-a clergyman--in a black frock coat, and by his side a woman
neatly dressed in a black alpaca dress. Said the chief, "There is only
one religion in the world which can lift a man out of the mire and tell
him to call God 'Father,' and that is the religion of Jesus Christ."
We have had many deferred hopes, and sometimes it has been dark as
midnight. After nearly three years of hard work, I had both of my Indian
missions destroyed, church and mission house burned, and our western
border for three hundred miles desolated by an Indian massacre, which
destroyed the fairest portion of our State, and left eight hundred of
our citizens sleeping in nameless graves. It was needed to teach us that
nations as well as individuals reap exactly what they sow. We began
again. Here and there some Indian would listen, and the gospel was the
same to him as to us. One day an Indian came to our missionary and said,
"I know this religion is true. The men who have walked in this new trail
are better and happier. But I have always been a warrior, and my hands
are full of blood. Could I be a Christian?" The missionary repeated the
story of God's love. To test the man he said, "May I cut your hair?" The
Indian wears his scalp lock for his enemy--when it is cut it is a sign
he will never go on the war-path again. The man said, "Yes, you may cut
it; I shall throw my old life away." It was cut. He started for home and
met some wild Indians who shouted with laughter, and with taunts said:
"Yesterday you were a warrior, to-day you are a squaw." It stung the man
to madness, and he rushed to his home and threw himself on the floor and
burst into tears. His wife was a Christian, and came and put her arms
about his neck and said: "Yesterday there was not a man in the world
who dared call you a coward. Can't you be as brave for Him who died for
you as you were to kill the Sioux?" He sprang to his feet and said, "I
can and I will." I have known many brave, fearless servants of Christ,
but I never knew one braver than this chief who is now in Paradise.
I wish I could take you to a Christian Indian's home. You might see
nothing but a plain log house, and you might wonder why the tears came
in my eyes as he said to me, "That is my daughter's room; the boys sleep
up stairs; this is for me and my wife." They are tears of joy, for I
knew them when they herded as swine, in a wigwam. It is the religion of
Christ which has brought respect for womanhood.
I want t
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