. A LEGAL EPISODE IN THE CHEROKEE NATION. By George E. Foster. OWDY!" The speaker was an Indian, whom I one day met as I was travelling upon the half-road and half-trail that marked one of the lonesome prairies of the Cherokee nation. The Indian wore a semi-civilized dress, the barbaric epoch being represented by buckskin trousers, with fringed stripes of fine-cut hide to ornament each leg. In marked contrast with the buckskin breeches • was his white vest, — or the one which might have been white when he started upon his journey over the dusty prairie trail. His coat was before him on the saddle; beneath his white vest he wore a red shirt; a black tie coiled beneath the overlapping shirt-collar, and was fastened in a sailorknot in front. Simultaneously with his exclamation of "Howdy! " he emphatically drew his bri dle, and his little Cherokee pony stopped short; and bringing mine to a standstill, we began to size each other up as strangers do when they meet alone on the prairie. "You are a friend of the Cherokees," he said; " you wrote the life of our greatest man." His remark was at the same time an affir mation and interrogation. He noticed my look of admission and surprise, and said, "I heard that you were over there," — point ing toward Tahlequah, the Cherokee capital. "But few people come to this nation unless we know who they are, and what they are here for. It is well that it is so, if they are white men." Glancing at his well-filled haversack, which hung at his pony's side, I noticed several leather-covered books protruding from its open top. Desiring to show penetrative fac ulties equal to the Indian's, I said, both in terrogatively and affirmatively, " Colporteur?"
Whether he knew what I meant or not, I do not know; but he appeared pleased that I had noticed his books. He laughed, and in a good-natured way, tapping his haver sack with his finger, he said, — "Heap law there!" "Then you are a lawyer," I said. I had been previously informed concern ing these travelling Indian lawyers, and was not surprised to receive his profound bow of assent. Rev. A. N. Chamberlain, a lifelong resi dent, teacher, missionary, also interpreter in the Cherokee country, had said to me, " I presume that there is no people anywhere better informed than the non-English speak ing Cherokees are in regard to their laws, and their treaties with the United States." I had here an English-speaking Cherokee armed and equipped with his law library, and I resolved to interview him. The mid-day sun was scorching the prairie, and there was no convenient shade-tree; but it was only the work of an instant for the Indian lawyer to unroll his blanket, in which were four sticks, some over three feet long. Having dismounted, he stuck these sticks in the ground, and threw the blanket over them; and into the shade of this hastily improvised sun-umbrella, or wickeyup, he invited me, and at my request, while the incense of pure "havanas," which I furnished, was wafted upward, he displayed his law library, — the code of the Cherokee nation. An ancient-looking book, printed in Eng lish, was a compilation of the laws which were adopted by the Cherokee Council at various periods previous to 1852. It sur prised me, and may be surprising to others to know, that the compilation occupied nearly two hundred and fifty pages; and many of the laws were passed by their Council be fore the Cherokees took their long, sad jour
