The San Francisco call., 1898-11-01
SAYS WHITES ARE TO BLAME
OFFICIALS TOO LENIENT WITH
 THE REDSKINS.
Permit Them to Live a Shiftless Life and to Indulge in Gambling and Barbaric Prac-
 tices.
Special Dispatch to The Call.

WASHINGTON, Oct. 31-The major ity of the annual reports of the Indian agents to the Commissioner of Indian Affairs are of an encouraging nature and indicate a progress generally along civilized lines. Some of them, however, are not so gratifying and make sur prising statements. Unusual in an an- nuaI report is the following arraign- ment in that of E. M. Yearian, in charge of the Lemhi Agency, in Idaho:
 These Indians. as a tribe. are honest and peaceable and kindly disposed, but are about as degraded and ungrateful a ed and, like spoiled children, want things their own way, and their condition, mode of living and barbaric practices would in dicate that undue concessions have been made on the part of the agents. While some avail themselves of the opportunity of earning their living by civilized pur- suits, others lead a lazy, Vagabond life.
 They are addicted to gambling. horse racing and dancing, and the influence of the so-called medicine man" operates to the disadvantage of the tribe.
 Their real advancement has not been what it should or what it was possible to have been under the circumstances. In the agents annual report for 1882 on the Lemhi Reservation, 1 find that twenty nine Indian families were engaged in farming. Fifteen years afterward l can report but forty-one following the agri-
  not one convert a year. What wonderful progressi
 Morally, these Indians are practically the same as they were twenty years ago; financially, they are but little better off. Aside from a few small farms, wagons and farming implements, held by some of the more energetic and industrious, they have comparatively nothing except great number of worthless ponies, 1T they did not own which they would not be any worse off. No horned stock is owned by them at all
 few have farms and keep constantly at work trying to establish for themselves comfortable homes. majority, how ever, seem to content themselves with their present condition and continue in the old channel, leading a life of idle ness and degradation.
 Agent Fuller cr the BlackfOot Agen- cy, Montana, referring to the opening of the ceded portion under the mineral land laws last April, says prospecting has been practically fruitleSS and pre- diets the abandonment of the So-called mineral strip before the 1st of Novem- Der.
 J. R. Jewell, in charge of the New York Agency, in his report, alleges that, after careful investigation he finds that the funds of the Seneca nation are almost wholly absorbed by the officers, and that the latter are in colluSion with white men for such purposes. Agent Jewell says: t
 The officers notoriously use the funds of the nation to purchase the votes of the ignorant and illiterate Indians, who, on election day are always anxious for a small sum of money. The better class of Indians are not numerous enough to over come the power of these corrupt Indians, who have the funds of the nation with which to corrupt the masses and perpetu- ate their corrupt dynasty.