The Quakers had offended God from the beginning by making
treaties of kindness with the heathen savages instead of
exterminating them as the Scripture commanded: "And when the Lord
thy God shall deliver them before thee, thou shalt smite them and
utterly destroy them; thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor
show mercy unto them." The Scripture had not been obeyed; the
heathen had not been destroyed; on the contrary, a systematic
policy of covenants, treaties, and kindness had been persisted in
for two generations, and as a consequence, the Ulstermen said,
the frontiers were now deluged in blood. They were particularly
resentful against the small settlement of Indians near Bethlehem,
who had been converted to Christianity by the Moravians, and
another little village of half civilized basketmaking Indians at
Conestoga near Lancaster. The Scotch-Irish had worked themselves
up into a strange belief that these small remnants were sending
information, arms, and ammunition to the western tribes; and they
seemed to think that it was more important to exterminate these
little communities than to go with such expeditions as Bouquet's
to the West.
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