swahtok] EARLY HISTOR"? OF THE CREEK INDIANS 233 
He [the captain] called to council the friars, the captains, and all the others, who, 
according to custom had a righl to he there, and, the case being proposed and explained, 
it was agreed thai only two captains with their men sin mid go, one of cavalry, the other 
of infantry, and the other four bodies of their little army remain in camp with the 
rest of the people. Then they likewise divided the monks, Fray Domingo de la 
Anunciacion going with the new army and Fray I>omingo de Salazar remaining with 
the others in Coza. The next day, those who wished so very dearly that it be in their 
Eavor, came for the answer. The captain gave them an account of what had been 
decided, ordering them to get ready, because he in person desired to accompany them 
with the two Spanish regiments and would take along, if necessary, the rest of the 
Spanish army, which would readily come to their assistance. The people from Coza 
were very glad and thanked the captain very much, offering to dispose everything 
quickly for the expedition. Within six days they were all ready. The Spaniards did 
not want to take more than fifty men, twenty-five horsemen and twenty-five on foot. 
The Indians got together almost three hundred archers, very skillful and certain in 
the use of that arm, in which, the fact that it is the only one they have has afforded 
them remarkable training. Every Indian uses a bow as tall as his body; the string is 
not made of hemp but of animal nerve sinew well twisted and tanned. They all use a 
quiver full of arrows made of long, thin, and very straight rods, the points of which are 
of flint, curiously cut in triangular form, the wings very sharp and mostly dipped in 
some very poisonous and deadly substance. 1 They also use three or four feathers tied 
on their arrows to insure straight flying, and they are so skilled in shooting them 
that they can hit a flying bird. The force of the flint arrowheads is such that at a 
moderate distance they can pierce a coat of mail. 
The Indians set forward, and it was beautiful to see them divided up in eight differ- 
ent groups, two of which marched together in the four directions of the earth (north 
south, east, and west), which is the style in which the children of Israel used to march, 
three tribes together in the four directions of the world to signify that they would 
occupy it all. They were Well disposed, and in order to fight their enemies, the 
Napochies, better, they lifted their bows, arranged the arrows gracefully and shifted 
the band of the quiver as if they wanted to beseech it to give up new shafts quickly; 
others examined the necklace [collar] to which the arrow points were fastened and 
which hung down upon their shoulders, and they all brandished their arms and 
stamped with their feet on the ground, all showing how great was their wish to fight 
and how badly they felt about the delay. Each group had its captain, whose emblem 
was a long stave of two brazas - in height and which the Indians call Otatl 3 and which 
has at its upper end several white feathers. These were used like banners, which 
everyone had to respect and obey. This was also the custom among the heathens 
who affixed on such a stave the head of some wild animal they had killed on a hunt, 
or the one of some prominent enemy whom they had killed in battle. To cany the 
white feathers was a mystery, for they insisted that they did not wish w T ar with the 
Napochies, but to reduce them to the former condition of tributaries to them, the 
Coza people, and pay all since the time they had refused obedience. In order togive 
the Indian army more power and importance the captain had ordered a horse to be 
tixed with all its trappings for the lord or cacique of the Indians, and as the poor 
Indian had never seen much less used one, he ordered a negro to guide the animal. 
The Indians in those parts had seen horses very rarely, or only at a great distance and 
to their sorrow, nor were there any in New Spain before the arrival of the Spaniards. 
The cacique went or rather rode in the rear guard, not less flattered by the obsequious- 
ness of the captain than afraid of his riding feat. Our Spaniards also left Coza, always 
1 This statement is probably erroneous, as the use 2 One braza is 6 feet, 
of poisoned arrows among our southern Indians is »Or otatli, a Nahuatl word, 
denied by all olher writers. 
