d the innocent. The emergency was
pressing, and Governor Lyttleton, of South Carolina, called out the
militia of the province. They were required to rendezvous at the
Congarees, about one hundred and forty miles from Charleston. To this
rendezvous Francis Marion repaired, in a troop of provincial cavalry
commanded by one of his brothers.* But he was not yet to flesh his
maiden valor upon the enemy. The prompt preparation of the Carolinians
had somewhat lessened the appetite of the savages for war. Perhaps their
own preparations were not yet sufficiently complete to make them hopeful
of its issue. The young warriors were recalled from the frontiers, and
a deputation of thirty-two chiefs set out for Charleston, in order to
propitiate the anger of the whites, and arrest the threatened invasion
of their country. Whether they were sincere in their professions, or
simply came for the purpose of deluding and disarming the Carolinians,
is a question with the historians. It is certain that Governor Lyttleton
doubted their sincerity, refused to listen to their explanations, and,
carrying them along with him, rather as hostages than as commissioners
in sacred trust, he proceeded to meet the main body of his army, already
assembled at the Congarees. The treatment to which they were thus
subjected, filled the Cherokee deputies with indignation, which, with
the usual artifice of the Indian, they yet contrived to suppress. But
another indiscreet proceeding of the Governor added to the passion which
they felt, and soon baffled all their powers of concealment. In resuming
the march for the nation, he put them into formal custody, placed
a captain's guard over them, and in this manner hurried them to the
frontiers. Whatever may have been the merits of this movement as a mere
military precaution, it was of very bad policy in a civil point of view.
It not only degraded the Indian chiefs in their own, but in the eyes of
their people. His captives deeply and openly resented this indignity
and breach of faith; and, brooding in sullen ferocity over the disgrace
which they suffered, meditated in silence those schemes of vengeance
which they subsequently brought to a fearful maturity. But though thus
impetuous and imprudent, and though pressing forward as if with the most
determined purposes, Lyttleton was in no mood for war. His policy seems
to have contemplated nothing further than the alarm of the Indians.
Neither party was exactly ripe for the