"But they rejected his overtures, and said in reply, 'Stay where you are for ten days, and we will treat with you; but if you advance we will give you battle.'
"Wayne was, however, too wise and wary to be deceived by them. He saw that nothing but a severe blow would break the spirit of the tribes and end the war, and, as Lossing says, he resolved to inflict it mercilessly.
"On the 15th of August his legion moved forward, and on the 18th took post at the head of the rapids, near the present town of Waterville, where they established a magazine of supplies and baggage, protected by military works, and named it Fort Deposit. There, on the 19th, Wayne called a council of war and adopted a plan of march and battle proposed by Lieutenant Harrison."
"Afterward general, papa?"
"Yes, nineteen years later he had become general-in-chief, and performed gallant exploits in this same valley of the Maumee.
"The next morning after that council, at eight o'clock, Wayne advanced according to that plan. They had gone forward about five miles when the advance corps, under Major Price, was terribly smitten by heavy volleys from the concealed foe and compelled to fall back. The enemy was full 2000 strong—composed of Indians and Canadian volunteers, and they were arranged in three lines within supporting distance of each other.
"Wayne's legion was immediately formed in two lines, principally in a dense wood on the borders of a wet prairie, where a large number of trees had been prostrated by a tornado, which made the movements of cavalry very difficult, besides affording a fine covert for the enemy. But Wayne's troops fell upon them with fearful energy, soon making them flee, like a herd of frightened deer, toward Fort Miami."
"The fort the British had built upon our ground without so much as saying by your leave?"
"The very same. They reached it by a hasty flight of two miles through the thick woods, leaving forty of their number dead on the way, by the side of each of whom lay a musket and bayonet from British armories.
"Three days and three nights Wayne and his army remained below the rapids, making such desolation as seemed necessary for the subjugation of the hostile Indians and the treacherous Britains and Canadians; all that in defiance of the threats of the commandant of Fort Miami, though his guns were within view of the American tents. He—Colonel McKee—was the chief instigator of the war with the Indians, with whom he was carrying on a most lucrative trade, and he had there extensive storehouses and dwellings. These our troops set fire to and destroyed, as they did all the products of the fields and gardens."