"You cannot take lands without war and conquest," were
the words of a young chief with a nose like a hawk's
beak, and an eye like the eagle's, to Lord Selkirk. "You
did not fight us; therefore you did not conquer us. How
comes it then that you have our lands?"

"Are you the owners of this territory?" calmly enquired
the nobleman.

"We are; no one else is the owner."

"But I shall shew you that from two standpoints, first
from my own, and afterwards from yours, it belongs not
to you. Firstly, it belongs to our common Sovereign, the
King of England. You belong to him; so likewise do the
buffalo that graze upon the plains, and the fishes that
swim in the rivers. Therefore our great and good Sovereign
sayeth unto me, his devoted subject, 'Go you forth into
my territories in the North of America, and select there
a colony whereon to plant any of my faithful children
who choose to go thither.' I have done so. Then, since
you hold possession of these plains only by the bounty
and sufferance of our good father the King, how can you
object to your white brethren coming when they were
permitted so to do?"

Ugh; that was only the oily-tongued talk of the pale-faces.
While seeming to speak fair, and smooth, and wise, their
tongues were as crooked as the horn of the mountain-goat.
Yet no chief could answer the Earl's contention, and they