This reply was well received and sanguine hopes were entertained of a
favorable termination of their mission.
The Indians returned again to their council at Miami, and the
commissioners supposing they would now be prepared to receive them,
proceeded on their voyage westward. Arriving at the mouth of Detroit river
they were obliged to land, being forbidden by the British authorities to
proceed any farther toward the place of meeting.
They were met here by another Indian deputation, bringing a paper with a
written statement of their determination, to make the Ohio the boundary
line between the Indian country and the United States, and requiring the
latter, if sincere in their desires for peace, to remove their settlements
to the south side of that river. To this the commissioners were desired to
give an explicit written answer.
They replied, referring to the understanding from their conference at
Niagara, that some concessions were to be made on both sides, and giving a
brief history of the treaties by which a title had been acquired to land
north of the Ohio, on the faith of which, settlements had been formed
which could not be removed; hence they answered explicitly.--"_The Ohio
river cannot be designated as the boundary line._"
They expressed the hope that negotiations might proceed on the basis of
these treaties, closing with some concessions, and liberal offers for some
lands still held by the Indians.
The debate at this council, it is said, ran high.
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