The times., 1898-10-24
Civilizing the Indian.

At about the time of the uprising
among the Bear Island Indians some
BODY interviewed the old chief Geroni-
mo, on the Indian question, and as he
is somewhat interested in that problem,
and may be supposed to have given 1t
considerable thought and study, one at
least of his ideas may be worth notice.
He thinks it is a waste of money to
educate the Indians under the present
system. An Indian child is placed in
school, away from the reservation, and
after some years of training is sent
back to live with the rest of the tribe.
The theory of'the people who originated
this scheme was that the educated
youths and maidens would civilize the
other Indians. Experience has shown,
however. that they usually give up the
task and go back to the blanket. and
then the world howls over the ineradi-
! cable savagery of the Indian. Old Ger
onimo thinks differently from the
/ world He says: What can an edu-
Gated Indian do in the sage brush and
! cactus?"
This is a pertinent question and one
which it will puzzle most people-even
theorists-to answer AS a general
thing, an educated white man of ordi-
nary morality and intelligence, when
thrown into the midst Of a lot of wild
men with the prospect of staying there
| for the rest of his life. does not raise
that tribe to his level; he sinks TO
theirs. Occasionally he civilizes few
of them; sometimes he becomes their
/ leader; and now and then he grows
to be a worse devil than the uneducat-
ed savage ever thought of being. When
he gains an influence over his savage
companions. it is usually gained be-
cause he is regarded by them as some
thing different from themselves, a be
ing of higher nature. and he is thus
the object OF a certain respect, even
reverence In the case of the Indian
boy or girl. this advantage is wanting.
There is a depressing atmosphere of
you are no better than we are" all
about the young fellow from Hampton
or Carlisle. when he comes back to his
own people He does not find his old
companions eager to look up to him
and follow him. There is a good deal
of human nature in an Indian. and it is
human nature, when one person has
been singled out for particular advan-
tages in the way of learning, to try to
prove that the advantages have not
done him very much good after all
When the college man comes home to
the paternal farm the other farmer
boys do not always flock to learn BIZ
ology philosophy. and mathematics of
their old comrade. They are more like
ly to remind him of the time they
pummeled him in the pubic school, and
try to prove to him that he cannot
make living with all his book-wisdom.
4 II is exactly the same way on an In
dian reservation. If the college boy
means to stay on the farm he must
conquer the farmers on their own
ground or lift them to his; and he US
ually settles the problem by getting as
far away from the scenes of his boy
hood as he can. This the Indian can
not do. He is turned loose on the res
ervation. amid all the associations of
his boyhood, and expected to civilize a
people ten times as intractable as the
ordinary country farmer-folk. The way
} to save these graduates of Indian
schools from the life of the blanket is
> to- put them where they will not be
} forced into that life by parents and
friends. Give them the same chance
: that a white boy has. Let them earn
their own living where they can find it.
Or. if they are to be kept on the reser-
vations. let there be schools at their
homes. where the whole community of
children may be educated at once. 1t
; will be slower but surer work There
: is moral support in numbers, and a
I dozen educated young people can make
r a life for each other in place which
would drive single thinking. reason
5 ing. reading. cultivated human being to
{ insanity. The way to civiliZe savage
is not to place him, and keep him, un-
2 der influences which drive a civilized
man back to savagery.