the Tsimseans, which caused them to be so unanimous in their applications to us for government aid in sending teachers to them.

In a report made by me to the Commissioner of Indian Affairs on my return, which was also published in the Port Townsend Argus, September 3, 1877, I dwelt at length on this subject, and strongly recommended that our government adopt towards the Alaska Indians a similar policy to that so successfully enforced in British Columbia, at the two missions of Metlakatla and Fort Simpson, a short account of which will serve to explain the method which I would suggest our government adopt in its future management of the Alaskan tribes.

In October, 1857, Mr. William Duncan, a missionary, schoolmaster, and catechist, and graduate at Highbury Episcopal Training College of the Church Missionary Society of London, was selected to fill the post of teacher and missionary at Fort Simpson, and, with no other aid than the stipend paid him by the society and occasional donations from charitable persons in England and in Victoria, he has succeeded in making the Indians under his charge a self-sustaining people, and their settlement is a model which many of our pioneer communities might emulate with profit.

In May, 1860, Mr. Duncan, finding the locality of the post at Fort Simpson unsuited to his purpose, removed to his present place at Metlakatla, some twenty miles south, where he established a town. Here, acting in turns as minister, schoolmaster, physician, builder, arbitrator, magistrate, trader, and teacher of various mechanic arts, he has labored so successfully that they now own a schooner trading regularly to Victoria; they have a joint stock trading-house, a market-house, a soap-manufactory, blacksmith-shop, saw-mill, an octagon-shaped school-house, which cost nearly $4,000, a building 90 feet by 30, used as a court-house, for public meetings, and to accommodate strangers, a mission-house 64 feet by 32, containing seven apartments on the groundfloor, a spacious dormitory above, and outbuildings. Also a church, a woolen factory, where they weave blankets and common flannel on a machine supplied them by the proprietors of the Mission Mills at San Francisco, a rope and twine factory, a tannery, a boot and shoe factory, and a variety of other useful things impossible for me here to particularize.

The British Government recognizes Mr. Duncan's great work, and directs all its officials in the navy and army, who may be on the coast of British Columbia, to render him such aid as he may need. But there his connection with his government ends. He has done this work with the voluntary aid and contributions of the Indians, and is by their help rendered independent of any outside support to carry on the mission work. There are no paid officials, no annuities, no treaties, and no thieving Indian agents, but the whole is managed just as any community of white people manage their town affairs.

After Mr. Duncan left Fort Simpson, he was succeeded by Rev. Mr. Crosby, of the Wesleyan Mission. What I have written of Mr. Duncan can be said of Mr. Crosby. Both these gentlemen are doing a great and marked good in their respective missions and the only way in which the Dominion Government of Canada takes care of them is through its efficient Indian commissioner, Dr. John W. Powell, of Victoria, who annually visits those missions and all the coast tribes in the Dominion steamer Sir James Douglas, and who is ready at all times to co-operate with Messrs. Duncan and Crosby in enforcing the laws of the Dominion relative to Indian affairs.

The coast tribes of British Columbia are quite as savage as those of Alaska. They all have trade and intercourse with each other, and their manners and customs are identical, and, as the Alaskan Indians are desirous of having schools and teachers as the British Columbia Indians have, it seems to me to point out the true method by which our government can manage those natives.

I am averse to all treaties and reservations, with their expensive machinery of agents and employés paid by the government, and of paying an uities to Indians to encourage them in idleness. That policy has been the ruling one since the days of George Washington. We all have seen the great error and the little good of that policy, but have been unable to avert or amend it. But Alaska is an exception to our Indian population. Separated from the States and Territories by British Columbia, her Indian tribes have no affinity with or knowledge of the working of our treaty system, and they present a fresh field of operation.

I respectfully suggest that the British Columbia plan, which has proved so eminently successful, be adopted. I would recommend that the various religious denominations send out missionaries, so that every tribe may be supplied. In order to do this, a commission should be sent to Alaska to ascertain just where and how many of these missions should be established, and then each missionary society be invited to select and send men fitted for the work, who would go in the same spirit, and with the same capacity, executive, ministerial, and financial, that Messrs. Duncan and Crosby have, and the whole to be under charge of one general superintendent, who, like Dr. Powell, should visit every mission once or twice each year, and report to the government in Washington. Such missions should be aided by the government to enable them to

start in a proper manner, but there would be no necessity for any great appropriation, for, as at Metlakatla and Fort Simpson, the missions should be self-supporting.

From my own knowledge and experience and long observation, I feel justified in asserting that the Alaskan Indians are now just in that state in which they would receive teachers most cordially, and would do as much as the Tsimseans have done for the missions at Fort Simpson and Metlakatla. This plan is no theory of mine, nor is it a new thing. It is a plan which has been in successful operation in British Columbia for many years, and is one peculiarly adapted to the Indians of Alaska, one which many of them have seen in successful operation, and one which they heartily indorse, and wish introduced among them. On the score of economy, it is eminently superior to any system we now have regarding Indian management, and, as regards benefiting the Indians in every respect, we have only to refer to the missions I alluded to for proof of its excellence. But above all things, this system is to be recommended for its freedom from change.

The question is often asked, and never with more pertinence than at the present time, when the subject of turning over the Indian Bureau to the War Department will be a leading topic in the next Congress, "What good has been done to the Indians by the peace policy, and why do we not see better results?" The answer is apparent to the most casual observer: it is the constant change of agents and the constant change of policy of every new incumbent in the office of Indian Commissioner. What is wanted more than anything is permanence of plan; and to accomplish this, a policy should be adopted of having good men like those I have named remain in position during good behavior, or so long as they are accomplishing good and beneficial results. This cannot be done under our present system, where every Indian agent feels that his appointment is only for four years and a change of administration is sure to turn him out of office. It is this change, more than anything else, which has induced so many men of weak moral stamina to pay more attention to enriching themselves, rather than to do their duty and carry out treaty stipulations. This change has more to do with our Indian troubles than most people are aware of. The Indian mind is not given to change, least of all sudden changes of policy; he may change his habitation and roam about, but his mind is stoical and fixed; and it is only by a long series of years, and the most careful and discreet exercise of judgment by those placed over him, that he can be induced to give up the wild legends and traditions of his forefathers and to adopt the manners and customs of civilized life.

The records of the Indian Bureau are full of accounts of frequent changes of agents and changes in administrative capacity. The Indian is told at the time of making a treaty what the government will do for him, and he places faith in the promise; but when such promises, solemnly made by a great nation, are so frequently and ruthlessly broken, he loses all faith, and considers the Great Father in Washington as a myth, whose name is synonymous with that of the "Shitan" of the Turk.

I am now writing at the Makah Indian Agency, instituted by the treaty of Neeah Bay. This agency was inaugurated under Agent Henry A. Webster, whose wise policy was being understood and accepted by these Indians, who were being gradually drawn from their savage ways and induced to look upon civilization in a more favorable light. The improvements he caused to be made, in erecting good and substantial buildings, in fencing, and clearing land, in making good roads, in raising great crops of potatoes, which were all distributed among the Indians, and in causing whole villages to assume an appearance of neatness, in his encouragement of their industries, and in the education of their children, was not lost upon the Indian mind; but he was relieved from the position, and since then four other agents have been in charge, each of whom had different views, and to-day I see the very improvements which I assisted to make while Mr. Webster was agent have been allowed to become dilapidated, and show evidence of utter shiftlessness and neglect. Buildings out of repair, roads impassable, fences covered with moss and rotting down, and not one acre of land cleared in addition to what we cleared during Mr. Webster's agency. The Indians see this, and daily I hear the remark that Mr. Webster was the best agent they ever had, and they ask to have the old policy restored. I can see and understand if Mr. Webster's plan had been continued to the present time, the great amount of good which would have resulted. But, instead, I find these Indians, with but few exceptions, and those principally of the school children, the same breechless savages they were when I first came here as an employé in 1862, an appearance which so disgusted Colonel Watkins, the Indian inspector, who was here a year ago, that he pronounced them the dirtiest set of savages he had ever seen on the whole continent.

Now this state of things has been simply the result of a continued change of agents. I do not make these remarks to reflect upon their present agent, who has been in charge only a few months, with but small means to work with, whose plans and views seem to be similar to those of Mr. Webster, but simply as an illustration of the remark I have made, of the bad effects on Indians of repeated changes.

The policy I suggest will find but little favor in the eyes of those persons who are

deep in the hidden mysteries of Indian rings, as there will be no great amount to be distributed among Indians by underpaid agents, and no prospective profits to loom up in the distant horizon of fraudulent contractors, by this policy; but if you, as the agent of the government, could visit Metlahkatla and Fort Simpson and see the working of this mission system, and visit the various Alaskan tribes as I did, I am confident you would pronounce my statement correct.

I would not presume to offer any views about the detail or the working of this plan; that is a matter for the investigation of commissioners, who, by conferring with Indian Commissioner Powell in Victoria, and going personally to Metlahkatla and Fort Simpson and to the various Alaskan tribes as far as Sitka, could be better able to suggest what, in their opinion, would be the best course to pursue. A commission could easily and economically be sent to Alaska from Port Townsend, who could visit every place I have named and be able to report before the adjournment of the present Congress. I can only say that the winter is the best time for such visits to be made, as the Indians would all be at home in their winter quarters, and if I can aid in any way or assist in developing this plan, even though it should not be ultimately adopted by Congress, I shall feel that I have been engaged in a good work for the red men of Alaska.

I am aware that these views of mine will be met with the statement, that the religious denominations have already, under the peace policy, furnished Indian agents, and that in very many instances their selections have proved failures. But simply being a professor of religion, or a minister of the gospel, does not prevent those who have an inborn cussedness from using their religion as a cloak under which they have carried out their thieving propensities. But in this place there is nothing to excite the cupidity of theological mawworms or Aminadab Sleeks; they are the very last people who would seek for an opportunity to do true missionary work as is done in British Columbia; and when we reflect that there are no soldiers, or Indian agents, or Indian treaties in all that country like we have in the United States, that they have no Indian wars as we have, and that Commissioner Powell, by the aid afforded him of the use of the naval vessels at Esquimault, has been able to suppress revolt, and keep all the coast tribes, under his jurisdiction, quiet, and at a trifling expense, it seems to me that it would be the part of wisdom if our government would at least inquire into this system before resorting to old, wornout theories, or attempting untried new ones.

There is much more to be said in favor of this proposition, but I fear I have already been too prolix. I will, however, assure you that I am ready, and shall be glad if I can be of any further service to you on the subject of the Indians of Alaska.

Very respectfully and truly yours,

Maj. WM. GOUVERNEUR MORRIS,

Port Townsend, W. T.

JAMES G. SWAN.

This idea of having a commission visit Alaska for the purpose of location, &c., of mission schools is to my mind the best practical method for the accomplishment of the undertaking. It will be observed the honorable Commissioner of Indian Affairs recommends the appointment of a special agent for this purpose. The composition of such commission as Judge Swan suggests, in my judgment, should consist of three persons-an officer of the Army, an officer of the Indian Bureau, who should be a minister of the gospel, missionary, or teacher, and an officer of the Treasury Department.

I think the sending of a commission there during the coming winter would not be opportune. While it is true, as Judge Swan states, that all the Indians will be found at their respective camps at this time of the year, still, in view of the fact of the season being already so far advanced, before such commission could be organized, means provided for their expenses and transportation, the tour of inspection made and report ready for transmission to Congress, that body will have adjourned. The better plan, I am satisfied, would be to send the commission to Alaska not later than the first of next April, with full authority to visit every available point in the Territory and the British missions at Fort Simpson and Metlacatlah, and inquire into everything connected with the subject-matter with which they are charged. This report should be ready to be presented to the Congress which meets in December, 1879,