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Show Those Mountaineers THE more details that are published about the Aliens and the other clans in the Blue Ridge and Alleghany mountains, the more clear it is that society has not done its full duty during the past hundred years in that region. To begin with, they are a generous people. They have not much, but they will divide that with anyone whom they hold is not their enemy. They have no comforts at home, no more than Indians; not much more can be expected from them than from wild Indians, and yet they have within them the elements of a great race, absolute ab-solute courage, a native integrity, a willingness to work, and In a vague, confused way, if they were to express themselves, they would say all they want of the world is a square deal. And such men and women are capable of the very highest civilization, but it needs patience and gentleness and devotion that never falters, and rather than bestow that, the people around them have just let things drift until now they are confronted con-fronted with a race which is a terror to them. What is the character of mind that must go among those people and redeem them? Does it require another Peter the Hermit, or another St. Patrick, or would not a gentle, honest, i 1 sympathetic American be sufficient for the woik? Not one, but many honest, simple and gentle Americans to lure them from their almost im- g memorial ideas, to make clear to them the lovli- 8 ness of knowledge and the necessity of obedl- ence to righteous laws. $ That is the question there, it is more or less a question in every state in the union, because if our civilization is not enough to redeem such people, then it is not worth very much. We are n not certain but that the work could be better done by devoted women than by men, because these strong men will treat a woman with re- spect even when her ideas clash with theirs. I And the question should be, how can they be I saved? We think the farmers of adjacent states might do a great deal of good by going among J them and asking permission to adopt some of their children, holding out to them that they will give them such education as they give their own children, not give them any more work, will pay them for their labor, and give them further to understand that once or twice a year they may go home or that their parents may come to see , them as often as they please. It is not an insoluble problem, nut it needs such devotion, such sincerity, and such faithful- I ness to duty as not every man cares to R assume, and no man will assume it unless the conviction is fastened upon him that there is 1 more rejoicing when one of those w,ild men is I tamed and becomes a good citizen, more rejoicing I in heaven and in earth than when a half a dozen men who know nothing of sorrow and nothing of temptation fall gently into the fold of righteousness. |