Destiny Smith

Dr. Evan Rothera

HIST 3503

September 6, 2023

Tangweera: Life and Adventures Among Gentle Savages

The author of this source, C. Napier Bell, states that though the book was written in his

old age, it contained stories of his youth. Those stories consisted of adventures he had among

Native Americans in Central America. In the preface of the source, Bell contrasts the time he

spent as a child in Central America with the most recent version of the Native Americans’ lives.

He says, “I have never returned to that beautiful country, but I hear that the lovely scenery, and

the peaceful, happy life of the Indians is now disturbed and upturned by political and commercial

changes. The silence, the sweet holy calm of those lovely rivers, is now outraged by the busy

river-steamboat… the once happy Indians, handed over to their old enemies, the Spaniards, are

now worried to frenzy by taxes…” The rest of the novel varies with an abundance of different

adventures that the author took with members of the Native American tribes in Central America,

but with the strong preface quoted above, the stories leave a tone of injustices within a contrast

of past and present.

The country Bell’s expeditions took place was known as the Mosquito Coast, lying on the

western shores of the Caribbean Sea. He described the Mosquito Indians as a maritime race,

whose instincts left them incapable of living far from the sea. They are contrasted from the other

Indians in Central America by being tall, slim, bony, and muscular with sharp features, whereas

the others were short, plump and thick set. There were five tribes within the Mosquito Indians

that were the Woolwas, the Twakas, the Payas, the Ramas, and the Prinzoos. Although the novel
is a lengthy one, detailing many adventures in such, Bell summarizes it well with the quote, “I

often wonder how it was I escaped with my life from the innumerable risks I ran in my youth

among the Creoles and the Indians of the Mosquito Shore, in bathing and voyages in the rivers

and lagoons, in capsizing at sea, or among the breakers of the beach or the the river’s mouth.”

Work Cited

Bell, Napier C., Tangweera: Life and Adventures Among Gentle Savages. Edward

Arnold. London. 1899. pp. 1-60.