The mounted police is said to be the best force 

 of its kind in the world, and numbers over one thousand 

 men. They patrol the whole Northwest, including the 

 provinces of Assiniboia, Saskatchewan, Athabasca and 

 Alberta, keeping in order the Indian population as well 

 as the rest of the inhabitants who might be inclined to 

 stra}' from the right path. 



Canada's treatment of the Indian problem has long 

 been acknowledged as wiser, more humane and more suc- 

 cessful than ours has been, and, as a result, we see the 

 prairies dotted everywhere with Indian tents, the men 

 being occupied with the business of farming or grazing of 

 cattle. They follow these pursuits contentedly and appar- 

 ently with good financial results. They are well dressed, 

 seemingly prosperous and have overcome their instinctive 

 desire tor the excitement of the hunter's life. 



What a sad sight is the great square piles of buffalo 

 bones stacked up at different stations awaiting shipment 

 to the East, where they usefully wind up their existence 

 in the sugar refineries and manufactories of phosphates. 

 The men who gather tlie bones up on the prairies and 

 haul them to the station get six dollars per ton. As an 

 indication of the extent of the business, the quantity sent 

 forward from JNIoosejaw Station alone is counted by the 

 hundred carloads. 



When it is recollected that the few pounds of bleached 

 bones, forming one skelton and bringing perhaps ten 

 cents at the cars, were once the framework of the noblest 

 animal that ever roamed over the continent, and that had 

 he even been slightly protected by law, by common .sense 

 or by humane feelings, he would have furnished us with the 



48 



