A thought from the mind set free will echo on for ever more."
Perhaps neither the metre nor the actual statement commend themselves to acceptance, but the matter of the little journal is full of interest. In the first place the names of the contributors afford full matter for meditation. Perhaps it is one of the steps which must be taken to civilise these poor Indians that their names should undergo a strange and, to me, unmeaning metamorphose. There seems no reason whatever why the Indian names should not be retained, or if there is any reason for changing them, at least there might be some discrimination and good taste exercised in the adoption of English Christian names.
The first number of the 'School News,' which I have before me, contains as an article: "What Michael Burns, an Apache boy, thinks on the Indian Question." He says, "I cannot help myself, having much feeling for my people, what has been said about them, and the efforts making to give us the same privileges as the people of the United States. And it is said how we have been treated by the bad white man, for the last ten or fifteen years, decreasing our number. But that kind for treatment for my nation will soon stop." The poor boy goes on to say: "There is no doubt that we are in fault. We had the opinion that we could not get beaten by any other nation. Now we know for ourselves that we will have to change.... But how does the white man know which way is the best to do. Was he born that way? No! Education gives him the light of knowledge." Then a boy named Marcus Poko writes to his father: "I want you to try hard and leave the Comanche way, and to find the white man's way." In the leading article, written, I presume, by Samuel Townsend, it is said: "Indian ways will never be good any more, it is all passed, gone away, and the other way is coming up to take the place. We shall all be glad when we all get into the civilised way of living, then the Indians will not make so much trouble for the American people. Some people say 'let the Indians get out of the way. There is no use in trying to advance them, kill them all they are like the wild animals deaf and dumb, they never will learn anything. We have already paid so much money for them they have never become civilised yet.' But all good people say, 'Oh, yes, give them an education and plenty of opportunities, and send more teachers among them so they may come up beside us and live as brothers and live in peace.'" There is a little paragraph as to language. "There are a great many words in the English," says the writer, "that the Indians have no word for, so the white people who make the Indian books have to make new Indian words. So the Indians have to learn the new Indian words. Now we don't know much about it, but we believe the Indians can all learn to speak the same as the whites." Then there is a column about the school news: "Lizzie McRae, a Creek girl, made a very good corn bread the other day. We had some of it. It was right good I tell you." "Robert American Horse is a steady boy. He works in the blacksmith shop very well, and Mr. Harris never has to tell him but once how to do something." "One of the teachers had artificial violets on her belt. A Gros Ventre boy saw them, but did not know what they were, so he got up from his desk and went close to the teacher. He looked at it and then smelt it. When he smelt it he said, 'Pooh! rags!'" "Boys, some time ago Captain Pratt gave us advice about throwing stones at birds. Some of the boys who understand most English did not listen. We want the birds to come and stay with us and sing for us, too. Let us remember about this, and not let Captain Pratt have to say it again." "Last Sunday some of the large girls had a prayer-meeting in the yard at the back of the girls' quarters. Nobody told them to do it, but they thought it would be a good thing." There is a long letter from Lizzie Walton, a Pawnee girl of thirteen years old, describing a trip to Philadelphia, and I believe there are very few girls of thirteen years of age in any school who could write more amusingly or better. The account of a magic lantern by Ada Bent, a Cheyenne girl, closes the number.
Letters from the children who are sent out to the farmers are published in this little periodical, and give a very pleasing picture of the lives and aptitudes of these Indians. Virginia, of Kiowar, writes from a farm, asking one of the teachers to pardon her for not having done so before; but "I have not much time," she says, "I am very busy set the table and wash dishes make my bed and make pies and cakes and try to make bread too, and the other things beside.... Sometime I make fire and bring in wood. Mrs. Borton is very kind lady she has two children one girl and boy. I love these little children very much." "My dear Miss H——, I am not bad a girl. I help now a great deal. I pray for you almost every night, also when I wake up in the morning. I like to pray very much because I make myself good." And so on in a pleasant little gossiping way, frequently in very difficult language. There is an article in the 'School News' of July upon the shooting of President Garfield: "The man who shot him," says the writer, "we suppose, thought he would please some of the people in the United States. He thought he was very smart. If President were to die how would every white man, black man and the Indian feel? It was not in war when the President was shot, for our country don't have war any more, but in peace.... We all feel sorry because the President is suffering. We hope he will soon recover." It is stated that about a hundred boys and girls have gone out to work on the farms, and there are some trite remarks about the advantages of hard work as opposed to the disadvantages of laziness. "The farmers up country say the Indian boys can bind wheat first-rate." "Nelly Cook, Sioux, made 36 sheets in one day last week. Nellie Cary, Apache, made 32, and Ella Moore, Creek, made 30. Boys, do you think those girls are lazy?" The 'School News' has a reporter, it would appear, for the paper says that "Our reporter took a walk round in the shops to see what the boys were doing. In all the shops every boy was busy. In the carpenter shop there were Jock (Arapahoe), Ralph (Sioux), Elwood (Iowa), and Joe Gun (Ponca) sawing out window and door frames. Oscar (Cheyenne) and Michael Burns (Apache) were busy carving balcony posts; and Lester (Arapahoe) was outside chiselling a beam. These things are all for our new hospital.... Jesse (Arapahoe) and Little Elk (Cheyenne) were busy in the gymnasium. The waggons which Robert American Horse has finished painting are to be sent to Oregon and Washington Territories." It is sometimes difficult to make out the meaning of the little prattle which these small people commit to the uncertain medium of the English tongue; but, on the whole, it is a most interesting and curious study. In one respect these children of the forest possess that which civilisation seems rather to dwarf amongst men of the highest culture and imagination—a certain stately eloquence and nobility of expression, in which natural images abound, and allegory and metaphor consort together in excellent and tasteful union. In a paper called 'Eadle Keatah Toh,' which seems to have been the precursor of the 'School News,' there is an interesting report from the Committee on Indian Affairs to the House of Representatives, submitted by Mr. Pound. The motto of the paper is "God helps those who help themselves"; but surely it might be better put that God will help those who seek to do good to the unfortunate Indians, who in contact with civilisation are rendered utterly helpless, and who in their attempts to help themselves according to the manner of the race must meet with nothing but extinction. From time to time there are notices of deaths. One would like to know who wrote the account of the "death of John Renville, son of Gabriel Renville, Chief of the Sisseton Sioux." After noticing the circumstances under which he contracted his fatal illness—fever, produced by drinking water at a spring on a hot day on a march to the camp in Perry County, the writer says:—"'Death loves a shining mark,' the poet sang long ago; and in the passing away of John Renville from our school we sadly say, how truthfully the poet sang.... Through all the days of his sickness his large sorrowful eyes had a far-away wondering look, no pain marred the beauty of his brow, and his voice as he addressed his sister, who tenderly watched over him, was like the trumpet warbling of some mournful bird. Our hearts follow the father in deep sympathy as he bears back the body of his beautiful boy to the land of the Dakotas for burial."
The Indian chiefs have a right, which they often exercise, of visiting these schools as a Board; and there is an account in the Carlisle paper of the visit of Spotted Tail, Iron Wing, White Thunder, Black Crow, and Louis Robideau from the Rosebud Agency; Red Cloud, American Horse, Red Dog, Red Shirt, Little Wound, and Two Strike from the Pine Ridge Agency; Like the Bear and Medicine Bull from the Lower Brule Agency; Son of the Star, Poor Wolf, Peter Beauchamp, and John Smith from Fort Berthold; Two Bears, John Big Head, Grass, Thunder Hawk, and Louis Primeau from Standing Rock; Charger and Bull Eagle from Cheyenne River; Brother to All and James Broadhead from Crow Creek; Strike the Ree and Jumping Thunder from Yankton; Robert Hakewashte and Eli Abraham from Santee Agency; Mr. Tackett and his wife and daughter; a daughter of Spotted Tail, and others. The meeting of the children with their parents is described as being most touching; and sometimes the pupils were not recognised, so greatly had they altered. As the chiefs seemed unwilling to speak when called upon to do so, there was silence for a time till a little girl, who had been about a year and a half at the school, expressed her desire to speak in so earnest a way that General Marshall permitted her to do so; and so, speaking in her own dialect, her words were translated into English and into Sioux. She declared that she liked the white man's ways and the white man's language. Indian words, she said, were down on the ground, but the white man's language was in his head. The chiefs, who listened attentively, seemed to understand this curious figure of speech, and nodded their approval. And then she enlarged upon the advantage of what she learned, and implored the chiefs to send their children to the school, where she says she is going to try to be God's daughter. Her words seemed to kindle the fire within the chieftains' breasts, for Like the Bear, a Sioux, and father of one of the boys at Hampton School, came forward and addressed the meeting. "There is no greater power in the world," said he, "than the Great Spirit, and we must listen to Him and do what He wants us to do. When the men who were sent out by the Great Father the President asked for my children I gave them up. I see you are making brains for my children, and you are making eyes for them so that they can see. That is what I thank the Great Spirit for, and it is that which will make me strong." Then Robert Hakewashte, a chief from the Santee Agency, spoke, and said that he wanted schools like that which he saw here on his own reservation, and Spotted Tail wished for the same thing. "Since I have learned the words of God," he says, "it makes no difference to me what is the colour of a man's skin; if he walks like a man it is the same. I do not believe God likes the white colour only. God likes red and white, for He made them all." And then the flood of eloquence was loosened, and an old chief of the Sioux, nearly blind, verging on ninety years of age, who had come to see his grandson, said: "I grew up a red man, and the things I see here I never had a chance to see before. I have heard about the white man's church and his religion, and I have heard about the holy house. I have looked into them, and I am very much pleased. But there is only one Great Spirit we all can worship, and the red men all over the country are hearing about it. You are teaching the children to worship the Great Spirit. That is a great thing, and I like it. But you have here two sons of one father. One is sick. I want you to keep the other." And so he carried him away.
The condition of the Red Man who is allowed to exist under the banner of the Republic is a subject which has attracted the attention of the best and wisest men in the United States. The treatment of the Indians is a question of future policy. It is one which must exercise a very deep and abiding influence on the whole history of an ancient and interesting people. But it is exceedingly difficult to put in a short compass its most salient points before those who are unacquainted with the nature of the problems to be solved. Comparisons are odious, above all places, in America, when they are not to the advantage of the Great Republic, and I shall not draw any between the state of the Indian tribes in Canada and in the States. But it may be fairly admitted that the Indian Question in Canada is divested of many of the difficulties which surround it south of the lakes. The people of Canada have far more land than they know what to do with. They are a sparse population. They are not impelled to fierce adventures by mining "booms," and they are altogether less progressive than their American brethren. Shall we say that they are more charitable, more humane, less greedy of other men's goods? I do not say so. But at all events it is perfectly true that the Red Man, although he is dying out under the influence of whiskey and other influences which need not be particularised, in his native land, lives in comparative peace and comfort under the British flag in Canada. He is content with the White Mother. He pursues the occupations dear to his race as a hunter and as a fisherman. He is a dealer in peltries, and in such small barter as his needs require. He is the companion of sportsmen, and he delights, free as mountain air, to hunt on the hillside and in the prairie in winter over the vast ranges of snowy fields which in the few short months of spring and summer teem with flowers, and the frosty lakes which yield fish to his spear and net. There are few or no railways through his reservations to vex his repose, no great trains of miners with pick and rifle to drive away the moose and the buffalo, and hand the native hunter over to starvation. The Indian gives to the white man all he needs, and aids him in obtaining from the wide stretch of land over which he roams all the wealth that it can afford. Practically one part of the Dominion is handed over to the Red Man and to the half-breeds, for there is an Indian frontier which as yet has not been much encroached upon by any large migration of whites. As far as I know, conflicts north of the Saint Lawrence between Indians and whites are unknown, or have not been heard of for very many years. South of the great lakes, in the wonderful land over which is displayed the banner of the stars and stripes, the fate of the Indian is very different. In the words of Mr. Carl Schurz, himself an expert in the question, "the history of the relations of the United States with the Red Man presents in great part a record of broken treaties, of unjust wars and of cruel spoliation." That is a sweeping statement, which it would be just as well for an Englishman not to make, but coming from the mouth of an American citizen and of a United States Minister with plenty of evidence to back it, there can be no harm in recording my conviction of its truth. It is but another indictment against a defect in the form of government which Americans exalt as the most perfect of human institutions, that the central government made treaties in good faith with the Indian tribes, but was unable to enforce their obligations or to maintain their integrity. There is, as all well-informed people know—well informed, at least, in reference to American affairs—a commissioner who makes an annual report to the Secretary of the Interior respecting the Indian tribes in the various locations over the Union and the Territories. The last of these reports which I have seen is that of the Acting Commissioner Mr. Marble, addressed to the Department of the Interior from the office of Indian Affairs at Washington in the November of last year. The volume contains the reports of the agents in the Indian Territory; of the schools for Indian children established in pursuance of a wise and humane policy, and detailed statistics in relation to the Indian settlements and reservations, the latter indeed forming by far the largest portion of the volume of 400 pages. Before I call attention to the condition of the Indians, and the efforts made to save them from extinction or from a degradation worse than annihilation, I should like to direct the attention of those who are interested in the subject to the view which is beginning to find favour, I believe, among the most experienced men in the States, that the system of "Reservations" is founded on a mistake the magnitude of which is demonstrated every day, and that the only means of saving the Indians from extinction is their gradual absorption as educated communities in the agricultural life of the nation, keeping them far as may be from the white man, but making no other distinction between them and the other citizens of the United States than such as must be found in the nature of the Indian race and their degree of culture and civilisation—treating them, in fact, as communities of Mennonites, Mormons, or Norwegians, or other nationalities would be treated in the United States. When the Reservations were first established it was considered impossible that the migration of the whites would extend to the remote regions of the west to which the unfortunate survivors of the people with whose virtues and vices Cooper and other novelists have made us familiar were gradually and often remorselessly driven. It is a plea which will be urged in bar of judgment that the doctrine of States Rights prevented the interference of the United States Government on behalf of the Indian tribes who were often ruthlessly destroyed. But it will scarcely be a plea, I think, which humanity in full court would recognise as valid. Homo homini lupus. But to the Red Man as to the Black in many cases the White Man is worse than any wolf; far more bloodthirsty and rapacious than any tiger—a Cain of Cains. It was our own kith and kin who, landing on the shores of the North American continent, encroaching by degrees upon the tribes and at last encountering their hostility, spread their sway literally by fire and sword, and rooted out the Red Man wherever they found him established on land or by sea which they coveted. We, whose countrymen have worked out the same policy on the Australian continent and Van Diemen's Land, and who can only be restrained from its pursuit in New Zealand by the strong arm of the Home Government, can scarcely afford to take up stones to fling at our American brethren; and it is not with any purpose of indictment or accusation that I proceed to make a few remarks on the relations of the United States Government with the Red Man, and the efforts which they have been making to compensate the Indians in some measure for the injustice and persecution dealt out for many a generation.
As I looked at the men gathered at some of the railroad stations in the western desert and thought of the Red Men whose fate it is to meet such representatives of civilisation and Christianity, I could not but be filled with pity for the unfortunates and with wonder at "the dispensation" under which they live. The faces are fine and bold enough, bearded to the cheek or shaved in the American fashion, with bold staring eyes, which "look square" in your own, with a general expression "Do you want a fight?" in them—the heads to which they belong are generally set on muscular bodies. If a gang of these men think fit to go on to an Indian reservation—the very name is too often a bitter mockery—who is to stop them? If the Indians try to do so and one of the white intruders is killed the country-side rings with cries of "vengeance for the massacre of our brethren," and all the papers are filled with accounts of "Another Indian Outbreak."
"The average frontier-man in the States looks," as Mr. Schurz says, "upon the Indian merely as a nuisance in his way. There are many whom it would be difficult to convince that it is a crime to kill an Indian." I will go further and say that there are many, I believe, who would take great pleasure in killing an Indian whenever they could; or as one gentleman observed to me, and I believe in his relations with white men no more just or honourable man or more humane could be found, "I would sooner kill an Indian than I would a skunk." When I was in the West, there was a cry raised that the Utes were about to wage war, and appeals appeared in the local papers for a military force to march against them. Their leaders were accused of arrogance and of insolence, and of murderous designs, and the general remark one heard was, "The Utes must go." I inquired a little into the matter when I got back, and I found that the Utes were strictly and absolutely, in their own right, standing upon the titles, which they had derived from the United States Government, to the lands from which they were required to move. These lands were wanted. Other lands were pointed out to them, to which they objected, and then they were informed that they would be moved by force, and preparations were made to levy war against these unfortunates, if they resisted deportation from the territory which had been assigned to them by the Great Father. Had they been Irish landlords, they could not have been treated worse; but in the West not one word was raised in favour of their claims.
The first point which has to be considered is, that the Indian is obnoxious to the very class of men with whom he is by the necessity of things most closely brought in contact. The railway has been the great persecutor of Red Men. It has driven away the game, it has carried in proximity to their reservations all the enterprise charged with whiskey, revolver, rifle, and greed, which can be furnished by the offscourings of the world. In the Far West the miners in advance throng into the valleys, and break the silence of the mountain-ranges by the sound of their picks, the cattle-raisers spread out over the plains, the ploughman settles down on the fertile land. "What," asks the American philanthropist, and his question is echoed all over the world by humane and good men, "what is to become of the Indian?" The hunting-grounds are gradually being pushed farther west and north until they are bounded by the sea, and by the eternal snow. And if by any chance it should be found that there is gold or lead, silver or iron, or copper, or coal in any abundance, even under these unpromising conditions it will be sought. The buffalo is disappearing fast, faster than the Indian himself. Deer are becoming scarcer every year. What is to be left for the Red Man? Pastoral life and agriculture, say the philanthropists. The substitution, however, is not so easy. The weakness of the United States Government is the main cause why the policy of reservations has failed. Let us take the account of it by a United States Minister. "The Government," says Mr. Schurz, "has tried to protect the Indians in good faith against encroachments, and has failed. It has yielded to the pressure exercised upon it by people in immediate contact with the Indians. When a collision between Indians and whites once occurred, no matter who was responsible for it, our military forces were always found on the side of the white against the savage. How was Government to proclaim that white men should for ever be excluded from the millions of acres covered by Indian reservations, and that the national power would be exerted to do so?" Such an idea the American Minister thinks would be utterly preposterous. The rough and ready frontier-man would pick quarrels with the Indians; the speculators would urge him on. Government could not prevent collisions; the conflict once brought on, Government, in spite of its good intentions and sense of justice, would find itself employing its forces to hunt down the Indian. The old story would be repeated, as it will be wherever, says Mr. Schurz, there is a large and valuable Indian Reservation surrounded by white settlements, "and unjust, disgraceful as it is, that is an inevitable result." Such being the case then, the United States Government being powerless to see that right shall be done, and it being at once a human and a Christian duty to avert, if possible, the extinction of the original possessors of this grand continent, let us see what can be done to carry out the object. Fit the Indians, it is said, for the habits and occupations of civilised life; give them individual possession of land as property, a fee-simple title to the fields they cultivate, guarded by an absolute prohibition of sale—because it has been found that whenever the Indians are exposed to the temptation of artful traders, they will be cajoled out of the titles they have to their land—and you will save the remnants from utter destruction. I hope it will be so. I could not but feel a glow of enthusiasm when I heard the Attorney-General, Mr. MacVeagh, at Washington, speaking incidentally one day about some railway matter, declare that he would not sanction the making of a line of railway through Indian Territory until he was satisfied that the Indians actually understood the conditions which had been offered to them by the company. "I will," said Mr. MacVeagh, "send down government agents there to ascertain that the Indians thoroughly understand what they are doing, and that it is of their own free will and consent that the railway passes through their territory in exchange for the money and goods they receive for the concession." Excellent and just minister! But, alas! I believe that ere I left the United States the whole thing was done; the railway company had declared that they would, whether or no, make their line, and if an Indian touched a hair of the head of any white man, the United States Government would not be able to avert the Divine wrath of every white man on the border from the whole of the tribe. Well may Mr. Schurz say that the thought of exterminating a race once the only occupants of the soil, where so many millions of our own people have flourished, must be revolting to every American who is not devoid of all sentiments of justice and humanity. Extermination or civilisation is the alternative offered to the Indian. Now let us see how it is proposed to civilise them. According to the returns in the Report for 1880, the number of Indians in the United States, exclusive of those in Alaska, is 256,127. Of these, 138,642 are described as wearing citizen's dress. It will be observed that there is no estimate given of the Indians who do not wear citizen's dress under this head. Citizens must be sometimes very badly dressed indeed if the Indians I saw at various stations along the line to San Francisco in shocking bad hats and tattered clothes were to be included amongst those who figured under this description in the report of the Commissioner. About 17,000 houses are reported as occupied. There are 224 schools, attended by 6000 scholars for a month or more during the year, scattered over the continent. About 34,550 Indians could read. There were 154 church buildings and 74 missionaries. The number of children of school age was 34,541; but this was an under estimate. Of these there was only school accommodation for 9972. The total amount expended for education during the year by the United States Government was $249,299; by the State of New York, $15,863; by the State of Pennsylvania, $325; by other States, nothing; by religious societies, $46,933; by tribal funds, $7481. 22,048 Indian families were engaged in cultivating farms or small patches of ground; 33,125 male Indians were labouring in civilised pursuits; and 358 Indian apprentices had been pursuing trades during the year. This census and these statistics are stated to be imperfect, and it would require a close examination of the returns to enable an inquirer to form any idea as to the progress made in the direction which we are told is the alternative of destruction.
The Reservations of the various Indian tribes are scattered irregularly over the United States; from Michigan, Wisconsin, and Minnesota on the north and north-west, away to the Territories on the other side of the Rocky Mountains, down to New Mexico and Arizona, there being none in the southern states bordering the Atlantic. But there are Red Men of different tribes located, as the Americans would say, in the States to the east, such as New York. The Reservations are of irregular size and extent. Isabella, in the State of Maine, reserved for 848 Indians, lies to the east of 86° longitude, and south of 44° latitude. There is a considerable group of Reservations on the western shore of Lake Michigan in Wisconsin, and in Minnesota. But the proper Indian territory lies west of Arkansas, with the Red River on the south, New Mexico on the west, and Kansas on the north; and in it are concentrated the Cherokees, Choctaws, Chicasaws, Comanches, Cheyennes, and several other tribes. The Navajo Reservation in New Mexico and Arizona ranks perhaps next in size, extending northwards into Colorado, where the Utes have got a large tract of land assigned to them upon what appears now to be very doubtful or vanishing tenure. These, and numerous reservations, which it would be tedious to enumerate, are under the charge of agents appointed by the Government at Washington, as to whose functions and personal character and attainments one hears very surprising and contradictory reports. But I confess, from a perusal of the documents which they have furnished to the head of the Department, and which are published in the Annual Report, there seems to me no just ground for imputing to these gentlemen want of zeal, knowledge, interest, or intelligence. Those who detest the whole work of saving the Red Man are very apt to impute to the Indian agents not only corrupt practices in relation to the sale of government stores and supplies destined for the use of those under their charge, but illicit traffic in spirits, which is ruinous to the Red Man, and even some participation in the acts of violence which have frequently led to Indian troubles. It all depends upon the manner in which your informant in the States regards the Indian Question whether the agents are described as scoundrels whom no man could trust, or as gentlemen of high propriety and general excellence.