Part 17

Realizing the importance of these matters, a study has been made of the physical conditions of the government Indian schools. An effort has been made to detect incipient tuberculosis and trachoma and segregate and treat those infected, so that healthy families may not be infected through the return of a child who has been infected at school. Regular talks are given to the children on sanitary matters.

There is vital necessity for more hospitals to care for the children and other members of the family in the early stages of disease.

Fully sixty per cent of the Indians under the supervision of the Indian service are still entirely dependent upon the government for medical assistance. The medical staff employed by the government comprises one hundred and twenty-eight regular physicians, devoting their entire time, and fifty-nine contract physicians giving part time service.

A unique and most helpful feature of the Indian Missions maintained by the Women's Board of Domestic Missions of the Reformed Church in America are the separate buildings known as lodges, set apart for the use of the Indians.

Here the specially needy sick find care and shelter until other provision can be made for them.

Here when the journey has been long, or necessity compels, mothers bring their little ones for rest, or to spend the night.

Young girls pressed by temptation or needing shelter can find security and safety at the lodge.

The lodge sewing machines and laundry facilities are greatly appreciated by the women who seek the help of such conveniences from time to time.

Here mothers are taught many helpful lessons in sanitation, the care of babies, and the preparation of food for the sick.

Occasionally Indian feasts and celebrations connected with the Mission are held or prepared in the lodge by the Indians themselves under the supervision of a worker.

The lodge matron knows the Indians and how to help them, and is loved and trusted by them because they realize her sympathy and appreciate what her kind hands do for them in the care of the sick, and often, also, in the preparation of their dead for burial.

Many a sick and needy one at the lodge has turned from the old Indian road of darkness, pain, and dread, and found rest, and help, and light in the Jesus Way.

* * * * *

"Here in Alaska the hospital boat was launched this summer, and will be of great use.

"One of the important results of my visit, I trust, will be a report of a medical survey made of the natives in Haines and Kluckwan. A number of estimates of the amount of tubercular and other infectious diseases among these people have been made, but, so far as my knowledge goes, no careful, exhaustive, complete medical survey of any one village has ever been made, or put into suitable form for presentation. I fear that this will disclose a most appalling condition (unless it should prove that the estimates hitherto available have been very carelessly made). Whatever it may show, I feel sure that it will help us in presenting to the United States Government the medical needs of these people in such a way as to compel the serious attention of Congress, and result in an appropriation annually for the introduction of such sanitary measures throughout Alaska as will eventually eradicate the dreadful source of contagion now existing.

"It seems almost inconceivable that while so much has been done for the Indians of the plains, for the people of the Philippine Islands and for Porto Rico, in the way of sanitation, these natives who have been wards of the nation for forty-seven years should have been almost entirely neglected in this respect. According to the information which I have, there is not a single government hospital in all Alaska, and only one hospital of any kind--our own at Haines--that is being maintained for the benefit of the natives; nor are there any homes for the aged, the incurables, or orphans, though these are sadly needed. While the church has been ministering to their spiritual needs, and the government and church together have been supplying educational facilities, all agencies have failed to meet the fundamental problem of physical regeneration.

"The question may be asked, as, indeed, it has been, 'What is the use of attempting to save a dying race?' and secondly, 'Can the race be saved?' I have little patience with Christian men and women who ask the first question, but shall reply most emphatically that on commercial grounds alone we should save these people. They ought to become a very valuable asset in the new economic development of the entire territory of Alaska. When properly trained and disciplined they make excellent workmen. Their natural adaptation to the climatic conditions should prove a valuable commercial asset. In the name of a common humanity; in the name of the gospel of the brotherhood of man, as well as for commercial reasons, I do not hesitate to say that they should be saved.

"Can they be regenerated physically? Possibly not as a race; but as individuals without hesitation I answer in the affirmative. The introduction of proper sanitary measures by the government; the development of educational systems by both church and state; and the ministry of spiritual advisers working hand in hand, would form a combination of agencies that in ten years would completely transform, rebuild and place on the sure road to health and prosperity, this people." [Footnote: Rev. M. C. Allaben, Woman's Board of Home Missions of the Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A.]

* * * * *

The mountain made a steep descent to the road except for one shelving bit of level ground upon which rested, as if it had alighted there, a one-room cabin, for which an end of a tree trunk served as a doorstep. A loosely-hung wooden door provided the only light by day, except that given by the flickering of the flames from the burning logs on the old open fireplace.

On a big bed in the corner, the only one the home afforded, lay a little baby girl, burning with fever. Over her bent her young mother, widowed, though still in her early twenties.

Pretty fair-haired children of two and four years of age crouched in sleepy misery on the foot of the bed, sharing in their childish way their mother's anxiety.

An older girl of six, pretty, but already womanly in her busy household ways, heaped another log on the fire and hovered over it for warmth. She was barefoot and, like the others of the household, including the sick baby, wore the scanty day-time clothing, having no other, for they were of the very poor of the mountains.

It was the lonely, desolate hour between midnight and morning. The watchers in the cabin listened intently for the sound of hoof-beats which would mean that the Mission nurse had been home when the summons came, and would soon be with them.

Hark! Yes!--through the night came the beat, beat of the hoofs of old "Bess" as she struck the road in a swift steady trot.

Emma, the oldest girl, is down in the darkness at the road to meet the beloved nurse and help her dismount. She holds the lantern while the saddle-bags are swung off and old "Bess" is blanketed and tethered.

As she enters the cabin Miss M---- goes immediately to the bed, and holding the lantern for light, examines her little patient and finds a bad case of pneumonia. The Mission hospital is not yet completed, and there is no doctor within many miles. She must fight alone for the little life.

Swiftly the saddle-bags are unpacked, yielding the "wonderful salve" (antiphlogistine) and other medicines--a small wash basin, soap, wash cloth and towel, flannel and a change of clothing for baby.