When he had finished going to school, he received in 1879 the appointment of government carpenter on the reservation, the first Indian ever in that place, and the first Indian employee on the reservation except the interpreter receiving the same wages as a white man. He remained in this position a few years, when his health failed and he resigned. No fault was found with his work, for he was very faithful and steady, and could be depended on to work alone, or to be in charge of apprentices and others with no fear that the work would be slighted. He afterward, for a time, lived mainly with the whites, as the government cut down the pay for all Indians so low that he could earn much better wages elsewhere. He often lived with a very rough class of whites at saw-mills and among loggers, but he held fast to his profession. In his quiet way he spoke many an effectual word for Christ, and gained the respect of those with whom he mingled by his consistent Christian life. Lately, however, he has gone to the Puyallup Reservation, where he has secured a good piece of land and has taken a leading part among those Indians.
XXX.
DISCOURAGING CASES AND DISAPPOINTMENTS.
F. A. was a Clallam, and one of the earlier school-boys. He had left the reservation previous to 1874 and lived and worked with his friends at Port Discovery. In April, 1875, he returned with three of his Port Discovery friends on a visit in good style. He said that he had worked steadily, earned hundreds of dollars, and he gave a brother of his in school quite a sum; that he had taught a small Indian school; that he was trying to have church services on the Sabbath; that the Indians at Port Discovery were about to buy some land for one hundred and fifty dollars; and that he had now come for advice, religious instruction, school-books, and the like. The agent furnished him with school-books and papers, and I gave him four written prayers, two Chinook-jargon songs, and a Testament. This was only a week after Balch and some of the Indians at Jamestown had visited us, who were making good progress. One of the employees on seeing F. A. come, just after the other (Clallam) Indians had visited us, said: “The agent is making his influence felt far and wide for good.” But before F. A. left he wanted to be made head chief of the tribe. The agent said that the present chief was doing well, that he had no good reason for removing him, and that he would not do so unless a majority of the tribe desired it, but that he would make F. A. a policeman if he wished so to be. But he did not want this. He said that after what he had told his friends before leaving home, he would be ashamed to go back without his being made chief. His three friends said also that they wished him to be chief. This showed that something was wrong, and by the time all was ferreted out, it was found that he had procured the horses for his party at Olympia at a high price, which he had said the agent would pay, that his style was all put on, and that in reality he was very worthless. It cost his friends more than twenty dollars to pay for the use of the horses, which he had afterward to work out, as he had no money. He tried to run away with one of the girls not long afterward, and never said any thing more about his school, church, and land. In 1883 he returned to the reservation to live, but does not help the Indians much in regard to Christianity.
L. was from Port Ludlow, fifty-five miles away, a half-breed, and was in school for a year or two. In the fall of 1879 he took hold well in prayer-meetings, and wished to join the church; but he was too desirous for this, it seemed to me, and answered questions too readily. The church deliberated long about him, for several were not fully satisfied, yet, on the whole, it was thought best to receive him, and it was done in January, 1880. The next summer he went home to remain, but while in most respects he has been steady and industrious, having a good reputation about not drinking or gambling, yet he does not honor a Christian profession.
M. was a half-breed school-boy, and was brought up in school. After the first three school-boys began to think that they were Christians, he joined them. After having been a year on probation, he was received into the church in July, 1878, when he was thirteen or fourteen years old. He did fairly until he left the reservation, three or four years afterward, when he went to a white logging-camp where his brother and brother-in-law were at work. Logging-camps are not noted for their morals, and their influence on a young man can not be good in this respect. He remained steadier than most whites around him, and his instruction is not lost, but his Christian life is sadly dwarfed, if it can be seen at all.
W. was among the first three of the school-boys to join the church, after a full year’s probation, at the age of about thirteen. He stood well for about two years, while in school, as a Christian, endured considerable persecution, and was especially conscientious. But as he grew older he went the wrong way. His father was a medicine-man, and this probably had something to do with his life, for when he went out into the outer Indian world he seemed to grow peculiarly hardened, so that he seldom came to church or Sabbath-school, and did not treat religion with the respect which the older Indians did who made no pretensions to Christianity. For immoral conduct we were at last obliged to suspend him.
As I look over the church-roll I find that nearly all the first Indian members were from the school; then came the earlier uneducated Indians, and then the later ones. It makes me sad when I see how many of the first ones who have been educated have been suspended before they were settled in life. Yet it must be said that those school children prepared the way for the earlier uneducated Indians, and these likewise prepared the way for the later ones. This second class watching the failures of the first learned wisdom and stood firmer, and the last class learning more wisdom by further observation have stood still firmer.
Simon Peter was one of the better Indian boys of the Twanas, and was in school about as soon as he was old enough. A younger brother, Andrew, was one of the first three of the school-boys to join us in January, 1877, and, like the brothers in the Bible, where Andrew first found Christ and then led his brother Simon to him, so now Andrew evidently led Simon along until, in January, 1878, he joined the church. He belonged to a good family and was well respected and I hoped much from him in the future, but in this I was doomed to disappointment, for consumption had marked him as its own, and in June, 1879, he died. Just before he died he took his brother’s hand, said he hoped this brother would not turn back from Christianity as some boys had done, and thus held him till he died. A young man of the Puyallup tribe, who is now an Indian preacher, told me that he owed his conversion to a letter he received from Simon Peter. Thus, “being dead, he yet speaketh.”
XXXI.
THE CHURCH AT JAMESTOWN.
IN the section about the Field and Work some account has been given of the beginning of civilization at this place. The Indians there had at first no help from the government, because they were not on a reservation. They had, however, some worthy aspirations, and realized that if they should rise at all they must do so largely through their own efforts. This has been an advantage to them, for they have become more self-reliant than those on the reservation, who have been too willing to be carried.