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 sition from Jack that generals Canby and Gillem, with the peace commissioners, should meet the Modocs in conference. The interpreters were sent out to learn Jack's wishes, and also to convey to him a protest from the commissioners, which was in writing, and which Riddle read to Jack, containing the terms before offered—a general amnesty and a new reservation in a warmer climate.

It was evident to Riddle, from the manner of the Modocs, that they were not acting in good faith. Jack threw the paper sent him upon the ground, saying he had no use for it; he was not a white man, and could not read. He also insisted upon the commissioners coming a mile beyond the council-tent, saying he would go no farther to meet them. Light remarks concernino; the commissioners were made in the hearing of Riddle by others of the Modocs. They had also been killing and were drying beef, and had thrown up breastworks of stone to strengthen certain points; all of which were to the interpreters indications that they were preparing for war rather than for peace.

After a good deal of negotiating. Riddle advising against any meeting, it was finally agreed—Thomas being chairman in the temporary absence of Meacham — that the conference should be held between Canby and the commissioners on one side, and Jack with five men on the other, all to go unarmed, and to meet at the place selected by Jack, an extensive basin surrounded by rocks, at eleven o'clock on the forenoon of the 11th. After this decision Riddle called on Canby and advised him to send twenty-five or thirty men to secrete themselves in the rocks near the council ground, as a safeguard against any treacherous movement on the part of the Modocs. To this proposal the general replied that it would be an insult to Captain Jack to which he could not consent; and that besides, the discovery of such a movement by the Modocs would probably lead to hostilities, and be