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Show XXIV REPORT OF THE COM.ISIISSIONER OF INDIAN AFFAIRS. cruelty to force him to abandon' the vicious and barbarous sun dance, where he lacerates his flesh, and dances and tortures himself erenunto death 7 Is it cruelty to the Indian to force him to hare his daughters edu&ted and married under the lams of the land, instead of selling them at a tender age for a stipulated price into concubinage to gratify the brutal 111sts of ignorance and barbarism l Having been gorerned in my action. solely by what I believed to ho the real interests of the Indians, I have been gratified to receive from eminent educators and missionaries the strongest assurance of their hearty and full concurrencein the propriety and necessity of the order. TWO of them I take the liberty to append herewith. The firstis from a former missionary among the Sioux; the second from an Indian agent of long experience, who has been exceedingly active in pushing theedu-cational interests of his Indians. As I understand it, your policy is to have the Indian taught Euglish instead of his mother tongue. I am glad you have hadthe oourage to taka thisstep, and I hope you may find that support which the justice and rightness of the step deserve. Before you came to admhister the affairs of the country the Republicansthought well tonn-dertska similar work in the Government aohools, but laeked the oourege to touch the work of the mission ~ohoolsw here i t was needed. If the wisdom of such work was recognized in the Government schoolr, u.hy not reoo&ize the wisdon~o f making it ceneral 8 When I was in Dakota as s missionarv &moo-s t he Sioux. I waa muoh im- pressed with the gmve inj~~s t idoosn e the Indian in all matters of trade, because he could not speak the laurnaxe in whieh the traderas transacted. This steo will hcln him out ofthe diffioulcy air1 lift him a. long way nearer equality with the whi& man. h i n g them is now being considerable said in the public press about the Indisu Office prohibiting the teaching of thovernaculnr to thelnditlus in Indiansohaols, and having been connected vith the Indian service for the past sixteen year% eleven years of which I hare been Indian agent and had ~choolsu nder my charge, Ideaire to state that I am a atrong advocate bf instruction to Indians in the English Ian-gnage only, as being able to read and write in the qernaoular of the tribe is but little use to them. Nothing can be goincd by teaching Indians to rend and write in the vernacular, as their litcrsture is limitednnd much valuable time would be lost in at-tempting it. Furthermore, I have fount1 the vernaonlar of the Siqur very mislcad-ing, while s full knowledge of the English enable8 the Indiana to transact business as individuals and to think sud act for themselves indeoendentla of each other. As I understand it, the order applies to children of schoobgoing ages (from six to aixteen years) only, and that missionaries are et liberty to Us0 the vernacular inrelig-ions instruatioos. This is essential in exohinin-e the -oreoe-ots of the Christian re-ligiou to adult Indiana who do not understand English. Iu my opinion sehm1s conducted in the vernmular are detrimental to oivilirntion. They encourage Indians to adhere to their time-honored cnstoms and inherout super-stitions whieh the Go~ermmenht a8 in every way sought to overcome, ,and which can only be aocornplished by adopting uniform rules requiring instruction in the Engliah language exclusively. I also append an extract on kl~is subject from one of the leading religious weeklies : English is the Ian-c ua-ae overwhelm in el^ se.o ken bv over sixtv millions of o.e on.i e. Oornido of these, t11cn' aru trro hundred thouaan,l Indiana old euuugh to talk \rhu usc ~h a n~l n ' d d i~l e emt an,y of whichrrrens u!~iotvlli~ihlton thoseayeakingthe othrrclio- |