. The situation is in other respects admirable for the purposes
for which he has chosen it. It is nearly central with regard to the
tribes which he wishes to unite. The water communication with Lake Erie
by means of the Wabash and Miami, with Lake Michigan and the Illinois
by the Tippecanoe, is a great convenience. It is immediately in the
center of the back line of that fine country which he wishes to prevent
us from settling, and above all, he has immediately in his rear a
country that has been but little explored, consisting principally of
barren thickets, interspersed with swamps and lakes, into which our
cavalry could not penetrate, and our infantry only by slow and laborious
marches."

Tecumseh did not keep his word. At the very time he was promising Wilson
to bring only a few men he was sending word in every direction to
collect his people. On the twenty-fourth of July he was within a few
miles' march of Vincennes with one hundred twenty or thirty warriors,
and the Weas under Lapoussier were coming on in the rear. The people
were greatly alarmed and irritated and there was danger of their firing
on the savage bands. Brouillette was kept in the saddle riding from camp
to camp. On the twenty-fifth, Harrison sent Captain Wilson twenty miles
up the river to demand of Tecumseh his reason for approaching the town
with so large a force, despite the Governor's injunction and his own
previous agreement. The savage after some equivocation, said that he was
only attended by twenty-four men and that the remainder had come "on
their own accord." Parties of savages were then lurking about the
settlements on every hand, and "upwards of one hundred were within two
miles of the town northwest of the Wabash." Some sinister design was
moving the chieftain's mind.

On the twenty-seventh the main body of savages arrived by canoe, and on
the next day came those who marched by land. Three hundred red men were
present, including twenty or thirty women and children. What was
Tecumseh's object? Harrison's spies reported to him that it was the
intention of the Shawnee to peremptorily demand a retrocession of the
late purchase, and if it was not obtained, to seize some of the chiefs
who were active in making the treaty, and in the presence of the
Governor put them to death. If the Governor interfered he was to share
the same fate. However this may be, the great chief abandoned any
hostile design he may have entertained on a view of Harriso