rgian life are valuable.

WORKS.

Bill Arp's Letters.
Articles in Atlanta "Constitution."
Fireside Sketches.
Bill Arp's Scrap-Book.

BIG JOHN, ON THE CHEROKEES.

(_From Fireside Sketches._[25])

Big John had had a little war experience--that is, he had volunteered
in a company to assist in the forcible removal of the Cherokees to the
far west in 1835. It was said that he was no belligerent then, but
wanted to see the maiden that he loved a safe transit, and so he
escorted the old chief and his clan as far as Tuscumbia, and then
broke down and returned to Ross Landing on the Tennessee River. He was
too heavy to march, and when he arrived at the Landing, a prisoner was
put in his charge for safe keeping. Ross Landing is Chattanooga now,
and John Ross lived there, and was one of the chiefs of the Cherokees.
The prisoner was his guest, and his name was John Howard Payne. He was
suspected of trying to instigate the Cherokees to revolt and fight,
and not leave their beautiful forest homes on the Tennessee and Coosa
and Oostanaula and the Etowah and Connasauga rivers. He brought Payne
back as far as New Echota, or New Town, as it was called, an Indian
settlement on the Coosawattee, a few miles east of Calhoun, as now
known. There he kept the author of "Home, Sweet Home" under guard, or
on his parole of honor, for three weeks, and night after night slept
with him in his tent, and listened to his music upon the violin, and
heard him sing his own sad songs until orders came for his discharge,
and Payne was sent under escort to Washington.

Many a time I have heard Big John recite his sad adventures. "It was a
most distressive business," said he. "Them Injuns was heart-broken; I
always knowd an Injun loved his hunting-ground and his rivers, but I
never knowd how much they loved 'em before. You know they killed Ridge
for consentin' to the treaty. They killed him on the first day's march
and they wouldent bury him. We soldiers had to stop and dig a grave
and put him away. John Ross and John Ridge were the sons of two
Scotchmen, who came over here when they were young men and mixed up
with these tribes and got their good will. These two boys were
splendid looking men, tall and handsome, with long auburn hair, and
they were active and strong, and could shoot a bow equal to the best
bowman of the tribe, and they beat 'em all to pieces on the cross-bow.
They married the daughters of the old chiefs, and when