The people with whom this practice prevailed, were commonly desirous of repairing their own losses, by adopting prisoners of war into their families; and even, in the last moment, the hand which was raised to torment, frequently gave the sign of adoption, by which the prisoner became the child or the brother of his enemy, and came to share in all the privileges of a citizen. In their treatment of those who suffered, they did not appear to be guided by principles of hatred or revenge; they observed the point of honour in applying as well as in bearing their torments; and, by a strange kind of affection and tenderness, were directed to be most cruel where they intend the highest respect; the coward was put to immediate death by the hands of women; the valiant was supposed to be entitled to all the trials of fortitude that men could invent or employ. "It gave me joy," says an old man to his captive, "that so gallant a youth was allotted to my share; I proposed to have placed you on the couch of my nephew, who was slain by your countrymen; to have transferred all my tenderness to you; and to have solaced my age in your company; but, maimed and mutilated as you now appear, death is better than life; prepare yourself therefore to die like a man." [Footnote: Charlevoix.]
It is perhaps with a view to these exhibitions, or rather in admiration of fortitude, the principle from which they proceed, that the Americans are so attentive, in their earliest years, to harden their nerves. [Footnote: _Ib_. This writer says, that he has seen a boy and a girl, having bound their naked arms together, place a burning coal between them, to try who could endure it longest.] The children are taught to vie with each other in bearing the sharpest torments; the youth are admitted into the class of manhood, after violent proofs of their patience; and leaders are put to the test by famine, burning, and suffocation. [Footnote: Lafitau.]
It might be apprehended, that among rude nations, where the means of subsistence are procured with so much difficulty, the mind could never raise itself above the consideration of this subject; and that man would, in this condition, give examples of the meanest and most mercenary spirit. The reverse, however, is true. Directed in this particular by the desires of nature, men, in their simplest state, attend to the objects of appetite no further than appetite requires; and their desires of fortune extend no further than the meal which gratifies their hunger: they apprehend no superiority of rank in the possession of wealth, such as might inspire any habitual principle of covetousness, vanity, or ambition: they can apply to no task that engages no immediate passion, and take pleasure in no occupation that affords no dangers to be braved, and no honours to be won.