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father-in-law made his appearance, with a train of Chinook warriors, all
painted and equipped in warlike style.

Old Comcomly had beheld, with dismay, the arrival of a "big war canoe"
displaying the British flag. The shrewd old savage had become something
of a politician in the course of his daily visits at the fort. He
knew of the war existing between the nations, but knew nothing of the
arrangement between M'Dougal and M'Tavish. He trembled, therefore, for
the power of his white son-in-law, and the new-fledged grandeur of his
daughter, and assembled his warriors in all haste. "King George," said
he, "has sent his great canoe to destroy the fort, and make slaves of
all the inhabitants. Shall we suffer it? The Americans are the first
white men that have fixed themselves in the land. They have treated us
like brothers. Their great chief has taken my daughter to be his squaw:
we are, therefore, as one people."

His warriors all determined to stand by the Americans to the last, and
to this effect they came painted and armed for battle. Comcomly made a
spirited war-speech to his son-in-law. He offered to kill every one of
King George's men that should attempt to land. It was an easy matter.
The ship could not approach within six miles of the fort; the crew could
only land in boats. The woods reached to the water's edge; in these, he
and his warriors would conceal themselves, and shoot down the enemy as
fast as they put foot on shore.

M'Dougal was, doubtless, properly sensible of this parental devotion on
the part of his savage father-in-law, and perhaps a little rebuked by
the game spirit, so opposite to his own. He assured Comcomly, however,
that his solicitude for the safety of himself and the princess was
superfluous; as, though the ship belonged to King George, her crew would
not injure the Americans, or their Indian allies. He advised him and his
warriors, therefore, to lay aside their weapons and war shirts, wash off
the paint from their faces and bodies, and appear like clean and civil
savages, to receive the strangers courteously.

Comcomly was sorely puzzled at this advice, which accorded so little
with his Indian notions of receiving a hostile nation, and it was only
after repeated and positive assurances of the amicable intentions of
the strangers that he was induced to lower his fighting tone. He said
something to his warriors explanatory of this singular posture of
affairs, and in vindication, perhaps, o