“We are all well pleased with the attention that you have showed us; also with the good intentions of our father, the President.  If you give us a few articles, such as needles, flints, hoes, powder, &c., we will take the animals that afford us meat, with powder and ball.”

Governor Harrison, if not deceived by the plausible pretences and apparently candid declarations of the Prophet, was left in doubt, whether he was really meditating hostile movements against the United States, or only laboring, with the energy of an enthusiast, in the good work of promoting the welfare of the Indians.  Having received a supply of provisions, the Prophet and his followers, at the end of a fortnight, took leave of the governor and returned to their head quarters, on the banks of the Tippecanoe.

CHAPTER VI.

Tecumseh visits the Wyandots—­governor Harrison’s letter about the Prophet to the Secretary at War—­British influence over the Indians—­Tecumseh burns governor Harrison’s letter to the chiefs—­great alarm in Indiana, in consequence of the assemblage of the Indians at Tippecanoe—­death of Leatherlips, a Wyandot chief on a charge of witchcraft.

During the autumn of this year, 1808, nothing material occurred with the Prophet and his brother, calculated to throw light upon their conduct.  The former continued his efforts to induce the Indians to forsake their vicious habits.  The latter was occupied in visiting the neighboring tribes, and quietly strengthening his own and the Prophet’s influence over them.  Early in the succeeding year, Tecumseh attended a council of Indians, at Sandusky, when he endeavored to prevail upon the Wyandots and Senecas to remove and join his establishment at Tippecanoe.  Among other reasons presented in favor of this removal, he stated that the country on the Tippecanoe was better than that occupied by these tribes; that it was remote from the whites, and that in it they would have more game and be happier than where they now resided.  In this mission he appears not to have been successful.  The Crane, an old chief of the Wyandot tribe, replied, that he feared he, Tecumseh, was working for no good purpose at Tippecanoe; that they would wait a few years, and then, if they found their red brethren at that place contented and happy, they would probably join them.[A] In this visit to Sandusky, Tecumseh was accompanied by captain Lewis, a Shawanoe chief of some note, who then engaged to go with him to the Creeks and Cherokees, on a mission which he was contemplating, and which was subsequently accomplished.  Lewis, however, did not finally make the visit, but permitted Jim Blue Jacket to make the tour in his place.

[Footnote A:  Anthony Shane.]