“The Great Spirit who rules the heavens and the earth knows that the children of William Penn have a hearty desire to live in peace and friendship with you. Your friend and great father, William Penn, retained a warm affection for all the Indians and commanded all those whom he sent to govern the Quakers to treat the Indians as his children; he continued in this love for them until his death. “My brethren: Your hearts have been clean and you have preserved the pledge of friendship long ago made for your great father’s children, and the chain has no breaks or rust; you have never forgotten the great love which our father, William Penn, had for you. “My friends: May your young men learn from you what your great father said to you before he went to his happy hunting-grounds. May our chain of friendship never be broken and may it endure between our children and our children’s children, and may it last while the creeks and rivers run and while the sun, moon and stars do shine. “I make you welcome to my home.” Altamaha stood up in his place, and with stolid mien, looking toward his people and the whites, began to reply, at first slowly, while his voice grew in volume as he proceeded: “Father: Listen to your children; you have them now before you. “We all belong to our great father, William Penn; we all are children of the Great Spirit; we walk in the same path; slake our thirst at the same spring; and now our great father wishes us to smoke the pipe around the same fire. “Brothers: We must love each other; we must smoke the same pipe; we must help each other; and more than all we must love the Great Spirit; he is for us; he will destroy our enemies, the King’s dogs; he will make all his red children and the children of our great father happy together. “Brothers: We are friends; we must assist each other to bear our burdens. The blood of many of our fathers and brothers has run like water on the ground to satisfy the avarice of the King. We, the red men, are threatened with great evil; nothing will pacify the King but the destruction of all the Indians. “When the English first set foot on our grounds they were hungry; they had no place on which to spread their blankets or kindle their fires. They were feeble; they could do nothing for themselves. Our fathers commiserated their distress and shared freely with them whatever the Great Spirit had given his red children. They gave them food when hungry; medicine when sick; spread skins for them to sleep on, and gave them ground that they might hunt and raise corn,--Brothers: Our enemies are like poisonous serpents; when chilled they are feeble and harmless; but invigorate them with warmth and they sting their benefactors to death. “Brothers: Our enemies came among us feeble and now that we have made them strong, they wish to kill us or drive us back as they would wolves and panthers.