THE ROGUE RIVER WARS. 415
seven hundred, not including John s people, were placed on board a vessel in charge of Captain Smith, to be taken to Portland, and thence to the northern end of the coast reservation in Polk county. Four hundred others, with whom went John s band, and the Pistol-river and Chetco bands, were sent to the southern end of the reservation ma the valley of the Coquille and Roseburg, at which place Captain Smith met them with his command as escort.
The removal of the Indians was not accomplished with out much difficulty, the coast tribes being especially troublesome, and escaping in parties of twos, threes, or half dozens. At the reservation affairs did not move smoothly. It was for the most part a rugged and heavily timbered country, bounded by mountains on one side and by the sea on the other. The Indians complained that the forest did not afford game. The houses hastily erected were uninviting. The shops, mills, farming machinery, and other beneficent gifts promised by the terms of the several treaties, were absent. The climate, though health ful, was rude compared to the warm southern airs of the Rogue-river country. Even the commissary department was a failure, because congress delayed making appropria tions, and the agents having to purchase on credit, were forced by that circumstance, and the long distance over which freight had to be hauled, to accept as flour the sweepings of the mill in the Wallamet, or at the best shorts ground over, 6 which the contractors thought good enough for Indians.
It might here be said that during the Cayuse war, sim ilar frauds were practiced upon the provisional govern ment, and by the same mill at Oregon City. 7 When good flour sold at Portland for eight dollars a barrel, the con tractor who furnished the reservation charged the govern ment twenty dollars a barrel for shorts, delivered at the
6 Report of Ross Browne in United States executive documents, 39, p. 42, thirty-fifth congress, first session, volume IX.
7 Owned in 1856 by George Aberuethy and Robert Pentlaud ; in 1846-7 by Abernethy and associates.
