The adventures of the day were few, only one of which I shall refer to now. Our U. S. Senator, who had done much for reconstruction in the Senate, challenged one of our Indians for a trial of muscle at the oars. The challenge was accepted, and senatorial broadcloth was laid aside, and brain and muscle put to the test. After a short race the prow of our boat ran into the bank on the side where brains was at work. For once at least, muscle proved more than a match for brains, and, besides, an Indian had won a victory over a great tyee. Now although our senator had proven himself a match for other great senators in dignified debate, he was compelled to listen to the cheers of our party in honor of a red man’s triumph over him. I doubt if those who of late defeated him, when a candidate for the highest seat in our halls of justice, felt half the gratification that “To-toot-na-Jack” did that morning when the tyee dropped the oar, exhausted and disgusted with his failure to hold even hand with a red brother, who was not a senator.
After a row of twenty miles, we landed within a half hour’s ride of Siletz. The agent, Mr. Simpson, met our party with saddle-horses.
While en route a horse-race was proposed; the dignified gentleman turning jockey for the nonce. In fact, the entire party engaged in a run. The road passed over low hills, covered with timber and tall ferns. While the Congressional and Indian Departments were going at a fearful speed, a representative
of the latter went over his horse’s head, and soon felt the weight of the United States Senate crushing the Indian Department almost to death.
The parties referred to will recognize the picture.
This was not the first time, or the last either, that the Senate of the United States has “been down on the Indian Department.”
Without serious damage, both were again mounted, and soon were fording Siletz river,—a deep, narrow stream, whose bed was full of holes, slight—“irregularities,” as defaulters would say.
We crossed in safety, except that one horse carried his rider into water too deep for wading. It matters not who the rider was, or whether he belonged to Congress or the Indian Department.
On reaching the prairie a sight presented itself, that gives emphatic denial to the oft-repeated declaration, that Indians cannot be civilized.
Spread out before us was a scene that words cannot portray. The agency building occupied a plateau, twenty feet above the level of the valley. They were half hidden by the remnants of a high stockade that had been erected when the Indians were first brought on to the agency fresh from the Rogue-river war. At that time a small garrison was thought necessary to prevent rebellion among the Indians, and to secure the safety of the officers of the Indian Department.