During the whole time that the messenger had remained with Tecumseh, the Prophet had been present, yet took no part in the conversation. He left that entirely to the management of Tecumseh, who, though apparently playing a subordinate part to the Prophet, was in reality the life and soul of the projected enterprise. His voice was heard in every council preaching peace, yet causing the red men to dream of war, by narrating over and over again, the wrongs and aggressions of the whites; and to such a degree had he already excited them, that the difficulty now was, to keep down the passions he had called into play. In his own bosom he felt the storm gathering with increased fury, and every hour of his time was passed in summing up the wrongs he had suffered. Large tracts of land had been conveyed away by particular tribes, when Tecumseh regarded it as the common property of all. Murders had been committed by the Indians on the whites, and the murderers had been handed over to the whites for punishment; murders had been committed on the Indians by the whites, and when the murderers were demanded, their calls had been neglected. The wave of population was steadily advancing and encroaching upon their grounds. Want and hunger were already the consequence of the near proximity of the whites, and a history of the past told too truly, that one aggression would be followed by another, until the plough of the stranger would run over the ground now occupied by their wigwams, and then, a few years more, and no Indian would own the land whereon he rested. These were the things which preyed upon the soul of Tecumseh, and caused him to weep for the fate of his countrymen, and these were the feelings with which, in the following month, he sat out to visit the Governor at Vincennes, with a hope of removing from his mind all unfavourable impressions which he might entertain towards the Indians, and at the same time determined to lay before him the wrongs of which he complained, and demand redress. It was on the 12th of August that Tecumseh, with a small band of warriors, the Governor having positively forbidden his being attended by a large retinue, made his appearance at Vincennes. Accommodations were prepared at the Governor's house, where he expected the proposed meeting would be held; but Tecumseh refused, and halted his followers in the open air, saying that “so the Indians had ever done, and he would not deviate from their customs. That houses were made for the whites to hold their councils in;—the Indians always held theirs under the trees.”