The Indians of New York, remnants of the once powerful "Six Nations,"
number five thousand and seventy. They occupy six reservations in the
State, containing in the aggregate 68,668 acres. Two of these
reservations, viz., the Alleghany 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 teacher's
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.