Government that their brother Odjebwes were few in number, while the
British were in great numbers and daily increasing from an unknown part
of the world across the ocean. They said, "Oh, my father, you are like
the trees of the forest, and if one of the forest trees should be
wounded with a hatchet, in a few years its wound will be entirely
healed. Now, my father, compare with this: this is what my brother
Odjebwe did to some of your children on the Straits of Mackinac, whose
survivors we now bring back and present to your arms. O my father, have
mercy upon my brothers and pardon them; for with your long arms and
many, but a few strokes of retaliation would cause our brother to be
entirely annihilated from the face of the earth!"

According to our understanding in our traditions, that was the time the
British Government made such extraordinary promises to the Ottawa tribe
of Indians, at the same time thanking them for their humane action upon
those British remnants of the massacre. She promised them that her long
arms will perpetually extend around them from generation to generation,
or so long as there should be rolling sun. They should receive gifts
from her sovereign in shape of goods, provisions, firearms, ammunition,
and intoxicating liquors! Her sovereign's beneficent arm should be even
extended unto the dogs belonging to the Ottawa tribe of Indians. And
what place soever she should meet them, she would freely unfasten the
faucet which contains her living water--whisky, which she will also
cause to run perpetually and freely unto the Ottawas as the fountain of
perpetual spring! And furthermore: she said, "I am as many as the stars
in the heavens; and when you get up in the morning, look to the east;
you will see that the sun, as it will peep through the earth, will be
as red as my coat, to remind you why I am likened unto the sun, and my
promises will be as perpetual as the rolling sun!"