3927. INDIANS, Lands of.—[further continued].
To promote the disposition
to exchange lands, which they have to
spare and we want, for necessaries, which we
have to spare and they want, we shall push our
trading uses, and be glad to see the good and influential
individuals among them run in debt,
because we observe that when these debts get
beyond what the individuals can pay, they become
willing to lop them off by a cession of
lands. At our trading houses, too, we mean
to sell so low as merely to repay us cost and
charges, so as neither to lessen nor enlarge our
capital.—
To Governor Harrison. Washington ed. iv, 472.
(W.
1803)
