Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 20, Number 24, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 November 1898 — WELL-BRED INDIAN MAIDENS. [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

WELL-BRED INDIAN MAIDENS.

Two Cherokee Girls Who Would Be at Home in Society. The average man’s impression of an Indian woman is that she is unkempt, of coarse appearance, entirely lacking in all that partakes of refinement and generally tending toward still deeper degradation. It is unfortunately too true that the picture will fit too many females of the red-skinned race, but not all by any metuis. Notable as exceptions are the Cherokee women, two fair specimens of whom are pictured, They are Jennie Thomas and Ellen Thomas of Chelsea, I. T. In the Cherokee language their names are respectively Wish-na-wa-ga and Lak-no-va, la, daughters of two well-to-do members of the prosperous Cherokee tribe. Both the girls are well educated, of more than average good looks, vivacious and generally well-fitted to take

their place* In i>olUv society. This they aro Ln no mood to do, preferring the freedom and unconventlorealfty of life as they find It 4n the place of their nativity. The women of their tril>e are almost always of fine figure and graceful carriage, the only particularly noticeable feature that perhaps detract* in a measure from their good looks being the high cheek bones that are apparent in even the sixteenth-blood Indians. The voice of the Indian girl Is never hoarse or coarse, but low and musical.

CHEROKEE GIRLS.