Father! You have got the arms and ammunition which our great father sent for his red children. If you have an idea of going away, give them to us, and you may go and welcome. Our lives are in the hands of the Great Spirit. We are resolved to defend our lands, and if it be his will, we wish to leave our bones upon them.
General Proctor writhed under this speech, but he had to swallow it. He might have done better by taking council with Tecumseh and attacking the Americans at the instant of their landing on the Canadian shore. The Indians would have fought very hard, even yet, for him. But he ordered the retreat again, he burned Fort Maiden, and marched inland up the Thames River of southwestern Ontario.
Tecumseh went unwillingly. His Indians were down-hearted. General Harrison crossed from Detroit, and pursued. Tecumseh felt the sting.
"We are now going to follow the British," he said to Jim Blue-jacket, son of old Chief Blue-jacket, "and I believe we shall never return."
He rode with General Proctor in a buggy, and suggested several places that looked good for making a stand.
Once General Proctor agreed. It was indeed an excellent spot, where a large creek joined the Thames.
"We will here defeat General Harrison or leave our bones," he declared.
That was a talk right to Tecumseh's liking.
"When I look upon these two streams they remind me of the Wabash and the Tippecanoe of my own country," he said hopefully.
But after Tecumseh had gladly arranged his warriors, General Proctor decided to leave them as a rear guard and to march on with his soldiers. The Americans brought up ten cannon, and Tecumseh was wounded in the left arm, and the Indians had to retreat, also.