il Pe tee ee Cornell Aniversity Library BOUGHT WITH THE INCOME FROM THE SAGE ENDOWMENT FUND THE GIFT OF Henry W. Sage 1891 Qi353e@ HUT a90 3777 WAV AO 3 1924 028 719 536 olin,ove2 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY CHIEF AMERICAN HORSE OGALALLA SIOUX THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY BY GEORGE BIRD GRINNELL, Ph.D. Author of ‘‘Pawnek Hero Stories ano Fork TALzs,” ‘‘BLackFooT Lopce Tacss,”’ “THE Story OF THE INDIAN,”’ etc., etc. ILLUSTRATED WITH FULL-PAGE PORTRAITS OF LIVING INDIANS HERBERT S. STONE AND COMPANY CHICAGO AND NEW YORK MDCCCC Oy COPYRIGHT 1900, BY HERBERT 8. STONE & CO THE ILLUSTRATIONS ARE FROM PHOTOGRAPHS COPY- RIGHT BY F. A. RINEHART, OMAHA, NEBRASKA TABLE OF CONTENTS PAGE CHAPTER I Tue Nortu AMERICAN EN DVAINS shies ere elt A ale Lhe oe alee 8 fe a eh Ee I CHAPTER II INDIAN CHARACTER: 6042.64 i aotenad ed iene aint eee a Meenas Dares 7 CHAPTER III BELIERS AND STORIES) se ccawaice ose edhe wana aureacneidigl ed web dcadus bln ss oSavad Aan Sete 13 CHAPTER IV ‘THE: YOUNG DOG{S (DANCE: co avant, saad. Ree bio waned bee wee NYE Soke Bae otlvae eam een’ 27 CHAPTER V PHE BUPEALO? W IPRS: were ccna u Aer Ace eave hota ee mie ae ae aca BRE ete RE RS 35 CHAPTER VI A BrackrooT SuN AND Moon MYTH.......... 00.0 ccc cee en eet e nee neee 45 CHAPTER VII ForMER DISTRIBUTION OF THE INDIANS... 1.0... cee cece ee ee tee tee ence ee ee AQ CHAPTER VIII Tre RESERVATION ccc ehr av hun acho Manas Me Rls dale SEA Sb eee u Ean Hes aeteoa acca 75 CHAPTER Ix TLAREVON THE RESERVALION sy.co she o AGU Wie sicdeg lana deleted ta eG eae ting DM EMRR Maes 141 Die AGENT'S RUDE cies sae ed re eee nein a Hele pee CAUSES VERE ee ene a aes 145 EDUCATION enn ROR Rawle s OOS ee be ee ee Se a eos ea ena siglo ees 153 Some DIFFICULTIES. 0... eee e ee ce ee ce en nn eee ene EEE ee ne Een eee tenes 163 Tue Rep MAN AND THE WHITE..... 2... csc cece ee ee ee tte ete teen eens 173 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. TOUCH THE CLOUD—Arapanoe. LITTLE BIRD— Arapauoe. CHIEF WHITE BUFFALO—Arapanog. LITTLE CHIEF— Arapanoer. YELLOW MAGPIE— ArapaHoe. LITTLE BEAR— Arapanor. BLACK MAN—ArapaHok. CHIEF MOUNTAIN— Brack FEET. THUNDER CLOUD—B tack Feet. THREE FINGERS— CHEYENNE. HUBBLE BIG HORSE—CueEvEnne, WHITE BUFFALO—CHEYENNE. CHIEF WOLF ROBE—CuHEyENNE. JOHN MASKWAS— PotrtawatTomt1. PEA-TW Y-TUCK—Sac anp Fox. NAICHE—Cuiricanua APACHE. BARTELDA—Cuiricanua APACHE. CHIEF GERONIMO—CuiricaHua APACHE. CHIEF JOSH—Sawn Cartos APACHE. NASUTEAS— Wicuita. CHIEF TOWONKONIE JIM— Wicuirta. SIX TOES— Kiowa. CHIEF WHITE MAN —Kuoowa. PABLINO DIAZ— Kiowa. PEDRO CAJETE— Puesto, LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS—ConTINUED. EX-GOV. JOSE JESUS NARANGO—Santa Crara PuEBLo. GOV. DIEGO NARANGO— Santa Ciara PuesLo. KICKING HORSE CHARLEY—F tar Heap. ENEAS MICHEL—F tar Heap. HEAD CHIEF LOUISON—F tart Heap. ANTOINE— Spokane. THE MAN W— AssInnIBOINE. CHIEF WETS IT — AssinnigoIne. KILL SPOTTED HORSE ~— AssinnigoINe. SPIES ON THE ENEMY—Crow. SPOTTED JACK RABBIT—Cnrow. MOSTEOSE — Iowa. CHARLES BIDDLE—Omana. DUST MAKER~ Ponca. CHIEF HOLLOW HORN BEAR—Cueyewne River Sioux. JOHN HOLLOW HORN BEAR—Cueyenne River Sioux. AFRAID OF EAGLE—Lower Bruté Sioux. SLEEPING BEAR—Lower Bruteé Sioux. CHIEF TURNING EAGLE—Lower Bruté Sioux. PETER IRON SHELL—Prne Rince Sioux. SPOTTED HORSE—Pine Ripce Sioux. CHIEF AMERICAN HORSE—Ocatatta Sioux. EAGLE ELK — Rosgsup Sioux. CHIEF GOES TO WAR — Rosesup Sioux. POOR DOG—Rosgsup Sroux. HIGH BEAR—Stanpinc Rock Sioux. SWIFT DOG—Srtanpine Rock Sioux. CHIEF GRANT RICHARDS— Tonkawa. JOHN WILLIAMS— Tonkawa. HENRY WILLIAMS—Mojave Apacue. PREFACE When I walked through the Omaha Exposition grounds one hot day in September of 1898, on my way to the encampment of the Indian Congress, I found it difficult to realize that only fifty years before, the ground where Omaha now stands had been a camping place for Indians; and that only twenty-five years ago, Nebraska, one hundred and fifty miles west of Omaha, had been a country dangerous to pass through, because the home and hunting ground of hostile tribes. All this has been forgotten now except by those who took part in the old life of those times; and it was well that by such a gathering as this Indian Congress the past should be recalled and the former wild inhabitants of this fertile Western State should be seen by the newcomers who have succeeded them. To one who reflected upon the contrasts here afforded by the conjunction of the two races the presence of the red man was full of suggestion. In its display of science and art, of invention, machinery and product, the Exposition stood for the bounding present; it marked the swelling tide of the progress of an expanding people; it exemplified the attainments of centuries of development. And over against all this, pathetic in the contrast, was the Indian in his skin lodge, clad in primitive dress, and typical of a diminishing race—a people to whom the century had brought an utter obliteration of the old life and a change of modes of living, of surroundings and of opportunities, so complete and so momentous that the white man cannot conceive it. To those of the Exposition visitors—and they were many—who recognized this phase of the exhibition, the Indian Congress was something more than a novel entertainment and the gratification of idle curiosity. It created interest in the Indians, stimulated inquiry, and awoke a desire to know more of them, their past and their present, and the outlook for their future. To meet this interest and to supply this fuller knowledge is the purpose of the present volume. The Indians of To-day—what are their numbers? where do they live ? how do they subsist ? are they becoming civilized, educated, learning the white man’s ways? These are some of the questions which intelligent people are asking and to which, so far as may be, the answer is given in the pages that follow. GeorRGE BirD GRINNELL. THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY CHAPTER I THE NORTH AMERICAN INDIANS When the white men first set foot in America, they found it inhabited by a people who were absolutely primitive, and whose development had been slow; for although man had inhabited the continent for many thousand years, his culture had progressed no further than that of the age of polished stone. Some tribes practiced agriculture, and all gathered the natural fruits of the earth, but they depended for food chiefly upon the abundant fish and game which swarmed in the rivers or on the uplands, and which yielded them an easy subsistence. The animals were trapped and snared, and killed with arrows tipped with points of stone and bone, for the Indians had no knowledge of metals. While many of the tribes occupied permanent villages, in which the dwellings were made of earth or grass or poles, yet since the conditions of their lives obliged them to make frequent extended journeys far from home, all used movable tents or lodges, consisting of a framework of slender poles covered with skin or bark. These lodges were similar in type over almost the whole continent. The population of North America was sparse in these pre-Columbian days; and we may suppose that the people lived a contented life, usually unbroken by wars, and devoted chiefly to gaining a subsistence. From the beginning there has been speculation as to the origin of the Indian; but to this day no one has reached any definite conclusion respecting this. Some authorities are quite certain that his home must have been Asia, while others believe that he came from Europe; but of when he came or how, nothing is positively known. Of one thing, however, we are certain. The Indians constitute a well-differentiated race, of very great antiquity—as men view time. Throughout the different tribes the physical characters of these people are everywhere the same. These physical likenesses, together with the extraordinary diversity of language found among them, are very suggestive of the great length of time they have occupied America. To say nothing of languages which have become extinct without leaving any record, we know I 2 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY of between fifty and sixty distinct linguistic stocks in North America, north of Mexico; groups of languages which appear to be as different from each other as the Semitic is from the Aryan or the Turanian. Within a single linguistic family we may have a number of tribes speaking different languages: as in the Algonquian family, the Ojibwas, Blackfeet, Cheyennes and Arapahoes speak four different tongues, each uncomprehended by the others; just as four Europeans of Aryan family might speak English, Spanish, German and Russian. It must have taken a long time for these different linguistic stocks to become developed. For a long time the settlement of the country by the whites made but little impression on the tribes that lived remote from the seaboard, and it is only since the completion of the Union Pacific Railroad that the power of the white man has been brought home to the tribes that wandered over the great plains and the mountains of the farther West. For one hundred years before that, the Indians of many tribes had possessed horses and metal knives and sheet-iron arrow- points, and the task of securing food had thus been made easier for them, but beyond this the coming of the white man had worked little change in their ways of life. When the railroad entered his country, its whistle sounded the beginning of the end of the Indian’s old life. This was not so much because the railroad brought the white man into actual contact with the Indian as because it at once opened a market for the hides and furs of the animals on which he subsisted, the buffalo, the elk, the deer and the antelope, and because, to supply the demand for the skins of these animals, white hunters proceeded at once to exterminate them, and thus soon deprived the Indian of his natural food. Within a few years the savage found that the prairie no longer yielded him a living, and that if he would escape starvation he must present himself at the agency to receive his weekly ration of beef. This, then, was the beginning of the Indian problem as we know it to-day—a problem of civilization, of assimilation, wholly different from the old war problem, which was settled once and for all with the disappearance of the buffalo. Up to that time, the Indians of the Western plains had followed the buffalo herds from place to place, in the earliest times capturing the game by means of surrounds, or by leading them into traps. After they obtained horses, they ran the buffalo, the rider forcing his steed close to the animal's side and driving the arrow into it with his powerful bow, or thrusting his lance deep into its vitals. The meat was dried in the sun, and served to tide over those periods when no game could be had. Perhaps no event has ever happened to a people that worked a greater change in their methods of life than did the acquisition of horses for the Indians. THE NORTH AMERICAN INDIANS 3 Until these strange beasts came to them, all journeyings had been on foot, for their only domestic animal was the dog, on which they used to pack light loads, and which dragged the primitive travois. Most of their possessions, however, they transported on their own backs, men, women and children alike carrying packs proportionate to their strength. But when the horse came, all this was changed. Ona sudden, they had a beast of burden which would transport not only their possessions, but themselves, and which enabled them with slight effort to cover such distances as before they had not dreamed of. Here was at once a freedom which they had never known. If they had enemies, they could swiftly ride long distances to attack them, and as swiftly ride away. Thus the possession of horses stimulated the tribes to wars with their neighbors, and wrought a most important change in the character of the people. In his old wild life the Indian was one of the most active of beings. He was, forced to work hard to obtain his food from day to day; or if food was abundant, his ambition—a desire for the approval of his fellows—led him to go continually on the warpath. Thus he was lean, sinewy and tough, living a wholesome natural existence, and always in the best of training. Those who reached maturity were literally the fittest of their race, for no weakling child survived the hardship and exposure of the primitive life. When the Indian was obliged to give over his wanderings and to become sedentary, a change took place in his physical condition. He ceased to be a worker, and sat about doing nothing. He no longer had any ambition, but brooded over the past. New conditions of life arose. He began to live in houses, and he and his children no longer subsisted on the flesh of the buffalo, but were obliged to accustom themselves to a diet which was largely vegetable. The changed conditions had a marked effect on his health. He became less able to resist disease, and contact with the whites brought to him new maladies a thousand times more fatal than those he had formerly known. Inthe transition stage between a life passed wholly in tents and one altogether in houses, and between a diet exclusively of fresh meat and one largely vegetable, the race suffered severely, and the death-rate became far heavier than it had been under ordinary conditions in the old time. But when the Indians had become thoroughly habituated to the new mode of life, the death-rate again became lower, so that now some tribes are said to be increasing in numbers. Among the many Indian tribes cared for by the government, there are different degrees of progress. Some are as untaught to-day as they were twenty years ago; others, who have had their well-being looked after and who have had more intelligent guidance, have made long strides toward self-support. All are wrestling with problems of which they know little or nothing, and are perplexed and discouraged. While marked improvements have taken place in the Indian 4 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY service of late years, the same old methods, long since known to be inefficient, are practiced in caring for them. It is not enough to furnish a tribe of Indians subsistence, an agent to look after them, and a few white employees to assist them. Unless they have more than that, no tribe will ever make much progress toward self-support. As Indians are only grown-up children, they must be taught, as children are taught, all the knowledge which is unconsciously absorbed by the white man from his early associations and his reading. Until the men employed in the field service of the Indian Bureau shall be sufficiently intelligent to understand the mental attitude of the Indian, and sufficiently interested to give special attention to this, his advancement must necessarily be slow. And if it is slow, this is only because we do not see that men are chosen for this service who are competent to teach the Indians how to live in our way, and to convey to the savage man of the Stone Age development the intelligence of the civilized man of the present day. To-day the Indian understands that he must work to live, but in many cases it is demanded of him that he shall make bricks without straw. He is asked to support himself, but is given no tools to work with. Some tribes have had cattle issued to them, but little has been done to teach them how to care for their cattle, and the work with them which the agency employees are supposed to do is frequently altogether neglected. We blame the Indians because they have not by this time become civilized, but in fact the fault is ours and that of our representatives in Congress, for assenting to a system which places the Indians in charge of men some of whom are unintelligent, inefficient, careless and some- times criminal. In many respects conditions are much better now than they used to be. The Indian Bureau struggles hard to improve matters, but is hampered by old methods and traditions, and above all by the manner in which a large number of the Indian agents are chosen. The condition of the Indians will not greatly improve until the agents are selected because of actual qualifications for their work, instead of receiving the position as a reward for political services performed. Moreover, when an agent has proved himself efficient, he should be continued in his position so long as his services are acceptable, and he is willing to remain. Frequent changes of agents hamper the Indian service and retard the advance of the people, for each new man who takes charge of an agency is obliged to acquaint himself with the conditions there, to learn the idiosyncrasies of this particular tribe and to acquire their confidence. Often almost as soon as he has done this he is removed to make room for a new man who, however good his intentions, must of course begin at the foundation to learn what is required in this particular place. " Os, Gam MD iti. Vpn g TOUCH THE CLOUD ARAPAHOE THE NORTH AMERICAN INDIANS 5 There is probably not a tribe in the United States which could not, under the direction of the right man, become entirely self-supporting within ten years, but it would be necessary that those tribes which to-day are absolutely without property—as the Northern Cheyennes—should be given a start in some way. Thus these Cheyennes—to take a specific example—who live in a country which is too dry for farming, yet is a good stock range, ought to have issued to them as their individual property one thousand five hundred head of cattle, and to be taught how to manage this live stock. The continual agitation by the neighbor- ing white population of the question of this tribe’s removal to some other part of the West, ought to be put an end to, and the title of their lands to be confirmed. In the same way the condition of each individual tribe should be studied, and it should be treated according to its needs. . Usually no prejudice exists against the individual Indian when he is brought into contact with white people, but against a body of them—as a tribe located on a reservation—there is almost always a very strong antagonism among the adjacent population. Asa rule, this prejudice is not felt by such Western people as have had dealings with the Indians, and so know them, but only by those who, though their neighbors, have never been brought in direct contact with them. I believe that this prejudice is less strong than it was a few years ago, and that ultimately it will cease to exist. Thus, in the future—provided intelligent effort shall be expended in teaching the Indians how to think like white men, how to work and how to labor to the best advantage—they may become a self- supporting and self-respecting part of our population. The history of the intercourse between the white race and the red, if studied, will lead the thoughtful American to feel that some consideration is due from us to them. If we can divest ourselves of prejudice—a hard thing to do—we must acknowledge that the Indians ought to be treated honestly, and therefore justly, as they have never yet been treated. Our prejudice against the race is merely that of an enemy. In fighting, in massacres and surprises, in the treatment of the dead who have fallen in battle, we who are civilized have little to boast of over those who are savages. The stories of the Chivington fight, of the Dull Knife outbreak at Fort Robinson, and of the Baker affair in Montana, where of the one hundred and seventy-six unoffending Piegan Indians killed in the surprised smallpox-stricken camp only eighteen were fighting-men and the rest old men, women and little children, show that there are two sides of the history of Indian warfare. We may say that all the ill treatment of Indians could not have been avoided; that savagery must yield to civilization; that the fittest will survive and the weakest go to the wall. If all this be true, it is also true that this nation is old enough to lay aside the prejudices of its childhood and, with the beginning 6 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY of the new century, to commence to treat the Indian intelligently, which only means fairly. With a few years of such treatment, a moderate investment to enable the poorest of the tribes to make a step toward gaining a livelihood would soon be repaid in the reduction of appropriations for Indian support. From all points of view, we should have a change. Bora \ seater La ae ae a ae Y o i 1 RAPAROE = LITTLE BIRD ARAPAHOE CHAPTER II INDIAN CHARACTER The Indian has the mind of a child in the body of an adult. The struggle for existence weeded out the weak and the sickly, the slow and the stupid, and created a race physically perfect, and mentally fitted to cope with the conditions which they were forced to meet, so long as they were left to themselves. When, however, they encountered the white race, equipped with the mental training and accumulated wisdom of some thousands of years, they were compelled to face a new set of conditions. The balance of nature, which had been well enough maintained so long as nature ruled, was rudely disturbed when civilized man appeared on the scene. His improved tools and implements gave him an enormous advantage over the Indian, but this advantage counted for but little in comparison with the mental superiority of the civilized man over the savage. People who have no knowledge of Indians imagine them to be merely ignorant people, like uneducated individuals of the white race—perhaps like the peasantry of Europe—and liken them to the poorest of the Italian, Polish and Russian immigrants to this country. They suppose that if the Indian were willing to take aspade and shovel dirt, and to send his children to school, the whole great problem of his progress would be solved at once and the race would become a self-supporting part of the population of the United States, able to hold its own in the competition which is becoming more and more a feature of American life. This is not the case. The Indian is not like the white man of any class or condition ; because his mind does not work like the mind of the adult white man. The difference which exists in mental attitude does not imply that the Indian is intellectually feeble, for when the young Indian is separated from his tribe and is brought up in association with white people, and so has an opportunity to have his mind trained to civilized modes of thinking and to imbibe civilized ideas, he is found to be not less intelligent than the average white. The difference in mind means merely that the Indian, like every other human being, receives his knowledge and his mental training from his surroundings. The boy, who is brought up in the camp and associates constantly with his own race, sets up for his standard of wisdom and learning the old and wise men of the tribe who obtained their position of precedence in the old days of war and hunting and who, of course, were born and reared in savagery. His ideas thus take their tone from the old people whom he is taught should be his examples, and will not 7 3 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY be very different from theirs. He will think as they think, and employ the same reasoning processes that they do. There will be some slight advance in thought brought about by the rapid changes of modern times, which must of necessity have some effect on those who observe them, but as many of these changes are not at all comprehended by the Indians, the advance will be slow. I have said that the Indian’s mind is that of a child, and by this I mean that it is a mind in many respects unused, and absolutely without training as regards all matters which have to do with civilized life. The Indian is a close observer, and in respect to things with which he is familiar—which are within the range of his common experience—he draws conclusions that are entirely just—so accurate in fact as to astonish the white man who is here on unknown ground. But in matters which are not connected with the ordinary happenings of his daily life he is wholly unable to reason, because he has no knowledge on which reasoning may be based. Bearing in mind that the Indian in the last days of his free wandering was undeveloped and not greatly changed from the grown up child of primitive times, let us consider what were some of his characteristics. As his very existence depended on his procuring food, he was industrious in seeking and securing it. As wealth was to be gained and fame acquired by going on the war path, he worked hard on his journeys to war, not only undergoing the severest fatigues, but exposing himself to death at the hands of his enemies. The woman’s work was never done; household cares, preparing clothing for the family and the labor of frequent moving kept her busy most of the time. In his own tribe and among his own people, he was honest, adhering closely to the truth in conversation. About matters concerning which he had no positive knowledge, he was always careful to qualify his statements, so that it never might be said of him that his talk was not straight, or that he had two tongues. Theft was unknown in an Indian camp. There was nothing to steal, and if there had been, there was no desire on the part of any one to take it. This was a temptation to which in his own home he was never exposed. Ifany one found a piece of property which appeared to have no owner, the finder commu- nicated his discovery to the camp crier, who shouted the news through the camp, so that the owner of the lost article might know where to go to recover it. But no question ever entered his mind as to the propriety of taking property from an enemy. The most praiseworthy thing he could do was to capture from the foe any possession which he desired and they valued; these were genuinely the spoils of war. Even when war was not in active operation—as, for example, during a pretended peace—it was equally creditable to spoil the enemy, provided it could be done without detection and risk. The tribal life pointed in the direction of community of property in the wild oa fe kiaiid CHIEF WHITE BUFFALO ARAPAHOE INDIAN CHARACTER 9 creatures or the fruits of the earth, on which they subsisted and which were to be had for the taking. Such common ownership, while perhaps seldom expressed, was tacitly acknowledged with regard to food. This in some degree explains the universal hospitality in an Indian camp. Those who killed food did so not merely to supply their own wants, but that the general public might eat. In certain tribes, those who did the actual killing might have some special advantage, as the possession of the skin or a choice part of the meat, but—except in times of great scarcity—food was always to be had from a successful hunting party for the asking. So among the tribes of the plains, if buffalo were driven into the slaughter pen, all were at liberty to enter and supply their wants. Among the tribes of the Northwest Coast, if a whale was killed, or found cast up on the beach, it did not belong to those only who had killed or found it, but all members of the tribe were free to help themselves to what they needed. No matter how great the scarcity of food might be, so long as there was any remaining in the lodge, the visitor received his share without grudging. It might often be the case that fathers and mothers would deprive themselves of food that their little ones might eat, but if this was done it was a voluntary act on their part, and did not lessen the supply to others in the lodge. Another characteristic was fidelity to friends. The intimacies which so frequently existed between two boys or two girls, perhaps first formed when they were very small children, were likely to last through middle life and even to old age, and were not interrupted except for some good reason, as the incidents of marriage, the division of the village or some other unavoidable cause. In case of need, such friends would literally give their lives for each other. The common belief that the Indian is stoical, stolid or sullen is altogether erroneous. They are really a merry people, good-natured, and jocular, usually ready to laugh at an amusing incident or a joke, with a simple mirth that reminds one of children. The respect shown for one another in their assemblages is a noteworthy characteristic. Such consideration for the rights of others is a natural and necessary outgrowth of the development of any community. This development not only taught the Indian consideration for his fellows, but also self-control in his dealings with them, so that in the camp quarrels were extremely rare. When, however, quarrels did occur, the parties to them were likely to be difficult to control, for each would be as unreasonable as a child, seeing only from his own point of view, and acknowledging no justification on the part of the other. Such quarrels, however, were usually one-sided, and sometimes resulted in a revenge which took the form of the destruction of property, or very rarely in murder. Murder was usually followed by either the death of the murderer, or his flight; or at least by a total loss of influence, and social ostracism. I have 10 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY known of more than one case where a chief or principal man had killed a member of his tribe, sometimes being obliged to do it in order to protect his own life, or that of others; but in almost all instances the man who thus had taken the life of one of his tribesmen, has sunk from a position of influence to a point where he was avoided by all the members of the tribe. The Indian, who went to war merely for the general purpose of accumulating property or acquiring glory, wished to inflict on his enemy as much harm as possible, without exposing himself to any special danger. Yet the wish to do injury to an enemy was general rather than specific, and in a particular case the warrior’s heart was often open to pity, so that a victim would be spared instead of being killed, or a captive enemy would be furnished with a horse, provisions and arms, and set free to return in safety to his tribe. On the other hand, if some special injury had been done to a family, a village, or a tribe—if some one had been killed or made captive—the friends and relatives of the victim would do anything to satisfy their longing for revenge on the offending tribe. If one of that tribe should be killed, they might cut his body apart, and hanging the pieces on poles, dance about them in triumph for weeks or months. If one of the enemy should be taken alive, he might be subjected to the most cruel tortures. Occasionally men made regular business of going to war, not for the purpose of injuring the enemy, but merely to accumulate greater possessions, just as with us in former times privateering was engaged in for the actual profit to be derived from preying on the vessels of the enemy. Parties on such expeditions sometimes took especial pains to escape encounters with the enemy, and looked upon fighting as a trouble that was to be avoided if possible. Big Foot, a Northern Cheyenne still living, was in his day a famous warrior, and made a constant practice of going on the war path to capture horses, but though of undoubted bravery, he would never fight the enemy if he could avoid it. An incident which exemplifies this is still told of him in the tribe with much amusement. On one occasion a war party to which he belonged charged a number of the enemy, who fled. Big Foot, who was on a horse of great swiftness, observed that one of the enemy was riding a beautiful horse which also seemed especially fast, and he was seized with a great longing to possess it. After a long chase he overtook the fugitive, but instead of trying to kill him, or knock him out of the saddle, he threw his rope over his enemy’s head, dragged him from his seat, and then letting the man go, simply took the horse. The Indian was brave, but fought in his own way. In his war journeys he was subtle and crafty as the wolf or the panther, and for success depended largely on discovering the presence of the enemy, and making the attack before the enemy knew he was near. He modeled his warfare after the plan of the other wild creatures among which he lived; as the panther creeps up within INDIAN CHARACTER Il springing distance of the unsuspecting deer, so the Indian crawled through the grass, or the thicket, or the ravine, until within striking distance of his unwitting enemy ; and then making himself as terrible as possible by his yells and whoops, he fell upon the victim before he could prepare any defense. The Indian of old times would have regarded as a lunatic the warrior who under ordinary conditions of the war path should permit his enemy to become aware of his presence and should challenge him to combat on equal terms. It is true that such duels sometimes took place, but they were only between great warriors, and were usually in the presence of two contending parties, by whom it had been agreed that the fate of the battle should rest ona single champion. Under another set of circumstances the warrior, who for any reason no longer cared to live, and wished to die a glorious death, sometimes set out on the war path with the avowed purpose of being killed. In such a case he would take none of the usual precautions of war, but exposing himself without any attempt at defense, would ride to death, endeavoring before it came to inflict as much injury as possible on the enemy. An example of conduct prompted by this feeling is shown in the Pawnee story of Lone Chief, and also in the experience of the young Cheyenne warrior Sun’s Road, as he told it to me years ago. He said: “It was long ago, when I was still unmarried, that I had had for a long time a sore knee, badly swollen and painful. It had hurt and troubled me for more than two years, and I thought that it would kill me. I said to my father, ‘Now pretty soon, I am going to die. When I die, do not put me in the ground and cover me with earth. I want you to put meina lodge ona bed and leave me there.’ “My father said, ‘My son, you must not die in that way. That will not be good. Instead, I will fit you out properly, and you shall go to war, and give your body to the enemy. Ride right in and count the first coup, and let them kill you. Then you will die bravely and well.’ “Not long after this a war party was gotten up by Big Foot to go against the Omahas, and I joined it. My father gave me his best horse; it was the fastest one in the party. I was finely dressed and nicely painted, and my hair was combed and smoothly braided so that I might look well and die bravely. “When we got down toward the country of the Omahas, our scout one day returned very soon, and told us that he had found the enemy close by. Just beyond a nearby hill they were butchering, where they had made a surround and killed buffalo. All our party started for the Omahas, but when we came in sight of the place where they had been, we could see no one. They had finished cutting up their meat and had gone. As we sat there considering what we should do, one of the party looked off down a little creek, and saw two men standing by their horses fixing their loads of meat. 12 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY “We charged them. The two Omahas jumped on their horses, left their meat and ran. I had the fastest horse of all the Cheyennes, and was ahead of all the rest. I was intending to do as my father had told me. As I rode, I saw that one of the Omahas had a flint-lock gun, and the other a bow and arrows, and as I was coming up with them, I saw the one who had the gun raise the pan cover and pour in some powder to make a sure fire. Then he began to sing, and made signs to me to come on. I had no gun, only a bow and arrows and a quirt. “The two Omahas rode side by side and pretty close together, and I thought that I would ride in between them, count cowvp on the one that had the gun, and give them both a chance to kill me. I did not wish to live. All the time I was catching up to them, and soon I ran right in between them, and raised the whip stock to hit the one who had the gun. Just as I was about to do this the Omaha twisted around on his horse, and thrust the muzzle of the gun so close to me that it touched my war shirt, and pulled the trigger. The gun snapped, and did not go off ; and as it snapped, I brought my whip handle down on his head, and almost knocked him off his horse, but he caught the mane and recovered. The other man, on my left, shot with his bow over his right shoulder, and the arrow went close to my ear; I could hear it. Then I rode on by them, and the rest of the party came up and killed them both. “ At the Omaha camp they heard the shooting when these two were killed, and many of the Omahas came out, and we had a big fight. We killed one more Omaha. Then we went home. “When we got home to the main village, and what we had done had been told, my father was glad. Hewasso glad that he gave away all the horses he owned. He said to me, ‘ My son, you have been to war and given your body to the enemy, and you have lived. Now, my son, you will live to be an old man. You will never be killed... Then my father went out, and walked about through the village and prayed, calling out and saying, to He amma-wihio:* ““T gave you my son, but you took pity on me and sent him back to me alive to live on the earth, and now he shall live a long life.’ “Then he shouted out and called different people to him, and gave away his horses, one after another, giving one to each person, and telling each one the story of what I had done.” The Indian, being a natural soldier, quickly learned, during his wars with the white troops, that theré was sometimes much advantage in fighting in the white man’s way, and when this lesson had been learned, he practiced it with such good effect as to impress upon the white enemy whom he met in battle, a wholesome respect for his courage. * He amma-wihio, the principal god of the Cheyennes; literally, intelligence on high. LITTLE CHIEF ARAPAHOE CHAPTER. Ill BELIEFS AND STORIES It is not easy for a white man, unless he has had some special training, to place himself on a level with the Indian, and learn how he thinks. Yet this must be done before we can understand him. To fully comprehend him, the investi- gator must cast aside all that he has been taught, and all that he has absorbed since childhood, must cease to be artificial and become natural, must move his point of view from that of civilization back to that of barbarism. He must become for a time a savage, and live with savages in their smoke-blackened lodges. Such a life is interesting, and much of it is picturesque. If one takes part with them in their daily lives, sitting with them about the fire, eating and smoking with them, listening to the solemn prayers which they offer when they light the pipe, and joining with eye, ear and voice in the conversation that passes between those who form the circle, he will gain an insight into a life and a method of thought that he did not suppose existed. The Indians’ dark faces, shaded by heavy masses of hair, are for the most part grave and impassive, yet keenly attentive and intelligent, and light up with enjoyment at a telling hit, or bitof humor. They will laugh and clap their hands once together, with keen appreciation of the good thing that has been said. A man who is making a speech or telling a story uses simple and direct words. His phrases are terse and epigrammatic, but he adds to and rounds out the spoken word bya marvelous wealth of gesture speech. The natural signs which he employs are those which all the world comprehends, and the listener, even though unacquainted with the language that is spoken, understands much of what is being said. As the Indians have no written records, their early history depends alto- gether on oral tradition. Until within a few years, these oral records were carefully preserved. In each tribe there were old men who were historians, and who made it their business to carefully instruct certain selected young men or children in the traditions of the tribe, just as their own grandfathers had taught them. The young people would gather in the lodges, and the old men would repeat the tales, telling them over and over again, until the hearers had committed them to memory. In this way the sacred stories, the elaborate religious ritual, and all the tribal history which is now extant, have been handed down in all the tribes. Among Indians who are more or less under civilized influences the ancient 13 14 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY myths and traditions are passing out of remembrance, but in the old wild days the handing down of the stories from one generation to another was regarded as a sacred duty by the old men who were most learned in this ancient lore. They felt a pride in their knowledge of this history, and a great desire to transmit it in the precise form in which they had received it. Very often portions of thé history, like many of the sacred stories, were kept in certain families for generations. It was to his own children or grandchildren that the man who was the best authority on certain matters most often talked of them, and if among these descendants he found one who manifested a special interest in the stories, or showed marked capacity for remembering them, he redoubled his efforts to perfect this particular child in this learning. Often to such a one he would present certain old stories as gifts, and these, thereafter, might not be related by another. Even to-day, old men will often tell how earnestly their elders strove to impress on them, when they were little lads, the importance of holding fast this history just as they had received it. It is not an easy matter to learn from an Indian his religious beliefs. Very few white men care to discuss with strangers the things that they hold most sacred, and the Indian is still more reticent. He suspects the enquirer of a wish to make fun of him, and since he is as shy and as easily embarrassed as a child, he takes refuge in silence, or in most laconic speech. It is different, however, when he is in his own home, and among his own people, or when he talks with a person who has won his confidence. Then, he is childlike again, but it is in his frankness and openheartedness. He will go into all the details of the story, and -discuss all the doubtful points, repeat the variants, and express his inability to comprehend the marvels. Sometimes, if he has been much under white influence, and so is a bit of a skeptic, he will ask you, confidentially, whether you believe that such a thing could have taken place. If you are wise, you will not express your doubts. It is much better to quote to him some Bible miracle, and assure him that the white people believe that. A stranger who asks an Indian to tell him the story of the Creation, will probably be told that the Indians know nothing about it; but if a friend asks the same question, the Indian will say to him, ‘‘We do not know how it was in the beginning, but we have heard. This is what the old men have told us; they received it from their grandfathers, who had it from theirs; so the story has been handed down, but we do not know that it is true.” While in the tribe such traditions may be received as facts, they are never told to the whites as such, but it is always explained that this is the story, but that the speaker has no actual knowledge of the matter. Many of the tribes are apparently without definite tradition of the Creation, while others have detailed accounts of it. The priests, doctors, or mystery men es 8 4 — & Gj + YELLOW MAGPIE ARAPAHOE BELIEFS AND STORIES 15 are usually the repositories of such stories, and it is to them that we must go to hear the tales in their fullest form, and only in this form have they any real value. The worth of an abstract of a story will vary with the individual who makes the abstract, and from such a skeleton the most important part may often be missing. Even though it involve much added labor and time, and the setting down of many trivial details and wearisome repetitions, it is much better to take down the Indian stories word for word, as they are uttered, so that the whole material may be considered and studied before any part of it is rejected. Only by this method can the material accessible at the present time be gathered up without loss. The Indian is acquainted with all the operations of the forces of nature, but is ignorant of their causes. The results of these causes he sees, but he knows not how they act, nor why. To him they are mysteries, some of which are terrifying. The dangers which they threaten can be averted by no act of his. Some higher power must turn aside the thunderbolt, must ward off the invisible arrow that causes disease, must prevent the attacks of the under-water animals if one crosses the lake, must drive away the ghosts. Therefore he is intensely religious, and prays continually for help from the higher powers, who, in his belief, rule nature. It may readily be imagined that a mental attitude such as this isa fertile soil for the growth of folklore, and that the attempts to explain the ordinary phenomena of nature give rise toa great number of myths. The folk stories of the Indians have to do with the natural objects among which they live, with the heavenly bodies, the mountains, rivers and trees, the animals, birds and people. They deal also with a great variety of other subjects ; with history, mythology, the Creation, the development of man, his emotions, his yearnings after the unknown, his fears of the supernatural. This lore explains too the origin of long established customs, tells how certain cherished religious articles came into the keeping of the tribe; or again, it may deal with matters intended only for entertainment and amusement. It is true folklore. While all this lore treats of the past, and usually of the distant past, it must not be imagined that it no longer finds credence with the Indians in their new condition. On the contrary, by the older Indians it is believed as firmly as ever. The younger ones, however, take less interest in the stories and there is far less opportunity of instructing them in the tales now than in the old days of the free wanderings. Although in some tribes the ancient ritual and the stories are still fairly well preserved, nevertheless as each old man passes away some little bit of history or tradition, some detail of a story, known perhaps only to him, is lost forever. And when we think that the tales these old men can relate constitute the only history of the tribes we can ever obtain, it is greatly to be regretted that more of them cannot be collected and preserved. 16 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY The Sun is personified, and is regarded as a man, who, each day, starts on his journey from the eastern horizon, and traveling across the sky to the west, there enters his lodge to pass the night. Very early in the morning he starts out again and passes around the southern edge of the flat earth, to appear again at sunrise in the east. In many tribes the Sun is the principal god ; the creator and the ruler of the world. His home is far in the west, beyond the big water, in a pleasant country. There is his lodge, big and fine, handsomely painted with figures of strange medicine animals, and from the tripods which stand behind it hang wonderful weapons and mysterious medicine bundles. Here, too, dwells the Moon, the Sun’s wife, the old woman; and here, according to the Blackfoot, lives also the Morning Star, who is the son of the Sun and the Moon. In the summer the Sun is strong like a man in his prime, but as autumn draws on he grows older, and in winter he is weak and his power is still less, but in spring he becomes young and strong once more, for his work through the summer. By these characteristics, we are enabled to identify the Sun as the culture hero of the Cheyennes, although they themselves do not recognize that this hero was the Sun. They say of him, whom they call merely The Stranger, that he lived with them “ for four or five long lifetimes of people. Children grew up, became old and died ; other young people were born, grew up, became old and died, but still this man lived on. All through summer he used to be young like a young man, but when autumn came and the grass commenced to dry up, he began to look older, and about the middle of the winter he was like a very old man, and walked bent over and crooked. In spring he became young again.” As has been said, the Moon is the Sun’s wife, and the mother of the Morning Star. She seems to represent the female principle, and in some of the old Pawnee songs she is called mother, just as the Sun is called father, although in historic times the Pawnees have never worshiped the Sun. An ancient Blackfoot legend about the Sun and the Moon, so old that it seems to have no relation to the other myths of that people, is told on another page. The Morning Star, child of the Sun and Moon, is the only one left to them of many sons. All of the others have been killed. Among the Pawnees and some other tribes, the Evening Star is the protector of fields and planting, and in ancient times a captive, carefully fattened in anticipation of the event, was sacrificed to the Star and afterwards cut into small pieces and the flesh scattered over the fields. Many tribes regard certain bright stars as men, who start out from their heavenly lodges at sunset and make nightly journeys across the sky. Sometimes such stars have taken women from among the tribes to be their wives, and there are many tales narrating the attempts of such women to rejoin a Py a cs Zz ri 4 Oi LITTLE BEAR ARAPAHOE BELIEFS AND STORIES 17 their people on earth, and giving the adventures of the children who have been born of such unions The earth is flat and circular, the Indian would tell you, and from the edges its surface runs vertically downward. The Earth is the mother, the fruitful one on whom we depend for food, drink and a place to live. It produces the corn, the roots and the berries on which we subsist ; from it grows the grass which the buffalo eats; so that without the earth we could have no food. The ground furnishes a course for the water. Without water we could not live. We cut our lodge poles from trees growing out of the ground. So it is that the earth is sacred. The Great Power put the earth here, and later must have put us on it. Without the earth nothing could live. There could be no animals, nor any vegetables. So it is that when we pray to the earth, we ask it to make everything grow that we eat, so that we may live; to make the water to flow, that we may have something to drink; to keep the ground firm, so that we may live and walk on it, and to make those plants and herbs to grow, that we use when we are sick, to make ourselves well. The thunder, the lightning, and the rain storm are all classed together in the Indian’s mind, and of all the powers of nature, none is more terrible to him than the thunder, which he calls “that dreadful one,” the only one we fear, our only danger. The thunder strikes without warning. His bolt shatters the lofty crag, blasts the tallest pine, and fells the strongest animal, a moment before active and full of life. From him it is impossible to run away. He strikes, and there we lie. Usually the thunder is described as a great bird, which flies through the air with his eyes shut, but when he opens them, the lightning flashes forth. The roar of the thunder is caused, some believe, by the wings of the Thunder Bird, while others think that it is his shouting. The thunder is wor- shiped with elaborate ceremonial, partly to propitiate him, because he is so dangerous, but also because he brings the rain and makes the berries large and sweet. In the autumn, the thunder goes south with the birds, but returns in spring, and is welcomed, because with his coming come the growing grass and the blossoming flowers. There is a bitter enmity between the Thunder Bird and some of the under-water monsters. The winter is caused by Cold Maker, whom some tribes call the Winter Man. He is white as snow, and comes riding a white horse in the midst of the snow-storm. Hecomes from a place far to the north, where there are always clouds, through which the sun can never shine to heat anything. It is from there that Ho-im-a-ha comes and brings the winter. Often he advances in a white cloud, and, as it moves along, he says to the Sun, “I am coming, I am coming; back away, because I am going to make it cold over all the land.” As he goes on he spreads the cold all over a wide stretch of country, 18 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY and it is cold everywhere. In the spring the sun begins to get higher and higher. As it gets higher, it says to Ho-im-a-ha, ‘Go back now to where you came from. I want to heat the earth again, and to make the grass and all things grow.” Then the cold goes back. So it is that each one has his power. At one time the Winter Man overpowers, and again the Sun gains the mastery. Thus they drive each other back and forth. In a Cheyenne story, the hero, Bow-fast-to-his-body, who has destroyed many evil animals and powers that were troubling the people, comes in contact also with the Winter Man. Bow-fast-to-his-body went to the Winter Man’s lodge, and when he came to it he spoke and said: “I have come to visit the people and havea talk with them.” He lifted the door and went in, and when the Winter Man saw him he said: “Ah! I have heard of you already.” Then he caused a great storm in the lodge, and called out: “Help me, my children, help me,” for he was afraid. It grew very cold and the snow fell so thickly that they could not see across the lodge. The young man was carrying a fan made from an eagle’s wing, and he began to fan himself as if he were ina sweat-house, and as he fanned himself the snow ceased falling, and that which was on the floor of the lodge quickly melted. The Winter Man cried out: “Run, my children, run. He is stronger than we are. He has the greater power.” They all ran, but Bow-fast-to-his-body, catching up a club, ran after them and killed them as they fled, all except one little one, that crept into a crevice of a rock and escaped. Afterwards when the people used to go and look into this crevice in the morning, they would find frost there. They used to bring hot water and pour it into the crevice, trying to scald this child to death, but every morning the frost was there. They say that if this one had been killed there would have been no more winter. The wind cannot be seen. Often the principal god uses it as his messenger, sending it to carry his words to people, or sometimes to transport people to him. Among the Blackfeet, the wind is caused by a great animal that lives in the mountains, and as it moves its ears backward and forward, makes the wind blow in furious gusts. The depths of the water shelter a horde of mysterious inhabitants. Some of them have the form of people, though quite different from those who live on the prairie. Others are animals similar in appearance to those living on the land, while others still are monsters. Many are malignant, lying in wait for any one who may venture on the water, and seizing and dragging him down. These under-water monsters delight to come to the surface to bask in the sun- shine, but there is a bitter feud between all of them and the Thunder Bird, and as they come toward the top they move very slowly, and look all about them for any sign of the Thunder Bird near. If there should be only a single little cloud BELIEFS AND STORIES 19 in the sky, they will not venture to show themselves at the surface. If the Thunder Bird sees one of them, he swoops down and grasps it in his claws and carries itaway. There are people who have seen the Thunder Bird carrying away an under-water monster, and the Dakotas believe that the land slips so often seen in the bluffs along the Missouri River show where the Thunder Bird has darted down to seize one of these under-water monsters which was leaving the water to creep into the earth and do it harm. Some tribes believe that under the springs which flow out from beneath bluffs and banks lie beings which must be propitiated; therefore, they bring presents and leave them bythe spring. If any one should carelessly jump across a stream flowing from such a spring near its head, he may have shot into him a mysterious arrow which will cause disease. As in all countries and among all people, ghosts are greatly feared. These are the spirits of the dead, and it is not very unusual for them to return to the places where they have lived. There are many stories telling of the return to life of persons who have died. A very interesting Blackfoot story is singularly like the classical myth of Orpheus and Eurydice. There is always a danger that the people, who have returned to life, will disappear again, if their instruc- tions are not obeyed, as in the story of the Ghost Wife. THE GHOST WIFE * One time there were living together a man and his wife. They had a young child. The woman died. The man was very sad, and mourned for his wife. One night he took the child in his arms, and went out from the village to the place where his wife was buried, and stood over the grave, and mourned for his wife. The little child was very helpless, and cried all the time. The man’s heart was sick with grief and loneliness. Late in the night he fell asleep, fainting and worn out with sorrow. After a while he awoke, and when he looked up, there was a form standing by him. The form standing there was the form of the one who had died. She spoke to her husband, and said, “ You are very unhappy here. There is a place to go where we would not be unhappy. Where I have been nothing bad happens to one. Here, you never know what evil will come to you. You and the child had better come to me.” The man did not want to die. He said to her, “ No, it will be better if you can come back to us. We love you. If you were with us,we would be unhappy no longer.” For a long time they discussed this, to decide which one should go to the other. At length the man by his persuasions overcame her, and the woman * Pawnee Hero Stories and Folk Tales, p. 129. 20 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY agreed to come back. She said to the man, “If Iam to come back you must do exactly as I tell you for four nights. For four days the curtain must remain let down before my sleeping place; it must not be raised; no one must look behind it.” The man did as he had been told, and after four days had passed, the curtain was lifted, and the woman came out from behind it. Then they all saw her, first her relations, and afterward the whole tribe. Her husband and her child were very glad, and they lived happily together. A long time after this, the man took another wife. The first wife was always pleasant and good-natured, but the new one was sharp-tempered, and after some time she grew jealous of the first woman, and quarreled with her. At length one day the last married became angry with the other, and called her bad names, and finally said to her, ‘““You ought not to be here. You are nothing but a ghost, anyway.” That night when the man went to bed, he lay down, as was his custom, by the side of his first wife. During the night he awoke, and found that his wife had disappeared. She was seen no more. The next night after this happened, the man and the child both died in sleep. The wife had called them to her. They had gone to that place where there is a living. This convinced everybody that there is a hereafter. The Plains Indian shares his home with the animals and the birds, whose kinship he acknowledges. He recognizes that of all living things there is a common origin, that all are made by the same Creator; so he calls the animals his relations—sometimes his younger brothers. Heknowsthat in certain respects they are his inferiors, for he can overcome them; but he sees also that they possess senses or instincts that are keener and more to be relied on than his own, and thus believes that they receive from a higher power help which is denied to him. Many of them typify qualities which he desires to possess, such as bravery, craft, endurance, or some physical attribute. Therefore, when he is in difficulties, or when danger threatens, he prays to the animals to help him, either directly by their own intervention, or by intercession with the ruler of the universe. Thus these animals often have a sacred character. In every tribe tales and traditions have grown up, which have for their central motive the powers exercised by certain animals and birds. There is a wide difference in the ways in which many of the animals are regarded by the various tribes of the prairie, but obviously the better known a species is—whether by reason of its strength, its numbers or its importance as food—the greater the likelihood of its taking on a special character, The buffalo, bear, wolf, coyote, beaver, raven, eagle, hawk, owl, swan and spider —_ 7 ul BLACK MAN ARAPAHOE BELIEFS AND STORIES 21 are held in reverence by all the tribes To the badger, wolverine, kit fox, magpie and others was given a less extended regard. As is natural, the buffalo was one of the most important and sacred of all the animals to those tribes which subsisted chiefly on its flesh. The Blackfeet called it Ni-ai, which means, my shelter, my protection, while all the plains tribes prayed to it. Often to-day, set up before the sweat lodges of the Cheyennes, may be seen the white and weathered skull of a buffalo bull, and after the people have taken their sweat and come out from the lodge, they light the pipe and offer it to the bull’s head, and as they used to in the olden time, ask it to rise from the ground, put flesh upon its bones, and run off over the prairie, so that they may have its meat to eat and its skin to use as coverin, for the lodges. There are many stories about young women having been carried away by buffalo, and about that ancient time before the people obtained bows and arrows, when the buffalo used to eat the people. As the largest and most dangerous of the carnivorous mammals, the bear was venerated, yet not so much for its strength as forits wisdom. It was believed to be invulnerable, to have the power of stopping the bullets or arrows shot against it, or to be able to take care of itself if wounded. It might render invulnerable those whom it wished to help, and might even restore to life persons toward whom it felt an especial friendliness. This reverence for the bear is common to all the North American tribes, but nowhere is it described with greater detail than among the Pawnees, by whom the following story is told concerning it: THE BEAR MAN * There was once a young boy, who, when he was playing with his fellows, used often to imitate the ways of a bear, and to pretend that he was one. The boys did not know much about bears. They only knew that there were such animals. Now, it had happened that before this boy was born his mother had been left alone at home, for his father had gone on the warpath toward the enemy, and this was about five or six months before the babe would be born. As the man was going on the warpath, he came upon alittle bear cub, very small, whose mother had gone away ; and he caught it. He did not want to kill it because it was so young and helpless. It seemed to him like a little child. It looked up to him, and cried after him, because it knew no better; and he hated to kill it or to leave it there. After he had thought about this for a while, he put a string around its neck and tied some medicine smoking stuff, Indian tobacco, to it, and said, “Pi-rau-child, you are a Nahurac;t Tirawa made you, and takes care of * Pawnee Hero Stories and Folk Tales, p. 121. + Nahfirac, animal. TirA4wa, the Great Spirit. a THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY you. He will look after you, but I put these things about your neck to show that I have good feelings toward you. I hope that when my child is born, the Nahurac will take care of him and see that he grows up a good man, and I hope that Tirdwa will take care of you and of mine.” He looked at the little bear for quite a long time, and talked to it, and then he went on his way. When he returned to the village from his warpath, he told his wife about the little bear, and how he had looked at it and talked to it. When his child was born it had all the ways of a bear. So it is among the Pawnees. A woman, before her child is born, must not look hard at any animal, for the child may be like it. There was a woman in the Kit-ke-hahk-i band, who caught a rabbit, and because it was gentle and soft, she took it up in her hands and held it before her face and petted it, and when her child was born it had a split nose like a rabbit. This man is still alive. This boy, who was like a bear, as he grew up, had still more the ways of a bear. Often he would go off by himself, and try to pray to the bear, because he felt like a bear. Heused to say, ina joking way, to the other young men, that he could make himself a bear. After he had come to be a man, he started out once on the warpath with a party of about thirty-five others. He was the leader of the party. They went away upon the Running Water, and before they had come to any village, they were discovered by Sioux. The enemy pursued them, and surrounded them, and fought with them. The Pawnees were overpowered, their enemies were so many, and all were killed. The country where this took place is rocky, and much cedar grows there. Many bears live there. The battle was fought in the morning; and the Pawnees were all killed ina hollow. Right after the fight, in the afternoon, two bears came traveling along by this place. When they came to the spot where the Pawnees had been killed, they found one of the bodies, and the she bear recognized it as that of the boy who was like a bear. She called to the he bear, and said, “Here is the man that was very good to us. He often sacrificed smokes to us, and every time he ate he used always to take a piece of food and give it to us, saying; ‘Here is something for you to eat. Eat this.’ Here is the one that always imitated us, and sung about us, and talked about us. Can you do anything for him?” The he bear said, ‘I fear I cannot do it. I have not the power, but I will try. I can do anything if the sun is shining. I seem to have more power when the sun is shining on me.” That day it was cloudy and cold and snowing. Every now and then the clouds would pass, and the sun would come out for a little while, and then the clouds would cover it again. The man was all cut up, pretty nearly hacked in small pieces, for he was the bravest of all. The two bears gathered up the pieces of the man, and put them eat bi ¥, oie 3 q wu. ue x R t CHIEF MOUNTAIN BLACK FEET BELIEFS AND STORIES 23 together, and then the he bear lay down and took the man on his breast, and the she bear lay on top of the body to warm it. They worked over it with their medicine, and every now and then the he bear would cry out, and say, “A-tf-us, Father, help me. I wish the sun was shining.” After a while the dead body grew warm, and then began to breathe a little. It was still all cut up, but it began to have life. Pretty soon the man began to move, and to come to life, and then he became conscious and had life. When he came to himself and opened his eyes he was in the presence of two bears. The he bear spoke to him, and said, “It is not through me that you are living. It was the she bear who asked for help for you, and had you brought back to life. Now, you are not yet whole and well. You must come away with us, and live with us for a time, until all your wounds are healed.” The bears took him away with them. But the man was very weak, and every now and then, as they were going along, he would faint and fall down ; but still they would help him up and support him ; and they took him along with them, until they came to a cave in the rocks among the cedars, which was their home. When he entered the cave, he found their young ones that they had left behind when they started out. The man was all cut up and gashed. He had also been scalped, and had no hair on his head. He lived with the bears until he was quite healed of his wounds, and also had come to understand all their ways. The two old bears taught him everything that they knew. The he bear said to him, ‘“‘ None of all the beings and animals that roam over the country are as great and as wise as the bears. No animal is equal to us. When we get hungry, we go out and kill something and eat it. I did not make the wisdom that I have. 1 am an animal, and I look to one above. He made me, and he made me to be great. Iam made to live here and to be great, but still there will be an end to my days, just as with all of us that Tirdwa has created upon this earth. I am going to make you a great man; but you must not deceive yourself. You must not think that I am great, or can do great things of myself. You must always look up above for the giver of all power. You shall be great in war and great in wealth. ‘Now you are well, and I shall take you back to your home, and after this I want you to imitate us. This shall be a part of your greatness. I shall look after you. I shall give to you a part of myself. If I am killed, you shall be killed. If I grow old, you shall be old. “T want you to look at one of the trees that Tirdwa made in this earth, and place your dependence on it. Tirdwa made this tree (pointing to a cedar). It never gets old. It is always green and young. Take notice of this tree, and always have it with you; and when you are in the lodge and it thunders and lightens,* throw some of it on the fire and let the smoke rise. Hold that fast.” *A cedar is never struck by lightning. 24 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY The he bear took the skin of a bear, and madea cap for him, to hide his naked skull. His wounds were now all healed, and he was well and strong. The man’s people had nearly forgotten him, it had been so long ago, and they supposed that the whole party had been killed. Soon after this the he bear said, “ Now we will take that journey.” They started, and went to the village, and waited near it till it was night. Then the bear said to him, “ Go into the village, and tell your father that you are here. Then get for me a piece of buffalo meat, and a blue bead, and some Indian tobacco, and some sweet smelling clay.”* The man went into the village, and his father was very much surprised, ‘and very glad to see him again. He got the presents, and brought them to the bear, and gave them to him, and the bear talked to him. When they were about to part, the bear came up to him, and put his arms about him, and hugged him, and put his mouth against the man’s mouth, and said, ‘As the fur that Iam in has touched you it will make you great, and this will be a blessing to you.” His paws were around the man’s shoulders, and he drew them down his arms, until they came to his hands, and he held them, and said, “As my hands have touched your hands, they are made great, not to fear anything. I have rubbed my hands down over you, so that you shall be as tough asl am. Because my mouth has touched your mouth you shall be made wise.” Then he left him, and went away. So this man was the greatest of all warriors, and was brave. He was likea bear. He originated the Bear Dance which still exists among the tribe of Pawnees. He came to be an old man, and at last died of old age. I suspect the old bear died at the same time. Among all the plains tribes the wolf typifies craft in war, and in Indian gesture language the sign for a scout is the sign for wolf. The animal is highly respected, and all people are on friendly terms with it, and regard it as an ally. Sometimes wolves talk to people, telling them what is going to happen, or informing them of the whereabouts of their enemies. The eagle, hawk and owl—birds that capture their prey—typify courage and dash, which lead to success in war, and are prayed to. The raven and magpie are birds of great wisdom. They talk to people, telling them of coming events, leading them to game, or advising them of danger, and recommending a course of action. Certain small water birds are used as messengers by the supernat- ural powers. All birds of whatever sort are said to have some spiritual power. The under-water people, believed in by the Blackfeet, are reported to use wild | * A green clay, which they roast, and which then turns dark red, and has a sweet smell. THUNDER CLOUD BLACK FEET BELIEFS AND STORIES “3 fowl—ducks, geese and swans—for their beasts of burden, and swans often bear to the home of the principal god the person who is to visit him. Beliefs about insects are less common; yet a faith in the intelligence and spiritual power of the spider is very wide-spread Often it is a wonder worker, and it always represents intelligence. Among the Blackfeet the butterfly seems to be the sleep producer. It causes us to slumber and brings us our dreams. The Blackfoot woman still embroiders on a piece of buckskin a cross—the sign of the butterfly—and ties it to her baby’s hair when she wishes it to sleep, at the same time singing a lullaby which asks the butterfly to come flying about and to put the child to sleep. These and a host of similar beliefs and tales have to do chiefly with the phenomena of nature, but there are many others that tell of the doings of the people, often inculcating some moral lesson, and showing how bravery, endurance, singleness of purpose, or some other virtue is rewarded by success. Besides the tales and traditions which treat of the Creation, of the phenomena of nature, of the animals, and of the people, there is another class which deal with a mythical person of great power, maliciousness and childish- ness, and which seem to be told largely for entertainment. Such stories are current among all tribes of Algonquin blood.* The coyote stories current among tribes west of the Rocky Mountains, and the bluejay stories of the Chinook Indians, collected by Dr. Franz Boas, are of asimilar nature. Of a more serious character, because having a historical interest, are those tales which describe the beginnings of certain customs which have been practiced so long that their origin is forgotten, except by the very old men of the tribe, who jealously preserve the tradition. Examples of such stories are the Young Dog’s Dance and the Buffalo Wife. * Blackfoot Lodge Tales, p. 128, 256, et seq. CHAPTER IV THE YOUNG DOGS DANCE The Pawnees formerly practiced a religious dance which, though bearing a different name, was in many respects similar to that common to many of the buffalo peoples, called the Sun Dance, or the festival of the Medicine Lodge. My old friend Pipe Chief first told me of the dance as we were sitting by the fire in one of the great dirt lodges. It was night and all was still, save now and then for the hoof-beats of some swiftly galloping horse which was carrying its rider to his home. The fire flickered brightly, and the forms of the people who sat about it cast queer shadows into the background, where one could see dimly the sleeping places with their curtains let down, the saddles hung to the roof posts, and over the bed of the lodge owner the sacred bundle which contained the mysterious objects which he valued the most highly of all his possessions. From time to time the old man bent forward and refilled the pipe, and lighting it by a coal from the fire, uttered his prayer to the Ruler, and smoked, first to the sky, and to the earth, and then offered the stem to the four points of the compass; and as the solemn words were spoken so gravely and reverently, I felt again asI have so often felt before, how real a thing to the believer is his religion, whatever that religion may be. Often before this day, I had noticed on Pipe Chief's chest four regular scars, two over each breast, which looked like the scars made when the breast is pierced and the skewers are passed through. Yet I had never felt like asking the old man what the scars meant. To-night as he spoke to me of the ancient times, he told me how they had been made, and related the story of the Young Dogs Dance, and how the Pawnees had first learned it. He explained too what this suffering had meant to the Pawnees and why they had endured it, and showed me that in its significance it was precisely like that which many cultivated people undergo to-day, when they fast during Lent or wear a hair shirt, or vow to perform some penance. In like manner it was similar to the sacrifice offered by the priests of Baal, when, disputing with Elijah, they cut themselves with knives and called on their gods to help them. In fact it expressed the belief common to all humanity, that God—under whatever name he may be known—delights in the self-sacrifice of his creatures, in the suffering of his worshipers. This was Pipe Chief’s story, told as we sat by the fire and smoked through the long winter evening: 27 28 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY Many, many years ago, when I was a boy, there lived in the village of the Pawnee Loups a man named Medicine Chief. He was lame. When Medicine Chief was young, he had gone to visit the Rees and had lived with them fora long time. While he was living in their village, the Rees told him the story of the Young Dog’s Society and Dance, and how they had first learned about it, and had come to practice it. In those days when a Ree wanted eagle feathers to tie on his shield or lance, or for a war bonnet, or to tie in his hair, he used to go out and catch the eagles, and this was the way he did it. On the top of the hill where the eagles used to come, he dug a pit in the ground and then covered it over with a roof of poles and scattered grass on the poles so as to hide them. He put a piece of meat on the poles, tying it down so that the eagles could not carry it away, and then, stripping off his clothes, went into the pit, and waited there without food or drink until an eagle came down to the bait. When the eagle had alighted and was standing by the bait the man reached up between the poles, caught the bird by the feet and drew it into the pit and killed it. Sometimes the eagles would not come for a long time, and the man would begin to think that he was not going to catch any, and would be very unhappy. A long time before Medicine Chief had gone to the Ree village, a certain Ree brave had gone out to catch eagles. One night while he was lying in the pit, praying for good luck, he heard the sound of drums beating a long way off, but he could not tell from what direction the noise came. He kept listening, and all night he heard the sound of the drumming. The next night as he lay there he heard the drumming begin again, and he got out of the pit and walked over the prairie trying to follow the sound and learn where it came from. He followed the sound till at last, when it was nearly morning, he came to the edge of a great deep lake. The sound of the drumming came out of thislake. All day he stayed by this water, and kept crying over his bad luck and praying for help. When night came, the drumming began again, and after a time he saw many birds and animals swimming in the water, and coming to the shore and walking out on the land. He could see ducks and geese, and dogs and beavers and otters. These and many other animals came out of the water. For four days he stayed by this lake, crying to Atfus Tirdwa* and praying to him for help, and at last on the fourth night he fell asleep, for he was very tired, and very hungry, because he had had nothing to eat for a long time. . While he slept something must have happened, for when he awoke he was in a large lodge in which there were many people. Some of them were dancing and some were sitting about the walls on their robes. Some of the robes were ‘ *Atius Tirdwa—Spirit Father. THREE FINGERS CHEYENNE THE YOUNG DOGS DANCE 29 made of bear and buffalo and beaver and wolf skins, others were of the skins of birds. Now these people who were in this lodge were the animals that he had seen swimming in the water. They had changed their shapes and had become persons. Not long after this Ree man awoke, one of these people who sat at the back of the lodge—a chief—stood up and spoke to him and said: “My friend, we know how unhappy you feel and how long you have been praying. We have listened to your prayers and we have talked about you and have made up our minds that we will take you in here and you shall be like one of us, for we feel sorry for you. You see all these people here in this lodge. They stand for the different animals. You see me; I am the chief of these animals, and lama dog. The Spirit Father who lives away up in the sky likes dogs. He has one himself. I like your heart, and that is why I have taken pity on you and want to help you. NowI have great power, and this power I will give to you. You shall be like me. Wherever you may be, my spirit will be with you, and will help you and protect you. You see this dance which these people are dancing? This dance I give to you. Watch it carefully and observe just what is done. I give you this dance. Take it home to your people, and let them learn it and dance it. It will make them lucky in war.” When this man, the Dog, had finished speaking to the young man, he turned to the others in the lodge and said to them: “Brothers, look at this young man; you see him and you know how unhappy he is. Take pity on him and give him your power, for I have pitied him and have given him the power that I have. Try to do what you can for him.” Then he sat down. For a little while no one said anything. All sat there looking at the ground, or at the fire that blazed in the middle of the lodge. At last the Owl stood on his feet and spoke to the chief, saying, “I also will do something for this young man.” He turned to the young man and said to him: “When I go about at night I do not care how dark it may be, I can see as well as if it were day. You shall be like me in this, for in the night you shall see asI do. Wherever you may go at night I will be with you. Take these feathers and wear them tied to your hair.” As he said this, he gave him some feathers from his back to wear on his head. Then the Owl sat down. The Buffalo Bull sat next to the Owl, and after a little silence he stood up and spoke. He said: “You shall be like me too. Wherever you travel about my spirit shall be with you. You shall be strong and you shall not get tired. You shall be brave too. Ifyou see your enemy right before you, you shall not be afraid, but shall rush upon him and shall knock him down and run over him as I do.” Then the 30 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY Bull gave the young man a shoulder belt of tanned buffalo hide, saying, ‘“‘ Wear this when you go into battle.” Then he sat down. After a little while, the Porcupine stood up and spoke to the young man. He said: “T also will do something for you. I have the power to make my enemy’s heart like a woman’s, and in this you shall be like me. Your enemies will fear you and when you fight with them you shall overcome them and kill them.” He gave the young man some quills from his back to embroider the leather shoulder belt with, and then he sat down. When these people were speaking, every one else sat quiet, saying nothing, but listening to the speeches, while the pipe passed from hand to hand and the fire flickered and the posts cast black shadows and the smoke rising toward the smoke hole spread out and made a thin blue haze in the top of the lodge. At length the Eagle rose to his feet and stood looking about him, while everybody waited to hear what he would say. When he began to speak, he said: “Everybody knows me, and knows that I am lucky in war. When I go out to fight I kill my enemies, and all the others run away. Now I too will be with you wherever you go, and you shall kill your enemies as I do mine. Take courage, therefore, for you shall be like an eagle.” He gave the young man some eagle tail feathers to tie on his head, and to tie on the shoulder belt that the Buffalo Bull had given him. Next to the Eagle sat the Whooping Crane, and when he got on his feet to speak, he stood up very tall, and his head reached up nearly to the blue smoke that hung under the roof. His voice was loud and clear when he said: ‘“T know how to scare my enemies, and in this you shall be like me. I will be with you wherever you go. When you attack your enemy, whistle on this, and he will be afraid and will want to run away.” The Whooping Crane took one of the bones out of his wing and gave it to the young man, and showed him how to make a war whistle out of it to blow when he went into battle. Then the Deer stood up and spoke to the young man and said: “T shall help you too and shall be with you wherever you go. I can run so fast that no one can catch me, and you shall be able to run as fast as I do. Take this rattle and when you come close to your enemy, strike him with it and count a coup.” So the Deer gave him the rattle, a string of little fawn hoof sheaths, strung together on a cord of twisted sinew. Next spoke the Bear, big and with a gruff voice: “ Everybody knows me and that I am hard to kill. If Iam wounded I know how to cure myself. Even if I am very badly hurt, I can make myself well again. You shall be like me. When the bullets or the arrows of the enemy hit you, you can save yourself. You shall be able to endure even great hardships ” HUBBLE BIG HORSE CHEYENNE THE YOUNG DOGS DANCE 31 The Bear then gave him a strip of fur from the roach of his back for a belt to wear about his waist After the Bear, many other animals spoke to the young man, and each one that spoke gave him his power or helped him in some way. And after they had all taken pity on him, and told him all these things, he fell asleep again. When he awoke and looked about him, he saw that he was at the same place where he had lain down by the big lake in which he had seen the animalsswimming. For a long time he sat there, thinking of what he had heard and seen, and then he got up and went home to the camp. When he reached home, he called the young men together and told them what he had seen and heard, and showed them the dance as the animals had shown it to him, and the different things that they had given to him; and he told them that this dance would make them lucky in war. While he was showing them the dance, the young man did many wonderful things before the people. So the young men formed a society which they called Young Dogs, and many were taught the dance. Any young man who wanted to join this society was taken into it and shown the dance, and the ornaments were put on him,as the animals had put them on the young Ree when he had been in the animals’ lodge. It was a long time after all these things happened that Medicine Chief was visiting the Rees, and he stopped for a long time in their village. While he was there he saw this dance, and he liked it, for it was awar dance. Hewas taken into the society, and the Rees gave him the secrets of the dance. So, when he got back to his own tribe, he told his people, the Pawnee Loups, about the dance and advised them to take it up and learn it. All thishappened before I was born. When I was a big boy, growing up, almost a young man, old enough to go to war, Medicine Chief was the leader of the Young Dogs Society. He was a very old man. When I considered this Society, I saw that those who belonged to it were the men I wished to be like; they were great warriors, men who had but one heart, those who stood foremost of all men by their victories over their enemies. They took many horses and were rich. Now a man who wanted to learn the secrets of this society and how to practice this dance had to go through a hard trial. He had to dance for a long time without food or drink, until he was very tired, and hungry, and thirsty, and he had to have his flesh pierced and cords tied to his skin and he had to pull himself free from the cords by tearing them out of his skin. He had to endure the sufferings that a warrior bears. I had a friend named Big Spotted Horse who belonged to the Young Dogs Society. At the time he was dancing and fasting so as to learn the secret of the dance, the Sioux came down to fight us, and we all went out to meet them. At this time he was wearing the ornaments which belonged to the dance. In the fight Spotted Horse, who was in the front of the battle, was wounded in the arm, 32 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY but even though he was wounded, he rode right over his enemy and struck him. Soon after this, he got the secrets of this dance, and after that became a great warrior, and every time he went on the warpath against his enemies he would bring back many horses and scalps. At last he became a chief. I used to talk with my friend Spotted Horse about the dance, for I had seen with my own eyes the great things that he had done and how fortunate he had been in war ever since joining it, and I had thought a great deal about joining it myself. He told me that all his luck came from this dance, and that he believed that the dog which lived up above with Tirawa was taking pity on him and helping him, and he advised me to join the society. At length I made up my mind that I would do this and I went to the old man, Medicine Chief, and said: “Grandfather, ]am very poor in my mind and want to be taken into this society. I am willing to do whatever must be done, for I do not care what becomes of me, for I am very unhappy and have always been unlucky.” On the day when I was taken in, we began to dance, I and fourteen others. We were obliged to dance for four days and four nights without eating or drinking, and Medicine Chief told us to fix our eyes on the Sun as we danced and at night to look at the Moon. On this day while we were dancing, there were in the lodge with us people belonging to the society; some were making shoulder belts, others tying up owl feathers to wear in the head, others making ready eagle feathers, and four women were putting porcupine quills on the belts. The man whose duty it was to pierce the breasts of the young braves for this suffering was named Pahu Katawah.* He was a great warrior and had struck his enemies many times. He pierced my breast and put the wooden skewers through the skin and tied them to the ropes and strung me up. While he was doing this Pahu Katawah was praying to Tirawa asking that he would take pity on me, as he had taken pity on him. So I began to dance and to try to break loose and I kept dancing day and night. Now of those who danced, some looked at the Sun and at the Moon and some looked at the buffalo bull’s head, for they wanted the Buffalo Bull to take pity on them, and as the young men looked at the Sun or the Moon or the bull’s head, they prayed in their heart for pity and help. As we danced people stood about us looking on: the warriors singing war songs to cheer on the young men, or shouting the war cry, and the women sing- ing too, and making their cry to encourage the others. They shouted as if it were in battle. There was one young man who was looking at the bull’s head and praying to it as he danced, and while he prayed and danced and looked at it, suddenly * Pahu Katawah, Knee print by the water. WHITE BUFFALO CHEYENNE THE YOUNG DOGS DANCE 33 it seemed to him that the Bull’s head was all covered with blood, and he began to cry, for this was a bad sign and meant bad luck for him. When Medicine Chief learned why he was crying, he told him to stop dancing and to sit down. I was of those who looked at the Sun and the Moon; and the third night of the dancing, as I looked at the Moon high in the sky, I saw hanging down from it many ropes made of buffalo hair such as we used to make. Some of these ropes were long and some short. But there was one longer than all the rest and at the end of this rope I saw a horse. I kept on dancing, and as I danced I kept jumping up, and trying to seize the rope, and at last I caught the rope to which the horse was tied and held it in my hand as I kept on dancing. On the fourth day, which was the last of the dance, I tore loose from the sticks that were through my breast and Pahu Katawah led me around the ring four times, and then had me stand in front of Medicine Chief, who put on me the different ornaments, one by one, in the order in which they had been given by the animals to the Ree brave who first received them. Some time after this dance was over, Spotted Horse determined to make a journey to war and he led us about through the village, dancing, to get us ready. We started, and went far up on the head of the South Platte River, close to the Rocky Mountains. As we were traveling along, we came to a trail where a number of people had passed, and this trail led into the mountains. We followed it, and when it became fresher, Spotted Horse sent me with another ahead of the party to follow the trail and see where the camp was. We followed this trail, and at length, when we looked over a hill, we saw close to us a large herd of horses, and beyond them the camp. Then we turned about, and came back to our party and told Spotted Horse what we had seen. Here we held a council to decide what we should do, whether to attack the camp and try to kill some people, or to drive off the horses. We decided to take the horses. The people of this camp were Cheyennes. Before we started, we prayed and made sacrifices to Tirawa and to the Sun and Moon and Stars. After night had come, we went down to the camp, and while the young men gathered up the horses that were on the hills, older warriors went into the camp and cut loose those tied in front of the lodges. We drove off these horses—about 300—among them many spotted horses and mules. All that night and the next day and the second night and day, we rode very fast, but after that we went more slowly. On the seventh day we sat down in a circle and divided the horses. So TirAwa had taken pity on us and helped us through the power of this dance. CHAPTER V THE BUFFALO WIFE The story of the Buffalo Wife is a story of long ago, of a time before the Indians had horses, creatures which they perhaps first saw when Coronado’s wandering forces, searching for the cities of Cibola, penetrated the Grand Quivera and came to the watershed of the Missouri River. It was so long ago that the buffalo were scarce, and were seldom secured for food by the people. Possibly it goes back to a day when the tribe lived only on the border of the buffalo’s range. Or it may merely mean that the buffalo, big and strong and swift of foot, and protected by the thick hide’ with its dense coat, were but seldom captured by primitive man, whose best weapon was a stone-headed arrow. For in the country inhabited by the Pawnees, in that prehistoric time, they must have depended for buffalo chiefly on their arrows. There were few or no cliffs there over which the brown herds could be hurled to destruction ; there was little or no timber which could be used for making pens or corrals, such as were constructed by other tribes which lived closer to the mountains. To the Indians their sacred bundles were, and are, as the Ark of the Covenant to the Hebrews. They were the most sacred things they pos- sessed, and were regarded with the deepest veneration. This story tells how the Pawnees obtained a certain sacred bundle, which was especially efficacious when the buffalo could not be found near at hand on the prairie, and they wished to draw the herds to them. When such necessity arose, the priests and the aged mer. who were learned in such matters, made their prayers to the Spirit Father, opened the sacred bundle, and with elaborate ceremonial performed their religious rites. Soon after this had been done, the buffalo would make their appearance in the neighborhood of the camp, or would be discovered by the far-traveling and swift-footed scouts sent out from the village. The stick game is a favorite athletic diversion of the Pawnee youth. It is played by rolling along the ground a rawhide wheel or ring, six or eight inches in diameter, through which two contesting players try to throw the long slender sticks with which they play. Perhaps this game, so much enjoyed and so constantly played by the Pawnee, gave him the tough muscles, and the unending endurance which led him cheerfully to travel hundreds of miles on foot on the warpath, in search of the camps of his enemies. The supernatural powers of the buffalo cow, and of her husband, are note- worthy. To the virtue of the down feather given the hero by the eagle is 2c Id 36 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY ascribed his preservation when attacked by the buffalo. Many wild animals were believed to have more or less power of this nature. I In the Pawnee tribe there once lived a young man who was handsome and always took great care how he looked. He used to comb his hair and paint him- self, and put on his finest clothes and go about through the village. This young man had never had a wife. He did not care for women and never looked at them. He was a good hunter and warrior, and was brave. He had some power too. The birds had taken pity on him and had given him some of their things. In the lodge where he lived, on his bundle, there was the down feather of an eagle which he used to tie on his head when he went to war. ; One day they went out on a hunt, hunting buffalo, on foot, as they used to do inthe olden times. They found the buffalo and surrounded them, but the buffalo broke through the line and ran all ways, and the Pawnees got separated, some following one little bunch and some another. This young man chased a small band and followed them a long way, and at last they ran into a ravine where there was water standing and deep mud. Some of the buffalo got mired down, but pulled themselves out before the young man came close. But one young cow was in the deep mud and going through it slowly. The young man ran fast and came up to her just as she was getting out, and he put an arrow on his bow-string to shoot her, but when he looked to shoot, there was no buffalo there, but a woman was walking away from the edge of the mud hole. The young man wondered at this, for he did not know where the cow had gone, nor where the woman had come from. She was a nice looking girl, and the man knew she did not belong to his tribe. But he liked her and spoke to her and they talked together. After a little while, the man told her that he liked her and asked her if she would be his wife. He said, “My camp is not far; come with me there. I have a good lodge and plenty to eat.” But the girl said, “ No, I am strange to your relations and to your people Ido not knowthem. [I like you and I will be your wife, but only if you will first promise that we shall live alone off here by ourselves for a time.’ The man said, ‘Very well, I will promise. Let it beso.” So he took her for his wife and they camped for some time by themselves on the creek near by. He gave hera string of beads that he wore about his neck, blue beads and white, very pretty, and tied them about her neck. After a little while the buffalo moved further off, so that when the man went out hunting he had to start early in the morning and be gone all day. One day he went out for meat, and at night when he got back to his camp, there was no camp there, but all over the flat, where his lodge had stood, were tracks of a big Oa ra CLS y (ney, Ta a CHIEF WOLF ROBE CHEYENNE THE BUFFALO WIFE 37 herd of buffalo; many tracks and deep in the ground, as if they had been running fast. Then he knew what had happened, that a herd of buffalo had come and had stampeded and run over his camp and destroyed it, and trampled his wife. He cried all that night, and the next day he looked everywhere to find his wife’s body, that he might bury her, but he could not find any part of it. The buffalo must have stamped it all into the ground. He mourned for his wife for a long time, and at last he went back to his tribe and lived with them, going about as he used to do; but he told no one of what had happened to him while he was away. Perhaps the people thought he had been off alone on the warpath. He did not take another wife. II Some years after this, one day in summer, he was playing the stick game with the other young men, when a little boy came toward them from a ravine near by, and said to him, “ Father, Mother wants you.” The young man looked at the boy, and saw that he did not know him, and said, “I do not know your mother,” and paid no more attention to him. The little boy went away. After a short while the boy came again and said, ‘‘ Father, Mother wants you to come to her.” The young man said, “I am not your father and I do not know your mother. Go away.’ The little boy went away. Some of the young men when they heard the little boy call him “father,” laughed at him, for they knew he had never married and that he did not like women. After a little while the boy came again, and said, ‘‘ Father, Mother says you must come to her; she wants to speak to you.” Then the young man was angry, and spoke roughly to the boy, and sent him away. Some of the young men said to him, “ Why not go and see what it is, or who wants you?” As the little boy turned away the last time, the young man noticed on his neck a string of blue and white beads, and he said to himself, ‘‘ Where have I seen those beads before?” Then he tried to remember about them, and while he was standing there thinking, he saw a buffalo cow and calf come out of the ravine and run off over the prairie. Then all at once he knew where he had seen those beads before. Ill He went home to his lodge and put aside his sticks and took his bow and arrows and started off after the buffalo cow and calf. He followed them fast and far, but he could not catch up to them. The sun was hot, and after a time he began to get thirsty, but the cow was angry with him, and every time she crossed a ravine in which there was water flowing, she would make it dry. After a while the man got very thirsty, and it seemed to him that he could not go 38 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY further unless he drank. While he was thinking about this, the calf left its mother and ran back and spoke to him, and said, “ Father, are you tired?” His father said, “ Yes my son, I am tired and very thirsty.” The calf ran forward again to its mother’s side, and said to her, “‘ Mother, Father says he is tired and thirsty.” The cow said nothing. Then the calf ran back to the man and said, ‘Father, I will tell my mother that I am thirsty and then at the next ravine she will give me some water to drink. When you come to it, you look for alump of hard mud. When you see that, lift it up, and under it you will find water.” They ran on, and as they came to the next ravine, the cow made it dry, but the calf said to its mother, “ Mother, I am thirsty.’ The cow said, “Come, I will give you some water.” Down in the bottom of the ravine she stopped and stamped her hoof in the ground and the hoof print became full of water. Then she ran on. The calf put his mouth down as if to drink, but as soon as his mother had gone on, he took a piece of mud and put it over the hoof mark and then ran on. When the man had come to the place he looked about and saw the cake of dry mud and lifted it up, and saw there water, and he drank and felt better and went on. As the sun got low toward the west, he saw far ahead of him a white lodge, and he knew that this was where his wife was camped. At night he got to it and lay down on the ground a little way off. He was afraid to go close tothelodge. The buffalo had changed topersonsagain. In the daytime they were buffalo, but at night they were people. His little boy came out and spoke to him, and then went in and said to his mother, “Mother, Father is out there, very tired.” The woman answered nothing, but the boy came out and played with his father. Next morning the buffalo ran on again and the man followed them. He was now getting pretty hungry. After the middle of the day the calf ran back to him and said, “ Father, are you hungry?” The man said, “Yes, my son, I am hungry.” The calf said, “I will try to get my mother to give you some food.” The calf ran back to its mother and said to her, ‘“ Mother, Father is hungry.” The cow did not answer. She just ran on. After a time the calf said to the cow, “ Mother, Iam hungry.” She gave it a little piece of pounded buffalo meat and tallow, and the calf took it and fell behind. Pretty soon he ran back to his father and gave him the meat and said, “ Father, here is something for you to eat. Eat this, and when you have eaten enough, put what is left in your quiver.” The man looked at the small piece of meat and thought, “Why, this is only a mouthful. I could eat ten pieces like this.” But he said nothing and the calf ran back to its mother. The man took one bite of the meat, and then another, and kept on eating until his hunger was satisfied, and there was still left a piece of the meat, and he put it in his quiver and ranon. That night when he came JOHN MASKWAS POTTAWATOMI THE BUFFALO WIFE 39 to the lodge where the woman was, he lay down a little closer to it than the night before, and his boy came out and played with him. The next day they ran on and the man ran after them. By this time he was getting tired. That day the calf ran back and said, “ Father, are you tired?” The man said, “Yes, my son, I am tired.” The calf ran forward and said to its mother, “ Mother, I am tired.” The cow shook her tail over the calf to restore its strength. Then the calf ran back and shook its tail over its father. It thought this would take his weariness from him Every day they ran on, and each night the man lay a little closer to the lodge where the woman slept, until at last he lay down right by the door, and the next night he went in. She sat there by the fire with her back toward him, and her long hair hanging down on each side, so that it hid her face. She wore a buffalo robe. She neither looked at him nor spoke to him. They ran on for many days. One day the calf said to the cow, “Mother, where are we taking Father?” She said, “We are taking him to where your grandfathers will kill him.” IV At last one day, as the man went over a hill, he saw, on the ridge before him, all the buffalo drawn up in line. All the biggest bulls were there, and they pawed the ground and shook their heads and grunted. They seemed to be angry. The man ran on down toward the buffalo camp. When he got there, the chief bulls told him that they were going to kill him, but they said: “If you can tell which is your wife, we will save you.” They took six cows, all exactly alike, and put them in line on the prairie, and said to the man: ‘“ Now, which one of these is your wife?” The calf had come to its father and said: “ Father, I will be playing about my mother, and I will draw my tongue over her hip, just by the tail. Look for the mark. That will be my mother.” The man walked up in front of the cows and looked carefully at them. They were all alike. Then he walked behind them and all around them. On one, by the tail, he saw where the calf had licked it. This cow was the third from one end of the line. He walked round in front of them and went up to this cow and pointed to her and said: “ This is my wife.” The chief bulls were all surprised, but still they were angry, and the next day they said: “ We will kill you if you cannot pick out your son.” Before the time came, the calf said to him: “ Father, I will have a cocklebur in my tail. Look for that, and when you walk round in front of me, I will wink my eyes.” The chief bulls picked out five other calves, all alike, and put the six in line. The man looked at them, and then walked slowly round them, and he saw that 40 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY one of the calves at the end of the line had a cocklebur in its tail, and when he came round in front of them, this calf winked its eyes. So he walked up to it, and said: ‘“ That is my son.” After he had picked out his son, the buffalo were still angry. They told him that he must runa race, and that if he beat their runners, they would let him go. So they picked out their best runners, all the fastest young bulls, and they were put in line tostart. But the night before they ran it rained so that the ground was wet, and then it froze, and the buffalo slipped and sprawled on the ice and could not runatall. But the young man ran straight on and beat them all. Then the chief bulls were surprised again, but they were still angry. They held a council about this, and finally determined that they would kill him any- how. So they told him to sit down on the ground. He did so and drew his robe about him. Then all the strongest bulls made a rush together where he sat, and their heads struck together and they pushed, and the dust rose from the ground, and the feather from the man’s head was in the air floating over the herd, over where he had been sitting. Then all the bulls said: “Stop, stop, he is trampled to pieces by this time. Now let us see how much there is left of him.” And they drew back in a circle and looked, and there the man sat in the same place, and the feather was on his head. Then the bulls all rushed at him again from all sides, and they came together with great force, so that some of them broke their horns, and they pushed and struggled for a long time, and over the place where the man sat the feather floated. At last, the bulls said: ‘Well, now, surely, we have trampled him to pieces. He is all mixed up with the dirt.’ Then they drew back to look, and there sat the man inthe same place with his robe drawn about him, as before, and the feather was on his head. Then the bulls saw that he really had power, and they took him into their camp. They said: “We can do nothing with him. She is his wife now. We will give her to him, and the boy, and will send them back to his people. But they shall return to us and bring us blue beads, tobacco, eagle feathers, and a pipe, and after they have come back we will tell them what we will do.” When the little calf heard this he jumped about and kicked up his heels and ran round and round, with his tail sticking in the air. He was glad. The other calves in the herd had made fun of him because he had no father there. They had said: “You big-eyed fellow, you don’t belong here. You have no father here. You belong somewhere else.” The calf said to his father: ‘Oh, my father! They are going to send us back to your people and you are to get some things, and after you have brought back these things to my grandfathers, and my uncles, and all my relations, they are going to talk good to you.” PEA-TWY-TUCK SAC AND FOX THE BUFFALO WIFE 4] V They started back to the village. The man was changed into a buffalo so they might travel faster. One young bull would come up to him and push him about and rub against him, and the other buffalo would crowd against him and push him, and the first thing the man knew he was changed into a buffalo. Then he fought with the young bull, and after a while the bull gave out, and the man, woman and boy, in shape of buffalo, started for the village. When they got close to the village, they stopped ina ravine. There they threw themselves down on the ground, and when they got up they were persons. They went into the village and into the lodge. When they got there the woman was frightened. The smell of human beings made her afraid. The young man’s father was there in the lodge asleep. The young man told his father to get up, and to make a fire, and he did so. The wife sat down by the fire with her back toward it. The young man asked his father for some food, but the father said they had nothing to eat inthe camp. Then the young man asked his wife to give him some meat. She took out from under her robe a big piece of fat buffalo meat. The young man told his father to go out and ask the chiefs and his relations for the presents that he wanted to take back. Then the father went out and walked through the camp and called out to his relations that his son had come back, and wanted these presents to take away. Pretty soon the people came bringing the things. Some brought eagle feathers, some beads, and some tobacco. They ate of the meat that the women had given, and then the young man told the people that he had come back on purpose to get these presents, and that he was going far off with them, and that when he returned he would bring with him good news which he would tell them. He made a bundle of all these things, and he and his wife and boy went out of the lodge and left the camp. When they had come to the ravine he told his wife to make herself a buf- falo. She threw herself on the ground and became a buffalo cow, and the man tied on her head a bundle of presents. Then the little boy said he wanted to carry something. He wanted to carry the beads and the tobacco—the beads because they were pretty and the tobacco because his grandfathers liked that. He made himself a buffalo calf and carried these things. Last of all, the man became a buffalo. He carried nothing. They traveled, and traveled, and traveled, until they came to the buffalo camp. Some old buffalo who were poor, had started out to meet them. They were afraid that there might not be presents enough for everybody, and that they might get nothing. The man gave them some presents, tying the things to their horns. When he got to the camp, he found the bulls all drawn up in line, watching to see them come, and the cows and calves behind. They were glad tosee him. The man became 42 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY a person again and smoked with the chief bulls and gave them presents. Then he went and stood on a little hill, while all the buffalo filed by one after another, and to each one he gave a present; to one some tobacco, to another an eagle’s feather, and to another some beads, tying the things to their horns; and as they went away, they were glad and tossed their heads and felt proud of their gifts. Then the chief bulls said to him: ‘‘ We know that your people are poor and that they are often hungry, and we will go back with you to your camp.” The whole herd started for the Pawnee camp. Before they got there the little boy told his father that he and his mother could go to the camp, but that he would like to stay with the buffalo; that he wanted to see how the people did when they killed buffalo; to see whether they could catch him. The father said that he might stay. The main herd of the buffalo stopped not far from the village, and they sent the young man’s son and a few old buffalo on to a certain place. The man and his wife went to the village and told the people that in that certain place there would be a few old buffalo and one calf; that they must not hurt nor kill this calf, for it was his son. It would run back to the big herd of buffalo and would bring more. Next day the men started out from the camp to hunt buffalo, and they killed all the buffalo except this calf. It ran very fast and got away from them. After that, the man told them that the buffalo would keep coming, great herds of them, and that this calf would be the leader, a yellow calf. This calf they must not kill, but they should kill of the others what they could. The herd would follow this yellow calf always. It was so. VI After a time the boy came to the camp himself. He said to his father: “Father, I want you to tell these people that I shall no more come into this camp asa person. I am going to lead the buffalo east. Now when the people hunt, let the person who kills me sacrifice my flesh to Atius Tirdwa; let him tan my hide, and let him wrap up in it an ear of corn and other sacred things, and each year when they start out on the hunt, let them look out for a yellow calf so that they can sacrifice its flesh and save a piece of its fat to be put into my bundle. I want to be with my people always. Father, when my people are starving for meat, let the principal men, the chiefs, council together and let them bring the pipe to me, so that I may tell Tirdwa that the people are hungry, and he may send another yellow calf, which may lead the buffalo to my people, so that they may have plenty of meat.’ Then the boy went back to the herd. The father told the people what his son had said, and each man chose his fastest horse, because he wanted to kill the yellow calf. They surrounded the THE BUFFALO WIFE 43 buffalo, and one man killed the calf and tanned the hide. When the corn was gathered, the old men got together, and in the midst of the circle was spread the calf’s hide. They had an ear of corn with a “feather” on it, and they smoked, and prayed and talked about the boy, and burned the flesh of the calf to Atius, and afterwards burned sweet-grass. Then they wrapped the corn ina bladder and put it and a pipe and some sweet smelling herbs and some Indian tobacco in the hide, and put the bundle away. After that every herd was led by a yellow calf, but they never killed this calf, excepting once a year for the sacrifice. By this time the man was powerful. He was pretty nearly a chief and a priest, but now he forgot all about his buffalo wife. One night she disappeared, and the man felt so badly that he had no strength. He could not eat nor do anything, and he just dried up and died. But the sacred bundle was kept and handed down from generation to generation, and is to-day in the possession of Ta-huh-ka-ta-wi-ah, a member of the Skidi band of the Pawnees. NAICHE CHIRICAHUA APACHE CHAPTER. VI A BLACKFOOT SUN AND MOON MYTH* The Blackfoot creator is known as Vdf7, Napiu, or Na&pioa, according to the dialect spoken by the different tribes of the Blackfoot confederation. Quite extended stories are told of how he made the world, and of his adventures. The one here told goes back, apparently, to the time before the creation of the earth as we know it to-day, and treats of an incident in the boyhood of Vz. The story was related to me by an old Blood chief named Men-es-té-kos, which means “all are his children,” though the word is commonly translated “father of many children.” J/en-es-to-kos is not less than seventy years old, and perhaps much older. He told me that he first heard this tale when he was a small boy, from his great-grandmother, who at that time was a very old woman —so old that her face was all seamed with wrinkles, and that her eyelids hung down over her eyes so that she could not see. It was told one night whena number of other old men had been relating stories of early times, many of which referred to the doings of Wapz. The place where the tunnel was bored through the mountains is in the main range of the Rockies, south of the Dearborn River. This is the story: A long time ago, very far back, before any of these things had happened, or these stories had been told, there was a man who had a wife and two children. This man had no arrows nor bow, and no way to kill food for his family. They lived on roots and berries. One night he had a dream, and the dream told him that if he would go out and get one of the large spider-webs, such as hang in the brush, and would hang it on the trail of the animals where they passed, he would be helped, and would get plenty of food. He did this, and used to go to the place in the morning and find that the animals had stepped in this web, and their legs were tangled in it, and they would make no effort to get out. He would kill the animals with his stone axe, and would haul the meat to camp with the dog travois. One day, when he got to the lodge, he found that his wife was perfuming herself with sweet pine, burned over the fire, and he at once suspected that she had a lover, for he had never seen her do this before. He said nothing. The next day he told his wife that he must set his spider-web farther off. He did so, * American Folk Lore Journal, Vol. VI., p. 44. 45 46 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY and caught an animal, and brought part of the meat back tocamp. The next morning he told his wife to go and bring in the meat that he had left over in the hills. Now the woman suspected that her husband was watching her, so when she started, she went over the hill out of sight, and then stopped and looked back at the camp. As she peered through the grass, she saw her husband still sitting in the same place where he had been when she left him. She drew back and waited for a time, and then went out and looked a second time and saw him still sitting there. A third time she came back and looked, but he was still there, so she went off to get the meat. The man at length got up and went to the crest of the hill and saw that his wife was gone. He spoke to his children, saying: ‘Children, do you ever go with your mother to gather wood?”’ They said: “ No, we never go there.” He asked: ‘‘ Where does your mother go to get her wood?” They answered: “Over there in that large patch of dead timber is where she gets it.” The man went over to this big patch of timber, and found there a den of rattlesnakes. One of these snakes was his wife’s lover. He gathered up wood and made great piles of it andset them on fire. Then he went back tothe camp, and said to the children: “I have set fire to that timber, and your mother is going to be very angry. She will try to kill us. I will give you three things, and you must run away. For myself, I will wait here for her.’ He gave the children a stick, a stone, and a bunch of moss, and said: “If your mother runs after you, and you see that she is coming up to you, throw this stick behind you on your trail; and if she comes up with you again, throw the stone back. If that does not check her coming on, wet this moss, and wring out the water on your back trail. If you doasI tell you, your mother will not kill you nor me.’ The children started off, as he had told them to. Then he went out into the brush and got another spider-web and hung it over the door of the lodge. When the woman, a long way off, looked back and saw that her timber patch was all on fire she felt very sorry, and she ran back as hard as she could toward the lodge, angry, and feeling that she must do something. When she came to the lodge, she stooped to go in at the door, but got caught in the cobweb. She had one foot in the lodge, but the man was standing there ready, and he cut it off with his stone axe. She still struggled to get in, and at last put her head in, and he cut this off. When he had done this, the man ran out of the lodge and down the creek. His children had gone south. When the man ran down the creek, the woman’s body followed him, while the head started after the children, rolling along the ground. As they ran away, the children kept looking behind them to see whether their mother was following, but they did not see her coming until the head was we ges dpe tise! i hi Ge By eae L) } ge GAR TeELPA- ras J pees ca} Midler vale BARTELDA CHIRICAHUA APACHE A BLACKFOOT SUN AND MOON MYTH 47 close to them. The older of the two, when he saw it, said: ‘“ Why, here is mother’s head coming right after us!” The head called out and said: “Yes, children, but there is no life for you.” The boy quickly threw his stick behind him, as he had been told to do, and back from where the stick struck the ground it was all dense forest. The children ran on, but soon they again saw behind them the head coming. The younger said: “ Brother, our father said to throw the stone behind us if our mother was catching up. Throw it.” The elder brother threw the stone, and when it struck the ground it made a high mountain from ocean to ocean—from the north waters to the south waters. The woman could see no way to pass this wall, so she rolled along it till she came to a big water. Then the head turned and rolled back in the other direction until it came to another big water. There was no way to pass over this mountain. As she was rolling along, presently she came to two rams feeding, and she said tothem: “Open a passage for me through this mountain, so that I can overtake my children. They have passed over it, and I want to overtake them. If you will open a passage for me, I will marry the chief of the sheep.” The rams took this word to the chief of the sheep, and he said: ‘Yes, butt a passage through the mountains for her.” The sheep gathered and the rams began to butt the mountains. They knocked down the rocks and peaks and cliffs and opened ravines, but it took a long time to butt a passage through the mountains. They butted, and butted, and butted till their horns were all worn down, but the pass was not yet open. All this time the head was rolling around, very impatient, and at last it came to an ant-hill. It said to the ants: “Here, if you will finish the passage through those moun- tains, I will marry the chief ant.” The chief of the ants called out all his people, and they went to work boring in the mountains. They worked until they had bored a passage through the mountains. This tunnel is still to be seen, and the rocks about it all bored and honeycombed by the ants. When they had finished the passage, the head rolled through and went rolling down the moun- tain on the other side. The children were still running, and had now gone a long way, but aftera long travel they could see the head rolling behind them. The younger one said to the older, “ Brother, you must wet that moss;” and as they were running along they soaked it, and it was ready. When they saw that the head was catching up, they wrung out the bunch of moss on their trail behind them, and at once found that they were in a different land, and that behind them was a big water surrounding the country which they had just left. That is why this country is surrounded by water. The head rolled into this big water and was drowned. When the children saw that the head was drowned, they gathered wood and 48 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY made a large raft, binding the sticks together with willow bark, and at a place west of here, where the water is narrowest, they tried to sail back to the land that they had left. The wind was blowing from the west, and helped them, and they used sticks for paddles, and at last they reached the land. When they had landed they traveled east through countries occupied by many different tribes of Indians, to get back to the land that they had left, and when they reached this country, they found it occupied by a different people, the Snakes and the Crows. So the youngest boy said: “Let us separate. Here we are in a strange country and among a different people. You will follow the foot of the mountains and go north, and I will follow the mountains south, and see what I can discover.”’ So they separated, one going north and the other south. One of these boys was very shrewd and the other very simple. The simple one went north to discover what he could, and to make people. The smart boy is the one who made the white people in the south, and taught them how to make iron and many other things. This is why the whites are so smart. The simple boy who went north made the Blackfeet. Being ignorant, he could not teach them anything. He was known across the mountains as Left Hand, and in later years by the Blackfeet as Old Man (Vapz). The woman’s body chased the father down the stream, and is still following him. The body of the woman is the Moon, and the father is the Sun. If she can catch him she will kill him, and it will be always night. If she does not catch him, it will be day and night as now. CHIEF GERONIMO CHIRICAHUA APACHE CHAPTER VII FORMER DISTRIBUTION OF THE INDIANS The Indians who inhabited America at the discovery were not all alike. They were all Indians—all belonged to what Dr. Brinton has happily termed the American Race—but they did not all live in the same way or speak the same language or hold the same beliefs. There were many different tribes, scattered over a vast region from the arctic to the tropics, and from ocean to ocean, all occupied in struggling with nature and endeavoring in a thousand different ways to win subsistence from her. While the Indians were all of one race, some tribes were obviously more nearly alike than others. This similarity might be shown in various ways. Two groups might closely resemble one another in their modes of life, yet there might be no likeness in their languages nor in their views about the operations of nature and life, death and religion. Another two might speak languages that were closely allied, yet, owing to their surroundings, lead very different lives. While we may imagine that originally all related people lived in the same or neighboring territories, nevertheless, conditions might frequently arise which would cause groups to wander away and become permanently separated from their kinsfolk. Scarcity of food, quarrels within the tribe or among its divisions, the attacks of more powerful enemies, even the restlessness of men who were dissatisfied with their lot in life, might lead to such movements, whether mere temporary separations or extended migrations. That such separations were constantly taking place, we know from Indian tradition, for almost every tribe has some story which tells of its former occupancy of another and distant land, and speaks of other tribes—its relations—from which it parted long ago; we know it also from the fact that tribes now separated by great distances hold similar beliefs and speak similar languages, and finally we know it from the history of such migrations which have taken place since our forefathers occupied the land. And indeed the white man did much to promote such migrations, for his settlement more than anything else crowded the Indian from his ancestral home and forced him to seek some spot which the newcomers had not invaded. The tribe thus driven out would, perhaps, encroach on the territory of some other tribe, and if sufficiently powerful, push it beyond its own home against some neighboring tribe, and so the process of moving along was continued. Ethnologists long ago determined that the surest and most natural classif- cation of the different tribes of Indians is one founded on the language which 49 5° THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY each speaks. So all the tribes speaking the same language or its dialects are said to constitute a linguistic family, or language stock. Often these several languages, although related, may be so different that a tribe speaking one dialect may be unable to understand other dialects of the same language, just as an Englishman may not understand French or German, which are languages closely related to his own. In 1891, Major J. W. Powell published in the Seventh Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology, a Classification of the Indian Linguistic Families of America, north of Mexico, which has found general acceptance among students of ethnology. His list included fifty-eight language stocks, and has since been but slightly modified, so that the linguistic families of North America now number fifty-nine and represent over eight hundred tribes. These families with rough suggestions of the territory occupied by each are given in alphabetical order in the succeeding pages. Several of these families are actually extinct, and others are practically so, while almost two-thirds of the remainder are confined to the Pacific slope and often occupy territories so small and are represented by tribes so unimportant as to be almost unknown, except locally. Such families have little interest for the general reader, and are mentioned only to complete the list. In the case of more important and better known families, attention is sometimes called to points which bear on problems which are often discussed. ALGONQUIAN FAMILY No other North American linguistic stock had so wide a distribution as the Algonquian. Its tribes occupied the greater part of the North Atlantic coast as far south as Cape Hatteras and north to the St. Lawrence River, and inhabited the whole of Labrador, except the strip on the sea-coast held by the Eskimo; thence their territory extended west throughout most of Canada, nearly to the Rocky Mountains, and they held a considerable area south of the Great Lakes, including West Virginia, parts of Pennsylvania, Ohio and Michigan, all of Kentucky, Indiana and Illinois. This is believed to include the most of the Algonquian territory at the time of the discovery of America; later the westernmost Algonquian tribes, the Blackfeet, Cheyenne and Arapaho, migrated to and even crossed the Rocky Mountains. The tribes of this family are by far the best known of all American Indians; and they have left memorials of their former occupancy of the land in the names of States, counties, towns and villages in the most thickly settled parts of America. It was with Algonquians that the Pilgrim Fathers fought when they first landed; it was Algonquians that the first settlers of Virginia drove back into the mountains; it was with Algonquians that William Penn did his FORMER DISTRIBUTION OF THE INDIANS 5I peaceful trading, and to-day in the minds of Americans the Algonquians stand as the type of the Indian. Scattered all over the vast territory which they occupied, were many dif- ferent tribes, some of them speaking languages that were closely related and easily understood by their neighbors, others, whose separation from the main stock had been longer, speaking tongues that were not understood. Many of the tribes had relations with each other which were friendly; others were often at war with those of their own blood. The habits of the different tribes varied greatly, being of course modified by the conditions of their several environments. All who lived in a territory where agriculture could be practiced did more or less farming, cultivating corn, the squash and tobacco. Usually they inhabited permanent villages; but, except during seedtime and harvest, they wandered to some extent for the purpose of hunting and of gathering the wild fruits, such as berries, nuts and roots, on which in part they subsisted. There is a record of between 30 and 4o different Algonquian languages and a greater number of tribes, many of which have be- come extinct, yet even so there exist to-day in North America not far from 100,000 people of this race. Of these the greater part are in Canada. ATHAPASCAN FAMILY The Athapascan family also is remarkable for the extent of territory which it covers. In northern North America it is found from Hudson's Bay west to the Pacific Ocean, and it extends from the mouth of the Mackenzie River on the Arctic Ocean interruptedly south into Mexico. Its latitudinal range, there- fore, is greater than that of any other American family. These people call themselves Tinne, Dinne or Déne, terms meaning “people.” The word Athabasca, taken from the lake of that name, is said to signify “place of hay,” while Chippewyan, a term which has also been applied to this family from one of its tribes, means “pointed coats.” The northernmost tribe of the Athapascans live about the mouth of the Mackenzie River, occupying the same territory with the Eskimo, and leading lives somewhat similar to them. On the whole, however, the Athapascans are inland people, the northern group being found throughout northern British America, west of Hudson’s Bay, and Alaska, except for a narrow strip of sea-coast, and south nearly to the Saskatchewan River. In old times, we are told by traditions of some western Algonquians, the Beaver River was the southern limit of the Athapascans in the northern interior. In Washington, Oregon and California, living on the sea-coast and just back from it, are many small tribes of Athapascan stock, most of them, perhaps, immigrants from the north in comparatively modern times. The southernmost peoples of this 52 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY family are the Navajo and Apache of New Mexico, Arizona and Old Mexico. It is perhaps doubtful whether they have occupied that territory for very many hundred years. The extended north and south range of this family has caused it to develop in many different directions, and to assume a great variety of habits of life. Its tribes are people of great energy and strong initiative; and when brought in contact with other less forceful races, they quickly gain the mastery, and direct them according to their will. Descent among the Athapascans is usually in the female line, the son and wife not considering the father and husband any relation to them. In Alaska, and probably in British America as well, the last few years have witnessed a great decrease in numbers of people of this stock. I was recently informed by a man who had spent two years on Copper River, that when he went there, there were not far from two hundred Indians living along the river, and that when he came out, this number had been reduced, as nearly as he could learn, to thirty-five. On the other hand, the Navajoes of the Southwest are said to be increasing in number. They possess great flocks and herds, ship each year large quantities of wool of their own shearing, raise considerable crops by means of irrigation, and finally are expert blanket weavers and silversmiths. There are twenty-five or thirty distinct tribes of Athapascans, many of whom speak dialects that are not intelligible to other tribes of their family. ATTACAPAN FAMILY The home of the Attacapan stock was on the Gulf coast of Louisiana. These people were called by their neighbors cannibals, the name of the tribe meaning, in Chocta, man-eater. Very little is known of them, though we have a considerable vocabulary of their language, which is treated as an independent one, although it is suspected that it may have relationships with that of the Chiti- machan, whose small territory touched that of the Attacapan. BEOTHUKAN FAMILY When Newfoundland was discovered, it was inhabited by a tribe or race of Indians known as Beothuks, now long extinct, and of whom little is known. They are only vaguely mentioned by the earliest travelers. Early in the eighteenth century Newfoundland began to be colonized by Algonquian tribes from the mainland, who fought with and ultimately drove back the Beothuks, who were also persecuted by the French. We hear of this family last in 1827, after which it disappeared. CHIEF JOSH SAN CARLOS APACHE FORMER DISTRIBUTION OF THE INDIANS 53 The Beothuks are said to have been unusually light in color, although they were commonly called Red Indians, no doubt from the fact that they painted their faces and perhaps their bodies red. In certain of their habits they seem to have differed from the tribes of the mainland, their canoes and houses being reported distinctly different from anything that we know. They did not possess dogs. They were skillful in carv- ing and tanning. Their language shows some words of Algonquian origin and others resembling the Eskimo, but, on the whole, it stands alone. CADDOAN FAMILY This was an important family, occupying portions of the western plains, from the Gulf of Mexico interruptedly nearly to the northern boundary line of the United States. The northernmost of its tribes is the Arikara, now living on the Missouri River, about Fort Berthold, but formerly at different points further down that stream, perhaps as far south as the Platte. Next, south of these, came the four tribes commonly known as Pawnee, which long resided between the Loup Fork of the Platte on the north, and the Smoky Hill River, in Kansas, on the south, controlling a large extent of territory. Still farther south, in the Indian Territory and northern Texas, were the Wichita, and again to the southward, the Caddo, Kichai, Hueco and Tawakoni tribes. The traditions of the Pawnees, told with some detail, state that they came from the South- west, probably from a point on the Gulf of California. The Pawnees were more distinctly agricultural than any of the tribes of the northern plains. They have always raised crops on fields which they have cultivated near their villages. The villages consisted of a number of dome- shaped houses, built of poles and sod and dirt, each one of which might be large enough to hold a dozen or twenty families. Between the time of planting in the spring and of harvesting in the fall, most of the able-bodied people of the different villages left their homes to travel to the buffalo ground, where game enough was killed to furnish meat, robes and lodge-skins for the requirements of the next six months. In the winter, when the robes were at their best, another hunting excursion was made. Within the past few years the Pawnees have been rapidly on the decline. The main tribe, which a quarter of a century ago numbered about three thousand, is now reduced to about seven hundred. The Arikara and Wichita are still fewer in number, while of the Kichai and Tawakoni, less than one hundred each remain. Among the tribes of the Pawnee stock, there survived until recently many customs found among the Aztecs when the Spaniards first 54 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY met them. Like many other tribes, they venerate the earth. Corn is sacred to them ; they call it the Mother, and have many ceremonies connected with it. Less than thirty years ago the Pawnee women still cultivated their corn with bone hoes, made from the shoulder blade of the buffalo, fastened to the end of a stick. They greatly reverence the evening star, which they believe to have an influence on their crops, and some of the tribes—and in ancient times, perhaps, all of them—offered each year a human being as a sacrifice, to insure the success of the crop. The ceremony connected with this sacrifice was an elaborate one, and the act was one of worship—as much so as was the burnt- offering to Jehovah by the Jews. Besides those mentioned, there were a number of other tribes of Caddoan stock, all of which have become extinct. CHIMMESYAN FAMILY The tribes of this family occupied the coast and river region of portions of northern British Columbia and southern Alaska. It is to this stock that the Metlakahtla Indians belong. This tribe—now about one thousand in number—was visited and first instructed more than forty years ago by Mr. Wm. Duncan, and wholly through his efforts has become entirely civilized. In 1887 they were driven from Canada by what may be fairly called religious persecution, and removed to Annette Island, in Alaska, where they founded a new settlement, called New Metlakahtla. Here there is a large and prosperous village—with schoolhouses and a very handsome church— occupied by Indians who are civilized and self-sustaining. They have a salmon cannery here which is the main support of the settlement. Efforts have been made recently, and are still continued, to take this island from the Metlakahtlas, although when the Government assigned it to them, they were promised that it should be theirs as long as they chose to occupy it. There are eight or nine tribes of this family, numbering in all less than five thousand people. CHINOOKAN FAMILY The tribes embraced within this family live along the Columbia River from its mouth to the Dalles, and their villages also extend on the Pacific coast, north to Shoal Water Bay and south to Tillamuk Head. There are about a dozen tribes. Their name was given to the trade jargon of the northwest coast. CHITIMACHAN FAMILY The home of this family, which, so far as known, consisted of only a single tribe, was in Louisiana. They were sun worshipers, and are said to have been i ol he aS ° ace TS [i ic ar Woman] FAR inenary : Le ae See LCE) ieee NASUTEAS WICHITA FORMER DISTRIBUTION OF THE INDIANS 55 monogamous. The tribe is now almost extinct, there being less than fifty individuals, still living in Louisiana. The tribal organization was abandoned in 1879. COPEHAN FAMILY This family was made up of a number of tribes, living in California and nowhere touching the sea-coast. They occupied a narrow block of territory extending from the region of the Sastean family on the north, south nearly to San Francisco Bay. They thus separated the many small families which lived on the sea-shore, from others living in the mountains, such as the Pujunan, Yanan and Palaihnihan. ESKIMOAN FAMILY The Eskimo are the most northern people of North America and are also one of the most widely extended, for they live along the coast from eastern Greenland to the Bering Sea and the extremity of the Aleutian Islands, with some villages in Siberia. At the present day they are almost exclusively a sea- coast people, for although they occasionally penetrate the interior for the purpose of hunting caribou, musk-ox, and other large animals, they do not go long dis- tances from the coast. The coast people of the Alaskan Peninsula, as far south as Prince William Sound, and of the Aleutian Islands, commonly known as Aleuts, belong to this family, although the language which they speak is not to-day understood by the Eskimo. The name Eskimo is derived from an Algonquian term, and means, “he eats raw flesh.” They call themselves Innuit, meaning people, a term used to desig- nate themselves by many of our American tribes. Although the Eskimo are at present dwellers in the Arctic and along the sea-shore, they have not always been so. Their traditions speak of a time when they lived far to the south, and tell the story of their migration, and this is con- firmed by the investigations of those who have studied them. There is other evidence that the Eskimo were once found as far south as the valleys of the Ohio and Delaware Rivers. Those Eskimo now found in Siberia are emigrants from American shores, and at present there is constant intercourse between the Eskimo of Asia and those of Alaska, and the Asiatic villagers frequently cross to Alaska for the purpose of trading with the whalers. Of the number of the Eskimo, not very much is certainly known; the best estimates ten years ago were about 20,000 for the inhabitants of Alaska, 11,000 for those of Baffin Land, 2,000 for those of Labrador and 10,000 for those of Greenland. So far as may be judged from recent reports as to the condition of the Alaska Innuit, their numbers are decreasing rapidly. Liquor is commonly 56 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY traded to them by the whalers, and their intercourse with the white people seems to be rapidly tending toward their destruction. They are a contented, cheerful people, remarkable for the ingenuity with which they have adapted themselves to the hard conditions surrounding them, and notable for their imagination and their extraordinary dexterity in fashioning tools, and in carving. They have an inexhaustible fund of songs, stories end traditions. IROQUOIAN FAMILY The Iroquois, famous as being the founders of the League of the Six Nations, as well as for their prowess as warriors, occupied considerable ter- ritories in the eastern United States and Canada, and were early known to the whites. Their country lay on both sides of the St. Lawrence River, from Quebec up that stream, and on both sides of Lake Ontario and Lake Erie, and, stretching southward through New York and Pennsylvania, terminated at the head of Chesapeake Bay. Another large section of the family, the Cherokee, occupied portions of Virginia, Tennessee, North and South Carolina, Georgia and Alabama, and there were two isolated settlements in southeast Virginia and northeast North Carolina. In early times the Iroquois were noted for their fierceness in war. They made long journeys from their northern home, down to the southern sea-coast, where they raided the tribes of Algonquian and Siouan stock, to whom their name was terrible. It is probable indeed that this continuous warfare was one of the chief reasons for the westward migration of the Siouan tribes which Mr. Mooney has announced to us. The Iroquois were not only hardy warriors, but were also very superior physically, and this superiority has continued to the present time. Dr. Brinton has told us that “the five companies (500 men) recruited from the Iroquois of New York and Canada during our Civil War, stood first on the list among all the recruits of our army for height, vigor, and corporeal symmetry.” . The League of the Iroquois is well known and has been fully described by Mr. Hale and Dr. Brinton. The five original nations were the Onandaga, Mohawk, Oneida, Seneca and Cayuga, to which were added later the Tuscarora and portions of the Neutral Nation, making the Six Nations which have become historic. The purpose of this league, which is said to have been devised by the Onandaga chief, Hiawatha, about the middle of the sixteenth century, was to abolish war altogether. Notwithstanding their extended war journeys, the Iroquois were asedentary people, living in permanent villages, whose houses were built of logs, and which by Riery 1698 & ey aa : ° tre CHIEF TOWONKONIE JIM WICHITA FORMER DISTRIBUTION OF THE INDIANS 57 were fortified with palisades. They cultivated great fields of corn, beans and tobacco, raising each year more than they could consume. The ritual of their religion and their legends and myths were highly developed and were handed down with most scrupulous care from generation to generation. As aids to the memory in regard to all these matters, they had devised belts and strings of wampum in which the arrangement and design of the beads had relation to the course of the story or the chant. It is interesting to note, asan example of how long a name may live in the popular mind after it has lost its original meaning, that to-day in North Carolina and Virginia a certain sort of bear which is supposed to be particularly ferocious is called Sinnaker, which is the confused survival there of the terrible name Seneca, and has come down, but little changed in form, with its original meaning all lost, but still retaining the idea of ferocity, from the time when the Seneca and their fierce relatives of the Six Nations used to raid the more peaceful Indian tribes, which surrounded the struggling white settlers on the Atlantic coast. KARANKAWAN FAMILY These people had their home on the coast of Texas, between the mouths of the Colorado and Nueces Rivers. Sibley, writing in the early part of this century, states that they spoke the Attacapan language. Not very much is known of the tongue spoken by the Karankawas, and as the tribe is practically extinct, there is little prospect of any knowledge on this subject. The Spanish called them cannibals and gave them a very bad name, but in modern times they have appeared a quiet people. KIOWAN FAMILY The Kiowan family is represented by a single tribe, the Kiowa, which at the time when the white men first reached the Great Plains, roamed about the head waters of the Platte River. Where they came from is not known, but Cheyenne tradition tells us that less than 250 years ago, when they had crossed the Mis- souri River and reached the plains north of the Black Hills, they found the Kiowas and Comanches occupying the country between those mountains and the Yellowstone River. Mr. Mooney has traced the Kiowas as far to the northwest as the Three Forks of the Missouri. In more modern times, the Kiowas were buffalo hunters and brave warriors, but by the Medicine Lodge Treaty in 1867, they gave up their free life and agreed to be assigned to their present reservation in the Indian Territory, which they have since occupied jointly with the Comanches. 58 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY Although the Kiowas are classed as an independent stock, their language nevertheless presents many points of likeness to the Shoshonean languages, yet this similarity does not appear sufficient to justify the classing the Kiowas with the Shoshonis. KITUNAHAN FAMILY Two or three closely related tribes living on the main range of the Rocky Mountains, some to the north and some to the south of the boundary line between the United States and Canada, are the only representatives of this family. They are known to the whites as Kutenai. They are for the most part mountain Indians and have always supported themselves by hunting, fishing, and gathering roots, although formerly they regularly visited the plains to hunt buffalo. There are not many of them left to-day. KOLUSCHAN FAMILY A number of tribes living on the northwest seacoast are classed together as Tlinkit. They inhabit the coast of Alaska and its islands, and draw their subsistence largely from the sea. They are a maritime people, tall and well built, and the men have considerable hair on the face. Usually they live in permanent houses, constructed of heavy planks, split from the trunks of the white cedar trees. Their canoes, hollowed out from the trunks of trees, are fine in model, and are often artistically carved and painted. The fronts of their houses and many of their utensils are also elaborately carved and painted, and before the houses are often erected sculptured totem poles, which represent the ancestry of the house-owner, and also often contain the ashes of the dead. Colossal wooden figures of birds and animals are erected over the graves of the medicine men, who are buried, not burned. The Tlinkit made effective weapons and utensils of stone and bone, and hammered out ornaments and weapons from the native copper, which they picked up. They were traders and slave-holders, purchasing slaves from neighboring tribes or capturing them in war. The Tagish, living on the headwaters of the Lewis River, is the only inland tribe of this stock. Most of the Tlinkit tribes are in some degree civilized, and in summer work in the canneries of Alaska. They receive no aid from the Government. KULANAPAN FAMILY The region occupied by this family extended back from the shores of the Pacific Ocean, south of the Russian River in northern California. There were a large number of tribes or villages. FORMER DISTRIBUTION OF THE INDIANS 59 LUTUAMIAN FAMILY Two tribes, the Klamath and the Modoc, belong to this family. The latter will be remembered in connection with the so-called Modoc war, in which General Canby was killed. MUSKHOGEAN FAMILY South of the Algonquians and Iroquois, and extending from the Mississippi River on the west to the Atlantic Ocean on the east and to the Gulf of Mexico on the south, lived the Muskhogean tribes. They occupied a part of Tennessee and most of Mississippi, Alabama and Georgia. On the borders of this ter- ritory lived a few small unrelated stocks, while most of Florida to the south- ward was occupied by the now extinct Timuquanan family. The tribes of the Muskhogean family lived in a fertile country with abundant rainfall and were well advanced and prosperous. They resided in permanent towns with strong and durable wooden buildings, often placed for defense on artificial mounds. They cultivated the ground, raising large crops, and their stone weapons and utensils were of striking beauty. Among the Muscogee, descent was in the mother’s line. Women were honored and sometimes were chiefs. The tribes were divided into gentes, and marriage was forbidden within the gens. The burial customs somewhat resembled those of the Hurons, the bones of the dead, after a certain time, being cleaned and deposited ina common sepulchral mound. They have traditions of a migration from the west and northwest. Many of the customs of the Muscogee bear close resemblance to those of the so-called ‘“Mound-Builders”’ of the Ohio Valley and it is probable that they are the descendants of those people, about whom there has been so much speculation. Most of the Muscogee of the present day are in the Indian Territory. Several of the tribes are practically extinct or absorbed, but the Creek, Chocta, Chikasa and Seminole still survive as considerable tribes. There are said to be a few Chocta in Mississippi and the Florida Seminoles are well known. NAHUATLAN FAMILY This family, which was formerly regarded as belonging to the Shoshonean linguistic stock, is represented by a number of tribes, most of which reside in Mexico. It was one of the three principal divisions of Dr. Brinton’s Uto- Aztecan family. Its territory lies south of the United States. NATCHESAN FAMILY The people of this stock resided on the Mississippi River not far from the present town of Natchez. There appear to have been two tribes, the Natches 60 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY and the Taensa. The latter have long been extinct, and nothing is known about their language further than the statements of the old writers that it was allied to that of the Natches. In 1882 a supposed vocabulary and grammar of the Taensa language was published in Paris by J.D. Haumonté. It was received by American students with great interest, but a little examination showed that the supposed language had been invented by the man who published it, and who pretended to have derived his materials from an ancient Spanish manuscript. In the American Anthropologist for July, 1899, Mr. James Mooney has given a very interesting account of the extermination of the Natches. There are still a very few Natches among the Creeks in the Indian Territory. PIMAN FAMILY In the Piman family are included several desert inhabiting tribes which live in southern Arizona and in Mexico. Of these the best known are the Pima and the Papago, with which last are usually mentioned the Maricopas, who, however, though for two centuries associated with the Pimas, belong to a different family. Such association of two tribes of different families is not uncommon. Another example of it is seen in the case of the Blackfeet and the Sarsi. The Piman tribes are believed by eminent authorities to have been the occupants of the valley of the Gila River at the time when that country sup- ported a large population of agricultural people, who watered the land by extensive irrigating ditches and occupied permanent houses collected together in considerable towns. These were the builders of the Casas Grandes and of those other ruins in that region which have been the subject of so much speculation and have given rise to so many theories. When the early Catholic missionaries first came to the Pimas, they found them occupying houses built of large adobe bricks, and sometimes roofed with tiles, or built of wood and plastered with mud. Piman tradition claims these ruins as their former homes, and some of the tribes were also the builders and occupants of some of the cliff dwellings, so abundant in the region. From this territory, the Pimas were driven by the attacks of the Athapascan invaders from the north, and were forced to flee southward to their relatives in the desert. The Apaches still relate the tradition of their attacks on the cliff-dwellers, long, long ago, and tell how they drove them from their homes. Nevertheless, the Pimas are said by the early historians to have been a brave, as well as an industrious people. Besides the corn which they grew and on which they chiefly subsisted, these tribes raised cotton, which they wove and dyed with much skill. FORMER DISTRIBUTION OF THE INDIANS 61 PUEBLO FAMILIES Under the general title Pueblo, a Spanish word meaning town, are grouped together in the public estimation members of four different language stocks, who are called Pueblo Indians, because they inhabit large communal houses of two or more stories. Their method of life has nothing to do with their race; they were obliged to adopt it as a means of protection against their enemies. Many speculations have been indulged in with regard to the ruins of houses, cliff dwellings, irrigation ditches and other works which are scattered through the Southwest, chiefly in New Mexico and Arizona and to the southward; and these constructions have been supposed to be relics of some high civilization which existed in that region in prehistoric times. No such elaborate theories are needed to explain these remains, which were probably constructed in part by the ancestors of the present Pueblo tribes, who at one time were much more numerous than now, and in part by the Pimas. When the Spaniards under Coronado marched north to explore the land, they found the Pueblos living in towns and cultivating the soil by means of irriga- tion ; safe within their fortresses from the attacks of their fierce enemies of the lower land, and for a short time protected there, even against the Spaniards clad in armor and bearing guns. To-day, the Pueblos live much as they lived then, but most of them now speak Spanish and many bear Spanish names. They have had Spanish missionaries for more than 300 years. They have always cultivated the soil, growing corn, cotton, peaches and apricots, and have considerable herds of horses, donkeys, cows and sheep. They are skillful weavers, make pottery and to some extent work the turquoise, which they mine from veins in the mountains. They understand the art of weaving feathers and make some basket work; they grind their corn on the stone mill called metate and thresh their wheat by driving horses over the straw lying on the ground; then choosing a time of day when the wind blows, the people enter the corral and throw grain and chaff into the air and the wind winnows it forthem. It is then gathered up, placed in baskets and once more cleaned by being poured ina little stream from a height down to the ground, when it is ready to be used. The celebrated houses of the Pueblos are built either of stone or of adobes and each one is usually occupied by the members of a single gens. When stones are used for the houses, they are held together by mud mortar. The dwellings on the cliffs were usually built on ledges, and often consisted only of an outer wall enclosing a cave. For the walls squared stones only were used, and the homes were reached sometimes by ladders, sometimes by steps cut in the rock, and sometimes even by ropes let down from above. The religious ceremonial of the Pueblos, whatever their stock, is elaborate, 62 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY and has been carefully studied by the workers of the Bureau of Ethnology. It is among the Pueblo Indians that the famous snake dance takes place. This is performed with live rattlesnakes, which the dancers carry about in the teeth as they rush through the dance. The ceremony is curious and interesting and has been many times described. It is a form of worship; in effect a prayer for rain. Setting aside the Moki—the Hopi—which belongs to the Shoshonean family, the Pueblo people are grouped in three families. KERESAN FAMILY This family includes the Pueblos known as: Acoma, San Felipe, Cochiti, Santa Ana, Hasatch, Santo Domingo, Laguna, Seemunah, Paguate, Sia, Punyeestye, Wapuchuseamma, Punyekia, Ziamma. Pusityitcho, TANOAN FAMILY Fourteen Pueblos are included in this language stock. They are:. Hano, Sandia, Isleta (in New Mexico), San Ildefonso, Isleta (in Texas), San Juan, Jemez, Santa Clara, Nambe, Senecu, Picuris, Taos, Pojoaque, Tesuque. All these villages were upon the Rio Grande and its tributaries, except the pueblo of Hano, which a long time ago, united itself with the Moki settlement to the east of the river Colorado Chiquito. SALISHAN FAMILY Many of the tribes of this family lived on the seacoast of Oregon, while others occupied almost the whole of northwestern Washington, a considerable area in eastern Vancouver Islands, and a great territory on the mainland in British Columbia, extending far inland. They also lived along a considerable part of the Upper Columbia River. There were between sixty and seventy small tribes and there are still existing perhaps 20,000 people of this family. ae ara 18 5 fy” WE, h by ' rR aa 1 Ca - ee a D na ie a oe ee a + #e y - NG re. CHIEF WHITE MAN KIOWA FORMER DISTRIBUTION OF THE INDIANS 63 The Salish are a people who depend in some degree on hunting but chiefly on fish, which they capture on the seacoast or in the rivers when the salmon run up to spawn. They differ from many tribes in that descent is in the male line, and the child does not follow the mother. The best known tribes of Salish stock in the United States to-day are the Flathead, Kalispel, Pend d’Oreillesand Spokane. The Flatheads never flattened the head, as we understand it, this practice having been followed by other tribes living to the northwest of them. Mr. Mooney has shown that the term was applied to the Flatheads in contempt, by tribes further to the west, who by artificial means had changed the shape of the head, making it pointed. The term as used by the more westerly Indians meant head that is flat on top, z. é., not pointed; but the first travelers gave this name to tribes which compressed the forehead, meaning flat forehead. Thus Indians and whites used the same name for two diametrically opposite things, and the term was naturally misunderstood by both. SERIAN FAMILY The Seri and two related tribes were formerly considered as belonging to the Yuman family, but recent investigations, resulting in a fuller knowledge of - their language, has led to the establishment of the Serian family. The Seris occupy the deserts of the eastcoast of the Gulf of California as well as some islands in the Gulf. They are perhaps the most primitive of the North American tribes. They still use stone weapons, and make curious boats of bundles of rushes tied together. They are said to use poisoned arrows. We owe most of what is known about the people of this family to the studies of that emi- nent ethnologist, Mr. W J McGee. Its territory is south of the United States. SHAHAPTIAN FAMILY This family occupied a large area of country along the Columbia River and its tributaries, between the parallels of 44° and 46° North Latitude. They thus touched the country of the Shoshoni and the Blackfeet on the southeast and east, and extended westward to the Pacific coast tribes. They sometimes crossed the mountains and descended to the plains to hunt buffalo. The best known among the Shahaptian tribes are the Nez Percés, whose celebrated dash for freedom from their old reservation toward British America will always be famous in Indian history. This so-called war was brought about by the encroachments on their reservation of white people, while the remonstrances sent to the Government by the Indians were disregarded. Collisions between the trespassers and the Indians became frequent, and a commission was sent from Washington to try to induce the Indians to move 64 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY away to some other spot. They acceded to this request, but while they were preparing to move, and were collecting their cattle and horses for the change, a band of white robbers attacked them, killed one or more of the men in charge, and ran off with the cattle. This was the climax. Joseph, chief of the Nez Percés, could no longer restrain his men, who attacked a neighboring settlement and killed twenty-one people. Troops were ordered out to punish them, and the Indians began their retreat. The band numbered about four hundred and fifty, of whom more than three-fourths were women and children. Yet they crossed the Rocky Mountains, came out on the plains, and after the loss of more than half their men, had reached the Bearspaw Mountains, almost within sight of the British line, when they were overtaken by fresh troops, their retreat was cut off, and they finally surrendered ; only, however, on pledge that they should return to Idaho in the spring. Nevertheless, they were sent to the Indian Territory, where fever still further reduced their numbers, and not until seven years later was the promise kept which had been made on their surrender, and they were sent back to the place from which they had come. The Nez Percés are a fine race, who may compare well with any Indians on this continent. As long ago as 1843 they were described in the report of the Indian Commissioner as ‘‘ noble, industrious, sensible.” They had always been friendly to the whites, notwithstanding the many wrongs that they had suffered at their hands. SHOSHONEAN FAMILY The vast areas originally controlled by the Algonquian and Athapascan families have already been spoken of, but there was one other language stock whose original territory almost equaled theirs. This was the group known as the Shoshonean. If the Algonquians controlled a country stretching from Georgia to Labrador and from the Atlantic Ocean to the Rocky Mountains, and the Athapascans had tribes on the borders of the Arctic Ocean and also in northern Mexico, the territory of the Shoshoneans extended from near the parallel of 49° north latitude almost uninterruptedly south to the Isthmus of Panama, and from the Pacific Ocean east to the great plains, and even to the Gulf of Mexico. Dr. Brinton has called this the Uto-Aztecan stock. It was remarkable, not only for the extent of territory which it occupied, but also for the great diversity of cultures found among its tribes. The so-called Digger Indians of Nevada and California are the lowest physical types found among the North American Indians, and were also the most miserable in the life they led, while the Aztecs of Mexico possessed the highest culture of any of the inhabitants of North America. PABLINO DIAZ KIOWA FORMER DISTRIBUTION OF THE INDIANS 65 Among the best known of the Shoshonean tribes were the Comanches, who, more than two hundred years ago, ranged over the great plains as far north as the Yellowstone River. Gradually driven south from this country, they have been in our own time fierce raiders in the Southwest, harrying without mercy the settlements of Texas, and carrying their war expeditions far south into Mexico, whence they supplied themselves constantly with fresh herds of horses and with Captives who grew up in the tribe, and, on reaching manhood, became fierce enemies of their own blood. The Comanches are very closely related to the Snakes, or Shoshonis, and it is said that a part of them separated from the Shoshonis not much more than one hundred years ago. The tribal sign by which they denote themselves is identical with that for the Shoshonis. Most of the people of this stock are sun and light worshipers, and all of them have a great reverence for the coyote, which is in some sense deified by them and corresponds ina measure with Napi and Nanibozho, of the Algonquian tribes. The Moki, or Hopi, belong to the Shoshonean family, but have adopted the Pueblo method of life. There are not far from fifty tribes of this stock, most of which, however, live in Mexico or to the southward. Among the best known of those found in the United States are the following: Bannock, Chemehuevi, Comanche, Gosiute, Piute, Paviotso. Shoshoni, Moki, Ute. SIOUAN FAMILY Because of the warfare which in recent years has been carried on between the Sioux and the white men, this is one of the more familiar of Indian names. The northern members call themselves Dakota, meaning allied or confederated, while the English name, Sioux, is a corruption of the term applied to them by the Algonquians, meaning snakes, and so enemies. In modern years the tribes have lived chiefly about the westernmost of the Great Lakes, and extended thence to and down the Missouri River and far out on the great plains; but in ancient times this was not the case. The Sioux are a'strong and hardy people, many of whom in recent years have supported themselves chiefly by hunting the buffalo, though the Mandans and one or two sub-tribes of the Sioux have always continued the practice of their agricultural pursuits. They do not appear to have had the gentile system, or, if so, it was not general. Their government was by chiefs, and the son inherited from the father. Until within a few years, it was generally believed that these tribes had reached their modern home in the middle west, by emigration from some point still farther west, but the investigations of Hale, Gatschet and Mooney have clearly shown that the original home of the Sioux was on the Atlantic coast, and that 66 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY certain small aggregations of people, whose relationships were long unknown, who have lived on the coast within one or two hundred years, are remnants of Siouan tribes who had earlier journeyed westward. It is altogether probable that those tribes found in the west when the first white men reached the Missouri River had emigrated from their eastern home not very long before. Nearly two hundred years ago, Gravier stated that the Miami and the Illinois knew the Ohio River as the river of the Akansea, because that people had formerly lived along it. The Akansea is the Kwapa tribe of Dakota stock which formerly lived on the Arkansas River. Catlin reported that the Mandans, whom he found living far up the Missouri River, had a tradition that they were emigrants from the east, and this tradition he used in support of his belief that they were descendants of the Welshmen supposed to have reached America under Prince Madoc. Major Sibley, more than sixty years ago, received from an old man of the Osages, a tribe of Dakota stock, essentially the same statement which is quoted by Gravier. The old Osage averred that his tribe had originally emigrated from the east, following the Ohio River down. He described that stream and the falls of the Ohio at Louisville, where his people had dwelt for some time, and where certain bands had separated from the main body and traveled away through the neighboring country. Those who continued their march down the river, when they reached the Mississippi, proceeded to the mouth of the Missouri, and then other bands broke off from the main body, some going up the Mississippi, others up the Missouri. There is thus a considerable body of independent traditional evidence going to show that such a migration took place. This alone would be strong, but besides this we have indisputable evidence of their presence in the east, in the language of Siouan tribes, known to have had their homes on the Atlantic coast since the white people came. In his interesting paper on the Siouan Tribes of the East, published by the Bureau of Ethnology, Mr. Mooney shows that at the time of the establishment of the southern colonies in America, the western half of what is now Virginia, almost the whole central portion of North Carolina, and the whole northeastern part of South Carolina, were occupied by tribes, of which many were certainly of this stock. The banks of the river Neuse, and the seaboard from Cape Lookout northward, were held by tribes of other blood, the Tuscaroras, living along the Neuse, while north of them were tribes of Algonquian blood, excepting only the Nottoways, who, like the Tuscaroras, were Iroquois. Between these Siouan tribes and the fierce Iroquois, whose home was chiefly in what is now northern and central New York, there was a bitter feud, and the stronger and more virile people of the north made constant raids to the southward, and kept the Siouan tribes which inhabited the FORMER DISTRIBUTION OF THE INDIANS 67 spurs and foothills of the southern Allegheny Mountains in a state of constant alarm. So fierce and so continual were these assaults, that these southern tribes early implored the help of the English against the northern enemy, and at length, when this help was not given them, a number of the tribes left their villages and assembled in close proximity to Fort Christanna, where they hoped that they might be protected from attack. Even this did not save them, for not long after they had taken refuge there, a party of Iroquois attacked them under the very guns of the fort, killed several of their men and took others captive. It was not until 1722 that the colonists were able to persuade the Iroquois to make with these southern tribes what proved to be a lasting peace. But this peace came too late to save them from extinction. Broken and decimated by the attacks of their enemies, and still further enfeebled by their closer contact with the whites, they melted away, and disappeared; some of them, as individuals, joining tribes of their own or alien blood, and being absorbed by them; while still others migrated by little companies, and were heard of here and there for a hundred years or two, and then disappeared, or perhaps to-day are known as living by tens or twenties with some other tribes, yet still preserving their names and something of their language. The migration of the Sioux, whom we, in our day, know as inhabiting the west, perhaps took place long before all this. How those tribes moved west, or when, we do not know, but we may imagine that many, with whose names we are most familiar, have reached their modern home since the discovery of America. Mr. Mooney says, “The absence of Siouan names along De Soto’s route in the interior country held later by the Osage is significant, in view of the fact that we at once recognize as Muskhogean a number of the names which occur in the narrative of his progress through the Gulf States. The inference would be that the Muskhogean tribes were already established in the southern region, where we have always known them, before the Siouan tribes had fairly left the Mississippi. In accordance with Osage tradition, the emigrant tribes, after crossing the mountains, probably followed down the valley of New River and the Big Sandy to the Ohio, descending the latter to its mouth, and there separated, a part going up the Mississippi and Missouri, the others continuing their course southward and southwestward. In their slow march toward the setting sun, the Kwapa probably brought up the rear, as their name lingered longest in the tradition of the Ohio tribes, and they were yet in the vicinity of that stream when encountered by De Soto.” It is interesting to find how universal this tradition of an eastern migration is among the different tribes of Siouan stock. Even the Assinaboines, who have long resided in northern Dakota and in Canada, say to-day that many 68 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY generations ago their fathers lived on the salt water, and while they cannot tell how long ago this was, nor indicate the route followed on their western journey- ings, they are all positive as to the main fact. It appears to be commonly thought, that because in modern times the Sioux were buffalo hunters, they had never practiced agriculture. This is an unwar- rantable inference. It is altogether probable that when they lived in their eastern homes, and even during their slow migration westward, most Siouan tribes, if not all of them, depended largely on farming for their living, and that it was only after they had reached the country of the buffalo and had found flesh food so abundant, and hence life so easy, and had encountered also a climate dryer than anything that they had ever before known, that they gradually gave up the practice of tilling the soil. The Mandans never abandoned agri- culture, and probably the Omahas did not. Neither did certain tribes farther west; those which ceased to practice it did so, it is reasonable to believe, because of the changed conditions of their environment. Of the tribes of Dakota stock now, or recently living in the western country, the best known are the Dakota proper or Sioux. Others, less important, are the Mandan, the Omaha, or people “up the stream”; the Crow, the Osage, the Oto, Missouria and the Kwapa, or “down stream” people. Besides these are lesser tribes, the Iowa, Kansa, Minitari, Ponca and Winnebago. The tribes of Siouan stock, of whom we know as living on the seacoast in historic times, were the Biloxi on the Pascagoula River in southeastern Missis- sippi, the Tutelo in southern Virginia, the Catawba in northern South Carolina, and the Woccon in North Carolina; there were probably many other tribes whose names have been forgotten. Some well-known Siouan tribes were situated as follows: Arkansas or Kwapa, on the Lower Arkansas River. Assiniboine, on the Saskatchewan River. Crow, on the Upper Yellowstone River. Iowa, on the Iowa River. Kansa or Kaw, on the Kansas River. Minitari, or Gros Ventres of the Village, on the Missouri River. Mandan, on the Missouri River. Ogallala, west of the Missouri Rivers. Omaha, on the Elkhorn River. Osage, on the Arkansas and Osage Rivers. Oto, on the Lower Platte River. Ponca, near the Oto. Sioux (in general), on the headwaters of the Mississippi and on the tributaries of the Middle Missouri. Winnebago, on the western shore of Lake Michigan. Yankton, on the Upper lowa. on pn i ETE = Ue canta PEDRO CAJETE PUEBLO FORMER DISTRIBUTION OF THE INDIANS 69 SKITTAGETAN FAMILY To this family belong the Haida of Queen Charlotte’s Islands and Prince of Wales Archipelago. In appearance, ways of life, and in artistic development, the tribes of this group closely resemble those of the Koluschan family; and, indeed, this resemblance extends to most of the coast tribes of northwestern America, between Puget Sound, in the United States, and Cook’s Inlet, in Alaska. TIMUQUANAN FAMILY Most of Florida—if not all of it—was occupied by people of this stock, concerning whom very little is known. It is quite certain that the country from the northern boundary of Florida, as far south as Lake Okeechobee, was occupied by them and they seem to have had many tribes or villages. They have been extinct for more than a hundred years, but the records of their speech left by the Spanish missionaries show that it was an independent stock, and the best authorities believe that it had affinities with the Carib language. TONIKAN FAMILY The Tonikas lived near the Mississippi River in two settlements. The northernmost lay wholly in the territory of the Muscogee, while the southern- most was on both sides of the Mississippi River in Mississippi and Louisiana. There are said to be still a very few Tonikas residing in Avoyelles Parish, Louisiana. . TONKAWAN FAMILY Fifty years ago the Tonkawas were a tribe of some importance, roaming over western Texas. They long served as faithful scouts for the United States troops in the Southwest, and their services to the government ultimately led to their being overwhelmed in revenge by other tribes whom they had helped to subdue, and thus to their practical extinction. There are now only about fifty- seven Tonkawas left. They are reported to have deified the wolf, which they held as their ancestor and creator; a belief which reminds us somewhat of those held by many tribes on the Pacific slope concerning the prairie wolf. UCHEAN FAMILY The Uchis occupied a small territory lying east of the Muscogee in central Georgia. In many of their customs they resemble the Creeks, which may in part be accounted for by their long association with that tribe. They call themselves “children of the sun,” which they regard as their mother. They havea tradition that a very long time ago the Creeks conquered them and brought them from their ancestral home to reside with the victors. Several hundred Uchis still live with the Creeks in the Indian Territory. 70 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY WAIILATPUAN FAMILY Only two tribes, the Cayuse and Molale, represent this small family. They lived near the Columbia River ; the Cayuse near the mouth of the Walla Walla; while the Molale, a mountain tribe, lived south of the Columbia River, about Mounts Hood and Jefferson. WAKASHAN FAMILY This large family, consisting of thirty-seven tribes, occupied the coast of northwest Washington, of Vancouver Island and parts of British Columbia. It included such well-known names as the Yuclulaht, the Bellabella, the Kwakiutl and the Quatsino; and the group has been carefully investigated by that eminent student Dr. Franz Boas. People of this stock were fishermen and hunters and expert canoemen, familiar with the ways of the sea. They were skillful with the harpoon, the fish spear and the bow and arrow. They were great respecters of wealth, and the highest ambition of each man was to accumulate as much property as possible, in order that, when he had acquired a sufficiency, he might give it all away at a great feast, called a fotlatch, an occasion for presenting gifts. Among these people descent was in the male line, the child following the father. The men were brave and women were honored for their virtue. In most of their ways the tribes of this family resembled the Koluschan and Skittagetan stocks. YAKONAN FAMILY The tribes of this family occupied many villages on the western coast of Oregon, and on the streams near it. They were chiefly a fishing people. The remnants of tribes belonging to it are dispersed among various agencies, and little is known of their present condition. YANAN FAMILY A single small tribe living in northern California, near Lassen Butte and Round Mountain, California, represents this family. They have a tradition that they came from the far East, and they are said to differ much in appearance from surrounding tribes. YUMAN FAMILY In the extreme southwest, along the Colorado River in Arizona, and on both sides of the Gulf of California, are found Indians of this family, represented by a number of tribes and still sufficiently numerous. To this family belong the Yuma, Maricopa, Cocopa, Havasupai, Mohave, Walapai, and other tribes. Ey US NARANGO. Poe ras ema! EX-GOV. JOSE JESUS NARANGO SANTA CLARA PUEBLO FORMER DISTRIBUTION OF THE INDIANS 71 Some of these are known also as Apache Mohave, Apache Tonto and Apache Yuma, a nomenclature which might lead to the confusing of these people with the true Apaches of Athapascan stock. As Dr. Brinton has pointed out, the word Apache is merely a Yuma term for fighting men, but it has usually been applied to the people of Tinneh stock, and should be confined to them. The Yuman is a strong, vigorous race, possessed of considerable energy and a willingness to work. Many tribes were agricultural, but of course the crops that they raised depended in large measure on the character of the country they occupied ; yet even the Cocopas, inhabiting the deserts of lower California, grew a little corn and a few squashes in hollows between the rocks. The Yumas and the Maricopas made fine pottery and good baskets. ZUNIAN FAMILY This family is represented by the single Pueblo of Zufii, on a river of the same name in western New Mexico. It did not differ markedly from other Pueblo groups. OTHER FAMILIES Besides these, there were a number of other families, most of them of minor importance, which it is necessary only to enumerate. Such were: CHIMAKUAN FaMILy, in northwestern Washington. CHIMARIKAN Famity, on New and Trinity Rivers, California. CuHuMASHAN Fami.y, from San Luis Obispo, California, south along the coast to San Buenaventura and inland, including the Missions Santa Barbara, Santa Ifiez and Purissima. CoaHUILTECAN FamILy, portions of Mexico and Texas, including the state from which it takes its name. Practically extinct. Costranoan Famity, south of San Francisco Bay to Monterey, California. EssELENIAN Famity, from the Bay of Monterey to the San Lucia Mountains. KaLapooian FamILy, valley of the Willamette River in Oregon. Kusan Famity, about Coos Bay in Oregon. MariposaN Famiy, along the King’s River and Tulare Lake, California. MoovuELumnaNn Famizy, on the Tuolumne River, California. PALAIHNIHAN Famiy, valley of Pitt River in northern California. Puyanan Famity, west bank of the Sacramento River, north nearly to Pitt River. QuoraTEAN Famity, on the Lower Klamath River, California. SaLINAN FamiIzy, coast about the Missions of San Antonio and San Miguel. SasTEAN Famity, Upper Klamath River and north as far as Ashland, Oregon. 72 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY TAKILMAN Famity, Upper Rogue River in Oregon. Wasuoan Famity, Reno, Nevada, to and through the Carson Valley. WEITSPEKAN FamiLy, on the Lower Klamath River. WISHOSKAN Fami.y, about Humboldt Bay, California. Yuxian Famity, Round Valley, Cal. We are accustomed to speak and think of Indian tribes and linguistic stocks, as if, under former conditions, the people of the various tribes and families kept exclusively to themselves and never mingled their blood with alien currents. Such a notion is wholly erroneous. There was a constant infusion of new blood into all the tribes, and from a variety of sources. In times of peace, there were frequent intermarriages between individuals belonging to different tribes, as between Ree and Sioux or Cheyenne; between Cheyenne and Sioux or Ree or Arapaho or Comanche; between Pawnee and Comanche or Cheyenne or Omaha or Ree. , In time of war, on the other hand, captives were constantly being taken; women who became the wives of their captors and bore them children, little. boys and girls who were adopted and grew up to manhood and womanhood as members of the tribe and with the same feeling for it as if they had been born in the camp. Such children, in the course of time, married members of the tribe, often of pure blood. Among the more warlike and energetic tribes, this admixture of foreign blood was very great, and this alien strain undoubtedly ‘added much to the vigor of the tribe, not only improving it physically, but also giving it dash and energy. In the case of the Northern Cheyenne, three out of the four principal chiefs are half-bloods of other tribes, and it may well be that the eminence which they have attained is in part due to their mixed blood. These Northern Cheyennes are a good example of this mixture of the blood of their tribes. From Two Moons—the principal chief—a list has been obtained -of the tribes with which at times they have been at war, and from which captives were taken, and it numbers 28, as follows: Apache, Kiowa, Comanche, Pah Ute, Mountain Ute, Spaniard (Mexican), Snake, Bannock, Grass Lodge People (unidentified), Flat Head, Nez Percé, Blackfoot, Assinaboine, Cree, Ree, Mandan, Gros Ventre of the Village, Ponca, Omaha, Pawnee, Cherokee, Osage, Pottawat- omi, Crow, Arapaho, Sioux, Wichita and Navajo. Indeed the Northern Cheyennes say—though of course they do not mean this to be taken literally— that it is not now easy to find in the tribe a person who has not some mixture of foreign blood in his veins. In the old war days what was going on in the Cheyenne tribe was going on toa greater or less extent in all the other tribes; the Pawnees received fresh RMR ‘ GOV. DIEGO NARANGO SANTA CLARA PUEBLO FORMER DISTRIBUTION OF THE INDIANS 73 blood from their friends and allies of different stock from them, and also from their enemies, by capture; the Blackfeet did the same, and so with all the other tribes and families wherever they might be. Among the tribes which formerly raided into Mexico and which took hundreds of white captives, there is a strong infusion of Mexican blood. This is notably true of the Comanches, at least one of whose chiefs in recent years was the son of a Mexican mother. White children, captured when young and reared in an Indian camp, became as truly Indian in their nature as the purest blooded savage of the tribe. An instance of this kind came under my own observation in recent years in the case of Blue Hawk, a member of the Northern Cheyenne tribe. This man is a curly-haired Mexican, captured many years ago by the Cheyennes during a raid into the southwest. Blue Hawk, a boy of ten years, was herding mules, when he was picked up by the war party. Adopted into the tribe, he lived with them until their surrender to the whites. His color and appearance showing his race, government officials endeavored to learn his history in order to restore him to his family. After some time they succeeded in learning where he had come from and who he was, and a brother came from Mexico to take him home. With much difficulty Blue Hawk was persuaded to accompany his brother, but when he reached Miles City, Montana, his courage gave out, he refused to go further and returned to the Cheyennes, with whom he still resides. Such minglings of blood took place under all sorts of conditions. Usually, perhaps, they were either between members of tribes that were at peace or between victors and their captives, yet this was not always the case. The Peace with the Snakes* is an example in which the general good feeling led to intermarriage on a large scale between peoples of two distinct families. The story of Comanche Chief, on the other hand, tells how a young brave on the warpath, peeping through a hole in a lodge, just as he was about to cut loosea horse tied before it, saw sitting by the fire a beautiful girl, with whom he fell in love, and for whom a year later he ventured into the camp of his enemy, facing death in the hope that he might win her. After he had succeeded in doing this, he made a lasting peace between the Pawnees and their long-time enemies, the Comanches, and this led to frequent intermarriages between the tribes. No longer ago than 1898, a young Blackfoot, visiting the Indian Congress at the Omaha Exposition, fell in love with an Apache girl there, and when the Congress broke up, went away with the Apaches, deserting his tribe and his people for the sake of the girl he loved. * Blackfoot Lodge Tales, p. 3. +Pawnee Hero Stories and Folk Tales, p. 25. CHAPTER VIII THE RESERVATIONS The Indians of the United States, exclusive of Alaska, number 262,965, and are under the care of the Indian Bureau, which attends to their lands, moneys, education and general welfare. They are located on 177 reservations, which are tracts of land reserved for their special use in 23 states and territories, chiefly west of the Mississippi River. The reservations vary in size from 276 to 7,000,000 acres, their aggregate area being 83,784,349 acres. Much of this land is of little value. Practically no one in this country has any knowledge of the present condition of the Indians at large. Certain individuals, of course, possess special information of particular tribes, and can answer questions about them with much fullness of detail, but no one outside the Indian Office—and but few persons there, without looking up the records—can reply satisfactorily to questions as to where the various tribes are situated, what they are doing, how much they are contributing toward their own support, whether they are advancing, retrograding or standing still, what proportion of their youth is being educated. For the purpose of supplying such information, I have prepared a brief statement of the conditions prevailing on each of the different reservations, from which those who are interested may gather for themselves a fair idea of the situation of the Indians of to-day. The facts have been compiled with care and have been brought down to the year 1899. For the opportunity to secure this late information I have to thank the Indian Bureau. It is believed that this represents, as fairly as can be shown by any one individual, the condition of the North American Indian to-day in his relation to civilization. For the general reader the most interesting points to be gathered from these statements are those which have to do with the advance toward civilization in respect to self-support and the education of the rising generation. It will be observed that as to both of these matters there is the widest possible variation in different tribes. We may conclude from what we read here that the Indian has every capacity for work—for he possesses strength, endurance and industry. On the other hand, he is easily discouraged, and hesitates to throw himself into unaccustomed labor because he is doubtful whether the results will be commen- surate with the effort put forth. If he can be convinced that his exertions will receive an adequate recompense, he is—at the present day—as willing to work . as in the old day he was ready to toil at his hunting or to undergo the manifold hardships of the warpath. 75 76 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY The old-time fashion of insisting that he should plow and sow in the midst of the waterless desert cast a blight on the Indian’s industry, since it resulted in implanting firmly in his mind the conviction that for him work was useless because work in the white man’s way brought him no return. The authorities, knowing nothing practical about the Indians, and persuaded by eastern doctrin- aires who knew as little, were convinced that agriculture was the only pursuit by which—wherever he might be—the Indian could thrive, and in this belief they. urged him to plant, not knowing whether the field he was to cultivate was on the top of some barren mesa, or in the arid regions of Dakota, or in some well- watered, fertile valley in eastern Kansas. We are now engaged in the slow process of uprooting the belief which we implanted in the Indian’s mind; and having discovered our own error we are striving to convince him that he must unlearn the lesson which we taught him. Having learned for ourselves that diverse industries must be practiced in different climates, we are now trying again to change the Indian’s ways and to adapt his methods of self-support to his surroundings. People who have once absorbed a conviction are slow to let it go, and there are still many white men who believe that all Indians everywhere must grow crops. The Indian is even more reluctant than the white man to abandon a faith once held and so in many cases he clings to the belief, which the white man’s instruction and practice have so firmly impressed upon him, that to work is useless because he will receive no compensation for his labor. We are paying now, in appropriations for the Indian’s support, for our own blunders in the past. What the Indian requires to-day is intelligent direction in intelligent methods. \ APACHE PRISONERS Near Fort Sill, Oklahoma, are located about seventy Apaches (Athapaskan) held by the War Department as prisoners of war. These with their families number about 300 individuals. They have recently been under the charge of Lieut. F. H. Beach, who reports about them to the War Department For some years they were in charge of Capt. H. L. Scott, of the Seventh Cavalry, who managed them with great judgment and wisdom, and his policy has been continued by Lieut. Beach. An effort has been made to teach them stock raising and the effort has so far been crowned with success. In the spring of 1897, they had about 900 head of cattle, which by the autumn of 1898 had increased to nearly 1800. Each family owns a few head of cows and their increase is marked with the family brand. The reservation has been fenced and the different families are required to look after their own cattle. An attempt has been made to start these Indians in hog raising, but it proved a failure, largely on account of hog-cholera. ° ite eas ree] ata tele Omauyea. KICKING HORSE CHARLEY FLAT HEAD THE RESERVATIONS ve In the years 1897-98, these Apaches filled a hay contract for Fort Sill, and with the money received for this, over $3,000, purchased a number of farming implements, such as mowing machines, hay-rakes, balers, etc. Recently each family has been settled on a farm of 10 acres, of which one acre is devoted to garden crops, one to cotton and eight to Kaffir corn. Some of their garden crops did well, but in many cases they were killed by drouth. Some corn, how- ever, was dried and saved for winter use. These prisoners of war are very poor and some little time must elapse before they can earn sufficient money to purchase clothing and other things which are absolutely necessary for their protection. Lieut. Beach recommends that the Quartermaster at Fort Sill be allowed to issue them such clothing as the officer who has them in charge thinks necessary. The health of these people is improving, and it is reported that the year from January, 1897, to January, 1898, was the first for many in which the births exceeded the deaths. The people are industrious and are anxious to be independent and self-supporting. They have also become provident and are disposed to look ahead. They require repair shops and schools. A few of the children attend the Mission school of St. Patrick’s at Anadarko. BLACKFEET AGENCY The Blackfeet (Algonquian) Reservation is located in northwestern Montana, on the eastern flank of the Rocky Mountains, its northern boundary being the parallel of 49°. The last census shows the number of Indians here to be 1,957, most of whom are Piegans, but there are a few northern Blackfeet and Bloods living here with them. There are on this reservation an unusual number of mixed bloods, who have returned to the tribe to share the prosperity which has come to it in recent years. The location of this agency being high, dry and cold, farming has proved entirely unprofitable, for it is only in exceptional years that a crop matures. The chief industry of these Indians must be stock raising, their reservation being admirably adapted to that pursuit. Beginning in the year 1890 with an issue of about 800 cows, their stock increased so that in the year 1897 they had about 22,000 head. Bad management by their agents and one or two unusually severe winters reduced their herds nearly one-half, but they still have enough cattle to make them independent in the course of a few years, provided only they shall receive intelligent guidance by their agents. They still suffer con- siderable losses each year through the trespassing of range stock belonging to adjacent white cattlemen, the herds of the Indians getting mixed with the range cattle and wandering or being driven away and never recovered. 78 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY In the year 1895 they made a new treaty, by which they sold a portion of their reservation for $1,500,000, distributed over ten years in equal annual payments, so that with what they now possess and with what they are to receive, they should be entirely self-supporting before the expiration of this treaty. Like many other tribes, the Blackfeet suffer from lack of school accommo- dation. The single boarding school on the reservation accommodates about 125 pupils and the Holy Family Mission provides for 72, but the children of school age number about 425. A new and larger school plant is promised. As is the case with so many other Indian tribes, the health of the Blackfeet is unsatisfactory. Contagious diseases, such as measles and scarlet fever, very often prove fatal when they attack them, and they seem to have little power of resisting pneumonia and other lung troubles. This is due in part to the fact that it is exceedingly difficult to make the Indians take proper care of the sick. Many of the children are afflicted with tuberculosis in one form or another, and this it is almost impossible to cure. CHEYENNE AND ARAPAHO AGENCY Practically all the Southern Cheyennes, about 2,000, and more than 1,000 of the Arapahos (Algonquian) are located at the old Cheyenne and Arapaho agency in Oklahoma. In the year 1890, these Indians were forced by Congress to take their land in severalty, at a time when they were entirely unfitted to become citizens of the United States, being then what were called “blanket Indians.’ The methods employed by the commissioners sent out to treat with the Indians for their land have been more than once described, and the shameful means used to oblige them to give up their reservation cannot be too strongly condemned. Their lands were taken in 1891 and the reservation opened to settlement by the whites. Since that time they have made marked progress, an advance which is less noticeable from year to year than it is when we look back and see the change that has taken place in the whole time. They have taken to farming, which they practice with fair success, and now raise considerable wheat and oats and very large crops of corn, besides vegetables and hay. They have a very few cattle, but as yet have hardly made a start in the stock business. At and near Darlington are two large boarding schools. There is another boarding school at Red Moon, 80 miles distant, another at Seger Colony, which accommodates 125 pupils, and still another has recently been completed at Cantonment, 70 miles from the Agency. There is also one day school and a Mission boarding school, the latter with 68 pupils. The aggregate attendance for 1899 was 580. With opportunities given at non-reservation schools the entire school population may be considered as provided for. al tage ne wn ER ENEAS MICHEL FLAT HEAD THE RESERVATIONS 79 A number of the Indians are building good dwelling houses for themselves; others are purchasing from their own means farming implements. On the whole the progress since they took their lands in severalty is gratifying. An interesting fact to be noted about these Indians is a marked absence of drunkenness among them. They are surrounded by whites and have every opportunity to procure liquor, yet they appear to use it little. CHEYENNE RIVER AGENCY This Agency is situated in South Dakota, on the west bank of the Missouri River, opposite Forest City, South Dakota, and immediately south of Standing Rock Agency. It is one of the large Sioux Agencies of the State, and here are located the Blackfeet, Sans Arc, Minneconjou, and Two Kettle bands of Sioux, in all 2,552 Indians. On this reservation efforts have been made in the past to raise crops, but these have been almost wholly unsuccessful, for the very sufficient reason that the land is not in any respect adapted to agriculture, the rainfall is very slight and never to be depended on and the opportunities for irrigation are not great. It is, however, a good stock country, and these Indians are well provided with cattle, owning more than 15,000 head. They take very good care of these and put up thousands of tons of hay. Many of them, especially among the mixed bloods, have considerable bunches of cattle,and all that is necessary to make this industry successful here is to see that the Indians take proper care of their herds. If sufficient attention is paid to this, there is no reason why they may not in time become self-supporting, through this means alone. For half their subsistence they now depend on government rations. Efforts are being made to induce them to take their lands in severalty, but it may be hoped that these attempts will not be successful. While it would be well that each family should have its own location, they need this whole reservation as a range for their cattle, and should be allowed to occupy it, until they are better able to care for their rights than they are at present. There are 708 children of school age here, and only a single boarding school, which has an average attendance of 119. In addition to this, there are three day schools, with 59 pupils, and there are three mission schools in the neighborhood, which obtain their 75 children from this reservation. More schools are clearly needed. COLORADO RIVER AGENCY The Colorado River reservation comprises about 240,000 acres of land lying on both sides the Colorado River, and thus partly in Arizona and partly in California. It is located chiefly on the bottom lands of the Colorado River, and 80 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY is surrounded by the absolutely waterless desert. It is occupied by about 700 Mojaves (Yuman) and 150 Chimehuevi (Shoshonean). The land of the bottom for the most part is fertile, and there is plenty of water in the river. But although the valley is but ten feet above the ordinary water level of the river, irrigation has been very difficult and expensive, and, for the most part, ineffective. Small strips of territory along the river and lagoons are sometimes overflowed in times of high water, so that on two or three hundred acres overflow crops can be raised. Sometimes, however, the river does not rise high enough to yield water, and in other seasons the overflow is so great as to wash away the seed of the growing crops. The average rainfall of the region is less than five inches. For twenty-five years, money and labor have been expended on irrigation with only meager or temporary results. Ditches have been made which have filled up with silt; pumps have broken down or worn out. Last spring, however, a steam engine and centrifugal pump which furnishes 5,000 gallons per minute was put in operation and gave abundant water to 350 acres; 200 acres more will soon be put under ditch. The crops raised are wheat and corn, with melons, pumpkins and sorghum. There should be nearly 2,000 Mojaves on this reservation. Of these, 700 are located near the agency at Parker, while the remainder live off the reservation in the vicinity of Needles, California, and Fort Mojave, Arizona. About forty miles above the agency is the settlement of 150 Chimehuevi, a branch of the Piutes. The Mojaves are reported to be -fairly industrious, and willing to work at hard manual labor to support themselves. They are quiet and peaceable, and remarkable for their industry. As against this, they are improvident, tenacious in holding to their old beliefs, and slow to receive new ideas. This is said of the Indians living about the agency. On the other hand, those living near the railroad towns are reported to be in a deplorable condition as to morals and progress. They are so far from the agency that the agent has practically no influence over them, while their nearness to the towns leads to drunkenness and other vices. A considerable number are employed by the Santa Fe Railroad, and are believed to receive nearly $60,000 per annum in wages. Yet they save none of this, and their material condition is steadily growing worse. On the other hand, a large proportion of those on the reservation occupy fair adobe houses. They have ceased to paint their faces, wear civilized clothing in part, and have given up most of their old barbaric practices, although they still burn their dead, but usually under police supervision. There is no drunkenness on the reservation, and many of the males have cut their hair. The distance of the agency from the railroad, while it makes the matter of getting supplies one of great difficulty, is yet obviously for the advantage of that gery qiex7 1899 4 F A RinewAnty Om ay HEAD CHIEF LOUISON FLAT HEAD THE RESERVATIONS 81 portion of the Indians living there, as it keeps them apart from the white people, and they are not exposed to the temptations which association with civilization invariably offers. During the year ending June 3oth, 1808, only one crime had occurred on the reservation. There is no white trader on this reservation, but five full-blood Indians keep small stores, bringing in their goods from the railroad in row-boats several times a year. The Chimehuevi, of Shoshonean stock, are progressive Indians, having laid aside most of their old-time customs, and cut their hair, and are wearing civilized clothing. They receive no aid from the Government, except that from time to time they visit the agency for medical attendance. There is a boarding school at this agency with a capacity of roo children, while the average attendance is 97. COLVILLE AGENCY The Colville and Spokane reservations are in northeastern Washington, and under the same agent are the Cceur d’Alenes, whose reservation is in Idaho. The tribes belonging to this agency are the Cceur d’Alene, 481, and Upper and Middle Spokane, 145, on Coeur d’Alene reservation; Upper and Middle Spokane, on the Spokane reservation, 180; Columbia (Moses Band), 311; Nez Percé (Joseph’s Band), 127; Lake, 292; Nespilem and Sans Poil, 400; Kalispel, 150; Colville, 303; Lower Spokane, 370; Okanagan, 573, on Colville reserva- tion—a total of 3,351. All these are Salishan tribes. The area of the Colville reservation is considerable, 2,800,000 acres, and on it there is a good deal of agricultural land. At the same time there is much land that can never be farmed, including valuable mineral lands which have been thrown open to mineral entry. Allotments upon the north half of the Colville reservation are in progress. The Cceur d’Alenes, upon the Cceur d'Alene reservation, are quite active in the cultivation of their lands. They possess 1,000 head of cattle, and raised, in 1899, 115,000 bushels of wheat, and over 120,000 bushels of oats. By purchasing with their own money, they have supplied themselves with all necessary farming implements. On the other hand, the Spokanes on the Spokane reservation are accomplishing little or nothing. They have suffered lately from crop failures, and are much discouraged and very poor. The Nespilem and San Poil tribes occupy the south half of the Colville reservation, are industrious, self-supporting, and often well-to-do. They have good farms, some few cattle, fine horses and comfortable homes. The Colville and Lake Indians are also industrious and thrifty. They have fine farms and raise good crops. They are self-supporting. 82 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY The Okanagan Indians are largely stock raisers, and most of them have small bands of cattle. They cut hay to winter their stock, have small farms, and raise garden vegetables. The Nez Percés, of Joseph’s Band, are reported not to be working and to be making no progress whatever. They still wear their blankets and eat Government rations, the only tribe under the Colville agency which does so. On the other hand, the Columbias are thrifty and energetic people, in many places farmers, in others lumberers and loggers, hay-makers, and, at the proper season of the year, hop-pickers for the white people. They are distinctly interested in their own improvement, are building themselves better houses, are getting rid of their ponies and trying to obtain cattle. On the whole, these people are distinctively progressive. With them are some Yakimas and Snakes. There is one contract Catholic school on each of the Colville and Coeur d’Alene reservations, and at each the attendance of the children is greater than the contract calls for. There are also two day schools, one on the Colville and one on the Spokane reservation, and the training school near Salem, Oregon, takes a good many children from these tribes, but it is obvious that there are not sufficient educational facilities for the number of children found here (700), scattered out as they are over a wide territory. CROW AGENCY The Crow reservation is situated in Montana, south of the Yellowstone River, and the agency is on the Little Big Horn. There are 1,962 of the Crows (Siouan). These Indians have been badly handled in the past and are rapidly decreas- ing in numbers. While they are a tall, well-built people, physically the equal of almost any tribe, their condition of health is exceedingly bad and they are rapidly dying off. It is said, however, that the health of the children is better than that of the adults. The Crows are making some progress in agriculture. The report of the Commissioner of Indian affairs for 1898 stated that they raised . 25,000 bushels of wheat and 35,000 bushels of oats, besides garden products, and that they supplied to the neighboring army post, Fort Custer, about 1,000,000 pounds of oats and 1,200 tons of hay. The fact that this post has recently been abandoned cuts off the Indians from their only market and must make a very material reduction in their income. During the past year there has been some falling off in the oat crop, but their hay crop has been increased. Farming on the Crow reservation has been practiced on the communal system, a number of Indians farming a large tract in common, under the super- THE RESERVATIONS 83 vision of a white farmer. The product of this large tract is then divided among the Indians. Such a system is wholly bad, since it takes away from each man his sense of responsibility and leads him to endeavor to get along with as little effort as possible, trusting that his fellows will do their share of the work, even if he shirks his part. These large tracts should be broken up and each man should cultivate his own farm and should have for himself whatever it may produce. He will thus learn to depend on his own efforts. Only in this way, can the Indian be taught that there is a reward for labor. An extensive, substantial irrigation system has been begun upon the Crow reserve, to cost over $300,000 and to cover 45,000 acres, to be paid for out of the Crow funds. The tribe has recently voted to pay $100,000 out of their grazing money for its completion. No small part of the money goes back to them in payment for work on the ditches, in which they have been remarkably inter- ested and skillful. About twelve miles of canal have been finished. The Crows have long had cattle, and if these had been properly cared for, their herds should now be very large. The same mistake has been made with regard to the cattle as with the farms. The live stock has been held asa communal herd and has belonged to the tribe, being managed by the agent and his employees, the beef being sold and the proceeds divided among the Indians. The result of this course has been that no Indian took any special interest in the cattle nor in seeing that they were properly looked after, and the herds have been shamefully neglected. Moreover the wolves have been very troublesome in this part of Montana and no doubt have done their share towards keeping down the increase. The range is injured by the thousands of prized but worthless ponies. The Crows, having always been friendly to the whites and having had a large reservation from the beginning, have always had land to sell and so have had large funds to their credit with the Government. Their reservation is still large, and with proper management, they might easily become self-supporting. Already the issue of Government rations has nearly ceased. The school at the Crow Agency is well attended. The number of children of school age is 389, of whom 138 have attended the Government school at the Agency, and 80 the Catholic Mission school. The Crow children are docile, attend school without much urging and seem willing to learn. It is greatly to be desired that a school should be established at Pryor’s Creek, where about 500 people reside, whose children have now no opportunity to attend school near their homes. CROW CREEK AGENCY The Crow Creek reservation, which is in South Dakota on the eastern bank of the Missouri River, not far from the town of Chamberlain, is occupied by 1,047 Lower Yanktonnai Sioux, who have received allotments and continue to 84 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY receive half rations. These Indians are no more successful in farming in this country than have been their relations above and below them on the Missouri River and they have practically no cattle. Their reservation is a grazing country; it is not one adapted to agriculture, and until they have cattle, they can only meet with discouragement and failure. On the other hand they can and do cut abundant hay on their reservation and are willing to work if there is a promise of reward. In 1898, and again in 1899, their agent advised the purchase for the tribe of 1,000 young cows, and this should certainly be done. He recommends, however, that the cows be held for some years with their increase as the common property of the tribe. This would only mean the holding back of the Indians for just so many years. It would be much better to divide the cows up among the families and give them the animals for their own, but not permitting them to kill or sell them, and thus to throw upon them the responsibility of the success or failure of the herd. They have been induced to sell 500 horses. There are three schools on this reservation; two Government boarding schools with an average attendance of 167, and the Immaculate Conception Catholic school, which, although it no longer receives aid from the Government, except the rations and clothing for the pupils, takes in the children and does excellent work. The births for the last year on this reservation were 39, while the deaths were 50. Of these 50 per cent. were from tuberculosis in one form or another. There was an epidemic of measles. DEVIL'S LAKE AGENCY The Devil’s Lake Agency, which has its headquarters at Fort Totten, North Dakota, comprises the Devil’s Lake reservation, where there are 1,043 Sioux, and the Turtle Mountain sub-agency, occupied by 266 full-blood Chippewas (Algonquians), and more than 2,000 mixed bloods. The agency is situated on Devil’s Lake. The reservation contains about 166,000 acres of high rolling land, well adapted to farming. More than half of the lands here have been allotted in severalty to the Sioux, who occupy about 300 fairly good houses. Nearly 4,000 acres are cultivated, and, in good years, with success; in 1898 only 9,000 bushels of wheat, 6,000 bushels of corn, 29,000 bushels of oats were harvested, together with barley, flax, potatoes and other vegetables. The Indians have about 1,000 head of horses, but very few cattle. It is very desirable that these industrious and hard-working people should have some cattle given to them. An industrial school occupies the buildings of the abandoned military post of Fort Totten, with a branch school in buildings at agency headquarters. The two departments under one head have an attendance of 273 pupils, most of them Turtle Mountain Chippewas. ANTOINE SPOKANE THE RESERVATIONS 85 The sub-agency at Turtle Mountain, which is under the charge of a farmer, contains more than 46,000 acres of land, some of it timber, some grazing, some farming country. It is quite fully occupied, for besides the 266 full-blood Indians, there are 2,000 mixed bloods claiming rights on the reservation. Practically all the full-bloods and many mixed bloods reside off the reservation, but in its vicinity, where the latter have taken homesteads; but the former have squatted, some of them on land owned by white men. This is a farming country, yet for two years the crops have been almost a total failure, owing to the lack of moisture. The season of 1899 promised a good yield of grain and vegetables from the 7,000 acres cultivated. It is a very difficult matter for these Indians to get along when the crops fail. There are so few people in the country that there is no demand for labor. The timber on the reservation has been very largely cut down. Game and fish have long since disappeared. In 1892 these Indians made an agreement with the Government, which Congress never carried out. There are three Government day schools on this reservation, and one contract boarding school, in charge of the Sisters of Mercy. The total capacity of these schools is 315, while the school population of the Turtle Mountain Chippewas is 728. The average attendance at the schools is 205. DIGGER INDIANS For the benefit of a number of wandering families—the so-called Digger Indians, whose family stock is uncertain—there was recently purchased by the Government 320 acres of land near Jackson, in Amador County, California. The reservation is dry, but crops might be raised if water could be supplied. The population is given in the report of the farmer for 1899 as only twenty-four, but there are a good many families living off the reservation, who occasionally visit it, but decline to make it their permanent home. A little hay and some vegetables are raised here, but, on the whole, the people are poor and worthless. No doubt if the greater number of the Indians in the neighborhood could be gathered on this reservation and water could be put on it, they would be able to grow some crops, but they are strongly attached to their old village sites and camping grounds. EASTERN CHEROKEE AGENCY The Eastern Cherokees, of Iroquoian stock, still hold a part of their ancient territory, amounting to about 100,000 acres, in Swain, Graham and Cherokee Counties, in western North Carolina, adjoining Tennessee. They number 1,363, and are situated on a number of small farms, for the country is mountainous, and there is but little arable land. They raise corn, beans, potatoes and some 86 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY wheat, and have some live stock. They are industrious and practically self- supporting, but live in a very simple manner, and practice the methods of their forefathers. The Cherokees live in single-room log houses, and earn but little money ; practically all that they do is to raise enough food for their support from year to year. Some of the young men and women, however, who have been sent away from the reservation to Carlisle and Hampton, have earned money and sent it home, and, on their return to the tribe, have done much to stimulate the ambition of the people. There are 393 children of school age, and the attendance at the Cherokee training school for the ten months of the year was 169. These people have done little more than to become self-supporting. They live in seven settlements or villages, and do not appear to have much ambition. The Eastern Cherokee Agency has recently been abolished. The Indians are now in charge of a school superintendent. FLATHEAD AGENCY The Flathead reservation lies chiefly in the Flathead Valley, in western Montana, on both sides of the Flathead Lake, and to the southward. It is occupied by several tribes, known as Flatheads, Pend d’Oreilles, Spokanes, Lower Kalispels (all Salishan), and Kutenais (Kitunahan), the total population being about 2,000. Of these, the Flatheads are much the most numerous. There are about 400 Kutenais, less than 100 Spokanes, and about 50 of the Lower Kalispels. Among these people there are all degrees of progress. Many of the Kutenais still support themselves by hunting and fishing, and by the wild roots and fruits which they gather in their seasons. On the other hand, many of the Flatheads are well-to-do, possessing good herds of cattle and horses, fenced farms, fairly good houses, and raising crops of grain and hay, good gardens, and perhaps a little fruit. The last report of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs gives the crops raised on this reservation as 38,650 bushels of wheat, 33,268 bushels of oats, 12,000 bushels of vegetables, 8,500 tons of hay, and says that 10,000 head of cattle are owned by the Indians. Of these, the greater number are in the hands of a few people, most of whom have white blood in their veins. While no allotments of land have been made on this reservation, many of the Indians have taken up farms and have located themselves permanently, although their title is one of occupancy only. The reservation being very large and the Indians scattered over it living in different places, those situated furthest from the agency receive no assistance from the Government, since it is not worth while for them to make long journeys on the chance of receiving some trifling help on issue day. The condition of the THE MAN ASSIN NIBOINE THE RESERVATIONS 87 Kutenais, living on the west side of Flathead Lake, is most miserable. They are in a starving condition, and can never hope to make any progress until some steps shall be taken to start them on the road towards improvement. School facilities on the Flathead reservation are unusually bad. There are 450 children of school age, but there is no agency boarding school, and but one small government day school, and Congress has cut down the government assistance to the Catholic Mission, which has been followed by a reduction in attendance from over 300 to 200. But the training school at Fort Shaw, Montana. takes 300 pupils from the various Montana agencies, thus supplying some small part of the reservation deficiencies. The same trouble is found here that occurs in so many Indian reservations ; the people cling to their horses as they did in the old times when they were constantly journeying from place to place, hunting the buffalo and going to war. Thus their herds of horses are increasing in numbers, but are growing less and less valuable. It would be greatly to the advantage of these and other Indians if they could sell off their horses, even if they receive for them no more than $1.00 a head, and put the money into cattle. Horses are constantly decreasing in price, while cattle are becoming worth more and more money every day. Adjoining counties are undertaking to tax the mixed-blood residents of the reservation, and have seized their stock to pay the taxes. At the same time, the counties do nothing for schools, roads, etc., on the reservation. The matter is now before the United States Court. FORT APACHE AGENCY The White Mountain Apaches, with a few Chiracahua Apaches (Athapaskan), are located at the Fort Apache agency, in Arizona. The northern part of the White Mountain reservation was separated in 1897 from the San Carlos agency, and put under a new agency. The census of 1899 shows 1,849 of these Indians, a slight increase during the two previous years. A number of small streams flow through narrow valleys, and along these the people are settled. The soil is fertile, and under proper irrigation good crops might be grown. No funds being provided, however, the irrigation plant here is very unsatisfactory, and by no means the most is made of the opportunities at hand. These Indians are poor, receiving little in the way of subsistence from the government, and for the rest being almost entirely dependent on their own exertions. The agency and the neighboring military post furnish their only market, and by supplying hay, grain and wood to the War Department and to 88 THE INDIANS OF-:TO-DAY the Indian Department, they earned, during the fiscal year of 1898-99, over twenty-four thousand dollars. They raise more grain than is required by the Government, having under cultivation something over twelve hundred acres of land, most of which has water on it. It is believed that wheat may be grown without irrigation on the uplands of this reservation; and if this could be done, the problem of self-support would be rendered much simpler for them, since they have a grist mill. Their reservation is also a good stock country, and an effort should be made to give them a start in cattle raising. If they can be taught to take proper care of the few cattle they possess—about 850—and an effort be made to put water on more of their land, they might do well. Like all the Apaches, they are energetic and industrious, eager to work, provided only there is a promise of reward for labor. As so often happens among those tribes which are struggling toward self-support, it is necessary to divide up the work in some degree, in order that each individual or family may have an opportunity to earn something. In letting out his contracts for wood and hay, the agent is obliged to limit the quantity that he will receive from each one, or else some would far exceed their allowance, while from others it would be impossible to receive anything. The women take their burros far up the sides of the mountains, cut hay there with a knife, load it on the backs of the animals, and sometimes carry it twenty miles toa market. And this work they do on a diet of pifion nuts, and a fragment of the roasted heart of the mescal. With proper encouragement, and a little start, these Indians could readily become self-supporting. They suffer from the usual. discouragements brought to them by white association. Whisky is brought on the reservation by white people, and it is difficult to catch the offenders. Besides this, the Indians distill from corn an alcoholic drink known as tiswin, but the manufacture of this has been somewhat lessened. White men’s stock trespasses on a portion of the reservation which the cattlemen have long regarded as their own free range and this works serious injury to the small herds of the Indians. The capacity of the Fort Apache boarding school is 65. With the average attendance, 71, it is overcrowded. FORT BELKNAP AGENCY The Fort Belknap Agency is in central Montana and lies between the Milk River, which forms its northern boundary, and the Little Rocky Mountains, whose summits bound it on the south. On this reservation live about 1,300 Indians, of whom 619 are Gros Ventres of the Prairie, a division of the Arapaho tribe of Algonquian stock, and 681 Assiniboines, the northernmost tribe of the Dakotas, of Siouan stock. There is, of course, no relationship between these CHIEF WETS IT ASSINNIBOINE THE RESERVATIONS 89 two tribes, and they are placed together for no better reason than that both of them in olden times inhabited this northern country. There are Assiniboines on the Missouri River, at Wolf Point and Old Fort Peck, and other bands of the same tribe live at various points in the British possessions. The northern part of the Belknap reservation is one of the bleakest and most arid regions in the United States, and, while well adapted for stock raising, farming is impossible there. From the slopes of the Little Rocky Mountains, however, in the southern part of the reservation, a number of streams flow down to the prairie and efforts have been successfully made to use the waters of these streams to irrigate a considerable extent of bottom land. Until within a few years the Fort Belknap Indians were in a miserable condition and had made no progress whatever towards civilization, but since 1895, under a good agent, sincerely anxious to see them progress, they have made a remarkable advance, although they still depend on government rations for more than half their support. Very many of them are now cultivating small farms, on which they raise oats, wheat, potatoes and other vegetables, and besides this, for the year ending June 30, 1899, they cut and stacked 1,650 tons of hay. They have had cattle for a good many years, but until within the last four have paid very little attention to caring for stock. Lately a great change has taken place; they are looking after their cattle carefully and keeping them close at home, in small neighborhood herds, so that their loss has been comparatively slight. The facts that their reservation is not fenced and that the herds of the neighboring cattlemen wander at liberty over it endanger the Indian herds, for in their migrations to and fro the drifting range cattle are likely to pick up and carry away with them any Indian cattle that are not under herd. Notwith- standing the losses which occur in this way, however, the cattle of the Belknap Indians are increasing, and they were authorized last year to furnish 300,000 lbs. of their beef issue. As is the case with so many prairie tribes, the Indians of the Fort Belknap Agency have many more horses than they need, or ought to have, and these run at large over the prairie, consuming the grass which should be saved for the cattle. Besides this, all Indians set so high a value on horses, that when any stray away and are lost, the owner at once proceeds to look for them. As the horses constantly wander, much of the time of the Indians which ought to be devoted to farming and tothe care of their cattle is really spent in hunting horses. Many of these Indians apply the money received by them from the sale of crops or beef to the purchase of farming implements from the local dealers, and I am told that men who buy such implements with their own money take far better care of them than do those who receive government implements for go FHE INDIANS: OF TO-DAY temporary.use. During the year 1899 these Indians received from the sale of beef cattle over $13,000, for hauling freight and for the sale of oats, nearly $1,000 each, and for the sale of wood and lumber, over $2,300, a total of nearly $18,000. They also earned over $8,000 for labor on irrigating ditches. I have spent much time on this reservation within the past few years and am familiar with the conditions prevailing there, and there is no question that the Indians are anxious to improve their condition and need only encouragement and proper guidance to become self-supporting in the course of a few years. Their present agent, Major Luke C. Hays, is a just and interested man, who can do much for them. A government boarding school and a contract school care for about 200 children. The latter has kept up its attendance of 92 children, notwithstanding the partial withdrawal of government assistance. It now receives pay for but 24 pupils. FORT BERTHOLD AGENCY The Fort Berthold Agency, in North Dakota, is occupied by three tribes— the Arickaras, of Caddoan stock, with the Mandans, and the Gros Ventres of the Village, or Minitari, both these being of Siouan stock. All these are rapidly decreasing in number. There are now 416 Arickaras, 243 Mandans, and 459 Gros Ventres. All these tribes have for many years been agricultural people, and in favorable seasons they raise abundant crops. They have also some cattle, and for 1898 and 1899 they furnished all the beef and part of the wheat needed for issue at their agency. They possess 4,000 head of cattle, and in 1899 sold to the government produce of one sort or another to the amount of $14,600, and in addition earned $1,800 by freighting. Their material condition is thus encouraging, except as frequent bad crop years keep them more or less dependent on government rations. On the other hand, the health of the three tribes is exceedingly bad, the deaths considerably outnumbering the births, and this death-rate is largely due to unsanitary methods of living. Efforts are now being made to provide them with new houses, which shall be larger, better lighted and ventilated, and which shall also have board instead of dirt floors. The boarding school at this agency was recently destroyed by fire, and the construction of a new one is well under way. There are 271 children of school age on the reservation. A mission school cares for thirty. FORT HALL AGENCY The Bannocks, numbering 424, and the Shoshoni, 1,014, occupy the Fort Hall reservation. The two tribes are related, being important members of the THE RESERVATIONS 9! great Shoshoni language stock. They are a quiet, temperate and moral people, and are devoting themselves to self-improvement in a way that is very satisfactory. Most of them work at ranching and stock raising, at which they are fairly successful. The crops last reported for them were 7,500 bushels of wheat, 5,500 bushels of oats, barley and rye, 4,900 bushels of vegetables, and nearly 3,300 tons of hay. They sold more than $21,000 worth of produce last year to the government and outside parties. They are fairly well provided with stock, having many horses, and about 2,300 head of cattle. As the reservation is in the arid country, irrigation is needed, but it is fairly well watered, and usually there is an abundance of water for all. These Indians are greatly interested in their cattle, and care for them as well as the average white man, looking after them, providing hay, and seeing that they are protected in winter. Here, as in many other places where the Indians possess cattle, the white people endeavor to purchase them from their owners at very low prices, and it is the duty of the agent to prevent this. There is comparatively little drinking on this reservation by the full blood Indians, but there are a considerable number of half-breeds who commonly purchase whisky openly in the neighboring town and bring it on the reservation, where it breeds trouble. On this reservation, as on most others, it is a matter of great difficulty to secure the co-operation of local officials in attacking this evil. These Indians have far too many horses, and it is greatly to be desired that the surplus, beyond what they need, should be turned into money, at whatever price, and this money invested in cattle. The Fort Hall boarding school has accommodation for 150 pupils, and an an attendance of 137. There are not far from 300 children of school age. More room is needed, and new buildings to replace those of the old fort, which are dilapidated and tumble-down. FORT PECK AGENCY This agency, which is also called the Poplar River Agency, is in the extreme northeastern portion of Montana and has for its southern boundary the Missouri River. It is occupied by about 1,222 Sioux and 642 Assiniboines, both of Siouan stock. Like most other Indians, those at Fort Peck are entirely willing to work and to work hard, provided they can see the prospect of a return for their labor. Their country is fairly well watered and has some good bottom land, which would be valuable, provided it could be irrigated. They also possess some cattle, about 3,000 head, and are said totake good care of them. The lack of irrigation 92 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY facilities, however, makes the hay crop a doubtful one at best, and the stock industry in northern Montana can never be regarded as a safe one unless abundant hay is put up. It is very desirable that some steps should be taken to make the most of the water on this reservation and to bring it on to the land, chiefly for the purpose of raising gardens and the hay crop. It may be doubt- ed whether that agriculture which consists in raising crops of grain will ever be successful in this part of Montana. At present 70 per cent. of their subsistence comes from government rations. There are 374 children of school age on Fort Peck reservation, where there is an industrial boarding school. The average attendance for the past school year was 149. Two private schools had 27 pupils, and 130 attended schools off the reservation. Only about 50 children failed of instruction in some school during some portion of the year. The buildings of the school, which consist of the abandoned barracks of the old military post, are in a very dilapidated con- dition and are unfit for occupation by the children. Two brick dormitories are now being constructed. There isa good and productive school farm and a school herd of about 60 head of cattle. GRANDE RONDE AGENCY Under what was Grande Ronde Agency in northwestern Oregon are 382 Indians, representing nine tribes and at least four linguistic stocks. These are Rogue River 52 and Umpqua 87 (both Athapaskan), Santiam 27, Luckamute 32, Mary’s River 33, Yam Hill 33 (all Kalapooian), Clackama 64 (Chinookan), Cow Creek 30(? Waiilatpuan), and Wapeto 24. These Indians raise fair crops and have a small start in cattle, owning about 500 head, besides several hundred head of swine. The school had an average attendance of 90 through the school year of ten months. The agency has been abolished and the school superintendent has been given charge of the Indians. GREEN BAY AGENCY The Green Bay Agency is located in Wisconsin, not very far west of Green Bay. About this agency there are located nearly 4,000 Indians; 1,389 Menominis (Algonquian), 1,941 Oneidas (Iroquoian), 528 Stockbridges and Muncis (Algon- quian). The two reservations with the allotted Oneida lands, occupied by these people, are in a timbered, farming country, and the Indians are doing quite well at farming and lumbering. They have also a very few cattle, which in this KILL SPOTTED HORSE ASSINNIBOINE THE RESERVATIONS 93 region, of course, have to be kept up, so that the number owned by each family must necessarily be small. They raise considerable crops, having produced during the year 1899 about 11,000 bushels of wheat, 84,000 bushels of oats, barley and rye, 25,000 bushels of corn, great quantities of vegetables, and 2,400 tons of hay. Their cattle in all number not far from 800. If we add to the incomes of the farms, the sums earned by logging and the annuities paid them by the government, we shall see that they are not badly off. The Menominis do the most of the lumbering, while the Oneidas devote themselves chiefly to farming, and the Stockbridges and Muncis, who are doing fairly well at farming, are so divided by factional quarrels within the tribe that they cannot agree upon any course of action to be pursued. A beginning has been made in allotting lands to these people, who are much better qualified for this step than most other Indians; almost all of them can talk English and a considerable number of the children go toschool. The Oneidas are regarded as citizens and vote at all elections, casting their ballots as intelligently as their white neighbors. There are two government boarding schools, one contract boarding school and five government day schools connected with this agency. The Menomini boarding school has a capacity of 150 pupils, and the school is always crowded and children have to be turned away. As is the case with most government boarding schools, there is a good farm attached to the schools, where the boys are taught farming, together with shoemaking and carpenter shops. The contract boarding school, under the charge of the Franciscan Fathers, has a capacity of 17ochildren. Forty-five government pupils were received during the year 1899, and besides these, 60 others were supported by the order. The Oneida boarding school has a capacity of 120 pupils and is well attended. The Oneidas also have four day schools and take great interest in sending their children to school. The day school located on the Stockbridge and Munci reservation has a fairly good attendance. The Stockbridges are an English-speaking tribe and their long association with white people has given hem a distinct appreciation of the importance of educating their children. Most of the Indians are nominally Christians and the many churches on the reservation are well attended. The Indians of this agency have every opportunity to secure liquor and they make the most of their opportunities. It is exceedingly difficult for the agent to secure evidence against liquor sellers, and often when this evidence is had, the punishment on conviction isso slight that it has no effect in deterring others from indulging in the traffic. The health of the tribes seems very good, and they are—perhaps temporarily —increasing, the births in 1898 having exceeded the deaths by 47 and in 1899 by 33. As elsewhere, consumption causes the greatest number of deaths. 94 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY HOOPA VALLEY AGENCY On the small Hoopa Valley reservation in northern California live four hundred and seventy-one Hoopa Indians (Athapaskan), who have had their lands allotted. Under the same agency are six hundred and seventy-three Klamaths (Lutuamian), who have received allotments along the Klamath River. They are an industrious, contented and fairly prosperous people, owning a few horses, cattle and small stock and cultivating the ground, from which they raise wheat, oats, corn and vegetables. These Indians are quiet, law-abiding and amenable to order, and are on good terms alike with their Indian and white neighbors. A very large proportion of their children attend school. The Hoopa Valley boarding school at this agency, occupying the buildings of an old military post, has a capacity of two hundred and an average attendance of one hundred and sixty-eight. The agency here has recently been abolished and the Indians are under the charge of the school superintendent. HUALAPAI AGENCY Under the charge of a Government farmer residing at Hackberry, Arizona, are the Hualapais and Yava Supais(Yuman). The first, numbering about five hundred, lead vagrant and dissolute lives in the vicinity of the towns along the railroad. The sentiment of the white population in the neighborhood is openly in favor of selling an Indian all the whisky that he can pay for, and efforts to arrest and convict white whisky sellers are frowned on by the civilized community. Their reservation has never been occupied by the Hualapais, and as it is arid, but little farming is possible. The earnings of the Indians come from the white settlers, to whom they sell a little hay and wood. Some of the Indians, too, hire themselves out as cowboys to the neighboring cattlemen, and most of those who have entered on this occupation have done well. They make good herders, and are preferred by the white men to white cowboys, receiving the same wages. The Hualapai reservation was selected for these Indians many years ago, because, as was stated, it was supposed to have nothing on it that a white man would want; but recently it has been found to have a few good cattle ranges, which should be occupied by cattle belonging to the Indians, instead of, as now, by the herds of the neighboring white people. It cannot be doubted that if the Indians had cattle, they would take at least as much interest in them as they do in those owned by their white employers, and the possession of such herds would give them independence and self-support. Over a very large portion of the upland of the reservation farming is quite impossible. The land is largely THE RESERVATIONS 95 desert, and water for irrigation cannot be found, though there are abundant water holes at which the stock drinks. The reservation has never been surveyed, and no one knows where the line runs. This leads to more or less bickering between whites and Indians, and in the case of crimes committed on the reservation, to a failure of jurisdiction, both of the Territorial and of the United States courts. The Yava Supais live by themselves in a deep cafion, far from the habita- tions of the whites. They are farmers, clinging to-day to the same methods, the same crops, and the same place that has been theirs for a hundred years. They raise large crops of corn, pumpkins, melons and peaches, and are entirely self- supporting. Living, as they do, by themselves, they have been little corrupted by the ways of civilization, and, if let alone, will continue to support themselves, even if their advance is not very rapid. Within the past few years a school has been furnished and efforts have been made to persuade them to adopt more modern methods of farming, and the implements given them have been gladly accepted and used, with the result that their crops have considerably increased. On the whole it may be said that these Indians are making substantial, if slow, progress toward self-support. The two Hualapai day schools at Hackberry and Kingman have a united capacity of 100 with an average attendance of 96. A boarding school is about to be furnished them in Truxton Cafion. The Supai day school, capacity 60, is fully attended. JICARILLA APACHES ee The Jicarilla Apaches (Athapaskan) are under the same agent as the Pueblos, and their sub-agency is at Dulce, New Mexico, 216 miles distant from the agent’s office at Santa Fe. There are 831 of these Indians and they receive rations to about one-half the amount necessary for their support. There isa very little farming land in the reservation, from which the Indians raise a small amount of grain by the aid of water. Their irrigation facilities might be increased, but at present they farm only the bottom lands close to the streams. The reservation is, however, a good stock range and the Jicarillas might in time become self-supporting from that industry, if the means were furnished them. They are, however, very little advanced and would have to be carefully watched to keep them from eating their live stock. Although,there are 251 children of school age here, there is no school nor any educational opportunities whatever on the reservation. The Indiansare anxious to send their children to a home school, for which plans are now being made. Drunkenness is very prevalent here, the Indians freely purchasing whisky on their visits to the towns to trade. During the last year no less than sixty-seven 96 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY Indians were imprisoned in the agency jail for drunkenness, and the evil seems to be on the increase. s On the whole the Jicarillas are in a condition about as wretched as any of the western Indians. Yet, although so unfitted for self-support or self-govern- ment, their lands have been allotted to these Indians, but through the careless- ness of the allotting officials, when the allotment papers were returned, only about 120 could be delivered, owing to the failure of the officials to get the names of the Indians to whom the allotments were made. The completion of this work is likely to render nine-tenths of these Indians paupers, or worse, and to free them from the slight restraint which the government now exercises over them. KIOWA AGENCY Under the Kiowa Agency, which has its headquarters at Anadarko, Okla- homa, are four different tribes, the Kiowa, numbering 1,074; the Comanche of Shoshonean stock, 1,490; the Apache of Athapaskan stock, 176; and the Wichita of Caddoan stock, 956. With the Wichitas are a number of other Indians, also of Caddoan stock, Caddos, Tawaconis, Kichais and Huecos; there are also a few Delawares of Algonquian stock. The Kiowas, Comanches and Apaches occupy in common a reservation which contains about 3,000,000 acres of land lying between the Washita River on the north and the North Fork of the Red River on the south. The Wichita reservation comprises about 750,000 acres, and is bounded on the south by the Washita and on the north by the South Fork of the Canadian River. While considerable portions of these reservations are best adapted to stock raising, there are nevertheless many tracts of good farming land along the streams and in the bottom lands. This is a country well adapted to the raising of grain, when there is sufficient rain, and as a portion of these Indians have always practiced agriculture, they have good crops in favorable seasons. Besides that, these tribes possess considerable herds of cattle, and mixed farming is likely to be successful here. Although when cattle were first given them, the Indians understood very little about taking care of them, they are gradually coming to look after their stock better, so that now many of them own individually good herds of cattle. They put up plenty of hay for their stock and take fair care of it. This industry is likely to be more profitable than agriculture, but as stated, there are abundant bottom lands where gardens and small crops can always be raised. In the midst of the Kiowa and Comanche reservation stands the military post of Fort Sill, and the Indians of the reservation have furnished large quantities of hay and wood for the post, as well as all the hay, grain and feed necessary for the use of the agency. Moreover all the freighting of govern- ment supplies is done by the Indians, who are at all times willing to work when Se ee SIX TOES KIOWA SPIES ON THE ENEMY CROW THE RESERVATIONS oF they find any occupation that will enable them to earn money. There are a large number of Indians among the agency employees and the aggregate of their wages is about $10,000 per annum. There are three government boarding schools and one day school on the reservation, besides five mission schools, the capacity of all being 600 and the attendance 506. Certain additions to the government school plants now contemplated will, if carried out, furnish accommodation for all the children of the agency. The health of the people on this reservation is said to be generally good. Most of the deaths are due to consumption. Malarial fevers are sometimes very prevalent here. KLAMATH AGENCY At this agency are located the Klamath and Modoc Indians, the latter well known as having come in conflict with the United States authorities many years ago, after which many of them were removed to the Indian Territory, where they still live. These tribes are allied and belong to the Lutuamian stock. There are 217 of the Modocs, with whom are 103 Piutes (Shoshonean), and 825 Klamaths. Among them, but said to have been absorbed by the Klamaths, are the so-called Pitt River Indians (Palaihnihan), originally from the Pitt River country in California, south of the Klamath Basin. These Indians have taken their land in severalty and are making many improvements, and farming with some energy. They raise considerable crops and possess about 4,000 head of cattle. Their reservation is a good one for farming, and as the Indians are docile and energetic, they are likely to get ahead. There is much good land here, and if irrigated, it would provide the Indians with more farming territory than they could use. There jis still some game, and the streams abound in fish, which, by treaty, are reserved to the Indians. There are two schools, known as the Klamath and Yainax schools. The average attendance at the first named is 82, while at the Yainax school the average attendance was 79. The schools are not nearly large enough, and are in a more or less dilapidated condition. There is room for improvement at both places. LA POINTE AGENCY This agency is situated in northern Wisconsin, near the shores of Lake Superior. It comprises seven reservations; four in Wisconsin and three in Minnesota; the whole including more than 500,000 acres of land. These reser- vations are at Red Cliff, Bayfield County, Wisconsin; Bad River, Ashland County, Wisconsin; Lac Court d’Oreilles, Sawyer County, Wisconsin; Lac du 98 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY Flambeau, Vilas County, Wisconsin; Fond du Lac, Carleton County, Minnesota; Vermillion Lake, St. Louis and Itasca Counties, Minnesota; Grand Portage, Cook County, Minnesota. On the several reservations are located 4,782 Chip- pewa Indians (Algonquian). There are also 200 Indians in Forest County, Wisconsin, known as Rice Lake Chippewas, who are nominally connected with this agency. These Indians, on the whole, are not doing well. Many of them have small clearings and gardens which they cultivate in an inefficient manner, but their chief dependence for support is sugar making, berry picking, rice gathering, fishing and hunting. On the other hand considerable logging is done, although most of the timber on parts of the reservations has been cut off. There are nine day schools and three boarding schools, two of them contract schools, under the charge of the agency, but at most of them the attendance is very small. For example, at the four day schools on Lac Court d’Oreilles reservation the average attendance is only sixty-four, although the total population of the reservation is about 1,150. The Fond du Lac day schools have an average attendance of thirty-two, while the total population is 796. The total school population of all these reservations is 1,120; the attend- ance, 457. A new boarding school at Vermillion Lake is now ready for pupils, and another boarding school for the Lac Court d’Oreilles Chippewas is being constructed—unwisely—at Hayward, Wis., twenty miles distant, instead of on the reservation. The fact that these Indians are not permanently settled, but are wandering about more or less during the summer months, makes the attendance at these schools very unsatisfactory. The health of these people receives but little attention. There is a single physician, with headquarters at Ashland, to care for these seven reservations, and however conscientious he may be, or however hard he may work, it is impossible for him to accomplish much. Nearly 2,500 allotments have been made to these Indians, covering about 189,000 acres of land. LEECH LAKE AGENCY Under the newly formed Leech Lake Agency are 1,346 Red Lake, 639 Mississippi and 1,319 Pillager Chippewas (Algonquian), who were formerly under the White Earth Agency. The Red Lake Indians have fine farming lands and raise good crops of corn, and with plenty of fish, live comfortably. The Pillagers have scattered potato patches along the lakes in the pine woods, and with fish and wild rice and some game manage to get along and to reject overtures for removal to the fertile White Earth reservation. The Indians of this agency have small annuities under treaty, and share in THE RESERVATIONS 99 the proceeds of pine timber and lands surrendered by the whole Chippewa tribe under agreements negotiated with the various bands in 1889. Many of them have received allotments. Whisky has been freely obtained by the Indians and its use encouraged so as to increase the number of arrests of offenders and witnesses upon which deputy marshals might obtain fees and mileage. The Indians finally came to pay no attention to warrants and to resist arrests. This resulted in a serious conflict, in October, 1898, between some Pillagers and a detachment of U. S. troops which had been sent to assist the deputy marshals in making arrests ; six soldiers were killed and twelve wounded. Irritation and resentment born of fraud and injustice in the disposition of their pine land funds was a more remote cause of the outbreak. In subsequent councils held with the Commissioner of Indian Affairs all but three of the Indians for whom warrants had been issued surrendered themselves to the marshals. Miserable and meager accommodations for 100 pupils in two overcrowded boarding schools are now being replaced by five new buildings—three of them for new schools—which will treble the capacity. There is also at Red Lakea contract school attended by fifty-seven children. LEMHI AGENCY Five hundred and twelve Indians, all of Shoshone an stock, occupy the Lemhi reservation, which is situated in the Lemhi Valley, Idaho, about seventy miles distant from Red Rock, Montana. The tribes represented are: Shoshonis, Sheep Eaters and Bannocks. These people are by no means progressive, they raise little or nothing, have no cattle, and might fairly enough be called worthless. Having no occupation, and nothing to keep them busy, they devote themselves to gambling and dancing. There are exceptions to this rule, but they are few. The country which they inhabit is a dry, grazing country, and the altitude being considerable, 5,400 feet, there is not much to be done in the way of farm- ing. There are 2,000 or 3,000 acres of land here, susceptible of cultivation, and, if a proper irrigation system were devised and put in operation, all this land might be cultivated to the extent of producing wild hay, timothy, clover and alfalfa, as well as oats and barley. If water should be brought on this land, and a few cattle distributed among these Indians, they would, undoubtedly, with proper handling, make a start at becoming self-supporting. As it is, the government issues them about one-third rations, and they earn the rest of their living by hunting, fishing, and by working for the white people. They have no especial incentive to improve themselves, and are not likely to make any long strides in advance until they see some such reward. There is a boarding school here with an average attendance of twenty-nine pupils, there being more than 100 children of school age on the reservation. 100 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY LOWER BRULE AGENCY The Lower Brule reservation lies on the west bank of the Missouri River immediately opposite the Crow Creek Agency, in South Dakota. It is now occupied by only 472 allotted Brule Sioux, the other half of the band having removed to the Rosebud reservation. July 1, 1899, they formally joined the Rosebud Sioux. This is another reservation where farming has been attempted without success. It is essentially a grazing country, and the people here, to accomplish anything, must devote themselves to stock raising. They have had some cattle, but recent severe winters have caused heavy losses and their herds are consider- ably reduced. Nevertheless in the year ending June 30, 1899, they furnished the government with 59,000 pounds of beef, and in the same year they put up 1,000 tons of hay for their cattle. They are making slow progress, but they are certainly advancing, though they still receive rations. There are 106 children of school age now here. The attendance at the boarding school during 1899 was 150. As the capacity of the school is about 140, it will hereafter more than meet the needs of the reduced population. MEDAWAKANTON SIOUX With headquarters for a disbursing agent at Redwood Falls, Minnesota, there are scattered over the neighboring country 900 Sioux belonging to this band, of whom but 200 are full bloods. They are located near Mendota, Shakopee, Eggleston and Morton. Asa rule these people are sober and indus- trious. They receive annuities in money and are practically self-supporting. The mixed bloods labor at the ordinary occupations of the whites, while of the full bloods, the women make lace, and the men Indian curiosities for trade. There is a government day school at Morton which cares for a portion of the children and there is also a mission day school. No doubt many of the children of the mixed bloods attend the district schools of this well settled region. MESCALERO AGENCY The Mescalero Agency is in New Mexico just south of Fort Stanton. Here there are 443 Mescalero Apaches (Athapaskan), occupying a reservation which has a fine climate and an excellent sheep range among its mountains, but contains only goo acres of irrigable land, of which goo acres have been in posses- sion of white persons for twenty years. The remainder is all under cultivation by the Indians. Other small, scattered tracts can be made to yield crops only when the uncertain rainfall is sufficient. A sawmill recently provided has given the Mescalero Apaches their first opportunity to exchange tepees for houses, which they are doing rapidly. The placing of everyavailable child in school, the SPOTTED JACK RABBIT CROW THE RESERVATIONS 101 wearing of civilized dress and the cutting of the hair have been rigidly enforced. In 1897 there were issued to these Indians 5,000 sheep. They have since bought a few hundred goats, and fenced in additional pasturage. Rations have been regularly issued but in decreasing quantities until last summer, when, for the time being at least, rations were withdrawn from all but the Indian police and about 50 aged persons. Their boarding school can accommodate about roo children and is full. A few other youth have been sent away to school. The Mescalero Agency was abolished not long ago, the Indians being now in charge of a school superintendent. MISSION-TULE AGENCY Under the jurisdiction of the so-called Mission-Tule River Agency are three groups of Indians, the Yuma, numbering 707, the Tule River 161,and the Mission Indians 2,954. These last represent several stocks and a great number of tribes and survivors of tribes, with of course a very large admixture of Mexican blood. . They are such Indians as in Mexico would be called peons. The Mission Indians are nominally civilized ; that is to say, they wear white men’s clothing, live in houses, and in many respects have adopted white men’s ways. During the Spanish occupancy of the country they lived by farming and stock raising, under the instruction and more or less under the peonage of the Catholic missions. After California became a part of the United States and the white population increased, claims in due legal form were filed upon lands which Indians had cultivated for generations and there was no one to present the counter claims of the Indians. They were thus gradually forced into the moun- tains and deserts until they were barely rescued from utter vagabondage and beggary by the setting aside, in 1875 and subsequently, of 180,000 acres in 25 small reservations as near their homes as available land could then be secured. Many of these reservations have little or no water, and litigation and trespass is the lot of those which have water. Allotments have been made upon eleven, and five others are to be allotted when surveys are completed. The lines bounding many of the reservations are unmarked, so that no one knows just what their limits are, and the confusion resulting from this leads to constant dissatisfaction and uneasiness. Where possible, crops are raised ; the Indians also do considerable work on ranches and as sheep shearers are in demand. On the whole they are wretch- edly poor, depend largely upon acorns and mesquite beans and are more or less improvident. A boarding school at Perris, California, has accommodations for 150, and an attendance of 186 pupils, and there are also ten day schools attended by 192 pupils. 102 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY The Yumas live in their old-time way on an unirrigated reservation on the Colorado River, their only civilizing influence being a boarding school in the old Fort Yuma military post which is attended by 126 of their children. The Tule River Indians live comfortably in a fairly civilized way, and have a day school. As is always the case, under conditions such as these, the liquor traffic flourishes among these Indians, and it is a difficult matter to secure proof of violation of the law and a conviction. It seldom happens that public sentiment in the neighborhood of the reservations supports the law against whisky selling to the Indians, and it is thus almost impossible to put an end to it, unless the agent is a man of exceptional energy and force. The health of these Indians is unsatisfactory and the death-rate high. Consumption, scrofula and organic heart disease are the most common and most fatal of their complaints. NAVAJO AGENCY These Indians occupy a large reservation lying partly in northeastern Arizona, and partly in northwestern New Mexico. They are estimated to number more than 20,500. Water is extremely scarce here, and the main industry is stock raising. For many years the Navajoes (Athapaskan) have been a pastoral people, and they are said now to possess more than 100,000 cattle, 1,000,000 sheep and 250,000 goats, though no reliable figures can be ascertained. They are industrious, and where water can be had, farm their patches with good success. Their wool crop is considerable. They obtain quite an income from the manufacture and sale of blankets; some of them work on the railroad. On account of the lack of water there, not more than two-thirds of the tribe live, or can live, on the reservation, and to gather them all on the reserve, as has been proposed, would mean that they must starve on its deserts, or be rationed by the government. Like most people of Athapaskan stock, the Navajoes are energetic and hardworking. They are law-abiding, too, and mind their own business, never interfering with that of their neighbors. In the year 1897, sixteen families of Navajoes, who had taken their flocks a short distance off the reservation, were assaulted by the officials of Coconino County, and a number of their sheep were killed. The brutal action of the county authorities, though clearly established at the time, was subsequently denied, and no action to right the injury done to the Indians has been taken by the United.States authorities. Of course, the Indians had put themselves in the wrong by leaving their reservation. Within the last three years special attention has been given to developing by ditches and reservoirs what little water supply the reservation affords. a RIGHT 1898 Sica Ao Coat MOSTEOSE IOWA CSS oN erga na -lowa - Deed THE RESERVATIONS 103 Nearly 2,000 acres of arable land have thus been added to the farming resources of the Navajo. Moreover, they have been advised and assisted in improving their own rude systems of irrigation. The Navajo children are bright and industrious, and their progress in school is very satisfactory, but there is school accommodation for only about 150 children. The boarding school not far from Gallup, N. M., has a capacity of 120 and an average attendance of 77. There is also one day school. Under the same agent as the Navajo are THE MOKI These Pueblo Indians (Shoshonean) live in compact villages on the barren tops of three mesas in their considerable reservation, which liessouthwest of and adjoining the Navajo reservation. They are now, as they always have been, tillers of the soil, and raise considerable crops in the valleys below and at some distance from their homes, the area of their cultivated lands being about 10,000 acres. They raise corn and vegetables, and possess a few cattle, sheep and goats, and usually have one or two years’ supply of grain in their storehouses. A few have been induced to come down from the crowded mesas and to build and occupy houses in the vicinity of their cultivated field, but they are loath to make any change in their traditional customs, and most of the ninety-six houses are occupied only in summer. In this dry country where nothing can be raised without the use of water, and where water is extremely scarce, there have been frequent disputes between the Indians who occupy the land and the whites who trespass upon it and endeavor to take up the springs, which are the only valuable things that it possesses. After one of the most recent of these disputes, the Department confirmed to the Indians, in August, 1897, certain allotments of land, and all parties concerned were notified of this decision, and the white claimants were warned to refrain from molesting the Indians. Nevertheless, when planting time came, in 1898, a Mormon claimant reasserted his claim to part of the allotted land, and refused to permit the Indians to plant there. The agent, thereupon, ordered the agency farmer for that district to take possession of the land, and to plant it for the Indian, by force, if necessary. The farmer did so, and was then arrested and tried before a justice of the peace and sentenced to imprisonment for six months and to pay a fine of $300. The case was appealed by the agent, but in the meantime the Secretary of the Interior was persuaded to suspend his order approving the allotments. An inspector, sent out to inves- tigate the matter, readjusted the allotment to the satisfaction of the Indians, while recognizing such rights as the Mormon claimant possessed. 104 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY The Moki are given as numbering 2,641. The historic and most conservative Pueblo of Oraibi is on this reservation. During the past year ascourge of smallpox swept over two of the Moki mesas, but by strict quarantine the third mesa escaped. There were 632 cases and 187 deaths in the population of 2,600. The Keam’s Cafion boarding school in Arizona for the Moki has a capacity of 100, with an attendance of 78. Another boarding school has just been started at Blue Cafion. There are three day schools, with a capacity of 120 and an enrollment of 122. NEAH BAY AGENCY The Neah Bay Agency is located in the extreme northwestern part of the State of Washington. Of the 707 Indians in this agency, 404 belong to the Makah tribe (Wakashan), 228 to the Quilliutes, and 75 to the Hohs (Chimakuan), Since 1898 the Indians here have decreased in number, owing to an epidemic of measles. The Makahs, since seal catching is denied them, are turning their attention somewhat to farming and stock raising, for which their lands are not suited, while most of their income is from the fish they ship to Seattle. The other tribes are very poor. There are two day schools, one at Neah Bay, and one at Quillayute. There is no school at Hoh and they seem to be in need of assistance in many ways. They own 250 head of cattle. Whisky drinking is a failing with these Indians, and it is almost impossible to find out where they get it. NEVADA AGENCY Five hundred and fifty-two Piute (Shoshonean) Indians are under the Nevada Agency, which is near the town of Wadsworth, Nevada. The reservation includes within its boundaries Pyramid Lake, a large body of water from which, by fishing, the Indians draw a large portion of their subsistence. They also work for neighboring farmers and stockmen. The territory in which their land is situated is dry and mountainous, and crops can be raised only by means of irrigation. They cultivate less than 200 acres of land and their crops often fail on account of the scarcity of water. Ditches are now being constructed which will irrigate more land. This reservation is well adapted to stock raising, and if. these Indians were furnished with a number of stock cattle and taught how to care for them, they would undoubtedly do well. At present their earnings from any source are exceedingly small. They do their own freighting and annually earn about $700 in this way. They also supply the agency with wood and hay, which gives them about $2,000 more. CHARLES BIDDLE OMAHA THE RESERVATIONS 105 There is a boarding school at Pyramid Lake, but it is poorly provided, and has an average attendance of 68 children, while there are on the reserva- tion 122 children of school age. The school at Carson, Nevada, takes a number of them. The health of the children at the schools is said to be good. In the town of Wadsworth, situated on the borders of the reservation, more or less liquor is constantly sold to the Indians and the usual difficulties follow. What the Nevada reservation especially needs is better irrigation facilities, the issue to the Indians of some live stock, and better school conditions. NEW YORK AGENCY Under the New York Agency, in the northern and western part of the State, are 5,320 Indians, who are in part descendants of the old Six Nations of the Iroquois. There are 170 Cayugas who have no reservation, and reside largely on the Cattaraugus reservation. They receive annuities from the State of New York, and merchandise annuities from the United States. The Onondagas number 551, and most of them occupy a reservation, which contains about 6,100 acres, about five miles south of Syracuse. A considerable portion of this is arable land which, for the most part, is cultivated by white people under leases. The stone quarries on the hillsides are also worked by white people under leases. A very few of the Onondagas are well-to-do farmers. The Oneidas number 255. A few reside on individual farms near the village of Oneida in Madison County. Other Oneidas live on the Onondaga reservation. Most of the tribe moved to Wisconsin in 1846. Those that remain in New York are citizens. The Senecas are far the most numerous of these New York Indians and number 2,812. They occupy three reservations known as the Allegany, Cat- taraugus and Tonawanda reservations; all in the western part of the State. They are not doing well, for although there are among them a few good farmers, most of them grow scanty crops and depend for their living, chiefly upon work- ing for their white neighbors. Toa very great extent, their lands are leased to white people for long terms of years, and the same is true of certain oil lands on the Allegany reservation. There are a few good Indian farmers on all these different reservations, but they are the exceptions to the rule, and the reserva- vations are for the most part occupied by whites. The St. Regis Indians, numbering 1,154, occupy a reservation located on the St. Lawrence River in Franklin County, just on the boundary line between New York and Canada, and the Canadian St. Regis reservation adjoins it on the north. The American Indians have some good farming land on their reservation, but most of them have given up farming to engage in basket making, by which they support themselves. The Tuscaroras, 378 in number, with 48 Onondagas, occupy a reservation in 106 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY Niagara County, not far from Suspension Bridge. There are about 6,300 acres in the reservation, which is fertile. The Tuscaroras are good farmers, and their farms will compare favorably with those of the whites in the neighborhood. They are by far the most progressive of the New York Indians. Only about one-third of the children of school age belonging to this agency attend the 29 schools furnished by the State of New York for their reservations, but an improvement has been noticed within two or three years in this respect. An Industrial School established in 1854 on the Allegany reservation by the efforts of the Society of Friends in Philadelphia, has a capacity of forty-five. There is also an orphan asylum for Indian children on the Cattaraugus reser- vation, which is supported by the State. On the whole it cannot be said that the New York Indians have made the progress towards civilization which they ought to have made. With a few exceptions, they still support themselves by occasional labor, and by the manu- facture of baskets and of bead work, which they sell in the summer to visitors from other parts of the country. NEZ PERCES AGENCY Three years ago the Nez Percé reservation in Idaho ceased to exist, their lands having been allotted in severalty to the 1,639 Indians who belong here. While a majority of the tribe wished and accepted their allotments, at least one- third were opposed, and their efforts to hamper the allotting agent by refusing to give their names and in other ways has since occasioned some confusion in the adjustment of allotments and issuance of patents. The Nez Percés (Shahaptian) are a fine people, earnest, energetic and pro- gressive, and the country where their allotments were made is fair farming land, yielding good harvests, and not always requiring irrigation. They also receive incomes from the leasing of their allotments—largely to their injury. An abundant supply of timber was reserved for the benefit of the Indians, from which they draw, at moderate expense, sufficient lumber for their needs. The surplus lands of the Indians having been sold for cash, which, by the terms of the treaty, shall be paid to them in cash, these Indians are handicapped by having too much money, which many of them squander as fast as it is received. Having become citizens of the United States, by the fact of having received their allotments, and being brought in close contact with the whites, and having plenty of money, it may be readily imagined that the liquor traffic flour- ishes among them. Efforts to secure the assistance of United States deputy marshals, in breaking up the whisky trade, have proved futile, and it is still carried on. The last report of crops raised by these Indians shows that their harvest THE RESERVATIONS 107 amounted to 40,000 bushels of wheat, 15,000 bushels of oats, barley and rye, 5,000 bushels of vegetables, and 2,000 tons of hay. They possess no less than 20,000 head of horses, and 15,000 head of cattle, and are among the most prosperous Indians of the northwest. A railroad has recently been completed, running by the agency to the Northern Pacific Railroad, which will greatly facil- itate the shipping of the Indians’ farm products to a market. There are about 350 children of school age among the Nez Percés, but the school at Fort Lapwai, which has a capacity of 175, has recently been poorly attended and much less interest than formerly is taken in it by the Indians, who, now that they are citizens, are not easily induced to send their children to school. The average attendance is only 58. However, a few Indian children have lately been attending the district schools established within the boundaries of the old Nez Perce resérvation. OMAHA AND WINNEBAGO AGENCY This agency is situated in northwestern Nebraska, on the west bank of the Missouri River, and has about 2,300 Indians, about equally divided between Omaha and Winnebago (Siouan). Their lands have been allotted to them in severalty, but they have leased many of their allotments to white people and are not themselves doing nearly as much as might be wished in the way of farming. The last report states that for the season of 1899, they raised 12,500 bushels of wheat, 65,000 bushels of corn, and that they then possessed about 700 cattle. Both the Omahas and the Winnebagos have long been agriculturists, but they do not appear to be making the progress that they should. There has been one industrial boarding school for each reservation, one for the Omahas and one for the Winnebagos. They have been fairly well attended. The Winnebago school building was destroyed by fire during 1898, which of course deprives these children of the opportunity to attend school. The work of replacing it is in progress. Many children of both tribes attend schools off the reservation and some the public schools which have been established on the reservations. These people are fairly healthy ; the deaths for the year 1898 numbering 86, while the births were 138. In 1899 the pendulum has swung back again. There are a considerable number of mixed bloods, and just how far this modifies the death rate it is difficult to say. OSAGE AGENCY The Osage and Kaw, or Kansa Indians (Siouan), are situated on the Osage and Kaw reservations under charge of a single agent. The Osages are the richest and—in consideration of their opportunities—the least, progressive of any 108 THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY tribe in the United States. They occupy a reservation of 1,400,000 acres of land, lying in the northeast corner of Oklahoma, adjoining Kansas on the north and the Indian Territory on the east. The reservation, while containing much fertile land in the valleys, has still much upland adapted to grazing, and some timber. It is fairly well watered. The Kansa’s reservation consists of 100,000 acres of land, lying to the west of the Osage reservation and adjoining it. There are 1,765 of the Osages, of whom about 900 are full bloods and the remainder mixed bloods. Of the Kaws, there are 208, 100 being full bloods. Much farming is done on these reservations, which produce large crops, far more than enough to supply the wants of all the Indians. Unfortunately, however, farming is done, not by the Indians, but by white men, either as tenants of the Indians, or as working in their employ. Besides the crops which they raise, the Indians have large herds of domestic animals. Their horses are said to number 7,800, their cattle 20,000, their swine 16,000. Besides this, the Osages receive for each man, woman and child an annuity of over $200 in cash. This means that a family of ten persons would receive $2,000, and it is hardly to be expected that people who are so well to do as these, would make very much effort toward self-improvement. No people, whatever their color or education, are likely to work very hard unless they have some motive todoso. All the wants of the Osages being provided for, they naturally take life as easily as they can. There are 601 children of school age on these reservations, and of these about 300 attend the home schools. There are two government boarding schools, and two contract Catholic schools on the reservations. The Osages seem to be slightly on the increase, and recently the births exceed the deaths. The Kaws have steadily decreased. On the whole the health of the Indians has been good. As might naturally be expected ona reser- vation situated as this one is, the liquor traffic is a serious evil. Under the most favorable circumstances this can only be kept down by constant watchfulness. PIMA AGENCY In the midst of an Arizona desert are located the Pima, Papago (Piman), and Maricopa (Yuman), three desert-inhabiting tribes, numbering in all nearly 8,000 people. Of these, 4,260 are Pimas, 340 Maricopas, and the remaining 3,300 Papagos. These tribes, all under the jurisdiction of the Pima agency, are scattered about on four different reservations in Arizona, not very far north of the Mexican boundary line. A considerable portion of the land which the Pimas occupy on the Gila River reservation is susceptible of irrigation from the Gila River, and this desert, when watered, produces astonishing crops. But the water supply for the reservation is yearly diminishing as white settlers above them (Posrmanen) Perens ge ON(A ~