The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1890-01-03

Some of the Quaint Missives That
Go Out From Carlisle Barracks.
From the Nero York Tribune.

From the Nelo York Tribune
CARLISLE. Dec. 2s.-The Indian children
at Carlisle barracks write ''home letters"
0nce month. An extra mail bag Is re-
quired to hold them all, and they go with
put stamps. The envelopes are marked as
belonging to the interior department, and
Uncle Sam requires no extra stamp. Dy
this seeming Partially e. his red chlluIeh
he is preparing them TO bring him IN dig
revenue by and by. The nome letters are
frll of ouaint. pithv savings. These Indians
have only been to school little while; they
have not been TAUGHT letter-writlng from
tabyhoOd, as white children are taught
The construction of sentences is crude,
Utmost unintellIgible sometimes, yet the
penmaDsniD is admirable. Indians are
naturally artistic, and this talent iseVlnced
in their chirography.
Bv special permission | had access 10 a
few Of the letters recently. A vein of hap
piness ran through them all Ihanksglv-
ing, with its turkey and pies and good u.neS,
& ,ame In for due attention. Nobody seemed
disconnected. There was anticipation OF
christmas coming. One could note the
likeness to white folks in sly hints al
holiday gifts Il expect | shall get nice
present for Christmas. What do you want
Inc to get for youw One student asked his
laome folks. away off in Wisconsin, what
lie should send them for a Christmas pres
emit He evidently went over IN his
mind their wants and what they most
needed. Suddenly he hit the right thing
lie wrote that he "would send them COW,
If only he could get the horneS in letter.
lie and his people knew that the COW and
her "hornesf would never go in an envelope,
by mail. but what was almost as good, the
right thought was expressed aud sent An
other wrote that II shall be ready to go
home very soon. with much thankful IN
NV mind" But the child leaves US in doubt
as TO whether it is the getting away from
Carlisle that makes the thankful in his
mind" or the going home part Of it,
One of the pupils writes: Our best
cousin is well and happy as a beautiful bird
Hying around IN the sky" Another boy
writes about his having been detailed TO
wash dishes in the boys kitchen. He was
called from his pleasant room to do this
most disayreeable of all work Butt be was
equal to the occasion. Finding some other
boys there he began to fish fun out OF the
siish-water. He does not complain of the
situation, but writes that 81 think work is
sociable.n Another boy writes: 81 have
been consummate well ever since | have
been here"
There is an Indian girl poet at Carlisle.
She has been here only a short time, and
can hardly speak English. She has not
read Browning or Tennyson; but she is a
poet as much as if she had taken her pencil
and sat down after the manner of a white
schoolgirl, determined to write poetry or
die. Only she stopped just before she got
to the rhyme. She was writing letter to
her mother, all about the sociable in the old
chapel; how the boys and girls spent the
evening together danced some, and were
polite to one another; how sweet the candy
was and how pretty the welcome, wrought
ia evergreen.
When she got ready to go home the door
suddenly opened and revealed the scene
outside to be ''grayheaded.n Such, at
least, was her uustudied description of it.
There had been light fall of snow in the
evening, just enough to leave white tips on
the grass blades. The girl did not say that
the ground was all white, for it was not
But there was just about as much white as
one expects to see in the hair of person on
whom age is only beginning to steal.