were generally fatal. The
death-rate of children under five was terrific. I have known women to
bear families of six or eight or ten children, and outlive them all,
most dying in infancy. In their state of deep depression disease had
its golden opportunity, and there seemed to be no escape. What was there
to save the race from annihilation within a few years? Nothing, save its
heritage of a superb physique and a wonderful patience.

THE INDIAN SERVICE PHYSICIAN

The doctors who were in the service in those days had an easy time of
it. They scarcely ever went outside of the agency enclosure, and issued
their pills and compounds after the most casual inquiry. As late as
1890, when the Government sent me out as physician to ten thousand
Ogallalla Sioux and Northern Cheyennes at Pine Ridge Agency, I found my
predecessor still practising his profession through a small hole in the
wall between his office and the general assembly room of the Indians.
One of the first things I did was to close that hole; and I allowed no
man to diagnose his own trouble or choose his pills. I told him I
preferred to do that myself; and I insisted upon thoroughly examining my
patients. It was a revelation to them, but they soon appreciated the
point, and the demand for my services doubled and trebled.

As no team was provided for my use to visit my patients on a
reservation nearly a hundred miles square (or for any other agency
doctor at the time), I bought a riding horse, saddle and saddle-bags,
and was soon on the road almost day and night. A night ride of fifty to
seventy-five miles was an ordinary occurrence; and even a Dakota
blizzard made no difference, for I never refused to answer a call.
Before many months I was supplied by the Government with a covered buggy
and two good horses.

I found it necessary to buy, partly with my own funds and partly with
money contributed by generous friends, a supply of suitable remedies as
well as a full set of surgical instruments. The drugs supplied by
contractors to the Indian service were at that period often obsolete in
kind, and either stale or of the poorest quality. Much of my labor was
wasted, moreover, because of the impossibility of seeing that my
directions were followed, and of securing proper nursing and attention.
Major operations were generally out of the question on account of the
lack of hospital facilities, as well as the prejudice of the people,
though I did operate on several of