that
about twenty Indians have been carried off by the small-pox, on the
Shiawassa, and the same number on the Flint River. Says the disease was
first brought to Saginaw by Mr. Gardiner D. Williams, and it was
afterwards extended to the Flint by Mr. Campau.
_21st_. Rev. J. A. Agnew, of N.Y., addresses me as one of the Regents
of the University, under a belief that the Board will, very soon,
proceed to the election of a chancellor and professors. He takes a very
just view of the importance of making it a fundamental point, to base
the course of instruction on a sound morality, and of insuring the
confidence of religious teachers of evangelical views,
_25th_. Mr. Conner brought me, some days ago, a cranium of an Indian,
named B-tow-i-ge-zhig (Both Sides of the Sun), who was killed and buried
near his house in a singular way.
It seems that another Indian, a young man, had fallen from a tree, and,
in his descent, injured his testicles, which swelled up amazingly.
Etowigezhig laughed at him, which so incensed the young fellow that he
suddenly picked up a pot-hook and struck him on the skull. It fractured
it, and killed him. So he died for a laugh. He was a good-natured man,
about forty-five, and a good hunter. I gave the skull to Mr. Toulmin
Smith, a phrenological lecturer.
_26th_. Mr. Cleaveland (Rev. John) preached his farewell sermon to the
First Presbyterian Church, Detroit, from Jonah iii. 2: "Arise and go to
Nineveh, that great city, and preach unto it the preaching that I bid
thee." This message he has faithfully and ably delivered to them for
about five years that he has occupied this pulpit.
_27th_. A letter of this date, from Fort Union, on the Missouri,
published in the St. Louis Bulletin, gives a frightful account of the
ravages of the small-pox among the Mandans, Aurickerees, Minitares and
Gros Venters, of the Missouri. This disease, which first broke out about
the 15th of July, among the Mandans, carried off about fifteen hundred
of that tribe. It left about one hundred and thirty souls.[82] It spread
rapidly, and during the autumn carried off about half of the two tribes
mentioned. It was carried to the Blackfeet, Crees, and Assinaboines, who
also suffered dreadfully. Upwards of one thousand of the Blackfeet
perished, and about five hundred Minitares. Whole lodges were swept
away, and the desolations created were frightful.
[Footnote 82: The report that they were entirely extinguished was an
error
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