n this voyage we may frequently kill bears, as they may be
crossing the Scioto and Sandusky. _Oh, ho, ho, ho!_ grant that we may
kill plenty of turkeys along the banks, to stew with our bear meat. _Oh,
ho, ho, ho!_ grant that rain may come to raise the Olentangy about two
or three feet, that we may cross in safety down to the Scioto, without
danger of our canoe being wrecked on the rocks. And now, oh, Great
Being, thou knowest how matters stand--thou knowest that I am a great
lover of tobacco, and that though I know not when I may get any more,
I now make a present of the last I have unto thee, as a free burnt
offering. Therefore I request that thou wilt hear and grant these
requests, and I thy servant will return thee thanks, and love thee for
thy gifts."

Smith tells us that a few days after Tecaughretanego made his prayer and
offered up his tobacco, rain came and raised the Olentangy high enough
to let them pass safely into the Scioto. He does not say whether he
thought this was the effect of the old Indian's piety, but he always
speaks reverently of Tecaughretanego's religion. He is careful to
impress the reader again and again with the importance of the Indian
family he had been taken into, and with the wisdom as well as the
goodness of Tecaughretanego, who held some such place among the Ottawas,
he says, as Socrates held among the Athenians. He was against the
Indians' taking part in the war between the French and English; he
believed they ought to leave these to fight out their own quarrels;
and in all the affairs of his people, he favored justice, truth, and
honesty. The Indians, indeed, never stole from one another, but they
thought it quite right to rob even their French allies; and it will help
us to a real understanding of their principles, if we remember that the
good and wise Tecaughretanego is never shown as rebuking the cruelty
and treachery of the war parties in their attacks on the English
settlements. The Indian's virtues are always for his own tribe; outside
of it, all the crimes are virtues, and it is right to lie, to cheat,
to steal, to kill; as it was with our own ancestors when they lived as
tribes.

Smith was always treated like one of themselves by his Indian brothers,
and he had a deep affection for them. Once, in a time of famine, when
Tecaughretanego lay helpless in his cabin, suffering patiently with
the rheumatism which crippled him, Smith hunted two whole days without
killing any game,