“I will try what I can do,” I answered.
“Good,” said the Major. “Now for your orders! You are to measure off for every able-bodied Indian, ten acres of ground to be plowed and seeded. If an Indian is lazy and will not attend to his plowing, report him to me and I will send a policeman. In the fall, you are to see that every family puts up two tons of hay for each horse or steer owned by it.”
I did not know what an acre was. “It is a piece of ground,” the agent explained, “ten rods wide and sixteen rods long.” From this I was able to compute pretty well how much ten acres should be; but I am not sure that all the plots I measured were of the same size.
I began my new duties at once, and at every cabin in my district, I measured off a ten-acre plot and explained the agent’s orders. Not a few of the Indians had done some plowing at Like-a-fish-hook village, and all were willing to learn. Once a month, I took a blacksmith around to inspect the Indians’ plows.
Rains were abundant that summer, and the Indians had a good crop. Some families harvested a hundred bushels of wheat from a ten-acre field; others, seventy-five bushels; and some had also planted oats.
The government began to issue cattle in payment of lands sold for us. The first issue was one cow to each family, and the agent ordered me to see that every family built a barn.
These barns were put up without planks or nails. A description of my own will show what they were like; it rested on a frame of four forked posts, with stringers laid in the forks; puncheons, or split logs, were leaned against the stringers for walls; rough-cut rafters supported a roofing of willows and dry grass, earthed over with sods.
More cattle were issued to us until we had a considerable herd at Independence. The cattle were let run at large, but each steer or cow was branded by its owner. Calves ran with their mothers until fall; the herd was then corralled and each calf was branded with its mother’s brand. My own brand was the letters SU on the right shoulder.
Herders guarded our cattle during the calving season; we paid them ten cents for every head of stock herded through the summer months.