NOTES OF A SUMMER TOUR 
 
 
 AMONG THE 
 
 INDIANS OF THE SOUTHWEST 
 
 FRANCIS E. LEUPP, 
 
 Washington Agent of the Indian Rights Association. 
 
 PHILADELPHIA: 
 
 OFFICE OF THE INDIAN RIGHTS ASSOCIATION, 
 
 No. 1305 ARCH STREET. 
 
 1897. 
 
7 t 
 
 University of California Berkeley 
 
 
Bancrou 
 
 NOTES OF A SUMMER TOUR 
 
 AMONG THE 
 
 INDIANS OF THE SOUTHWEST, 
 
 My annual tour in the Indian country this year included a 
 most interesting visit to Fort Sill, O. T.,. where the Chiricahua 
 band of Apache prisoners have their home. 
 
 To travel through Arizona and hear the people talk of Geron- 
 imo, the Apache arch-fiend, who, if he set foot in the Territory, 
 would be hanged for murder without the formality of a trial, is 
 impressive. But to pass up into Oklahoma and find this same 
 Geronimo putting in his honest eight hours of work daily as a 
 farmer in the fields, and at intervals donning his uniform as a 
 United States scout and presenting himself with the other scouts 
 for inspection, is still more so. 
 
 Most Indian outbreaks have been the result of a situation 
 which, in a measure at least, justified them. To go upon the 
 warpath is sometimes the only means left to a tribe for calling 
 the attention of the Government and the people sharply to the 
 wrongs it has been suffering. Other cases find a type in the last 
 campaign of Chief Joseph, who, after the Government had 
 wickedly removed the Nez Perces to a region where they died 
 like sheep smitten with a murrain, led his people across the 
 country on a march which has, perhaps, never been paralleled 
 in military history, and which need not have cost a single human 
 life but for the folly of his pursuers. 
 
 No excuse seems, however, to have been urged or sought in 
 the case of Geronimo. He was simply troubled with what the 
 
 3 
 
Indians call a bad heart ; and, all his savage impulses stimulated 
 by the obvious terror of the white communities which he threat 
 ened, he went on his career of plunder, rapine, and bloodshed 
 until General Miles cornered him and induced him to surrender. 
 Realizing what the incensed state of local feeling would lead to 
 if Geronimo and his Chiricahua band were allowed to remain 
 within reach of the people he had terrorized, Miles hurried them 
 away to a place where they would be safe as prisoners of war until 
 the Government could decide what to do with them. The next 
 few years were passed, as may be remembered, in Florida and 
 Alabama, where, though under more or less close confinement, a 
 part of the band received their first lessons in civilization at the 
 hands of Lieutenant Witherspoon. Finally, in the fall of 1894, 
 the War Department issued an order for their removal to Fort 
 Sill, a military post in Oklahoma, where they passed under the 
 care of Captain Hugh L. Scott, of the Seventh Cavalry. 
 
 It was an unprepossessing task at which to set the Captain. 
 The idea of bringing these savage Indians into Oklahoma was 
 violently opposed by the white population already settled there. 
 The officers and troops at the post were not at all predisposed in 
 favor of their new neighbors, who had a bad name everywhere ; 
 and the charge of such a band partook too much of the nature 
 of mere police duty to please the strictly military taste. So the 
 outlook for converting this gang of outlaws to respectability was 
 not encouraging at first. 
 
 But Captain Scott had his own notions, and he persevered 
 with them. He was fortunate in the one respect of having the 
 War Department to deal with ; as that Department, always pre 
 suming that an army officer is a gentleman and a man of honor, 
 embarrasses him with far less red tape than the Interior Depart 
 ment, which transacts its business on the apparent theory that 
 every agent is either an incompetent or a thief. 
 
 After assuring himself that the Apache prisoners were to make 
 their permanent home at Fort Sill, Captain Scott resolved to 
 provide them with houses. For this purpose he had them divide 
 into twelve groups or villages, according to kindred or intimate 
 friendbhip. The head man in each group was ordered to select, 
 within certain boundaries, a site for his village, having reference 
 to both its scenic and its sanitary attractions. The village system 
 
was adopted for various reasons, chief among which was the fact 
 that the country, through lack of water, is not adapted to 
 agriculture, but only to grazing, and stock flourish best when 
 kept on a large common range ; the impracticability of separate 
 and scattered farms was therefore obvious. Other considerations 
 were the greater content of the Indians when in close social 
 companionship with their relatives in their leisure hours, and the 
 greater ease of inspecting their condition and controlling their 
 movements. 
 
 The model selected by Captain Scott for his houses was that 
 known as "two pens and a passage." Two small cottages are 
 under one roof, but an open space about as broad as either of 
 the cottages is left between them. Doors from the two cottages 
 open upon the passage. The advantage of this arrangement in 
 a country where the sun beats down in midsummer with parching 
 fierceness, and where trees on the uplands are almost unknown, 
 is that it affords one shady out-of-doors spot in connection with 
 each dwelling. The Indian family that occupies the double cot 
 tage has domestic work during the day, washing, preparing the 
 food for cooking, etc., which can be done better in the open 
 air than inside, and here it can be done in the shade and with 
 comparative comfort. At other times, when the men are in 
 from the fields and taking their rest, this is a favorite place for 
 their social enjoyment. The passage, moreover, is required to 
 be kept in as neat condition as any other part of the premises, 
 and it does away with the multitude of ramshackle open-air 
 shelters which usually make the neighborhood of a Government 
 cabin on an Indian reservation look so untidy and forlorn. 
 
 To build the cabins it was necessary to have wood and labor. 
 Most of the Indians were ignorant of the use of tools, but 
 under the instruction of a patient white mechanic they were 
 soon taught enough to cut long pickets on the nearest timber 
 land. An old saw-mill, formerly in use for the Kiowas and 
 Comanches, but which had fallen into disuse and was about to 
 be condemned, was borrowed, repaired, and hauled down to a 
 place convenient to the lumbering operations, where the Indians 
 were taught to work it, with the assistance of a white engineer 
 to manage the boiler. The pickets were squared and made 
 ready for building. Then came the first hitch. Mules were 
 
6 
 
 needed to haul the pickets to the building sites, and it was three 
 months before the animals were furnished. Captain Scott became 
 alarmed lest all his plans should fail after so much had been done. 
 He accordingly fell back upon a quantity of sawed lumber which 
 happened to be more accessible. This will account for the fact 
 that, of the seventy houses, more than two-thirds are built of 
 sawed lumber, instead of pickets as originally proposed. 
 
 But all the houses are of the Indians' own construction. They 
 acted as so many pairs of hands, under competent white direc 
 tion, in framing and raising the buildings, closing them in, roof 
 ing and painting them. The Indian is a natural mechanic, and 
 these Apaches proved apt pupils as soon as Captain Scott had 
 convinced them that as prisoners of war they were obliged to do 
 what their captors demanded, and that they would find their 
 highest comfort and profit in working for themselves. Now that 
 they have got their houses and have been quartered in them long 
 enough to give them a thorough trial, the more intelligent 
 Indians appear to have settled down to the notion that their 
 present mode of living is an improvement on their old nomadic 
 existence. Even those who are not yet converted have, at all 
 events, learned that in silent resignation lies their greatest safety, 
 and they live their lives and go about their daily work with at 
 least the outward appearance of contentment. 
 
 On the bottom-lands and along the edges of a creek, the 
 Indians have their garden patches and cultivated crops. Such 
 water as is used has to be brought by hand from the creek. They 
 raise corn for roasting-ears, melons and canteloupes, etc. Such 
 of their surplus garden products as are good enough they ped 
 dle at the neighboring Fort and among the white mechanics and 
 others living on its outskirts. But the great crop for the bottom 
 lands in so dry a region is karfir corn. Captain Scott has added 
 to his military accomplishments those of a practical farmer. He 
 studies the agricultural reports and the local farm newspapers as 
 diligently as he used to study his tactics. Some time ago he became 
 convinced that the soil and climate of Fort Sill were well adapted 
 to kaffir corn, and made some experiments which amply justified 
 his conclusion. This crop furnishes both human food and forage 
 for stock. The grain is developed in the head, and is a nutritious 
 
breadstuff; and, besides the grain, the stalks and leaves can be 
 fed to animals like those of the ordinary corn. 
 
 Fort Sill is situated on a rectangular reservation supposed to 
 run due east and west. The surveyors who platted it out evi 
 dently did not allow for the variations of the needle, however, 
 and the lines actually run slightly west-by-north and east-by- 
 south, inclosing about 23,000 acres. The reservation is on land 
 belonging to the Kiowas and Comanches. It was only by their 
 permission, procured through the friendly offices of Captain 
 Scott, whom they knew and trusted, that the Apache prisoners 
 were brought and planted there. Recently, owing to the 
 necessity for a larger tract for grazing purposes, Captain Scott 
 procured the consent of the Kiowas and Comanches to the addi 
 tion of some 30,000 acres to the Fort Sill reservation, and last 
 February President Cleveland made the addition by an execu 
 tive order. The new parts are rectangular, and are added to 
 either end of the original reservation, but following corrected 
 township lines. The addition at the east end runs north and 
 south, and that at the other end east and west, so that the whole 
 tract resembles a figure 7 lying on its side. As the Government 
 will, in due course, abandon Fort Sill as a military post, it is 
 hoped that Congress will appropriate money for the purchase of 
 the whole figure 7, so that the Apaches, now so well on the 
 road toward civilization, may hold all the good they have 
 gained and be encouraged to advance further. As there are 
 some questions still unsettled in connection with the future of 
 the Kiowas and Comanches, it has been deemed best to let this 
 matter lie over for the present. 
 
 The prairie included in the Apache subreserve is not pasture- 
 land alone. On a part of it grows a native grass which, when 
 long enough to cut, can be cured into a very fair quality of hay. 
 So Captain Scott has taken his Apaches into the hay market, 
 and they have been successful bidders on a $5000 Government 
 contract for supplying the stables at Fort Sill. They had also, 
 at last accounts, put in a bid for supplying the Fort with 300,000 
 pounds of Kaffir corn a contract which, if it should bear out 
 its promise, would bring them about $2000 clear profit. 
 
 Meanwhile, the Indians' cattle have been getting their subsist 
 ence from the pasture-lands. Captain Scott attends carefully to the 
 
8 
 
 buying of the stock, which, though comparing unfavorably in point 
 of size with some of the big-boned animals of a more northerly 
 latitude, are good of their kind, and the best which can be suc 
 cessfully bred in this neighborhood. The Chiricahua band are 
 entered as a whole as a member of the Texas Cattle Association. 
 This gives them the protection afforded by the Association's 
 inspection system against the introduction of diseased animals 
 into their herds, and also the aid of the detectives who are en 
 gaged in hunting down and punishing cattle-thieves. The 
 cattle, as they increase, will be used in part for the subsistence of 
 their owners, and the surplus will be sent to the beef market at 
 Kansas City. 
 
 By a judicious course of instruction, including both precept 
 and object-lessons, Captain Scott has contrived to teach his 
 Apaches something about the value of a dollar. This is no 
 easy task with a barbarous people, accustomed to live only from 
 hand to mouth, and knowing nothing of trade except that when 
 they were hungry and it was impracticable to find food or steal it, 
 they could sometimes get it by bartering anything they happened 
 to have on hand perhaps a gun for a loaf, a last blanket for a 
 handful of dried meat. But a better idea can be drummed into 
 the minds even of savages, if one has tact and patience. When 
 these Chiricahuas began to discover how convenient it was to 
 have a little ready money on hand, how much more they could 
 get for a coin than for the equivalent of that coin in any form 
 of exchange, they had taken their first step. The effect of 
 peddling their vegetables was in itself a revelation. Another 
 was in store when Captain Scott procured a well-boring machine, 
 and taught the Indians how to use it. They were then shown 
 the wisdom of taking care of a good piece of machinery, since 
 they were not only enabled to bore wells for all the villages, 
 but could earn money by going among the Kiowas and 
 Comanches, and among the whites outside, and boring wells on 
 contract. Other mechanical implements have been added to the 
 plant from time to time. The latest purchase was a couple of 
 hay-balers. These were employed in preparing the hay for 
 delivery under this year's contract, and will become the per 
 manent property of the Indians, to be preserved and used in 
 future years. 
 
 * * * * 
 
It has already been remarked that in choosing sites for the 
 Apache villages, Captain Scott gave much latitude to the judg 
 ment of the head men. This suggests another chapter of the 
 story. 
 
 Two courses lie open to every agent or other officer who takes 
 charge of a band of Indians. He finds them organized under 
 certain leadership. There will, perhaps, be a war chief, a peace 
 chief, several sub-chiefs, head men, and the like. He may 
 promptly depose all these dignitaries and announce himself as 
 the sole source of authority, calling no councils, asking no 
 advice, and brooking no interference. On the other hand, he 
 may place himself wholly outside of the organization, refer every 
 thing to the leaders, issue his communications through them, and, 
 by deferring to their wishes in all matters, add to the authority 
 they already possess the sanction of Government support. In 
 deciding at the outset what attitude he shall take toward the 
 existing organization, he may make or mar his entire administra 
 tion. No unvarying rule can be laid down, applicable to all 
 Indians and all conditions. In some instances the prominent 
 members of a tribe have been so spoiled by timid or time-serving 
 agents that to give them any rein whatever means to surrender 
 all hope of advancing their followers in civilization. In other 
 cases it is the conservative, wise, steady-headed old men upon 
 whom the agent must lean in trying to keep the younger generation 
 out of vice and crime, while the so-called "progressive " element 
 are lending themselves, often under the cloak of religion, to 
 every scheme for making money out of their own flesh and blood. 
 It therefore behooves the white officer in command to study 
 well the condition in which he finds his Indians, and shape his 
 conduct accordingly. 
 
 Captain Scott, in dealing with his Apaches, has taken a shrewd 
 middle course. He has neither ignored the leaders of the band 
 nor abdicated in their favor, but has simply made use of the in 
 struments nature and circumstances placed in his hand. The 
 Apaches, like other tribes in a nomadic state, undoubtedly chose 
 their chiefs and head men for some inherent quality of leader 
 ship. This trait in an Indian chief may not always present a 
 phase of virtue to our more enlightened view. His stoical indif 
 ference to suffering of his own, which challenges our admiration, 
 
10 
 
 may be associated with the most revolting cruelty toward others ; 
 his brilliant generalship in the field may have for its companion- 
 piece a degree of treachery which would disgrace the meanest of 
 spies ; his generosity in giving away his last rag of clothing or 
 ear of corn to his followers may be coupled with uncommon skill 
 and prowess as a thief. But, be that as it may, the fact that he 
 towers above all his fellows in one thing or in many has made 
 him a marked figure ; and if he is ready to recognize the fact 
 that he is only a lieutenant and not in command, he may be made 
 very useful to the white man over him. 
 
 Acting upon this theory, Captain Scott promptly recognized 
 the position of several of the leading men in the Chiricahua 
 band. But he did it with discretion. When the Indians first 
 came to Fort Sill, for instance, Geronimo was considered a great 
 curiosity. He was nearly mobbed here, as he had been both in 
 Alabama and Florida, by sightseers, who would often bring him 
 presents for the honor of shaking his hand. This was precisely 
 what ought not to have been done, as it tended merely to keep the 
 old Indian's vanity in full blast, and to give him a false and 
 damaging importance among the younger members of the tribe. 
 Captain Scott quickly gave orders that all such folly should cease. 
 He did not commit the opposite error of needlessly humiliating 
 Geronimo, and thus stamping him as a martyr, but quietly and 
 unostentatiously set him down where he belonged, gave him dis 
 tinctly to understand that he was simply an ordinary prisoner of 
 war, and that the Government would require the same good be 
 havior of him in every respect as it required of the humblest 
 member of the band, and then left the situation to work out its 
 own conclusion. Stripped of his factitious distinction, Geronimo 
 soon ceased to be the great man of the band. He worked with 
 the rest, as hard and as effectively as his advanced years would 
 permit. It would be flattery to say that he accepted this change 
 of status with alacrity, or even that he submitted to it with a 
 wholly cheerful grace. But he did submit, and that was all his 
 custodian demanded of him. The young men of the band wit 
 nessed his descent in glory, and were duly impressed. They 
 observed, also, that those other leaders who set them the best 
 example in adaptability and thrift received just recognition at the 
 hands of the Government. Captain Scott obtained permission 
 
II 
 
 to enlist the head men, including Geronimo, as scouts, without 
 reference to their age or physical condition. The scouts have 
 been suitably uniformed in army blue and brass. One of them 
 is without an eye, a second is lame, a third bow-legged ; and 
 various other defects which would rule them out if they offered 
 themselves for enlistment as regular troopers are overlooked 
 under the circumstances. The point to be gained was to commit 
 the leaders to the service-of the Government, put them distinctly 
 on their mettle, command their influence for good among their 
 own people, teach them that there was more real eminence to be 
 gained by wise conduct than by foolish, and give the rising gen 
 eration the incentive of possible promotion. The plan has 
 worked admirably. The scouts are proud of their uniform, and 
 careful to avoid disgracing it. They perform police duty, and 
 keep Captain Scott informed of what goes on in the several 
 villages, so that he can take measures for discipline where it is 
 needed. Some of them have become warmly attached to him 
 personally. The chevrons are tokens of distinguished merit, 
 and the Indians recognize the fact. Neither they nor the visi 
 tors to Fort Sill fail to notice, moreover, that Geronimo himself 
 wears no tape on his sleeve, and this object-lesson does its silent 
 work. 
 
 Incidents like this 'occur sometimes : A young Indian left his 
 wife and took up with another. The matter was reported to 
 Captain Scott, who sent for the man and questioned him. He 
 admitted what he had done, but offered as an excuse that his 
 first wife and he could not agree, and that he did not want to 
 live with her any longer. 
 
 " Very well," said the Captain," if you are unhappy together, 
 I shall not force you to share one home ; but in the eye of the 
 law, which you must respect, that woman is still your wife, and 
 you have no right to live with any other." 
 
 " What will happen if I continue to do so?" asked the Indian. 
 
 " I shall be obliged to put you in the guard-house, and keep 
 you on bread and water as long as the military regulations 
 allow." 
 
 The young man protested that this was a pretty harsh punish 
 ment, but Captain Scott explained to him that bigamy was 
 punishable by imprisonment in the case of a white man, and an 
 
12 
 
 Indian must not expect to find the way of the lawbreaker any 
 easier because of the color of his skin. " Now go and think this 
 over, and come back to-morrow and tell me what you have 
 decided to do," said he in conclusion. The next day the offen 
 der appeared, and rather doggedly announced that he would 
 prefer bachelorhood to imprisonment. The Captain commended 
 the common sense of this view, and dismissed the case without 
 making any more ado about it. When I saw the man a little 
 while afterward he had evidently not yet overcome his chagrin, 
 but he knew with whom he had to deal and was making the best 
 of the inevitable. 
 
 As has been said, the people of Arizona cherish a very ugly 
 feeling toward the Chiricahuas, which is not unnatural. They 
 do not hesitate to say that if the band or any of its more active 
 members should come back to their old haunts, they would be 
 given short shrift. The Arizona feeling was shared at first by 
 the Oklahoma people, who denounced in unmeasured terms the 
 planting of the "murderous band" in their Territory as a 
 menace to the safety of the white population. This ingrafted 
 sentiment appears to have almost, if not entirely, died out. At 
 any rate, both people and press have ceased to express it, and no 
 longer have any more to say about the imported Apaches than 
 about any class of white immigrants who have settled among 
 them. The Indians can scarcely have failed to discover this 
 change, due to their good behavior. They are also, doubtless, 
 well aware of what would result if they should run away and 
 return to their former home. But Captain Scott has not felt 
 justified in leaving such a possibility subject to a mere moral 
 influence. He has taken the precaution to obtain, from a trusty 
 Indian who is thoroughly acquainted with the country, a map of 
 the trail leading from Fort Sill to Fort Stanton, New Mexico, 
 which is the one the Apache prisoners would take if they should 
 attempt an escape. A copy of it has been filed with the Adju 
 tant General of the Department of the Missouri, so that if the 
 Indians should slip away in the night, a telegraphic despatch in 
 the morning would start a body of troops at once for some point 
 where the fugitives could be promptly headed off and recaptured. 
 
 It is not likely that such an attempt will be made so long as 
 Captain Scott remains in charge, or if he is succeeded by an 
 
13 
 
 officer competent and willing to carry out his policy. Should 
 circumstances render such a change necessary, however, the 
 Government could make no worse mistake than to reduce in 
 number or weaken in character the force of subordinates now 
 assisting in the work with the Apaches. Two particularly strong 
 men in this corps are Lieutenant Capron, who is Captain Scott's 
 good right hand, and Dr. Glennan, the army surgeon, who has, 
 by his kindness as well as his professional skill, done much to 
 win the Indians away from the thraldom of their medicine men. 
 Five others, including three non-commissioned officers of the 
 Seventh Cavalry and two civilian employees, make up the con 
 tingent, every one of whom is needed to continue this large and 
 highly important work. The wonder is, not that so many per 
 sons can find in it full employment for their time, but that a 
 service of such magnitude can be efficiently performed by 
 
 so few. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 Another point I visited was Sante Fe, the headquarters of the 
 Pueblo and Jicarilla agency. This agency has jurisdiction not 
 only of the Jicarilla Apaches at Dulce, N. M., a point which 
 can be reached by rail only by going away east and north into 
 eastern Colorado, and then away west again to within a half-day's 
 journey of the Utah line, but also of twenty widely separated 
 pueblos and fourteen schools. The total enrolment does not fall 
 far short of 10,000 Indians. The agent has perhaps a larger 
 load to carry than any other in the service. It is a physical 
 impossibility for him to get about and visit all parts of his 
 domain as frequently as he ought to in order to keep in 
 close touch with his subordinates and their work, and most 
 agents who have been assigned to this place have made no 
 attempt to do so. The bulk of the agent's duties must be per 
 formed through correspondence, which, in view of the size of 
 the field, is bound to be very voluminous. The highest impor 
 tance attaches, therefore, to the choice of a clerk. A lazy drunk 
 ard, such as, on at least one occasion within a short time, has 
 been sent to this agency to write the letters and keep the records, 
 is considerably worse than none at all. It was the old story of 
 the man with the " pull " a survival of the patronage system. 
 
 Captain Charles E. Nordstrom, of the army, the present act- 
 
14 
 
 ing agent, is a man of energy and resolution. Properly sup 
 ported at Washington, he would be capable of making a mark in 
 this place. He received his detail last spring. Following a line 
 of predecessors who, as a rule, have been content to let things 
 drift for the sake of keeping the Indians quiet and avoiding 
 needless quarrels with border whites, he found the affairs of the 
 agency in a pretty slack condition, and has been trying ever 
 since to straighten them out. By gradually moving about to the 
 extent that his allowance for traveling expenses would permit, 
 he has made the personal acquaintance of the larger part of the 
 employees of both agency and school service under him, and 
 studied somewhat their surroundings and methods. I am glad 
 to say that he has found a most efficient assistant in Miss Mary 
 E. Dissette, who has given so many years to hard work among 
 the Zunis, first as a missionary and afterward as a Government 
 teacher, and that he appreciates her at her true value. 
 
 The Zunis, by the way, have been the most troublesome of 
 the pueblo Indians attached to this agency. They are about 
 1500 strong, and, from the ethnological point of view, perhaps 
 the most interesting Indians of New Mexico. At any rate, they 
 have been so petted and pampered and coddled by a number of 
 white persons of both sexes who have lived among, them osten 
 sibly in the interest of science, that they have come to consider 
 themselves a little better than the whites anywhere, and espe 
 cially superior to that remote abstraction called the Government. 
 Every time a movement has been made in the way of holding 
 them responsible for violations of the law of the land, some of 
 their patrons have cried: "Hands off! These Indians are 
 merely following the dictates of their religion, and they have 
 the same right to religious freedom as any other people in the 
 United States." 
 
 No one exceeds Captain Nordstrom in his respect for the 
 rights of others or his American attachment to the idea of reli 
 gious liberty ; but he promptly asserted that where the exercise 
 of religious rites came into conflict with the criminal law of the 
 land, the rites, and not the law, would have to give way. 
 The Zunis have among them a hierarchy known as the Priests of 
 the Bow, who make it a part of their business to ferret out and 
 punish witchcraft. When Indians fall mysteriously ill, or other 
 
afflictions overtake them from a source not easily discernible, 
 these priests are apt to jump to the conclusion that the sufferer 
 is bewitched. The next thing is to find his enchanter. Having 
 fixed their suspicions upon some one, the Priests of the Bow try 
 to drag from him by torture a confession that he has been 
 practising witchcraft. The favorite form of ordeal is tying 
 the witch's arms, slipping a stick under his elbows and behind 
 his back, and hanging him by this stick. If he attempts to re 
 lieve the agonizing strain upon his armpits by bracing his feet 
 against the wall behind him, the offending feet are whipped as 
 an additional refinement of torture. Sometimes the so-called 
 witch takes the chance of other kinds of penance by confession ; 
 sometimes he goes to the opposite extreme and dies while still 
 hanging, nature being unable to endure the strain longer; some 
 times he is lowered before life is wholly extinct, and has the 
 poor satisfaction of breathing out his life in a horizontal posi 
 tion ; sometimes, if he is exceptionally strong, he may survive 
 the ordeal altogether, but the odds are always against him. 
 
 Captain Nordstrom not unreasonably assumed that, when it 
 came to sacrificing human life, even religious fanaticism was no 
 excuse. Other agents had tried to interfere, but never with 
 such a show of force as convinced the priests that they must 
 give up their witch-hanging ceremonies or take the ribk of being 
 hanged themselves. On one of the latest occasions, for example, 
 the United States Marshal, who came over from Gallup to arrest 
 the guilty parties, was given only twenty-five soldiers from Fort 
 Wingate to assist him. All the effect of such a demonstration 
 was to incite the Indians to more violence. They gathered with 
 what arms they could command, surrounded the troops, jeered 
 at the officers, and had their own way generally until another 
 body of men was sent from the Fort, and temporizing measures 
 wound up the whole affair, no arrests being made. 
 
 The latest witch-hanging, I am glad to say, bore more serious 
 fruit. Captain Nordstrom, who took charge of the agency 
 about the time it occurred, assured the Indian Office that he 
 could put a summary end to the whole business if properly 
 supported, and called for four troops of cavalry. This was re 
 garded at Washington, at first, as an extraordinary demand ; but 
 he insisted, and it was finally decided to give him his way. 
 
i6 
 
 He was not allowed to command the troops himself, on an ab 
 surd theory that, as he had temporarily accepted a detail to the 
 service of the Interior Department, he could not properly pe rform 
 the functions of an officer of the army ; but, at any rate, he got 
 his soldiers. 
 
 This proof that the Government was in earnest had an instan 
 taneous effect. All the vainglory of the Priests of the Bow 
 suddenly forsook them. The troops came first and inve*ted the 
 pueblo, and then the sheriff arrived and made his arrests without 
 encountering the slightest resistance. The accused Indians and 
 the witnesses were carried before a Justice at Las Lunas for a 
 preliminary examination, and then the accused were locked up 
 in default of bail to await the February term of court. The fear 
 among the whites who know these Indians best is that a plot 
 has been arranged for making one old Indian, Hatotsi, a scape 
 goat for all the guilty parties ; and that, when he has been sent 
 to prison to expiate the crimes of his companions and the excite 
 ment has blown over, the rest of the culprits will join to wreak 
 vengeance upon the Indian witnesses who have stood by the 
 Government and told the truth in court. Indeed, it is going to 
 call into play all the cleverness of the white servants of the 
 Government to keep guard over the witnesses and prevent the 
 guilty parties from spiriting them away before the trial, or terror 
 izing them into silence at the critical moment. A press 
 despatch of recent date states that the head men of the Zuni 
 pueblo have met in council and decided, in view of the now 
 obvious policy of the Government at Washington, that witch- 
 hanging had better be given up for the future, as they do not 
 care to have disturbances with the troops or to see any more of 
 their people carried off to jail. I have no means at command 
 for verifying this story, but it has a color of probability at least. 
 
 It must not be inferred from all this that Captain Nordstrom 
 has confined his activities to the punishment of crime among his 
 Indians. He has taken quite as lively an interest in protecting 
 the property rights of innocent Indians when these have been 
 menaced by the somewhat chaotic condition of land titles in cer 
 tain parts of the Territory. Through his urgent representations, 
 the Department has been induced to appoint an attorney to de- 
 
fend the interests of the Indians and advise with the agent as 
 
 cases arise. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 One thing is very much needed at Santa Fe" ; that is, a house 
 which the agent can use as a lodging-place for the Indians who 
 come to see him on business. The distances between many of the 
 pueblos and the agency are long, and the travel difficult ; and as 
 a visit from a delegation of Indians to the agent often saves the 
 agent a troublesome and expensive trip to their pueblo, it is but 
 right that the visitors should have a shelter of some sort for the 
 nights they are obliged to pass in the city. The Government 
 owns a considerable establishment in the abandoned military 
 post in Santa Fe. It includes buildings which are not now put to 
 any profitable use, and which are only going to slow decay. 
 One of these could be turned over to the agency as an Indian 
 lodge without cost, and would be a great boon ; but it is a slow 
 task to arouse the interest of the powers that- be in such a project, 
 because few persons at Washington understand the needs of the 
 agency, and there are parties whose private advantage is pro 
 moted by keeping the Department either ignorant or indifferent. 
 
 While in Santa Fe I visited the Indian school now under the 
 superintendence of Colonel Thomas M. Jones. This school is 
 admirably situated on high, well-drained land, a short distance 
 out of town. Colonel Jones is a Virginian and a graduate of 
 West Point, but resigned his commission in the United States 
 army and entered that of the Confederacy when his State seceded 
 from the Union. He manages his school on a military basis. 
 He has had experience as a superintendent in the white schools 
 of Virginia, and was in the Indian service under the first Cleve 
 land administration as agent for the Shoshones on the Wind 
 River reservation in Wyoming. His wife is a woman of energy 
 and force, and takes a special motherly interest in the younger 
 children. They both encourage open-air sports among the pupils, 
 who have proved their prowess by defeating the white boys of 
 the neighborhood at baseball and similar games. As the school 
 was out of session at the time of my visit, I was unable to wit 
 ness any of the class-room work, but I was impressed by the 
 obvious popularity of the school among the young Indians wher 
 ever I went in the Southwest this summer. The boys and girls 
 
i8 
 
 from Santa Fe go home and carry on a vigorous propaganda 
 among their mates on the reservations, not only coming back 
 gladly themselves, but bringing in new scholars with them at the 
 beginning of each term. As the school draws upon the mem 
 bership of a large number of different tribes, the Apaches, the 
 Navajos, the Utes, the Pimas and Papagos, and the various 
 pueblos, the pupils have no common language ; and the policy 
 of Colonel and Mrs. Jones, in encouraging sports in which all 
 can join, has the effect of making them learn English readily as 
 the tongue in which they can reach the largest number of play 
 fellows. 
 
 From Sante Fe I passed to Albuquerque. The school there is 
 in some respects the worst I have ever visited. After inspecting 
 it, I can no longer wonder at the brevity of service there of 
 superintendents who are able to get a transfer to almost any 
 other post. It is wrong for the Government to throw upon the 
 shoulders of a conscientious school-worker the responsibility of 
 caring for 300 Indian children under conditions such as he must 
 face at this place. 
 
 Whoever chose the site for the Albuquerque school made 
 a fatal blunder. The land is low so low that there is a fall of 
 but eight feet in the mile and one-half distance between the 
 school and its only drainage outlet, the Rio Grande River, or 
 about one-eighth of an inch to the foot. Such a fall, of course, 
 puts it out of the question for any sewer to flush itself thoroughly, 
 no matter how steady the flow through it. Artificial flushing, if 
 done properly, would involve some extra mechanical appliances 
 and a large drain upon the water resources, and still would pro 
 duce results not nearly so satisfactory as natural flushing. A 
 sewer system, according to the latest estimates, would cost not 
 less than from #25,000 to $30,000. 
 
 As it is now, the place is unfit for habitation. The outhouses 
 send forth the most nauseous odors, which the wind carries into 
 the buildings where pupils and employees are living. The slops 
 and garbage from the kitchen pass through a drain-pipe at the 
 ground-floor level, and are emptied into an open barrel sunk in 
 the earth just outside of the kitchen porch. The greatest care 
 it is possible to exercise in emptying this barrel periodically with 
 buckets and carrying the contents off to the muck heaps does 
 
not suffice to keep it in decent condition. Even the hospital 
 refuse has to be disposed of by buckets and hand labor. Cer 
 tainly such object-lessons are not calculated to impress the 
 Indian children with the superiority of white men's ways over 
 those of the dwellers in tepee and hogan, which are scarcely more 
 primitive. Bancroft 1 
 
 The buildings are, as a rule, very old or very poor. Two or 
 three, perhaps, in the entire plant, are worth the money needed 
 to keep them in fair repair. In the boys' dormitory building I 
 found some of the walls and ceilings stripped wholly of their 
 old coat of plaster and preparing to take on a new one. This 
 was not because the old coat had come off of itself, but because 
 it had been found absolutely necessary to knock the whole thing to 
 pieces as the shortest way to get rid of the vermin which infested 
 it. 
 
 It would take more space than can be spared for the present 
 writing to give anything like an adequate picture of the condi 
 tion of things at this school. This is all the more deplorable 
 because Albuquerque is well situated for such an institution. 
 Had its founders used ordinary common sense, they would have 
 built the school on a high, dry, and sightly mesa to the east of 
 the present location, where wholesome drainage could have been 
 effected without trouble. The soil and climate are well adapted 
 for fruit-farming, and this could have been made the chief in 
 dustrial feature, and the school used as a feeder for the labor 
 market upon which southwestern fruit-growers must draw. To 
 be popular among Indians, it is of the first importance that a 
 school shall have a reputation for healthfulness, and that the 
 Albuquerque school has not, for the causes already cited. The 
 more careful agents are suspicious of it, and are not so ready to 
 drum up recruits for it among their Indians as for some other 
 schools. It would be a good thing if the Government could 
 bring itself to the point of abolishing the Albuquerque school 
 altogether, and, with the money it now spends there, enlarging 
 and improving one of the other schools which has the same 
 country tributary to it the one at Santa Fe, for instance, already 
 described ; or the one at Fort Lewis, which is well adapted for 
 pupils from tribes that live at a high altitude, and which has a 
 
20 
 
 good basis for its plant, and needs only the expenditure of a fair 
 amount of money to be put into first-class condition. 
 
 If the Albuquerque school is continued, the Government 
 should acquire land enough on the mesa to transfer the entire 
 plant thither and equip it with modern buildings. To keep 
 things as they are is a disgrace to a civilization which professes 
 to offer to the Indians something better in a material sense than 
 what they now possess. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 My next visit was to the Navajo agency at Fort Defiance, in 
 Arizona, where I found Major Williams, the acting agent, strug 
 gling with the problem of providing better quarters for the 
 school at Little Water. Mrs. DeVore and her sister, Mrs. Has- 
 kell, have had the most discouraging experience in managing 
 this school. Mrs. Ha'skell, when I reached the agency, was 
 there, recruiting her health after a season of great privation and 
 hardship in which her nervous system had been almost wrecked. 
 
 The Indians in the neighborhood of Little Water have sup 
 ported the school well in spite of the cramped and miserable 
 quarters. The children from a distance have had to be given 
 shelter as well as food, and this has meant their sleeping four in 
 a bed, and eating mercy only knows how. All the water has 
 to be carried from a spring a half-mile distant. Dirt floors and 
 leaking roofs have tended to dissipate the lessons in cleanliness 
 and home comfort which the teachers have tried to impress ; and 
 altogether it has seemed as if all the forces of nature had con 
 spired together to cause the Government to abandon its effort to 
 do anything at this place. But a better day seems to be dawn 
 ing. The contractors of the neighborhood, having kept their 
 bids for new buildings at so high a figure that the Indian Ofpce 
 has not felt justified in putting up any in that manner, Mdjor 
 Williams has taken the matter in hand himself, and proposes to 
 build the absolutely necessary quarters from such allowances as 
 the Office could make him from its general fund. Being some 
 thing of an architect in an amateur way, he has submitted 
 drawings to Washington which have been approved, and he 
 will strike in at once. Three thousand dollars has been set 
 apart for him to begin work with, and he will also receive 
 
21 
 
 what is needed to sink a well and thus save the heavy task of 
 drawing the water-supply from a distance. Mrs. DeVore and 
 Mrs. Haskell, who in their discouragement had applied for trans 
 fers to other posts, have therefore gone back to Little Water 
 with fresh hope. 
 
 The boarding-school at Fort Defiance has passed under the 
 superintendency of Francis M. Neel, who has a good record in 
 the service. He is a young man, in full vigor of body and 
 mind, who regards his work as opening a career, and seems 
 resolved to make it a success if possible. The school-buildings 
 are not, as a rule, of the best. One of them, the girls' dormitory 
 building, is modern and in pretty fair repair. The boys' build 
 ing is, however, in need of many changes to put it into anything 
 like satisfactory condition ; and the best thing the Government 
 could do with it, probably, would be to tear it down and rear a 
 new and better one in its place. The drainage of this building 
 is particularly bad, the water from the bath- and wash-rooms 
 dripping into a small pool under the ground floor and render 
 ing the lower story damp and unwholesome. The largest class 
 room at the school is in a one-story building by itself, which was 
 not built for school purposes, but is one of the abandoned 
 houses of the old fort. Whitewash, plaster, and paint have done 
 all that they can to make this room comfortable and sightly, but 
 the lighting is not of the best, and practically the only ventila 
 tion is through openings in the roof into which the stovepipes 
 ascend, but which, with the arrangement of the stoves as I found 
 them, carry off about twice as much warmth as vitiated air. 
 
 The irrigation work on the Navajo reservation, since the sub 
 stitution of George Butler for E. C. Vincent as engineer, appears 
 to have proceeded satisfactorily. Mr. Butler received his train 
 ing in this work under Walter H. Graves, the expert in charge 
 of the corresponding enterprise on the Crow reservation. The 
 only criticism I heard passed upon his work was, that he had 
 made some of it unnecessarily substantial ; but as the ditches, 
 gates, etc., will pass into the custody of the Indians after he has 
 finished them, and will have to be kept in repair by these com 
 paratively ignorant men, their strength is likely to prove a virtue 
 rather than a fault. 
 
 After considerable spurring, the Department of the Interior 
 
22 
 
 this summer moved in the matter of the Navajos, ruthlessly dis 
 possessed of their homes by the sheriff of Coconino County, and 
 procured from the Attorney-General an order to the Federal 
 District Attorney to investigate the case and try to bring the 
 authors of the outrage to justice. This order had scarcely gone 
 forth before the Democratic District Attorney then in charge 
 had to make way for a Republican successor, and the proceedings 
 came temporarily to a standstill. The impression prevailed, 
 wherever I inquired about it, that, for local political reasons, the 
 prosecution would not amount to anything unless special counsel 
 were employed, and that would have to be done by outsiders. 
 It is recommended that, if any philanthropic association desires 
 to employ such counsel for the Indians, it retain the services of 
 Mr. Tipton, the acting sub-agent, who took so strong an interest 
 in the case and made the first official report on it, and who, hav 
 ing recently had his salary seriously reduced, is about to leave 
 the Indian service and resume the practice of law. 
 
 Miss Thackara's hospital, near the Navajo agency, has been 
 open now for one season, though still incomplete in both build 
 ings and equipment. It is by far the most attractive and im 
 pressive house in the whole region round about, being built of a 
 white stone quarried on the cliffs overlooking the Fort. The 
 Indians admire it very much. Miss Thackara is badly off for 
 help. She has had to depend for medical and surgical services 
 thus far wholly on the agency physician, Dr. C. J. Finnegan, 
 who has his own duties to attend to, and whose aid must, there 
 fore, be more or less fitful, no matter how earnest his purpose. 
 Her one Indian male helper has to be at once interpreter, team 
 ster and laborer ; and when he is absent, hauling freight or en 
 gaged in other manual occupation, she has no one to act as a 
 medium of communication with the Indians. She was also, at 
 the time of my visit, without any satisfactory female assistant, 
 and had to be nurse, cook, laundress, housekeeper, and all the 
 rest, herself. Of course, it is impracticable to make any headway 
 with her hospital work proper under such conditions. But she 
 has made a start, and the fame of her first important case that 
 of a patient whose arm was successfully amputated has spread 
 over the reservation with good effect. She is now negotiating 
 to procure the services of a woman who is a graduate in medi- 
 
2 3 
 
 cine and a trained nurse, and who will be able to divide duties 
 and responsibilities with her and help the hospital to take its 
 
 next step forward. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 From Fort Defiance I went over to Keam's Canyon and the 
 first of the Moqui mesas. This is a hundred-mile journey through 
 a rough, barren, and waterless country. At the mesa I stayed, 
 with Major Williams and his party, in an Indian house in the 
 pueblo of Sichomnavi, and, among other things, witnessed the 
 two great religious ceremonials of the year the antelope dance 
 and the snake dance at Walpi. Of these so much has been 
 written and printed that no special report is called for here. 
 
 Something must be done, and that very soon, for the Moqui 
 boarding-school. The plant at Keam's Canyon, never very 
 large or very good, has long been outgrown by the needs of the 
 Indians. The natural beauty of the location and the excellence 
 of the water-supply have thus far outbalanced any arguments for 
 changing its site, but there seem to be good reasons for not put 
 ting any more heavy and expensive buildings there, on account of 
 the poor foundation which can be got in so soft a soil. Moreover, 
 having purchased the plant and improved it, the Government 
 may well question the wisdom of abandoning it as long as 
 there is no menace to the health of pupils or teachers. 
 
 But with its present dimensions the school can not be made to 
 do its legitimate work. For the sake of keeping up its reputation 
 with the Indians and with the authorities at Washington, all 
 the children have been taken who could possibly be packed into 
 the school. To crowd three children into one three-quarter 
 bed may be enterprising and economical, but it is not whole 
 some, nor is it much of an advance, fundamentally, upon the 
 sleeping arrangements of the Indians at home. Yet that is what 
 has been going on at Keam's Canyon, the school being made to 
 accommodate fifty per cent, more pupils than there was proper 
 space for. 
 
 Superintendent Ralph Collins, who is about to leave this 
 school to take charge of a new and larger establishment in South 
 Dakota, has spent much time within the last two years in pros 
 pecting for a better site. He has found what he believes to be 
 an eligible point, more nearly equidistant from all three mesas, 
 
24 
 
 the Canyon having the disadvantage of thirty miles' distance from 
 the third mesa, though only fifteen miles from the first. He claims 
 that a good water-supply and an abundance of fertile land are 
 to be found at the proposed new site, and other persons familiar 
 with the neighborhood bear him out in this view. 
 
 It might be feasible to make use of both places. The present 
 plant, with all its faults, is too good to throw away, and might 
 be kept as a school for industrial instruction exclusively, while 
 a new school could be reared on the other tract to serve the 
 purposes of general instruction, such as is given now at Keam's 
 Canyon. The Moquis are a particularly intelligent people, and 
 the Government will be well repaid for furnishing to them all 
 the educational facilities it can. Two boarding-schools would 
 be by no means too many, especially if one of them were put 
 near enough to the second and third mesas to leave the inhabi 
 tants of those mesas no longer with an excuse for keeping their 
 children at home. 
 
 Before closing this report, I wish to record here, briefly, the 
 fact that this visit to the Walpi mesa gave me a more satisfactory 
 object-lesson than I had ever enjoyed before in the practical 
 work the Indian schools even the most primitive of them are 
 doing. It is quite the fashion nowadays to decry this work. 
 On every side we hear persons of generally good judgment say 
 ing: "The Government^ throwing its money away. The 
 Indian children are gathered into the schools and taught, but as 
 soon as they return to their homes they drop back into the old 
 tribal life, and all that has been done for them is lost." This 
 is a serious error, which no one ought to make if he pauses long 
 enough to consider all the conditions. It is true that most of 
 the children drop back into the tribal life ; it would be strange 
 indeed if they did not. Race characteristics which have been 
 transmitted from generation to generation for centuries are not 
 to be uprooted in a day, or a year, or a good many years. The 
 Indians are not peculiar in that respect. Any one who has a 
 chance to study social conditions among all classes of whites 
 will find the same rule prevailing there. Do we change the 
 whole nature of a white boy who has been reared amid vulgar 
 associations by sending him to school ? In nine cases out of ten, 
 does not the clodhopper who has been put through college 
 
25 
 
 become a clodhopper again if he returns to pass his remaining 
 years amid his old environment ? For that reason shall we close 
 our public schools, or shut the doors of our higher institutions 
 in the face of every boor who can not bond himself not to return 
 to his boorish associations after he has won his diploma? 
 
 Whoever would propose such a course would stamp himself a 
 fool. Common sense revolts against it. The boor who has been 
 given a taste of a higher life is a different boor from the one who 
 has not, however uncouth he may still appear outwardly. Why, 
 then, should we argue that it is a waste of money or energy to 
 give the Indian child a chance to learn better things than he will 
 learn if kept in the tepee or the pueblo ? Suppose he does re 
 turn, so far as outward appearances go, to the ways of his fathers ; 
 does it follow that he goes all the way back to barbarism because, 
 with the renewal of the old influences, he dons the blanket again 
 and lets his hair grow long ? We may regret that we have not 
 turned him inside out and made him over into another being, 
 but we must ignore all the laws that govern human nature if we 
 expect to accomplish such a metamorphosis. We have got to 
 learn patience. The seed has been sown ; we must content our 
 selves to let it sprout in its own time, not in ours. 
 
 In the Indian dwelling where our party stayed, the mother 
 and daughters swept our floor, made our beds, cooked our food, 
 set our table, and washed our dishes ; and they did these things 
 better than many whites of a corresponding class could. It is 
 not so many years since that adult woman would have been in 
 capable of taking care of us in such a manner. She had never 
 been to school, but the girls had. At their school they had been 
 taught how white men live, and they had carried their accom 
 plishments home with them. It is true that they had gone back 
 to their tribal dress with a few slight modifications. They still 
 cherished their katchinas, or toy images of the good and bad 
 deities worshipped by their people. They still attended the 
 dances, and apparently found pleasure in them. Before we 
 came, and after we left, they doubtless followed most of the old 
 habits of living, for their elders were accustomed to these habits 
 and were too well wedded to them to change. 
 
 But were the children no better for having attended a Govern 
 ment school, even for a single year ? Beyond a doubt ; they had 
 
26 
 
 learned that there were other ways of living than those in which 
 they had been brought up, and that no harm, at least, came 
 from following such ways. The spell which bound their young 
 lives had been broken. They were no longer afraid of the 
 white people. On the contrary, they had learned that there 
 were many good white people who loved them and wished to 
 teach them new and useful things. The school, as an institu 
 tion, had been robbed of the terrors which had enveloped it in 
 the minds of their grandsires, and which still hung mistily over 
 it even in the minds of their parents. 
 
 These little girls will, in their turn, grow up and have children 
 of their own. They will not object to letting their children go 
 to school or mix with the white civilization. Thus the work 
 will go on. Each generation will know more, and be prepared 
 to do better, than its predecessor. My experience among the 
 Moquis was not unique. I had observed the same facts before, 
 and among other tribes, but last summer's visit brought them 
 home to me with uncommon force. If every reader of these 
 lines could have looked through my eyes for a little while, 
 despair would have had no place in his philosophy thereafter.