very lucidly in the _North
American Review_ for April, 1879, in an interview with Bishop Hare of
South Dakota.

"If I ever sold any land to the Government," says he, "it was done in
this way: Suppose a man comes to me and says: 'Joseph, I want to buy
your horse.' I say to him: 'I am satisfied with my horse. I do not wish
to sell him at any price.' Then the man goes to my neighbor and says to
him: 'I want to buy Joseph's horse, but he would not sell it to me.' My
neighbor says: 'If you will buy my horse, I will throw in his horse!'
The man buys my neighbor's horse, and then he comes and claims my horse
and takes it away. I am under no obligation to my neighbor. He had
nothing to do with my horse."

It was just such dealing as this which forced Black Hawk to fight with a
handful of warriors for his inheritance. The Government simply made a
treaty with the Sacs under Keokuk, and took the land of the Foxes at the
same time. There were some chiefs who, after they had feasted well and
drunk deep and signed away their country for nothing, talked of war,
and urged Black Hawk to lead them. Then they sneaked away to play "good
Indian," and left him to bear the brunt alone.

There were no more Indian wars for thirty years. The Southwest frontiers
were now occupied by eastern tribes or their remnants, which had been
transported beyond the Mississippi during the early thirties. Only
fragments were left here and there, in New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio,
Indiana, and the South. The great Siouan race occupied nearly all the
upper valley of the Mississippi and Missouri rivers and their
tributaries. North of them dwelt the Ojibways, an Algonquin tribe with
an entirely different language. The Sioux nation proper originally
occupied a vast territory, and in the middle of the nineteenth century
they still held the southern half of Minnesota, a portion of Wisconsin
and Iowa, all of the Dakotas, part of Montana, nearly half of Nebraska,
and small portions of Colorado and Wyoming. Some of the bands were
forest Indians, hunters and trappers and fishermen, while others roamed
over the Great Plains and hunted the buffalo, elk, and antelope. Some
divided the year between the forest and prairie life. These people had
been at peace with the whites ever since the early French explorers and
the Jesuit priests had entered their country. They had traded for many
years with the Hudson Bay and American Fur companies, and no serious
difficulty had arisen