SOURCE OP ST. PETER 3 ravER. 245 



countries of the Mississippi and Lake Michigan, north- 

 wardly of the 42nd parallel of north latitude. The numerous 

 bands of the Dacota or Sioux nation, together with those of 

 their irreconcileable enemies the Chippewas, are daily be- 

 coming less numerous and powerful, in consequence of an 

 incessant warfare which has for a long time existed be- 

 tween those nations, and of the frequent hostilities that take 

 place between them and other neighbouring Indians ; and al- 

 though they have at present but little occasion to be alarmed 

 at the prospect of having their country wrested from them 

 by a white population, yet their final extirpation cannot be 

 viewed as an event very remote. 



There can exist but little doubt, that most if not all of 

 these Indians would, in any emergency decidedly favour- 

 able to their views, take up arms against the people of the 

 United States. They have no calamity to dread so fatal 

 to their repose, as that of the inroads of our population 

 upon their territory, and no evil so much to be deprecated, 

 and so pernicious to their welfare, as that of a free in- 

 tercourse between them and a semi-barbarian race, often 

 resident among them, and always ready to occupy the 

 ground from which they have retreated. There is, how- 

 ever, no new occasion to enlarge upon this part of the 

 subject, and we shall conclude with briefly stating, that the 

 intercourse, between the citizens of the United States and 

 the Indians, is of a nature calculated to vitiate and deprave 

 the former, while it engenders distrust, malevolence, and 

 hatred in the minds of the latter. In fine, the language held 

 forth by the Indian in relation to the Americans is, that 

 they have claim to no other feeling but that of abhor- 

 rence, and that it is from principles of policy, and not of 

 esteem and reverence, that he treats them with deference, 



Vol. IL 32 



