Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1892-11-12

A@~N
~ Y 49, woman the greater part
@ :: :: :: !: :: !: ::
if such a mission could
be termed fad, is the education Of the Indian
youth, and she has spent some seven years on
the reservations and in the schools.
81 was SO pleased to see the representation Of
students from Carlisle" she said enthusiastic
cally. "wouldnt Columbus have been sur
prised with the advancement made BY the de-
scendants of the savage people he met in the
new world? 1t seems to me that among those
30, 600 splendid school children those 200 Indian
boys and girls taught the greatest object lesson.
The white boys are the descendants of q long
line of civilized ancestorS0 The Indian boys
and girls-was 1t not nice that the only women
IN all those parades were daughters Of the
aboriginal races? Without exception ! am
told, they were blanket Indians when they
were taken to Carlisle; that is they come from
| tribes who have not adopted what we term
civilized garb but still wear the blanket as a
principal garment If you could have forgot
ten the black hair and swarthy skin of the In
dian children you never would have thoughtfor
| an instant that up to three years ago they never
had spoken word of Enlish or worn a white
mans clothes. Now. would you?"
And The STAR representative had to confess
that the small redskins were quite as civilized
in appearance and marched just as well as their
white friends, the public school children Of
New York city. A sharp contrast was drawn
between the civilized and unciviized Indians
by few attired in war paint, blankets and war
bonnets, while just behind them marched the
company of Indian boys in their neat suits of
military blue, fine, manly fellows, with soldierly
bearing and the long. free step which seems
born in an Indian. The girls wore a uniform
dress of blue flannel, and their bright black
eyes, flashing white teeth and round good
natured faces won them friends and cheers OH
every side.
IN THE SCHOOL ROOM.
"And if you could just sec those boys ard
girls in the school room," continued the little
woman, lyon would be astonished at their rapid
teachers know by experience, is usually . very
difficult thing to toach. If this ia true of
children who have educated parents and ex-
cellent home trimming something of the task of
teaching it to Shawnees and Seminoles .Kicka-
poo and kiowas can be imagined. But they
do learn very fast considering everything One
OF the things they take to naturally il writing
Their penmanship soon becomes well nigh fault
less. Even the very little ones write we'll. They
are generally good spoilers, too, and some Of
them are quite artistic. l think this comes
from the inbred custom OF Indian tribes who
DID the famous picture writing. Would you
like to see some of the aboriginal essays have?"
ABORIGINAL ESSAYS.
OF course The STAR reporter would, so she
brought out box full Of traps" No other
word would fit the curious collection of Indian
dolls, diminutive bows and arrows, crayon
heads of dogs, charcoal caricatrlres of pupils,
lead pencil sketches of reservation life bead
pincushions, chamois skin pouches moccasins,
mittens, tintypes and photographs. 1t was a
regular curiosity sbOn and from ha hoffo,n -
the box she fished dog-eared portfolio of
essays" That was what she called them and
The STAR reporter made no effort to recbristen
them. In fact ESSAY" seemed good word in
that connection.
These we're all done by my second-srade
pupils. explained the little woman as she low
ingiv turned over the written pages. II was
teaching then in one of the large Indian schools
in the west NY boys and girls ranged in age
from seven to thirteen. Some Of them were
half breeds and could speak English quite well.
Others were fuli-biooded Indians, many Of them
having come to me the year before in blankets
and moccasins, unable to form one word in anv
but their own Indian dialect and utterly igno-
rant of books, manners and everything else. 1.
was hard to keep the children interested. The
confinement made them stupid and 1 had
always to be inventing some new amusement
One afternoon after had been teaching them
several months l suggested that they write
essays. They were delighted to try something
and told them to choose their own subjects.
have every one of those frs. attempts The
range OF subjects was not large. but the result
OF their labor was quite satisfactory to me. even
though they did fall down on their verbs and
lose sight of their pronouns and genders. II
showed them 10 BIO original and that they dis
played the average intelligence in expression,
even if the style was crude.
THE FIRST ONE FINISHED.
"a small Usage girl was the first one to finish
her essay. She was only eight years old and
fond Of dolls, 30 her subject was Christmas
then near at hand-and dolls
Miss Hope handed the ESSAY" over 1t was
written in plain, neat hand, withouta mis-
spelled word. Here it is verbatim
ION Christmas little girls gets dolls Some
girls has their dolls yet like to play with
the dolls. l broke my doll. Eta has big
doll She lets the girls play with it."
A little cight-year-old half breed perpetrated
the following biographical sketch:
MY home at Indian territory. There are
five children in one family, and, with my
mother and father, there are seven Of U.s. My
father keeps store and my grandmamma and
grandfather they helps to get people well. My
grandmammas name is Mrs. Cedartree am
years old. Christmas is coming George used
to say: 'Hurrah, hurrah for Christmas!
DIFFERENCE IN cAPABIL1r1Es
81 found that there was as great q difference
in the capabilities Of Indian children, accord
ing to latitude, as in white children" said Miss
Hope, as she placed another essay in THE STAR
reporters hand. 1.-The northern Indians, as a
rule, have more trouble with English than the
southern tribes, so was not astonished that my
Oldest pupil, an Oneida boy, stumbled good
many times in his little story about his native
state, Wisconsin,"
1t was as follows: 'The story in North W.
The snow sometimes About three feet in high.
Snow and Cool In winter and the summer Is .
hot. IL many bears and deers all kinds OF
animals. This fall see a dear and bear too -