PAPERS OF MIRABEAU BuoNAPARTE LA:r.rAR 167 has so long pursued towards the Indians within her territory, has never been productive of the good which was anticipated; but on the con- trary, it has generally resulted in injury to the whites, without any adequate benefit to the savages; for after much forbearance, and a long endurance of the most atrocious cruelties, the Government has usually been compelled to visit the very tribes which they had most cherished, with the severest exercise of power. And it does appear to me, that it would have been the better policy to have commenced, instead of ·ending with military inflictions. For by so doing, it might have spared the lives of a thousand inocent families, who being lulled into a false security by this mistaken humanity, had fallen victims to the tomahawk and scalping knife. Let us then endeavour to profit by the long ex- perience of a people whose situation is similar to our own, and learn in time the important lesson, that our only security against a savage foe, is to allow no security to him. The white man and the red man cannot dwell in harmony together: Nature forbids it. They are sep- arated by the strongest possible antipathies, by colour, by habits, by modes of thinking, and indeed by all the causes which engender hatred, , and render strife the inevitable consequence of juxtaposition. Know- ing these things, I experience no difficulty in deciding on the proper po-licy to be pursued towards them. It is to push a vigorous war against them; pursuing them to their hiding places without mitiga- tion or compassion, until they shall be made to feel that flight from our borders without the. hope of return, is preferable to the scourges of war. One of the best safe guards to the frontier, is a well organized Militia. Its entire disorganization when I came into office and the difficulties experienced in organizing it since, owing in some degree to the sparseness of our population, but mainly to the general repugnance which is felt to the performance of militia duty, unless an immediate call to the field is intended, have rendered that most important arm of National defence, in a great degree unavailable. That there is suffi- cient patriotism in the country to induce our citizens to rush to the battle field upon the appearance of an enemy, is proved by the will- ingne~s with which they have in most instances responded to their country's call for volunteers, whenever there was any prospect of speedy conflict with the foe. But the necessity of placing and keeping them- selves in such a state of organization and discipline as will enable Government f.~ic] to know their strength, and to bring them into active service, without a ruinous or embarassing delay, is a lesson which it seems almost impossible to press upon the minds of our citizen soldiers. Viewing the l\Iilitia as I always haYe done, as our chief reliance against sudden invasion, I have most ardently endeavored to make it a bul- wark indeed; and in carrying out the law 77 passed at the last session of Congress, for the organization, every measure has been adopted which it was thought might be conducive to that end. But although these efforts have not resulted as satisfactorily as was desired, yet the work is now progressing with an energy which assure us that it will in a short time be accomplished to as great an extent as the scattered
77 Act of Jan. 24, 1839. Printed in Gammel, H. P. N., Laws of Texas, II, 88.
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