l6 GEN. R. H. PRATT: 



We, left in the surroundings of civilization, grow to possess 

 a civilized language, life and purpose. Transfer youth from 

 our highest civilized families to savage surroundings, and 

 they will grow to possess a savage language, superstition and 

 habit. Transfer the savage born youth to the surroundings 

 of civilization, and they will come to possess a civilized lan- 

 guage and habit. 



These results are inevitable and established over and over 

 again beyond all question, and it is also well established that 

 those advanced in life, even to maturity, of either class, soon 

 lose the already acquired qualities belonging to the side of 

 their birth, and gradually take on those of the side to which 

 they have been transferred. 



As we have taken into our national family ten millions of 

 Negroes, and as we receive foreigners at the rate of a million 

 a year, and assimilate them, it would seem that the time may 

 have arrived when we can ver}' properly make at least the 

 attempt to assimilate our 270,000 Indians, using these same 

 potent methods, and see if that will not end this vexed ques- 

 tion, and end the Indian as a curiosity, where he occupies so 

 much more space than he is entitled to, either by numbers 

 or worth. 



No evidence is wanting to show that the Indian can 

 become a capable and willing factor in our industries, if he 

 has the chance. What we need is administration which will 

 give him that chance. 



The highest purpose of all Indian schools ought to be to 

 prepare the young Indian to enter the public and other schools 

 of the country, and immediately he is so prepared, for his 

 own good and the good of the country, he should be for- 

 warded into these other schools, there to temper, test and stim- 

 ulate his brains and muscles into the capacity he needs for 

 his struggle to secure the good things of life in inevitable 

 competition with all our other people. 



The missionary can, if he will, do far greater service in 

 helping the Indian than he has done, but it will only be 



