Journal of the Southwest

The Indians of Texas in 1830 by John L. Berlandier; John C. EwersReview by: C. Alan HutchinsonArizona and the West, Vol. 12, No. 4 (Winter, 1970), pp. 389-391Published by: Journal of the SouthwestStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40167611 .

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REVIEWS 389

from Colorado's statehood question with the Sand Creek affair serving as the

coup de grace. He devoted the rest of his life to his many railroad, educational, and civic interests, and left to Colorado its first family.

Kelsey's research is first-rate; he has used all of the collections one could

expect save some papers of a few of Evans' contemporaries. He acknowledges his debt to the late Edgar C. McMechen, but uses the latter's biography of Evans

sparingly and judiciously. Kelsey lets the reader (and Evans) down in only one

regard. His style is cautious to the point of making Evans a lesser man than (I at least, believe) he really was. This study demonstrates that Evans had the energy, intelligence, and concern of one of America's leading humanitarians, but had

Kelsey developed his subject more strongly, Evans' numerous accomplishments would have stood out in higher and truer relief. Students of the West can use any number of biographies of this type, especially if the author will dare a little more character analysis and perhaps dub into the background a bit more of "the times."

I must mention the publishers, those cooperative people who operate within the State Historical Society of Colorado. They, with Pruett, have produced a handsome book with all the photos and illustrations any author could seek. But (there is always a "but") 100 pages of footnotes massed behind 229 pages of text can discourage the most diligent reader, if the price ($12.50 yet) has not already eliminated him. These fashionable complaints have nothing to do with the

quality of this sound biography; they are a cry for help.

Thomas L. Karnes

A Professor of History at Arizona State University, Tetivpe, the reviewer is a specialist in Western history.

THE INDIANS OF TEXAS IN 1830. By John L. Berlandier. Edited

by John C. Ewers. Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1969. 209 pp. $10.00.

Jean Louis Berlandier was the French-born, Swiss-educated botanist and

zoologist who accompanied the Mexican expedition of the Comision de Limites which set out in 1827 to determine the boundary between Mexico and the United States in the Sabine-Red River region. The expedition was also instructed to collect data on the geography and natural resources of Texas, as well as information on the Indian tribes of that area. General Manuel de Mier y Teran was the leader of the party which included, besides Berlandier, Rafael Chovell as mineralogist, Lieutenant Jose Maria Sanchez y Tapia as cartographer, Colonel Jose Batres, a geographer, and Lieutenant Colonel Constantino Tarnava, a military engineer. This book is the annotated translation of one of Berlandier's French manuscripts describing the expedition. The work was originally entitled "Indigenes nomades des Etats Internes d'Orient et d'Occident des Territoires du Nouveau Mexique et les Deux Californies," which Dr. John C. Ewers, who has edited the work and

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390 ARIZONA and the WEST

provided an introduction and notes, has renamed The Indians of Texas in 1830. The first part of Berlandier's work is a detailed description of the customs

and life-style of the Indians he met, doubly valuable because of his acute and unbiased observations and because many of the tribes with which he came in contact later died out. A second section of the work registers Berlandier's deter- mined efforts to identify, locate, and estimate the numbers of the many small tribes living in East Texas and on the Gulf Coast during the period 1 828-1 830, as well as Plains Indians and tribes who had emigrated to the area before the onward push of the American settlers. Following the Berlandier text is a dis- cussion of Lino Sanchez y Tapia's fine watercolors of Texas Indians, illustrated

by sixteen color plates of Lipan Apache, Comanche, Cherokee, Caddo, and other tribes drawn from life by Berlandier or Jose Maria Sanchez y Tapia. The volume closes with an eleven page description, with illustrations, of artifacts collected by Berlandier between 1828 and his death near Matamoros in 1851.

The introduction to the text by Dr. Ewers and his footnotes are scholarly and helpful, but the general value of the work is unfortunately marred by faulty translation of Berlandier's French text. Through the courtesy of the Thomas Gilcrease Institute of American History and Art at Tulsa, which owns the

manuscript, it has been possible to borrow a copy of the original and compare it with the translation in this book. A brief selection of the errors encountered, and these only in the first twenty-two pages of the text, must suffice to show how unreliable it is.

According to the English version the garrison troops "often yield to an understandable temptation to damn the weather, particularly on the immense coastal plains . . ." (p. 30), whereas Berlandier merely says "often they cannot withstand the harshness of the weather." Again, on this same page, the English translation runs: "All the garrison troops are cavalry, and their members are forbidden to marry." Berlandier, however, says the opposite: most of the garrison troops are married. On page 44 the English text states: "Since these natives have acquired some idea of cleanliness, they settle permanently in the locality

"

But Berlandier does not mention cleanliness, he is talking about "property," which makes the passage more understandable. "Once the game has been sighted," according to a passage of the translation on page 45, "the hunter's work is as good as done." But Berlandier's original is: "once the animal is lifeless, the hunter's work is done," meaning that from then on the chore of skinning the carcass and preparing the flesh is done by the hunter's wife.

On pages 46-47 the English text explains: "The Navajos, a small people in New Mexico who have settled a little to the west of Santa Fe, get along quite well without either hunting or warfare, those twin obligations of all the other natives." This prompts Dr. Ewers in note 26 on page 47 to say that Berlandier's assumption that the Navaho abandoned both hunting and warfare after they became shepherds is erroneous, and he provides a suitable authority to disprove Berlandier. But Berlandier did not say that they abandoned hunting and warfare. What he says is that apart from hunting and warfare, which are obligatory occupations for all natives, they busy themselves with raising their flocks (not, incidentally, as the translator has it, "educating their children").

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REVIEWS 391

In addition to errors such as these, portions of the text are omitted, without

warning the reader, and inserted at other places. An instance of this occurs on

page 35, line 25, where a passage discussing pre-marital behavior among the Comanches is omitted. A similar passage inexplicably appears in note 56 on page 61, but this is credited to Berlandier's "Journal," a different manuscript. There are also numerous misspellings of French and Spanish names of persons, places, and objects. It would appear that what is needed now is an accurate printed copy of the original French version of Berlandier's important work.

C. Alan Hutchinson

An Associate Professor of History at the University of Virginia, the reviewer recently published Frontier Settlement in Mexican California.

LOS HERMANOS PENITENTES: A Vestige of Medievalism in Southwestern United States. By Lorayne Ann Horka-Follick. Los

Angeles: Westernlore Press, 1969. 226 pp. $7.50.

Los Hermanos Penitentes is a religious brotherhood found among the

Spanish-American citizens in New Mexico, in Southern Colorado, and in con-

tiguous territory across the border of Mexico. They practice flagellation for the

expiation of their sins and dramatize the actual Biblical story of the Passion.

Although their religious role is of primary importance, the Penitentes have exercised a charitable role among its members, have been directly involved in

politics, have even played a judicial role in some communities, and have provided the primary social outlet for its members. They reached the apogee of their

strength during the nineteenth century, but have steadily declined since 1900. Usually isolated in mountain areas, the Penitentes have retained the culture of seventeenth century Spain. They are essentially a secret lodge and in their ability to dominate many regions of New Mexico their power has been likened to that of the Ku Klux Klan in the Reconstruction South.

Because of the secret nature of the Penitentes, and as most of its members were illiterate, accurate information about the group has been scarce. Then too, most of the observers of their rites were so unsympathetic that their accounts have to be used with caution. Thus, anyone who writes about the Penitentes is at an obvious disadvantage. This book is an effort to treat the entire history of Los Hermanos Penitentes. It attempts to explain the origin of the society, its appeal to the membership, its religious framework, and its cultural contribution. Its attractive illustrations add to the value of this work. The author has examined most of the literature dealing with the Penitentes but has overlooked a few

significant items. The undertaking is an ambitious one and shortcomings are inherent in the

nature of the task. Unfortunately, the work was originally submitted as a doctoral dissertation, and its stilted literary style is typical of the genre. There are factual

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