Idaho County free press. [volume] (Grangeville, Idaho Territory) 1886-current, 1889-01-11
CONVERTING INDIANS.
A Jesuit Pr TESTS Opinion of the Red Mon
of Canada.

WAS it not very difficult to give
them Christian principlesp How did
you beginP"
cit was all very simple" said the
priest; "it had to he simple, for an In
dian Of eighteen is not above a white
child of six years. 1t was hard work
for them to learn to read their own
tongue; but few learned to read and
sing from manuscript books written in
the characters of our printed alphabet.
AS they are exceedingly fond of music,
and liked our melodies far better than
their own dull chants, they at once took
to copying these hymns. Music led
them on, till, finally, nearly all have
learned to read their hymns and cate
chism now printed for them. They
write good many letters for me to
carry from post to post. And in the
woods they frequently give news and
make appointments in the hunting
grounds by writing ON birch bark,
which they put into split stick erect
ed on some frequented route. This
primitive postal service is quite relia-
BILE, and brings me news often from
even the most remote families; and you
would be surprised at the delicacy and
strength of sentiment in some of those
letters. Their earliest literature, so to
speak, is geography, very accurate
maps of their country drawn on birch
bark to guide the first traders and mis-
sionaries; some of them are still pre-
served by the Hudson Bay Company.
at Montreal. But to return to their
conversion, their progress was COM
paratively easy after they became in
terested in the hymns"
"What do you try to teach themp"
"Simply to read the hymns and cat
echism. Then our preaching is upon
the most elemental duties and morality
of Christians. They need nothing be-
yond this in their simple existence; in
fact, they are with us so little, and
have such slow minds, that it would
be impracticable to do more. They
can not count even beyond ten, ex-
cepting by additions to ten, as ten-one,
ten-two, ETC."
"Do you find any difficulty in gov
erning themp"
"None whatever, if they keep away
from the whites. They are very ODE
dent, and they worship the missionary
as vertically the representative of God.
And we have to be doctor and
magistrate as well as teacher and
preacher to them. They take very
easily the leading ideas of Christian
ity, and follow them pretty well; and
they are very regular in their relig-
ious duties, even in the woods"
"But why don't you give them more
of the material advantages of civilian
ton, and extend their education morep"
THAT is scarcely practicable. They
will not change their mode of life.
The only way to help the Indian is to
give him the simplest code of moral
and religious conduct, make him feel
the constant criticism of God even in
his isolation, and then let him con.
tinue his natural life in the woods.
They must be kept firmly under con.
troll, but only through kind and sym
pathetic relations, and through the in
fluence of religious duties. l think
that your Indians and every wild race
could be governed peaceably by sucf
means, instead of by armies and in
dustrial civilization that they will no
accept"
The winter life of these Montagnai.
is essentially the same as that of theil
heather forefathers. They all star
for the woods in August in theil
canoes, loaded down with provisions
etc. They travel slowly up the variou.
rivers of the coast in companies to the
far interior; there each family leaves
its companions as it reaches its hunt
ing-ground, and sets up its lodge or
its ancestral domain. They spend {
month or more preparing snow-shoes
toboggans, ETC., for winter; then, al
navigation closes, they put up theil
canoe and begin the winters hunt
The game is too small and scarce t,
allow more than family or two t.
live in given locality; SO the arctic
winter passes in dreary isolation
c. II. Farmhana, IN Harper's Magazine