Many reports had been circulated among the Konzas respecting the invitation to council their chiefs had received. They were conscious of having recently offended, by firing on Major O'Fallon, and by insulting and plundering several soldiers of Captain Martin's command. For these offences they had been in some measure punished at the time, Major O'Fallon having returned their fire from his boat, and not entirely without effect, as was supposed; several also had been flogged by the orders of Captain Martin; yet they did not consider themselves secure from the vengeance of the whites. Many believed that at the time of the anticipated council, barrels of gunpowder were to be placed in the earth to destroy them at once. The two runners, who had been despatched, quarrelled before they had gone far; one saying, all {112} the things that had been told them by the interpreters were lies, for which assertion he was struck to the ground by his companion. In this situation they were found by the advancing chiefs. Finally, a dispute happened between the chiefs themselves respecting rank, in consequence of which ten or twelve of them returned to the village. Mr. Say, who spent some time among the Konzas, gives, in his notes, the following account of that nation: "The approach to the village is over a fine level prairie of considerable extent; passing which, you ascend an abrupt bank of the height of ten feet to a second level, on which the village is situate in the distance, within about one-fourth of a mile of the river. It consists of about a hundred and twenty lodges, placed as closely together as convenient, and destitute of any regularity of arrangement. The ground area of each lodge is circular, and is excavated to the depth of from one to three feet, and the general form of the exterior may be denominated hemispheric.