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Show 152 REPORT OF THE COMMIESIONER OF INDIAN AFFAlRS. mountainous country, partly timberbd. H. H. Johnson, superintend-cnt of the Jicarilla Indian School, reports that much of the timber is matured and that some of it is dying rapidly. On March 5, 1906, a draft of legislation to govern this subject was prepared and forwarded to the Congress, with :quest that it be enacted into law. No action was taken by the Congress on the pro-posed legislation, and owing to the fact (as noted under the head of "Allotments," p. 81) that the Office desires to readjust the allotments 110 action has beer? taken looking to the sale of the timber. At the next session the Congress will again be requested to enact legislation recommended last March, or legislation of similar import, and as soon as such legislation is past and the allotments are readjusted the Office will take steps to comply with the provisions of the act of March 28, 1906. MONTAUK INDIANS. In 1SQG the legis!ature of New York past an act to enable the Mon-t a d tribe of Indians in that State to maintain suits to establish their rights to certain land situated at the extreme eastern end of Long Island. The act provided that no such action should be begun unless the consent, in writing, of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs were filed in the office of the clerk of the county in which.the venue of such action is laid; and three weeks' previous notice of the time and place of the application for consent must be given by publication in a newspaper of Suffolk Connty, N. Y. On the 17th of last May Charles G. Maas notified the Office that, as counsel for the Montauk Indians, he purposed to bring an action to establish their rights to certain easements which he believed they had in respect to certain lands, and in order that he might publish the notice required by the act he desired the Commissioner of Indian -4ffairs to fix a time and place of hearing. He was notified that a hearing would be given in this Office on June '29 at 2 o'clock. At the time set due proof by affidavit of the publication of the notice and a copy of the complaint were filed with the Commissioner. As no one appeared in opposition to the application, after hearing coun-sel for the Indians consent was given to the tribe to bring an action in the supreme court of New York, in the county of Suffolk, against Jane Ann Benson, Mary Benson, Frank Sherman Benson as ex-ecutor of the estate of Arthur W. Benson, deceased; Frank Sherman Benson, the Montauk Company, the Montauk Dock and Improvement Company, Alfred W. Hoyt, the Montauk Estension Railroad Com-pany, and the Long Island Railroad Company for the relief set out in the complaint, together with costs and disbursements. On the same date, but after the consent had been granted, a letter was received from Messrs. Daly, Hoyt & Mason, attorneys at law, of New York City, saying that they represented the defendants in this |
