II. PRESENT CONDITION AND PROGRESS.
During the first four years of their sojourn in the Indian Territory the condition of the Pawnees was most miserable.
They had left the high, dry, sandy country of the Loup, and come south into the more fertile, but also more humid country of the Indian Territory, where they found a region entirely different from that to which they had been accustomed. Soon after their settlement on their new reservation, they were attacked by fever and ague, a disease which had been unknown to them in their northern home, and many of them died, while all were so weakened by disease and so discouraged by homesickness that their nature seemed wholly changed. They lost their old spirit and their energy, and were possessed only by a desire to return to their northern home. This was, of course, impossible, since their old reservation had been thrown open to settlement, and in part occupied by the whites. During the first ten years of their sojourn in the Territory more than one of the agents appointed to look after the Pawnees were either incompetent or dishonest, so that the people suffered from lack of food, and some of them even starved to death. They were miserably poor, for they did not know how to work, and no one tried to encourage or help them to do so. The few horses which they had were stolen from them by white horse thieves, and they were now in a country and under conditions where they could not practice their old war methods. The tribes against which their expeditions had once been made were now their neighbors and their friends.
When Major North and his brother Luther visited the agency in 1876, to enlist scouts for General Crook’s northern campaign, they found the Pawnees in a pitiable condition. They were without food, without clothing, without arms and without horses. Their sole covering consisted of cotton sheets, which afforded no protection against cold and wet. It is not strange that under such circumstances the people died off fast. At this time Major North had orders to enlist only one hundred scouts, but he was greatly perplexed in selecting his men, for four hundred wanted to go with him. Every able-bodied man in the tribe, and many who were not able-bodied, tried to get their names on the muster roll. Each man, at any cost, sought to get away from the suffering of his present life; from the fever that made him quake, the chill that caused him to shiver, and above all from the deadly monotony of the reservation life. After Major North had enlisted his quota of men and started with them on his way north, more than a hundred others followed him on foot to Arkansas City, in the hope that he could be persuaded to increase his force, or else that some of those enlisted would drop out through sickness, and there might be room for others.
The wretched condition of the Pawnees continued up to about 1884 or 1885. Before this time the people had become in a measure acclimated in their new home, and had come to realize that it was absolutely necessary for them to go to work if the tribe was to continue to exist. They began to work; at first only a few, but gradually many, of the Skidi, and then the Chau-i and the Kit-ke-hahk´-i. Presently a point was reached where it was no longer necessary to issue them Government rations. They raised enough on their farms to support themselves. Each year of late they have done better and better. A drought one season, and a cyclone another, destroyed their crops, but, undiscouraged and undaunted, they push ahead, striving earnestly to become like white men. The Pita-hau-erats are the least progressive of the four bands, and many of them still live in dirt lodges, and cultivate patches of corn scarcely larger than those tilled in their old villages; but as the other bands advance, and as the results of manual labor are seen and understood by those who are more idle, they, too, will catch the spirit of progress, and will lay hold of the plow.
Last March, as I drove along toward the agency, and as we came in sight of Black Bear Creek, I was surprised to see what looked like good farm houses dotting the distant bottom. A nearer view and a closer investigation showed me that the most well-to-do of the Pawnees live in houses as good as those of many a New England land owner, and very much better than those inhabited by new settlers in the farther West. Many of them have considerable farms under fence, a barn, a garden in which vegetables are raised, and a peach orchard. They realize that as yet they are only beginning, but to me, who knew them in their old barbaric condition, their progress seems a marvel. Nowadays by far the greater number of the Pawnees wear civilized clothing, ride in wagons, and send their children to the agency school. They are making rapid strides toward civilization, just such progress as might be expected from the intelligent and courageous people that they are and always have been.
The Pawnees receive from the Government a perpetual annuity of thirty thousand dollars, of which one-half is paid in money, and one-half in goods. Besides this they have a credit with the Government of about two hundred and eighty thousand dollars (the proceeds of the sale of their old reservation in Nebraska), on which they receive interest; and for some years past they have leased to cattlemen about one hundred and twenty-five thousand acres of their reservation, for which they receive about three thousand eight hundred dollars per annum. It will thus be seen that in addition to the crops which they raise, the tribe is fairly well provided with money. While a considerable part of this is, of course, wasted, being spent for trifles and for luxuries, it is nevertheless the fact that a certain proportion of it is invested by the Indians in tools, farming implements, and in furniture. Three years ago the Indians merely dropped their corn into the furrow, while some planted with a hoe. There was then only one corn-planter on the reservation. Now there are thirteen of these implements of improved pattern, bought by the Indians, and paid for with their own money. Reapers and mowers belong to the Indian Department, and are loaned, not issued, and these pass round from one family to another. Within the last four years one hundred breaking and stirring plows have been issued, and one hundred and five double shovel cultivators. Eighty wagons and one hundred and fifty sets of harness have been issued in the same length of time. Besides these, eight two-horse cultivators are loaned them by the Government.
The Pawnees seem to be saving up their money to put into farming implements, and they are looking ahead. Two-thirds of the houses built in the last three years have been built by the Chau-i, who are pushing the Skidi hard in their advance toward civilization.
The following table, taken from the official papers of the Indian Bureau, gives some statistics as to the progress made by the Pawnees during the last three years: