While we know our northern friends may not feel it, in the South, Spring is
here. So we thought we'd share a few of our gardening sites appropriate
for this time of the year. Along with gardening, there's grilling, and getting
ready to diet so that you can fit back into that bathing suit this summer!
Check The Leasing Of Indian Lands; Stop Rations For The Idle.
Certain groups of Indians who ten years ago were working upon their own land are
now leasing their lands, securing enough yearly rental to supply them with the
mere necessities of life, and not doing a stroke of work for the last few years.
We are thus sending them back to barbarism, by allowing them to lease their
lands. We had lifted them a little way by land and labor; we are letting them
fall back again. From the issue of rations, from a share in "annuity payments,"
and from leasing their lands they get enough to enable them to live in idleness.
The necessity of working if one would eat the great fundamental discipline of
civilized life we deprive them of. While you seek to inculcate sound ideas as to
the breaking up of tribal funds, will you not in these next months use all your
influence to direct public thought to the danger and evils which, attend that
reckless leasing of Indian lands, allotted and un-allotted, which enables
Indians to live in squalid idleness? And will you not protest against the
continuance of rations to able bodied men who will not work?
Connect The "Homestead" Idea With The Allotting Of Lands In
Severalty.
Is it not possible, as we approach the final solution of the Indian problem, to
devise some plan by which the title of an Indian to his allotted land shall be
made to a certain degree dependent upon occupancy and use, so that the principle
of the homestead act, which gives land to the actual settler who wishes to use
it, may be worked in with the principle of the severalty act? I have not yet
attempted to think through the details of such a plan. Its suggestion was made
to me since we came together for this conference by one of the thoroughly
educated young women who, from philanthropic motives and from the experience
gained in unselfish Christian service among the Indians, are thinking out
results. I am sure that the idea deserves our careful attention.
Information Can Be Had From The Board Of Indian Commissioners.
Let me say to the friends of the Indians who are attending this conference that
requests for our annual reports or for such literature of information as we can
place within your reach, if addressed to me as secretary of the Board of Indian
Commissioners, 1429 New York avenue, Washington, D. C., will receive immediate
attention. And our board always welcomes suggestions and questions from those
who are interested in that policy of educating, uplifting, and Christianizing
the Indian, and thus fitting him for intelligent American citizenship, which the
Board of Indian Commissioners was thirty years ago created and commissioned to
devise, shape, and forward, that "the Indian question" may cease to exist.
Congress And The Government Intend To Do What Is Right.
In the purposes, which, we have at heart in this conference friend of the
Indian, should come to understand that the Government of the United States, in
the Department and in Congress, is with us and not against us. I want to bear
witness here to the steadily growing confidence with which those who seek
justice for the Indian may expect to be received by the members of the House of
Representatives and of the Senate of the United States. It is now more than
seventeen years since I became a member of the Board of Indian Commissioners;
and, as chairman of that board for nine years and its secretary for the last two
years, I have had occasion to see something of every Congress, which has
convened since 1884. Sixteen or eighteen years ago it was difficult to find
members of Congress in the Senate or in the House who would listen to
suggestions with intelligence and friendly interest when justice, education, and
civilization for the Indian were the objects sought. Senator Dawes in the Senate
and Mr. Darwin R. James, now chairman of this board, when a member of the House,
were perhaps the most prominent and consistent friends of the Indian in the very
small group who at that time could be counted upon to favor legislative efforts
at justice and civilization for the Indians. There seemed to be comparatively
few members of Congress who did not share the feeling expressed in the old and
bitter jibe, "The only good Indian is a dead Indian." Now there are few members
of either House who share in that feeling, and a still smaller number who
venture to express the feeling if they have it. Gradually, but steadily, a great
change has come about in Congress. When the members of our board appear before
the House committee, whose chairman is with us in this conference today, we
uniformly find him and his fellow members of the committee quick to appreciate
the rights and the needs of the Indian and responsive to every appeal for
justice. This is equally true of the Senate committee. It is well for friends of
the Indian to appreciate this changed attitude toward the matters, which
interest us here. Always there will be the pressure of many other interests to
stand in the way of giving time to needed legislation for the Indians. And
always there will be some selfishly interested men in Congress and outside of
Congress, who will seek in every possible way to obstruct legislation which, if
secured, would put an end to the abuses by which they profit. But in general we
have the right to feel that our Senators and Representatives in Congress intend
to do the righteous thing. And I have no sympathy with those writers and
teachers of morality, whether they are preachers, editors, or college
professors, who cannot speak of members of Congress or of men who are active in
political life with out an implied sneer. The teacher of morality is never truer
to his high calling than when he insists upon high standards of honor and
morality in the public life of our land and recognizes these principles in the
lives of public men who practice them.
There was a time in the early history of the Mohonk conference when a little
band of the tried and true, who had been pioneers in special work for the
Indian, met here, and were drawn into such close relations with one another that
if death entered the circle during the year all the members of this conference
felt the loss as a personal bereavement. It is a source of great encouragement
to those of us who have longest shared in this work that the number of those who
through the meetings of this annual conference are deeply interested in the
welfare of the Indians has come to be so large that we feel the enthusiasm of
numbers as well as the enthusiasm of a lofty purpose. Our circle has now grown
to such proportions that we do not venture even to name over in public the list
of those who, from year to year, are called from our life of Christian service
here into the larger life beyond. But high aims in life make firm friends; and
the higher the aim the greater the number of aspiring souls who may be bound by
it to one another, and to that grateful service of the God who loves us," which
is possible only in the loving service of our fellowmen. To the fellowship of
this high service, as your chairman, as president of the conference, I bid all a
most cordial welcome. Those who are with us for the first time (at first
disinterested spectators, but sure to become interested friends of the cause)
are no less welcome than are the trusted friends who have so often taken counsel
together here in the years that are past.
Gen. Thomas J. Morgan. I received yesterday a brief statement of the tribute of
Lone Wolf to President McKinley, which to me was very touching. Lone Wolf was
one of the chiefs of the Kiowa Indians. He has professed Christianity and united
with a little local church. I would like to read this tribute. It was taken in
shorthand as he spoke.
Lone Wolf, chief of the Kiowa, lives near the new town of Hobart, which sprang
up in a day when the Kiowa Reservation was opened to settlement in August, The
following account of his remarks, as contained in the Kansas City Star of
October 3, is vouched for as substantially correct by one who heard him speak:
"One of the unique incidents of the memorial services held at Hobart in honor of
President McKinley was the address delivered by Lone Wolf. He had been invited
to make a talk, but when he arrived at the place of meeting he called for an
interpreter. None being present, Lone Wolf, who is chief of the Kiowa, rose up
from his seat and solemnly addressed the crowd. He spoke as follows, according
to a stenographer's report of his address: Mebbe so me not talk; mebbe so me not
read; mebbe so me not make you understand when me talk. Me never go to school,
but me not like I used to be. Mebbe so me better than me was. Me changed. Mebbe
me pa was bad; he not know r better. He not read. Mebbe so he not Christian, for
he lived long ago and go on the warpath and kill.
Mebbe last summer me go to Washington to see McKinley. McKinley he work; he
work; he great father; he be fine man. Me shake hands with him and me proud. Me
like him, the great father.
"At this point Lone Wolf raised his hands in a gesture of sorrow, and with tears
streaming down his cheeks said: Mebbe so McKinley dead; him gone; him no more
walks; him no more speaks to his red children; him dead. With breaking voice he
continued: Me not able to say what me mean. Me know. Mebbe people all over
country, mebbe so white people and Indians feel heap bad Kiowa, Comanche,
Apache sorry. With tears flooding down his cheeks he said: Me sorry; me heap
sorry. That's all. Notwithstanding his bad English and disjointed remarks, Lone
Wolf made a wonderful impression on his audience."
The chairman introduced the next speaker as a man of clear vision and great
experience, "our beloved General Whittlesey."
Gen. E. Whittlesey. I have no hesitation in saying that the Indian service is
improving year by year. It is now administered by the Commissioner of Indian
Affairs and the Secretary of the Interior at Washington, honestly and
faithfully; and in the field, though here and there a man creeps into office
through political influence who is unfit for the place, yet the great majority
of Indian agents, inspectors, teachers, and matrons are honest, faithful, and
efficient; so that as we look back, some of us who have been watching Indian
matters for twenty five or thirty years, and see how order and system have been
made to replace chaotic confusion, we feel that there is ground in the present
state of affairs for optimism as we look toward the future.
One auspicious fact is the retention of our present excellent Commissioner of
Indian Affairs in office. Some years ago we tried pretty hard to secure the
retention of another good Commissioner of Indian Affairs, but political
influence was too much for us. The present auspicious fact is due to the wisdom
of that noble, much loved President, William McKinley. However much we mourn,
and shall continue to mourn his untimely death, yet another auspicious fact is
that we have in the White House at Washington, as our Chief Magistrate, a man
who has a large knowledge of Indian affairs, larger probably than that of any
President who has preceded him, and who is fully committed to the principles of
civil service reform. We may feel sure that he will make no changes in the
personnel of the service without cause, and that he will make no new
appointments without having ascertained in some way the fitness for office of
those whom he appoints.
I may mention another auspicious fact, and that is that A. K. Smiley still lives
and that the Mohonk conference still thrives. It certainly is no insignificant
fact that a hundred and fifty or two hundred men and women gather here year
after year, at a considerable sacrifice of time, and sometimes of business
interests, to discuss topics of interest concerning the education, the
industries, the moral training of a race of our own people. These things afford
ground for optimism as we look to the future. Above all, and far greater than
all, is our assurance that God himself is with us; and with Him on our side it
matters very little who or what is against us.
The Chairman. We are to have now the pleasure of listening to one of those
fearless women who, years ago, went beyond the verge of civilization to dwell
among warlike savages, where she has in trenched herself in the affections of
the Indians, and has done more, perhaps, than any one woman we could name to
lead the Sioux to Christian civilization Miss Mary C. Collins, of Standing Rock
Agency, Fort Yates, N. Dak.
It is always a great pleasure to come to Mohonk and stand before these friends,
though I hardly know what to say, there are so many things I would like to have
you know and understand. I want to speak from the standpoint of the Indian,
letting you into the life of the Indian his home and thought and heart life. The
Indian, like all other people, has his intellectual, his physical, and his
spiritual nature, and we must reach him in all points if we would make a full
man of him. I should say also that all we can do for him intellectually and
physically, although very important, is not enough; we must reach him
spiritually, because we cannot separate the Indian from his religion. It is
impossible. His daily, hourly life in the old times was religious, and the
religious spirit comes up in everything that he does. If an Indian smokes, he is
offering incense; it is part of his religion. He does not smoke to gratify his
appetite. Wherever tobacco does not grow he uses the red willow bark or
Kinnikinnick. They sit in a circle, and after lifting up the pipe to the Great
Spirit, and then to the four winds, and making a prayer, they pass the pipe
around the circle. So in the dances. All the dances are religious ceremonies. If
I could only have the people understand, and have our agents understand, and the
Government understands, that dancing, to the Indians, is not play, I think I
could make a great step forward in teaching the Indians to lay aside old
customs. To the white man dancing is play, and to have the old time Indian
dances and Wild West Fourth of July to amuse the white people is a great thing
in the West; and some of our best Indians are led into this through the prizes
offered and the glory they get out of it from those who ought to work to stop
these things. It is not play; it is religious worship, and an Indian can not go
into it for exhibition without doing violence to his conscience as a religious
man; and no man can violate his conscience and not retrograde. Not only is
dancing a part of their religion, but even the preparation for going after the
game has its religious ceremony. So also when they start on the warpath.
Everything they do they do with prayer. They are praying constantly. From
childhood they are taught their dependence upon the Unseen, not the one Great
Spirit as we understand it, but upon something which is unseen and unknown the
Wakonda, the Great Unknown. We are so apt to speak of Indian gods as if they
meant the great God. He worships everything under the sun, and the sun itself.
He offers prayers to them, but he knows nothing of a God of Love. All the old
gods were cruel, and required sacrifices, and brought all kinds of trouble to
the Indian. They had never a god that brought blessing. What was the maize
dance? When the Indian went out, was it to offer thanksgiving for his corn? It
was not that. All these prayers were raised to the various spirits that they
should not destroy the corn crop that they should not come with blighting winds
and frosts to destroy and take away their life food from them. It was not a
prayer to bring a blessing. It was a prayer to let them alone. When we come to
the Indian tribe I speak of the Sioux we find them full of religion. Now, can we
train them to make them self supporting men and leave out this most important
part of their lives? It is impossible. We must bring to them knowledge of the
true God, a knowledge of Christ, a knowledge of how to live the true Christian
life. If we remember that they are essentially religious, we readily meet a
response from them. When you meet an Indian on that ground he can understand
what you are talking about. If you ask that his children be educated he does not
feel much interest in that, If you ask that they be taught a trade he can not
understand what benefit it would be; but talk to him about the Great Spirit,
about the inner life, about prayer; tell him that you have the word of God, that
God is directing his people, that they are God's people, and he can meet you and
you will gain his confidence. The president in introducing me spoke of the
devotion of the Indians to me. It is because I have come to them in this spirit.
There is no Indian so poor or so low or so ignorant that he does not know
something of the religious life; and knowing that I am a religious teacher, he
can open his heart to me, and, speaking his language, I can understand him and
help him.
I was much interested in stopping at Buffalo. I made my way from the gate
directly to the Indian show in the Midway, and I reached there just in time to
see a chief from Pine Ridge introduced to the great throng as the greatest
living chief of the Sioux Nation. The audience was told that this man was the
greatest warrior among the Sioux; that he had killed many people, and was
considered by the President of the United States and by the generals of the Army
as one of the greatest generals of the day; that he had been on the warpath and
followed up by our Army, which was not able to overtake him, and had to call in
assistance from another country before he was vanquished. Then an Indian whom I
do not know made a speech to the people at the door, and the old man, in his own
tongue, said:
"My friends, we are brought here by your white people to play before you, and in
the inside of this tent the play will be going on; and if you pay you will see
our people. You will see us ride on our horses. This is all I have to say." The
interpreter said: "Now you will want to know what the old man said. He said that
he wished he had been in this late war; that he would have annihilated all those
enemies, and he also said that he was a great man among his own people, and that
there was only one thing that he was not happy about, and that was that he had
only eight wives, and there was another old red devil on the reservation that
had nine."
[Cries of Shame! Shame!]
The President. It is a shame, is it not, that such things should be tolerated?
Was the so called interpreter a Government official?
Miss Collins. I do not know. I stood within 6 feet of him and heard the speech.
The congress of Indians, as I saw it, was only a poor imitation of a Wild West
show with another name. I tell you this that you may understand how perfectly
helpless these people are in the hands of their interpreters, and how important
it is that you know your interpreters when you use them in Washington. I have
frequently been in a great meeting when I have heard things said by the Indian
which were translated by the interpreter to mean a very different thing. Our
Indians are very often misrepresented in this way.
It is necessary for the good of these people that the missionary should keep out
of all political questions on the reservation as far as possible; but when the
missionary is a woman and speaks the language of the people, and is among three
or four thousand Indians who know that they can go to her without an interpreter
and tell her everything that is in their heart, she does sometimes get mixed up
in the politics of the reservation, and it is necessary that she should make
protests against things that are going on which she knows are a detriment to the
Indians. I look forward to the time when the Indian shall own his own home and
the issue of rations shall be done away with. But I live neighbor to these
people. I am right at their doors; I visit their houses every day and know them
as you know your neighbors; and it is a very hard thing when an order comes to
cut down rations, and we know that owing to drought almost nothing has been
raised to eat. How can it be done? What are they to eat? I know it is said that
necessarily some must starve, but must it be dear old Grindstone, the faithful
old chief who has served his people all his life, a Christian man, loyal to the
Government, who for many years has cared for his old mother, who is 100, and he
himself 79? Must they go hungry and die perhaps because "some must suffer?"
Could you pick out those who might starve? Very many are hungry today because
the rations have been cut down so small that in places they barely sustain life.
I know that you can not make men out of people who are always fed; but are there
not enough wise people to make the change come in such a way that it will not be
felt so violently in its coming. Why should a Senatorial committee come out from
Washington and make a treaty with the Indians, and in ten years after we be told
that the treaty is old fashioned; that they did the best they knew, but that
things are different now?
President Gates. In your opinion how could a measure be devised which should
discriminate between those who really need help and those who do not?
Miss Collins. After one year's notice I would cut off all English speaking mixed
bloods and all families of white men who have married Indians. At the same time
I would also give notice that in two years all English speaking young men (and
their families) who have been in school shall be cut off, and in one more year
those coming out of school, etc. But have it understood that a man who has had
his rations taken away should take his allotment of land for home at once, still
holding his right in the grazing land. On Standing Rock the land should be
allotted in homesteads, and let the grazing land be in common, as there is so
little water that the reservation can not support many cattle unless they are
herded on the streams. To become self supporting they must raise cattle.
The half breeds are almost all English speaking, and have more influence with
the agents than an Indian who can not speak for himself. Most of them have some
property. Then, not too rapidly, I would take it from others, but never without
previous notice.
I would let the old people, those who will never be able to support themselves,
and who have but little property, and who will live probably only a few years,
have rations; and where rations are stopped and land taken I would give cows to
them to start a herd.
I want to leave the impression with you who believe in the Christian work that
you must see to it that the missionary work is carried on and supported.
Whatever the Government does, it cannot do this Christian work in the hearts of
the people. If we would change a savage Indian into a citizen who shall be
faithful to the Government, there must be those as guides who care for his soul
life as well as his physical life. If we take away his old religion we must give
him something in its place, for his religion is cruel; and he cannot become a
good citizen, the best kind of a citizen, with his old ideas of religion, "An
eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth."
I would ask that the friends at Mohonk, the Indian Rights Association, and all
who have gathered here, as friends of the Indian, take more thought for our
people. We have indeed reached a crisis; and between the Government's idea of
treaty rights and the greed of Western cattle men, and the power of railroads,
and weakness of Indian agents and their helplessness in the hands of State
politicians, we were never before so much in need of strong, able friends to see
that the Indian is not deprived of all the benefits which should come to him.
Allot the lands as soon as possible; but in no case allow the lands to be rented
to cattlemen in bulk, lest we are in the condition of the State of Nevada, where
the cattlemen have all the water and farmers have no chance to live.
Friends, if you are not alert now to prevent wrongs, you will have to be aroused
sooner or later to a state of things that will make you see that the Indian
problem has two sides. Do not let all of these great questions of the day in
regard to our new possessions make you forget that our Indians are in this
helpless condition, not of their own choice, but in obedience to the demands
made by the Government through treaties. Then hold these treaties sacred until
you can induce the Government honorably to get out of them the best way for both
parties, just as if they were white people. I trust that Congress will allow no
juggling with words, but insist that until lawfully abrogated the treaties must
be left.
Give the law, and liberty, and the religion of the meek and lowly Nazarene.
Miss Annie B. Scoville was introduced as the next speaker.
Miss Annie Beecher Scoville. If there is an idol that the American people have,
it is the school. What gold is to the miser, the schoolhouse is to the Yankee.
If you don't believe it, go out to Pine Ridge, where there are 7,000 Sioux on
8,000,000 acres of land incapable of supporting these people, and find planted
over that stretch of territory 32 schoolhouses, standing there as a testimony to
our belief in education. There is something whimsical in planting schoolhouses
where no man can read, far from the highways, neighbored by farms, and planted,
not at the request of the Sioux, but because we believed it was good for them.
It is a remedy for barbarism, we think, and so we give the dose. Uncle Sam is
like a man setting a charge of powder. The school is the slow match. He lights
it and goes off whistling, sure that in time it will blow up the old life, and
of its shattered pieces he will make good citizens. And there lies the danger.
The danger is that he whistles over his task. It is easy to blow up the old
life. It is easy to teach a child the three R's, and to put on him a civilized
dress though he may hide his clothes on the way home from school. It is easy to
blow up the old life. But how if you have destroyed his old belief in the old
father, such a father as Grindstone, who stands for the best, whether Indian or
white? How is it if you take the child from the mother who can advise, and the
daughter who can care for it, and if you say to the child, "See, education is
all that you need?" And the child goes across from the schoolhouse to the Omaha
dance house, which waits to teach its lessons. You say we must not take all
amusement from these people, yet the Omaha lodge is an amusement that will not
bear explanation; but for those who know what it was for the Hebrew to worship
Baal it will be easy to understand how that Omaha appeals to the flesh and this
world, and robs those children of righteousness and the training that has been
given them. Do not misunderstand me; this dance is not the worship of the old
Indian. We have broken the life, which demanded the exertion, the self
sacrifice, the long prayer, and vigil, which made the man. We have left nothing
but a game, which appeals to all that is low in life, and then we say that that
is their social life. The children go to our schools, but all summer long, on
every other Friday and Saturday, they go down to that Omaha. And when the mother
says that is not a good thing to do, they reply, "You don't know as much as I
do; I can read." So, unchaperoned and unguarded, they go into that life, and the
Indian camp is really less moral because of the work we have done in it. That
sounds terrible for our schools, and yet I believe in the schools and in all
that they can do; but we must not leave everything to them, and forget that
though religion without education may breed superstition, yet it is not so
dangerous as education without religion, which makes of the barbarian an
atheist. These boys and girls who are allowed to go on with these dances do not
believe in them. If they had any religious significance to them it would be
different; but we have wiped away by our work all that stood for strength, and
now we are in danger of leaving these young people without a God; without an
ideal to lift them up. However broadly you educate, unless you have given ideals
to the people, unless you have put soul into the body, you might better leave it
untrained. You do not want an educated savage. And the man who has no God is a
man who is a danger to us, whether a modern socialist or a wild Indian.
Miss Estelle Reel, superintendent of Indian schools, was next
introduced.
Miss Estelle Reel. The work for the past year has been generally encouraging. I
spend much of my time in the field about nine months each year and have just
returned from Oregon and Washington. I find it much easier to go out and correct
evils than to write about them. In Washington the Indians are nearly all
citizens, and the time has arrived when they should be released from tutelage. I
found Indian citizens riding into town in vehicles better than my old buckboard
and wearing better clothes than I. I call to mind one Indian whose income from
lease money is $800 annually, his land renting for $10 per acre. These Indians
speak good English, and I think need no further assistance from the Government
in educational matters.
My heart goes out to the Indians of Arizona. They are not like the Indians of
Oregon, many of whom are rich, nor those of Washington. They are greatly in need
of assistance, and we are asking Congress to appropriate money for irrigating
the arid lands of this region. If this request is granted, they will soon become
not only self supporting, but well to do.
Affairs in the Indian Territory are somewhat discouraging, owing to the fact
that the Indians are so ready to lease their lands. An Indian woman who owned
land near a school wished to obtain a position in the Government service, but I
endeavored to make her see that it would be much more profitable for her to
raise chickens and sell eggs, butter, and milk. A white woman in the same
neighborhood sold $60 worth per month, and I convinced her that it was better to
remain at home and rear her children than to go into the Indian service at $50
per month.
The missionaries are doing a noble work in uplifting and Christianizing the
Indians, and the Indian Bureau greatly appreciates their efforts; but we cannot
get many people to dedicate their lives to it, as Miss Collins has. I want also
to thank Mrs. Doubleday and the Woman's Association for their ever ready
sympathy and the great assistance they have been to me in my work.
Gen. James Grant Wilson. Two men in this broad land of ours have won the noble
title of the apostle to the Indians. It was first worn by Rev. John Elliott in
the seventeenth century. The other was well known to this conference and well
loved, Henry B. Whipple. This morning I received from Mrs. Whipple a letter, in
which she gave me some touching details of her noble husband's last hours and of
his funeral, which more than 200 Chippewa Indians came to attend four days after
his death, some coming more than a hundred miles to look once more on the
beautiful face of their ever faithful friend, to whom they gave the appropriate
title of "Straight Tongue." That was the name by which Henry B. Whipple was
known throughout all the Indian tribes of his diocese in Minnesota. Mrs. Whipple
says the most heartrending and pathetic letters continue to come to her from
Indians all over the country. May I read this one from the Chippewa Indians?
A tribute to Bishop Whipple by the Rev. J. J. Enmegahbowh (full-blooded
Chippewa), ordained to the priesthood by Bishop Whipple in the early part of his
episcopate:
"I write the language of my sorrowful heart. I can not say much at this time my
heart is too heavy. When I heard that our bishop had died, I said, 'No, this can
not be;' I did not think our bishop could die. But in another hour a second
messenger entered my house to assure me that the loved bishop had died truly. I
and my wife wept aloud in our lonely room, and then for hours spoke not to one
another.
"The Indians began to come from all directions, and to ask with startled faces
what it meant. I said, my friends, the best friend our people ever had in this
world the great warrior, the great bishop, the great loving man has fallen. The
grief was terrible to see. They could not believe it. Some went away with bitter
weeping; others stole to their homes stunned to silence.
"I went to Faribault for the last time with my sorrowing people. I said to them:
This time we go to Faribault with feelings unlike any that we have ever had.
Before we have gone with bounding step and happy hearts. We have known that we
were to look on the face of our loving bishop, the friend of our lives. It was
our joy to see the face of the man who loved and sympathized with my people.
Before, we have been going to get inspiration, courage, and counsel. We have
gone away full of hope and courage, blessing our bishop and with our hearts
ready to go on as he had bidden us.
"Our bishop was all love. He preached always, from the beginning, love, and
love. My children, love the Great Spirit. Love one another. Love all other
tribes. His one great aim has been to unite us by close connection in Christian
fellowship.
"He is no more here to give us these lessons. His loving face is hidden from us.
His voice is silenced. Silenced, do I say? Yes, and no. His voice shall sound
and be forever ringing in our ears. Yes; and it shall be ringing as long as his
red children live, throughout the Indian country.
"More than forty years ago, when I went with him through the forests, he carried
his blanket, his robe case and other things, and many times the Indian said: We
must not let him do this. He will kill himself. He can not work in this way and
live. But he would smile oh, how we loved that smile, and every step he took and
say: 'Oh, this is nothing; this does not tire me;' and his voice filled us with
hope and courage.
"Our beloved bishop has stood for over forty years and defended the defenseless.
He has spoken and written for the rights of his red children, and that when no
man gave much thought to the forlorn outcast of the world. He alone, the first
bishop who entered into the Chippewa heathen land. Today, throughout the
Chippewa country, tears are blinding the eyes; hearts are heavy loaded with
sorrow, and are looking upward, crying, My Father, my Father, like Elisha of old
when his friend was taken away from him. In a loud voice he cried, 'My Father,
my Father.' The double portion of Elijah's spirit was given him. May the double
portion of our departed bishop's love be given us. His has been a long battle
for us. His Indian work has been blessed in the conversion of many. He has built
churches and has ordained many Indian deacons who are doing their work
faithfully. How truly can he say in the language of St. Paul, 'I have fought a
good fight; I have kept the faith.'
"But we, what are we to do? What courage can we take away? We are lost children.
Our hearts are lead. I bid you farewell."
Mr. A. K. Smiley. It is not our custom to hold memorials of the dead in this
conference, but I think that Bishop Whipple should be an exception. He was one
of the rarest men this country ever produced, most picturesque in appearance, as
well as straightforward, and noble in character.
On motion it was voted that the business committee should arrange for a suitable
memorial minute in honor of Bishop Whipple. Adjourned at 12.30.
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Thirty-Third Annual Report Of The Board Of Indian Commissioners,
1901
