Although he had himself dreaded a good deal from the hostility of
the Pottawattamie, he could have wished this deed undone. That there
was a jealous distrust of each other between the two Indians had
been sufficiently apparent; but the bee-hunter could not have
imagined that it would so soon lead to results as terrible as these!
After examining the body, and noting the state of things around it,
the men proceeded, deeply impressed with the necessity, not only of
their speedy removal, but of their standing by each other in that
remote region, now that violence had so clearly broken out among the
tribes. The bee-hunter had taken a strong liking to the Chippewa,
and he regretted so much the more to think that he had done this
deed. It was true, that such a state of things might exist as to
justify an Indian warrior, agreeably to his own notions, in taking
the life of any one of a hostile tribe; but le Bourdon wished it had
been otherwise. A man of gentle and peaceable disposition himself,
though of a profoundly enthusiastic temperament in his own peculiar
way, he had ever avoided those scenes of disorder and bloodshed,
which are of so frequent occurrence in the forest and on the
prairies; and this was actually the first instance in which he had
ever beheld a human body that had fallen by human hands.
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