When the Indians held a council at Fort King, consisting of thirteen chiefs, only eight of them were willing to leave for the West. Hoithlee Mattee, or Jumper, a sworn enemy of the whites, who was called in their language "The Lawyer," and for whom General Jackson had offered a reward of five hundred dollars, rose in their council, with all the dignity of a Roman orator, after which he announced his intention in thundering tones: "I say there is no good feeling between Jumper and the white man. Every branch he hews from a tree on our soil is a limb lopped from Hoithlee's body. Every drop of water that a white man drinks from our springs is so much blood from Hoithlee's heart." After the return of Charlie Emaltha from the West, who was the most intelligent of their chiefs, he met with the whites in council, that he might give expression to his opinion: "Remain with us here," said he to the whites, "and be our father; the relation of parent and child to each other is peace--it is gentle as arrow-root and honey. The disorderly among us have committed some depredations, but no blood has been spilled. We have agreed that if we met a brother's blood on the road, or even found his dead body, we should not believe it was by human violence, but that he had snagged his foot, or that a tree had fallen upon him; that if blood was spilled by either, the offender should answer for it." Previous to this period the Indians were lords of the soil, and considered themselves located in a land of undisputed titles, as entirely their own property, by right of possession, as though they held registered deeds. The following is an effort at Indian poetry, descriptive of their condition previous to hostile demonstrations: We were a happy people then, Rejoicing in our hunter mood; No footsteps of the pale-faced men Had marred our solitude.