ace of people, and are well disposed towards the
whites. They have long been divided, however, into two parties, one
of which is friendly towards our government, while the other,
called the _British band_, is under the influence of the British
traders. It has always been the policy of the latter, to keep the
Indians upon the western frontier in a state of disaffection
towards the American people, and by these means, to secure to
themselves an undue proportion of the fur trade. So long as it
should remain difficult upon our part to gain access to the tribes,
and our intercourse with them be liable to interruption, jealousy,
and distrust, so long would the British trader possess an advantage
over us in relation to this traffic. The British fur companies,
whose agents are numerous, intelligent, and enterprising, have
always acted upon this policy, and the English officers in Canada,
both civil and military, have given it their sanction. Almost all
the atrocities which have been committed on our frontiers by the
Indians, within the last fifty years, have been directly or
indirectly incited by the incendiary agents of that mercenary
government. The _British band_ of the Sacs and Foxes have been in
the habit of visiting Malden annually, and receiving valuable
presents--presents, which being made to a disaffected portion of a
tribe residing not only within the United States, but within the
limits of a state, could be viewed in no other light than as
bribes,--the wages of disaffection. Black Hawk, though not a chief,
is one of the most influential individuals of the _British band_."

* * * * *

In a late number of the American Museum, we find the following article.
It bears intrinsic evidence of coming from the same pen, and presents in
a striking point of view the rapid extension of our settlements, and the
consequent recession of the Indians.

Most of our readers have become familiarly acquainted with the
name of the redoubted Black Hawk, whose adventures are detailed in
this volume and whose fame has been spread from Maine to Florida.
There was a time when he shared the eager attention of the public
with Fanny Kemble and the cholera, and was one of the lions of the
day; and as regularly talked about as the weather, the last new
novel, or th