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Show ! EEPOET OF TEE COXXIS8IOXER OF, IXDIAN AFX'AIRS. 45 . ' $66,836.81. It has not been constructed, Mr. Shoemaker, supervisor of ditches, is of tbe opinion that the irrigation funds can be more profitably expended in the construction of smaller ditches leading from the San Juan River. He accordingly recently submitted an estimate to construct ditch No. 3, surveyed by himself, at a cost of $3,885.87. Authority was granted for the expenditure of this sum by Supervisor Shoemaker, who had been made a special disbursing o5cer and bad given bond. The work of irrigating the Navaho lands along the San Juan River will be pushed and the Indians encouraged to locate upon and cultivate the lands when irrigated. Thie course seems to be the only way to place the Navaho in a position to become self-supporting and comfortable. SALES OF INDIAN LANDS. Inherited Lands (aat Hay 27,1902).-The amended rules for the con-veyance of inherited Indian lands approved October 4 1902, provide that a list of such laud as is to be offered for sale must be posted in the o5ce of the Indian agent or other officer in charge for ninety days from the first Monday after a petition for the sale of the land has been filed. By reasouof this amendment no deed for inherited Indian land was approved by the Department until March 4,1903. Since that date the sale of inherited Indian land has steadily prograssed, and it appears from the volume of business being transacted that the Indian heirs are, as a rule, taking advantage of the law authorizing them t.o sell and convey such land as is inherited by them from some deceased lndian allottee. The descent and distribution of allotted Indian laud is governed by the l m of descent in force in the severaI State8 and Terrihies wherein the land is situated. There is some doubt as to whether this provision is the best that could have been made, for under the law each member of the Indian tribe received an allotment without regard to age or sex, thereby distributing the tribal real property among men, women, and children. Certain unusual conditions arise by rea-son of this distribution, and the application of such laws of descent.to the real property so distributed in some inshnces works an injury to the Indians and in others creates much inequality. The injury arises where a white man has married an Indian woman and sub-sequently deserted her, leaving more or less offspring of the marriage. In such instances, if these children die, the white husband, as a rule, inherits all of their allotted land to the exclusion of the mother and the surviving brothers and sisters, if any, who in equity are entitled to at least a portion of it. The inequality arises largely from the fact that as a rule these laws of descent provide that the father shall be entitled to all the estate owned by any deceased child who ies without |