Page:Life and Select Literary Remains of Sam Houston of Texas (1884).djvu/354

 to each other face to face. Our hearts were open to each other. Words of kindness entered into them and gave light to our countenances. When we talked together, our people were in our thoughts, and we remembered the women and children of our nations,—you have kept your words, nor have I forgotten mine. You wish to raise corn in our country, and to be our friends. I know that you and our Delaware brothers are good men and will not use crooked ways with your friends. I have written to our commissioners and told them to let the Shawnees, Delawares, and Kickapoos settle on the waters of the Brazos and raise corn. They will also keep all bad red men from our frontier, or, if any should come, they will treat them as enemies. You will stand by us and keep trouble from our people. If red men come to our settlements or hurt our people when they meet them, the blame may fall upon good red brothers, and cause injury to them and their people. So that our brothers must watch all those whose hearts are not straight and who walk in crooked paths and bushes.

If your people and my friendly brothers should raise corn and live on the Brazos and trade to our trading-houses and receive the talk of our agents, you must get the wild brothers to make peace and keep it. If they do not, you must look upon them as enemies, because they will bring harm upon your people, and this will cause great sorrow and crying with your women and children, and the loss of warriors sinks deep in the hearts of the chiefs and wise men of a nation.

Our traders will buy from you all that you may have to sell, and the horses and mules which you may bring to them will get you all the things which you may wish to buy for your warriors, your women, and children.

The red brothers all know that my words to them have never been forgotten by me. They have never been swallowed up by darkness, nor has the light of the sun consumed them. Truth can not perish, but the words of a liar are as nothing. I wish you to come and we will again shake hands and counsel together. Bring other chiefs with you. Talk to all the red men to make peace. War can not make them happy. It has lasted too long. Let it now be ended and cease forever. Tell all my red brothers to listen to my commissioners, and to walk by the words of my counsel. If they hear me and keep my words, their homes shall be happy—their fires shall burn brightly, and the pipe of peace shall be handed round the hearth of their wigwams. The tomahawk shall no more be raised in war. Nor shall the dog howl for his master who has been slain in battle. Joy shall take the place of sorrow; and the laughing of your children shall be heard in place of the cries of women. Your brother,


 * —I send this talk to you by Gov. Butler, the Agent of our Great Brother, the President of the United States. The words I speak to