THE INDIAN -A SUBJECT FOR ART 



By E. W. Deming 



Illustrations from canvases by E. W. Deming and photographs by Edward S. Curtis 



THE Indian of the old time has passed away, although a few old men 

 of the race still live, and we have certainly very little to be proud 

 of in the record of our dealings with him. He received us with 

 generous hospitality and has rarely broken a treaty with us, while we have 

 seldom kept one. Every Indian war has been the result of our avarice. 

 We have brought him disease which has killed off whole tribes as the Man- 

 dan were killed off in 1837. For civilization brought disastrous changes 

 to this race too primitive to possess the necessary adaptability. The 

 Indian was a meat-eater. Rapidly the supply dwindled under the encroach- 

 ments of the white man and he was forced to depend on the "provisions" 

 of civilization, seldom obtained first-class. He had lived in some rude 

 habitation like the tipi which was a sanitary dwelling, never closed, with 

 fresh air always coming in, and moreover continually moved from one place 

 to another. The life that he now leads in houses which he keeps airtight 

 has killed off a good part of every tribe. Many die of consumption. 



We have cheated the Indian out of his land and his furs — worse than 

 cheated him — we have traded him liquor and by this means debauched 

 him. He was a great orator and although he has never had a historian, 

 we get a glimpse here and there of the power of his speeches. He was a 

 great hunter. He was a mighty warrior — we have adopted his mode of 

 fighting. His mythology and folklore rank with the mythology and folk- 

 lore of the white race. 



It has been my good fortune since a time some fifty years ago to live 

 with many tribes of this race, with Sioux, Crow, Blackfoot and Apache, 

 most with the Indians of the Plains, with Pueblo and also with the Winne- 

 bago. I have hunted and shot with the members of many tribes, but 

 could never come up to any in tracking. They honored me by adopting 

 me into their tribes and in that way I came into close touch with Crow, 

 Blackfoot and Sioux. But this is what I wish to say that in all this inti- 

 mate knowledge of them I have never had an oldtime Indian betray a 

 confidence. My grandfather, who knew Indians well throughout his life, 

 said that he had never refused to trust an Indian and that he had never 

 had an Indian betray his trust. 



It is very difficult indeed for a white man to interpret the Indian's point 

 of view, wholly impossible perhaps unless he lives with the Indian for many 

 years. The death of Dr. William Jones has been one of the hardest blows 

 to our knowledge of Indian history and mythology. He was part Indian 

 and had the Indian's point of view together with the white man's, which he 

 had gained through a good education. He was scientific as an observer. 



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