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1 _ J/7DJA/? <7//?? MAK/ftG ASTRING of little black beads, linked together with gold, brought to Indianapolis a few days ago is regarded by anti quarians of the far west as suu^tantial evidence in support of the theory that the American Indians are of old world descent. The beads were a present to Mrs Claire Bell, 428 North Alabama street, from her mother, Mrs. B. L Canfield, who is a teacher in the Sherman in stitute, a school for Indian children at Riverside, Cal., and they are the work of the girls in the school. The beads are pellets about the size of a pea and jet black. They are hard and metallic to the touch, but are as light as paper. The wonderful pe culiarity about them is that they have a strong, agreeable odor of roses, an odor that never will leave them, and it ls this peculiarity that makes them of such interest to antiquarians. For, according to Mrs. Canfield, who received her information from a pa per published by a California anti quarian who became absorbed in the study of the beads-not this particular string, but others like them made by the Indian girls of the southwest beads remarkably similar to these have been found in the pyramids of Egypt and in temples of oriental an tiquity. Those beads, in spite of the fact that they had been buried for scores of centuries, still retained a strong, delicate scent of roses. A comparison of these beads with rare strings of beads in the possession of Indians of the southwest, who are supposed to have migrated north from the Inca settlements in Peru, showed them to be identical. As the beads were wholly unlike anything else of Lnown existence, the conclusion was reached that the ancestors of the In dians must have been either the mak ers of the beads found in the pyra mids r . their ancestors. White men were deeply puzzled over the composition of tue beads, and it was supposed th~f the manufac ture of them must be one of the lost arts. But when the Inuians discov ered the interest that had been aroused in their relics,. they found that the method of making them had been transmitted through the tribe by tradition. They set to work, accord ingly, and duplicated the pellets, to the astonishment of the white nv n. The secret of the Indians did not remain exclusively tribal for very long, however, since a great demand arose at once for the rose-scented beads. The art was taught to a large number of the Indians, and from them lt leaked out, until now there is no longer a mystery about their manu facture.. But the novelty of it is just as inter esting as the mystery. The secret of the scent of roses is that the beads are actually made of rose petals. "The Indian girls at our school hold parties to make the beads," said Mrs. Canfield, "much on the order of the fudge parties of their white sisters, or more like the old-fashioned spinning or quilting parties. "They gather bushels and bushels of rose plants, which grow, as you know, in profuse abundance In California. They grind these petals up very fine, maning them through a grinder seven times seven times-you mustn't say forty-nine times, for there is a mystic significance to them in the expression 'seven times seven' which is lost In the prosaic 'forty-nine,' and this mys ticism, they believe, has an important part in the result of their labors. "When the petals are properly ground they are put into iron pans and tincture of Iron is poured over them. That ends the first party, for it is necessary to let the mixture set for several days, so that the tincture will eat into the iron of the pan and color the composition black. Every time one of the girls passes a pan dur ing this period of 'ripening' she stirs the mixture with her bands, so that ft ? will have the proper color and con sistency all the way through. "After the m.xture has 'ripened' the girls gather again to make it into beads. It is a black, viscous sub stance, thick er.ough to remain in any shape into which it may be rolled. The moisture in it has been supplied by the juice of the rose petals, which runs out in surprising quantity during the process of grinding, and by the tincture of iron. "The girls take small quantities of this viscous substance from the pans and roll them into pellets such as you see In this string. They are very deft at the work and very painstaking, not stopping until the pellet i?^perfectly round. "These pellets are then pierced with hatpins, and are strung on the pins to dry. When a big beadmaklfig party is given at our school there is a hatpin famine In Riverside, for the girls buy up all they can find at the stores. "Then the Indian maidens stretch strings across their bedrooms and from these strings they suspend the hatpins to allow the beads to dry. The process of drying consumes several days, and during this time the girls very jealously avoid raising dust in their queerly decorated rooms. "When the beads are dry they are taken off the hatpins and the little rough spots caused by piercing them are carefully polished off. You have then a neatly-pierced, black, perma nently rose-scented bead ready for the jeweler." Mrs. Canfield has been In the gov ernment service for 17 years as a teacher of Indians, first in the reser vation schools and finally in pictur esque Riverside, and she has an abun dance of first-hand information of In dian life and character that is highly interesting. Learn White Man's Petty Grafts. One of her regrets is that the In dian artisan, engaged in the making of blankets, baskets and other beauti ful curios, ls learning the vices of the white man, so that now Inferior ar ticles are being made and sold so ex tensively that only an expert is free from the danger of being swindled. Their education at the Sherman in stitute consists of the common school education, including the eighth grade, and In addition they are given indus trial training. Upon graduating from the school the Indians are at liberty to do as they please. Some of them go to the higher Institutions of learning, such as the Carlisle school, and some, whose parents can afford it, enter other large American colleges. Others go back to their reserva tions, where they become teachers in the reservation schools or enter Into the active life of the tribe, where their superior education soon makes them leaders. Still others, attracted by their summer work, hire themselves I out as skilled servants to the Cali fornians. A few go to the cities and become a j part of the great active world of America, putting themselves upon an equal footing and in competition with white men in their chosen trades or professions. Many of these Indians have more than made good In the bat tle of the big city. Romances begun at the school fre quently culminate in marriage after graduation, many a stalwart Hiawatha having proudly claimed a bashful Min nehaha. Occasionally an Indian girl marries a white man, or an Indian man a white girl, but, according to Mrs. Canfield, such caBeB are rare In California. Mrs. Canfield believes the government ls doing a great work at Riverside and at similar institutions. The Silent Father. "I'll bet that man is the father of six or seven children." -Why?" . "fr he had less than three he'd I bragging about them." Closing Out Winter Clothing ;?::v.:.: \ 3 ?gaasgafc . gcw^g at ? aaa sssi TON^^^CLO: GUARANTEED In order to close out all heavy clothing, over coats and pants we will make a sweeping reduc tion of 25 Per Cent for Cash for the next fifteen days. Now is the time to buy a new suit for yourself or for your boy, even if you do not need it until next winter. Besides getting our money out of the goods, we must make room for Spring goods which are already arriving. All 15 " " All 12 .. ?' All io " " 11.25 9.0O 7.So. All $L'o Ruits now All 18 " " All 16 " " $15.00 13-50 12.00 All $8 suits now $6 No Goods Charged at These Prices The same sweeping reduction will be made in in overcoats and pants. Tell your neighbors and friends of the great bargains we are offering in winter clothing. Dorn & Mims