more fully the fraud and warlike purpose of the Shawano, the excitement gradually died away among the Ojibways, and the medicine men and chiefs who had become such ardent believers, hung their heads in shame whenever the Shawano was mentioned. At this day it is almost impossible to procure any information on this subject from the old men who are still living, who were once believers and preached their religion, so anxious are they to conceal the fact of their once having been so egregiously duped. The venerable chiefs Buffalo, of La Pointe, and Esh-ke-bug-e-coshe, of Leech Lake, who have been men of strong minds and unusual intelligence, were not only firm believers of the prophet, but undertook to preach his doctrines.
One essential good resulted to the Ojibways through the Shawano excitement—they threw away their poisonous roots and medicines; and poisoning, which was formerly practised by their worst class of medicine men, has since become almost entirely unknown. So much has been written respecting the prophet and the new beliefs which he endeavored to inculcate amongst his red brethren, that we will no longer dwell on the merits or demerits of his pretended mission. It is now evident that he and his brother Tecumseh had in view, and worked to effect, a general alliance of the red race, against the whites, and their final extermination from the "Great Island which the great spirit had given as an inheritance to his red children."
In giving an account of the Shawano excitement among the Ojibways, we have digressed somewhat from the course of our narrative. The messengers of the prophet reached the Ojibway village at Lac Coutereille, early in the summer of 1808, and the excitement which they succeeded in raising, tended greatly to embitter the Indians' mind against the white race. There was a considerable quantity of goods stored in Michel Cadotte's storehouse, which was
