The Indian Dispossessed
with the last hostile tribe "reduced to the condition of suppliants for charity." Throughout the four years the Nez Perces, Flatheads, and Pend d'Oreilles remained steadfast friends of the whites, and the ratification of their treaties came as a long-delayed reward.
A Government agent bore the news to the expectant Nez Perces, and a grand council was called to welcome the word from their Great Father. Lawyer, the head chief, Joseph, Looking-glass, and numerous sub-chiefs, voiced their hearty approval of their new relation to the Great Father in Washington; in the characteristic Indian way they expressed their gratitude, their firm determination to maintain a perpetual peace, their blind confidence in the stability of the new covenant. The record of this council is quite complete.
Lawyer, head chief of the Nez Perces nation, made the opening speech:
"I heard you talk yesterday. I heard what the Great Father said. He has laws for his white children and for his red children. He says: 'My white children must do what is right, and my red children must do the same; that is the law.'
"The Great Father tells us his heart through you, and now you have told us all he has to say; it is good. Your law for us is right. I respect the law; my children and young men respect it.
"Now, I will tell you my heart; the chiefs are
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