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Show REPORT OF THE COMMILIBIONER OF INDIAN AFFAIRS. XXIII The cpndition of the Mission Indians of California becoma, jearly, more deplora.ble. These Indians are composed of the following tribes, T-~z: Seranos, Digenes, San Luis Rey, Coahuillas, and Owongos. They are estimated to number about 3,000, and their settlements a n scattered over portions of San Bernardino and San Diego Counties, and chiefly in the mountain and desert districts embraced in a range hundreds of miles in extent. In the last annual report of this ofice these Indians were made the subject of special mention. Attention was drawn to the fact that many of them were occupying, by sufferance, lands which their ancestors h& cultivated from time immemorial, and to which they supposed they had an indisputable right; but that such lands had been found to be within the limits of private land claims confirmed by the courts to grantees under the Mexican Government, before the acquisition of California by the United States; and that the owners thereof were threatening t.116 Indians with summary ejectment. Legislation, to provide them with suitable and permaneut homes, was urgently recommended, but beyond the introduction by Representative Page, of California, of a bill (H. R. 3728, 46th Congress, 2~1 session), appropriating the sum of $100,000 for the purchase of San Tsabel Rancho, in 8an Diego County, whioh, it may be remarked, is wholly nnfitted for the purposes of a reservation, no action was taken in Con-gress. By executive order, dated the 17th of January last, a prior executive order, dated December 27,1875, was canceled (so far as it related to the Aqua Caliente Reservation and a portion of the Santa Ysabel Reserw-tion), as being in conflict with certain prior land grants, severally known as the "Sen Jose del Vallel7 and "Valle de San Jose." Referring to this order, Aient Lawson, in his report for the current year, says: In conversation a few days ago with the preseat owner of the rsnolle (Sau Jose del Vaile), he inrormed me he was about to sell it, and before he could give possession the Indians must be removed. What these people will do in this event, m where they oan be placed, so aa to find subaiste~cein this sterile region of country, are question.% that I am not able to soaver. This is the situation of an eqoally large body of In-dieus now occnpying the Raneho San Jaointo, their ejectment being liable to occur at sn,y time. Thin, in short, ia the situation all around; and there being no unooonpied publio land*, except such as are uninhabitable, the only alternative left to these hith-erto peaceable and thrifty communities is to wander about singly or by fsmilies to awell thevagabond class that already infests the villages end towns, to become a prey to vices to which, as yet, foeg are oomparative strangers. - The agent also reports that about fifteen families imder similar cir-cumstances were a few months ago forced to remove from the Cucco Rabch, in San Diego County. In the season of 1879 tho supply of water for irrigating pnrposes on the desert, some 50 to SO miles distant from the agencx, wherehundreds of these Indians live, eutirely failed, and they werecompelled todepend |
