"You advise me to discharge or dismiss from service, until the will of the President can be known, such portion of the militia as have rendered three months' service. This advice astonishes me even more than the former. I have no such discretionary power; and if I had, it would be impolitic and ruinous to exercise it. I believed the militia who were not specially received for a shorter period were engaged for six months, unless the objects of the expedition should be sooner attained; and in this opinion I was greatly strengthened by your letter of the 15th, in which you say, when answering my inquiry upon this subject, 'The militia are detached for six months' service;' nor did I know or suppose you had a different opinion until the arrival of your last letter. This opinion must, I suppose, agreeably to your request, be made known to General Roberts' brigade, and then the consequences are not difficult to be foreseen. Every man belonging to it will abandon me on the 4th of next month; nor shall I have the means of preventing it but by the application of force, which under such circumstances I shall not be at liberty to use. I have labored hard to reconcile these men to a continuance in service until they could be honorably discharged, and had hoped I had in a great measure succeeded; but your opinion, operating with their own prejudices, will give a sanction to their conduct, and render useless any further attempts. They will go; but I can neither discharge nor dismiss them. Shall I be told that, as they will go, it may as well be peaceably permitted? Can that be any good reason why I should do an unauthorized act? Is it a good reason why I should violate the order of my superior officer and evince a willingness to defeat the purposes of my government? And wherein does the 'sound policy' of the measures that have been recommended consist? or in what way are they 'likely to promote the public good'? Is it sound policy to abandon a conquest thus far made, and deliver up to havoc or add to the number of our enemies those friendly Creeks and Cherokees who, relying on our protection, have espoused our cause and aided us with their arms? What! Retrograde under such circumstances? I will perish first. No. I will do my duty; I will hold the posts I have established, until ordered to abandon them by the commanding general, or die in the struggle; long since have I determined not to seek the preservation of life at the sacrifice of reputation.