under the
guise of treaties.

Among the better class of Indians this policy aroused the bitterest
resentment. The rise of Tecumseh, son of a Shawnee warrior, and of his
brother the Prophet, dates from this time. It was the aim of these
remarkable individuals to prevent the further alienation of Indian lands
by limiting the authority of irresponsible local chiefs and conferring
it upon a congress of warriors from all allied tribes. During the year
1808, Tecumseh and the Prophet laid the foundation of a confederacy by
establishing an Indian village on Tippecanoe Creek, one hundred and
fifty miles above Vincennes.

In the following year (1809), Governor Harrison anticipated the
formation of this Indian confederation by beginning negotiations with
the same irresponsible sachems for the cession of more lands. The
treaty, which was readily concluded, carried despair to the heart of
every follower of Tecumseh, for it conveyed to the National Government
three millions of acres of the best lands in the Indian country,
extending along both banks of the Wabash for a hundred miles. An
alliance with the British seemed to be the only recourse of the Indians.
Only a spark was needed to start a conflagration along the whole
frontier.

Although war was believed to be imminent by the people of Indiana, the
winter and summer of 1811 passed without untoward events. Toward the end
of October, Harrison began a forward movement into the Indian country.
On the morning of November 7, his camp on the banks of the Tippecanoe
was attacked. A sharp engagement followed, in which the army narrowly
escaped disaster; but the troops rallied and finally succeeded in
routing the Indians. In the abandoned village of the Prophet were found
English arms--confirmatory evidence, it was said, of the part which the
British in Canada had taken in the projects of Tecumseh and the Prophet.
Occurring at a moment of tension between the United States and Great
Britain, the battle of Tippecanoe may be regarded properly as "a
premature outbreak of the great wars of 1812." An unforeseen consequence
of this skirmish on the frontier was the rise of a new popular hero in
the West.

Nationally minded men indulged high hopes of the new Congress which
convened at the capital in November, 1811. The presence of some seventy
new members, many of whom belonged to a younger generation, warranted
the expectation that the Twelfth Congress would exhibit greater vigor
than its p