by the Long Knives. Do not meddle with any thing that does not belong to you; but mind your own business, and cultivate the ground, that your women and children may have enough to live on. My Father-I have informed you what we mean to do; and I call the Great Spirit to witness the truth of my declaration. The religion which I have established, for the last three years, has been attended to by the different tribes of Indians in this part of the world. The Indians were once different people; they are now but one. They are all determined to practice what I have recommended to them, that has come immediately from the Great Spirit, through me. * Formerly, when we lived in ignorance we were foolish; but now, since we listen to the Great Spirit, we are happy. I have listened to what you have said to us. You have promised to assist us. I now request you, in behalf of all the red people, to use your exertions to prevent the sale of liquor to us. We are all well pleased to hear you say that you will endeavor to promote our happiness."

It seems that the interviews which took place, at this time, between Governor Harrison and the prophet, had a tendency to subdue, in the mind of the former, some strong suspicions of the honesty and good faith of the latter. These suspicions had their foundations, mainly, in "the reports of many, both white people and Indians,"* who denounced the prophet and his followers as enemies of the United States, and as adherents and instruments of the British authorities of Canada. The professions of the prophet, and the temperate conduct of the small number of his followers who attended him on his visit to Vincennes, induced the governor to doubt, for a while, the truth of these reports. But, after the lapse of a brief period, the information which he received, from various sources, in relation to the proceedings of the Indians at the Prophet's Town, impelled him to regard the prophet and Tecumseh as very dangerous persons, who, having received some encouragement from certain subordinate officers in the British Indian department, were endeavoring to form a strong confederacy of Indian tribes, which, on the breaking out of a war between

*Dawson's Life of Harrison, p. 109.

the United States and Great Britain, would become the allies of the latter nation.

The prophet, with about forty of his followers, visited Vincennes, in the summer of the year 1809, and, in the course of a conference with Governor Harrison, declared that he had, in the preceding fall, received and rejected an invitation from the British, to engage in a war against the United States-that he had taken no part in any attempt to organize an Indian force, for the purpose of making an attack on the frontier settlements of the Indiana territory; and, that he had prevailed upon some of the northwestern tribes to abandon their hostility to the United States.

It

The interviews which took place between Governor Harrison and the Shawanee prophet, did not satisfy the former of the sincerity of the prophet, nor of the pacific views of those Indians over whom he exercised a controlling influence. seems, indeed, that the governor, at this time, regarded the bands of Indians at the Prophet's Town as a "combination" which was "produced by British intrigue and influence, in anticipation of a war between them and the United States."*

Acting in accordance with his own strongly marked policy, and in conformity with the instructions of the President of the United States, Governor Harrison continued his efforts to extinguish, by treaties, the Indian claims to lands lying within the boundaries of the Indiana territory. At Fort Wayne, on the 30th of September, 1809, he concluded a treaty with the chiefs and head men of the Delaware, Pottawattamie, Miami, and Eel river tribes. By the stipulations of this treaty, the Indians sold and ceded to the United States about two million nine hundred thousand acres of land, lying, principally, on the southeastern side of the river Wabash, and below the mouth of Raccoon creek-a stream that enters the Wabash within the present boundaries of Parke county. The chiefs and head men of the Wea tribe met Governor Harrison, in council, at Vincennes, on the 26th of October, 1809, and agreed

*Letter from Governor Harrison to the Secretary of War, dated “Vincennes, July 5, 1809."

Laws, etc., relating to the Public Lands, compiled by authority of Congress, edition 1828, p. 1057.

to acknowledge the validity of the treaty of Fort Wayne. By the terms of a treaty, negotiated at Vincennes, on the 9th of December, 1809, between Governor Harrison and several of the sachems and war-chiefs of the Kickapoo tribe, the treaty of Fort Wayne was confirmed; and the Kickapoos ceded to the United States about one hundred and thirteen thousand acres of land. At this period the total quantity of land ceded to the United States, under treaties which were concluded between Governor Harrison and various Indian tribes, amounted to about 29,719,530 acres.

The prophet, and his brother, Tecumseh, steadily maintained and expressed their opposition to the making of treaties for the disposal of Indian lands; and, in speaking to Governor Harrison, at Vincennes, in August, 1810, Tecumseh clearly intimated that he would resist any attempt that might be made to survey the lands which had been ceded to the United States by the treaty of Fort Wayne.

Among a certain class of persons who were suspected, by Governor Harrison, of giving counsel and encouragement to the prophet and Tecumseh, there were some petty officers in the British Indian department, and a very small number of land speculators who resided in the Indiana territory, and whose opposition to the treaty-making policy of the governor was active and uncompromising.

Between the summer of 1805 and the spring of 1807, the efforts which were made, in the Ohio Valley, by Aaron Burr, to organize an expedition, to be employed in some secret enterprise, created considerable excitement among the people of the Indiana territory. Jeffersonville, Vincennes, and Kaskaskia, were visited by Colonel Burr, who induced a few of the inhabitants of the territory to enroll their names on the list of his followers. The nature and extent of the designs of Burr have never been clearly exposed; but it is probable that they embraced, first, an invasion of the Mexican territory, and ultimately the founding of an independent republic composed of States lying west of the Allegheny mountains. In a letter written by Waller Taylor to Governor Harrison, and dated "Louisville, January 12, 1807," the writer says: "I arrived at Jeffersonville on Saturday morning last, after an extremely disagreeable journey, occasioned by the badness of the roads,

and the difficulty of making our stages of a night. The publie mind at this place appears to be much agitated, on account of Colonel Burr's mysterious movements. Conjectures are various about his intentions; but nothing certain has transpired to throw any light on his views. There is stationed at this place about two hundred militia, who examine all boats that descend the river. No discoveries have yet been made by them; and only two boats have yet been detained, which were built by Burr's direction at Jeffersonville, or this place, I am not certain which. A large drove of horses, said to be purchased for the expedition, will be seized to-day, by the civil authority of the State. It seems to me that the precautions now taken are perfectly useless; because Burr, I believe, has got all the force he could raise from this State, and is, probably, before this time, at Natchez."

Early in the year 1807, Burr was arrested in the Mississippi territory, by the authority of a proclamation issued by the President of the United States. Before his arrest, however. his expedition was abandoned, and his followers dispersed.

CHAPTER XXXIV.

LAND CLAIMS-FRAUDS-TERRITORIAL LEGISLATURE.

THE various questionable grounds on which lands were claimed by different inhabitants of the Indiana territory, induced congress, in 1804, to establish a board of commissioners, who were authorized to inquire into the validity of certain claims, to decide thereon, according to justice and equity, and to report their decisions to congress. Within the districts of Vincennes and Kaskaskia, some of the settlers insisted that they held their lands by virtue of grants which had been made under the authority of the government of France; others derived their titles from the court of Vincennes, which was established in 1779; and a few claims rested on Indian grants,

and on occupancy, accompanied by undisturbed possession. The more numerous class of land claimants was, however, composed of persons who set up claims under the provisions of the resolutions of congress, of June 20, 1788, and August 29, 1788, or under an act of congress, of March 3, 1791. The resolutions of 1788 made provisions for confirming, in their "possessions and titles," the French, Canadian, and other inhabitants, who were heads of families, and settlers about Vincennes and "in the Illinois country," "on or before the year 1783," and who had "professed themselves citizens of the United States, or any of them." The act of congress, of March 3, 1791, made provisions for confirming the title of each claimant of lands, not exceeding four hundred acres, at Vincennes, or "in the Illinois country," in all cases where such lands were held, improved, and cultivated, "under a supposed grant of the same, by any commandant or court claiming authority to make such grant;" and, by the sixth section of the act, the governor of the territory was authorized to grant a quantity of land, not exceeding one hundred acres, to each person who had not obtained any grant of land from the United States, and who, on the 1st of August, 1790, was enrolled in the militia at Vincennes, or "in the Illinois country," and had performed militia duty.

With a view to carry the provisions of these laws into effect, Governor St. Clair proceeded to make grants of land, and to confirm the titles of settlers, at Vincennes and in the Illinois country, until the time of the division of the northwestern territory, in 1800, when the authority to make such grants and confirmations was vested in the governor of the Indiana territory, who continued to exercise the power until it was transferred, by an act of congress, of March 26, 1804, to the registers and receivers of the landoffices at Vincennes, Kaskaskia, and Detroit, who were formed into three boards of commissioners, for the examination of claims and titles to lands lying within their several respective districts.

Before the close of the year 1810, these boards of commissioners, severally, examined and confirmed a great number of 'valid and just titles and claims, and rejected a very numerous class of claims, of which some were illegal, and many were fraudulent. While the fraudulent claims were very numerous,