present occasion that, in felicitating you on a continuance of the national
prosperity generally, I am not able to add to it information that the
Indian hostilities which have for some time past distressed our
Northwestern frontier have terminated.

You will, I am persuaded, learn with no less concern than I communicate it
that reiterated endeavors toward effecting a pacification have hitherto
issued only in new and outrageous proofs of persevering hostility on the
part of the tribes with whom we are in contest. An earnest desire to
procure tranquillity to the frontier, to stop the further effusion of
blood, to arrest the progress of expense, to forward the prevalent wish of
the nation for peace has led to strenuous efforts through various channels
to accomplish these desirable purposes; in making which efforts I consulted
less my own anticipations of the event, or the scruples which some
considerations were calculated to inspire, than the wish to find the object
attainable, or if not attainable, to ascertain unequivocally that such is
the case.

A detail of the measures which have been pursued and of their consequences,
which will be laid before you, while it will confirm to you the want of
success thus far, will, I trust, evince that means as proper and as
efficacious as could have been devised have been employed. The issue of
some of them, indeed, is still depending, but a favorable one, though not
to be despaired of, is not promised by anything that has yet happened.

In the course of the attempts which have been made some valuable citizens
have fallen victims to their zeal for the public service. A sanction
commonly respected even among savages has been found in this instance
insufficient to protect from massacre the emissaries of peace. It will, I
presume, be duly considered whether the occasion does not call for an