MOONEYl THK UNICOI TTKNI'IKK 87 



and, should it so happen th;it a hrothiT, fdr^fttinir his natural affi'ctions, should 

 raise his hands in an^er and kill his lirothor, he shall he accounted j;uilty of murdi-r 

 and suffer accordingly. 



3. If a man have a horse stolen, and overtake the tliief, ami sliould his anirer he 

 so great as to cause him to shed his bluod, let it remain ou his nwn conscience, but 

 no satisfaction shall be required for his life, from his relative nr clan he may have 

 belonged to. 



By order of the seven elans. ' 



Under an ao-reenicnt with the Cherokee in isi;', a c<iiiipaiiy ((unijosed 

 of representatives of Tennessee, Georgia, and tiic Cherokee nation 

 wasoi-ganized to lay out a free ))ul)lii' rotid from 'I'enncssee river to 

 the head of na\ioation on the Tuoahx) })ranch of SiUiinnah river, with 

 provision for convenient stopping places along the line. 'I'iie road 

 was completed within the next three vears. and 1)ecame the great liigh- 

 way from the coast to the Tennessee settlements. Heginning on the 

 Tugaloo or SaA'annah a short distance below the entrance of Toccoa 

 creek, it crossed the upper Chattahoochee, passing throngh Clarkes- 

 ville, Nacoochee valley, the Unicoi gap, and Hiwassee in (ieorgia; 

 then entering North Carolina it descended the Hiwassc(\ passing 

 through Hayesville and Murphy tmd over the Creat Smoky range into 

 Tennessee, until it reached the terminus at the Cherokee c;ii)ital, 

 Echota, on Little Tennessee. It was officially styled the Unicoi turn- 

 pike' but was commonly known in North Carolina as the Waciiesa 

 trail, from Watsi'.sa or Wachesa, a prominent Indian who li\'cd near 

 the crossing-place on Beaverdani creek, below Murphy, this portion 

 of the road being laid (uit along the old Indian trail which already 

 bore that name.^ 



Passing over for the pre.sent some negotiations having for their i)ur- 

 pose the removal of the ('herokee to the West, we arrive at the period 

 of the Creek war. 



Ever since the treaty of (irccnville it had been thedreauiof 'I'cciun- 

 tha, the great Shawano chief (88), to weld again the confed(>riicy of tiie 

 northern tribes as a barrier iigainst the further aggressions of the white 

 man. His own burning eloquence was ably seconded by the subtler 

 persuasion of his brother, who assiuued the role of ii ])roj)het witli ti 

 new revelation, the burden of which was that the Indians must return 

 to their old Indian life if they would preserve their national existence. 

 The new doctrine sj)read among till the northern tribes and at last 

 reached those of the south, where Tecuni*ha himself h:id gone to enlist 

 the warriors in the great Indian confederacy. The prophets of the 

 Ujiper Creeks eagerly accepted the doctrine and in a siiort time their 

 warriors were dancing the '"dance of the Indians of the lakes." In 



iln American State Papers: Indian Affairs, ii, p. 283, 1834, 



2See contract appended to Wa-sliington treaty, 1819, Indian Treaties, pp, 269-271, 1837; Hoyec map. 

 Fifth Ann. Rep. Bureau of Ethnology, 1888. 

 ■■* Author's persontil informution. 



