after the termination of that disastrous war, had so far
abandoned their wild hostility, as to have settled in
various points of contiguity to the forts to which they,
periodically, repaired to receive those presents which
a judicious policy so profusely bestowed.

The reinforcement just arriving was composed principally
of warriors who had never yet pressed a soil wherein
civilization had extended her influence--men who had
never hitherto beheld the face of a white, unless it were
that of the Canadian trader, who, at stated periods,
penetrated fearlessly into their wilds for purposes of
traffic, and who to the bronzed cheek that exposure had
rendered nearly as swarthy as their own, united not only
the language but so wholly the dress--or rather the
undress of those he visited, that he might easily have
been confounded with one of their own dark blooded race.
So remote, indeed, were the regions in which some of
these warriors had been sought, that they were strangers
to the existence of more than one of their tribes, and
upon these they gazed with a surprise only inferior to
what they manifested, when, for the first time, they
marked the accoutrements of the British soldier, and
turned with secret, but unacknowledged awe and admiration
upon the frowning fort and stately shipping, bristling
with cannon, and vomiting forth sheets of flame as they
approached the shore. In these might have been studied
the natural dignity of man. Firm of step--proud of
mien--haughty yet penetrating of look, each leader offered
in his own person a model to the sculptor, which he might