1820 — Sault Ste. Marie, MI

The soldiers do not know Indians, my brothers. They mean well but are ignorant of our ways. Our ancestral votive tree is gone — by fire from heaven; by the axe of a new people. Its fall may be a symbol. The might of my people is ended; this I have long known. Accept it, my brothers! Let us live in peace.

Source: The Mighty Soo: Five Handed Years at Sault Ste. Marie, by Clara Ingram Judson (New York: Follett, 1955), pp. 106-107.

Also: I Have Spoken: American History Through the Voices of the Indians, ed. Virginia Irving Armstrong (Athens, OH: Swallow Press, 1991), p. 50.