l the
whites; he was more than a tribesman; he imagined what it was to be
a citizen. Among the Ohio men of the past there is no nature more
beautiful, no memory worthier than his. He was a savage, and his thirst
for vengeance, or rather the smoldering thought of his wrongs, lowered
him for a time to the level of the white and red men about him. Yet he
was framed for gentleness, and he surpassed another great Ohio Indian
as much in breadth of character, as he surpassed Tecaughretanego in an
ideal of conduct.

Tecumseh, the famous war chief of the Shawnees, was born at the
ancient town of Piqua on Mad River, not far from the present city of
Springfield, in Clark County. His name means Shooting Star, and he was
indeed the meteoric light of his people while he lived. He was of a high
Indian, family of the Turtle Tribe, and his father had come with his
clan to Ohio from their home in Florida, about the middle of the last
century. Tecumseh was born, as nearly as can be reckoned, in the year
1768, and from his earliest childhood he showed the passion for war
which ruled him through life. He led his playmates in their mimic
fights, and at seventeen he went on his first war party against the
Kentuckians. The Indians attacked some boats on the Ohio River, and
killed all the boatmen but one, whom they brought back and burned at the
stake. Tecumseh was present, and though he said nothing, the sight of
the torture filled him with such horror, that he used his power with the
Indians to put a stop forever to the burning of prisoners. He was such
a hater of our race that, as he once confessed, the mere presence of a
white man made the flesh of his face creep; but he hated cruelty more,
and in the bloody events which he spent all his power in bringing about,
he could always be trusted to keep the captives from torture, and to
save the lives of women and children.

In spite of his hatred of white men, it is said that he was once in
love with a white woman, the daughter of a settler in Greene County.
He offered her fifty silver brooches if she would marry him; but she
refused, saying that she did not wish to be a wild woman and drudge like
a squaw; and she would not be tempted even when he promised her that she
should not work, but should be a great squaw.

[Illustration: Tecumseh 154]

He was not always terrible, even with white men, and it is told of him
that once meeting in a settler's cabin a stranger who showed alarm at
sight of