A January Trip.
By Rev. James F. Cross.
Missionary among the Indians in Dakota.
On the 8th of January, I started from home at the Agency to visit Northfield and Park Street Church Stations. A snow, heavy for this region, had fallen, and I thought a sled would run easier than a buggy, so I made a sled. I had counted on the road being broken, as fifty wagons had gone over it only a day or two before. Here was my first difficulty. Only a few hours before I started a heavy wind arose and filled up every track. So for every step of the thirty miles I had to break a new road. Most of the way it was knee deep, and in some places it was entirely impassable and it was necessary to go half a mile or even a mile to cross a [pg 157] ravine forty feet wide. In one place where the road seemed plain, the snow was particularly deep. The crust was just thick enough to hold a horse until he began to pull. Then down he would go. Finally one horse could not reach the ground and rolled over on his side, and left me not yet halfway up the hill. I unhitched the horses, tramped the snow down so they could stand, drove them out and around perhaps forty rods, and then took in the situation. There was the sled half way up the hill. To pull it up was impossible; to turn it round the same, to back it down by hand the same. The only thing left was to haul it down. Here is where a picket line is the best kind of a missionary. It will often help a man out of a hard place, or unto a hard place, as in this case. Making a turn of a rope around the sled and hitching the team on forty feet down the hill we were soon on solid ground. After eleven hours of hard work I reached Black Pipe Creek, where our Northfield Station is situated. In ordinary weather the trip would take five or six hours and not worry a team. But the longest road generally leads to a warm house and the coldest drive is forgotten when your team is in a warm stable and the prospects are good for a hot supper.
Spotted Bear, who is the native teacher and preacher at Northfield Station, has gone to work with earnestness and enthusiasm. Here is a large community, perhaps fifty houses, heathen to the core. Reuben Quick Bear, a Carlisle student, lives here. Beyond him few know anything of Christianity. Spotted Bear has an evening school of twenty or more young men. He teaches Dakota, and as much English as he can. A few can read. These he puts into a Bible class. The New Testament is the text book. On Sunday he holds two or three services, and the house is always full. A larger room is needed at once. To build this will be my first spring work. The value of just such work as this cannot be overestimated. Spotted Bear himself got his education in just such a school. As soon as Mrs. Ellen Spotted Bear had given me a supper, cooked as carefully and nicely as any woman could, and served on neat dishes, figured, and with plated knives, forks and spoons, Spotted Bear asks me for the Iapi Oaye—the news and religious paper published in Dakota. He opens the paper and he and his wife read it. One item of news is the change of Government in Brazil. He asks me just where Brazil is; why they change the Government. He reads of the fire in Boston and Lynn. He inquires where Lynn is. Being a Congregationalist he knows Boston as a Jew knows Jerusalem and a Mohammedan knows Mecca. Then he reads the church and Y.M.C.A. news.
Here is a man, who by his life is denying what nine out of every ten men in the United States are saying: "It is no use to work among the adult Indians." He was twenty-five and over before he commenced study of any kind. He is now a citizen, Republican, Prohibitionist, church officer, teacher, preacher, all of which require a fair amount of intelligence and information.
His work, too, is invaluable if the aim is to change the Indian to an American citizen. In this village this one room only is the opening to civilization. Some of the young men are tired of Indian ways. They think the dance is something that ought to be thrown away. These young men now have a place to spend their evenings, beyond the dance house. These houses and native helpers break down more superstition and Indian life than any other influence on the reservation. In the matter of dress it is the same. Here is an Indian woman who is not ashamed to wear a dress like a white woman. The teachers in the day schools complain that they cannot get the girls to wear the civilized dress when they leave school. And Indian dresses mean Indian dirt and carelessness. One Indian woman advocating "dress reform" by example, will do more than any teacher on the reservation.
From Black Pipe I go to Park Street Church Station. Here I have a road of twenty-five miles and not a mile of snow. Instead of a four hour drive I have ten hours of dragging along. But the end comes at last.
At Park Street Station considerable progress is made. The school attendance is more regular. The children are cleaner; they wash their faces and comb their hair more frequently. They take more interest in study. The older ones, too, are picking up reading. In two houses I found children teaching their parents to read.
The Christians here are holding on and others are coming to their side. Some have reached the second stage of Christian life. The first is leaving their heathen ways and accepting Christianity. The second is giving testimony in public. Wherever you go young Christians give the same testimony. In Jerry McAuley's mission in New York, testimony like this was given: "Boys, ye knowed me. I used to drink and fight and beat my wife and spend all my wages for liquor. It ain't so now; I've got Jesus, we're pals now. D'ye see this coat? I bought it—it's new. I didn't buy it at Uncle's. There's my wife, she smiles, now we're happy, this is the right way." Two young men gave testimony like this: "My friends, you all know me. I used to dance and paint. I am a Dakota. I have thrown these things away. I have my hair cut, I don't paint. I have given the dance up. I believe in God, I believe in Jesus my Saviour, I want you to know God and Jesus, I want you to be his children. It is hard for me to talk to you; but I know this is the right way; it is God's way."
The school-room is open every evening in the week. A substitute is offered for the dance and heathen amusements. If the work is slow it is sure. When a young man gives up the dance, paint, long hair, right at his home, it costs something, and because it costs something he puts some value upon it.
After spending ten days at Park Street, I started back in the deep snow and coldest weather of winter. In one place I spent almost seven hours going thirteen miles. And right in sight of home about ten o'clock at [pg 159] night I ran into an enormous drift. The horses sank almost out of sight, and then I had to work. But after an hour of tramping snow and pulling out with a rope I was on the road again and soon at home. Such is missionary work at this season of the year.
From the Word-Carrier.