NYYM_scrapbook_210

stringent laws for the government of thier slaves, and for binding thier Chains more strongly upon them. The Choctaw Indians. fifth day of the week and first of Twelfth month 1842. After having finished our visit to the Cherookees, Creeks, and Seminoles, we hired a private conveyance to Fort Smith, on the border of the Choctaw nation. We there took horses and rode fifteen miles to the Choctaw Agency and put up at a Tavern kept by an Indian woman. In the evening we had some conversation with a young Indian who had been educated at the Choctaw accademy in Kentucky; he was not very flattering. We learned while in the Nation that at the Council lately held on Red River, the Choctaws resolved not to have anything more to do with that school. Their annual Council was in Session near the Red River where the greater part of the Choctaws reside. Many of the Indians near Red River are said to live well, they keep slaves, and raise Cotton for thier own consumption, and for mar- ket, they also raise corn, wheat, potatoes and other vegetables, and keep large stocks of neat cattle, horses and swine, and a few of them have sheep, and make some cotton and woolen goods for thier slaves and for themselves. They have in general comfortable log houses and live like the new settlers in the west. They have six or eight schools in the nation, where the primary branches of an english education are taught; there are however but a small por- tion of the Choctaw Children who are recieving and education at schools, either in or out of the nation. We were informed that the Council now in Session, have resolved to establish two manual labour schools on an extensive plan. One them is to be located on Red River, and the other at Fort Coffee on Arkansas River; and one important feature in the plan about to be adopted by them is, that the female children of the nation, are to be educated at a place several miles distant from where the males are educated. They have appropriated Eighteen Thousand Dollars towards the support of these schools. It was reported that the Methodists were expecting to have the control of the one at Fort Coffee. We visited one of thier primary schools taught by a man from South Carolina, which consisted of about Twenty Scholars. We were pleased with the appearance of it, and thought the teacher was doing well for the scholars. He informed us that he had been engaged in this school since 1838. and had a salary of Eight hundred and fifty Dollars per annum. The Country owned by the Choctaws extends from the Arkansas to the Red River, and is generally fertile and well adapted to the grow- th of cotton, corn, wheat, and potatoes. Some of the Indians have embraced Chris- tianity, but the greater part of them still ad- here to thier old traditions. Some have become temparate, but dissipation, idleness, and thier kin- dred views are very prevalent amongst most of them. The Government and Civil policy of this Nation are similar to that of the Cherokees heretofore discribed. We saw a few of the Chickasaws, but ascertaining that there was no material difference between these Indians and the Choctaws, we did not consider ti important for us to make a special visit to them. They are settled on the Choctaws land, and speak the same language, and intermarry with them.