en years ago I met the young man
in Washington and was taken by him to call upon certain of his mother's
relatives.

The ascendancy of Hole-in-the-Day was not gained entirely through the
consent of his people, but largely by government favor, therefore there
was strong suppressed resentment among his associate chiefs, and the Red
Lake and Leech Lake bands in fact never acknowledged him as their head,
while they suspected him of making treaties which involved some of their
land. He was in personal danger from this source, and his life was
twice attempted, but, though wounded, in each case he recovered. His
popularity with Indian agents and officers lasted till the Republicans
came into power in the sixties and there was a new deal. The chief no
longer received the favors and tips to which he was accustomed; in
fact he was in want of luxuries, and worse still, his pride was hurt by
neglect. The new party had promised Christian treatment to the Indians,
but it appeared that they were greater grafters than their predecessors,
and unlike them kept everything for themselves, allowing no perquisites
to any Indian chief.

In his indignation at this treatment, Hole-in-the-Day began exposing
the frauds on his people, and so at a late day was converted to their
defense. Perhaps he had not fully understood the nature of graft until
he was in a position to view it from the outside. After all, he was
excusable in seeking to maintain the dignity of his office, but he had
departed from one of the fundamental rules of the race, namely: "Let no
material gain be the motive or reward of public duty." He had wounded
the ideals of his people beyond forgiveness, and he suffered the
penalty; yet his courage was not diminished by the mistakes of his past.
Like the Sioux chief Little Crow, he was called "the betrayer of
his people", and like him he made a desperate effort to regain lost
prestige, and turned savagely against the original betrayers of his
confidence, the agents and Indian traders.

When the Sioux finally broke out in 1862, the first thought of the
local politicians was to humiliate Hole-in-the-Day by arresting him
and proclaiming some other "head chief" in his stead. In so doing they
almost forced the Ojibways to fight under his leadership. The chief had
no thought of alliance with the Sioux, and was wholly unaware of the
proposed action of the military on pretense of such a conspiracy on his
part. He was on his way to the agen