dash of the pencil--not a single ingredient of the sentimentality of poetry, to give it life and power over the feelings. The naked truth has in it more of poetry and a more energetic challenge on the affections, than any possible embellishment, or fictitious garniture, that could be thrown around it--more than any creations of fancy, with which it could be charged. Show that race, as they _are_ and _have_ been, and none of human kind can fail to be interested in them.
But there were many reasons, notwithstanding, why, if the Author consented to make any public use of the facts in his possession, he should embody them under a mixed garb of romance and history. And he actually proceeded so far, as to execute one volume under this plan. But after submitting it to other minds, a grave discussion arose, and it was earnestly insisted:--that it should be _properly fiction_, or _sober history_;--and it was agreed, that the facts were abundantly sufficient to demand the last, and that no fictitious dress could equal the interest of the exact truth.
Having resolved upon the historical course exclusively, the delicate situation of the Author, as an American, came next to be considered. It was impossible for him to do justice to this subject, as it stood before his mind and rested upon his own feelings, without entering somewhat largely into the discussion of the recent policy of his own Government towards the Indians. To suppress the detail, would dilute the whole into insipidity; to give it, would necessarily involve more or less of disclosure.
The principal considerations, which settled the Author’s purpose, in regard to the course he has pursued, are here submitted:--
1. The fate of the American Indians, whether they shall exist or be annihilated, has come to a crisis.
2. Their rights are properly the cause of humanity, and though well defined in the conscience of _the world_, are yet undefined and unsettled in the _fact_ and operation of their social and political relations; and these rights can only be fixed by a thorough public discussion before the world, which will claim to be arbiter in the case, and which alone, as a community of nations, is likely to be a fair court of appeal. The question of their rights is so prominent and interesting, that the world _will_ sit in judgment upon it; and the sooner their opinion is formed and expressed, the better. That judgment can hardly be wrong; and it must also be respected and influential, if it comes in season. Indeed, the very anticipation of it, may possibly answer all the purpose.