vember, a delegation from these Indians, headed by Black Kettle and Big Mouth, visited Gen. Hazen at Fort Cobb, and requested permission to bring their bands there to dwell with him. He declined to permit them to do so.

On the 15th of November, 1868, he made contracts for rations of beef and corn to supply the Indians for six months from that time, to be paid for monthly provided the officer receiving the rations was supplied with funds by the government; if he were without funds the payment was to be deferred until funds were provided. He had $50,000 set apart for his use by Gen. Sherman, and was expressly prohibited, in general order No. 4, from creating any obligation in excess of that sum. Like Harney, among the Sioux, he paid no attention to this limitation upon his action.

On the 7th of December, 1868, he advised Gen. Sherman that Col. Boone, the new agent of the Kiowas and Comanches, was at Fort Arbuckle, on his way to Cobb, but without any annuities, and advised that he do not come among the Indians without them, since so many promises have been made about these annuities and none of them carried out.

Not having much to do in fulfilling the stipulations of the treaties of 1867, with the Indians parties to them, since the Cheyennes and Arapahoes were outlawed, and the Apaches and many of the Kiowas and Comanches were still among the buffalo, Gen. Hazen amused himself in corresponding with Gen. Sherman in relation to the transfer of the Indian bureau to the war department. The Indian agent, in his opinion, was a poor fellow at best, and frequently the chum , and partner with the Indian trader. He exalted the horn of the army officer, and presented his fine points and qualifications for an Indian agent, and was satisfied there would be, in the transfer, a great economic advantage. This he illustrated in his own case. "Why," said he, "I will get the ration here for about one-half what was paid for it last year by the Indian bureau, and I think the same has been true in New Mexico, where the army has fed the Navajoes." This was all said on the 10th of November. On December 1, having then some Indians assembled to whom rations were issued, he wrote Gen. Sherman and said: "I am surprised how little money I

am getting on with, and I am informed that my expenses are only about one-tenth monthly what it has usually cost to care for the Indians here. I only feed the actual number of Indians present with a ration, all of which they require, while it has been the custom to bear upon the returns a vastly larger number, all of whom a ration was counted against, and so composed that most of the articles could either be neglected or commuted." The contents of this communication were so pleasing to Gen. Sherman, that in transmitting it to the secretary of war, he said: "Gen. Hazen's assertion that he only provides for such as he knows to be there, accounts for the other assertion that the subsistence of the Indians costs only one-tenth of former years. I hope the secretary of war wil be careful to have these papers, as also others of a similar kind, sent heretofore, carefully laid before the committee of Indian affairs of the Senate." He ought to have added, "since they may be valuable in promoting our scheme of the transfer of the Indians to the army."

Shortly after the arrival of Gen. Hazen at Fort Cobb, he received fifteen days' rations for the few Indians that were at that place, and one hundred head of beef cattle from the subsistence department of the army. The first of December may be assumed as the period at which he began to provide food for the Indians at Cobb, and his duties ceased on the 30th of June, 1869. He found he could not obtain the ration at six cents, as he had reported he could, but that the ration of beef and breadstuff, the latter sometimes reduced in quantity, would cost eight cents. He said, however, that for many months in the spring, summer, and autumn, but little beef was required, the buffalo affording ample meat, which the Indians preferred.

In November he wrote Peter Cooper, chairman of the New York Indian Commission, and invited one of the commission, or some person deputed by it, to visit Fort Cobb, and there, with him, study the condition and wants of the Indians. He said the government was assembling, under his direction, from 8,000 to 10,000 wild Indians at Cobb. Mr. Vincent Colyer, the secretary, was, upon this invitation, sent down to Fort Cobb. He was there after midwinter and

spent some time. On his departure, he brought away a census or statement of all Indians of both sexes, and all ages, belonging to the Southern Indian District, from actual count and the best authority. This statement was made up by an army officer (Captain Charles G. Penney), and embraced not only the Kiowa, Comanche, and Apache, but the Cheyenne and Arapahoe, and the Wichita and affiliated bands. It was of the date of February 1, 1869, and embraced not only the Indians present, and to whom the rations were issued, but those absent among the buffalo. The number of Indians at that time, of all ages, and including all the bands named, whether absent or present, was 7,638. Of this number, 3,241 were dwelling near Fort Cobb, and 4,397 were absent. General Hazen gave the gross number, on June 30, 1869, at 7,339, of which he estimated as on the reservation 4,339, and absent 3,000. It is believed that the number stated to be on the reservation, or rather near Fort Cobb, on the 1st of Februaryto wit, 3,241-would be a liberal estimate for the whole period. of the administration of General Hazen, although that officer estimated a larger number in the summer, when the Indians would naturally seek the buffalo, the meat of which they preferred. General Hazen reported that when he left, on June 30, 1869, there were supplies on hand sufficient for two months. This being so, he supplied rations for 3,241 Indians for nine months, which would require 884,793 rations; at 8 cents each, these rations would cost $70,783.44. To discharge this bill for rations alone, he had at his command only $50,000, of which he had expended for labor, $3,730; for traveling expenses, $610; for needful things for the Indians, such as clothing, medicine, implements, and two houses built for the chiefs, $4,410-in all, $8,750; leaving, of the $50,000, the sum of $41,250, to be applied to the ration account; and, when so applied, leaving due, on this account, the sum of $29,533.44. In his final report, he states that there is due from the government, on his accounts, $56,106.86, for which he submitted an exhibit in detail; but this is not printed with his report, although referred to in it. As the exhibit is not printed, it can not be aualyzed here; but it appears, from the

figures, that his indebtedness exceeds the cost of the rations, and the incidental expenses above stated, the sum of $26,573.42. In his report General Hazen said, that "the feeding of Indians here, the eight months before my arrival, was made a matter of grand speculation, amounting to fraud. An investigation of the matter shows that the United States paid some six times what the service was worth; and, unfortunately, much of this came from what was intended for the Indians' benefit in other ways." The document from which this extract is taken was prepared at Camp Wichita, and it is presumed had special reference to what occurred at the Wichita agency, the Indians of which, after his arrival at Fort Cobb, were under his supervision, and are embraced in those classed as on the reservation, and to whom rations were issued. Henry W. Shanklin was the agent of those Indians, but was not among them, or at the agency, after the 1st of October, 1868, having left because of the confused state of Indian affairs, growing out of General Sheridan's campaign "against the hostile Indians south of the Arkansas." He had under his care while agent, in addition to the Wichita and affiliated bands, the Delawares and Shawnees, then located within what was known as the leased district. The Wichita and affiliated bands on the reservation, by the statement furnished Mr. Colyer, February 1, 1869, numbered 898 souls, of all ages and both sexes. To ration these for one year, at eight cents per ration (General Hazen's price), would cost the sum of $26,221.60. The amount appropriated by Congress, for the year ending June 30, 1868, for the Wichita and other affiliated bands, for expenses of colonizing, supporting, and furnishing them with agricultural implements, stock, clothing, medicine, iron, steel, maintenance of schools, and pay of employes, was $37,800. Of this amount, agent Shanklin expended, during the year, only $24,971.87, divided as follows: For the Indian service, in the district of country leased from the Choctaws, the sum of $14,628.05; colonizing, supporting, etc., the Wichita and other affiliated bands, $5,593.07; pay of superintendents and agents, $2,956.25; pay of interpreters, $400; contingencies, $239.25; buildings at agency, $993.61; vaccination of Indians, $161.65-making the gross sum, as

above, $24,971.87; and leaving unexpended, of the appropriation of $37,800, nearly $13,000. The appropriation made by Congress for this same agency, for the year ending June 30, 1869, was, for all purposes, only $15,000, which was made July 27, 1868, none of which, it is presumed, came into the hands of agent Shanklin, since he left the Indian country on the 1st of October, 1868, and did not return. From the foregoing facts, it is submitted that General Hazen was not warranted in asserting that Shanklin paid six times as much as the service was worth, or that, for eight months before his arrival, the agent had made the matter of feeding the Indians a "grand speculation, amounting to fraud." It is shown that to ration the 898 Indians of the Wichita and other affiliated bands would have cost per year, at eight cents per ration, $26,221.60, whereas Shanklin had expended, for all purposes, during his last year, only $24,971.87; and out of this sum, for these Indians only $5,593.07; the residue being expended for the Indian service in the leased district.

Col. Leavenworth, the agent for the Kiowa, Comanche, and Apache Indians, left the Indian country, on the 26th of May, 1868, and did not return, hence he could not have been engaged in feeding Indians, or any operations among them, in the eight months preceding the date of the report of Gen. Hazen, in which he makes this charge.

Col. Wynkoop, the agent of the Cheyennes and Arapahoes, had his agency more than two hundred miles from Fort Cobb, and did not operate in that region at all. He was north of the Arkansas. Moreover, nearly ten months before the date of Gen. Hazen's report, the military had declared Wynkoop's Indians hostile and at war, and thereafter he had no official connection with them, and left the Indian country before Gen. Hazen reached Fort Cobb.

According to the reports of the agents, in 1867 and 1868, of the number of the Indians in their charge, as tabulated in the report of the commissioner of Indian affairs, the Kiowas and Comanches are placed at 4,000; the Cheyennes and Arapahoes at 3,000; and Wichita and other affiliated bands, at 1,175-making the whole number, 8,175. The census and estimates of these same Indians, made by one of Gen. Hazen's