Spread of English-Speaking Peoples 87 



The task set to the son of Sehoy was one of in- 

 credible difficulty, for he was head of a loose array 

 of towns and tribes from whom no man could 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 merci- 

 lessly destroyed all weaker communities, red or 

 white; they had no idea of showing justice or gen- 

 erosity toward 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 



gart, it can only be trusted where it was not for his interest 

 to tell a falsehood. His book was written after McGillivray's 

 death, the object being to claim for himself the glory belong- 

 ing to the half-breed chief. He insisted that he was the war- 

 chief, the arm, and McGillivray merely the head, and boasts 

 of his numerous successful war enterprises. But the fact is, 

 that during this whole time the Creeks performed no impor- 

 tant stroke in war ; the successful resistance to American en- 

 croachments was due to the diplomacy of the son of Sehoy. 

 Moreover, Milfort's accounts of his own war deeds are mainly 

 sheer romancing. He appears simply to have been one of a 

 score of war chiefs, and there were certainly a dozen other 

 Creek chiefs, both half-breeds and natives, who were far more 

 formidable to the frontier than he was ; all their names were 

 dreaded by the settlers, but his was hardly known. 



