Indian Comparison

3 Pages 645 Words

John Hicks document is much different compared to D.H. Montgomery’s document about the Indians. First off, Hicks document is very racist compared to Montgomery’s document. In the second paragraph, Hicks states, “Racial traits may account for a part of this failure…” The failure in which Hicks is talking about is that the Mayans and the Aztecs in Mexico and the Incas in Peru are much more successful than the American tribes. However, they are not in comparison with the best tribes that Asia and Europe have ever cultivated. Hicks believed that the Indians were not civilized. The only positive thing that Hicks said was that the Indians taught the Europeans how to live in America. The Indians taught them how and what to plant, what streams and trails to use, but most importantly, what wealth the land possessed. The Indians went through many cold and harsh winters where sometimes they even had to fast. The men basically were unwilling to perform any labor around the homestead, and left it upon the women’s shoulders. The women were regarded as slaves to the men, and they performed everything except for hunting and war, which they left up to them men. Hicks regarded some of the Indians as nomads and others were known to live in villages, but he did not include anything else about how they lived. Since the women were always engaging in physical and manual labor, it was very hard for them to have a fully developed and properly nurtured baby. One out of every thirty babies survives infancy.
Montgomery’s document basically talks about the civilization of the Indians. He goes into detail about how they lived, what they did daily, and what they believed in. Montgomery said, “The Indians did not really occupy the land: they simply possessed it. To them it was mainly a hunting ground to roam over or a battlefield to fight on.” A trait of the male Indians was known as the “scalp lock”. The lock was the Indians sign of defiance...