The National tribune., 1909-02-25
Hs OF
One Ricskhicf.

has been Commissioner that the world
will thank him for hundred years
hence, when there will probably be not
a single full-blooded Indian living of
anv of the great tribes which inhabited
this country when Columbus was dis
covered by them. He. has, encouraged
their art, restored to them the right to
speak their languages in all their puri-
ty both in the schools and on the
reservation, and has tried in every way
possible to preserve in all its originality
all the customs and habits of the peo-
pie while teaching them better methods
of doing each and all Commissioner
Leupp believes that the aboriginal ART
of the Indians, if kept in its purity
will rival that of the japanese or East
Indians. No finer bead work has ever
been seen than that done by the Sioux
no finer blanket weaving than that OF
the Navajos, no more sliilful artificers
in silver and copper than the Zunis and
Pueblos. The pottery of the Pueblos
and other village building Indians ranks
with fine pottery of the aboriginals OF
the Old World. 1t is too sadly true
that the spirit of commercialism has in
vaded the aboriginal ranks, and thai
we have "mili''-made blankets and ma
in the East and carried back to the
guileless children of the forest, the
mountains and the plain for them tc
sell to credulous tourists. There are
always people who are willing to be
gulled. however, and that is their fu-
neral.
1t has been the policy of the Indian
Department for many years up to Mr.
Leupp's incumbency of the Commission
ership to force by penalty the Indian
children to give up their language and
E'noliSh hoy fvo,
their parents and their homes and to
make them forget that they were born
Indians. 1t was a cruel, a monstrous
doctrine. The history of the Indian
peoples of America, while red with the
horrors of barbarian hostility, is yet a
brilliant one, and it must be remem-
bered that the Indians were not the
original aggressors. However hideous
the massacres and the bloodshed, the
legends of the various tribes are rich
in imagery and battling in origin. They
are like, yet utterly unlike any known
peoples. and their origin shrouded in
the mists Of a past SO distant that the
rim of its horizon has not yet been
reached. We are to-day excayating
some of their communal homes, SO cor
rectly planned and built as to battle
science, for when the foundations were
laid it is declared that exact science
N'NaN iot ldNc Dcch hiluWU 10 the DullQ-
ers, yet the proof that they had mas
tered and forgotten this science is un-
covered day by day from the drifting
sands of a desert that was once an
ocean bed. They knew it then; they
do not remember it to-day. No more
wonderful finds are being made in the
buried cities of Italy and Egypt than
are being uncovered in the Valley of
the Rio Grande and Colorado, and the
desert where succeeding centuries of
sands have covered deep the
palaces of a race that lived. loved,
wrought. married. increased, vanished: !:
vanished as snowflake In a furnace
blast ia.
But for the firm and forcefuI man
agement of Commissioner yLeupp the
remnants of the mighty tribes that have
history a few hundred years hence
would be forgotten as the vanished
races now are. The Superintendents
OF Indian schools thruout the country
once disciplined the pupils who dared
TO speak word Of their language on
the playground, and ithey were practi-
cally forbidden to make their own pic
ture art on states or paper, and were
discouraged in every way In reyerting
to the fact that they were aboriginal
Americans. CommissionereL Leupp has
all that. and the Indian BOYS
hHo BiiiS VI Tho country owe MIN q
debt of gratitude. Commissioner Leupp
has helped them to remember their
history, that its dark places may be
frightened by industry and advance
ment. He has taught them that no
man can live in the love of the world
who is not good and gentle as well as
great and daring.
The American Indian-the aboriginal
Indian-was big, brave. brainy and in
dependent. He was a born aristocrat.
He was the original athlete; he believed
in God, the Great Spirit, and he had
a high sense of honor. Degrading in
fuences lowered their pride and de-
based their later history. but in the
elder period OF their existence the
American Indians lived a wonderful
life, and in more wonderful buried
cities than those now being uncovered
beyond the seas.