humane instincts of his heart.

In the negotiation of these treaties in the northwest, Governor Harrison
acted as the minister plenipotentiary of the government, and the
numerous Indian treaties of that day were conducted under express
authority and command from the City of Washington. The series of
negotiations finally terminated in the Treaty of Fort Wayne on September
30, 1809, by which the United States acquired the title to about
2,900,000 acres, the greater part of which lay above the old Vincennes
tract ceded by the Treaty of Grouseland, and below the mouth of Big
Raccoon Creek in Parke County. "At that period, 1809," says Dillon, "the
total quantity of land ceded to the United States, under treaties which
were concluded between Governor Harrison and various Indian tribes,
amounted to about 29,719,530 acres."

As the consummation of that treaty was the principal and immediate cause
which led up to the great controversy with Tecumseh, and the stirring
events that followed, including the Battle of Tippecanoe, and as the
charge was subsequently made by Tecumseh that it was brought about
through the threats of Winamac, the Potawatomi chief, it may rightfully
be said to be the most important Indian treaty ever negotiated in the
west, outside of General Wayne's Treaty of Greenville, in 1795. We will
now enter into the details of that transaction.

That part of the lands acquired by the United States Government by the
Treaty of Fort Wayne, and being situated in the valley of the Wabash and
its tributaries may be thus described: It lay south of a line drawn from
the mouth of the Big Raccoon Creek, in what is now Parke county, and
extending southeast to a point on the east fork of White River above
Brownstown. This line was commonly called The Ten O'clock Line, because
the direction was explained to the Indians as toward the point where
the sun was at ten o'clock. The whole territory acquired in the Wabash
valley and elsewhere embraced about 2,900,000 acres and in the Wabash
region was to be not less than thirty miles in width at its narrowest
point. It will thus be seen that the tract lay directly north of, and
adjoining the white settlements in and about Vincennes. It was
afterwards known as the New Purchase.

There had been frequent and bitter clashes between the settlers and the
Wea and Potawatomi Indians of this part of the territory for years.
Justice and right was not always on the side of the white man. An
ac