Page:The Indian Dispossessed.pdf/288

 an agreement with the Rosebud Indians for the purchase of 416,000 acres at the eastern end of their reservation. This tract included the entire frontage on the Missouri River, and practically all of the agricultural land on the reservation. Nearly one-half of the tract, however, consisted of strictly grazing land, worth but little more for stock-raising purposes than the western portion of the reserve left to the Indians, except that it was nearer to the river and to transportation facilities.

The price was fixed at two dollars and a half per acre, or one million and forty thousand dollars; nearly half of the sum was to be paid to the Indians, in money and live-stock, upon ratification of the agreement, the remainder to follow in four annual cash installments.

The agreement was signed according to the treaty of 1868 by 1031 Indians, that number, as the agent certifies, "being twelve more than three-fourths of the male adult Indians of the Rosebud reservation."

Although, according to a subsequent report of no less an authority than the Honorable Commissioner himself, "when the agreement of September 14, 1901, was being concluded, the Indians argued with great persistency that their lands were worth more than two dollars and a half per acre, and they were almost unanimous in declaring that they were well worth five dollars per acre," it is not the intention to question here the methods used to obtain the