get perfect, and none but himself even imperfect, obedience. The nation
could not stop a town from going to war, nor, in turn, could a town stop
its own young men from committing ravages. Thus the whites were always
being provoked, and the frontiersmen were molested as often when they
were quiet and peaceful as when they were encroaching on Indian land.
The Creeks owed the land which they possessed to murder and rapine; they
mercilessly destroyed all weaker communities, red or white; they had no
idea of showing justice or generosity towards their fellows who lacked
their strength, and now the measure they had meted so often to others
was at last to be meted to them. If the whites treated them well, it was
set down to weakness. It was utterly impossible to restrain the young
men from murdering and plundering, either the neighboring Indians or the
white settlements. Their one ideal of glory was to get scalps, and these
the young braves were sure to seek, no matter how much the older and
cooler men might try to prevent them. Whether war was declared or not,
made no difference. At one time the English exerted themselves
successfully to bring about a peace between the Creeks and Cherokees. At
its conclusion a Creek chief taunted the mediators as follows: "You have
sweated yourselves poor in our smoky houses to make peace between us and
the Cherokees, and thereby enable our young people to give you in a
short time a far worse sweat than you have yet had."[29] The result
justified his predictions; the young men, having no other foe, at once
took to ravaging the settlements. It soon became evident that it was
hopeless to expect the Creeks to behave well to the whites merely
because they were themselves well treated, and from that time on the
English fomented, instead of striving to put a stop to, their quarrels
with the Choctaws and Chickasaws.

The record of our dealings with them must in many places be unpleasant
reading to us, for it shows grave wrong-doing on our part; yet the