Brantford

“ He died on an estate granted him by the British government on the banks of Lake Ontario on the 24th of November 1807. A monument was erected to his memory at Brantford, Ontario, Canada (named in his honour) in 1886. ”

“ Later he became business manager of the “Brantford Courier,” and at the time he purchased the “Port Elgin Times” held this position. On taking possession of the “Times” he at once put his splendid business ability into the enterprise and established it upon sound business principles. Under him the “Times” has become one of the brightest country weeklies in Ontario. He has ideas which he is not afraid to put forward, and his paper is ever for the uplift and moral reform of the community which he so ably serves. He is a splendid platform man, speaking with ease and fluency. ”

“ Sara Jeannette Duncan, author and journalist, born in Brentford, Ontario, Canada, in 1862. She is most widely known by her maiden name, Sara Jeannette Duncan. Her PHŒBE COUZINS. father, Charles Duncan, is a merchant of Brantford and a man of wide information and keen intelligence. Her mother is a quick-witted Irish woman. ”

“ Fairfield Harwich Kent Sarah A. Burt [8] Fairview Gore of Downie Perth L. Robinson Falkenburg Macaulay Victoria Wm. Holditch Falkirk Williams Middlesex, W. R. James Priestley Falkland Brantford Brant, W. R. M. Stally [20] Farmersville Yonge Leeds, S. R. Arza Parish Farmington Amaranth Wellington, N. R. Farnham Centre Farnham Brome John Johnston Farquhar Usborne Huron William Edmond Farran’s Point Oznabruck Stormont George N. Hickey [9] Father Point (sub) Ste. ”

“ Bulwer Eaton Compton A. Williams * Burford Burford Brant, W. R. John Catton Burgessville Norwich Oxford, S. R. Josiah Campbell Burleigh Burleigh Peterboro’ Jas. Golborne Burn-brae Seymour Northumberl’d, E. R. Alex. Donald Burnhamthorpe Toronto Peel Geo. Savage Burnley Haldimand Northumberl’d, W. R. R. H. Grimshawe Burns Mornington Perth [12] Burnstown McNab Renfrew James Douglas Burritt’s Rapids Oxford Grenville, N. R. John Meikle, Jr. Burtch Brantford Brant, W. R. Geo. ”

“ With head erect, the strong-knit figure of the chief stands at repose. The eyes are mild and wide-set and about the lips a smile is playing. In the portrait we see, too, the resolute heart, the thoughtful mind, and the restless energy that made Joseph Brant a ruler of the native races.
On being asked as to the help he might render to the English arms in the New World, Brant asserted strongly that he and his people were loyal. He said that, as War Chief, he would lead three thousand of his warriors into the struggle, and that they would fight manfully as subjects of the king. ”

“ Two children, Isaac and Christiana, were born to him of this, his first, marriage. We may pass rapidly over these tranquil years of Brant's life. He did his domestic duties as a man should; and Sir William Johnson, finding him trustworthy, had constant work for him, and sent him on many important missions to the Indians, even to the far-western tribes. During this period Brant became a communicant in the Anglican Church, and, knowing well what hardships the missionaries had to endure, he gave them what help he could in their work among the red people. ”

“ The former does what it likes, ’tis lord and master; the latter is, by its very nature, a creature of compromise.
Brantôme possesses all the verve and brightness of a genuine Frenchman. All the conditions of life are highly favourable for him; he is rich and noble, while intelligence and wit are stamped on his very face. He wins his first spurs under François de Guise, whose protégé he is; when he has had enough of war, he comes to Court. ”

“ The Plants of Branford were a good family, and they have always borne a high reputation through the eight or nine generations which have elapsed since they first established themselves in Branford. They were intelligent, thoughtful farmers, industrious, sound thinkers, orthodox in faith, and leading those quiet country lives, of which the old New England towns presented so many examples. The village minister was a man greatly reverenced by all his people, and if a youth of more than ordinary promise could be instructed under his direction, it was something to be proud of. ”

“ A garden with one Eve is the perfect combination in a world awry. Muffled, the music and the sounds of the ballroom came faint and far to them; star-made shadows danced at their feet. The girl paused, expectant; but it was the unexpected that happened. The nimble tongue which had done such faithful service for Mr. Bransford now failed him quite: left him struggling, dumb, inarticulate, helpless—tongue and hand alike forgetful of their cunning. ”

“ In one of Brant's hostile incursions upon the settlements, during the war of the Revolution, Rose and his nephew, with others, were taken prisoners, and marched in the direction of Niagara. During the journey, Brant took Rose aside one morning, and admonished him not to move far away from himself (Brant,) but at all times on their march to keep within call. "I have reason to believe," said the Chief, "that that nephew of yours is plotting your death. He is endeavoring to bribe one of my Indians to kill you. ”

“ The termination of Brant's military life brought not therewith a state of inactivity. The proverbial indolence of his race in regard to all matters excepting the war-path and the chase, was not a characteristic of him. On the contrary, the history of man scarcely supplies a parallel instance of such active, unremitting, and unwearied public service, as well in the council as in the field, as was performed by this celebrated man, from the day when he first fleshed his youthful tomahawk at Lake George, until his death more than half a century afterward. ”

“ CHAPTER XIV THE CHURCH BELL RINGS Joseph Brant had been a valiant warrior; he had dealt with the affairs of the Six Nations wisely and well. But he had never forgotten that one of the first duties of any ruler is to be, in some sense, a priest unto his people. From a lad, he seems to have been a devoted Christian. The alarms of war had drawn his mind for a period, it is true, to worldly considerations alone, but now that strife had ceased he became once more the friend of the missionary and sought to supply the spiritual needs of the tribes over which his influence was felt. ”

“ The difficulties between the Mohawks and the Provincial Government, respecting the title to the lands of the former, which the elder Brant had so long labored, but in vain, to adjust, yet continuing unsettled, in the year 1821 John Brant, alias Ahyouwaeghs, was commissioned to proceed to England, as his father had been before him, to make one more appeal to the justice and magnanimity of the parent government. He urged his claim with ability, and enlisted in the cause of his people men of high rank and influence. ”

“ Brant was not only trusted, consulted, and distinguished by several eminent British officers in America, but personally beloved by them. Now I could conceive men in power, for defensible reasons of state politics, to have officially trusted, and even publicly distinguished at courts or levees, an active and sagacious Indian chief, of whose private character they might nevertheless still entertain a very indifferent opinion. But I cannot imagine high-minded and high-bred British officers forming individual and fond friendships for a man of ferocious character. ”

“ In the course of his conversations with Major James Cochran and General Porter, long after the war, in regard to the alleged cruelty of his career, Brant assured those gentlemen that he had always spared in battle whenever it could be done without bringing upon himself the censure of his own people. In more instances than one, he said, he had been instrumental in preserving life when exposed to the fury of his warriors, and that he had winked at the escape of white prisoners, whose sufferings would not permit them to proceed on their march. ”

“ If he haled his bedmate to justice and the real Bransford got away—that would be a nice predicament for an ambitious young man! He was sensitive to ridicule, and he saw here such an [Pg 164] opportunity to earn it as knocks but once at any man’s door.
If, on the other hand, while he held Bransford cooped tightly in the Basin, this thrice-accursed Long should escape him and there should be no Bransford in the Basin——What nonsense! What utter twaddle! Bransford was in the Basin. He had found his horse and saddle, his tracks; no tracks had come out of the Basin. ”

“ Ain’t that rich?”
“Very rich,” said Brant grimly. Then he saw his advantage and made good use of it. “In fact, it is much too rich to spoil. Go find the fellow and tell him I’m in a bad humour, but that he is safe as long as he keeps away from me. Will you do that?”
“Sure,” assented the brakeman, getting upon his feet. “I’ll do better than that: I’ll scare him till he won’t get a good breath this side o’ the Missouri River.”
Brant’s eyes narrowed, and in the turning of a leaf the mantle of humility slipped from him and he became Brant the man-queller. ”

“ Brantôme himself lived an adventurous life. Born in Perigord in 1537, he was only eighteen years younger than the queen he here discusses. His family, the de Bourdeilles, was one of the oldest and most respected in that province. "Not to boast of myself," he says, "I can assert that none of my race has ever been home-keeping; they have spent as much time in travels and wars as any, no matter who they be, in France." The young Pierre had his first experience in Court life, at the Court of Marguerite, sister of Francis I., to whom his mother was lady-in-waiting. ”

“ With Miss Percy Fred had felt indignant at the man who had been indirectly the cause of Brant’s death, and although he did not curse him as she had done, he never thought of him without a feeling of horror. And now it was proven that he was the father of the girl he loved more than his life, and with his recollection of Mr. Grey he knew that he was not the unprincipled man he had imagined Brant’s adversary to be. He, like Brant, was infected with a disease he had not the strength to resist, and his life had paid the penalty of his misdeeds. ”

“ As the younger family grew up, he became jealous of them, imagining that they received a larger share of parental favor than his sister and himself. Nothing could have been more groundless than were his suspicions, since from the concurrent testimony of the survivors of the family, and the aged contemporaries of the old Chief yet living at Grand River, no parent was ever more scrupulous in the impartial bestowment of his affection among all his children than Captain Brant. ”

“ Throughout the Revolution he was engaged in warfare chiefly upon the border settlements of New York and Pennsylvania, in connection with the Johnsons and Butlers. He held a colonel's commission from the king, but he is generally ealled Captain Brant. After the peace in 1783, Brant again visited England, and, on returning to America, devoted himself to the social and religious improvement of the Mohawks, who were settled upon the Ouise or Grand River, in Upper Canada, upon lands procured for them by Brant from Sir Frederic Haldimand, governor of the province. ”

“ He reported to General Arnold, who promptly released his brother, and gave him a full pardon.
Brant was again at Oquaga in 1778, the terror of the border. Women turned pale and children trembled at his very name. In the bitter animosity of the day no story of cruelty was too black to be laid upon Brant, the great chief of these savage warriors. Brant felt keenly the hatred with which he was regarded in afterlife among frontiersmen. The proud chief wished to be regarded as a gentleman in every respect. ”

“ The hope of a great fortune was realized no more on the side of his king than on that of his beautiful, virtuous, and rich lady. He is, no doubt, “liked, known, and made welcome by the kings, his masters, by his queens and his princesses, and all the great seigneurs, who held him in such esteem that the name of Brantôme had great renown.” But he is not satisfied with the Court small-change in which his services are paid. He is vexed that his own lightheartedness is taken at its word ”

“ A bitter smile came over Brant's face, but passed as quickly.
“Enough,” he said quietly, “I will meet you beside the Run, and cross the marsh with you until you are within hailing distance of your lines. I will be in plain clothes, Alice,” he went on slowly, “for it will not be the commander of this force who accompanies you, but your husband, and, without disgracing his uniform, he will drop to your level; for the instant he passes his own lines, in disguise, he will become, like you, a spy, and amenable to its penalties.” ”

“ Brant is an Indian by birth. In the American war he fought under the English banner, and he has since been in England, where he was most graciously received by the King, and met with a kind reception from all classes of people. His manners are semi-European. He is attended by two Negroes; has established himself in the English way; has a garden and a farm; dresses after the European fashion; and nevertheless possesses much influence over the Indians. He assists at present (1795) at the Miami Treaty, which the United States are concluding with the western Indians. ”

“ A gentleman of family, acknowledged and treated as kinsman by Queen Margot, wife of Henry IV., living habitually in the society of the most famous men of his time, a contemporary of Rabelais, Marot and Ronsard, a sincere but unbigoted Catholic, a man of exceptional literary endowments, Brantôme is one of the happiest representatives of the French mind in the XVIth Century. ”