Relations between Whites and Indians, Cooper

By far the most telling and interesting part of Cooper’s account is the even tone throughout the pieces, even a naivety with which he speaks of the relation between colonial bigotry and colonial sense of charity. Schools built and trade established was punctuated by “The Indians have never been slain; except in battle, unless by lawless individuals; never hunted by blood-hounds, or in any manner aggrieved, except in the general, and perhaps, in some degree, justifiable invasion of a territory that they did not want, nor could not use.” However fictitious Deerslayer may be, the conversation between the protagonist and the “Injin” indicates a nice common ground between the two cultures, hinting at a progressively tolerant, if tentative and hostile, attitude. Granted, Cooper writes the class mentioned “American Hero,” and in doing so exemplifies the honor of Deerslayer, but that Cooper recognized this to be a positive step says a lot of colonial/native relations. Cooper writes in his Notions of the Americans: The Indians,
“As a rule, the red man disappears before the superior moral and physical influence of the white, just as I believe the black man will eventually do the same thing…In nine cases in ten, the tribes have gradually remove west; and there is now a confused assemblage of nations and languages collected on the immense hunting grounds of the Prairies.”
While tense, the progression has to be mentioned, and taken as a sign of the change in culture. Cooper does write with a hint of the civil revolutions to come which reveals a lot of what growing sentiment there was between both cultures.