rt, who was
possessed of the most daring spirit. McGillivray preferred to plan and
engage in intrigue, which gave the remarkable powers of his mind full
play.

There is no doubt that the authorities of Georgia made a great mistake,
after the war, in neglecting to win the friendship of McGillivray. Such
a course would have prevented much suffering and bloodshed. The father
of the great chief, Lachlan McGillivray, was living in Savannah at the
close of the Revolution; and when the British were compelled to evacuate
the city, he scraped together an immense amount of money and other
valuables, and sailed for Scotland. He abandoned his plantations and
negroes, in the hope that his wife and three children might be permitted
to inherit them; but the Georgians confiscated the whole of the valuable
estate, and thus the Creek leader had another reason for entertaining a
bitter prejudice against the Whigs.

The result was, that until the day of his death, which occurred in
1792, he succeeded in baffling all the efforts of the Federal and State
authorities to come to an understanding with the Creek nation. He was
perhaps the most accomplished diplomat in the country,--a veritable
Talleyrand, able to cope with the most distinguished statesmen among the
Americans. Such of his letters as have been preserved do not suffer by
comparison with the writings of even the greatest of the Americans. The
most of these depended on a stately and scholarly diction to attract
attention. McGillivray paid little regard to diction; but his letters
possess the distinction of style, and in this particular but one
American writer can be compared to him,--Benjamin Franklin. There is,
in fact, a modern touch and flavor about McGillivray's letters that
even the writings of Franklin do not possess. He wrote thus to
Andrew Pickens, who had addressed him on behalf of the United States
Government:--

"When we found that the American independence was confirmed by the
peace, we expected that the new government would soon have taken some
steps to make up the differences that subsisted between them and the
Indians during the war, to have taken them under their protection
and confirmed to them their hunting grounds. Such a course would have
reconciled the minds of the Indians, and secured the States their
friendship, as they considered your people their natural allies. The
Georgians, whose particular interest it was to conciliate the friendship
of this nation, h