NEW TYPE OF INDIAN UPRISING.
REV. GEORGE W. REED, FORT YATES, N. D.
The missionaries' correspondence begins to bring inquiries concerning an Indian uprising. With the war news are mingled expressions of fear that the Indians will be only too ready to seize upon the opportunity to avenge fancied wrongs. Most of the soldiers have been withdrawn from the frontier posts. In regard to the Sioux, those who know them best have no fear. They recognize the progress made by them in the last ten years. Too many of them have become followers of the Prince of Peace. These ten years of splendid school training have given us a new type of young men and women, who have more of home love and who are beginning to think for themselves. The majority are no longer roused to action by the harangue of a petty chief. The day of the chief is rapidly passing away. The thinker and not the talker is becoming the leader.
There must be convincing proof of a good cause and of beneficial results before another Indian war is undertaken under the most favorable circumstances. In territory there is nothing to be gained. They cling tenaciously to what they have, but they are not grasping for more, for they realize that their vast hunting grounds have been lost to them forever. The young men and women in going half across the continent to Carlisle and Hampton, being educated there and in summer homes in the East, come back impressed with the largeness of the country, the prosperity and vast numerical superiority of the people. They care not to war against so strong a foe.
There is an uprising of the Indians, however, which is being too slowly recognized. They are slowly but surely rising above superstition and ignorance, yes, even above indolence. The old roving, restless, tramp-like spirit has not wholly disappeared. Some are still living only a stomach level life, with apparently no thought of head or heart. The old Indian life is self-centered, hence selfish, ever gathering to itself, never giving out, hence stagnant, non-progressive.
Religion has given the life a new center and indefinite breadth. The Fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man are truths which once accepted must change the whole life, and he who teaches them to an Indian becomes a friend and not an enemy, and becomes loved for what he brings and not hated for what he has taken away. The Indian and the white man have gone into partnership in building churches. The Indian has been giving liberally to missions outside of his own little land.
The progress in educational work has been marked in the last decade. Today every healthy boy and girl over six years of age is supposed to be in school. More than half of these are for ten months of every year in a boarding school, well cared for, well fed, well instructed. To me one of the greatest evidences of progress is that so many of them uncomplainingly—some eagerly—part with their young children during these many months. The large majority of the parents have never attended school a day in their lives, yet they make this large sacrifice for the child's good. Ten years ago there was a dance house in nearly every village, and the senseless gyrations were in progress every week. The larger portion of the two weeks' rations was given to the dancer's feast, and the half fed children were the sufferers. Today there is not a dance house for the whole 90 miles along Grand River.
Ten years ago the first Indian returning with his bi-weekly rations would invite his neighbors as they came home to help him eat in one day, often in one meal, all this food. For the remainder of the two weeks the family would be driven to live upon other feasts, or to the fields for the wild turnip, the few berries or the plum. If four or more feasts were called daily, the feasts gave way to famine before the coming ration day. Often a week of feasting, then a week of famine, became the rule. This state of things is becoming more and more a thing of the past. Hospitality is as marked, but is not carried to starvation extremes. Recently passing some trees in which twelve or more years ago seven bodies were placed, and contrasting this with the last funeral I attended, impressed upon me progress in another line.
Ten years ago last Jan. 12, a day made memorable by the great blizzard which swept over our land with death and destruction, in the early morning, long before daylight, I was aroused from slumber by a knock at the door of our little log house on Oak Creek. One stops to think twice before he jumps out of a warm bed when the temperature is out of sight below zero in the room, the fire has gone out and a blizzard is howling outside. The rapping at the door was continued till I opened it. A rope was placed in my hand in which were two knots. They showed the length and width of a coffin the man wished to make, and for which he wanted lumber. I had only an old packing-case to give him. At daylight, breakfastless, I went over to the tent and helped him make a coffin from the case, a soap box and a small stable door. It was a crude and weak affair. Ignorant of the language, I could only read words of comfort from the Word of God and try to sing two Indian hymns. Only a few of us stood about the grave, which the husband and myself had dug.
In the coffin had been placed dry crusts of bread, waste pieces of meat, a rusty knife, fork and spoon. In the grave were first placed some thick comfortables and a filthy pillow, on which the coffin, warmly wrapped, was placed. Then over the mouth of the grave was laid the broken tent poles, the tent covering folded and laid over, then a great mound of earth. At the grave everything the family had was given away. And this was only ten years ago. But how great an improvement on the custom of laying the body on the top of a high hill, or in the branches of a tree, or even leaving the top of the coffin even with the surface of the ground, which has been done away with only in the last twelve years.
I have described one of the first funerals in the Indian country that I remember. How different the funeral of one of our most faithful women, Mrs. Mary Gilbert, who was buried from our crowded Grand River Chapel April 17th. She had been a great sufferer for years, yet patiently, uncomplainingly, bearing it all. Though in her last sickness there was no hope of recovery, the most popular medicine man was not sent for. The suffering woman was not put out in a tent to die. Gratefully did she receive the tender nursing of the white lady missionary and the skillful school physician. Tenderly was she cared for to the last in a comfortable bed, in a clean, tidy house. The body was not hurried with unseemly haste to the burial. Through the darkness of night a messenger rode 30 miles to have the agency carpenter make a coffin, neatly cover it with black cloth and white metal trimmings. Through the darkness of another night was it carried back. The one service of the Sabbath day was the funeral service. Crowds gathered at the house at an early hour. The long procession of wagons was nearly two hours in reaching the chapel. Beautiful and simple was the service, and the closing words of the sorrowing husband will long be remembered, as he spoke of his wife's noble work and trusting faith in the Master. Through the parted lines of the 80 school children was borne the casket, followed by the parents of these children and others to the number of over 200, most of whom in the last eight years have found Christ as an ever-present Saviour, and have learned to know Him as "the resurrection and the life." In this belief they gathered about this grave, and from it they went to their homes to live re-consecrated lives.
I have but hinted at progress in these illustrations from their life. May the churches recognize this new type of Indian uprising, this progress in many ways, by larger gifts for building much needed churches, and in sending out new messengers of the Gospel of peace. The Indians seem ready to do their share, are we ready to do ours?