d in making fences and planting orchards, and be instructed in raising cotton and making cloth. Small mills should be erected to save the women the labour of pounding corn, and mechanics should be employed to teach the young Indians how to make ploughs, carts, wheels, hoes, and axes."
Benton and other great men argued in the Senate. "In contact with the white race the Indians degenerate. They are a dangerous neighbour within our borders. They prevent the expansion of the white race, and the States will not be satisfied until all their soil is open to settlement."
And so, to remove the Indians to a home of their own became the great work of Clark's life.
"A home where the whites shall never come!" the Indians were delighted. "We will look at these lands."
"I recommend that the government send special agents to collect the scattered bands and families and pay their expenses to the lands assigned them," said Clark, estimating the cost at one hundred thousand dollars. But not all of the tribes would listen.
In November, 1826, Clark drove from St. Louis in his carriage to the Choctaw nation in Alabama, to persuade them to move west of the Mississippi.
"After many years spent in reflection," said the Commissioners, "your Great Father, the President, has determined upon a plan for your happiness. The United States has a large unsettled country on the west side of the great river Mississippi into which they do not intend their white settlements shall enter. This is the country in which our Great Father intends to settle his red children.
"Many of the tribes are now preparing to remove and are making application for land. The Cherokees and Muscogees have procured lands, and your people can have five times as much land in that fine country as they are now living on in this."
Never before in the conquest of nations had the weaker race been offered such advantageous terms. Two days passed while the Indians considered and argued among themselves.
