rnment. Its instructions to its agents have, on
the contrary, been explicitly to cultivate, with good faith, the peace
between Spain and the Indians: and from the known prudence and good
conduct of Governor Blount, to whom it is imputed, it is not believed to
have been proposed by him. This proposition then, you are authorized
to disavow to the court of Madrid, in the most unequivocal terms. With
respect to the treaties, the speech, and the letter, you will see that
they undertake to espouse the concerns of Indians within our limits; to
be mediators of boundary between them and us; to guaranty that boundary
to them; to support them with their whole power; and hazard to us
intimations of acquiescence to avoid disagreeable results. They even
propose to extend their intermeddlings to the northern Indians. These
are pretensions so totally inconsistent with the usages established
among the white nations with respect to Indians living within their
several limits, that it is believed no example of them can be produced,
in times of peace; and they are presented to us in a manner which
we cannot deem friendly. The consequence is, that the Indians, and
particularly the Creeks, finding themselves so encouraged, have passed,
without the least provocation on our part, from a state of peace, which
appeared to be well settled, to that of serious hostility. Their murders
and depredations, which, for some months, we were willing to hope were
only individual aggressions, now assume the appearance of unequivocal
war. Yet such is our desire of courting and cultivating the peace of
all our Indian neighbors, that instead of marching at once into their
country and taking satisfaction ourselves, we are peaceably requiring
punishment of the individual aggressors; and, in the mean time, are
holding ourselves entirely on the defensive. But this state of things
cannot continue. Our citizens are entitled to effectual protection, and
defensive measures are, at the same time, the most expensive and
least effectual. If we find then, that peace cannot be obtained by the
temperate means we are still pursuing, we must proceed to those which
are extreme, and meet all the consequences, of whatever nature, or from
whatever quarter, they may be. We have certainly been always desirous to
avoid whatever might disturb our harmony with Spain. We should be still
more so, at a moment when we see that nation making part of so powerful
a confederacy as is formed in Eu