When the Indians had taken their places James Greydon advanced with solemnity to address his guests:
“My children: The spirit of our great father, William Penn, calls us together again. I welcome you as his children. We are all his children. We have been driven from our homes by the persecutions of the English. We seek our homes among the children of the Great Spirit of the forest, the red men; we are brothers.
“We love our brothers; if they come to our wigwams, hungry, we give them food; we do not make war upon them in their hunting-grounds; we love peace.
“The Great Spirit who rules the heavens and the earth knows that the children of William Penn have a hearty desire to live in peace and friendship with you. Your friend and great father, William Penn, retained a warm affection for all the Indians and commanded all those whom he sent to govern the Quakers to treat the Indians as his children; he continued in this love for them until his death.
“My brethren: Your hearts have been clean and you have preserved the pledge of friendship long ago made for your great father’s children, and the chain has no breaks or rust; you have never forgotten the great love which our father, William Penn, had for you.
“My friends: May your young men learn from you what your great father said to you before he went to his happy hunting-grounds. May our chain of friendship never be broken and may it endure between our children and our children’s children, and may it last while the creeks and rivers run and while the sun, moon and stars do shine.
“I make you welcome to my home.”
Altamaha stood up in his place, and with stolid mien, looking toward his people and the whites, began to reply, at first slowly, while his voice grew in volume as he proceeded:
“Father: Listen to your children; you have them now before you.
“We all belong to our great father, William Penn; we all are children of the Great Spirit; we walk in the same path; slake our thirst at the same spring; and now our great father wishes us to smoke the pipe around the same fire.