in August at the battle of
Bushy Run, near Fort Pitt. In this engagement, after two
days of strenuous backwoods fighting, the Indians were
finally worsted. Pontiac's star had begun to set. With
hopeless odds against him, the stubborn chief of the
Ottawas kept up the struggle until the following year,
but at last he was compelled to sue for peace.

In the meantime Brant's reputation among his tribesmen
was steadily rising. In the spring of 1764, when the
fighting was at an end, he returned to Canajoharie Castle.
There he built a comfortable house, wedded the daughter
of an Oneida chieftain, and dwelt for some years in peace
and quiet. Two children, Isaac and Christiana, were born
to him of this, his first, marriage. We may pass rapidly
over these tranquil years of Brant's life. He did his
domestic duties as a man should; and Sir William Johnson,
finding him trustworthy, had constant work for him, and
sent him on many important missions to the Indians, even
to the far-western tribes. During this period Brant became
a communicant in the Anglican Church, and, knowing well
what hardships the missionaries had to endure, he gave
them what help he could in their work among the red
people. He assisted the Rev. John Stuart, a missionary to
his tribe and afterwards a distinguished clergyman in Upper
Canada, in his translation of the Acts of the Apostles,
in a History of the Bible, and in a brief explanation of
the Catechism, in the dialect of the Mohawks. It is
related that a belated missionary, footsore and weary,
crept one day to Brant's abode, where he was given food
and cared for in his sickness. 'Joseph Brant,' the
missionary wrote in grateful tribute, 'is exceeding kind.'

It was well that a man of judicious mind and fearless
heart was coming to the fore among the nation of the
Mohawks. A cloud had begun to fleck the horizon; soon
would come the sound of the approaching tempest. How
would it fare with the Six Nations in the day of turmoil?

CHAPTER IV

THE WAYS DIVIDE

The happy ending, in 1763, of the war with France left
the English colonies in America with little to disturb
them, except the discontented red men beyond the Alleghany
Mountains. The colonies grew larger; they did more business
and they gathered more wealth. But as they prospered they
became self-confident and with scarce an enemy at home
they became involved in a quarrel with the motherland
across the sea. England, they said, was taxing th