provided, in their removal to
the west of the Mississippi, with food, clothing, and every means of
transportation; and making a just and humane appeal to their sense of
justice to remote; but assuring them that, if these considerations were
allowed to pass unheeded, his instructions were imperative, and he had
an army at his command, and would be compelled to order it to act in the
premises. Such an appeal must be successful.

However much we may sympathize with the poetic view of the subject, and
admire that spirit of the human heart which loves to linger about its
ancient seats and homes, the question in this case has assumed a purely
practical aspect founded on public transactions, which cannot be
recalled. The inaptitude of the Indian tribes generally, for conducting
the business of self-government, and their want of a wise foresight in
anticipating the relative power and position of the two great opposing
races in America, namely, the white and red, has been the primary cause
of all their treaty difficulties. The treaties themselves are not
violated in any respect, but being written by lawyers and legalists, the
true intent of some of these provisions, or the relative condition of
the parties at a given time, are not sometimes fully appreciated; and at
other times, the Indian chiefs exercise diplomatic functions which their
nation has not restored, as in the case of the Creeks of Georgia, or to
the exercise of which the majority are actually opposed, as in the
treaty of New Echota with the Cherokees. Some of their most intelligent
and best minds led the way to and signed the treaty of final cession of
New Echota, in 1835. But the compensation being found ample, and the
provisions wise, and such as would, in the judgment of the United States
Senate, secure their prosperity and advancement permanently, that body,
on large consideration, yielded its assent, making, at the same time,
further concessions to satisfy the malcontents. These are the final
arrangements for leaving the land to which Gen. Scott, in his
proclamation, alludes.

This tribe has lived in its present central position longer than the
period of exact history denotes. They are first heard of under the name
of "Achalaques," by the narrator of De Soto's Conquest of Florida, in
1540; within a dozen years of three centuries ago.

_June 2d_. I proceeded, during the latter part of May, to visit the
Ottawas of the southern part of Michigan, to inquire abou