As it was desirable also for them to understand, that the dividends from
it might be greater some years than others, this was explained by
referring to the idea of planting, as they could know from experience,
that some years they would have from the same ground a better crop than
others. Hence after this when speaking to Mr. Morris about their money,
they would inquire _what kind of a crop they were going to have that
year_?
Another point of interest with them, was to ascertain _how large a pile,
the money they were to receive, would make_?
This was shown them by representing the number of kegs of a given size, it
would take to hold, and the number of horses that would be necessary to
draw it.
These questions being settled, the next point to be agreed upon, was the
size of their reservations. Mr. Morris had stipulated, in case their
demands were reasonable, no deduction would be made from the price they
were to receive. But instead of moderate, very exhorbitant claims were
presented, growing out of a degree of rivalry between different chiefs.
Their comparative importance would be graduated in a measure by the size
of their domain, and the number of people they would thus be enabled to
have about them; hence they were individually ambitious of not being out-
done, in the size of their reservations.
Red Jacket put in a claim to about one-fourth of the entire tract
purchased. Cornplanter desired about as much; and other chiefs were alike
ambitious in securing extensive reservations; and they wished to have them
marked out by natural boundaries, such as rivers, hills or the course of
streams.
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