The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1898-10-09

in. She goes through a lot Of lamentations
and other antics over the patient. If he
RECEIVERS it is solely due to her skill, but if
rot it must be the evil spirit who has been
led to aff1ict the sick by some one of his
enemies. The prophecies at once proclaims
that the patient has been bewitched and
points out the woman or man who be-
witched him. In such cases where death
ensues the relatives of the deceased are LA
Bile to kill the person so charged with being
a witch.
ON THE INDIAN FARMS.
spent some time the Indian farms
They are good farmers. not a few using
American machinery, such as plows. They
are as a rule rather stock men than grain
raisers. found very few of the men labor
in in the fields, and, am told. that the
women do the most of the farm work. ex-
cept on the farms of the larger land owners,
where the rotos or Chilean peasants act as
hired hands. The roto is the product Of
crossing the Spanish and the Indian blood.
Like most hybrids he is in many respects
worse than either of the people from whom
he is descended, often having the vices of
both and the virtues OF neither. The In
dian, / am told, is cleaner than the peon.
He is more honest and more self-respecting.
to work for a white man. and to-day the
Araucanian feels himself the equal of any
person on earth. He has always been a
man of some civilization, and he had his
farms and his stock when the Spaniards
came to this continent. The clothes he wears
are woven by his wives, and his ponchos
have all the bright colors and much of the
beauty of the blankets made by our Navajo
Indians.
The Araucanian is shrewd trader, but
as rule he seems not to care for money.
I have tried a number of times to buy the
blankets of Indians whom met by offering
what they should have considered good
prices, but have invariably failed. 1t was
the same with the jewelry, which tried to
purchase of the girls. The only place to
get such things is in the pawn shops of the
frontier towns The Indians are fond of
liquor. They drink the vilest alcohol, and
when out of money will sell or pawn almost
anything they have for the means of get
ting 1t. This brings them to the pawn
brokers, and the result is that you can oft
en- pick up their curious jewelry or beauti-
full blankets quite cheap. I was offered to-
day a pair of solid silver stirrups, each of
which weighed pound. for thirty-five Chill
can dollars or almost $12 of our money,
and 1 bought an almost new hand-woven
poncho, as big as bed quilt. for ten dollars
in silver, or for $3.50 in American gold.
It is on account of his desire for alcohol
that the government has forbidden the In
dian to sell his lands. INSCRIPTIONS specu-
lators have until now been robbing him of
them in many parts of the country, so that
only comparatively small amount of what
he has had remains. This part Of Chile is
settling UP fast that the demand for
land grows greater day by day, and it is
only question of time when the property
now reserved to the Araucanians will be
thrown on the market. The railroad is
bringing the white man farther and farther
south, and the days of the Araucanians are
numbered. FRANK G. CARPENTER.