ent Grant placed them under control of the churches, making them
responsible for all their Indian agents, whom the churches were to
nominate. But as fraud and war have been more or less as rampant as
ever, it seems that the first thing should be, to relieve the Indians
from church rule, and recognize at once the Indian's inalienable right
to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness," the same as we claim
for ourselves; so long as they do not disturb the peace or violate the
rights of their white neighbors, we have no right to interfere with
either their religion or laws upon their reserves. It is this
meddlesome injustice which makes all the trouble; it would make
trouble with any other community, if another religious sect should be
allowed to dominate over them in all their affairs. It is not Indian,
but human, nature, to do so, the world over. Dr. Bland, editor of _The
Council Fire_, says:

"I have been long and intimately acquainted with many tribes.
I find that they are not savages, but the peers of white men,
with great self-respect, a high sense of honor, and love of
truth."

Even the civilized tribes still retain their mutual confidence. Hence,
they use no locks, no bolts nor bars, when absent from their homes; a
stake in the ground, about three feet from the door, is a sufficient
guarantee from intrusion. It would be deemed a reflection upon
neighborly honor to lock a door in the Indian Territory. I was there
when they built their first prison; they now number sixty thousand,
most of whom have lived there forty years, and then, they said,

"The new railroad brought so many white renegades among us
that we had to build a prison for them."

I asked, "What do you do when one Indian kills another?" They
answered: "We have a trial, and if the killing was without great
cause, we sentence the guilty one to be killed by the near of kin to
his victim; we appoint the time and the place, and we have never known
an Indian to fail to come voluntarily in time for his own execution."

They believe that the Great Spirit will give all the hell or all the
heaven that each deserves; that there is no possibility of escape from
a just penalty and no danger of losing a deserved heaven, but to them
it is unjust to hope for anything on the merits of another. H. W.
Beecher said in his first lecture after his return from the Pacific
Coast:

"I made special inquiry of those who are posted on Indian