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Beyond Penn's Treaty

A Mission to the Indians from the Indian Committee of Baltimore Yearly Meeting to Fort Wayne, in 1804

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Ohio. On approaching it, I felt no small degree
of awe. The slow and majestic movement of so
vast a body of running water, added to the re-
collection of the blood which had been spilt re-
lative to its shores, enforced the sensation. With
what obstinacy the poor Indians resisted the de-
signs of the white men in making settlements
west of this river! Having been driven further
and further westward, relinquished claim to tract
after tract, they here made a stand, fixed in a re-
solve, hitherto ye may come, but no farther!
This river shall be the boundary between us!
It shall limit your encroachment! The resist-
ance they made, and the blood which was split,
sufficiently prove the reluctance with which they
gave up the contest. The bottom upon the west
side of the river where we crossed, which was at
the junction of Short Creek

, is very rich, but not
wide. In this bottom we observed a mound of
earth cast up to the height of fifteen feet, its
diameter at the base forty-five feet, and said to
be a burial place, but whether made by the In-
dians or not is not ascertained. It is said that
two miles below this is a square fortification
containing several acres of ground, enclosed by
a bank of earth thrown up by art to the height
of eight feet.

Along the east shore of the river great de-
struction was made a few years ago by a species
of caterpillar which infested the trees. They
fed upon the leaves, and thus killed trees of