The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1880-03-15
WASHINGTON.


Further Testimony on the Indian Cues
ton.
WASHINGTON, March 13.-The Senate COM
mittee on removal of the Poncas continued
the examination of Indian Inspector Pollock
today. He said he found the Indians as a rule
quite as honest and truthful as the average
white man. They almost uniformly observed
the treaty obligations when they understood
them, while on the other hand to the best of
his knowledge and belief scarcely one of over
$50 treaties entered into with the Indians
by the government ever had been fulfilled in
accordance with its terms, and many of them
had been grossly violated He considered the
giving Of lands to the Indians in severalty
with proper restrictions as to alienation the
most effective means of solving the Indian
problem except their education. AT present
the Indian has no incentive to make good
farm or plant orchards, ETC., since when it is
all done the property belongs to somebody
else as much as to him. The Indian needs
farming implements and instruction in their
use, but under the present restrictions as to
the number of employees at any agency the
means and men to instruct the Indians are en-
tlrely inadequate. His observation was that
within few years past the Indians had been
progressing in civilization very much faster
than ever before, and that to make sufficient
expenditures now to aid them to become self
supporting at the earliest possible period will
be not only the best course for the Indian, but
Sentenced to be Hanged.
In the criminal court today Judge Hayner
refused to grant a new trial in the case of the
negroes, Babe Bedford, Edward Queenan and
Sandy Pinn, convicted of the murder of George
Phillip Hirth on January It'll last and sem
fenced the prisoners to be hanged April g.
Capt. Eads's Ship Railroad.
Capt. Eads was before the committee on
the inter-oceanic canal this morning, and con-
n CHI 0f nj of
an inter-oceanic ship railroad. 1t was one of
the rules of ship building that ship should be
so strong that if it were supported by blocks at
each end it would not break down in the
middle, and if supported in the middle it
would not break down at either end E. j.
Reed, naval constructor, had stated to him in
speaking of the ability of ship to resist any
strain which it might receive during transpor-
tation by railway, that in launching the
Northumberland, which was 450 feet in length,
the vessel had struck on the ways with 100 feet
of her length overhanging. She had an iron
plating on which was a load equal to that of
the cargo of the largest merchant vessel, and
had remained in that position for two months
without suffering the slightest injury.
Capt. Eads stated that a ship laden with a
cargo would be perfectly safe from bursting it's
sides in railroad transit as proposed, and ex-
planned that the railway would have the great
weight of the vessel SO distributed by 1900
wheels on different tracks that no damage
COulu 6uSu0 W tu0 UrdCk OF rOdQDoO.
Hearing on the Paper Question.
The hearing on the paper question was re-
sumed before the Committee of Ways and
Means today. Mr. Warner Miller concluded
his argument, urging the injustice of removing
the duty on wood pulp as contrary to the spirit
of our legislation; that the present tariff duty
OF 20 per cent. was not prohibitory duty, but
simply revenue duty. To remove the tax
would be to crush the industry in the United
States.
Erastus Brooks followed and urged remov-
al of the duty, which he proposed to accom-
plish by simply giving proper construction to
the existing law. He urged that the rise in
the price of paper was entirely disproportionate
to the rise of other commodities and due to
combination of Western manufacturers. He
believed the removal of tho present duty on
wood pulp would result in reduction Of at
least two cents per pound on printing paper
that unless some action of this character is
taken by Congress there will be no guarantee
that paper might not be forced to the most
extortionate prices. He stated that no duty
was imposed on wood pulp in England, where
it entered largely into the manufacture of pa
per, and the fact that the price of paper re-
mains in London about the same as six months
ago, while it has advanced in this country
from six to nine cents per pound, was adyanc-
ed as a still further argument.