SIR: I have the honor, in conformity with law, to render the annual report on the Indian affairs of the country, and in so doing beg leave to make it somewhat less formal, and considerably more general and liberal in scope and tone, than would be expected in a simple account of the operations of a bureau for a single year. It has seemed desirable, in recognition of the wide popular interest taken in the dealings of the Government with the Indians, and of the frankly admitted ignorance of the special subject on the part even of those most sincerely interested, to present at this time a pretty full statement of the situation of Indian affairs, and of the policy of the Government in view of that situation. I have, therefore, without attempting anything like a scientific contribution to the history or ethnology of the Indians of this continent, thrown together as much information as possible relating to their present condition, habits, and temper, giving especial prominence to those facts of the situation which may properly go to determine the judgment of the legislator and the private citizen upon the practical questions: What shall be done with the Indian as an obstacle to the progress of settlement and industry? What shall be done with him as a dependent and pensioner on our civilization, when, and so far as, he ceases to oppose or obstruct the extension of railways and of settlement?

      The Indian policy, so called, of the Government, is a policy, and it is not a policy, or rather it consists of two policies, entirely distinct, seeming, indeed, to be mutually inconsistent and to reflect each upon the other: the one regulating the treatment of the tribes which are potentially hostile, that is, whose hostility is only repressed just so long as, and so far as, they are supported in idleness by the Government; the other regulating the treatment of those tribes which, from traditional friendship, from numerical weakness, or by the force of their location, are either indisposed toward, or incapable of, resistance to the demands of the Government. The treatment of the feeble Poncas, and of the friendly Arrickarees, Mandans, and Gros Ventres of the north is an example of the latter; while the treatment of their insolent and semi-hostile neighbors, the Sioux, furnishes an example of the former. In the same way at the south, the treatment of the well-intentioned Papagoes of Arizona contrasts just as strongly with the dealings of the Government by their traditional enemies, the treacherous and vindictive

Apaches. This want of completeness and consistency in the treatment of the Indian tribes by the Government has been made the occasion of much ridicule and partisan abuse; and it is indeed calculated to provoke criticism and to afford scope for satire; but it is none the less compatible with the highest expediency of the situation. It is, of course, hopelessly illogical that the expenditures of the Government should be proportioned not to the good but to the ill desert of the several tribes; that large bodies of Indians should be supported in entire indolence by the bounty of the Government simply because they are audacious and insolent, while well-disposed Indians are only assisted to self-maintenance, since it is known they will not fight. It is hardly less than absurd, on the first view of it, that delegations from tribes that have frequently defied our authority and fought our troops, and have never yielded more than a partial and grudging obedience to the most reasonable requirements of the Government, should be entertained at the national capital, feasted, and loaded with presents. There could be no better subject for the lively paragraphist in his best estate, or for the heavy editorial writer on a dull news day, than such a course on the part of the Government. These things can be made to appear vastly amusing, and the unreflecting are undoubtedly influenced in a great degree to the prejudice of the Indian policy by the incessant small-arms fire of squibs and epigrams, even more perhaps than by the ponderous artillery of argument and invective directed against it. And yet, for all this, the Government is right and its critics wrong; and the "Indian policy" is sound, sensible, and beneficent, because it reduces to the minimum the loss of life and property upon our frontier, and allows the freest development of our settlements and railways possible under the circumstances.
      The mistake of those who oppose the present Indian policy is not in erroneously applying to the course of the Government the standard they have taken, but in taking an altogether faIse standard for the purpose. It is not a whit more unreasonable that the Government should do much for hostile Indians and little for friendly Indians than it is that a private citizen should, to save his life, surrender all the contents of his purse to a highwayman; while on another occasion, to a distressed and deserving applicant for charity, he would measure his contribution by his means and disposition at the time. There is precisely the same justification for the course of the Government in feeding saucy and mischievous Indians to repletion, while permitting more tractable and peaceful tribes to gather a bare subsistence by hard work, or what to an Indian is hard work. It is not, of course, to be understood that the Government of the United States is at the mercy of Indians; but thonsands of its citizens are, even thousands of families. Their exposed situation on the extreme verge of settlement affords a sufficient justification to the Government for buying off the hostility of the savages, excited and exasperated as they are, and most naturally so, by the invasion of their hunting-grounds and the threatened extinction of game. It would require one hundred thousand troops at least to form a cordon behind which our settlements could advance with the extent of range, the unrestrained choice of location, the security of feeling, and the freedom of movement which have characterized the growth of the past three or four years. Indeed, the presence of no military force could give that confidence to pioneer enterprise which the general cessation of Indian hostilities has engendered. Men of an adventurous cast will live and work behind a line of troops with, it is possible, some exhilaration of feeling on that account; but, as a rule, men will not place women and children in situations of even possible peril, nor will they put money

into permanent improvements under such circumstances. Especially has the absence of Indian hostilities been of the highest value, within the last few years, in directing and determining to the extreme frontier the immigrants arriving in such vast numbers on our shores. Americans habituated to the contemplation of this species of danger as one of the features of pioneer life, will scarcely comprehend the reluctance with which men accustomed to the absolute security of person and property in the settled countries of Europe expose themselves and their families to perils of this kind. I was informed by the late president of the Northern Pacific Railroad that it was found almost impossible to hire Swedes and Norwegians to work upon the line of that road then under construction from the Red River to the Missouri, on account of the vague apprehension of Indian attack which prevailed in connection with the progress of the road through the past summer. As a matter of fact, no well-informed person believed that the savages would undertake any offensive operations whatever until after the Missouri had been crossed and passed at least one hundred miles. But these people, unaccustomed to regard possible torture and murder as one of the conditions of a contract to labor, would refuse high wages rather than subject themselves to the slightest risk. The fact that Americans are more daring and adventurous in the presence of a danger more familiar to them, only constitutes a stronger reason for maintaining the immunity which has, for three years now, been secured by the feeding system. There are innumerable little rifts of agricultural or mining settlements all over the western country which, if unmolested, will in a few years become self-protecting communities, but which, in the event of a general Indian war occurring at the present time, would utterly and instantly disappear, either by abandonment or massacre. The first month of hostilities would see fifty valleys, up which population is now slowly but steadily creeping under cover of the feeding system, swept bare by the horrid atrocities of Indian warfare, or deserted by their affrighted inhabitants, hastily driving before them what of their stock could be gathered at a moment's notice, and bearing away what of their household goods could be carried in their single wagons. Such would be the result even with the most favorable issue of military operations. It is right that those who criticise the policy of the Government toward the Indians, and ridicule it as undignified in its concessions and unstatesman-like in its temporizing with a recognized evil, should fairly face the one alternative which is presented. There is no questign of national dignity, be it remembered, involved in the treatment of savages by a civilized power. With wild men, as with wild beasts, the question whether in a given situation one shall fight, coax, or run, is a question merely of what is easiest and safest.

      The system now pursued in dealing with the roving tribes dangerous to our frontier population and obstructing our industrial progress, is entirely consistent with, and, indeed, requires the occasional use of the military arm, in restraining or chastising refractory individuals and bands. Such a use of the military constitutes no abandonment of the "peace policy," and involves no disparagement of it. It was not to be expected–it was not in the nature of things–that the entire body of wild Indians should submit to be restrained in their Ishmaelitish proclivities without a struggle on the part of the more audacious to maintain their traditional freedom. In the first announcement made of the reserva-

tion system, it was expressly declared that the Indians should be made as comfortable on, and as uncomfortable off, their reservations as it was in the power of the Government to make them; that such of them as went right should be protected and fed, and such as went wrong should be harassed and scourged without intermission. It was not anticipated that the first proclamation of this policy to the tribes concerned would effect the entire cessation of existing evils; but it was believed that persistence in the course marked out would steadily reduce the number of the refractory, both by the losses sustained in actual conflict and by the desertion of individuals as they should become weary of a profitless and hopeless struggle, until, in the near result, the system adopted should apply without exception to all the then roving and hostile tribes. Such a use of the strong arm of the Government is not war, but discipline. Yet it would seem impossible for many persons to apprehend any distinction between a state of general Indian war, and the occasional use of the regular military force of the country in enforcing the reservation policy, or punishing sporadic acts of outrage on the part of disaffected individuals or bands. Such persons appear to think that the smallest degree of Indian hostilities is equivalent to the largest degree of such hostilities, or at least to hold that if we are to have any Indian troubles whatever--if everything in the conduct of Indian affairs is not to be as calm and serene as a summer day–we might just as well have all the Indians of the continent on our hands at once. Upon the other side, many persons zealously and painfully intent on securing justice to the aborigines of the country, bewail the slightest use of the military in carrying out the reservation system and repressing depredations, as in effect a making of war upon the Indians and a resort to the bloody methods of the past. This misunderstanding in regard to the occasional use of force in making effective and universal the policy of peace, has led no small portion of the press of the country to treat the more vigorous application of the scourge to refractory Indians which has characterized the operations of the last three months as an abandonment of the peace policy itself, whereas it is, in fact, a legitimate and essential part of the original scheme which the Government has been endeavoring to carry out, with prospects of success never more bright and hopeful than to-day.
      It will be sufficient, perhaps, to mark the distinction, to say that a general Indian war could not be carried on with the present military force of the United States, or anything like it. Regiments would be needed where now are only companies, and long lines of posts would have to be established for the protection of regions which under the safeguard of the feeding system, are now left wholly uncovered. On the other hand, by the reservation system and the feeding system combined, the occasions for collision are so reduced by lessening the points of contact, and the number of Indians available for hostile expeditions involving exposure, hardship, and danger is so diminished through the appeal made to their indolence and self-indulgence, that the Army in its present force is able to deal effectively with the few marauding bands which refuse to accept the terms of the Government.

      It is unquestionably true that the Government has seemed somewhat tardy in proceeding under the second half of the reservation policy, and in applying the scourge to individuals and bands leaving their prescribed limits without authority, or for hostile purposes. This has been

partly from a legitimate deference to the conviction of the great body of citizens that the Indians have been in the past unjustly and cruelly treated, and that great patience and long forbearance ought to be exercised in bringing them around to submission to the present reasonable requirements of the Government, and partly from the knowledge on the part of the officers of the Government charged with administering Indian affairs, that, from the natural jealousy of these people, their sense of wrongs suffered in the past, and their suspiciousness arising fromrepeated acts of treachery on the part of the whites; from the greatdistance of many bands and individuals from points of personal communication with the agents of the Government, and the absence of all means of written communication with them; from the efforts of abandoned and degraded whites, living among the Indians and exerting much influence over them, to misrepresent the policy of the Government, and to keep alive the hostility and suspicion of the savages; and, lastly, from the extreme untrustworthiness of many of the interpreters on whom the Government is obliged to rely for bringing its intentions to the knowledge of the Indians: that by the joint effect of all these obstacles, many tribes and bands could come very slowly to hear, comprehend, and trust the professions and promises of the Government.
      Such being the sentiment of the general community, that forbearancewas due to the Indians on account of past wrongs; and such the knowledge on the part of the Government of difficulties to be encountered in fully acquainting these people with its benevolent intentions, all the re-sources of expostulation and conciliation have been exhausted beforethe aid of the military arm has been invoked. It is not a matter forwonder or blame that communities which suffer, meanwhile, from thecontinuance of the evil should complain bitterly and accuse the Gov-ernment of inaction, without inquiring very closely whether the evil isnot the result of a previous wrong on the part of those to whose evilas to whose good things they succeed alike, or whether their presenttroubles are not the waves of a storm that is over and past. But it isthe duty of the Government to act in the premises with a somewhatbroader view and more philosophical temper than is to be expected ofthose who are actually smarting in their families and their propertyfrom the scourge of Indian depredations.
      The patience and forbearance exercised have been fully justified intheir fruits. The main body of the roving Indians have, with goodgrace or with ill grace, submitted to the reservation system. Of thosewho still remain away from the assigned limits, by far the greater partare careful to do so with as little offense as possible; and when theirrange is such as for the present not to bring them into annoying ordangerous contact with the whites, this Office has, from motives ofeconomy, generally been disposed to allow them to pick up their ownliving still by hunting and fishing, in preference to tying them up atagencies where they would require to be fed mainly or wholly at theexpense of the Government.

      There is a residue whose disposition and behavior certainly give little encouragement to further forbearance. The numbers of the actually hostile and depredating bands of to-day probably do not exceed in the aggregate eight thousand. Among these are several bands of Apaches in Arizona, principally the Tonto Apaches, the Quahada Comanches, and their confederates of the Staked Plains, west of the Indian Country,

and the greater portion of the Kiowa nation. It would be impossible, from the large number of tribes, great and small, known to the annals of the country, to select three which have so little in the way of past wrongs to justify present hostility as these three tribes, which commit, practically, all the outrages properly to be charged against Indians. The depredating Kiowas and the Quahada Comanches are utterly without excuse. They are compelled to go back as far as 1847 to find a single substantial grievance of which to complain. Since that time the United States have given them a noble reservation, and have provided amply for all their wants. No white man has gone upon their lands to injure them; the Government has failed in no particular of its duty toward them; yet they have persisted in leaving their reservation, and marauding in Texas. They have not done this through any misapprehension of the intentions of the Government, from the pressure of want, or under the smart of any real or fancied wrong. I am disposed to think that the messages recently delivered to them by their agent and by the special commission sent to them the last summer; the unequivocal declarations made to their chiefs on the occasion of a recent visit to Washington; and, especially, the chastisement inflicted on the Quahada Comanches at McClellan's Creek, in October, by Colonel Mackenzie, have fully convinced these tribes that the Government is in earnest, and that a continuance in their present course will involve, as it ought, their extirpation. This may be enough; but, if it proves otherwise, they should be signally punished. An example made here would do much to strengthen the policy of peace both with other Indians and with the country at large, as well as free the borders of Texas from a scourge that has become intolerable.

      It is saying nothing against the course of the Government toward the semi-hostile tribes, to allege, as is often done, that it is merely temporizing with an evil. Temporizing as an expedient in government may be either a sign of weakness and folly, or it may be a proof of the highest wisdom. When an evil is manifestly on the increase, and tends to go from bad to worse, to temporize with it is cowardly and mischievous. Even when an evil cannot be said to be on the increase, yet when, not being self- limited or self-destructive, and having, therefore, no tendency to expire of inherent vices, it cannot be shown to be transient, the part of prudence and of courage is to meet and grapple with it without hesitation and without procrastination. But when an evil is in its nature self-limited, and tends to expire by the very conditions of its existence; when time itself fights against it, and the whole progress of the physical, social, and industrial order by steady degrees circumscribes its field, reduces its dimensions, and saps its strength, then temporizing may be the highest statesmanship.
      p;   Such an evil is that which the United States Government at present encounters in the resistance, more or less suppressed, of the Indian tribes of this continent to the progress of railways and settlements, growing out of the reasonable apprehension that their own existence as nations, and even their own individual means of subsistence within the duration of their own lives, will be destroyed thereby. This case differs from others recorded in history only in this–that never was an evil so gigantic environed, invaded, devoured by forces so tremendous, so appalling in the celerity and the certainty of their advance.

      It belongs not to a sanguine, but to a sober view of the situation, that three years will see the alternative of war eliminated from the Indian question, and the most powerful and hostile bands of to-day thrown in entire helplessness on the mercy of the Government. Indeed, the progress of two years more, if not of another summer, on the Northern Pacific Railroad will of itself completely solve the great Sioux problem, and leave the ninety thousand Indians ranging between the two transcontinental lines as incapable of resisting the Government as are the Indians of New York or Massachusetts. Columns moving north from the Union Pacific, and south from the Northern Pacific, would crush the Sioux and their confederates as between the upper and the nether millstone; while the rapid movement of troops along the northern line would prevent the escape of the savages, when hard pressed, into the British Possessions, which have heretofore afforded a convenient refuge on the approach of a military expedition.
      Toward the south the day of deliverance from the fear of Indian hostility is more distant, yet it is not too much to expect that three summers of peaceful progress will forever put it out of the power of the tribes and bands which at present disturb Colorado, Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico to claim consideration of the country in any other attitude than as pensioners upon the national bounty. The railroads now under construction, or projected with a reasonable assurance of early completion, will multiply fourfold the striking force of the Army in that section; the little rifts of mining settlement, now found all through the mountains of the southern Territories will have become self-protecting communities; the feeble, wavering line of agricultural occupation, now sensitive to the faintest breath of Indian hostility, will then have grown to be the powerful "reserve" to lines still more closely advanced upon the last range of the intractable tribes.

      No one certainly will rejoice more heartily than the present Commissioner when the Indians of this country cease to be in a position to dictate, in any form or degree, to the Government; when, in fact, the last hostile tribe becomes reduced to the condition of suppliants for charity. This is indeed, the only hope of salvation for the aborigines of the continent. If they stand up against the progress of civilization and industry, they must be relentlessly crushed. The westward course of population is neither to be denied nor delayed for the sake of all the Indians that ever called this country their home. They must yield or perish; and there is something that savors of providential mercy in the rapidity with which their fate advances upon them, leaving them scarcely the chance to resist before they shall be surrounded and disarmed. It is not feebly and futilely to attempt to stay this tide, whose depth and strength can hardly be measured, but to snatch the remnants of the Indian race from destruction from before it, that the friends of humanity should exert themselves in this juncture, and lose no time. And it is because the present system allows the freest extension of settlement and industry possible under the circumstances, while affording space and time for humane endeavors to rescue the Indian tribes from a position altogether barbarous and incompatible with civilization and social progress, that this system must be approved by all enlightened citizens.
      Whenever the time shall come that the roving tribes are reduced to

a condition of complete dependence and submission, the plan to be adopted in dealing with them must be substantially that which is now being pursued in the case of the more tractable and friendly Indians, as described in the portions of the report which follow. This is the true permanent Indian policy of the Government.

      The people of the United States can never without dishonor refuse to respect these two considerations: 1st. That this continent was originally owned and occupied by the Indians, who have on this account a claim somewhat larger than the privilege of one hundred and sixty acres of land, and "find himself" in tools and stock, which is granted as a matter of course to any newly-arrived foreigner who declares his intention to become a citizen; that something in the nature of an endowment, either capitalized or in the form of annual expenditures for a series of years for the benefit of the Indians, though at the discretion of the Government as to the specific objects, should be provided for every tribe or band which is deprived of its roaming privilege and confined to a diminished reservation: such an endowment being not in the nature of a gratuity, but in common honesty the right of the Indian on account of his original interest in the soil. 2d. That inasmuch as the progress of our industrial enterprise has cut these people off from modes of livelihood entirely sufficient for their wants, and for which they were qualified, in a degree which has been the wonder of more civilized races, by inherited aptitudes and by long pursuit, and has left them utterly without resource, they have a claim on this account again to temporary support and to such assistance as may be necessary to place them in a position to obtain a livelihood by means which shall be compatible with civilization.
      Had the settlements of the United States not been extended beyond the frontier of 1867, all the Indians of the continent would to the end of time have found upon the plains an inexhaustible supply of food and clothing. Were the westward course of population to be stayed at the barriers of to-day, notwithstanding the tremendous inroads made upon their hunting-grounds since 1867, the Indians would still have hope of life. But another such five years will see the Indians of Dakota and Montana as poor as the Indians of Nevada and Southern California; that is, reduced to an habitual condition of suffering from want of food.
       The freedom of expansion which is working these results is to us of incalculable value. To the Indian it is of incalculable cost. Every year's advance of our frontier takes in a territory as large as some of the kingdoms of Europe. We are richer by hundreds of millions; the Indian is poorer by a large part of the little that he has. This growth is bringing imperial greatness to the nation; to the Indian it brings wretchedness, destitution, beggary. Surely there is obligation found in considerations like these, requiring us in some way, and in the best way, to make good to these original owners of the soil the loss by which we so greatly gain.
      Can any principle of national morality be clearer than that, when the expansion and development of a civilized race involve the rapid destruction of the only means of subsistence possessed by the members of a less fortunate race, the higher is bound as of simple right to provide for the lower some substitute for the means of subsistence which it has destroyed? That substitute is, of course, best realized, not by system-

atic gratuities of food and clothing continued beyond a present emergency, but by directing these people to new pursuits which shall be consistent with the progress of civilization upon the continent; helping them over the first rough places on "the white man's road," and, meanwhile, supplying such subsistence as is absolutely necessary during the period of initiation and experiment.

      The assistance due to the Indians from the Government in the discharge of those obligations which have been adverted to should not much longer be irrespective of their own efforts. Just so soon as these tribes cease to be formidable, they should be brought distinctly to the realization of the law that if they would eat they must also work. Nor should it be left to their own choices how miserably they will live, in order that they may escape work as much as possible. The Government should extend over them a rigid reformatory discipline, to save them from falling hopelessly into the condition of pauperism and petty crime. Merely to disarm the savages, and to surround them by forces which it is hopeless in them to resist, without exercising over them for a series of years a system of paternal control, requiring them to learn and practice the arts of industry at least until one generation has been fairly started on a course of self-improvement, is to make it pretty much a matter of certainty that by far the larger part of the now roving Indians will become simply vagabonds in the midst of civilization, forming little camps here and there over the face of the Western States, which will be festering sores on the communities near which they are located; the men resorting for a living to basket-making and hog-stealing; the women to fortune-telling and harlotry. No one who looks about him and observes the numbers of our own race who, despite our strong constitutional disposition to labor, the general example of industry, the possession of all the arts and applicances which diminish effort while they multiply result, and the large rewards offered in the constitution of modern society for success in industrial effort, yet sink to the most abject condition from indolence or from vice, can greatly doubt that, unless prompt and vigorous measures are taken by the Government, something like what has been described is to be the fate of the now roving Indians, when they shall be surrounded and disarmed by the extension of our settlements, and deprived of their traditional means of subsistence through the extinction of game. Unused to manual labor, and physically disqualified for it by the habits of the chase, unprovided with tools and implements, without forethought and without self-control, singularly susceptible to evil influences, with strong animal appetites and no intellectual tastes or aspirations to hold those appetites in check, it would be to assume more than would be taken for granted of any white race under the same conditions, to expect that the wild Indians will become industrious and frugal except through a severe course of industrial instruction and exercise, under restraint. The reservation system affords the place for thus dealing with tribes and bands, without the access of influences inimical to peace and virtue. It is only necessary that Federal laws, judiciously framed to meet all the facts of the case, and enacted in season, before the Indians begin to scatter, shall place all the members of this race under a strict reformatory control by the agents of the Government. Especially is it essential that the right of the Government to keep Indians upon the reservations assigned to them, and to arrest and return them whenever they

wander away, should be placed beyond dispute. Without this, whenever these people become restive under compulsion to labor, they will break away in their old roving spirit, and stray off in small bands to neighboring communities, upon which they will prey in a petty fashion, by begging and stealing, until they have made themselves so much of a nuisance, that the law is invoked against them, or their apprehensions of violence become excited, when they will pass on, to become the pests of other and more distant communities. In a word, in the two hundred and seventy-five thousand Indians west of the Mississippi, the United States have all the elements of a large gypsy population, which will inevitably become a sore, a well-nigh intolerable, affliction to all that region, unless the Government shall provide for their instruction in the arts of life, which can only be done effectually under a pressure not to be resisted or evaded. The right of the Government to do this cannot be seriously questioned. Expressly excluded by the Constitution from citizenship, the Government is only bound in its treatment of them by considerations of present policy and justice. Even were the constitutional incapacity of these people not what it is, and were there nothing in the history of the dealings of the United States with them to form a precedent for their being placed under arbitrary control, still, the manifest necessity of self-protection would amply justify the Government in any and all measures required to prevent the miserable conclusion I have indicated.

      I have purposely divested these remarks of what is commonly known as "sentiment," and have refrained from appealing to the higher considerations of human and Christian charity, not because I have not respect for such considerations, nor because sentiment is out of place in dealing with such a question, but because I believe that the Indian policy of the Government, past and prospective, can be fully justified before the country by arguments addressed solely to self-interest, and because it has appeared to me that a certain class of the community have become a little wearied of appeals, in behalf of the Indians, to sentiments which are, perhaps, rather too fine for popular daily use. Nothing that the Government is doing toward the Indians but can be vindicated on grounds of practical usefulness and economy as completely as the expenditures of our American communities for the education of the young.
      I know of no stronger proof that could be offered for the satisfaction of the country that the Indian policy of the Government, notwithstanding so much about it that appears whimsical and contradictory, is really to be justified on common-sense principles, than the fact that for several years bills making appropriations for the necessarily heavy expenditures involved, have run the gauntlet of the appropriation committees of both House and Senate, without losing a single original feature of value. No one who understands the constitution of those committees, and knows their readiness to slaughter any provision for any service which cannot give an unmistakable reason for itself, will need stronger assurance that when the details of the Indian policy come to be explained, point by point, to men versed in public affairs and in the methods of business, they are found to be based upon good practical reasons, and not upon theories or sentiments.

      I cannot admit that there is any reason for the apprehensions which many persons feel, that when the Indians cease to be formidable, they will be neglected. It is certainly desirable on all grounds, not merely to avoid the possibility of an occasional failure in the provision for their wants, but also for the sake of securing comprehensiveness and consistency in the treatment of the subject, that the endowments for the several tribes and bands be capitalized, and placed in trust for their benefit, out of the reach of accident or caprice. The proceeds arising from sales, as their reservations are from time to time diminished by authority of law, for the sake of securing a higher culture of the portions remaining, ought, if the Indians are honestly treated in the transaction, to be sufficient to provide for all ordinary beneficial expenditures in behalf of tribes and bands having lands secured to them by treaty.
      The reservations granted heretofore have generally been proportioned, and rightly so, to the needs of the Indians in a roving state, with hunting and fishing as their chief means of subsistence, which condition implies the occupation of a territory far exceeding what could possibly be cultivated. As they change to agriculture, however rude and primitive at first, they tend to contract the limits of actual occupation. With proper administrative management the portions thus rendered available for cession or sale can be so thrown together as in no way to impair the integrity of the reservation. Where this change has taken place, there can be no question of the expediency of such sale or cession. The Indian Office has always favored this course, and notwithstanding the somewhat questionable character of some of the resulting transactions, arising especially out of violent or fraudulent combinations to prevent a fair sale, it can be confidently affirmed that the advantage of the Indians has generally been subserved thereby.
      For those tribes and bands which have no reservations secured to them by treaty, from which they can hope in the course of time to realize a civilization and improvement fund, provision will still require to be made by law. Their right to endowment is none the less clear than the right of other tribes whose fortune it was to deal with the United States by treaty, before Congress put an end to the treaty system, with its many abuses and absurdities. We have received the soil from them, and we have extinguished their only means of subsistence. Nothing in the history of the United States justifies the belief that either Congress or the country will be wanting in justice or generosity in dealing with the necessities of a people who have been impoverished that we might be rich. Our national charity has sought the objects of its benefactions at the ends of the earth: Americans will never be wanting in simple justice to helpless dependents at home. I have, therefore, no fear for the future of the Indians of this continent when once the arms of their resistance are laid down, and Indian outrages are no longer reported to inflame the hostility of the border States, and to mingle doubt and misgivings with the philanthropic intentions of the charitable and humane.

      With these remarks I respectfully submit the following detailed account of the numbers, the location, and the present condition of each tribe and important band within the administrative control of the Indian Office. This account, whether statistical or descriptive, has been care-

fully studied, with a view to securing the highest degree of exactness consistent with the nature of the subject. No unpleasant feature of the situation has been softened. No suppression has been permitted with any thought of relieving the service from odium thereby. On the other hand, the more agreeable aspects have been presented, if not in a skeptical, at least not in a sanguine spirit, for it is known and painfully appreciated how obstinate are the faults of character with which those who would improve the condition of the Indian have to deal; how delusive is oftentimes the appearance of improvement; and how easy the relapse to indolence and vice. Within the past year the Indian Office has seen the habits of industry of two important tribes, which had made a progress really commendable and even admirable toward self-support and independence, terribly shaken by the catastrophe of a total loss of crops from drought and the ravages of grasshoppers; the progress of the people completely arrested thereby; and large numbers driven off to hunting and fishing, from which they will not easily or speedily be recalled. Such calamities are apt enough to discourage and demoralize communities that have made large accumulations, and, having been long in habits of industry, are not easily moved from them. But to a people just emerging from barbarism, making their first painful efforts at agriculture, ignorant and superstitious, with no resource and no reserve, it could hardly be a subject of wonder or blame if such a calamity as the utter destruction of their crop should undo the beneficial work of years and throw them back in complete discouragement upon courses which it was hoped they had abandoned forever. It is always a weary work to lift any man or people from degradation to self-respect, self-restraint, and self-reliance; while with the Indian of this continent we have the exceptional difficulty of a nature singularly trivial, and habits singularly incompatible with civilized forms of life and industry.
      But such consiedrations as these afford reason for moderating anticipations, not for relaxing effort. Even were it hopeless to rescue the men and the women of a single tribe now under the control of the Government from the life and the death of savages, it would still be the interest and the duty of the nation to organize and maintain an increasing service for the instruction of these people in the arts of industry and life, in the hope and reasonable expectation that another generation may be saved from becoming a pest and a scourge to themselves and to the larger community upon which they are to be thrown, their traditional morality unlearned, their tribal and social bonds dissolved, all that there was of good in their native character and condition completely lost, and with only such substitute for all this as we shall now give them.

      The Indians within the limits of the United State, exclusive of those in Alaska, number, approximately, 300,000.
      (a) They may be divided according to their geographical location, or range, into five grand divisions, as follows: In Minnesota and States east of the Mississippi River, about 32,500; in Nebraska, Kansas, and the Indian Territory, 70,650; in the Territories of Dakota, Montana, Wyoming, and Idaho, 65,000; in Nevada and the Territories of Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, and Arizona, 84,000; and on the Pacific slope, 48,000.
      (b) In respect to the three lines of railroads–built or projected--Between the States and the Pacific Ocean, viz, the northern, central,

and southern routes,* they may be divided, excluding those residing east of Minnesota and of the Missouri River, south of Dakota, as follows: Between the proposed northern route and the British possessions, about 36,000; between the northern and central routes, 92,000; between the central and the proposed southern routes, 61,000; and between the Southern route and Mexico, 85,000, making a total of 274,000.
      (c) As regards their means of support and methods of subsistence they may be divided as follows: Those who support themselves upon their own reservations, receiving nothing from the Government, except interest on their own moneys, or annuities granted them in consideration of the cession of their lands to the United States, number about 130,000; those who are entirely subsisted by the Government, about 31,000; those in part subsisted, 84,000–together about 115,000; those who subsist by hunting and fishing, upon roots, nuts, berries, &c., or by begging and stealing, about 55,000.
      (d) They may be divided again, with respect to their connection with the Government, as follows: There are about 150,000 who may be said to remain constantly upon their reservations, and are under the complete control of agents appointed by the Government; 95,000 who at times visit their agencies either for food or for gossip, or for both, but are generally roaming either on or off their reservations, engaged in hunting or fishing; and 55,000 who never visit an agency, and over whom the Government as yet exercises practically no control, but most of whom are inoffensive, and commit no acts of hostility against the Government.
      (e) Again, it may be said that of the 300,000 Indians of the country about 180,000 have treaties with the Government; 40,000 have no treaties with the United States, but have reservations set apart by Executive order or otherwise for their occupancy, and are in charge of agents appointed by the Government; 25,000 have no reservations, but are more or less under the control of agents appointed for them, and receive more or less assistance from the Government, the remainder consisting of the same 55,000 already twice described, over whom the Government exercises, practically, no control, and for whom there are no treaty or other provisions.
      (f) As to civilization, they may, though with no great degree of assurance be divided, according to a standard taken with reasonable reference to what might fairly be expected of a race with such antecedents and traditions, as follows: Civilized, 97,000; semi-civilized, 125,000; wholly barbarous, 78,000.

      New York.–The Indians of New York, remnants of the once powerful "Six Nations," number five thousand and seventy. They occupy
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*The northern route consists of the proposed Northern Pacific Railroad, commencing at Du Luth, Minnesota, and terminating at a fixed point on Puget Sound, Washington Territory. The central route is composed of the Union Pacific Railroad, running from Omaha, Nebraska,, to Ogden, Utah Territory, and the Central Pacific, from Ogden, Utah Territory, to San Francisco, California. The southern route is composed of the Atlantic and Pacific Railroad, starting at Springfield, Missouri; thence to a point on Canadian River, in the Indian Territory; thence to the head-waters of the Colorado Chiquito; thence along the 35 parallel of latitude, as near as may be found practicable, to the Colorado River, at such point as may be selected; thence by the most practicable route to the Pacific; and of the Southern Pacific Railroad, which is authorized to connect with the Atlantic and Pacific at or near the southeastern boundary of California.

six reservations in the State, containing in the aggregate 68,668 acres. Two of these reservations, viz, the Allegany and Cattaraugus, belonged originally to the colony of Massachusetts, but by sale and assignment passed into the hands of a company, the Indians holding a perpetual right of occupancy, and the company referred to, or the individual members thereof, owning the ultimate fee. The same state of facts formerly existed in regard to the Tonawanda reserve, but the Indians who occupy it have purchased the ultimate fee of a portion of the reserve, which is now held in trust for them by the Secretary of the Interior. The State of New York exercises sovereignty over these reservations. The reservations occupied by the Oneidas, Onondagas, and Tuscaroras, have been provided for by treaty stipulations between the Indians and the State of New York. All six reserves are held and occupied by the Indians in common. While the Indian tribes of the continent, with few exceptions, have been steadily decreasing in numbers, those of New York have of late more than held their own, as is shown by an increase of one hundred in the present reports over the reported number in 1871; and of thirteen hundred over the number embraced in the United States census of 1860. On the New York reservations are twenty-eight schools; the attendance during some portions of the past year exceeding eleven hundred, the daily average attendance being six hundred and eight. Of the teachers employed, fifteen are Indians, as fully competent for this position as their white associates. An indication of what is to be accomplished in the future, in an educational point of view, is found in the successful effort made in August last to establish a teachers' institute on the Cattaraugus reservation for the education of teachers specially for Indian schools. Thirty-eight applicants attended, and twenty-six are now under training. The statistics of individual wealth and of the aggregate product of agricultural and other industry are, in general, favorable; and a considerable increase in these regards is observed from year to year. Twenty thousand acres are under cultivation; the cereal crops are good, while noticeable success has been achieved in the raising of fruit. An instance is furnished, from the Tuscarora reservation, of one Indian who realized a profit of over $2,000 on the sale of peaches alone during the past year. Favorable reports are given of the annual fairs held upon one or more of the reservations, at which the displays of fruits, home manufactures, &c., were quite creditable. A subject of importance to many of the Indians in New York is the proposed allotment of the lands of Cattaraugus and Allegany reservations. The Society of Friends, at Philadelphia, have prepared a memorial upon the subject, and will, it is understood, present the same with a proposed bill to Congress at its next session. The United States agent, Daniel Sherman, esq., in expressing his views upon this matter, as set forth in the proposed bill, a copy of which was furnished, remarks that the Tuscaroras have already as good if not a better plan as to the division of their lands. Upon that reservation, he says,

      The improved lands are practically allotted to the individual adult Indians, in fee, who can buy and sell only as between themselves; two-thirds of their reservation is under actual cultivation, and the balance, being timbered land, is owned by the Indians in common. The chiefs have appointed a committee to protect the timber, to see that no waste is committed, and that none is used by the Indians, except for fuel and building purposes.

      These Indians have, by treaty made with them in 1794, a permanent annuity in clothing and other useful articles to the amount of $4,500. The Senecas on the Tonawanda, Cattaraugus, and Allegany reservations

have a permanent annuity in money of $6,000, by act of February 19, 1831,and interest in lieu of investment, &c., by act of June 27, 1846, amounting annually to $5,902.50, in all $11,902.50, which is paid to them per capita. The Tonawanda band of Senecas, residing on the Tonawanda reservation, also have United States bonds held in trust for them to the amount of $86,950, the interest thereon, amounting to $5,217, being paid annually to that band.

      The bands or tribes residing in Michigan are the Chippewas of Saginaw, Swan Creek, and Black River; the Ottawas and Chippewas; the Pottawatomies of Huron, and the L'Anse band of Chippewas.
      The Chippewas of Saginaw, Swan Creek, and Black River, numbering sixteen hundred and thirty, and the Ottawas and Chippewas, six thousand and thirty-nine, are indigenous to the country. They are well advanced in civilization; have, with few exceptions, been allotted lands under treaty provisions, for which they have received patents; and are now entitled to all the privileges and benefits of citizens of the United States. Those to whom no allotments have been made can secure homesteads under the provisions of the act of June 10, 1872. All treaty stipulations with these Indians have expired. They now have no money or other annuities paid to them by the United States Government. The three tribes first named have in all four schools, with one hundred and fifteen scholars, and the last, two schools, with one hundred and fifty-two scholars.
      The Pottawatomies of Huron number about fifty. They have by treaty of 1807 a small money annuity, $400, paid to them annually, and rank in respect to civilization with the other Indians of the State.
      The L'Anse band of Chippewas, numbering eleven hundred and ninety-five, belong with the other bands of the Chippewas of Lake Superior. They occupy a reservation of about 48,300 acres, situated on Lake Superior, in the extreme northern part of the State. But few of them are engaged in agriculture, most of them depending for their subsistence on hunting and fishing. They have two schools, with an attendance of fifty-six scholars.
      The progress of the Indians of Michigan in civilization and industry has been greatly hindered in the past by a feeling of uncertainty in regard to their permanent possession and enjoyment of their homes. Since the allotment of land, and the distribution of either patents or homestead certificates to these Indians, (the L'Anse or Lake Superior Chippewas, a people of hunting and fishing habits, excepted,) a marked improvement has been manifested on their part in regard to breaking land and building houses. The aggregate quantity of land cultivated by the several tribes is 11,620 acres, corn, oats, and wheat being the chief products. The dwellings occupied consist of two hundred and forty-four frame and eight hundred and thirty-five log-houses. The aggregate population of the several tribes named (including the confederated "Chippewas, Ottawas, and Pottawatomies," about two hundred and fifty souls, with whom the Government made a final settlement in 1866, of its treaty obligations) is, by the report of their agent for the current year, nine thousand one hundred and seventeen, an increase over the number reported for 1871 of four hundred and two, due, however, perhaps as much to the return of absent Indians as to the excess of births over deaths. In educational matters these Indians have, of late, most unfortunately, fallen short of the results of former

years; for the reason mainly that, their treaties expiring, the provisions previously existing for educational uses failed. It may, perhaps, also be justly said that missionary efforts in respect to these Indians have during the same period relaxed. The following comparison will show the loss occasioned by the joint result of these two causes. For the year 1872, report is made of but eight schools, with three hundred and twenty-three scholars; while, for the year 1862, there were as many as thirty schools in operation, with one thousand and sixty-eight scholars.

      The bands or tribes in Wisconsin are the Chippewas of Lake Superior; the Menomonees; the Stockbridges and Munsees; the Oneidas, and certain stray bands (so called) of Winnebagoes, Pottawatomies, and Chippewas.
      The Chippewas of Lake Superior (under which head are included the following bands: Fond du Lac, Boise Forte, Grand Portage, Red Cliff, Bad River, Lac de Flambeau, and Lac Court D'Oreille, number about five thousand one hundred and fifty. They constitute a part of the Ojibways, (anglicized in the term Chippewas,) formerly one of the most powerful and warlike nations in the Northwest, embracing many bands, and ranging over an immense territory extending along the shores of Lakes Huron, Michigan, and Superior, to the steppes of the Upper Mississippi. Of this great nation large numbers are still found in Minnesota, many in Michigan, and a fragment in Kansas.
      The bands above mentioned by name are at present located on several small reservations set apart for them by treaties of September 30, 1854, and April 7, 1866, in Wisconsin and Minnesota, comprising in all about 695,290 acres. By act of Congress of May 29, 1872, provision was made for the sale, with the consent of the Indians, of three of these reservations, viz, the Lac de Flambeau and Lac Court D'Oreille in Wisconsin, and the Fond du Lac in Minnesota, and for the removal of the lndians located thereon to the Bad River reservation, where there is plenty of good arable land, and where they can be properly cared for and instructed in agriculture and mechanics. The reasons which influenced the Department in recommending the above legislation were, first, that on their present reservation these bands are completely surrounded and interpenetrated by evil influences, from which, at the Bad River reservation, they would be measurably exempt; second, that in their present location they have no sufficient funds to allow them to make beneficial improvements on any considerable scale, while by the sale of their land they would realize a capital sum sufficient to handsomely establish them on the Bad River, and provide them with stock and tools. Under the provisions of the treaties of September 30, 1854, and April 7, 1866, these Indians (excepting the Boise Forte band) have a limited annuity, (two installments still due,) in coin, of $5,000; in goods, &c., $8,000; agricultural implements, &c., $3,000; educational purposes, $3,000; and an annual appropriation for the support of eight smiths and shops, and two farmers, of $9,220. The L'Anse band, in Michigan, participate in these annuities. The Boise Forte band, under treaty of April 7, 1866, receive limited annuities, (thirteen installments still due,) as follows: In money, $3,500; in goods and other articles, $6,500; provisions, ammunition, and tobacco, $1,000; for support of blacksmith and assistant $1,500; for support of teacher, purchase of books and stationery, $800; and for instruction of Indians in farming, purchase of seeds, tools, &c., $800.
      The greater part of these Indians at present lead a somewhat roving

life, finding their subsistence chiefly in game hunted by them; in the rice gathered in its wild state, and in the fish afforded by waters convenientlynear. Comparatively little is done in the way of cultivating the soil. Certain bands have of late been greatly demoralized by contact with persons employed in the construction of the Northern Pacific Railroad, the line of which runs near one (the Fond du Lac) of their reservations. Portions of this people, however, especially those situated at the Bad River reservation, have begun to evince an earnest desire for self-improvement. Their agent says of them that "no people ever responded more readily to efforts on their behalf than the Chippewas of Lake Superior to the noble Christian policy of the Government." Many live in houses of rude construction, and raise small crops of grain and vegetables; others labor among the whites, and a number find employment in cutting rails, fence-posts, and saw-logs for the Government. In regard to the efforts made to instruct the children in letters, it may be said that, without being altogether fruitless, the results have been thus far meager and somewhat discouraging. The majority of the parents profess to wish to have their children educated, and ask for schools, but, when the means are provided and the work undertaken, the difficulties in the way of success to any considerable extent appear in the undisciplined character of the scholars, which has to be overcome by the teacher without parental co-operation, and in the great irregularity of attendance at school, especially on the part of those who are obliged to accompany their parents to the rice-fields, the sugar-camps, or the fishing-grounds. A few years ago the American Mission Board established a mission and boarding-school among the "Bad River" bands, which gave promise of future good; quite a number of the Indians became converted to the Christian religion; but the Board, in consequence of the unfriendly attitude of the Government agent, withdrew from the field, the Christian band of Indians became scattered, and the children of the school returned to their homes. Since then the property of the mission has passed into the possession of the Presbyterian Board of Missions and the school has been, under a contract with the Department of the Interior, re-established, with more encouraging prospects.
      The Menomonees number thirteen hundred and sixty-two, and are located on a reservation of 230,400 acres in the northeastern part of Wisconsin. They formerly owned most of the eastern portion of the State, and, by treaty entered into with the Government on the 18th October, 1848, ceded the same for a home in Minnesota upon lands that had been obtained by the United States from the Chippewas; but, becoming dissatisfied with the arrangement, as not having accorded them what they claimed to be rightfully due, subsequently protested, and manifested great unwillingness to remove. In view of this condition of affairs, they were, by the President, permitted to remain in Wisconsin, and temporarily located upon the lands they now occupy, which were secured to them by a subsequent treaty made with the tribe on the 12th May, 1854. This reservation is well watered by lakes and streams, the latter affording excellent power and facilities for moving logs and lumber to market: the most of their country abounding with valuable pine timber. A considerable portion of the Menomonees have made real and substantial advancemeut in civilization; numbers of them are engaged in agriculture; others find remunerative employment in the lumbering camp established upon their reservation, under the management of the Government agent, while a few still return, at times, to their old pursuits of hunting and fishing.
      Under the plan adopted by the Department in 1871, in regard to cut-

ting and selling the pine timber belonging to these Indians, 2,000,000 feet have been cut and driven, realizing $23,731; of which individual Indians received for their labor over $3,000, the treasury of the tribe deriving a net profit of $5 per thousand feet. The agent estimates that for labor done by the Indians upon the reservation, at lumbering, and for work outside on railroads, during the past year, about $20,000 has been earned and received, exclusive of the labor rendered in building houses, raising crops, making sugar, gathering rice, and hunting for peltries. The work of education upon the reservations has been of late quite unsatisfactory, but one small school being now in operation, with seventy scholars, the average attendance being fifty. It is, however, in contemplation to open one additional large school at an early date.
      By act of Congress of February 13, 1871, provision was made for the sale of a portion of the Menomonee reservation; but as the consent of the Indians has not been obtained, no portion of their lands has been disposed of. They are now receiving a limited annuity (eight installments still due) of $16,179.06, under treaty of May 12, 1854, and also the interest on $154,438.89 United States and State bonds, held in trust for them by the Secretary of the Interior, amounting annually to $8,381.94.
      The Stockbridges and Munsees, numbering two hundred and fifty, occupy a reservation of 60,800 acres adjoining the Menomonees. The Stockbridges came originally from Massachusetts and New York. After several removals they, with the Munsees, finally located on their present reservation. Under the provisions of the act of February 6, 1871, steps are now being taken to dispose of all of their reservation, with the exception of eighteen sections best adapted for agricultural purposes, which are reserved for their future use. They have no treaty stipulations with the United States at the present time, nor do they receive any annuities of any kind from the Government. They have, however, $6,000 invested in United States bonds, held in trust for them by the Secretary of the Interior, the interest on which ($360) is used for educational purposes for the benefit of their children. These tribes–indeed, it may be said this tribe, (the Stockbridges,) for of the Munsees there probably remain not more than a half a dozen souls–were formerly an intelligent, prosperous people, not a whit behind the most advanced of the race, possessed of good farms, well instructed, and industrious. Unfortunately for them, though much to the advantage of the Government, which acquired thereby a valuable tract of country for white settlenment, they removed, in 1857, to their present place of abode. The change has proved highly detrimental to their interests and prospects. Their new reservation, the greater part poor in soil and seriously affected by wet seasons and frequent frosts, has never yielded them more than a meager subsistence. Many have for this reason left the tribe, and have been for years endeavoring to obtain a livelihood among the whites, maintaining but little intercourse with those remaining on the reservation, yet still holding their rights in the tribal property. The result has been bickerings and faction quarrels, prejudicial to the peace and advancement of the community. More than one-half of the present membership of the tribe, from both the "citizen" and the "Indian" parties, into which it has been long divided, are reported by the agent as having decided to avail themselves of the enrollment provisions in the act of Congress of February, 1871, hereinbefore referred to, by which they will finally receive their share of the tribal property and become citizens of the United States. Those who desire to retain their tribal relation under the protection of the United States may, under the act adverted to, if they so elect by their council, procure a new location for their

future home. This act may fairly be looked to as securing, with proper administration, a substantial improvement in the condition of these Indians. The school interests and religious care of this people are under the superintendence of Mr. Jeremiah Slingerland, a Stockbridge of much repute for his intelligence and his success in the cause of the moral and educational improvement of his people. Mr. Slingerland has for many years had charge of the schools of the tribe, numbering on the roll forty-six scholars, with an average attendance of thirty.
      The Oneidas, numbering twelve hundred and fifty-nine, have a reservation of 60,800 acres near Green Bay. They constitute the greater portion of the tribe of that name (derived from Lake Oneida, where the tribe then resided,) formerly one of the "Six Nations." Two hundred and fifty of the Oneidas yet remain in New York on the reservations already described. Those who are found in Michigan are progressing in the arts of civilized life, many of them being intelligent, industrious, and ripe for citizenship. The progress of those best disposed and most advanced is, however, retarded by the fact of the tribal lands being held in common, by which the incentive to individual exertion is greatly impaired, and habits of industry and frugality discouraged. There are also some members who fail to keep pace with the progress of the tribe, in part, probably, from the same cause which hinders the improvement of those better disposed, but principally from that fatal curse of the Indian, the passion for intoxicating liquor, which is especially developed among those members of the tribe who are engaged in lumbering.
      It is now believed that a large majority of the tribe favor the divisionof their lands and the allotment of parcels to families and individuals, a measure deemed to be of the first importance to the future welfare of this people, and which, it is suggested, should be the subject of legislative action, with a view to its consummation at the earliest practicable date. There are two schools for this tribe, having on the rolls two hundred and seventeen scholars, the average attendance being ninety. With additional accommodations, a much larger number could be brought under instruction. The Episcopal and Methodist denominations have long sustained mission stations upon the reservation with some success. They have comfortable houses for public worship, and the attendance upon the regular religious services of the Sabbath is good.
      The Oneidas of Wisconsin participate in the permanent annuity in clothing, amounting to $4,500, per treaty of 1794, made with the "Six Nations" of New York, $1,000 of which sum is being used for their benefit. They have no other treaty relations at present with the Government, nor are there any other funds expended for their benefit, with the exception of a small amount for pay of teachers and support of schools.
      The stray bands of Winnebagoes, Chippewas, and Pottawatomies number about sixteen hundred. They are scattered in small parties over the central and northern portions of the State, and are those members of the tribes named who did not remove when their respective tribes went west of the Mississippi. They receive no assistance from the Government, and subsist by cultivating small patches of corn and vegetables, by hunting, fishing, and gathering berries, and by working for the whites at certain seasons of the year; a number own a few acres, others rent small patches from the whites. They are accused of causing considerable annoyance to the farmers in some localities, and, on account of complaints having been made in this respect, Congress has appropriated funds to remove them to the tribes to which they respectively

belong, or to some place in the Indian territory south of Kansas. For various reasons their removal has not yet been undertaken. Indeed, while this may be found practicable, I doubt whether it can be thoroughly accomplished without additional and severe legislation on the part of Congress, as the Indians are attached to the country, and express great repugnance to their contemplated removal from it. On this account, and for the reason that they cannot be supposed to feel much interest in those from whom they have been so long separated, and by whom they might not be heartily welcomed, it is probable that those who should be removed against their will would return to their old haunts, and do the same as often as they should be removed therefrom. Such has been the case heretofore, not only with these, but with other Indians.

      The Indians residing within the limits of Minnesota, as in the case of those of the same name living in Wisconsin, heretofore noticed, constitute a portion of the Ojibway or Chippewa nation, and comprise the following bands: Mississippi, Pillager, Winnebagoshish, Pembina, Red Lake, Boise Forte, Fond du Lac, and Grand Portage. The last three bands, being attached to the agency for the Chippewas of Lake Superior, have been treated of in connection with the Indians of Wisconsin. The five first-named bands number in the aggregate about six thousand four hundred and fifty-five souls, and occupy, or rather it is intended they shall ultimately occupy, ample reservations in the central and northern portion of the State, known as the White Earth, Leech Lake, and Red Lake reservations, containing altogether about 4,672,000 acres, a portion of which is very valuable for its pine timber.
      The condition of these Indians, except those upon the White Earth reservation, has been but little changed during the past year from that of several years preceding. Great difficulty is still experienced in inducing the Indians to remain permanently upon their reservations; a roving life is still preferred by many, their old haunts presenting more attractions for them than new homes, with the unavoidable necessity of labor for subsistence. Yet, no inconsiderable number are already evidencing by their efforts, as well as by their professions, a new spirit of industry and enterprise. The past year has been one of trouble and unusual excitement on the part of both whites and Indians, on account of the ill-behavior of the Pillager band, and apprehensions of a serious outbreak were for a time entertained. Nine murders of citizens are reported to have been committed by individual Chippewas, mainly if not wholly of this band, and threats were made on the part of some of the Pillagers, which, if carried out, would have involved nearly all of the Indians of this section in hostilities. Happily, by the prompt arrival of United States troops upon the White Earth reservation, and more especially by the strong disapprobation of the conduct of the Pillagers expressed in council by the general body of Leech Lake Indians, and their evident purpose to unite with the Government in putting down any and all enemies of the peace, the crisis was passed, and comparative quiet has again been restored. In view of the atrocities committed by the Pillagers, and of the alarm occasioned thereby among the citizens of Minnesota, Governor Austin issued a proclamation requiring all Indians to remain upon their reservations under penalty, of arrest, to be effected by the militia of the State, should it be found necessary. In the present condition of things, however, a compliance by all with this requirement

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