pp. 118-119, 1876.
'Author's personal information: sue also Carrington, Eastern Band of Cherokees; Zeigler and
Grosscup, Heart .,i the AUeghanies, pp. 35-36, 1883.
'Commissioner H.Price, Report of Indian Commissioner, pp. Ixiv-lxv, 1881, and Report of Indian
Commissioner, pp. Ixix-lxx, 1882; see also ante, p. 151.
17o MYTHS OF THE CHEROKEE
sioner of Indian Affairs later in the same year, and was renewed by
successive commissioners to cover the period of ten years ending June
30, 1892, when the contract system was terminated and the Govern-
ment assumed direct control. Under the joint arrangement, with some
aid at the outset from the North Carolina Meeting, work was begun
in 1881 by Thomas Brown with several teachers sent out by the Indiana
Friends, who established a small training school at the agency head-
quarters at Cherokee, and several day schools in the outlyingsettle-
ments. He was succeeded three years later by H. W. Spray, an expe-
rienced educator, who, with a corps of efficient assistants and greatly
enlarged facilities, continued to do good work for the elevation of the
Indians until the close of the contract system eight years later. 1 After
an interregnum, during which the schools suffered from frequent
changes, he was reappointed as government agent and superintendent
in 1898, a position which he still holds in 1901. To the work con-
ducted under his auspices the East Cherokee owe much of what they
have to-day of civilization and enlightenment.
From some travelers who visited the reservation about this time we
have a pleasant account of a trip along Soco and a day with Chief
Smith at Yellow Hill. They describe the Indians as being so nearly
like the whites in