374 The Winning of the West 



the red men by solemn treaty. The Watauga set- 

 tlements had been kept compact by the presence of 

 the neighboring Indians. They had grown steadily 

 but slowly. They extended their domain slightly 

 after every treaty, such treaty being usually though 

 not always the sequel to a successful war; but they 

 never gained any large stretch of territory at once. 

 Had it not been for the presence of the hostile tribes 

 they would have scattered far and wide over the 

 country, and could not have formed any government. 

 The preceding spring (1781) the land office had 

 been closed, not to be opened until after peace with 

 Great Britain was definitely declared, the utter de- 

 moralization of the government bringing the work 

 to a standstill. The rage for land speculation, how- 

 ever, which had continued, even in the stormiest days 

 of the Revolution, grew tenfold in strength after 

 Yorktown, when peace at no distant day was as- 

 sured. The wealthy land speculators of the sea- 

 board counties made agreements of various sorts 

 with the more prominent frontier leaders in the ef- 

 fort to secure large tracts of good country. The 

 system of surveying was much better than in Ken- 

 tucky, but it was still by no means perfect, as each 

 man placed his plot wherever he chose, first describ- 

 ing the boundary marks rather vaguely, and leaving 

 an illiterate old hunter to run the lines. Moreover, 

 the intending settler frequently absented himself for 

 several months, or was temporarily chased away by 

 the Indians, while the official record books were 

 most imperfect. In consequence, many conflicts en- 



