The morning call., 1895-02-05
ON THE CROW RESERVATION,
An Indian Race That Is Fortunately
Fast Dying Out.

Our ride from the fort to the field was
through the pretty valley of the Little Big
Horn We passed one large Crow village,
and at one time witnessed a picturesque
sight-to wit, about hundred Crow In
dams engaged in actual labor. Captain
Watson, the military officer in charge OF
the Crow agency, has established here an
experimental farm, the Indians performing
the bulk of the work. He had them en-
gagged in chopping down sage grass on the
bottom as we passed These Grow Indians
are the richest Migrants in the world. They
own the land composing the vast reserva-
ton, they have free food and ammunition
in abundance, and they only number about
23OO all told. If they had their holdings IN
severalty they would have small fortune
per capita.
AS we came upon the sagebrush-smiters
the landscape was full of color. The hand
some ponies, with gay blankets and rich
saddles, were tethered on the plain, and
the golden sunshine was gliding their
trappings with autumnal effulgence. The
bucks wore broad white sombreros, and
were clad in variegated blanket coats and
trousers, while the squaws could have
given June rainbow cards and spades, SO
to speak, in the matter of color, though
they really had hoes, and l can truthfully
say that | never saw such a formidable,
forceful array and so little achievement.
The men were for the most part sitting
around, smoking cigarettes or lounglng
half asleep, while the papooses rolled IN
the sun and the SquawS alone swung the
glittering hoe.
These Grow Indians take it, says Col
onel Cockerill in the New York Herald,
bear about the same relation to virile In
dians of the Sioux stamp that the genus
corvus bears in ornithology to the white
headed eagle. When one of these Indians
takes up a bit of land and sets up as a
granger the Government builds him nice
frame house. As soon as the house be-
comes pediculous the aboriginal farmer
sets up tepee on his front lawn, moves
his family and his penates into it and turns
the Government mansion over to his
ponies. / saw a number of instances in
which the corvine son of Agricola had thus
returned, hog-like, to his wallow.
On ration day at the Grow agency these
genial wards of the nation flock there to a
man and woman for frolic. Each gang
is allotted certain number of cattle, and
they do their own slaughtering. This is
gala day for the Indian and his dog.
When a steer is stricken down he is i'm
| mediately eviscerated, and the leading man
seizes the kidneys as a bon bouche. These
are eaten warm and raw, and if the buck
is in high feather he smears his face with
blood. The liver and heart of the steer are
eaten by tribesmen of lesser degree, while
the squaws squeeze out the intestines and
proceed to devour them with gusto, clean
| ing by water even being dispensed with.
Engaged in this sort of barbaric gustatory
pastime will be found Indians who have
| been schooled at Carlisle and elsewhere,
and who ought to know better. And right
here, under the shadow of the hand
soonest, best-equipped agency in the
West, and under the eye of the
finest cavalry barracks outside of San
| Antonio, Tex, these Indians dispose of
their dead by hanging them up in tree
| tops. saw within five miles of the fort
| Crow corpse in tree-a very becoming
| place for a crow-and 1 could but regret
| the scarcity of trees and similar ornamen-
| tations 1t is somewhat satisfying to know
that these Indians who cling so tenaciously
| to the skirts of barbarism are not fructify
| ing. Their census shows an annual de-
crease of from fifty to 100. Their general
| worthlessness and the vices and diseases
kindly translated to them by the whites
may be depended on to do the business,
and the Crow Indian, like the Irish wolf
dog, will soon be "Reminiscences Chicago
Times.