The great West. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1889-18??, 1889-12-13
10, THE YOUNG INDIAN.
Redskin Boys and Girls in the Nursery
and at Work.
How They We're Reared Before the Govern
ment Established schools-Contrast Be
tween Their Education Then and Nova,
Indian Medicine Man.


the infantile disorders with which
white children are afflicted, and that
they soon become sturdy and tough.
never fret or cry and at an early
period are able to shift for themselves.
That they cry less than white babies
do is true, but this owing to the heroic
treatment administered by their squaw
mothers. To evince feeling of any
kind is supposed to be unindianlike.
and as it annoys the warrior who sits
putting his pipe in the tepee the moth
er covers the baby's mouth with her
hand to stifle its cries or grasps it by
the nose until the papoose is almost
choked.
Before the reservations were located
and agency physicians employed, the
Indian papoose had pretty hard time
when the mumps, collie or measles in
vaded the system, for the only RENE
dies known were those used by the
medicine man of the tribe, who was
called in to charm away the sickness
This he usually tried to do by hammer
ing for dear life on native drum, the
object being to drive off the evil spirit
who was supposed to have bewitched
the child.
1t must not be supposed that the In
dian mother is heartless beca use she
pinches her baby's nose to still its cries
or calls in a base drummer to cure the
whooping cough. She is only following
in the footsteps of her mother and
grandmother, and firmly believes what
she does is for the best. Her love for
the sick child is fully as strong as that
displayed by her pale-face sister under
similar circumstances, only civilization
has taught the latter better methods.
Because the Indian baby is strapped
to fiat board and securely laced in
cradle made of dressed antelope skins
one need not imagine the papoose is
cruelty treated. Soft grasses are
placed at it's back and the little one
sleeps in this primitive cradle quite as
contentedly as does the pink and white
cherub in its nest OF downy satin.
When the squaw is obliged to leave the
tepee and forage for wood or water the
cradle is suspended from the limb of an
adjacent tree above the reach of stray
dogs or Drowling coyotes, and there the
baby swings in the breeze as happy as
clam at high tide.
Tho Indian hor hos n ,,,,,oh 1a@<or
time than his sister. From the day the
young animal leaves the confinement
OF the cradle to roll around in the tall
grass until the time he becomes full
aedged brave his lot by contrast is an
easy one. He robs birds nests, tortures
the camp dogs, runs, jumps, wrestles
or goes swimming with his wild COM
panions, sets snares for rabbits, shoots
the small game with the blunt arrows
provided by his proud parent, or when
at home gorges himself with strips of
meat snatched from the live Goals.
At four or five years of age the
Indian girl begins to learn her lesson of
life, which is one of constant drudgery
and trouble. unreheved by the slight
est ray of sunshine during her entire
existence. At six she can rustic in
wood help to cultivate the corn patch,
and at a pinch, fill the water barrel
and pack it from the river a mile dis
tant. She learns to, strike the tents by
Harvesting her fathers dogs to a NINA
ture ''travois," and at ten years old is
full-fedged graduate in all the les
sons of drudgery and toll to which it is
her cruel lot to be subjected. At
twelve or fourteen she marries, and at
sixteen has several children. BY the
time she is twenty her freshness is
gone, her back bowed from cons tant
bending to the load and her face pre-
maturely wrinkled.
With the advent o: the Indian board
ing schools established by the govern
ment, of course the conditions change,
and the boys and girls enter upon a
new existence. In the past eight or
ten years a great improvement has
been made in the rearing of the youn g
Indians. At the present time every
head of a family living on a reserva-
ton is compelled to send his children
to the government school, or he is not
allowed to draw rations from the
agent This ruling acts a wonderful
incentive to the lazy buck. and is one
that he seldom ignores. AS a conse-
quence the youngsters are gradually
becoming civilized, and the restraints
of school life, together with the disci =
pine enforced, have had very salu-
tary effect upon their young lives.
Still it is all up hill work, for of course
the hereditary traits inherited from
generations of s'bad" Indians cannot