The Canadian Brothers; Or, The Prophecy Fulfilled: A Tale of the Late American War — Volume 1Richardson, Major (John)
History
The Canadian Brothers; Or, The Prophecy Fulfilled: A Tale of the Late American War — Volume 1
Richardson, Major (John)
United States -- History -- War of 1812 -- Fiction; War stories
There was one of the number, however, and his canoe was
decorated with a richer and a larger flag, whose costume
was that of the more civilized Indians, and who in
nobleness of deportment, even surpassed those we have
last named. This was Tecumseh. He was not of the race
of either of the parties who now accompanied him, but of
one of the nations, many of whose warriors were assembled
on the bank awaiting his arrival. As the head chief of
the Indians, his authority was acknowledged by all, even
to the remotest of these wild but interesting people,
and the result of the exercise of his all-powerful
influence had been the gathering together of those
warriors, whom he had personally hastened to collect from
the extreme west, passing in his course, and with impunity,
the several American posts that lay in their way. In
order more fully to comprehend the motives and character
of this remarkable man, it may not be impertinent to
recur summarily to events that took place prior to the
declaration of war by the United States against England.
It being a well established--and even by themselves
uncontradicted--fact, we can have no hesitation in stating
(what we trust no American will conceive to be stated in
illiberality of spirit, since such feeling we utterly
disclaim) that the government of the United States, bent
on the final acquisition of all the more proximate
possessions of the Indians, had for many consecutive
years, waged a war of extermination against these
unfortunate people, and more especially those residing
on the Wabash, to which the eye of interest or preference,
or both, had directed a jealous attention. For a series
of years the aggression had been prosecuted with fearful
issue to the Indians, when, at length, one of those daring
spirits, that appear like meteors, few and far between,
in the horizon of glory and intelligence, suddenly started
up in the person of Tecumseh, who, possessed of a genius,
as splendid in conception, as it was bold in execution,
long continued to baffle the plans and defeat the measures
of his most experienced enemies. Whether the warrior owed
his original influence, or rather the opportunity for
development of his extraordinary talents, both diplomatic
and warlike, to the fact of his being the brother of the
Prophet--a similar, and rather mean looking person, whom
a deep reading of the prejudices of his followers had
bound to him in an enthusiasm of superstitious credence
--whether, we repeat, Tecumseh owed his elevation to this
circumstance in part, or wholly to his own merit, it is
difficult to determine with certainty, but it is matter
of history, that plausible and powerful as the Prophet
had rendered himself, his more open and generous brother,
while despising in his heart the mummeries practised by
his wily relative, was not long in supplanting him in
the affections, as he rapidly superseded him in authority
and influence, over his people--All looked up to him as
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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