This was such a disgrace to him, that he painted a black mark on his face, and wore the mark for almost ten years. Only a scalp could wipe it off.
The white trespassers kept coming in. They respected nothing. They even built fences around the corn fields of the principal Sac village, at the mouth of Rock River; they ploughed up the grave-yard there; they took possession of Black-hawk's own lodge; and when in the spring of 1828 the Black-hawk people came back from their winter hunt, they found that forty of their lodges had been burned.
Up to this time none of the land had been put on the market by the United States. But the Indian agent was trying to persuade the Sacs to move across the Mississippi, into Iowa. That was for their own good. The white settlers were using whiskey and every other means, to get the upper hand.
Chief Keokuk agreed with the agent. He was not of the rank of Black-hawk and the Thunder clan, but he had fought the Sioux, and was of great courage and keen mind and silver tongue. He was an orator; Black-hawk was a warrior.
So the Sacs split. Keokuk—a stout, heavy-faced man—took his Sacs across into the country of the Foxes. Black-hawk's band said they would be shamed if they gave up their village and the graves of their fathers.
Black-hawk visited some white "chiefs" (judges) who were on Rock Island. He made complaint. He said that he wore a black mark on his face; but that if he tried to avenge the black mark, by striking a white man, then the white men would call it war. He said that the Sacs dared not resent having their lodges burned and their corn fields fenced and their women beaten, and the graves of their fathers ploughed up.
"Why do you not tell the President?"
"He is too far off. He cannot hear my voice."
"Why do you not write a letter to him?"
"It would be written by white men, who would say that we told lies. Our Great Father would rather believe a white man, than an Indian."