Mrs. Guy LeRoy Stevick
R. D. Route 1, Box 450
Redwood City • California

Lower brule Indian Agency, Dak.

September, 30th, 1888.

The Indians of the Great Sioux Reservation have been in
high council during the past week. The Commissioners appoint-
ed to secure the assent of the Indians to the Dawes Sioux Bill
enacted
[印文] at the present session of Congress, called a general
council of the leading Indians from each of the six Agencies.
Nearly all of the prominent Indians of the Siuox nation were
present. It was the most important gathering of Indians which
has taken place in since the treaty of 1868 was made at Fort
Rice, and if the Act proposed at this council is ratified by
the Indians it will surpass in importance the treaty of '68.
OXXIXXIXKXXIXKXXIXKXXIXKXXIX

The Great Sioux Reservation contains twenty three mil-
lion acres of land, and on it live twenty three thousand In-
dians. They were placed here more as a measure of defence
than in accordance with any definite plan for thier advance-
ment in civilization. This land was thought to be beyond the
range of white settlement, it was filled with buffalo, deer,
andtelope and all kinds of small game, and by reserving it
for the exclusive use of the Indians was found a ready solu-
tion to what was then the Indian problem: how to pretect
white settlers from the atrocities of roaming Indian bands.
But with the rapid growth in the settlement of our western
territory, the equally rapid destruction of game and the de-
crease in the number, and power of the Indians a new, Indian
problem has arisen: how to protect the Indian from extermina-
tion and teach him the ways of civilization.

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The extermination of the buffalo, however it may be regretted from the sportman's standpoint, has done more towards the civilization of the Indian than any other one factor. The Indian is naturally a hunter and as long as he could live by hunting, with the excitement of an occasional raid upon the whites, it was almost impossible to induce him to forsake his savage life. At the present time one can travel for days or weeks through the Sioux Reseruation without seeing a hair or feather of wild game. The Indians are crowded around the various Agencies living almost exclusively upon the rations and annuities issued by the government. A very few cultivate small patches on ground, but the Indians who are at present self-supporting could be counted on one's fingers.

Vast tracts of land lie wholly unoccupied. Take for example the Cheyenne Ri ver Agency; it contains twelve thousand square miles and is occupied by twenty nine hundred and fifty Indians— more than four square miles for each man, woman and child. These people are gathered in bands, and do not actually use (even to roam over) more than two thousand square miles; thus leaving ten thousand square miles of land entirely unoccupied and useless.

It was with this condition of things in view that the Dawes Bill was framed. Its object is to give to each Indian the fee-simple to a tract of land large enough for his support, to furnish him with necessary farming stock and implements, to provide for his education in farming and industrial pursuits until he becomes able to support himself and to establish a permanent fund for his benefit in the national treasury for his benefit, one half of the interest to be expended

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annually for $\frac{4}{5}$ of an acre for educational purposes and the other
half as the Secretary of the Interior shall think best.

In compensation for these benefits the government proposes to
open for settlement under the Homestead laws about one half
of the reservation—11,000,000 acres. It proposes to sell
this land to settlers at the rate of fifty cents an acre and
as it is sold to place the money on interest in the national
treasury for the Indians; but before the land is sold the
government proposes to give them certain implements and stock
to give them Indian over the age of eighteen years necessary
farming stock and implements (a yoke of oxen, two milch cows,
a wagon, a horow, plow, seed etc and twenty dollars
in cash) and to advance one million of dollars towards the
permanent fund already mentioned.

When the Commissioners first presented this Act to the
Indians they encountered the most determined opposition. The
Indian refused to part with their land under any considera-
tion, and after repeated explanations of the Act, and of the
present state of the Indians and their probable future, the
Indians began to see that they must agree to a proposition
somehow of this character. At the general council the leaders
of the Indians agreed to accept the Dawes Bill with some
modifications, the principal of which is in the terms of
payment for the land. They demand that the government shall
buy the land outright from them and then dispose of it in
whatever way it sees fit. John Grass, their leading speaker,
"Here, you propose to sell our land for us to homesteaders
at fifty cents an acre and put that on interest for us at
Washington. Now, not one third of our land is left for farm-
ing, it is good only for grazing. You will never sell it for

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farming and we will never get paid for it. If you want our
land, pay us fifty cents an acre for it outright and put that
money on interest for us. Then we will consider your pro-
position."

In addition to this change the Indians demanded that
their chiefs should be taken to Washington to see the Great
Father." A trip to Washington has been the accompaniment to
all former treaties, and without it they would consent to no-
thing. To satisfy them upon this point and to come to some
satisfactory arrangement concerning the terms of payment
the Comrs consented to bring a delegation from each Agency to
Washington. If the Secretary of the Interior approves of this
plan, the delegations will reach Washington next week. Upon
this consultation will depend not only the opening of this
immense tract for settlement but the prosperity of the country
on each side of the reservation between which it now lies
as an impassible barrier.

The delegation to Washington will comprise the leading
men of the Sioux nation. Per haps the most prominent of these
is John Grass, the orator of the Sioux orator. He is a man
of fine natural abilities, of good phisique and has a very
compressive style of speech. He has an open attractive coun
tenance, and when he speaks it lights up with a smile which he
maintains except on rare occasions. Sometimes when recounting
the wrongs of his people and the injustice of the whites
his face assumes a deep thoughtful expression which never
fails to call out the sympathy of his hearers. Grass is a
full blooded Indian, and has never had the advantage of an
education. He understands a little English, but speaks none.

5I have often heard it asked" How would he compare with our white speakers?3 His education, his field of thought has been so different from that of white men that a comparison is almost impossible; but so far as his manner of delivery is concerned and his speech within his range of thought are concerned, he is the equal of oir best white speakers. He is the Judge of the Indian Court at his Agency and the leader of the more progressive element; altpgether he is a good Indian.

In marked contrast to Grass is that crafty old medicine man, who came sneaking into the council a day after his Agent, with his blanket over his head and his arms conceiled beneath him, who never raised his voice in council except to advise good-will and peace and kind words, and who was foremost out of council in dire threats against any one who would accept the offr of the Commissioners. He was one of the men he planned the campaigns in the Indian war preceding the Black Hills treaty of 1876. He was present personally at some of the most brutal outtrages and He ought to have been shot for his crimes, but instead after a short imprisonment at Fort Randall, he was released by the government and made a lecturing tour through the East. The foolish attention paid to him by those of our people who rave over any freak from a crowned prince to a con demnMurderer has made him the most notorious Indina in the country —Sitting Bull. Among his own people he has no such reput ation as he has among the whites. He is the leader of a small band of the most Northern Indinas, but does not rank as a chief; he is inreality only a cunning medicine man.

6 The leader in the Custer massacre was all. No one who sees his face will wonder at the determination and the complete-ne ss with which that massacre was carried out. It would be hard to find a stronger face or a more stolid air among any people. During the councils at Standing Rock he stood direct ly in front of the commissioners, with his shirt thrown open in front and thrown back from his breast, and no matter how warm the discussion was he never changed a muscle of his face It was only when he talked that he betrayed his strong feel ing. His speches were always short and positive.

Of an entirely different class is Mad Bear—a type rarely seen among the Indians. He is a cautious, careful business man—a farmer who attends to his cattle and his crops and saves his money. He has that knowledge which is most rare among Indians—the knowledge of the art of a dollar. In appearance he resembles somewhat a canny scothchman. He is tall, erect and dignified and approaches nearer to the ideal “noble red man” than any Indian I ever saw.

The leader of the Indians who favor the Bill is Big Man. a chief of the Lower Brulees. Only a few yrs ago he was one of the wildest Indians on the reservation. When the Commos 1882 were here on a mission similar to the present he was most determined in his opposition. But Big Man is a clear headed politician. He has the ability to grasp a situation and the probabilities of the future and when he came to the conclusion that the Indians must accommodate themselves to the wishes of the white men ways, he threw his whole energy in that direction. It was due to his efforts more than to those of any other one Indian that the Comm succeeded in obtaining the assent if three fourths of the Lower Brule Indians in the face of the determined opposition of all the Agencies around him and against the lead of the Head Chief—Iron Nationz

Big Man: ( to the head-men of the Indians → You are too hard and I am suffering. I am sorry. I have no malice towards you, but my heart is sad on your account. It may be because some of us do not understand it, or because some of us understand it better than others, that we are divided.

( to the mass of the Indians → You other Indians under the chiefs, I feel in the same way towards you. Some of you Indians are complaining that you are entirely bereft of all farming utensils and of all help from the government. Your thoughts were like this: "I wish that hereafter I could get such an amount of property as my neighbors have, from the government." Again, others say to us: "I want to be by myself on this earth," and such think of nothing except struggling along by themselves, but this probably is dangerous. Then there are two ways. Put it all together, all on this reservation. Here we are encamped from one end of the reservation to the other because the land is ours.

Some issue day, or between issue days, we come to the Agency and say to the agent: "Here are some people who have come in between us." Then again, some days when I am at the Agency, some of you come from below, and you bring the news to the agent that up at the Keyahapa river, on this side of it, the settlers have taken up their abode, and the ranchmen have a herd of cattle there. Again, from above the report comes to the Agency that the white people have moved on the reservation and are destroying our timber. These complaints are not hostile demonstrations, but it is the way we now assert the Indians' side.

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Now then, there was a day in the past that all the tribes
around us did some bad things, and mischief arose, and we
went and prayed for peace, as the Great Father wished, and so
I went from camp to camp, and from tribe to tribe, and prayed
for peace. And we brought the people to whom we prayed for
peace into a peaceful mind; but they do not remember us for
it, nor do they give us credit for the peace we brought.

We all know we came near selling this reservation to one
time—in 1882. These Commissioners come now and say: "This
reservation will be yours to keep and to live in hereafter,
and you can die here peaceably." What answer shall we make,
my friends, when this good news is brought to us? In times
past we had one fear, that there was no telling but what the
white people would come and drive us from our homes. The way
is now opened for us by the Great Father by which we can all
hold on to the homes which we now have. All you, my relatives,
and you young people who are standing around listening
to these words, you must have come to some conclusion by this
time. If they had brought this word to us: "You Indians who
live yonder and you who live yonder must all move off from
your places and go to other places;" if they had brought such
news it would not have suited you, nor would such news ever
have suited me. For several days our minds have been worked
up. Some say mean, merciless things and with vengeance in
their words. My friends, my wish is that you should all look
on the right side.

3

Ever since the Indians have existed on this land, we have had customs of our own. According to the Indians' custom the whole camp moved together, and if they came to a stream that was hard to cross, perhaps one party said: "There is a good crossing;" and others said: "No; yonder is the best crossing." Thus they were divided, for the leader of one party said that he knew that crossing, and that it was a good crossing; and the leader of the other party said that he knew the other was a good crossing. And so the party was divided, but as soon as the one party came to their crossing and began going over without any trouble, and none of the other party had yet crossed, then they all came towards the good crossing. So let us all look in the same direction now. Let us all go in the same way. We are all relatives, we are poor, we know the end is coming. We do not know whether any of the people at this Agency will live four years longer. The white people have worked out a way by which this generation can live longer. My friends, my relatives, where are we? We are men on the earth, but we can make ourselves better men, and we can make ourselves like white men. We can do good. All who want to sign, do it with a good heart. All those of you who have a different mind, can act accordingly. But whether we sign the black paper or the red paper we must all do it with a good heart.