Meanwhile the Indians were getting into a state of unrest.  The presents, on which they depended so much for existence, were not forthcoming, and rumours of trouble were in the air.  Senecas, Shawnees, and Delawares were sending war-belts east and west and north and south.  A plot was on foot to seize Pitt, Niagara, and Detroit.  Seneca ambassadors had visited the Wyandots in the vicinity of Detroit, urging them to fall on the garrison.  After an investigation, Captain Campbell reported to Amherst that an Indian rising was imminent, and revealed a plot, originated by the Senecas, which was identical with that afterwards matured in 1763 and attributed to Pontiac’s initiative.  Campbell warned the commandants of the other forts of the danger; and the Indians, seeing that their plans were discovered, assumed a peaceful attitude.

Still, the situation was critical; and, to allay the hostility of the natives and gain their confidence, Amherst dispatched Sir William Johnson to Detroit with instructions ’to settle and establish a firm and lasting treaty’ between the British and the Ottawa Confederacy and other nations inhabiting the Indian territory, to regulate the fur trade at the posts, and to settle the price of clothes and provisions.  He was likewise to collect information as exhaustive as possible regarding the Indians, their manners and customs, and their abodes.  He was to find out whether the French had any shipping on Lakes Huron, Michigan, and Superior, what were the best posts for trade, and the price paid by the French for pelts.  He was also to learn, if possible, how far the boundaries of Canada extended towards the Mississippi, and the number of French posts, settlements, and inhabitants along that river.

Sir William left his home at Fort Johnson on the Mohawk river early in July 1761.  Scarcely had he begun his journey when he was warned that it was dangerous to proceed, as the nations in the west were unfriendly and would surely fall upon his party.  But Johnson was confident that his presence among them would put a stop to ’any such wicked design.’  As he advanced up Lake Ontario the alarming reports continued.  The Senecas, who had already stolen horses from the whites and taken prisoners, had been sending ambassadors abroad, endeavouring to induce the other nations to attack the British.  Johnson learned, too, that the Indians were being cheated in trade by British traders; that at several posts they had been roughly handled, very often without cause; that their women were taken from them by violence; and that they were hindered from hunting and fishing on their own grounds near the posts, even what they did catch or kill being taken from them.  He heard, too, that Seneca and Ottawa warriors had been murdered by whites near Forts Pitt and Venango.  At Niagara he was visited by Seneca chiefs, who complained that one of their warriors had been wounded near by and that four horses had been stolen from them.  Johnson