The evening light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1881-1883, 1882-04-05
10. THE U. s. SENATE.

claimed, representative force of $780,
900 names was backed into the senate
and dumped on the 18th ult., under the
starry auspices of Senator Dawes, of
Massachusetts,. The philanthroplc
Senator, bleeding at every pore, called
attention to the government outrages
committed upon the poor Indian,
which WIS 4 matter of which the y. S.
Senate had heard before. But the sig
nificance of such names as dignillcd
this appeal, the great responsibility OF
the signers, was new matter and an
impressive feature in the bill. The
governors of various states were among
them. Eminent clergymen had signed
on behalf of their congregations, and
elemosynary presidents for their COM
panies; so that no numerals could be
placed to give the Senate even an APP
proximate idea of the vast quantity of
public opinion thus unloaded in its
presence.
In the memorial the government is
exhorted to maintain with scrupulous
fidelity its treaties with the Indians; to
establish common schools, providing a
teacher for every thirty Indian children
among the tribes; to grant them lands
to be held in severalty for 20 years: to
bestow upon them all rights of person
and property, as we'll as religious rights.
1t is notorious that the difficulty of
maintaining treaties with the Indians
lies in the fact that upon some pretext,
just when the electric sprlng-llfe awak-
ems in the veins of that citizen, he leaps
on the back of his ready stced and
with his rifle takes the war path. And
it is just as notorious that Indians will
not hold land in severalty.
AS for the schools, we have ourselves
4 sober weakness for 10 when he pre-
sents himself as the untutored savage
thirsting for drafts from the inexhaust-
ible Pierian spring, but it is disturbed
by an iron-clad tendency to doubt his
taking to the drink. He will, at least,
want it gilded with tat1y and otherwise
nectared, so as to be able to PROSTATE
the lazy fiend that ever walks with the
a original student till he gets old
enough to take his pony and rifle,
when life takes at once livelier turn.
A few years ago the Indian was con-
signed to pastoral duties because too
indolent for agricultural pursuits, and
the government fondly hoped that with
encouragement and care it might lead
its ward into the straight and narrow
way of peace and industry. But 10
may be SAID to have failed as shepherd.
Happy would it be now if the Indian
youth, endowed with even a common
education, might become an embassa-
dor to his tribe in the cause of higher
civilization. But it is feared the work
ing of the Indian problem will continue
to exhaust itself in the old way, like
yeast, and leave the government with
the blood of its massacres and the
fragments of its broken treaties on its
hands, until the socery is learned by
which the yet hidden charm that is to
bring the ponderous driver down upon
the head of the pile, may have effect.
The great sensation in Missouri is the kill
ling of Jesse James
While we are blessed in "dry West Tex
as" with abundant rains and cool, pleasant
weather, dispatch from Denson states that
in northern Texas it is hot, dry and dusty.
The democrats carried the municipal cleo
ton in Columbia, South Carolina, yesterday,
and were 50 glad over it that they fired a can
non. These South Carolina dcms. would like
to use republican voters to wad their cannon
with.