HISTORY OF THE NEW YORK IROQUOIS 337 



During the council the Six Nations presented the address they 

 would send to the Piankashaws, Kickapoos and other western 

 Indians. Their messengers would inform them of the peace 

 between the Iroquois and the Cherokees, and of the good under- 

 standing with the English. The Iroquois were surprised at their 

 conduct to them and to the English traders going to the Illinois. 

 They were out of their senses, and the Six Nations took them by 

 the head, shaking them so as to restore their wits and taking the 

 hatchet from their hands because they did mischief. If they 

 proved obstinate, there would be war, and with war, ruin. 



In the autumn of 1770 a great Indian congress met at Scioto 

 in Ohio, intended for a stricter union among the Indians. It 

 ended in general resolutions for peace among all, introductory to 

 a firm alliance between the northern and southern nations for 

 some purpose not made known. Johnson opposed this council 

 but could not prevent it. His deputies from the council at 

 German Flats met the Indians from Scioto at Fort Pitt in Decem- 

 ber, and summoned them to reassemble at Scioto, when they 

 would communicate the resolutions agreed to at German Flats 

 and on which they had over 100 belts. He had great confi- 

 dence in several of these deputies and hoped to defeat anything 

 dangerous. 



In July 1771 he held a council with 350 of the Six Nations, on 

 a report that they were stirring up the Shawnees, Delawares and 

 others to war on the English. They denied it, but he gave his 

 authority, and this' brought explanations. Then he thought there 

 was reason to distrust only the Senecas on the Ohio and at Gene- 

 seo. The Indians themselves examined those present from the 

 farthest castle, who said that any remaining evil must have come 

 from Guastarax, chief of the Senecas, who was now under ground 

 but had been a bad and troublesome man. In the late Indian 

 war he secretly sent a belt hatchet to the Shawnees and others, 

 that he would remove the door of the Six Nations from his vil- 

 lage of Geneseo to Scioto plains, and he wished them to help him 

 fight his way there. The Senecas then disavowed his acts. As 

 his cunning was now well known, they thought it likely he had 



