226 CHEROKEE NATION OF INDIANS. 
The salient points of this proposition were that the Cherokees should 
make a cession of land in proportion to the estimated number of their 
nation who had already removed or enrolled themselves for removal to 
the Arkansas; that the United States preferred the cession to be made 
in Tennessee and Georgia, and that in the latter State it should be as 
near and convenient to the existing white settlements as was pos- 
sible; that the reservation which the Cherokees had expressed a desire 
to make for the benefit of a proposed school fund should be located 
within the limits of Alabama Territory, inasmuch as the cession to be 
made in Georgia would, under the provisions of the act of Congress of 
1802, belong to that State, and the lands covering the proposed cession 
in Tennessee would be subject to location by North Carolina military 
land warrants. Neither was such school reservation to constitute any 
portion of the land which the Cherokees were to cede in conformity to 
the principle of exchange embodied in the first paragraph. The United 
States would continue to extend its protection to both branches of the 
Cherokee people, but those remaining east of the Mississippi, having 
expressed a desire that the lands retained by them should be absolutely 
guaranteed from any danger of future cession, were informed that in 
order to secure such guarantee it was indispensable that the cessions 
they were about to make should be ample, and that the portion of terri- 
tory reserved by them should not be larger than was essential to their 
wants and convenience. The Secretary reminded them that should a 
larger quantity be retained it would not be possible, by any stipulation 
in the treaty, to prevent future cessions; that so long as they retained 
more land than was necessary or convenient for themselves they would 
feel inclined to sell and the United States to purchase. He commented 
on the fact that they were rapidly becoming like the white people, and 
could not longer live by hunting, but must work for their subsistence. 
In their new condition of life far less land would be essential to their 
happiness. Their great object should be to hold their land by severalty 
titles and to gradually adopt the manners and laws of life which pre- 
vailed among their white neighbors. It was only thus that they could 
be prosperous and happy, and neglect to accept and profit by the situa- 
tion would inevitably result in their removal or extinction. 
The question as to the area of territory that should be ceded as the 
equitable proportion of the Arkansas Cherokees formed the subject of 
much dispute. The Eastern Cherokees denied the accuracy of the 
emigration roll of Governor McMinn, and asserted that, instead of 5,291 
emigrants, as stated by him, there had actually been not exceeding 
3,500, while the non-emigrant portion of the nation they gave as num- 
bering 12,544, or more than three-fourths of the entire community.! 
It being impossible to reconcile these radical differences of esti- 
mate and the Indians becoming wearied and discouraged with the per- 
sistent importunities of the United States officials, they consented to the 

! Cherokee delegation to Secretary of War, February 17, 1819. 
