o'clock in the evening.
_Red Cloud in New York._
Red Cloud changed his mind, and came on to New York to attend a great
meeting of friends of the red men, at Cooper Institute. On the evening
of June 16th, the party were treated to a grand reception, at which it
was supposed that no less than five thousand were present. Among other
things, Red Cloud said:
"I have tried to get from my Great Father what is right and just. I
have not altogether succeeded. I want you to believe with me, to
know with me, that which is right and just. I represent the whole
Sioux nation. They will be grieved by what I represent. I am no
Spotted Tail, who will say one thing one day, and be bought for a
fish the next. Look at me! I am poor, naked, but I am chief of a
nation. We do not ask for riches; we do not want much; but we want
our children properly trained and brought up. We look to you for
that. Riches here do no good. We cannot take them away with us out
of this world, but we want to have love and peace. The money, the
riches, that we have in this world, as Secretary Cox lately told
me, we cannot take these into the next world. If this is so, I
would like to know why the Commissioners who are sent out there do
nothing but rob to get the riches of this world away from us. I was
brought up among traders and those who came out there in the early
times. I had good times with them; they treated me mostly always
right; always well; they taught me to use clothes, to use tobacco,
to use fire-arms and ammunition. This was all very well until the
Great Father sent another kind of men out there,--men who drank
whisky; men who were so bad that the Great Father could not keep
them at home, so he sent them out there."
_Reception of Red Cloud at Home._
Doubtless speculators and contractors were disappointed when they
heard, on General Smith's return, of Red Cloud's satisfaction, and what
he said about being peaceable, and using his influence among his
warriors. A thousand lodges were gathered to receive him, and the
demonstrations made over his return exceeded any the oldest Indian had
ever seen before.
On the way out, Red Cloud gave General Smith his reason for asking the
government for the seventeen horses. He did not really need them, but
made up his mind that if he had been sent back on foot from Pine Bluff,
or Fort Laramie, his tribes might think he was lightly esteemed by our
authorities, and thereupon they might begin to despise him. His
influence would decrease, and he might be unsuccessful in preventing
war. He merely wished to accept of them as a tribute to his exalted
position as a great warrior among his people. The general said that his
appearance, with his whole party well mounted, had the desired effect,
and Red Cloud's warriors saw at a glance that the chief was believed to
be a great warrior by the Great Father at Washington.
CONCLUSION.
Boys love fair play, and I know they will make every allowance for the
poor Indian, who is, in his wild state, indeed a savage, born and bred
up among the wild beasts of the forest; untutored and cruel to his
enemies, whether man or beast. We must take him as we find him, then,
and not as some sensation writers would make us believe, to be _more
noble and generous_ than many white men. For we may find many noble
examples of generosity among them, in freeing captives and forgiving
wrongs done to them; but they have been for over two hundred years
victims of the white man's dishonest dealings, and I think that we
would do pretty much as the Indian does, if we were Indians, and had
been taught the lesson of our forefathers' wrongs. The Indian agents
have been in former years mostly dishonest, and cheated those they
should have remembered were simple children of the forest; and though
they were knowing enough to perceive they were badly dealt with and did
not get their due, could not tell just where the cheating came in. You
remember the story of a white man and an Indian going a hunting on
shares. Well, they killed a wild turkey and a buzzard, the latter good
for naught. They sat down on a log to divide the game. "Now," said the
white man, "You take the buzzard, and I'll take the turkey; or, I'll
take the turkey, and you take the buzzard." The Indian opened his eyes
wide, and replied, "Seems to me you talk all buzzard to me, and no talk
turkey."
Very little "talk turkey" has the Indian experienced in dealing with
the whites. Indeed, you can judge of fair dealing, or want of it, when
it is known that an agent came out our way to pay off annuities with
blankets, etc. These were "shoddy blankets," and when one tribe was
paid off with them, the agent bought them all back again with bad
whisky, and went on farther, to pay off other tribes in like manner.
So one agent carried out to California some annuity goods to pay off
Indians, according to treaty, _and among them were several thousand
elastics; and yet no Indian wears a stocking_!
The bad Indians _must be punished, just as bad boys, who do wrong;
and the army alone can deal with refractory Indians, whose tender
mercies are most cruel to white men, women, and children_.
General Sherman came out here in 1868 as one of "the Peace Commission,"
to personally investigate the whole matter. On his arrival at Cheyenne
and at Denver, a large number of pioneers were ready to insult him,
because he would not make a speech, and authorize them to band together
and kill Indians wherever found![4]
[4] A man whom I had some respect for, said to me at this time,
"If we can get up a smart Indian war now, wouldn't it be the
making of Cheyenne?" He had an eye to an army contract. General
Sherman would probably have called him a "bummer."
This idol of the American people they were not willing to trust to do
justice to both parties, after visiting among the tribes on the plains,
and in New Mexico, and seen things for himself. Such is human nature.
But the general could wait his time, and the judgment of the whole
people will be, to give him credit for a far-sighted policy, the result
of a wise head and an understanding heart, that swerves neither to the
right hand nor the left, so it be in the plain path of duty! Why not
believe and trust him in the future, as we have in the past? We are to
take care how we draw down upon our nation God's anger for _previous_
years of injustice and bad treatment; and if General Grant had done
nothing more to signalize his administration than the appointment of
honest agents to look after the welfare of Indians on reservations,
while leaving to Generals Sherman and Sheridan the dealing with wild,
refractory bands of pagan savages, roaming over the settlements on the
plains, to do their murderous work of brutalities that sicken the heart
to contemplate, and make to the sufferers a welcome death as speedily
as possible,--he would be one of the greatest Presidents we have had.
I have thus tried to give an impartial history of the "Indian
Question," showing the characteristics of our white settlers in their
treatment of the Indians; and, on the other hand, painting the savage
as he is, in his wild, cruel nature, and with whom we have to deal with
all the wisdom our government can devise. I have done so with a
purpose. This is to show how little Christianity has done thus far to
make white men just, fair, and honorable, and to gain the respect of
the red man for the Christian's God. It is a sad reflection, too, that
we are doing so little, and that the world's conversion is so far, so
very far away in the future. _There is a dreadful responsibility
resting somewhere!_
If our religion is not a sham, we must meet the question as it has
never been met before. Infidelity has no surer or more deadly weapon
than that which it wields to-day against our professions of love for
the souls of our fellow-men, while we content ourselves with
expressions only of that love. It is hollow, superficial, and full of
cant. If our religion does not take a deeper form, and go out in active
sympathy and work, it will surely perish, and deserves to perish. Men
ask for results, and it is right they should. The tree is known by its
fruits. We cannot gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles. This is
Christ's standard. Do we belong to Him, or are we false, hypocritical
children of the Evil One?
Our Saviour said, "It must needs be that offences come; but woe to that
man by whom the offence cometh!" Now, if so be that God, who is just,
shall require that we atone for all the wrongs perpetrated upon the red
men ever since the Mayflower landed her pilgrims on the shores of New
England (for there is no repentance for nations at the day of
judgment), or that our children shall suffer in some way for it,--who
shall say it is not a righteous retribution? "Vengeance is mine, I will
repay, saith the Lord."
LORD'S PRAYER IN SIOUX LANGUAGE.
Ate-un-yan-pi, Mar-pi-ya, ekta, nan-ke-cin, Ni-caje, wa-kan-da-pi,
kta, Ni-to-ki-con-ze, ukte, Mar-pi-ya, ekta, ni-taw-a-cin, econ-pi,
kin, nun-we; au-pe-tu, kin, de, au-pe-tu, iyoki, aguyapi, kin,
un-ju, miye.
Qu, un-kix, una, e-ciux-in-yan, ecaun-ki, con-pi,
nicun-ki-ci-ca-ju-ju-pi; he, iye-cen, wau-ur-tan-ipi, kui,
un-ki-ci-ca-ju-ju, miye. Qa, taku, wani-yu-tan, kin, en, unkayapa,
xui, pa, Tuka, taku, vice, cin, etanhan, eunt-da-ku-pi.
Wo-ki-con-ze-kin, no-wax-a ki, kin, ga, wouitan, kin, hena-kiy, a,
ouihanke, wanin, nitawa, heon. Amen.
The name of God is Wakantanka. The name of the Lord is Itankan.
APOSTLES' CREED.
Wakantanka iyotan Waxaka Atezapikin parpia, maka iyahna kage cin,
he wicawada:
Qua Jesus Christ Itankan unyapi, he Cinhintku hece un Mary eciyapi
kin, utanhan toupi; Pontius Pilate kakixya, Canicipauega, en
okantanpi, te qua rapi; Wanagi yakonpi etka I, Iyamnican ake kini;
Wankan marpiya ekta iyaye. Qua Wakantanka, ateyapi iyotan waxaka
yanke cin, etapa kin eciy atanhan iyotanka; Heciyatankan meaxta
nipi, qua tapi kin, hena yuuytaya nicayaco u kta, Woniya Wakan kin
he wicauada; Omniciza, wakan Owaneaya kin Owaneaya kin, Wicaxta
Wakan Okodakiciye kin; Woartani kajujupi kin; Wicatancan kini kte
cin; Qua wicociououihanke wanin ce cin; Hena ouasin wieawada. Amen.
DISTANCES.
From Omaha to Cheyenne is five hundred and sixteen miles; Cheyenne to
Greeley, on Cache-la-poudre River, fifty-four miles; Cheyenne to
Denver, one hundred and eleven miles; same to Golden City; Cheyenne to
Sherman, thirty-three miles (this is eight thousand two hundred and
forty-two feet above the level of the sea); to Fort Sanders, fifty-four
miles; Laramie City, fifty-six miles; Salt Lake, five hundred and
thirty-five miles; Salt Lake to Lake's Crossing, Truckee River, four
hundred and ninety-nine miles; Truckee to Sacramento, one hundred and
nineteen miles; thence to San Francisco, one hundred and twenty-four
miles; Omaha to San Francisco, one thousand seven hundred and
ninety-two miles.
Cheyenne, northwest to Fort Fetterman, one hundred and seventy miles;
Fort Reno (abandoned), two hundred and seventy-four miles; Fort Phil.
Kearney (abandoned), three hundred and thirty-nine miles; Fort C. F.
Smith, four hundred and twenty-nine miles; Helena, Montana, six hundred
and nine miles; Junction of Bear River to City of Rocks, one hundred
and eighty-one miles; to Boisé City, three hundred and ninety-three
miles; to Idaho City, four hundred and forty miles; to Owyhee, four
hundred and seventy-five miles; to Fort Ellis, Montana, six hundred
miles; to Fort Brown, Sweetwater, four hundred and forty-two miles.
THE END.
End of Project Gutenberg's Three Years on the Plains, by Edmund B. Tuttle