cause of our failures with the Indians, to whom the
strange and intense story of the Gospel appears at first in something as
wild and marvelous as some of their own relations; and who are, at any
rate, firmly fixed in their heathenish rites and devotions to a subtil
system of deism, and the invocation of gods of the elements and demons.

With respect to the mission of Mackinack, its influence, on the whole,
has been eminently good, and not evil. Mr. Ferry possessed business
talents of a high order, with that strict reference to moral
responsibilities and accountabilities, which compose the golden fibres
of the Gospel net. He sought to bring all, white and red men, into this
net; and its influences were extensively spread from that central point
into the Indian country. He gathered, from the remotest quarters, the
half-breed children of the traders and clerks, into a large and well
organized boarding school, where they were instructed in the points
essential to their becoming useful and respectable men and women. They
were then sent abroad as teachers and interpreters, and traders' clerks,
over a wide space of wilderness, where they disseminated Gospel
principles. Many of their parents also embraced Christianity. Many of
the girls turned out to be ladies of finished education and manners, and
married officers of the army or citizens. There were some pure Indian
converts of both sexes, among whom was the chief prophet of the
Ottawas--the aged Chusco. In 1829, after seven years' labor, he
witnessed a revival among the citizens of that town, which appeared to
be his crowning labor, and it had the effect to renovate the place, and
for many years to drive vice and disorder, if not entirely away, into
holes and corners, where they avoided the light. He came to this island
first, to begin his mission, I believe, in 1822. The effort to set up a
mission there seemed as wild and hopeless, to common judgments, as it
would be to dig down the pyramids of the Nile with a pin. I defended its
course of proceedings from an unjust attack in the legislative council
of the territory, in 1830, having had extensive opportunities to scan
its principles and workings--which were only offensive to worldly men,
because, in upholding the Gospel banner, a shrewd knowledge of business
transactions was at the same time evinced. To be a fool in worldly
things is sometimes supposed, by the wits of the world, to be an
evidence of pious zeal.

_6th_. Bei