Rensselaer Republican, Volume 16, Number 32, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 17 April 1884 — Canada’s Treatment of the Indian. [ARTICLE]

Canada’s Treatment of the Indian.

Canadian statesmen say that the Indians in the States would not cost any more than they do if Congress boarded them all at the rnth Avenue Hotel, whereas in Canada each Indian costs a little less than would keep a private in the army. There are about a quarter of a million Indians split up into little bands, whose reserves are sprinkled over the land like the lakes of Maine. The Government keeps an account with each band, sells for them what lands are not wanted, and holds $3,000,000 ifi trust for them. It instructs them in farming, provides them with implements, seeds and cattle, instructs their children, and feeds all who qeed food with pork and grain. Already the home farms, where the savages were shown hpw to till the soil, are rapidly being closed up, and the rations of food are being withdrawn from one band after another as the Indians manifest ability to store and preserve their crops through the winters. Nearly all the Indians do something toward self-support. Some make baskets, some make snowshoes and toboggans, others sell furs, others make barrels, others catch fish, and so on. Five years ago the .Slackfeet were on the war path. Now almost every family has a house and farm.— New York Sun. . <