defended it with a lasting devotion and persevering tenacity.  Little of their early history can be gathered from their traditions, extending back scarcely a century preceding the Revolution. Oka-na-sto-ta, one of their distinguished chiefs, visited England during the reign of George the Second.  From his time they date the declension of their nation.  His place of residence was at Echota, one of the Over-Hill Towns.  Of the tumuli, or mounds scattered through the country, and other ancient remains, they know nothing, and considered them, when they took possession of the country, as vestiges of a more numerous population than themselves, and farther advanced in the arts of civilization.  The several Indian tribes in America have been compared to the fragments of a vast ruin.  And though these vestiges of a remote period in the past may not awaken the same grand associations in the mind of the beholder as the majestic ruins of Greece and Rome, yet they cannot fail to excite feelings of veneration for the memory of a numerous people, whose lingering signs of greatness are widely visible from the western borders of North Carolina to the Gulf of Mexico, and throughout the Mississippi valley.

As early as the year 1806, two Deputations attended Washington City from the Cherokee nation; one from the lower towns, to make known to the President their desire to remove west of the Mississippi, and pursue the hunter’s life; the other Deputation, representing in part the Cherokees belonging to the above settlement, to make known their desire to remain in the lands of their fathers, and become cultivators of the soil.  The President answered their petitions as follows: 

“The United States, my children, are the friends of both parties.  As far as can be reasonably asked, they are willing to satisfy the wishes of both.  Those who remain may be assured of our patronage, our aid, and good neighborhood.”

The treaties formed between the United States and the Cherokee Nation, in the years 1817 and 1819, made provision for those desiring to remain, agreeably to the promise of the President; and they thus became citizens of the United States, each family being allowed a reservation of six hundred and forty acres of land.  The whites claimed the same lands under a purchase made of the State.  Suits were instituted in favor of the Indians, and by our Courts were decided in their favor.  Afterward they sold their reservations to the Commissioners of the State, and purchased lands in the white settlement, and in the neighborhood of the hunting grounds reserved for them by treaties concluded with the Cherokee nation between the years 1790 and 1799; which privilege as a part of their nation they now enjoy.

The Cherokees now own in Haywood county, a tract of seventy-two thousand acres of land, well adapted in the vallies for farming, and on the mountains for wild game and sports of the chase. Qualla Town, their metropolis, is chiefly inhabited by the former sovereigns of the country, among whom are a few Catawbas.  The Qualla Town people are divided into seven clans or divisions, over each of which a chief presides.