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The Cherokees were a bright, intelligent race, better fitted to "follow the white man's road" than any other Indians. Like their neighbors, they were exceedingly fond of games of chance and skill, as well as of athletic sports. One of the most striking of their national amusements was the kind of ball-play from which we derive the game of lacrosse.
From the lower South the Creeks, Cherokees, Choctaws, and Chickasaws were gradually removed during the years 1830 to 1838, sometimes after the most shameless and brutal treatment by the representatives of both the States and the Nation.
The Shawnees had not been consulted in the treaty with the Cherokees. Following the fierce and bloody battle of Point Pleasant in October, 1774, peace had been declared between the Northern Confederacy and the Long-Knife Virginians; nevertheless, here just before the war with England, British agents were stirring the Indians up against the colonists. Kentucky, said the Shawnees, must be cleared.
By the treaty of 1791, the United States solemnly guaranteed to the Cherokees all of their land, the whites not being permitted even to hunt on them. In 1794 and 1804 new treaties were negotiated, involving additional cessions of land. By the treaty of 1804, a road was to be cut through the Cherokee territory, free for the use of all United States citizens.
The affair, however, proved to be a mere flash in the pan: for the Cherokees finding that things were not exactly in the train they wished, sent on a deputation with their wampum belts and peace-talks to bury the hatchet and brighten the old chain of friendship with the whites; and the good-natured governor, thinking them sincere, concluded a treaty with them.
During the preceding three or four years, some scores of the settlers on the Cumberland had been slain by small predatory parties of Indians, mostly Cherokees and Creeks. No large war band attacked the settlements; but no hunter, surveyor, or traveller, no wood-chopper or farmer, no woman alone in the cabin with her children, could ever feel safe from attack.
"I'm off to Charlestown to leave the lad," said my father, "and then to fight the Cherokees." "Good," said the other. And then, "Where are you from?" "Upper Yadkin," answered my father. "And you?" The officer, who was a young man, looked surprised. But then he laughed pleasantly. "We're North Carolina troops, going to join Lee in Charlestown," said he.
Abram Varney, too, experienced a recurrence of ease. He had unwittingly imbibed much outlandish superstition in his residence among the Cherokees, and indeed other traders and settlers long believed in the enchaining fascination of Herbert's Spring, and drank or refrained as they would stay or go.
Attusah was obviously an impostor. Many, however, had full faith in his supernatural power, and often he seemed to believe in his own spectral account of himself. "Tsida-wei-yu!" "Akee-o-hoosa! Akee-o-hoosa!" Then triumphantly, "And behold I am still here." Attusah had gone unscathed through that bloody campaign of 1761 in which the Cherokees suffered such incredible rigors.
The Qualla Town people are divided into seven clans or divisions, over each of which a chief presides. He accordingly directed his clerk to write in the Indian language an agreement which translated reads as follows: "The undersigned Cherokees, belonging to the town of Qualla, agree to abandon the use of spirituous liquors."
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