"I called them (the Cherokees) together and made a short speech. It is, however, vain to talk to a people almost universally opposed to the treaty and who maintain that they never made such a treaty. So determined are they in their opposition that not one of all those who were present and voted at the council held but a day or two since, however poor or destitute, would receive either rations or clothing from the United States lest they might compromise themselves in regard to the treaty. These same people, as well as those in the mountains of North Carolina, during the summer past, preferred living upon the roots and sap of trees rather than receive provisions from the United States, and thousands, as I have been informed, had no other food for weeks." Four months later,[429] General Wool again, in the course of a letter to the Secretary of War concerning the death of Major Curry, who had been a prominent factor in promoting the conclusion of the treaty of 1835, said that-- Had Curry lived he would assuredly have been killed by the Indians. It is a truth that you have not a single agent, high or low, that has the slightest moral control over the Indians. It would be wise if persons appointed to civil stations in the nation could be taken from among those who have had nothing to do with making the late treaty. REPORT OF JOHN MASON, JR. In further testimony concerning the situation of affairs in the Cherokee Nation at this period, may be cited the report of John Mason, Jr., who was in the summer of 1837[430] sent as the confidential agent of the War Department to make observations and report. In the autumn[431] of that year he reported that--