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1791 WD 12 3 Brant which he accepted & agreed to head the Men, & that the Number
of Indians was very large, this account came by Bigtree & John Dicker who were in Philadelphia last Winter they, were glad to see us & we them.
13 4: Morning Capt. Hendrick came to take leave of us, & let us know he was
going, I imported to him some Observations that occur'd which he received kindly, we distributed a few more small Articles with which they appear'd to be pleased, & soon after went to Council, when the Col:
Red deliver'd a long Speech, but beofre this Speech was received, Red Jacket Jacket spoke on a belt & made Observations on the foregoing Speech, Brother Speech you have blamed us very much, because we take the Advice of our Brothers
the Brittish, & not come to you for Advice; I will tell you the Reason why we do so, the Brittish are our Antient Friends, they live near us, when we deal with them they make use of Wampum, which we understand, they give us good advice, when Peace is offered to us by the united states they Advise us to accept of it; but the 13 fires are very far from us, we should ware out our Clothes & consume our Provision by the way, if we went to you for Advice, beside they make use of writing, not one Man among us can read, then we are obliged to go to our Neighbors the Brittish to get them explain'd to us, however Brother, we are now come down to you about Peace & Friendship, we are now begining to do our Business at this Council Fire, we desire you to appoint an Agent for Indian Affairs, to whom we may go to to tell every Thing that happens to us, & from whom we may hear what concerns us, as there used to be in old Times, these are some of our Reasons Brother, for our applying to the Brittish for their Advice & not coming to you heretofore
14 5: Good Peter made an animating Speech 15 6: The Council met in the log House, Fishcarrier introduced the
Business by saying there were certain Men for particular Business, but those who spoke, it was on behalf of the five Nations, then good Peter rose & agreeably to their Custom repeated most of what the Commissioner delivered the day before, and express'd their hearty uniting with what had been done during the Treaty in establishing Peace, &c. After he had done the Col: read a Letter sign'd by the Cornplanter, Halftown, Bigtree, Newarrow & John Dicker, which seemed to me to be dictated by some Officer in the military Line, the Contents were, that Capt. Brant who was sent with a Message of Peace to the western Indians, had taken up the Hatchet & joined them against the Brethren the Americans, in Consequence of