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Rh long date, while large tracts of good land were secured "for all time" to the Indians on which to live and, if possible, cultivate the arts of peace. On these "reservations" the government "located" the Indians. They built them houses, supplied them with agricultural implements, missionaries, schoolmasters, and all appliances of civilization, and above all they supplied them with that acme of all roguery — an Indian agent. The agents were not selected for their knowledge of aboriginal character, or, indeed, with any regard to their character whatever. They were merely the ruck of decayed politicians or wire-pullers, not presentable enough for foreign missions, or with souls above post-offices. The result need not be told. Yet, strange to say, these offices were and are largely run after. A lawyer with a practice of ten thousand dollars per annum in San Francisco or Chicago has been known to accept an Indian agency in some remote place, and after living there for five years retire — stranger still to say — with a fortune. Probably he may have saved it from his salary — there are some very economical people even in America. But in regard to this the world has been uniformly sceptical, and, we are bound to say, not unreasonably. For on an average the salary of an Indian agent is only fifteen hundred dollars per annum in greenbacks, and without rations, in a quarter where rations cost no little money; indeed, the fact need not be concealed — for in America there is nothing better known — the officials of the Indian department are notoriously dishonest. The Indian annuities pass through their hands, and so do the Indian contracts, and a large percentage of both go no further. There may be exceptions, but the exceptions prove the rule. Endless stories are told of the peculations of these men, one of whom a facetious senator once described as "that noblest, but at the same time rarest, work of God, an honest Indian agent." No subject is a more favorite one for the American press to dilate on, or for the transatlantic philanthropist to thunder about. So scandalous has this state of matters become that in one or two places the government has put the Indians in charge of the Quakers, as being pious men, and, therefore, presumably honest. But lately this has not worked altogether well, and for years past there has been an agitation to have the Indian department, commissioner, superintendents, agents, interpreters, and all, incorporated with the war department. But that would, in fact, be only removing the evil to another quarter, not eradicating it; though, we are bound to say, that an officer and a gentleman would be more likely to be honest than a New York ward "repeater," who may be an officer but is not a gentleman. But the evil does not end then. The Indians know perfectly well that the agent is a thief, and often tell him so. Various Indian wars have originated in this way. But after being secure in their reservations — as they think — an order comes to remove the Indians further off. Their improvements and their rich lands have excited the envy of the whites, whose votes are too powerful for Congressmen of flabby fibre to resist. And so the Indian, amid bloodshed and hate, has again to take up his weary western tramp, knowing that again he will have to remove. The result is that he loses heart, becomes utterly depraved and demoralized, and adding to his original sin that learned from the agents, and the entourage of an agency, becomes impervious to anything like civilization or ennobling influences. General Pope, only a few years ago, reported that he had examined into the causes of all the Indian wars in the far West, and he had come to the conclusion that in no case were the Indians the original aggressors. However, as the savages subscribe to no newspapers, and are powerless in caucus and convention, it is nobody's business to advocate their cause, but everybody's interest to conceal the truth. The end, no doubt, will be that every summer, as the grass and game get plentiful enough, some "Sitting Bull" or other will make unhappy the life of some General Howard, or that "Young-man-afraid-of-his-ho'sses" will not show himself so afraid of other peoples.

 

 From The Spectator.

are often surprised at the preference which many Orientals display, and which most, we think, feel at heart, for their own life over the life of Europe. The latter seems to them so much more varied, so much more interesting, so much fuller both of change and of incident, that they can hardly understand how a man who has tasted both can deliberately prefer the former. They think that to bring Orientals to Europe is to make them European, to convince them that "civilization" is a pleasing ideal, to plant in their minds 