Page:The History of the American Indians.djvu/369

 An Account of the Chikkafah Nation. 357

trembling army had polled themfelves out of danger. In the midft of the night they decamped, and faved themfelves by a well-timed retreat, left the Chikkafah triumphant, and infpired them with the fiercenefs of fo many tygers ;. which the French often fatally experienced, far and near, till the late cefiion of Weft-Florida to Great Britain. I have two of thefe mells, which I keep with veneration, as fpeaking trophies over the boafting Mon- fieurs, and their bloody fchemes.

Tn the year 1 748, the French fent a party of their Indians to ftorm fome of the Chikkafah traders' houfes. They accordingly came to my trading houfe firft, as I lived in the frontier : finding it too dangerous to at tempt to force it, they patted with their hands a confiderable time on one of the doors, as a decoy, imitating the earneft rap of the young wo men who go a vifiting that time of night. Finding their labour in vain, one of them lifted a billet of wood, and ftruck the fide of the houfe, where the women and children lay, fo as to frighten them and awake me< my maftiffs had been filenced with their venifon. At laft, the leader went a-head with the beloved ark, and pretending to be directed by the di vine oracle, to watch another principal trader's houfe, they accordingly made for it, when a young woman, having occafion to go out of the houfe, was mot with a bullet that entered behind one of her breads and through the other, ranging the bone ; Hie fuddenly wheeled round, and tumbled down, within the threfhold of the houfe the brave trader inftantly bounded up, founding the war whoop, and in a moment grafped his gun, (for the traders beds are always hung round with various arms of defence) and rei- cued her the Indian phyfician alfo, by his fkill in fimples, foon. cured her.

As fo much halh been already faid of the Chikkafah,. in the ac counts of the Cheerake, Mufkohge, and Choktah, with whofe hiflory, theirs was necefiarily interwoven, my brevity here,. I hope will be excufed. The Chikkafah live in as happy a region, as any under the fun. It is temperate ; as cool in fummer, as can be wifhed, and but moderately cold in winter, There is froft enough to purify the air, but not to chill the blood; and the fnow does not lie four-and-twenty hours together; This extraordinary benefit, is not from its fituation to the equator, for the Cheerake country, among the Apalahche mountains is colder, in a furprifing degree ; but from the nature and levelnels of the extenfive circumjacent lands, which in general are very fertile,. They have no running dream in

their.

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