n.

In these years of trouble, the Black-hawk band had killed or abused no
white settlers. The so-called "war," on their part, had been a war of
words and fences. Now they soon were to take up the hatchet.

They had been expelled over the river in this year 1831 too late for
planting crops. The white settlers declined to share with them, from
the fields at the village of Saukenuk. One night some of the Sacs
crossed "to steal roasting-ears from their own fields," as they said.
They were shot at by the settlers, and driven off.

This made more bad feeling.

Black-hawk had sent his head warrior, Nah-po-pe, or Soup, up to Canada,
to ask council from the British "father" there. He had been "General
Black-hawk" in the British army, and thought that he deserved help.

But the United States and Great Britain had been at peace many years.
The British father told Nahpope that if the Sacs never had sold their
land, of course they had a right to live upon it. That was all.

On the way back, Nahpope stopped to see Wa-bo-kie-shiek, or White
Cloud, who was half Sac and half Winnebago, and a great medicine-man or
prophet. He had a village at his Prophet's Town, thirty-five miles up
the Rock River, in Illinois.

White Cloud pretended to rival the Open Door of the Shawnees. He fell
into a trance, and cut several capers, and spoke a message from the
Great Spirit. Let Black-hawk go to war. The Great Spirit would arouse
the Winnebagos and the Potawatomis and the British, and the Americans
would be driven away! White Cloud said this out of his own heart,
which was black toward the Americans.

He invited Black-hawk to visit him and the Winnebagos and the
Potawatomis, raise a summer crop and talk with the Great Spirit.

Much rejoiced, Nahpope hastened to tell the news to his chief. When
Keokuk heard it, he advised Black-hawk to stay at home. The prophet
White Cloud was a mischief maker and a liar.

Black-hawk was inclined to listen, and to wait until he was more
certain of the other nations who might join with him. But the young
men of his band were hot. Unless he did something, Keokuk would appear
to be stronger than he. His people looked to him to get back their
village and their grave-yard. The black mark on his face had not been
wiped off.

None of Keokuk's Sacs or the Foxes would help him. So in April of 1832
he took his men and their families and started up the river from Fort
Madison, Iowa, for Rock River.