Page:U.S. Department of the Interior Annual Report 1880.djvu/31

Rh progress in the pursuits of civilized life. Many of them havedevoted themselves to agriculture, herding, freighting, and mechanical pursuits with remarkable energy and success.

At the Santee, Sisseton, and Devil's Lake Agencies they are virtually self-supporting. They are located in severalty, living in houses, wear white man's dress, are well provided with farming implements and stock cattle, and their crops during the past year will average ten bushels of wheat, live bushels of corn, and sixteen bushels of vegetables to each member of the tribe. They are still receiving some aid from the government, but are at the same time investing their surplus crops largely in farming implements, cattle, and other appliances of civilized life. At Cheyenne River, Crow Creek, Standing Rock, and Lower Brulé, where a few years ago the progress of the Indians was seriously retarded by the Sioux war, they have erected 718 houses, broken a large tract of land, and this year raised 41,000 bushels of wheat and corn and 12,000 bushels of vegetables. The Ogalala and Brulé Sioux, whose chiefs, Red Cloud and Spotted Tail, are well known, removed to the locations they occupy at present in 1878. They now have 700 log houses, cultivate 2,200 acres of land, own 300 mules, 5,600 head of cattle, and 280 swine, in addition to many thousands of horses. This year their crops were seriously injured by an early drought, which caused great disappointment, but they have bestowed great care upon their stock cattle, and should be encouraged by the government in this respect as much as possible. Instead of living together as formerly in crowded camps and villages, they are now scattering over a large extent of ground, locating farms and building homes upon them. Their success in the pursuit of freighting with their own horses has been particularly remarkable. Their conduct, with the exception of one or two inconsiderable disturbances, has been peaceful and satisfactory in every respect. One of these occurrences is worthy of special notice. A small party of Brulé Sioux, consisting of six young men, stole some horses and shot a white man in Nebraska. Although they were all great favorites with the chiefs and headmen, they were without resistance arrested by the Indian police and turned over to the civil authorities for trial. In the first week of October I received a letter from Chief Spotted Tail inclosing a check for $332.80, with the request to employ that money, which had been collected by the Indians among themselves, in procuring an attorney to assist the six young Indians, so that while they should be punished if guilty, they might if not guilty have “the chance of a white man” for acquittal. This is one of the signs indicating that the respect for law and authority, and a desire to accommodate themselves to the white man's ways, is rapidly growing among the same Sioux, a large part of whom were still in arms against the government a comparatively short time since, and who, two years ago, according to the predictions of some, could never be depended upon as peaceable Indians “unless they received another thorough whipping.”