the English settler, who regarded the
red man as having no rights he was bound to respect. While the rivalry
between the two white nations was in progress, the red man was courted
by each as holding in large degree the balance of power. But the war
over, the ascendant Briton no longer regarded the Indians as necessary
allies, and they were in large measure treated with indifference and
injustice. The hostility of the Indian against the British was, of
course, assiduously promoted by the French, who saw in it trouble for
the British, possibly a regaining of their lost ground. The warlike and
revengeful spirit of the Indian began to give itself vent. The
smouldering fires were bound to burst forth. During the years 1761 and
1762 plots were hatched in various tribes to stealthily approach, and,
by attack or treacherous entrance, destroy the posts of Detroit, Fort
Pitt, and others. These plots were severally discovered in time to
forestall their attempt. Indian indignation reached its height when in
1763 it was announced to the tribes that the King of France had ceded
all their (Indian) country to the King of England, without consulting
them in the matter. At once a plot was contrived, "such as was never
before or since conceived or executed by North American Indians."

It was determined and planned to make an assault upon all the British
posts on the same day; "then, having destroyed the garrisons, to turn
upon the defenceless frontier and ravage and lay waste the white
settlements." It was fondly believed by thousands of braves that then
the British might be exterminated, or at least driven to the seaboard
and confined to their coast settlements. It was the great chief,
Pontiac, who if he did not originally instigate, fostered, directed, and
personally commanded this secretly arranged universal movement. His
mastermind comprehended the importance and necessity of combined and
harmonious effort. He proposed to unite all the tribes into one
confederacy for offensive operations. At the close of 1762 he despatched
ambassadors to the different nations--to the tribes of the North on the
Lakes; to the northwest, the head-waters of the Mississippi and south to
its mouth; to the east and the southeast. The Indians thus enlisted and
banded together against the British comprised, "with few unimportant
exceptions, the whole Algonquin stock." Especially were the Ohio tribes
solicited and secured; the Shawanoes, the Miamis, the Wyandot