Page:Speeches, correspondence and political papers of Carl Schurz, Volume 4.djvu/167

Rh and to establish an institution for the education of Indian children at Carlisle, in Pennsylvania, where the young Indians would no longer be under the influence of the Indian camp or village, but in immediate contact with the towns, farms and factories of civilized people, living and working in the atmosphere of civilization. In these institutions, the Indian children, among whom a large number of tribes are represented, receive the ordinary English education, while there are various shops and a farm for the instruction of the boys, and the girls are kept busy in the kitchen, dining-room, sewing-room and with other domestic work. In the summer, as many as possible of the boys are placed in the care of intelligent and philanthropic farmers and their families, mostly in Pennsylvania and New England, where they find instructive employment in the field and barnyard. The pupils are, under proper regulations, permitted to see as much as possible of the country and its inhabitants in the vicinity of the schools.

The results gained at these institutions are very striking. The native squalor of the Indian boys and girls rapidly gives way to neat appearance. A new intelligence, lighting up their faces, transforms their expression. Many of them show an astonishing eagerness to learn, quickness of perception, pride of accomplishment and love for their teachers. Visiting the Carlisle school, I saw Indian boys, from ten to fifteen years old, who had arrived only five months before without the least knowledge of the English language, writing down long columns of figures at my dictation and adding them up without the least mistake in calculation. Almost all submit cheerfully to the discipline imposed upon them. The boys show remarkable proficiency in mechanical and agricultural occupations, and the girls in all kinds of housework. They soon begin to take a lively and