The ceremony of burying the dead,--covering the grave with leaves to
obscure it from sight,--of burying the hatchet taken from the head of the
victim, thus representing his death by violence,--of covering it with
stones and pulling up and planting over it a pine tree, so that in after
years it should never be disturbed; of wiping the blood from the head of
the victim, and tears from the eyes of the mourners,--these things
represented by speech and action having been performed, the council was
opened in earnest on the day following.
In reply to Colonel Pickering's remarks of the preceding day respecting
peace, and upon keeping the chain of friendship bright, Fish Carrier, an
aged and influential chief, in a speech of some length recounted the
history of the whites and of their intercourse with the red men from their
first settlement in this country. He referred to the manner in which they
had been received, to the friendship, that had existed before the
controversy of the United States with Great Britain, and to the
negotiations that had taken place since that time, the grievances they had
suffered, dwelling particularly upon the dissatisfaction still existing
among them about the treaty at Fort Stanwix in 1784. "The commissioners
were too grasping, they demanded of us too much." But as they had taken
hold of the chain of friendship with the fifteen fires they were disposed
to hold fast; but he thought it needed brightening up a little.
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