Indian, uncontaminated with the vices of civilization, has a most exalted sense of character. He is every whit a man; and, in his own opinion, a great man. An insult seems to leave a scar on his very heart. The remembrance of a wrong done him clings to him through life. His hatred is the most bitter of all hatreds; it may be smothered for a time, but never quenched. Though bare and breechless, he walks the earth with all the dignity of a born lord. It is his pride that makes the Indian so stoical as he is. He will not manifest his feelings. He may suffer keenly; but he will repress every expression of pain. It would be unmanly in him to give evidence of distress. His pride enables him to endure the most frightful torments at the hands of his enemies without flinching. When tied at the stake, in a position of utter helplessness, he will not move a muscle, though the explosion of fire-arms in his face should singe off his eyebrows. He will not so much as wink, though the tomahawk, hurled whistling through the air, should chip the top-knot from his head within an ace of the skin. But the Indian's pride is fully equaled by his vanity.

The French had understood the Indian character far better than their rivals, and they had adapted their policy to it. They had taken advantage of his overweening self-importance, and had won him to their cause. They had treated the Indian throughout, with the most flattering attentions; and had made him feel as though they thought about as much of him as he thought of himself. He could withstand the most awful tortures, but he could not resist the crafty appeals to his vanity. This was the secret of the French success in creating and maintaining alliances with the Indian tribes. But the English, on the contrary, had been altogether unaccommodating in their treatment of the Indian. They regarded him as an intruder on the soil, and he regarded them in the same

ever.

ILL-TREATMENT OF THE INDIANS.

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light. They could not harmonize in any respect whatAn Englishman, upon meeting with an Indian for the first time, would stand and stare at him as at a wild beast. That was offensive. But, grown more familiar with the sight, the Englishman would not notice him at all. That was more offensive still. Soon the Indian had become a nuisance, to be rudely jostled from the path; and that was a mortal offense. When the chiefs visited the forts, they were no longer received, as before, with every mark of honor and distinction, but were met with coldness and suspicion, or with utter indifference. The soldiers would make fun of them, mimic the tones of their voices and their pompous airs, and ridicule their appearance generally. The very boys were allowed to tease them with impertinent questions, call them nicknames, make faces at them. The officers would not invite them to the tables; but, after dinner, would send out crusts and bones to them in the yards with the dogs.

The pride of the Indians was constantly wounded by the conduct of the English. Repeated insults had been superadded to repeated injuries. The sagacious chiefs had seen the surveyors tramping about in search of the choicest lands, and they believed that a crowd of Englishmen would soon follow after them to destroy all the hunting-grounds. They had seen the unprincipled traders cheating their people out of their property, exchanging the most worthless goods for the richest furs, and making them foolish with strong drink. And these offensive things were not accidental, but intentional. Outrage had been reduced to a system. And the English forts and military posts had become like so many springs of bitter water, overflowing, and sending out their poisonous streams further and further through the wilderness. Such a state of things could not last much longer. A rupture had become inevitable.

CHAPTER VII.

PONTIAC'S WAR.

Indian method of drilling their warriors

Pontiac Pontiac assembles a council-Pontiac's speech - His dream - The fort at Detroit - Pontiac inspects the fort during a calumet dance - Pontiac's conspiracy on the fort at Detroit defeated - A general destruction of the forts and settlements by the Indians - Stratagems of the game of ball, between the Ojibways and Sacs, and destruction of Michilimackinac - Fall of Venango - Condition of the frontier settlements Colonel Henry Bouquet - His victory near Fort Pitt A council with the chiefs Their apology for the war -Bouquet's reply - Orders the Indians to bring in all their prisoners before giving them the hand of friendship — Meeting of long-lost friends Conclusion of the Indian war Assassination of Pontiac.

THE English colonies were illy prepared to meet the impending war. Those armies which had conquered Canada, had been broken up and dispersed. The rangers. had been disbanded. The regulars had been sent home to England. There remained barely troops sufficient to garrison the posts in the Indian country. In the meanwhile, the deeply-rooted hatred of their oppressors was urging the Indians on precipitately to action, which would have much weakened the effect of the meditated blow, and have given the English time for preparation. But a master mind was busy restraining the impetuosity of the Indian character, and wielding a moral influence over the wild, discordant elements, to reduce them into a species of military order. An Indian chieftain, ruling over a large confederacy, with broad, comprehensive views of policy, is, indeed, an anomaly in the history of the wilderness.

PONTIAC'S CONFEDERACY.

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Pontiac, the great leader of the Indian confederacy, is reported to have been not above the average hight of men. But his muscular form is said to have been remarkable for its symmetry and vigor. His features were irregular. His complexion was darker than is common with the Indian. The expression of his face was bold, stern, determined. His whole bearing was imperious. At the commencement of the war, he is said to have been about fifty years old. Ordinarily, his dress consisted of a scanty cloth, girt about his loins. His hair was not shaven, but hung flowing over his shoulders. Upon great occasions, he appeared before his warriors, plumed and painted, and in a robe, and leggins, and moccasins richly ornamented, in the most impressive style of savage art. He was resolute, wise, and eloquent. His capacious intellect grasped everything within the range of Indian vision. He possessed uncommon force of character; and in subtlety, he was more than a match for the wiliest chieftains of his race. With all those qualities which distinguish great men, it was his misfortune to have been born an Indian. He was passionate, treacherous, and cruel. One of Nature's noblemen by birth, he had been reduced by circumstances and position to a savage. His splendid genius blazed for a while in the wilderness like a fallen star.

During the summer of 1762 the conspiracy against the English had ripened to perfection. The hour of vengeance was drawing near. The danger extended the whole length of the western border, and was imminent to all the middle provinces. Early in the fall, Pontiac had dispatched his ambassadors to the Indian tribes. He had his head-quarters in a small, secluded island, at the opening of Lake St. Clair. From that place he had sent his messages throughout the country of the Ohio and its tributaries;

through the vast region of the upper lakes; through the wild fastnesses of the Ottawa River; through the entire length of the Valley of the Mississippi. And all the tribes north of the Cherokee country, between the Alleghanies and the great plains on the Missouri, had joined in the conspiracy, including even the Senecas, one of the Iroquois nations.

Pontiac had directed that the blow should be struck in the month of May following. The precise time had been indicated by reference to the changes of the moon. The tribes had been counseled to make a general and an instantaneous rising. Each tribe had been charged with the destruction of the English garrison in its own neighborhood. Then they were to fling themselves in a mass on the defenseless colonists. Throughout the recesses of the forest the preparations for war had already been begun. The Indians, indeed, had no armies to drill in complicated tactics, no military stores to provide; but a deep personal interest in the approaching contest had to be awakened in every warrior. The success of an Indian campaign would be dependent on the intensity of the passion which should urge each one on to heroic deeds. Concert of action could be secured in no other way than by bringing similar influences to bear with nearly equal force on them all. That was the scope of the Indian tactics.

For that purpose, the Indian war-songs and the Indian war-dances had long ago been devised. These were peculiarly adapted to stimulate savage natures to the highest pitch of excitement. Mere animal courage always will kindle quickly, by contact with its like, into a fierce and furious flame. Could the English, in 1762, have pierced the gloom of the wilderness, they would have beheld the enacting of scenes of demoniac grandeur that would have startled them from their fancied security. Throughout the vast region of lakes and rivers, in all the valleys,