“We are a free people. Just now we need many things. We soon shall have them. War has exhausted us, but we shall make up our strength overnight. We shall never submit.” “Bah! You submit now,” wrathfully cried McGillivray. “You are powerless now. Why should you think you will be strong tomorrow? Does weakness breed strength? You say the future of my people and that of the Thirteen Fires are tied up in the same bundle. God forbid! That is what I am trying to escape from. We want none of your future, with its humiliations, with its bending of the knee to Spain. We are free to sail the Mississippi. We trade with New Orleans. When Spain speaks to us she speaks softly. Without our aid she is powerless. My friend, we shall use Spain rather than allow Spain to use us. Her future on this continent is bound up with the future of the Creeks.” And he rose and extended his arms, his inner vision painting a new and mighty empire in which McGillivray of the Creeks and allied nations played a leading rôle. Abruptly changing and without waiting for Sevier to speak, he became the smiling host again and asked— “What is it I hear about your separating from North Carolina?” “As you heard it as soon as, if not before, we did, there’s nothing new to tell,” Sevier replied. “We are about to set up an independent State and be admitted to the Union.” “So? My agents are careless fellows,” sighed the emperor, shaking his head ruefully. “Both careless and ignorant fellows. Why, they actually informed me that the Western settlements have been given to the central Government as North Carolina’s share of the war-debt. They led me to believe Carolina was paying her debts with Western land. Never a word about the new State.” “A month from now they’ll be telling you about the new State,” Sevier answered. McGillivray simulated a density of understanding and rubbed his head in perplexity. “I can’t comprehend it,” he sorrowfully confessed. “The wine must have muddled my poor head. Now let me see. North Carolina owes some five million dollars, a ninth of the national debt, plus three millions unpaid interest. France advanced much of the money and is asking for the interest and some arrangement that ultimately will take care of the principal. North Carolina, not having the five millions, votes to pay some twenty-nine or thirty million acres of land. Now, if I have followed you correctly, the thirty million acres refuse to be considered as the equivalent of North Carolina’s share of the debt and insist on being created into a State. It’s very bewildering.”