ingularly magnificent. The council was held under a
spacious booth of green boughs, and lasted for several days. Keokuk was
present on this occasion, as the head chief of the Sacs, and took an
active part in the council; his course being marked by that moderation
and sound policy, for which he is eminently distinguished.

[Illustration: COUNCIL GROUND AT PRAIRIE DU CHIENS]

In the early part of the year 1828, the President of the United States,
appointed Governor Cass and Colonel Pierre Menard, to treat with certain
tribes of Indians for the cession of what is called the "mineral region"
lying on the Mississippi, south of the Wisconsin. The commissioners
arrived at Green Bay late in the summer of that year, and on the 25th
of August, made a temporary agreement with the Indians, by which the
whites were allowed to occupy the country where the lead mines were
worked; and in the ensuing year a treaty was to be held with the Indians
for the purchase of the mineral country: in the mean time, no white was
to cross a certain line, described in said agreement, to dig for ore;
and finally the Indians were paid twenty thousand dollars in goods, for
the trespasses already committed on their lands by the miners. This
agreement was ratified by the President and senate of the United States
on the 7th January, 1829. Soon after President Jackson came into office
in 1829, he appointed General McNeil of the army, to fill the place of
Governor Cass in the said commission, which was to meet at St. Louis and
under the agreement above described, proceed to the mineral region, to
effect by treaty, its purchase. In consequence of some disagreement in
opinion between these two commissioners, the President subsequently
united with them, Caleb Atwater, Esq. of Ohio. They reached Prairie du
Chien about the middle of July, where they met deputies on the part of
the Winnebagoes, Chippeways, Ottowas, Pottawatimies, Sioux, Sauks, Foxes
and Menominees; and on the first of August, a treaty was concluded for
about eight millions of acres, extending from the upper end of Rock
island to the mouth of the Wisconsin, from latitude 41 deg. 15' to latitude
43 deg. 15' on the Mississippi. Following the meanderings of the river the
tract is about two hundred and forty miles from south to north. It
extends along the Wisconsin and Fox rivers from west to east so as to
give a passage across the country from the Mississippi to lake Michigan.
At this treaty Keokuk and