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Baltimore Yearly Meeting Indian Committee Minutes, 1795-1815

BYM_Page_019

Towns we have had large opportunity of discoveringtheir present situation often exposed to the inclemen-cy of the Seasons with a very precarious and freq-uently a scanty supply of food and cloathing &;from the knowledge we have obtained of theextensive and valuable Country they have latelygiven up to the United States and of the narrowstrip of Land yet reserved for their own use betweenthe line of American Garrisons from Detroit tothe Mouth of Kentucky river we were impressedwith a belief that these who reside in this Countrythe Wyandots, Shawanese &; Delawares unless they altertheir present mode of living must in a few yearsfrom the scarcity of game be reduced to a stateof extreme want and distress and in order to awakentheir minds to reflection on this subject and openbefore them the desire Friends had to afford themsome assistance, by using some endeavours we gotan opportunity with two of the principal Chiefs ofthe Wyandot Nation together with several of theirformer warriors and young men and having IsaacZane for our Interpretor we addressed them nearlyin the following words Brothers We are about to speak to you with theMouths of a large council of the sons of peace theQuakers who live on the other side of the great Moun-tains towards the sun rising.