330 ANTHROPOLOGY. 



one of the ablest red men now living. At the Fort Hall Agency, in 

 Idaho, there is another band that is thoroughly mixed up with the Ban- 

 nacks. The Northwestern Shoshonis have an agency in Utah; but this 

 band does not seem to be united at all, and is scattered over Western 

 Utah and Eastern Nevada. 'ihe Walpahpe and Yahooskin bands of 

 Shoshonis are in Oregon and formerly roamed about with the Modocs, 

 before their removal from Oregon, as they now do with the Klamaths 

 and Pi CTtes.| 



Nearly all of them receive annuities from the government, and some 

 effort has been made toward teaching them how to carry on farms, but 

 the farming land is generally so badly located, the frosts so severe, the 

 grasshoppers so plentiful, and the altitude so great, that, in most in- 

 stances, but little can be said in favor of these farming operations. It 

 would be difficult for the best American farmers to raise crops on some 

 of the reservations that have been set apart for the Indians, and I do 

 not think that we ought to expect more from them than we can from our 

 own race. 



By far the larger portion of the eastern reservation is barren and 

 mountainous. The valley of the Little Wind River, in which the agency 

 is situated, contains eight or ten sections of land which can be irrigated 

 and cultivated. There is little or no wood except on the mountain-sides, 

 distant some ten or twenty miles from the agency, if we except some 

 tine shade-trees along the course of the river. The Wind River Mount- 

 ains are supposed by the Indians to be the home of the spirits, and they 

 believe a person can see the spirit land, or the land they will occupy 

 after death, from the top of them. They are fond of describing the beau- 

 ties of this land, and the enjoyments and pleasures they Mill find therein: 

 fresh and pure streams; wide prairies covered with grass and flowers, 

 and abounding in deer; beautiful squaws to wait upon them; horses, 

 always ready and never tired, to take part in the chase; new lodges 

 supplied with every comfort, and provisions and meat so plentiful that 

 they will never again suffer the pangs of hunger. 



These [ndians have not much of an idea of God, though they be- 

 lieve in Tamapah, or Sun-Father, who is the Father of the Day and 

 Father of us all, and lives in the sun. They believe that when a good 

 Indian dies, he falls into a beautiful stream of bright, fresh water, and 

 is carried to the pleasant grounds 1 have described, whereas when a 

 bad Indian dies, he falls into a stream of muddy, filthy water, and is 

 borne off to a dark and noisome swam]), where he is unhappy, dirty, 

 and miserable. When an old man is dying he finds himself near the top 

 of a high hill on the Wind River Mountains, and, as the breath leaves 

 his body, he reaches the top of it, and there, in front of him, the whole 

 magnificenl Landscape of eternity is spread out, and the Sun-Father is 

 there to receive him and to do everything in his power to make him happy. 

 They recognize the fact that there is a difference in the future state 

 made be1 \\ ecu the good and the bad, though the idea of eternal torment 



