The Word Carrier (Santee, Nebraska), 1891-07 - 1891-08

              The Word Carrier.
VOLUME   XX.
HELPING   THE   KIGHT,   EXPOSING   THE   WRONG.
NUMBERS 7-8.
SANTEE AGENCY, NEBRASKA.
JULY-AUGUST, i8qi.
FIFTY CENTS PER YEAR.
OUR   PLATFORM.
For Indians we want American Education ! lie want American Homes!
We want American Rights! Tlie result of which is American Citizenship!,
And the Gospel is the Power of God for
their Salvation.
Like the uprooting and transplanting of full grown forest trees
is the removal of Mr. and Mrs. W.
K. Morris from the superintend-
ency of Good Will Mission school,
Sisseton Agency, S. D.,to the Presbyterian Mission at Omaha Agency, Neb. All the arrangements
were completed before anybody, except those most directly interested,
had heard of it. The Indian pastors, elders, and church members
generally of the churches on Sisseton Agency have sent in a protest
to the Presbyterian Board of Home
Missions.
We have seen nothing neater
than the way in which General
Morgan turned to ridicule the action of certain Avhite nincompoops
of Nebraska avIio violently protested
against the Genoa Indian school
hoys being allowed to go out to
work on the sugar beet farms. The
Commissioner mercilessly called attention to the foreign names signed
to the protest in behalf of native
Americans. He also coolly intimated that it would be quite possible to move this large Indian
school into a more congenial neighborhood ; Avhich Avould have been
complying AA'ith a vengence. These
brave American (?) laborers were
completely squelched.
Opportunity for a work of special
importance is given to the gifted pen
of Mrs. Elaine Goodale Eastman.
It is not so much to fight the battles of the race that she has adopted
by her marriage Avith Dr. Charles A.
Eastman, as to harmonize the best
thought of both -races. In their
real interests, which are the interests of humanity and not of tribes
or types of men, they are not opposed to each other. The intelligent and principled Indians see
this. Nor is it difficult to make the
honest white settlers see the same.
Those most difficult to reach are
the Agency hangers on, tbe driftwood on the shores of civilization.
But they are factors in the problem
of reconstruction which cannot be
ignored. They must be rehabilitated in manhood rather than antagonized. Herein is the patience of
the saints.	
The commendations of Commissioner Morgan by the Protestant religious papers for breaking off with
the Catholic Indian Bureau, are all
right and well deserved, but they
leave the impression upon the minds
of their readers that it accomplishes
more than it does. It does not do
anything towards equalizing the
grants to the denominational contract schools; for the Romanists
get more this yeai'ithan ever. Only
the government funds are not to go
through the hands of the Catholic Bu-
reau,but directly to the Roman Catholic schools. One peculiarity has
marked the commissioner's attempt
to resist the inroads of the Romanist
propaganda upon the government
treasury; in that every stand made
against them has been financially
profitable to the Romanists. They
have secured more money every
time they have been opposed, in
order to prove that the government
was not persecuting them. As for
touching the merits of the case, no
progress has been made. Except
so far as this, that the never-satisfied and ever-enlarging demands
of the Romanists will soon compel the government to cut off all
grants-in-aid to missionary schools,
good and bad alike.
A VISIT TO ROSEBUD.
The Indians there and at Pine
Ridge Agency have worn more of
the ancient heathen dress since the
outbreak last winter than in several years before. Paint and feathers are much in vogue. And the
dirty white sheet constitutes the
more important garment of the
grimy would-be brave. The visitor
Avas strolling toward a butte in
search of fossils when overtaken by
sudden rain. At a short distance
to one side were some willow poles
stuck into the ground and bent over
into a dome shaped structure, which
Avhen covered over with a blanket
makes the kind of a camp shelter
that is called a "wickiup." Toward
these bare bent poles a sheeted Indian was approaching on horseback.
He flopped off his horse, hastily
disrobed and stretched his white
garment over the poles, then crouching beneath, was as sheltered as
any one need be. But the white
visitor, insufficiently protected by
his civilized clothes, immediately
envied the Indian and, pickaxe in
hand, made a hasty charge on the
wickiup. The Indian seemed pleased at the appreciation of the usefulness of his AA'hite robe. Therefore they sat together, the Indian
meanwhile listening to the visitor's
explanation of fossilology. The red
man Avas very attentive and asked
some pointed questions, and Avith a
final recommendation that he interest himself in the strange rocks of
his native lands,the visit or Avithdrew.
The location of Rosebud Agency
is about the Avorst that it could be.
There are hundreds of square miles
of beautiful land on the great reservation,  but the Agency is in the
midst of the worst broken country
to be found.  Great bare clay bluffs
and rocky buttes tower up on all
sides.    And   these   are   broken
through by deep, craggy, tortuous
ravines   and canons that surround
the little huddled group of Agency
buildings.   As the hills are around
Jerusalem—yes the hills crossed by
j the clay and sandy paths that are
! so dazzling in the sunlight and so
■ ghostly  in the gloaming,  remind
! one very strongly of the more beau-
! tiful environs of Jerusalem.    Here
! is sand rock instead of the Jerusa-
! lem lime, and scrub pine in place of
olive trees.   But far be it from comparison with the New Jerusalem!
Rosebud is reputed to be one of the
! most troublesome Indian Agencies.
There   is   plenty of truth in the
| statement   that   on   this   Agency
! more Indians have been made of
white men than civilized men from
1 Indians.    The   mixed bloods   are
i many.   When a Avhite man has so
! little self-respect as to live with an
Indian  Avoman in order to feed up-
! on Government rations; and when
in addition to this he not only
shamelessly begs but steals more
than his share from the Indians'
beggarly sustenance, then surely
that white man is a pauper of Ioav-
est grade. There are many such
on this fair-named Rosebud Reservation ! But the majority of" squaw
men" are morally straight. They
haA'e been legally married and have
lived with one woman. In this respect they are morally aboA'e many
of the white employees. And these
white men with Indian wives have
on the whole done more toward
giving the Indians an example of
family life than any other Avhites
except the missionaries.
Of all the Sioux the Rosebud
Indians appear the most promising
though they have had least done for
them. If the Government will only cease to barbarize and pauperize
them and place them in conditions
that shall force them to appreciate
the value of education and then
genuinely educate them!
Skiniciya.
the indian avomen of dakota.
We are deeply and earnestly interested in our sister women over the
seas, and study Avith untiring energy of the "Women of Persia," the
"Women in Armenian Villages"
and their strange dress and
manners. But we have in our
midst women of more than equal
interest to us, because, being more
at home in this land of ours than
we ourselves, they should have our
first attention, being Americans in
the first and best sense of the word.
I refer to the women of the
numerous small tribes of Indians
such as Cheyennes, Sioux, *Ogalal-
la, Yanktons, and other tribes.
The women of the different tribes
do not differ materiallv in personal
appearance, all being rather below
the average of other women in
stature.
In general they have small hands
and feet, Avhich are often so perfectly shaped that they would cause
almost a feeling of envy in the
breast of many a "pale-faced" belle.
Their hah- is of raven blackness;
Avhen dressed for church in the
two smooth strands close behind
each ear, Avhich is the universal
style of hairdressing among them,
one cannot imagine anything more
glossy or shining. Some have an
abundance of Avell-kept tresses,
Avhich beauty they fully appreciate.
In dress they have changed for
the worse, in regard to pictur-
esqueness at least. Most of them
wear what is known in Western
terms as a "squaw dress," it being
of very simple cut, merely a sack
like gown wider at the hem than at
the neck, material usually calico,
but oftentimes of gorgeous color,
such as bright green trimmed in
red, and the fit of the dress of no
consideration; and always, on
warmest summer days, or coldest
winter evenings, at home or abroad,
folded in an oblong and drawn
closely to the form, the indispensa-
ahle shawl or blanket, the head
: without a covering of any kind.
Last summer we saw on one of
their fete days, three ideal Indian
girls.    They were daughters  of a
i chief and their dresses Avere marvels
*The writer does not seem to know that Ogalalas
i and Yanktons are Sioux.
of Indian art.    The dresses were of
buckskin and reached from neck to
ankle,  gradually Avidening toward
the lower edge, witli wide, floAving
sleeves, all parts of the  dress   entirely  covered  Avith  beautiful   designs done in many colored  beads
of every   shape  and size,  Avhich
threw off rainbow colors as they
rode swiftly from place to place on
their sleek little ponies.    Suspended from tlieir ears were bead ornaments perhaps three  inches wide
and reaching to the waist.    Their
moccasins and leggings were beaded   to   match   their   dresses, and
one could not desire a more beautiful or appropriate setting for the
dusky beauty of nature's children.
ToAvard one another they are forgiving and unselfish, but careless or
unthoughtful of the little kindnesses so necessary toward the sick,often
leaving them to  the care  of  any
chance nurse if the care of  them
interferes with their inclination to
go and come as they are continually
doing. They have a keen sense of the
ridiculous at any time or place and
can   be  more  sarcastic  and  contemptuous than any people it has
been my fortune to  meet.    There
is a stolid endurance about them
that   makes them   seem   indifferent  to pain or  hardship, though
they do not reach an advanced age
probably from the reason of their
exposure to  all  kinds  of  Aveather
while on their roving, gypsy expeditions, and so Ave do not often meet
with an Indian women avIio is too feeble from age to perform the work of a
household.    They have no system
their about work and are seemingly
very indolent about housework. But
the unsettled, nomadic life they lead
is not conductive to settled habits or
systematic arrangements of duties.
The necessary comforts of the day oi-
hour is tlieir only incentive to duty.
And they being still the slave and
drudge of the men  of the   family
circle we cannot wonder that they
have   not   a  love  for  the  home-
making which is so dear to the heart
of their American sisters.
In the frequent wanderings of the
Indian it is the woman who finds the
fuel and carries it on her back to
kindle the lire and cook the food for
the"noble red man ;" she who pickets
the ponies, makes and breaks camp,
taking the tepees down and loading
the wagons, and performs all work
which we are accustomed to see performed by the men. The man is
merely ornamental with them, and
it has been their condition so long
that there is no thought of another
state of things nor word of complaint.
On the reservation, when they are
at home, they now have for each
family a small log house, and the
Avomen like them better than the
tepee, though we nearly ahvays see
a tepee standing near the house, and
also a summer house built of poles
and green boughs, the same being
used as sleeping apartments during
Avarm weather, it being impossible
for them to abandon entirely their
free,out-door life. There is a strange
fascination in their free,wandering
life,and those avIio have in any way
been associated with them, have
been impressed Avith the fact that
it is so much easier to fall into their
Avays of living than to convert them
to ours.—KateCarnes inChatauquan.