effectually protected the walls from moisture. It had a wide entrance,
protected by two large buffalo-hides hung so as to meet together in the
middle. There were no windows, but an aperture in the roof, shielded by
a flap of skins a few feet above the opening, let out the smoke and
admitted just enough light to dissipate a portion of the gloom that
always shrouded the interior. Low benches, neatly made of cane, were
ranged around the circumference of the room. This was the great
council-house of the Cherokees. Here they met to celebrate the
green-corn dance and their other national ceremonials; and here the king
and half-king and the princes and head-men of the various towns
consulted together on important occasions, such as making peace or
declaring war.

At the time of which I write, several of the log cabins of Echota were
occupied by traders, adventurous white men who, tempted by the profit of
the traffic with the Cherokees, had been led to a more or less constant
residence among them. Their cabins contained their stock in
trade,--traps, guns, powder and lead, hatchets, looking-glasses,
"stroud," beads, scarlet cloth, and other trinkets, articles generally
of small cost, but highly prized by the red-men, and for which they gave
in exchange peltries of great value. The trade was one of slow returns,
but of great profits to the trader. And it was of about equal advantage
to the Indian; for with the trap or rifle he had gotten for a few skins
he was able to secure more game in a day than his bow and arrow and rude
"dead-fall" would procure for him in a month of toilsome hunting. The
traders were therefore held in high esteem among the Cherokees, who
encouraged their living and even marrying among them. In fact, such
alliances were deemed highly honorable, and were often sought by the
daughters of the most distinguished chiefs. Consequently, among the
trader's other chattels would often be found a dusky mate and a