Some time in August[564] a convention was assembled at Tahlequah upon the call of John Ross, to take into consideration the question of the difficulties and dangers surrounding the Cherokee Nation and to determine the most advisable method of procedure. At this convention a number of speeches were made, all of which were bitterly hostile in tone to the United States and favorable to an open alliance with the Southern Confederacy. Ross, among others, gave free expression to his views, and according to the published version of his remarks gave it as his opinion that an understanding with the Confederacy was the best thing for the Cherokees and all other Indians to secure and that without delay; that, as for himself, he was and always had been a Southern man, a State rights man; born in the South, and a slaveholder; that the South was fighting for its rights against the oppressions of the North, and that the true position of the Indians was with the Southern people. After this speech the convention, which was attended by four thousand male Cherokees, adopted without a dissenting voice a resolution to abandon their relations with the United States and to form an alliance with the Confederacy. _Treaties between Confederate States and various Southern tribes._--General Pike did not see Ross again until September.[565] In the meantime, the latter had secured the attendance of a large number of representatives of both Northern and Southern tribes, at a convocation held at Antelope Hills, where a unanimous agreement was reached to maintain a strict neutrality in the existing hostilities between their white neighbors. The alleged purpose of this assembly, as stated by General Pike, was to take advantage of the war between the States, and form a great independent Indian confederation, but he defeated its purpose by concluding a treaty with the Creeks on behalf of the Confederate States, while their delegates were actually engaged in council at the Antelope Hills. Following his negotiations with the Creeks, he concluded treaties in quick succession with the Choctaws and Chickasaws, the Seminoles, the Wichitas, and affiliated tribes, including the absentee Shawnees and Delawares, and the Comanches.[566] On returning from his treaty with the Comanches, he was met before reaching Fort Arbuckle by a messenger bearing a letter from Ross and his council, accompanied by a copy of the resolutions of the council and a pressing personal invitation to repair to the Cherokee country and enter into a treaty with that tribe. He consented and named a day when he would meet Ross, at the same time writing the latter to notify the Osages, Quapaws, Senecas, and the confederated Senecas and Shawnees, to meet him at the same time. At the time fixed he proceeded to Park Hill (Ross's residence), where he concluded treaties with these various tribes[567] during the first week in October, reserving the negotiations with the Cherokees to the last, the treaty with whom was