mooney] THE END OF TECUMTHA 691 



triumph in the issue. His sun had gone down, and he felt himself 

 already standing in the shadow of death. He was done with life and 

 desired only to close it, as became a warrior, striking a last blow 

 against the hereditary enemy of his race. When he had posted his 

 men, he called his chiefs about him and calmly said, " Brother warriors, 

 we arc now about to enter into an engagement from which I shall never 

 come out — my body will remain on the field of battle." He then 

 unbuckled his sword, and, placing it in the hands of one of them, said, 

 "When my son becomes a noted warrior and aide to wield a sword, 

 give this to him." He then laid aside his British military dress and 

 took his place in the line, clothed only in the ordinary deerskin hunt- 

 ing shirt. (Drake, Tecumseh, 9.) When the battle began, his voice was 

 heard encouraging his men until he fell under the cavalry charge 

 of the Americans, who had already broken the ranks of the British 

 regulars and forced them to surrender. Deprived of their leader and 

 deserted by their white allies, the Indians gave up the unequal contest 

 and tied from the held. Tecuintha died in his forty-fourth year. 



After the close of the war the prophet returned from Canada by per- 

 mission of this government and rejoined his tribe in Ohio, with whom 

 he removed to the west in 1827. (Schoolcraft, Ind. Tribes, 2.) Catlin, 

 who met and talked with him in 1832, thus speaks of him: 



This, no doubt, has been a very shrewd and influential man, hut circumstances 

 have destroyed him, as they have many other great men hefore him, and he now 

 lives respected, hut silent and melancholy, in his tribe, I conversed with him a great 

 deal about his brother Tecumseh, of whom he spoke frankly, and seemingly with 

 great pleasure; but of himself and his own great schemes he would say nothing. 

 He told me that Tecumseh's plans were to embody all the Indian tribes in a grand 

 confederacy, from the province of Mexico to the Great Lakes, to unite their forces 

 in an army that would be able to meet and drive back the white people, who were 

 continually advancing on the Indian tribes and forcing them from their lands 

 toward the Rocky mountains; that Tecumseh was a great general, and that nothing 

 but his premature death defeated his grand plan. ( Catlin, 2.) 



