1760-1763.] DISORDERS OF THE FUR-TRADE. 175 



employ, were ruffians of the coarsest stamp, who 

 vied with each other in rapacity, violence, and 

 profligacy. They cheated, cursed, and plundered 

 the Indians, and outraged their families ; offering, 

 w^hen compared with the French traders, who were 

 under better regulation, a most unfavorable example 

 of the character of their nation. 



The officers and soldiers of the garrisons did 

 their full part in exciting the general resentment. 

 Formerly, when the warriors came to the forts, 

 they had been welcomed by the French with atten- 

 tion and respect. The inconvenience which their 

 presence occasioned had been disregarded, and 

 their peculiarities overlooked. But now they were 

 received with cold looks and harsh words from the 

 officers, and with oaths, menaces, and sometimes 

 blows, from the reckless and brutal soldiers. 

 When, after their troublesome and intrusive fash- 

 ion, they were lounging everywhere about the fort, 

 or lazily reclining in the shadow of the walls, 

 they were met with muttered ejaculations of impa- 

 tience, or abrupt orders to be gone, enforced, per- 

 haps, by a touch from the butt of a sentinel's 

 musket. These marks of contempt were unspeak- 

 ably galling to their haughty spirit.^ 



1 Some of tlie principal causes of the war are exhibited with spirit and 

 truth in the old tragedy of Ponteach, writt-en probably by Major Rogers. 

 The portion of the play referred to is given in Appendix, B. 



" The English treat us with much Disrespect, and we have the greatest 

 Reason to believe, by their Behavior, they intend to Cut us off en- 

 tirely ; They have possessed themselves of our Country, it is now in our 

 power to Dispossess them and Recover it, if we will but Embrace the 

 opportunity before they have time to assemble together, and fortify 

 themselves, there is no time to be lost, let us Strike immediately." — 

 Speech of a Seneca chief to the Wyandots and Ottawas of Detroit, July, 1761. 



