OCR Text |
Show 109 were comparatively small, yet the aggregated beneficent results to the Indians themselves cannot be easily esti- . mated. The products were not commensurate with the amount of ground cultivated, or with the work actually done. Many, after putting in their crops, when the time for visiting the mountains and settlements came, could not resist the temptation. Though they promised, and I doubt not intended, to return and attend to their crops, most of those who went failed to do so, and thus lost the result of their earlier labors. But those who remained or returned in season are now rejoicing in what to them seems a bountiful harvest. Among those specially worthy of commendation for their persevering efforts and success in farming I would mention Chief Tabby, whose example and counsels have been most salutary. There were also several sub-chiefs and other prominent Indians whose efforts are worthy of special praise. As the Indians take entire charge of their crops it is almost, if not quite, impossible to tell what was produced, but it is estimated that their wheat crop alone must have been about twelve hundred bushels. Had it not been for the cold, backward spring, and neglect on the part of many, the yield would have been very much greater. But, as before intimated, the full benefits of the year's labors are not to be estimated by the amount of products, but very largely by the moral and encouraging influence of those labors upon the Indians themselves , which is shown by their commencing even now to prepare ground for next year's crop. During my intercourse with these Indians I have never known them to be in better temper or have so much ambition to help themselves, wh^ch is shown by their commencing even now to prepare ground for next year's crop....with judicious encouragement and aid this agency might, in a few years, be brought nearly, if not quite, to a self-sustaining condition.9 Critchlow saw many things that men with more experience and more rank failed to see. He reasoned that herding was suited to the Utes and to the Uintah Basin, and that cattle herds should be bought for the Agency, especially since the largest single expenditure of funds at the Agency was for beef with which the Indians there subsisted 9lbid. |