OCR Text |
Show REPORT OF THE twenty-one Indians of the following tribes or hands, vie: the Alseas, Cooses, Umpquas, and Senslaws, a11 of whom are parties to the treaty already named as not having been ratified. Like their brethren at the Siletz agency, they are greatly dissatisfied because of their treaty not having been &ned into effeot. The amount of arable and pasture land at this agency is v e ~ ylim ited, but is amply sufficient for the wants of the small number of Indians. They have the best of fisheries, and an abundance of game is found in the adjacent mountains, so that, with hut little assistance from the government, they would vevsoon be in comfortable circumstances, and the agency become self-supporting. From the foregoing summary of Indian affairs within this superintendency it will he seen that, considering the vast amount of good to be accomplished for the whites as well as the Indians, they may, by a comparatively emall outlay, be placed in a most satisfactory and promising condition. I most earnestly comrnend the whole subject to your consideration, and through you to that of the approaching Congress, and trust that the various recommendations and sug-gestions may be carefully considered and meet with that liberal response to which I believe them entitled. CALIFORNIA SUPERINTENDENCY. The condition of Indian affairs within this superintendency is to me far from satisfactory, and I am fully satisfied that it can be materially improved as well in regard to economy as in promoting the welfare of the Indians and ridding the whites of the inconvenience and annoyance inseparable from the present system, or rather want of system, in organization. The State is divided into two districts, the northern and southern, involving the necessity of two superintending agents, both of whom reside at San Fran-ciscn, and both requiring offices and clerks. This, as I conceive, nearly, if not quite, doubles the expense of the service performed. The duties of a superintendent in Galifornia, who should perform all the labor incident to that position for the entire State, would not, in my opinion, prove more onerous than are those of the respective superintendents of sevcral of the superintendencies, and would certainly be far less so than are those of the central and southern. I see no good reason, then, why the government should be burdened with the expense of two superintendents. Within the northern district there are four Indian reservations owned by the government, viz: Klamath, Mendocino, Nome Lacke, and Round Valley. The first three of these are almost worthless as reserves. The buildings and im-provements have been suffered to fall into decay, the adjacent country is occu-p: ed and owned by whites, and many settlers, under one pretext or another, by permission of agents and without permission. have gone upon the reservations; and the result has been, that they are almost entirely abandoned by the Indiane, who prefer to gain a precarious living as beat they may, rather than submit to those vexations and aggressions incident to so close a proximity to the whit-, and often leading to arson, robberies and murder, as well on the part of the whites aa the Indians. Whether the whit= or the Indians are the more blama-ble for this state of affairs, it is very evident that these three reservations are no |