The following text of "Letter to President Pierce, 1855" by Chief Seattle has been annotated by a student. Chief Seattle (1786 - 1866) was the leader of the Dewamish and other Pacific Northwest tribes. The city of Seattle, Washington, bears his name. In 1854, Chief Seattle reluctantly agreed to sell tribal lands to the United States government and move to the government-established reservations. The authenticity of the following speech has been challenged by many scholars. However, most specialists agree it contains the substance and perspective of Chief Seattle's attitude toward nature and the white race. | Why? What does this mean? If he didn't write it, who did? | We know that the while man does not understand
our ways. One portion of the land is the same to him as the next, for
he is a stranger who comes in the night and takes from the land whatever
he needs. The earth is not his brother, but his enemy, and when he has
conquered it, he moves on. He leaves his fathers' graves, and his children's birthright(?) is
forgotten. The sight of your cities pains the eyes of the red man. [But
perhaps it is because the red man is a savage and does not understand.] (irony) | Who are we? Why switch from he/him to your here? Implication: the ways of the white man described here are not the ways of the Indian. | There is no quiet place in the white man's cities. No place to hear the leaves of spring or the rustle of insect's wings. But perhaps because I am a savage and do not understand, the clatter only seems to insult the ears The Indian prefers the soft sound of the wind darting over the face of the pond, the smell of the wind itself cleansed by a mid-day rain, or scented with the piñon pine. The air is precious to the red man. For all things share the same breath--the beasts, the trees, the man. Like a man dying for many days, he is numb to the stench. | Note repetition. See how he uses denotation to compare sounds in cities and in nature. air = breath Who? | What is man without the beasts? If all the beasts were gone, men would die from great loneliness of spirit, for whatever happens to the beasts also happens to man. All things are connected. Whatever befalls the earth befalls the sons of the earth. | Does he expect all the animals to vanish? Why? | It matters little where we pass the rest of our days; they are not many. A few more hours, a few more winters, and none of the children of the great tribes that once lived on this earth, or that roamed in small bands in the woods, will be left to mourn the graves of a people once as powerful and hopeful as yours. | why? Is this true? sad! | The whites, too, shall pass--perhaps sooner than other tribes. Continue to contaminate your bed, and you will one night suffocate in your own waste. When the buffalo are all slaughtered, the wild horses all tamed, the secret corners of the forest heavy with the scent of many men, and the view of the ripe hills blotted by talking
wires, where is the thicket? Gone. Where is the eagle? Gone. And what is it to say goodbye to the swift and the hunt, the end of living and the beginning of survival? We might understand if we knew what it was that the white man dreams, what he describes to his children on the long winter nights, what visions he burns into their minds, so they will wish for tomorrow. But we are savages. The white
man's dreams are hidden from us. | A direct warning to his audience, and still relevant today. What talking wires does he mean in 1855??
repetition again living ≠ survival repetition Does he think they have dreams for their children?? | | | Vocab: piñon, birthright |
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