The Weekly Kansas chief. [volume] (Troy, Kan.) 1872-1918, 1882-08-24
THE INDIANS FUTURE.

The question of what is to be the glorious ul-
timatum of the red man in America is one which
demands of us, rs people, serious consdera.
ton. Will few fleeting years extirpate and
exterminate from the face of the earth race
which has long filled our fourth readers and our
school declarations with crude oratOry, exist
only a. a smoke tanned, bead-trimmed memory !
Will the beautiful picture of the brunette In
dian maiden at last become nothing but the
froutispiece of time-honorod legend, and tho
trademark of a tine-cut factoryf Let hope
that it will not.
We have crossed the wide ocean and wrested
from these people their lands, and then, to add
insult to injury, we have taught them the mys-
teries of our civilization.
With the white man came the doctrine of
vicariOus atOncment, and the open back shirt.
He brought with him the dictionary and the
garden hose, salvation and saleratus The tale
soon told, and now, on the yertebrae Of the
continent, the telephone and the morning pa
pers are crowdng the red wIdower and pigeon
toed scion of Powhattan into the moaning
The restless waves of civilization and soap have
crowded old Rise-Up-William Riley and his
whole tribe into the black night Of forgetfulness
and death. Gradually, he has picked up his
household goods, and his wife, and his upright
piano, and stolen toward the couch of dying
day. Now he stands upon the rocky battle
ments that border the new States, and bathed
in red sunlight, and nothing else in particular,
he shakes hands with his approaching doom.
Had he taken more kindly to the bath-tub of
the pale-faee, and fraternzed more adequately
with the crash towel of the European, HE obliv-
ion would have been less speedy, and the black
tom cat night of eternal sleep less formidable.
Silent and unrelenting, unmoved above the
broad cemetery of his people, stolidly awaiting
forgetfulness and death, We can not help admir-
ing the brawny brave with the undaunted eye
and the buckskin pants with the scat cut out.
Nature gave to thee, thou dusky warrior,
strength like the eagle, and swiftDess in the
chase but in her wisdom denied thee the copper
lining that is required to meet'and conquer the
vintage of a progressive age. The mountain
lion NAV meet thee, and yield up his life in thy
hands, but the juice of the centipede that is dis
titled by the paleface and sold to thee, tapgies
up thy duodonem and cracks the crown sheet of
the digester.
Brave orator of the school book, grim relic Of
the days of PocahOntas, We watch with tcar-
dimmed eyes thy closing hours. Adieu, thou
Indian mother, standing on the steep, precip-
itous shores of eternity. Behind thee rest the
dead heroes of thy race, and at thy side the
brindle relic of a mighty tribe of Indian dogs,
fatigued and listless, pets his favorite flea. No
one can look upon this sad and smoky group
unmoved. The fading remnants of n glorious
petty larceny mob. Had he adopted the Prince
Albert coat, and the doctrine of protective
tariff, instead of the plug hat and the whiskey
sour, his future might have been n Respondent
one, and his life less clouded with failure and
remorse.
We should learn from this to shnn the errors
which have busted the glorious future Of the
red man. Let us profit by his example, and
eschew the towing bowl. We should also avoid
the exposure of an outdoor life. communion
with nature and wet feet shortens life, and
clouds the pathway with gloom and catarrh.-
Bill Nve In Bo0msrdHa