The Trail of the Seneca

by James A. Braden

At considerable length the Delaware chief reviewed the whole case which had been presented both by Ree and by Lone-Elk, the accuser. He criticised the “Paleface brother” for having failed to bring before the council the one who had been accused. He praised Ree, however, for the frank and open way in which he had laid his arguments before the Indians and for the friendliness he had shown the Delawares at all times.

About the boundary between the white nation and the Indian nations, Captain Pipe said it was true that a treaty had been made several years earlier by the white people and the Delaware, Chippewa and Wyandot nations (at Fort Industry, in 1785) in which it was agreed that the Indians would give up all claim to the land east of the Cuyahoga river, the portage path and the Tuscarawas river, or main branch of the Muskingum, as it was also called. He said further that this same treaty was renewed at a somewhat later time (at Fort Harmer, in 1789) when the Delawares, Wyandots, Chippewas, Sacs and Pottawatomies had made an agreement with the Palefaces.

That the treaties were not kept, Captain Pipe declared, was the fault of the white people because they were always encroaching upon the lands of the Indians and always seeking to drive them farther and farther to the west. He could not consider, he said, that the two young white settlers had any rights in the Ohio country except that which came to them by reason of their having traded goods for the certain small parcel of land they occupied. If they wished to hunt or fish on any other land excepting the few acres they owned, they did so only because the Indians permitted it. Therefore if any violation of Indian laws or customs was committed, they must answer to the Indians for the violation and not contend, as White Fox had done, that a trial by the people of their own color and laws was their right, because they did not actually live on Indian soil.

The agreement the council had reached in regard to the charge of witchcraft against him who was called “Little Paleface,” Captain Pipe at last concluded, was that Lone-Elk and others should go forth to search for further evidence against the white boy. Further, it was agreed that the Delawares would grant the White Fox—meaning Ree—permission to try to show that Big Buffalo died from some cause other than witchcraft if he would give himself as a hostage for the delivery of Little Paleface into the hands of Lone-Elk, in case it was finally decided that witchcraft actually caused the death of the warrior whose voice was now silent.

The latter proposition came as a decided surprise to Kingdom. He had been prepared to hear the decision that Lone-Elk have the opportunity to produce evidence. He remembered vividly now the secret visit the Seneca had paid the clearing the night before. But he dared not speak of it. To do so would betray Fishing Bird. And not knowing what Lone-Elk would “find” in the way of “evidence,” Ree was much at a loss to answer when Captain Pipe, bidding him speak, sat down.

Like the ingenious Yankee boy that he was, Ree did not reply at once to the hostage part of the Delaware chief’s proposal. Concerning the search for evidence, he could only say, he stated, that full permission was given the Indians to look in every nook and corner of the cabin by the river and in the clearing and the woods surrounding it, or wherever else they chose. If they found anything which could be taken to be evidence that John Jerome had aught to do with the death of Big Buffalo, it would be something which had been placed among their property by others; it would be “made to order” evidence, and therefore worth nothing to any fair minded member of the Delaware or any other nation.

Having spoken thus far, and thinking now of the offer that he give himself as a hostage, though he did not mention it, Ree asked of Captain Pipe and all the Indians present whether he was to consider them personally as friends or foes. He wanted to know whether he himself was to be free to come and go as in the past, or whether it was their intention to dispossess him of his land by practically driving him off of it.

“If you do this,” said he, “in what way is it better than the treatment the Indians themselves complain of, that they are driven from their forests?”

The thought thus presented interested Captain Pipe a great deal and for a second or two he did not answer.

“The council is over. The Paleface brother knows its decision. It is not the custom to talk when the time for talking is past,” he said at last.