efore, as a fact, that the tribes on the borders do
increase, in the same ratio with their material strength, grows also
their invincible, stern, and unchangeable hatred towards the American.
In fact, more or less, they have all been ill-treated and abused, and
every additional outrage to one tribe is locked up in the memory of all,
who wait for the moment of retaliation and revenge. In the Wisconsin
war (Black Hawk, 1832), even after the poor starved warriors had
surrendered themselves by treaty, after a noble struggle, more than two
hundred old men, women, and children were forced by the Americans to
cross the river without boats or canoes. The poor things endeavoured to
pass it with the help of their horses; the river there was more than
half a mile broad, and while these unfortunates were struggling for life
against a current of nine miles an hour, they were treacherously shot in
the water.

This fact is known to all the tribes--even to the Comanches, who are so
distant. It has satisfied them as to what they may expect from those
who thus violate all treaties and all faith. The remainder of that
brave tribe is now dwelling on the west borders of Ioway, but their
wrongs are too deeply dyed with their own blood to be forgotten even by
generations, and their cause is ready to be espoused by every tribe,
even those who have been their hereditary enemies; for what is, after
all, their history but the history of almost every Indian nation
transplanted on the other side of the Mississippi?

This belt of Indian tribes, therefore, is rather an unsafe neighbour,
especially in the event of a civil war or of a contest with England.
Having themselves, by a mistaken policy, collected together a cordon of
offended warriors, the United States will some day deplore, when too
late, their former greediness, cowardice, and cruelty towards the
natural owners of their vast territories.

It is among these tribes that Joe Smith wishes to lay the foundation of
his future empire; and settling at Independence, he was interposing as a
neutral force between two opponents, who would, each of them, have
purchased his massive strength and effective energy with the gift of
supremacy over an immense and wealthy territory. As we have seen,
chance and the fortune of war have thrown Smith and the Mormons back on
the eastern shores of the Mississippi, opposite the entrance of
Desmoines river; but when forced back, the Mormons were an unruly and