The U.S. government made some effort to follow the British practice of
treating the Indian tribes as a nation and conduction relations with the
tribal governments through the treaty process.  Delegations were invited
to Washington, D.C., throughout the nineteenth century, where they were
welcomed with hospitality and displays of pomp.  They were given presents
of clothes, goods, and silver peace medals, often to mask the fact that
the treaties promoted during these visits were generally not in the
Indians' best interests.  This photograph shows a delegation of Cheyenne
and Kiowa Indians in the white House Conservatory on March 27, 1863.  Of
those pictured here all four of the Indians in the front row were dead
within eighteen months.  From left to right:  War Bonnet and Standing In
the Water were both killed in 1864 at the Sand Creek Massacre; Lean Bear
was mistaken by troops as an enemy and murdered, also in 1864; and Yellow
Wolf died of pneumonia shortly after this photograph was taken.