n8 The Winning of the West 



British agent McKee for ever having interfered in 

 the Indian councils, and misled the tribes to their 

 hurt ; and in writing to the Secretary of the Indian 

 Office for Canada he reminded him in plain terms of 

 the treachery with which the British had behaved to 

 the Indians at the close of- the Revolutionary War, 

 and expressed the hope that it would not be re- 

 peated; saying: 50 "If there is a treaty between Great 

 Britain and the Yankees I hope our Father the King 

 will not forget the Indians as he did in the year '83." 

 When his forebodings came true and the British, in 

 assenting to Jay's treaty, abandoned their Indian 

 allies, Brant again wrote to the Secretary of the In- 

 dian Office, in repressed but bitter anger at the con- 

 duct of the King's agents in preventing the Indians 

 from making peace with the Americans while they 

 could have made it on advantageous terms, and 

 then in deserting them. He wrote: "This is the 

 second time the poor Indians have been left in 

 the lurch & I cannot avoid lamenting that they 

 were prevented at a time when they had it in 

 their power to make an Honorable and Advan- 

 tageous Peace." 51 



McKee, the British Indian agent, was nearly as 

 frank as Brant in expressing his views of the con- 

 duct of the British toward their allies; he doubtless 

 felt peculiar bitterness as he had been made the ac- 

 tive instrument in carrying out the policy of his 



50 Canadian Archives, Brant to Joseph Chew, Feb. 24, and 

 March 17, 1795. 

 81 Do., Brant to Chew, Jan. 19, 1796. 



