The hatred displayed in the face of the old savage was unmistakable, yet the boy did not fear him.
“You must have seen Colonel Washington in the Braddock campaign?”
“I have seen him. The Great Spirit keeps him and turns the bullets away from him.”
“He is much respected in Virginia. He inherited a big estate, Mount Vernon, with much land and many slaves.”
“Like all palefaces he wants more. He sends men into the Indian country to take more land.”
“The Indian does not use the land as do the English. The Indians want to roam and hunt over it. The white man works hard and builds a home and lives on much less land than does the Indian.”
“He scares away the game and the squaw and pappoose must cry in hunger. The Great Spirit made this country for Indian and he must hold it or follow the sun.”
Rodney did not know but that he had said too much, yet he liked a good argument and was curious to learn how the Indians felt and what they believed. “Do the Indians want to dig up the tomahawk and make war on the whites?”
“The young braves do, but Ahneota fought with Pontiac. No chief was ever obeyed by so many Indians, by Ottawas, Wyandottes, Pottawattomies, by the Ojibwas of the far north, all took the war belt and made their faces black. Some day another great chief 84 will bring the war belt and the red men will follow where he may lead, but he has not come. The signs are not right. Already the Great Father of the English says to his children, ‘I have made peace with much wampum with the Father of the French. Give me wampum.’ The children grow angry; they kick away the peace belt and will not smoke the pipe. Then the Indian will rise from the ground like the leaves in a big wind and blow in their faces. When father and children quarrel, the eagle comes down like fire from the sky, and the wolves howl in the forest.”