Read INDIAN GRATITUDE of Stories About Indians, free online book, by Rufus Merrill, on ReadCentral.com.

As an Indian was straying through a village on the Kennebec, he passed a gentleman standing at his store door, and begged a piece of tobacco. The person stepped back, and selected a generous piece, for which he received a gruff “tank you,” and thought no more of the affair. Three or four months afterwards, he was surprised at an Indian’s coming into the store and presenting him with a beautiful miniature birch canoe, painted and furnished with paddles to correspond. On asking the meaning of it, he was told, “Indian no forget; you give me tobacco; me make this for you.” This man’s gratitude for a trifling favor had led him to bestow more labor on his present than would have purchased him many pounds of his favorite weed.

GO TO: A PAWNEE BRAVE
GO TO: INDIAN OBSERVATION