Page:On the border with Crook - Bourke - 1892.djvu/479

 in this place over one hundred Apaches, many of them following out from Camp Apache to hear the results of the conference.

The Apaches with whom General Crook talked at this place were, in addition to "Alchise" and several others who had been sent out from Camp Apache to notify the members of the tribe hiding in the mountains, "Nagataha," "A-ha-ni," "Comanchi," "Charlie," "Nawdina," "Lonni," "Neta," "Kulo," "Kan-tzi-*chi," "Tzi-di-ku," "Klishe." The whole subject of their relations with the whites was traversed, and much information elicited. The only facts of importance to a volume of this kind were: the general worthlessness and rascality of the agents who had been placed in charge of them; the constant robbery going on without an attempt at concealment; the selling of supplies and clothing intended for the Indians, to traders in the little towns of Globe, Maxey, and Solomonville; the destruction of the corn and melon fields of the Apaches, who had been making their own living, and the compelling of all who could be forced to do so to depend upon the agent for meagre supplies; the arbitrary punishments inflicted without trial, or without testitimony of any kind; the cutting down of the reservation limits without reference to the Apaches. Five times had this been done, and much of the most valuable portion had been sequestered; the copper lands on the eastern side were now occupied by the flourishing town of Clifton, while on the western limit Globe and MacMillin had sprung into being.

Coal had been discovered at the head of Deer Creek on the southern extremity, and every influence possible was at work to secure the sequestration of that part of the reservation for speculators, who hoped to be able to sell out at a big profit to the Southern Pacific Railroad Company. The Mormons had trespassed upon the fields already cultivated by the Apaches at Forestdale, and the agent had approached a circle of twenty of the chiefs and head men assembled at the San Carlos, and offered each of them a small bag, containing one hundred dollars—Mexican—and told them that they must agree to sign a paper, giving up all the southern part of the reservation, or troops would be sent to kill them. A silver mine had been discovered, or was alleged to have been discovered, and the agent and some of his pals proposed to form a stock company, and work it off on confiding brethren in the East. In none of the