Meanwhile, Houston had joined his old friends, the Cherokees, now living in Arkansas Territory, and asked to be admitted to the tribe. The Indians expressed the opinion that he should have beaten his wife instead of abandoning her, but nevertheless adopted him, and for three years he lived their life, dressing, fighting, hunting and drinking precisely like any Indian. The papers, meanwhile, were filled with surmises concerning him. No one understood why he should have exiled himself, and it was reported that he intended to lead the Cherokees into Texas, conquer the country and set up a government of his own. President Jackson wrote to him, protesting against "any such chimerical, visionary scheme," which, needless to say, Houston had never entertained. These rumors grew so annoying, that he issued a proclamation offering a prize "To the Author of the Most Elegant, Refined, and Ingenious Lie or Calumny" about him. The trouble culminated when Houston, having gone to Washington to plead for his friends, the Indians, caned a member of Congress who had slandered him on the floor of the House. He was arrested, and arraigned before the bar of the House for "breach of privilege," and was reprimanded by the Speaker and fined five hundred dollars--a fine which President Jackson promptly remitted, remarking that a few more examples of the same kind would teach Congressmen to keep civil tongues in their heads. Houston's comment on the affair was, "I was dying out once, and, had they taken me before a justice of the peace and fined me ten dollars for assault and battery, it would have killed me; but they gave me a national tribunal for a theatre and it set me up again." It did "set him up" in earnest. The President, who always had a warm place in his heart for him, helped by sending him--not, perhaps, without some insight into the future--to Texas, to examine into the value of that country, in case the United States should decide to buy it. What Jackson's private instructions were can only be surmised, but, certainly, Houston showed no hesitation or uncertainty after he reached the scene. On December 10, 1832, he crossed into Mexican territory, and was soon at the head of the Texas insurrectionists, who had determined to establish a government of their own, and who found in Houston a leader after their own hearts. Armed collisions between Texans and Mexican troops became of common occurrence, and the spirit of revolt spread so rapidly that Santa Anna, dictator of Mexico, sent an army under General Cos to pacify the country and drive the Americans out.