pulation (half-breed)-country lying between it and Victoria very
fertile, is within easy reach of Blackfeet, Cree, and Assineboine
country; summer frosts often injurious to wheat, but all other crops
thrive well, and even wheat is frequently a large and productive crop;
timber for fuel plenty, and for building can be obtained in large
quantities ten miles distant; coal in large quantities on bank of river
and gold at from three to ten dollars a day in sand bars.

Only one other subject remains for consideration (I presume that the
establishment of regular mail communication and steam navigation would
follow the adoption of the course I have recommended, and, therefore,
have not thought fit to introduce them), and to that subject I will now
allude before closing this Report, which has already reached proportions
very much larger than I had anticipated. I refer to the Indian question,
and the best mode of dealing with it. As the military protection of the
linq of the Saskatchewan against Indian attack would be a practical
impossibility without a very great expenditure of money, it becomes
necessary that all precautions should be taken to prevent the outbreak of
an Indian war, which, if once commenced, could not fail to be productive
of evil consequences. I would urge the advisability of sending a
Commissioner to meet the tribes of the Saskatchewan during their summer
assemblies.

It must be borne in mind that the real Indian Question exists many
hundred miles west of Manitoba, in a region where the red man wields a
power and an influence of his own. Upon one point I would recommend
particular caution, and that is, in the selection of the individual for
this purpose. I have heard a good deal of persons who were said to
possess great knowledge of the Indian character, and I have seen enough
of the red man to estimate at its real worth the possession of this
knowledge. Knowledge of Indian character has too long been synonymous
with knowledge of how to cheat the Indian--a species of cleverness which,
even in the science of chicanery, does not require the exercise of the
highest abilities. I fear that the Indian has already had too many
dealings with persons of this class, and has now got a very shrewd idea
that those who possess this knowledge of his character have also managed
to possess themselves of his property.

With regard to the objects to be attended to by a Commission of the kind
I have referred to, the principal w