Austin. Why, they were all three of them chiefs!

Hunter. The speech made by the chief, Little Turtle, at Baltimore, on his way to see the President of the United States, will interest you. Some Quakers, who saw him, told him that the habit among his tribe of drinking rum prevented them from doing them good.

“Brothers and friends—When your forefathers first met on this island, your red brethren were very numerous; but, since the introduction amongst us of what you call spirituous liquors, and what we think may justly be called poison, our numbers are greatly diminished. It has destroyed a great part of your red brethren.

“My friends and brothers—We plainly perceive that you see the very evil which destroys your red brethren. It is not an evil of our own making. We have not placed it amongst ourselves; it is an evil placed amongst us by the white people; we look to them to remove it out of the country. We tell them, ‘Brethren, fetch us useful things: bring us goods that will clothe us, our women, and our children; and not this evil liquor, that destroys our health, that destroys our reason, that destroys our lives.’ But all that we can say on this subject is of no service, nor gives relief to your red brethren.

“My friends and brothers—I rejoice to find that you agree in opinion with us, and express an anxiety to be, if possible, of service to us, in removing this great evil out of our country; an evil which has had so much room in it, and has destroyed so many of our lives, that it causes our young men to say, ‘We had better be at war with the white people. This liquor, which they introduced into our country, is more to be feared than the gun or tomahawk.’ There are more of us dead since the treaty of Greeneville, than we lost by the six years’ war before. It is all owing to the introduction of this liquor among us.

“Brothers—When our young men have been out hunting, and are returning home loaded with skins and furs, on their way, if it happens that they come where this whiskey is deposited, the white man who sells it tells them to take a little drink. Some of them will say, ‘No; I do not want it.’ They go on till they come to another house, where they find more of the same kind of drink. It is there offered again; they refuse; and again the third time: but, finally, the fourth or fifth time, one accepts of it, and takes a drink, and getting one he wants another, and then a third, and fourth, till his senses have left him. After his reason comes back to him, when he gets up and finds where he is, he asks for his peltry. The answer is, ‘You have drunk them.’ ‘Where is my gun?’ ‘It is gone.’ ‘Where is my blanket?’ ‘It is gone.’ ‘Where is my shirt?’ ‘You have sold it for whiskey!’ Now, brothers, figure to yourselves what condition this man must be in. He has a family at home; a wife and children who stand in need of the profits of his hunting. What must be their wants, when even he himself is without a shirt?”

Austin. There is a great deal of good sense in what Little Turtle said.

Hunter. The war between England and America made sad confusion among the Indians, and the missionaries too; for it was reported that the missionaries were joining the French against the English, so that they and the Indian converts were dreadfully persecuted.

Colonel de Peyster, who was then the English governor at Fort Detroit, suspected the Christian Indians of being partisans of the Americans, and the missionaries of being spies; and he wished the Indians favourable to him to carry them all off. Captain Pipe, a Delaware chief, persuaded the half king of the Hurons to force them away. Persecution went on, till the missionaries, seeing that no other course remained, they being plundered without mercy, and their lives threatened, consented to emigrate. They were thus compelled to quit their pleasant settlement, escorted by a troop of savages headed by an English officer. The half king of the Hurons went with them. But I will read you an account of what took place after they reached Sandusky Creek. “Having arrived at Sandusky Creek, after a journey of upwards of four weeks, the half king of the Hurons and his warriors left them, and marched into their own country, without giving them any particular orders how to proceed. Thus they were abandoned in a wilderness where there was neither game nor provisions of any kind; such was the place to which the barbarians had led them, notwithstanding they had represented it as a perfect paradise. After wandering to and fro for some time, they resolved to spend the winter in Upper Sandusky; and, having pitched on the most convenient spot they could find in this dreary region, they erected small huts of logs and bark, to shelter themselves from the rain and cold. They were now, however, so poor, that they had neither beds nor blankets; for, on the journey, the savages had stolen every thing from them, except only their utensils for manufacturing maple sugar. But nothing distressed them so much as the want of provisions. Some had long spent their all, and now depended on the charity of their neighbours for a morsel to eat. Even the missionaries, who hitherto had uniformly gained a livelihood by the labour of their hands, were now reduced to the necessity of receiving support from the congregation. As their wants were so urgent, Shebosh the missionary, and several of the Christian Indians, returned, as soon as possible, to their settlements on the Muskingum, to fetch the Indian corn which they had left growing in the fields.