Deer were once abundant. Elk horns have been found, and there are disputed records of straggling herds of buffalo. Panther tracks were sometimes seen, and the black bear—that interesting vagabond of the woods—was a faithful visitor to the wild bee trees. Wolves roved through the timber. Wild cats, foxes, woodchucks, raccoons, and hundreds of smaller animals, dwelt in the great forests. In this happy land lived the Miami and Pottowattomie Indians. Their little villages of bark wigwams and tepees of dried skins were scattered along the small streams, the borders of the river, and on the many islands that divided its course. They sat in spiritual darkness on the verdant banks until the white man came to change their gods and superstitions, but the region teemed with fish, game and wild fruits, and, with their limited wants, they enjoyed the average contentment of humankind. Whether or not their moral well being improved or deteriorated under the teachings and influence of the Franciscan and Jesuit fathers and the protestant missionaries, is a question for the casuists, but the ways of the white man withered and swept them away. Unable to hold what they could not defend, they were despoiled of their heritage and exiled to other climes. Their little cemeteries are still found, where the buried skeletons grimly await the Great Solution, amid the curious decayed trappings of a past age that were interred for the use of the dead in mystical happy hunting grounds. Their problem, like ours, remains as profound as their sleep. Occasionally curious delvers into Indian history have unearthed grisly skulls, covered with mould, and fragments of bones in these silent places. Many thousands of stone weapons, flint arrowheads, implements of the red men’s simple agriculture, and utensils of their rude housekeeping, have been found in the soil of the land where once their lodges tapered into the green foliage. Traces remain of the trails that connected the villages and threaded the country in every direction. The relations between the first settlers and the Indians seem to have been harmonious, but friction of interests developed with the continued influx of the whites, until the primitive law of “might makes right” was applied to the coveted lands. Sculptured monuments have now been erected to the red chieftains by the descendants of those who robbed them—empty and belated recognition of their equities. Many hunters and trappers came into the wild country, lured by the abundant game and fur. The beavers and muskrats provided the greater part of the spoil of the trappers. Gradually the pioneer farmers began clearing tracts in the forests, where they found a soil of exuberant fertility.