Rocky Mountains. 269 



council, to meet at Point Pleasant, the day after our arrival 

 there, to adopt measures to forward the negotiations for 

 peace with the Osages, with whom they had been at vari- 

 ance for many years. 



The origin of the quarrel existing between these two pow- 

 erful and warlike nations, is by some referred to the period of 

 the American Revolution, when the Osages killed a number 

 of refugees, who had fled to them for protection. Among 

 these were some Cherokees, some Indians of mixed breed, 

 and it is said some Englishmen, to whom the success of the 

 American arms rendered unsafe a longer residence in the 

 country then occupied by the Cherokee nation. Whether 

 the outrage thus alleged against the Osages, was in fact 

 committed, it is not at this time easy to determine. It ap- 

 pears, however, agreeably to the information we have been 

 able to collect, that of late years the Cherokees have, almost 

 uniformly been the aggressors, while the abuses of the Osa- 

 ges, so loudly complained of, both by the Cherokees, and 

 the whites have been acts of ret.tliation. A large number of 

 Cherokees now live on the south side of the Arkansa, upon 

 lands claimed by the Osages, and all the Cherokees of the 

 Arkansa, are in the habit of hunting and committing other 

 depredations on the Osage hunting grounds. 



In 181.', the Cherokees with a number of Delaware*, 

 Shawnees, Quapaws, and eleven American volunteers, the 

 whole amounting to about six hundred men, made an irrup- 

 tion into the territory of the Osages, having previously ta- 

 ken measures to quiet the suspicions ot their enemies by oc- 

 casional messages, professing a peaceable disposition on their 

 part. When they had arrived near the village, they sent a 

 deputation to the Osages, concealing at the same time their 

 numbers, and their hostile intention, and inviting Clermont, 

 the chief, to a council, which they proposed to hold at a lit- 

 tle distance from the town. Clermont being absent on a 

 hunt, with the young men of his village, an old Indian, 



