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land. My friends, I told
you the other day that the President of the United States, the
Secretary of the
Interior and the Commissioner of Indian Affairs hare your interests at
heart
and the interest of all the Indians, but that they are powerless to
stop the
tide of emigration and stop the opening up of the surplus lands of
Indian
reservations. All persons connected with the Department of the
Interior, having
charge of the Indians, are very desirous that I conclude an agreement
with you
for that tract of land, so that you may thus secure the residue that
will be
left, that is your reduced reservation. As
I told you the other day, the entire reservation as
defined by that agreement
of 1889, contains about 800,000 acres of land; the cession of that
western
portion which we desire, would leave you about 544,000 acres, which
would allow
about 400 acres for every man, woman and child belonging to your
reservation. The only object in the
past for Indians to
have large tracts of land was the advantage of having hunting grounds,
but game
is not only steadily but rapidly disappearing. When
I first went among the Indians west of the Missouri
river the
plains were covered with buffalo. Today
there is not a buffalo in the country except a few that are in parks
owned by
cities and private individuals. The
bear, otter, beaver, fox and even the wolf are disappearing from the
country. You people are very fortunate
here in having a magnificent lake, which affords you a great many fish,
but in
a few years more there will be no game in the country.
Therefore this tract of land that I ask you
to cede is of little value to you as it is, that is, you derive very
little
benefit from it at the present time. The game will soon disappear and
there is nothing
there that you can realize anything from except to locate upon it and
cultivate
the land, but you have a much better country for your homes right here,
within
the proposed diminished reservation, than you would have out there, and
you
would be very much happier to remain here,
