In a little more than two months this new party reached St. Simons Island. The settlers there, who had been fearing an attack by the Spaniards, were delighted to welcome the general and his company. Oglethorpe went to work at once to strengthen the forts, to build roads between the forts and the towns, and to station scout ships to give notice of any hostile fleet. Then he went to Savannah, where cannon roared at his approach and the settlers crowded about to welcome their trusted governor and general. Tomochichi and the chiefs of the Creek nations came to assure him of their loyalty and offered to serve him at any time against their common enemies the Spaniards. General Oglethorpe well knew how important the help of the Indians might be to him, and so decided to journey through the wilderness to visit the various tribes. This meant a long and perilous trip. It is partly described for us. "Through tangled thickets," runs an account of the journey, "along rough ravines, over dreary swamps in which the horses reared and plunged, the travelers patiently followed their native guides. More than once they had to construct rafts on which to cross the rivers, and many smaller streams were crossed by wading or swimming.... Wrapped in his cloak, with his portmanteau for a pillow, their hardy leader lay down to sleep upon the ground, or if the night were wet he sheltered himself in a covert of cypress boughs spread upon poles. For two hundred miles they neither saw a human habitation, nor met a soul; but as they neared their journey's end they found here and there provisions, which the primitive people they were about to visit had deposited for them in the woods.... When within fifty miles of his destination, the general was met by a deputation of chiefs who escorted him to Coweta; and although the American aborigines are rarely demonstrative, nothing could exceed the joy manifested by them on Oglethorpe's arrival.... By having undertaken so long and difficult a journey for the purpose of visiting them, by coming with only a few attendants in fearless reliance on their good faith, by the readiness with which he accommodated himself to their habits, and by the natural dignity of his deportment, Oglethorpe had won the hearts of his red brothers, whom he was never known to deceive." A great council was held, a cup of the sacred black-medicine was drunk by the white man and the chiefs, the calumet or pipe of peace was smoked, and a treaty was drawn up, by which the Creeks renewed their allegiance to the king of England while Oglethorpe promised that the English would not encroach upon the Creeks' country and that the traders would deal honestly with them.