The Word Carrier (Santee, Nebraska), 1898-01

              The Word Carrier
©
VOLUME   XXVII.
HELPING   THE   RIGHT,   EXPOSING   THE   WRONG.
NUMBER  1.
SANTEE AGENCY, NEBRASKA.
JANUARY, i8q8.
FIFTY CENTS PER YEAR.
OUR   PLATFORM.
For Indians we want American Education! We want American Homes!
We want American Rights! The result of which is American Citizenship!
And the gospel is the Power of God for
their Salvation!
The story of the Five Civilized
Tribes in Indian Territory is that
of one of the most visionary schemes
that ever found place on this continent. It was a beautiful dream
that in this Indian paradise these
tribes should dwell in pristine
simplicity unmarred and unharmed by white men's ways "as long
as grass grows and water runs."
It could never have been realized.
Tlie serpent was already in their
Eden. Already white blood was
running in their veins and white
brain was moulding their plans
and directing their councils. So
that now the Indian pure and simple has little to do with the case.
For years he has been a silent partner. If any one would seek his
welfare or protect his rights it is
not to be done through those who
pose as the dignitaries of his tribe
and who manipulate his political
affairs.
Meanwhile a great political emergency has arisen, a nation of white
men has sprung up within the Indian nation, but without protection
or restraint of law and without
schools or any of the institutions
of civilized life. Nor are the most
of them intruders. They have come
on invitation, to open the farms
and care for the crops of the more
reposeful Indian. Now they are
there they cannot be left to social
and political chaos. So the time
has come when the pretty dream
must be remanded to the story
book. In this year 1898 we must
come down to realities. With this
new year the United States will assume its legitimate responsibility
to "establish justice and insure domestic tranquility" here as in other
parts of its great domain. And
the friends of the Indian will say,
"Amen."
Government officials generally
disdain to recognize the Dakota
language. In their judgment it
never should have been given written form and is not only useless
but a hindrance to civilization.
Consequently it is interesting, if not
amusing, to find official notices
posted in the Dakota language
whenever it is desired that all the
people may read and understand
them. And notices written in English will be understood all the sooner because the missionaries have
been wise enough in language development to lead from the known
to the unknown.
Compel the reservation Indians
to work. If it is not done for their
self support let it be done for their
physical and moral development.
Set them to work! Issue rations
in measure of labor accomplished.
Build roads. Cut all important
roads through all the hills and
build bridges over every stream.
Make every Indian reservation a
park of good highways.
Irrigation is evidently to be the
making of this western country for
civilized life. If our Goverment
would spend a little in arranging for
irrigation on the Indian reservations, and at the same time compel
tbe Indians to do the work they
could soon become self-supporting.
SUNDAY IU  A SIOUX CAMP.
It was Sunday in Flying By's
camp. It was Sunday also in New
York and Chicago, and several other
places; but there the resemblance
ceased, ln New York and Chicago
horses were dropping dead in the
street, and frightened people putting
ice on their heads; but in Flying
By's camp there was no fear, save at
the log-house on the butte, where the
missionary watches over her flock,
—there we were afraid that the thermometer would burst, so when it
approached 137°, we put it in the log-
house to keep cool.
Probably for lack of a thermometer, the horses in our camp were
lively as usual,and after the herds—
led by those of a man suitably
named Crazy Horse and followed
by all tbe boys swinging their long
lariats—had been for their morning drink, they climbed to the highest point of an exposed butte, and
spent the day safe from flies but
fully exposed to the fervid heat of
the July sun.
The log church and mission house
stand sharply above the surrounding camp on an abrupt promontory
in the bluffs that climb from the
wide green bottom-land of Grand
River to the endless sweep of a prairie above. Thus far it resembles
Israel's temple, "whither the tribes,
the tribes of the Lord go up," but
beyond its situation there is nothing
in the twelve by fourteen foot building, chinked with mud, to remind
us of Solomon's grandeur. The
small gray house clings closely to
the earth that rises behind it in almost sheer wall to the vivid blue
sky above. This sharp angle of the
butte is intensified by a single
thread-like track that climbs its
side, and seems to end in the heavens themselves. But the long haired
Dakotas that so rise above us day
by day are not seeking heaven, but
another camp, and the trail is worn
by their sure-footed ponies.
From the old bell at the church
door there is a short, steep slide of
buffalo grass, and then the bluff
spreads out in a tiny plateau, and
then drops abruptly down in rain-
washed gravel to the green river
land and big trees.
There, on this shelf of earth, midway between tbe water and tbe sky,
swept by the winds of the heaven,
looking down on the shade one may
not enjoy in this climate and across
to Flying By's white teepees, is the
tiny, gray, log house of the missionary.
Here a gently bred woman eight
miles from any of her own race, lives
by herself, with only her ponies for
companions. These she cares for
daintily with her own hands, often
putting their comfort before her own,
after a weary day in the camp. The
dismal cry of tbe coyote is the only
night sound, and her friends and
protectors are that band of Sioux
whose boast is that they wiped out
the United States Army on the Big
Horn. Her log house, not as large
as the old sitting-room at home, with
itswalls covered with cotton cloth,its
shiny cook-stove, its dishes, its real
lamp, its bed hidden by a curtain
with flowers on it, its barrel of coffee-
colored river-water for drinking, is
in our eyes the last outpost of sacrifice, but in the eyes of the Indians it
is wealth and luxury, and it is the
only house in the camp that could
not be packed and ready to move in
ten minutes.
When, that July morning, the
herds, looking from our brush arbor
like flies climbing a wall, had wound
slowly up the bluffs, all was hot and
tranquil until Helper, the native
preacher, came and dinged on the
old bell. Then big lumber-box wagons and gay horsemen began to
wend their way from the camp, and
climb the steep paths that lead to
Zion. To me it seemed hot even
with the thermometer out of sight,
yet the Indian women folded their
heavy blanket shawls over their
heads, and looked cool and calm.
As each team arrived, the horses
were picketed out, until we looked
like a fair or a gypsy camp.
All chatted together until two
boys came up from the house, bringing the tiny organ that was the wonder of the band, and put it in its
place of honor in tbe church. Behind it the fair-haired leader took
her place, and her little congregation followed her in. There was a
door which compelled the men to
bow down on entering, a four-paned
window, through which the southern sun shone, a table fashioned
from a pine box, and a large stove,
offering a reminder of Dakota winters.
The women and girls sat on one
side, the men on another, and the
boys were squeezed in between the
men and the preacher whose place
was marked by the pine box at one
end of a bench. The men as they
came in stopped to shake hands witb
the white ladiesand then talkedcheer-
fully until the meeting began. They
sang in Dakota, they read in Dakota; the native preacher preached in
Dakota and prayed in Dakota, but
I thought in English. The preacher's child crawled regularly to his
father's feet, was caught, carried
back, and fed, until, at last, patience ceased to be a virtue, and he
was taken without and disciplined.
Studies in Indian babyhood kept
me from studying Dakota as I
meant to, and then the dogs. Quietly a little procession of them would
file into the center of the room, and
the women would all say "Sh ! 'sh!"
at which the older and better trained would retire, as all well-bred dogs
should. But there was one little
yellow fellow, with perky ears, who
had no breeding at all. He would
trot boldly back after each eviction,
followed by two or three sneaking
black shadows. Then it was that
I discovered the resources of a log
church. Finding "Shl'sh!" did
not last, a women would turn about
and arm herself with a chunk of dry
mud from the wall behind her, and
dexterously hit the yellow dog, when
the canine population would withdraw for a time only to be piloted
back by Perky Ears, and again peppered with mud by the audience.
These episodes in no wise disturb
ed the devotions of the people, and
were one of the few proofs that I saw
ofthe stolidity of this simple laughter loving race.
These were only surface facts and
fancies that marked my distance
from home, but stamped on the
earnest faces was a me sage hard
to believe. The unwritten history
of conquered people is traced on the
rugged features of Crazy Horse,
Swift Cloud, Victorious, Flying By,
and Two Runs. These names, meaningless to us, are the Dakota coat-of-
arms, and were won when this handful of men were leading a great nation. Their faces.so eager over their
Bible lesson, were flushed with victory on the Big Horn. Their memories hold the secret of Custer's death,
and many another bitter secret;
and yet deeper than time or war are
graven the lines of a heart-breaking
struggle to uphold their own, of a
pathetic effort to adopt in their old
age a new life. These warrior faces
are stamped with a kindliness even
tender, that forced me to acknowledge that the ferocity of their war
was redeemed by that which only
redeems any war—patriotism.
I never knew the preacher's text,
but, as I looked from one to another
of my fellow-worshipers, I knew
that "God made of one blood all the
nations of the earth." These people
belonged to those
"Generations old,
Over whom no church-bells toll'd
Sightless, lifting up blind eyes
To the silence ofthe skies."
Blind they may have been, but
were the heavens so silent to the
souls that molded these men ? But
my private sermon must close, for
they are singing, in long hard words,
Praise him, all creatures here below.
And we rise to shake hands with the
audience, and watch them break
camp and scatter for another week.
I sat long, that night, and watched
the busy life about the teepees fade
into darkness, and thought, and I
knew that these mud-chinked buildings, with their lonely life and limited services, were the point of contact
between our warring races, and that
the fettered work of the mission station stood for more progress among
the Sioux than all the self-binding
reapers driven by long-haired Indians in the two Dakotas.—Anna B.
Scoville in Sunday School Times.
At the annual meeting of Pilgrim
Church, Santee Agency, Neb.which
was held on New Year's day—Mr.
F. B. Riggs, the treasurer, passed
through the congregation mimeographed copies of his report for the
year 1897. The contributions reported were as follows: To Home
Missions $45.64; Church Building
Society $8.60; American Missionary Association $62.40; Sunday
School Society $23.00; Ward Academy $15.00; Whitman College $5.50;
Dakota Native Missionary Society
$239.16; American Board $120.86
and to other objects $23.00, making
j a total of $543.16 to missionary
i causes. The amount used for home
expenses was $133.71, leaving a balance in tbe treasury of $3.97. The
total contributions in the church
and its societies amounting to
i $680.84.
j Santee Normal Training School Press,
■i Santee Agency, Neb.