Lippincotts Magazine of Popular Literature and Science | Page 8

peaceful offices of a blacksmith, whose curious little shop,
bearing the suggestive name of "Ute," is seen near the bridge. Here
bronchos, mules and burros are fitted with massive shoes by this
frontier Vulcan and sent rejoicing upon their winding and rocky ways.
Our sleepy gaze follows along Santa Fé Avenue, and the eye sees little
that is suggestive of a modern Western town. But soon comes noisily
along a one-horse street-car, which asserts its just claims to popular
notice in consequence of its composing a full half of a system scarce a
fortnight old by filling the air with direful screeches as each curve is
laboriously described. And later, when the magnificent overland train,
twenty-six hours from Kansas City, steams proudly up to the station,
fancy can no longer be indulged. The old has become new. The great
Plains have been bridged, and the outposts of but a decade ago become
the suburbs of to-day.
[Illustration: OLD BRIDGE.]
Doubtless Old Si Smith now and then indulges in reveries somewhat
similar, but his retrospections would be of a minute and personal
character. To warm up the average frontiersman, however--and Old Si
is no exception--into a style at once luminous and emphatic and
embellished with all the richness of the border dialect, it is only
necessary to suggest the Indian topic. However phlegmatically he may
reel off his yarns, glowing though they be with exciting adventure, it is
the red-skins that cause his eyes to flash and his rhetoric to become
fervid and impressive. To him the Indian is the embodiment of all that
is supremely vile, and hence merits his unmitigated hatred. Killing
Indians is his most delightful occupation, and the next in order is
talking about it. His contempt for government methods is unbounded,
and the popular Eastern sentiment he holds in almost equal esteem. The
Smith brothers have had a varied experience in frontier affairs, in
which the Indian has played a prominent part. They hold the Western

views, but with less prejudice than is generally found. They argue the
case with a degree of fairness, and many of their opinions and
deductions are novel and equally just. Said Stephen Smith to the writer:
"We've got this thing reduced right down to vulgar fractions, and the
Utes have got to go. The mineral lands are worth more to us than the
Indians are"--this with a suggestive shrug--"and if the government don't
remove them from the reserves, why, we'll have to do it ourselves.
There's a great fuss been made about the whites going on the Indian
reserves; and what did it all amount to? Maybe fifty or sixty
prospectors, all told, have got over the lines, dug a few holes and hurt
nobody. But I suppose the Indians always stay where they ought to! I
guess not. Some of them are off their reserves half the time, and they
go off to murder and kill. Do they ever get punished for that? Not much,
except when folks do it on their own account. But let a white man get
found on the Indian reserves and there's a great howl. I want a rule that
will work both ways, and I don't give much for a government that isn't
able to protect me on the Indian reserves the same as anywhere else.
Some years ago Indian troubles were reported at Washington, and
Sherman was sent out to investigate. Of course they heard he was
coming, and all were on their good behavior. They knew where their
blankets and ponies and provisions came from. Consequently, Sherman
reported everything peaceful: he hadn't seen anybody killed. That's
about the kind of information they get in the East on the Indian
question.
"Misused? Yes, the Indians have been misused, badly misused. I know
that. But who have they misused? This whole country is covered with
ruins, and they all go to show that it has been inhabited by a
highly-civilized race of people. And what has become of them? I
believe the Indians cleaned them out long years ago; and now their turn
has come. I find it's a law of Nature"--and here the narrator's tone grew
more reverent as if touching upon a higher theme--"that the weak go to
the wall. It's a hard law, but I don't see any way out of it. The old
Aztecs had to go under, and the Indians will have to follow suit."
Whatever humanitarians and archæologists may conclude concerning
these opinions, they are nevertheless extensively held in the Far West.
The frontiersman, who sees the Indian only in his native savagery, who
has found it necessary to employ a considerable part of his time in

keeping out of range of poisoned arrows, and who must needs be
always upon the alert lest his family fall a prey