* Ax-makers.
The Cherokees, squatting in a half-circle on the shore facing us and the beached canoes, exchanged uneasy glances.
"Then what does our brother of the Hodenosaunee advise?" asked the oldest chief. "What policy do his people pursue to uphold themselves? They are directly between French and English. If there is no help from one or the other, what is the Indian to do?"
"The Hodenosaunee maintain their place by strength," replied Tawannears. "They have made their help worthwhile to the English. But the time will come, brothers, when the English will no longer need us, when the white man's firewater has debauched our young men, when so many white men have come over the Great Water that they will outnumber the Indian. Then the Indian must go."
"Where?" demanded the Cherokee.
Tawannears waved his arm down-stream.
"Brothers," he said, "I journey to find what lies betwixt this and the sunset—and beyond. It may be that Hawenneyu has set aside a country for the red man that the white man cannot take."
"If the red man gives ground forever, then surely the white man will drive him out," declared the Cherokee.
"True," agreed Tawannears. "And if the red men united together, the white man could never drive them out. Your brothers, the Tuscaroras, came north in my father's time, driven from their homes by the same white men who now harass you. We of the Hodenosaunee took them into our League, and now they are safe. The walls of the Long House protect them. Perhaps the Hoyarnagowar would decree a lengthening of the walls if the Cherokees desired to enter the League."
"Yes, as younger brothers to sit outside the Fire Circle, without casting votes in the Council of Royanehs," returned the Cherokee with passionate emphasis. "That is what happened to the Tuscaroras. They are dependents of the Hodenosaunee. We Cherokees are a great people. Shall we lose ourselves in the fabric of the Long House?"