and they hastened off with the news to their home camps on the Cheyenne River. The news flew rapidly among the Indians at the various agencies, and caused much excitement.
Custer found gold in the Black Hills, on the 2d day of August, and he immediately sent the report to army headquarters, whence it was published to the world, and men everywhere set out to enter the new eldorado. The army was instructed to keep all white men out of the Black Hills until a treaty had been negotiated with the Indians, and the Sioux were notified that no one would be allowed to enter their reservation until such a treaty was made. With this assurance the Indians sensibly decided to let matters take their course. The military used every means possible to keep the gold hunters out of the Hills, but many of them succeeded in entering, and the reports they sent out only served to increase the gold fever, and the determination of others to enter.
It was not until the autumn of 1875 that all of the Sioux people were summoned to meet in council at Red Cloud's agency to make a treaty for the sale of their lands. Senator William B. Allison, of Iowa, was the chairman of the commission sent out by the government to make such a treaty. Under the terms of the treaty of 1868, which had created the great Sioux reservation, it was provided that no part of that reservation should be sold or disposed of unless three fourths of all the adult male Indians interested in the reservation should sign the treaty of sale or relinquishment. Feeling certain that it would be impossible to get three fourths of the Indians to sign the treaty
