310 TRAVELS THROUGH UPPER CANADA: 
our guard against giving them too much of the 
latter; but he advised us always to give them 
some whenever we took any ourselves, and 
advised us also to eat with them, and to be¬ 
have towards them in every respect as if they 
were our equals. We had already seen enough 
of the Indians, to know that this advice was 
good, and indeed to have adopted of ourselves 
the line of conduct which he recommended, 
even if he had said nothing on the subject. 
Having arranged every thing to our satis¬ 
faction, we returned to Fort Erie; there we 
disposed of all our superfluous baggage, and 
having made some addition to the stores of dried 
provisions and biscuits which our kind friend 
captain E—— had furnished us with on leavr 
ing his hospitable roof, we embarked, with 
all belonging to us, in the ship's boat, for the 
village on Buffalo Creek, where we had settled 
to pass the night, in order to be ready to start 
early the next morning. 
The Indians were with us according to ap¬ 
pointment at day-break ; they divided the bag¬ 
gage, fastened their loads each on their carrying 
frames, and appeared perfectly ready to depart, 
when their chief requested, through the in¬ 
terpreter, that we would give them before 
“ they set out a little of that precious water 
“ we possessed, to wash their eyes with, which 
would dispel the mists of sleep that still hung 
