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Gayoso comments on Minor’s mission and forwards a translation of his diary to the governor-general in New Orleans. On last May 28 I informed Your Lordship about the incident, which I then described, relative to the opposition of the Chacta and Chicasa Indians to our settlement in Nogales . On the 30th day of the same [month] Don Estevan Minor left this post with my response for Franchimastabé. [He was] instructed about how much he should discuss not only with that Chief, but with the other [Chiefs] and with traders who were to found there. On the 14th day of the past [month] he returned and handed to me a diary [describing] what he had done, a translated copy of which I send to Your Lordship as N.° 1. By means of it Your Lordship will see the good reception that he encountered among the Chacta Indians and particularly from the same Franchimastabé, Sulemastab é, or Red Shoes, his son, and other Chiefs. The brother of the named Sulemastabé, who guided Don Estevan Minor to Nogales, did it with the greatest care. Instead of returning from [Nogales] from said destination, he preferred to come down to this post where he waited to join with the Chiefs who were supposed to come and to return in their company. I received him very well, and from the day of his arrival I ordered that he be provided a daily ration. The formality with which they received the Spanish ®ags with which they [then used] to decorate the space (Glorieta) designated for the formal meetings and the expressions of pleasure with which they welcomed a Spanish of¤cial in their country con-¤rms their inclination towards our nation. If they have demonstrated dissatisfaction with our settlement at Nogales, it is through the counsel of someone who has particular in®uence on Franchimastabé in order to avoid damage that might affect his business. This [person] is surely a trader named Turner Brashears, who lives with the mentioned Chief and rewards him with a thousand trinkets that ®atter the ambition of his friend and with which he [Brashears] in®uences his [Franchimastabé’s] will. This explains Franchimastabé’s opposition to entering into discussion with Don Estevan Minor [and] limiting himself only to [complaining] about not having received any payment from the English for the Nogales lands, [saying that] he ought to keep the land in spite of the fact that in reality he had discussed and agreed afterwards to the cession of said land and even permitted the marking of the dividing lines. To this he added—with 5 Gayoso on Minor’s Mission to the Choctaws, July 1, 1791 Manuel Gayoso de Lemos to Estevan Miró, Natchez, July 1, 1791, enclosed as N.° 1 with Estevan Miró to Luis de las Casas, New Orleans, July 15, 1791, N.° 206, AGI, SD, leg. 2556. other frivolous points—that those lands are the only ones on which they depend for subsistence. He did not want to admit anything that might change his mind; he avoided discussing it and included the Chicasa Nation in the arguments against our occupying Nogales. The answer that our Interpreter Fulson has heard from Franchimastabé and Brashears proves to be the same as I have just stated. The latter, especially, demands of the Chief that he not allow us [to be] in Nogales. In the future he did not want to be enslaved with all his people. In the end it turns out that because of everything done by Minor, Franchimastabé realizes that ¤nally he would have to agree with what we want and that this good disposition is already to be found in Sulemastabé, who particularly told Minor that he might share it with me. [However], at the time he did not ¤nd it best to announce his disposition to the Nation but [rather] decided to do it when it might be most advantageous. [He] is one of the people of major in®uence among the Chactas. [I know] on the basis of reports I have had up to now, con¤rmed by Don Estevan Minor. Because Franchimastabé offered to send me his word through the mouths of the Chiefs Iteleghana and Taboca, he has not written to me. However, by means of the meticulous report that Don Estevan Minor has given to me, I have no doubt concerning the good and exact accomplishment of his charge. I could since then form an opinion as to the reasons for Franchimastabé’s...

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