s is to remove you, peaceably if I can, forcibly if I must! I
will now give you two days in which to remove, and if you do not cross
the Mississippi by that time, I will adopt measures to force you away."

I told him that I never would consent to leave my village and was
determined not to leave it.

The council broke up and the war chief retired to his fort. I consulted
the prophet again. He said he had been dreaming, and that the Great
Spirit had directed that a woman, the daughter of Mattatas, the old
chief of the village, should take a stick in her hand and go before the
war chief, and tell him that she is the daughter of Mattatas, and that
he had always been the white man's friend. That he had fought their
battles, been wounded in their service and had always spoken well of
them, and she had never heard him say that he had sold their village.
The whites are numerous, and can take it from us if they choose, but she
hoped they would not be so unfriendly. If they were, he had one favor to
ask; she wished her people to be allowed to remain long enough to gather
their provisions now growing in their fields; that she was a woman and
had worked hard to raise something to support her children. And now, if
we are driven from our village without being allowed to save our corn,
many of our little children must perish with hunger.

Accordingly Mattatas' daughter was sent to the fort, accompanied by
several of our young men and was admitted. She went before the war chief
and told the story of the prophet. The war chief said that the president
did not send him here to make treaties with the women, nor to hold
council with them. That our young men most leave the fort, but she might
remain if she wished.

All our plans were defeated. We must cross the river, or return to our
village and await the coming of the war chief with his soldiers. We
determined on the latter, but finding that our agent, interpreter,
trader and Keokuk, were determined on breaking my ranks, and had induced
several of my warriors to cross the Mississippi, I sent a deputation
to the agent, at the request of my band, pledging myself to leave the
county in the fall, provided permission was given us to remain, and
secure our crop of corn then growing, as we would be in a starving
situation if we were driven off without the means of subsistence.

The deputation returned with an answer from the war chief, "That no
further time would be given than that specified,