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Show REPORT OF THE ACTING COMMISBIONEE. 13 your direction instructions were forwarded to Agent Leavenworth to proceed forthwith to the place where these Indians agreed to meet Agent Labadi, to counsel with and endeavor to induce them to send some of their principal and most influential men to the council which the peace eommissioners appointed under the act of Congress of 20th July last proposed to hrlld with other Indians at Fort Larned about the 15th of October ultimo. Should they have agmed to do so, and their representatives have reached that point before the wo ~ kof the commission shall have closed, it may be expected that some arrangements have heen made with them for peace and friendly conduct towards the citizens of Texas. In that case quietude and a sense of security may be enjoyed by the people who have so long been kept in dread of attacks by these Indians, and suffered so much by their frequent outragel and depredations. Agent Labadi has received similar instructions. COLORADO SUPERINTENDENCY. There has been during the past year no very marked change in the condition of the Indians of this superintendency, and it will not likely be much improved until they are all concentrated upon reservations and furnished the means to enter upon a different mode of life to what they are now leading. I t does not appear that they are disposed at present to do this; on the contrary, they are averse to it. Yet it is their only remedy against the evils to which they are subjected and the inevitable consequences of the steady advance of the white race. The tribes in the ,two agencies established for the Territory are the Uinta and Grand River Utes and the Tahequache Utes, together numbering about I 6,500. With the former a treaty was made in 1866 by Governor Gommings, which secured to the government routes of travel through the country claimed by them, and provides indemnity for the interference by citizens and the railroad company with their hunting grounds, and for the destruction of timber. I con-cur in the opinion expressed by this office, in submitting the treaty to your department last January, that it should be ratified. In regard to the Tahequache Utes, Agent Head reports that their manage-ment has caused him much anxiety, and he is more than ever impressed with the importance of removing them to the reservation provided in their treaty of 1863. Events, and the condition of things hitherto, have prevented the adoption of measures for that end, but should there he no special legislation by Congress respecting the matter of colonizing all the tribes in Colorado in one locality, tho efforts of the department will be directed to the securing of this object at the earliest practicable date. The Mohnaehe Utes, living in the noithelp part of New Mexico, who are related by intermarriage with the Tabequache band, and speaking the same language, should be removed to that reservation, or one near it, and some pro-vision made for their support. MONTANA SUPERINTEXDENCY. In the absence of annual reports, except that of Agent Wright, from this superintendency, I am nnable to make such a statement of the condition of the service within its hounds as could be desired. The Blackfeet hands have always been more or less hostile with the whites, and with some of their Indian neighbors. In 1865 a treaty,was made for a cession of the country elaimed by them, lying south of the Missouri, the object being to throw open to settlement a section supposed to contain precious metals. No action has baentaken upon it in consequence of the Indians having, soon after, violated its stipulations by renewing hostilities. The necessity for such an arrangement as it proposed still exists, and if the treaty is not to be ratified, another should he negotiated. |