His articles of silverware
excelled all similar manufactures among his countrymen.
He next conceived the idea of becoming a blacksmith. He visited
the shops of white men from time to time. He never asked to be
taught the trade. He had eyes in his head, and hands; and when he
bought the necessary material and went to work, it is
characteristic that his first performance was to make his bellows
and his tools; and those who afterward saw them told me they were
very well made.
Se-quo-yah was now in comparatively easy circumstances. Besides
his cattle, his store, and his farm, he was a blacksmith and a
silversmith. In spite of all that has been alleged about Indian
stupidity and barbarity, his countrymen were proud of him. He was
in danger of shipwrecking on that fatal sunken reef to American
character, popularity. Hospitality is the ornament, and has been
the ruin, of the aborigine. His home, his store, or his shop,
became the resort of his countrymen; there they smoked and talked,
and learned to drink together. Among the Cherokees those who have
are expected to be liberal to those who have not; and whatever
weaknesses he might possess, niggardliness or meanness was not
among them.
After he had grown to man's estate he learned to draw. His
sketches, at first rude, at last acquired considerable merit. He
had been taught no rules of perspective; but while his perspective
differed from that of a European, he did not ignore it, like the
Chinese.
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