h to disturb
the equanimity of a "grisly saint;" and, with all humility, I disclaim
having any pretensions to that character. I have frequently heard a
long-legged, sallow-looking backwoodsman talk of having come lately from
Paris, or Mecca, when instead of meaning the capital of _La grande
nation_, or the city of "the holy prophet," he spoke of some town
containing a few hundred inhabitants, situated in the backwoods of
Kentucky, or amidst the gloomy forests of Indiana. The Americans too speak
in prospective, when they talk of great places; no doubt "calculating"
that, one day, all the mighty productions of the old world will be
surpassed by their ingenuity and perseverance.

I reached Little Sandusky about one o'clock in the day, and there learned
that there was a treaty being holden with the Delawares--accordingly I
repaired to the council ground. On a mat, under the shade of seven large
elm trees, which in more prosperous times had waved over the war-like
ancestors of this unfortunate people, were seated three old sachems, the
principal of the tribe. The oldest appeared to be nearly eighty years of
age, the next about seventy, and the last about fifty. On a chair to the
right of the Indians was seated a young "half-breed" chief, the son of one
of the sachems by a white squaw; and on their left, seated on another
chair, a Delaware dressed in the costume of the whites. This young man was
in the pay of the States, and acted as interpreter--he interpreting into
and from the Delaware language, and a gentleman of the mission (a Captain
Walker) into and from the Wyandot. At a table opposite the Indians were
seated the commissioners.

The Lenni Lenape, or Delawares, as they were called by the English, from
the circumstance of their holding their great "Council-fire" on the banks
of the Delaware river, were once the most powerful of the several tribes
that spoke the Delaware tongue, and possessed an immense tract of country
east of the Alleghany mountains. This unfortunate people had been driven
from place to place, until at last they were obliged to accept of an
asylum from the Wyandot, whom they call their uncle; and now are forced to
sell this, and go beyond the Mississippi. To a reflecting mind, the scene
was touching beyond description. Here was the sad remnant of a great
nation, who having been forced back from the original country of their
fathers, by successive acts of rapacity, are now compelled to enter into
a com