THE DECREASE OF THE NORTH AMERICAN INDIANS, 299 
test to be a vilest concoction of nauseous and most deadly drugs. The unwhole- 
some effects of such beverage may be readily imagined. Of disease the scrofu- 
lous taint has been the most malign. Some medical authorities claim that there 
is scarcely an Indian within the confines of the United States whose system is 
not to some extent infected with it. This is certainly an extravagant generaliza- 
tion; but the bare fact of its being ventured is evidence of the general prevalence 
and insidious virulence of this type of disease. The frequency of various 
strumous symptoms, and the development of the V-shaped jaw in some tribes ; 
and the alarming mortality among all Indians, of such diseases as affect particu- 
larly the glandular system, are momentous indications in the same direction. 
Obviously this is a catalogue of adverse influences that might well break the 
most buoyant and elastic constitution. The Indians have borne up against them 
with a surprising persistency, but the struggle has been unequal. The magnitude 
of the Iliad of their woes may be inadequately determined by the fact that in 
nearly every instance they have lost ground. In the greater number of cases 
they are still losing ground. The only question now before the friend of the 
Indian is whether this state of things shall continue; whether the decay shall be 
suffered to go on practically unhindered till most of the present tribes pass 
out of existence and become matters of interest solely to the philologist and 
inquisitive historian.* 
Nominally the question was decided years ago. Philanthropists have devised 
and applied not a few schemes for the saving and civilization of the Indian. But 
in practice, with here and there a remote exception, the choicest schemes have 
proven altogether nugatory, if, indeed, not prejudicial. The Indian, as a class, 
remains still hopeless and helpless. To him, as also to his would-be benefactor, 
the experience of the past is not remarkably encouraging. 
Now, of means possible for the correction of the abuses under which the 
Indian is losing ground, as I have endeavored to show, there appear to be but 
two. I. The official, which involves a complete reconstruction of our adminis- 
trative policy with regard to them. The radical defect of the administration of 
Indian affairs hitherto has been that in their direction the goverenment has in 
fact, if not in principle, acted toward them as though they were a temporary 
burden incident to the acquisition of our newer territory, and its duty was simply 
to render easy their passage out of existence and not rather to elevate them into 
the only true existence—that of a man among fellow men. A pupilage, such as 
their present condition is sometimes complacently termed, lacks the one essential 
element of a true pupilage: it is not a state of preparation for better things. It 
is, so far as concerns the Indian, a perpetuity, ending only with his existence. 
*I am aware that the statement here offered will receive a prompt rejection from a considerable number of 
those who have made Indian history and affairs a topic of long and criticalinvestigation. Quite recently there 
has sprung up a strenuous tendency to go to the other extreme and claim that the Indians are in tle main 
_ steadily increasing. I believe the truth lies between. There are noteworthy instances of increase; but there 
_ are undoubtedly more that show a decrease. I have in this paper purposely refrained from giving lists of 
Statistics, that I might not trespass necessary limits; but I have also carefully refrained from stating aught that 
might not be verified by copious data. 
