LIBRARY 
 
 UNIVERSITY OB 
 CALIFORNIA 
 
 i SAN DIEGO
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM 
 
 A CHAPTER IN KING PHILIP'S WAR 
 
 BY 
 
 THOMAS C RICE 
 
 WORCESTER MASS 
 S WESBY AND SONS 
 1899
 
 COPYRIGHT BY 
 J S WESBY AND SONS 
 
 All rights reserved
 
 DEDICATED TO THE CITY OF WORCESTER 
 WHICH, AS A TOWN OF 5,OOO INHABITANTS, WAS MY 
 
 GODMOTHER, AND OF WHICH, BY 
 
 PROXY OR IN PERSON, I HAVE BEEN A HABITANT 
 BETTER 'N TWO HUNDERD 'N FORTY YEAR. 1 
 
 THE AUTHOR. 
 
 " Breathes there a man with soul so dead, 
 Who never to himself hath said 
 This is my own, my native land? " 
 
 1 The author's three times great-grandfather was the first white settler in 
 the plantation of Quinsigamond, and a part of the land belonging to the pri- 
 mal occupant is still in possession of a descendant and namesake.
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 A PREFACE is always an afterbirth, and to write one 
 is invariably more or less a task to the author, and is too 
 often a bore to the reader. 
 
 Many people never read a preface at all, but pass it by 
 as a matter of course, immaterial, which is wrong, as it 
 may possibly be important. 
 
 A preface, if an author must write one, should possess 
 one of two qualities : It should be either instructive or 
 amusing, and if anything in the author's meaning should 
 chance to be very obscure, the preface might be so con- 
 structed as to aid the printer out of a dilemma and the 
 reader into the sense. 
 
 If the preface is intended as a key to unlock the sub- 
 ject-matter under consideration, it is, or should be, super- 
 fluous, as the open seasame should be in the combination 
 and not transferable. If a subject is properly treated in 
 the body of the work there should be no necessity for a 
 preface. 
 
 History and romance are arts, as much so as painting 
 or sculpture. 
 
 Every work of art, literary or other, should tell its own 
 story without a prefatory word, otherwise why not require 
 the painter to tack to his canvas an explanatory page,
 
 4 PREFACE. 
 
 or a sculptor who has chiseled out a Minerva to place in 
 her lap the fractured skull of a Jupiter, to denote her 
 origin. 
 
 Preface making is simply a fashion ; a very old fashion ; 
 one more aged than venerable, and respectable only be- 
 cause of its antiquity. But this author for once, in pur- 
 suance of a time-honored custom, purposes a prefatory 
 line to a proposed historical romance. But what is all 
 history but romance interspersed with statistics, and with 
 characters compelled to fit the scenes, or vice versa ? 
 
 Pure history would be a simple statement of occurrences, 
 more or less disjointed, and, although perhaps sequent, 
 not indispensably so. 
 
 Casualties, being independent of motive, are not, of 
 course, traceable to human agencies, and so do not involve 
 human responsibility. 
 
 Acts, until mankind is all cast in the same mould, can 
 neither be always predicted of character, nor with any 
 certainty traced back to it. 
 
 In all history every lapse between events taxes the in- 
 ventive talent of the historian to fill the vacuum with at 
 least plausible motives touching the event next in succes- 
 sion, and every act or event is made the natural result of, 
 and is predicated upon, the observed character. But 
 character is too liable to fluctuation to be altogether 
 reliable. Prince Hal, and Henry crowned, are very diverse 
 personages. The coward of to-day may develop a hero 
 to-morrow, or what we had taken for a solemn saint may 
 turn out a mouthing Barebones, usurping empires, cutting
 
 PREFACE. 5 
 
 throats, or at best a lively rascal. Your Cromwell a 
 commoner, is not so common as a Protector. 
 
 To be an entertaining historian one must also be pos- 
 sessed of the qualities of a good novelist, the chief differ- 
 ence in their pursuits being that the historian must utilize 
 a foundation already laid, while the romancer may improvise 
 one. And, while the historian is in duty bound to keep 
 within the limits of actual occurrences, the romancer is 
 licensed to lie as much as he chooses, and is } r et entitled to 
 acquittal, so he keeps within the bounds of probability ; 
 for the only scale by which to measure his assertion, or to 
 weigh a fanciful diversion is might it not have been so? 
 
 The writer of romance, historical or other, occupies an 
 almost limitless domain, except that in treating of facts 
 he also should be exact. The true artist shrinks from 
 improbabilities. He never paints a scorpion with wings, 
 nor a seraph with the tail of a dragon. He is the gymnast 
 of literature. His stage is set upon some certain facts. 
 Events are his appurtenances, character his appliances, and 
 wit and imagination his paraphernalia. He is a weaver 
 at his loom; mankind is his warp and things inanimate 
 his woof. His web is rich or intricate according to his 
 skill, and he has carte blanche for use of everything in 
 earth, sea, or sky. 
 
 So he is true to nature his truth is absolute. 
 
 His privilege is to avail himself of all legendary lore 
 obtainable, and his license extends to forging material to 
 pad the lapses, or even to create new events, with scenes 
 and characters to harmonize. If he entertains his readers
 
 6 PREFACE. 
 
 he has fulfilled his task, and if he has conveyed some new 
 truths he has done even better. He has led imagination 
 in untrodden paths, has perhaps benefited himself by 
 mental exercise, and afforded his reader an hour of 
 thoughtful recreation if no more. But my preface must 
 still linger on the verge of commencement, while I crave 
 pardon for an act of vandalism in purposely setting fire 
 to a cherished literary dogma the writing of prefaces 
 and now, as a formal preface to an historical romance I 
 will proceed to say, If you look over these chapters for 
 information, then read them as you would inspect a mine 
 held out for purchase. It may be salted. Beware of too 
 easily uncovered nuggets. Don't mistake graphite for 
 indications of either bitumen or anthracite, and waste no 
 thought upon ' ' fool gold. " " All is not gold that glitters. ' '
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 IN the northeastern part of the Plantation of Quinsig- 
 amond, a tract of land converted in the year sixteen 
 hundred eighty-four into the township of Worcester, by 
 Decree of the General Court of Massachusetts, at a point 
 near the old stage road from Boston to Keene, and near 
 where West Boylston and Shrewsbury corner against 
 Worcester's line, or, to be more explicit, one hundred 
 rods due south from Eagle Rock, and by the City farm's 
 brook where it flows under the east brow of Burncoat 
 Hill, was enacted the first scene in a tragedy which cul- 
 minated in the destruction of the second settlement of 
 Worcester, wrapped central Massachusetts in a veil of 
 smoke, and bathed her hearthstones in the blood of her 
 sons and daughters. At the place here designated, on an 
 October afternoon in the year seventeen hundred one, a 
 startled buck darted between the trunks of the wide-apart 
 old chestnut trees and was making for the hillside, when 
 two arrows, shot from opposite directions by unseen hands, 
 pierced either flank, and with a convulsive bound, a halt, 
 a momentary quiver of the whole frame, the sharp muzzle 
 elevated by spasmodic twitches skyward, the wounded 
 deer fell to one knee, rallied for a moment, and then with 
 a sidelong stagger stretched its limbs upon the leafy carpet
 
 8 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 of the brookside and gasped away that portion of its life 
 which had not issued through the fatal wounds. 
 
 As the game reeled to its death, two Indians sprang 
 from opposite thickets, and as each viewed the other, un- 
 conscious until that moment that he had a rival, they 
 halted about twenty paces apart, and taking into mind the 
 situation, seemed for a moment undecided how to act. 
 
 As they thus stood we will sketch them. 
 
 One was tall, perhaps twenty years of age, with wide 
 shoulders, straight limbs, slightly stooping carriage, black 
 hair hanging loosely about his neck and confined only by 
 a belt of wampum that encircled his head. A red wool 
 blanket, folded and made to cross one shoulder met under 
 the other arm and was bound by a body belt of raw hide, 
 which also was attached to and supported a short shirt 
 of soft tanned buckskin. Upon his feet were high-topped, 
 laced buckskin moccasins. A quiver of arrows upon his 
 back, a bow in his left hand, and a tomahawk and butcher 
 knife in his belt completed his outfit. 
 
 He was the Chief of the Quinsigamond tribe, Wandee 
 of Wigwam Hill. 
 
 The other Indian, who stood so statue-like in the short 
 distance, was Shonto, Chief of the Washakims, or Twin 
 Lake tribe. 
 
 Both these tribes were parts of the Nipnet confederacy, 
 a nation that included all the tribes between the Massa- 
 chusetts, the sea shore tribe, and the Mohawks of the 
 Connecticut Valley, and from the Penobscots on the north, 
 to the Pequods on the south.
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 9 
 
 The Washakitn was shorter of stature than the Hill 
 Indian, and was apparently somewhat older. His legs 
 were slightly bent and knees set wide apart, but with his 
 heavy chest, his thick, bear-like neck, and muscles that 
 would grace a gladiator, he seemed fully a match for the 
 rival whose height and superb proportions gave him per- 
 haps the more commanding appearance. 
 
 The Washakim chief wore the red blanket, but a lynx 
 skin shirt, and was otherwise accoutred like the first. 
 
 Both chiefs wore the steel butcher knife ; for the whites 
 were already settling upon their front and rear, and upon 
 either flank, and were eager to barter implements of war 
 or peace for the rich peltry of beaver and otter then 
 plentiful in all the inland waters. 
 
 The white man had come to occupy the Plantation of 
 Quinsigamond, had become possessed of it by a grant 
 from the colonial authorities, who had based their right 
 of bequest upon the assumption that a stranger, if he be 
 a heathen, can have no rights which an Englishman is 
 bound to respect. To be sure the planters had called for 
 negotiations with the chiefs of two or three tribes con- 
 cerned, had placed before them a gallon of rum to stir 
 their stolid spirits into trading humor, and had then 
 acquired, for "ten pounds of lawful money, or its equiva- 
 lent in store goods, ' ' a tract of land eight miles square ; 
 had repeated the play of the birthright and the pottage, 
 and left the Indians homeless except by sufferance. 
 
 There was much that was bad in the transaction. But 
 this is not now important, and I have digressed here merely
 
 10 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 to indicate the proprietary standing of these lords of the 
 woods. Their fathers had sold them out twenty years 
 previous. 
 
 " It is my game," said the taller Indian, in his gutteral, 
 Nipnet dialect, as he started forward with a determined 
 air to appropriate the spoil. 
 
 "Stop!" said the Washakim ; "It was my arrow that 
 stung him." 
 
 And they again halted within three paces of the dis- 
 puted property, each fully assured that his own weapon 
 had effected the death, and disbelieving that the other 
 had made a shot at all ; for the arrows had left the stifi 
 ash bows at the same moment, with a velocity that scarcely 
 found impediment in the boneless matter of the yielding 
 flank, and had flown far beyond and out of sight, while 
 the copious flow of blcod had obliterated the points of 
 entry and exit. 
 
 "I take it!" said the Washakim, and catching the 
 dead buck by the antlers he threw it with a whirl upon 
 his stout shoulders. But the tall Indian was in no mood 
 to be robbed with impunity. 
 
 It is nothing to our purpose to depict the scene that 
 followed. No words were bandied, but a quarrel ensued. 
 A sharp and desperate struggle. The Washakim met with 
 hindrance and retaliated with a blow. The young Quin- 
 sigamond was master of the spoil and the Washakim chief 
 went to the happy hunting grounds. 
 
 As will appear, the fate of Shonto and the arm that
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. II 
 
 slew him became known at the Twin Lakes, 1 and Te- 
 huanto, a younger brother and chief, set his face upon 
 revenge. 
 
 1 Twin Lakes. The two lakes of Washakim twelve miles to 
 the north of Lake Quinsigatnond.
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 IT now becomes necessary to turn our attention for a 
 while from this incipient tribal feud toward the new white 
 settlement, two miles west of Lake Quinsigamond, and 
 three to the south of the scene of the encounter with 
 which the chapter closed, as upon this disturbance of the 
 peace hangs, in a measure, the fate of the colonists here 
 located. 
 
 At the head of the valley of the Blackstone, on that 
 river's tributary, the Bimelick, 1 in the Plantation of Quin- 
 sigamond, a few rods north of what is now known as 
 Lincoln Square, and close by the palisades that encircled 
 a log house of sufficient capacity to admit of the moving 
 about freely of seventy persons in arms, a building slit 
 with loop-holes for musketry and styled the Castle, was 
 a frame house thirty-five by forty feet upon the ground 
 and one and one-half stories in height. If to this descrip- 
 tion you add a roof with a pitch of forty degrees covering 
 the base, and a water shed or "lean-to " of much less in- 
 clination running from one eave of the main structure 
 fifteen feet out to the rear, you have the area of its base, 
 and have seen the exterior of the Castle Tavern. Descend - 
 
 1 Biruelick, later Mill Brook, now diverted to an underground 
 channel as Worcester's sewer main.
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 13 
 
 ing the cellar stairs, you observe a stone chimney base 
 measuring twenty feet in each direction and forming a low 
 arch, and above stairs, upon the ground floor, that aper- 
 ture in brick called a fire-place, blazing this November 
 morning with a fore-stick fifteen inches in diameter and 
 eighty-four inches in length, with a back-log but two feet 
 shorter, both logs resting upon two huge brass mounted 
 andirons, while the space between is heaped with burning 
 wood until crane and pot hooks redden with the fervency 
 of heat. If you look at those four-pound billets of iron, 
 with their long tapering handles terminating in a bended 
 ring, and see the shovel ("fire-slice") with its iron staff 
 seven feet in length, and by the other chimney jamb you 
 see the tongs with legs of ample length to fit an ostrich, 
 and if you deign to look at that little ten- foot bar with its 
 dozen of flowing blue quart mugs, then you have seen 
 the tavern hall, the gentlemen's reception room ; the place 
 where they concoct, with the aid of those iron billets 
 heated to a white glow, the brew divine, designated in ye 
 olden time as flip. And this is the room where the land- 
 lord stirs up for clergy and laymen, for saints and sinners, 
 for the doomed and the elect, what was termed "rum 
 toddy." Nor is our landlord stingy in his dealing out. 
 Why should he be? This essence of Jamaica cane juice 
 costs but two shillings per gallon. 
 
 Our landlord, the proprietor of the Castle Tavern, is 
 Captain John Wing, a young man with whom we have 
 large expectancy in the near future. 
 
 In the great kitchen we may see not only the duplicate
 
 14 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 of that monster fire-place, but by its side, when the matron 
 is ready with those mince pies, you may look into the 
 glowing blue red maw of the now open oven and see the 
 seething crater of Popocatepetl in miniature. See, now, 
 that young woman in the corner of the room pacing back 
 and forth, alternately minding her distaff and impelling 
 that spinning-wheel ; see the white-haired grandmother 
 by the window, adjusting her spectacles to focus upon 
 the page of a much worn, leather-covered, yellow-papered 
 copy of the Holy Bible, the larger half of the most ex- 
 tensive library in the plantation, if we except one owned 
 by a little blue-eyed, sunny-haired, young lady up on 
 Sagatabscot Hill. But she is just from school at Boston, 
 and her doting father has squandered three years' income 
 to help her to an education. 
 
 We shall learn to recognize the little lady of Sagatabscot, 
 for the fates and the witches, and those wild, red devils 
 of the woods will be pulling at her skirts by and by. 
 See that embryo soldier and statesman, that incipient 
 democrat, who shall live to declare in the face of his pre- 
 sumptuous sovereign, Royal George, that "all men are 
 born free and equal. ' ' See him gallop through the kitchen 
 astride the house dog Bose, a canine pet, somewhere 
 between the mastiff and fox hound, with the mastiff 
 dominant. Hear the matron stamp and scold the midget 
 whose mimic equestrianship has imperiled that table full 
 of savory mince pies that wait, but for a moment, till the 
 iron door is again opened, when down into the red-hot 
 bowels of that glowing chasm those mince pies must go,
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 15 
 
 after a little waiting, while it sheds a ruddy glare and 
 paints with crimson those smoke-grimed skeins of drying 
 pumpkin that depend from poles attached at either end to 
 the great beams of the kitchen overhead, waiting for a 
 lull in its fierce fervency. 
 
 But who among us, takes much interest in strangers? 
 
 And what but strangers to us are the men and women 
 of two hundred years ago, except as we follow them to 
 their homes, inspect their environments, regard their man- 
 ners, listen to their conversations, and by appreciating 
 their surroundings, their joys, their sorrows, their trials, 
 we make acquaintanceship, take on a measure of sym- 
 pathy, of affiliation, and so learn to think with them? 
 
 We have seen the kitchen : Let us go back to the bar- 
 room and listen to the talk of those new-comers ; and 
 now that his attention is somewhat averted, let us look 
 again at that lusty young fellow, the captain, Captain 
 John Wing. Six feet in his stockings is his height. 
 Light-haired, blue-eyed, and dressed in knee breeches of 
 olive brown ; dark, silk stockings, short, cut-away coat, 
 and cocked hat. No facial adornment of hair for him. 
 It isn't respectable in a young man to wear his beard. 
 
 There are guests in the room. Deacon Henchman, 
 father of Captain Daniel ; Fiske, the surveyor, and the 
 Parson Meekman. The parson was born in the north of 
 Ireland, and his real name was Mike Rafferty ; but he 
 thought the name ill-befitting a Puritan pulpit, so they 
 changed it in Boston, in the great Colonial Assembly, 
 changed it to Meekman, and left off the too Romish pre-
 
 1 6 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 fix ; but Michael or Meekman except that he wanted 
 the brogue was as Irish as Irish could be. 
 
 And others were there. There was Sargent, and Hart, 
 and the Rice's Gershom and Jonas Rice, and Jim Pyke. 
 Jim Pyke, in his way, was peculiar. There were the 
 Paynes, and a Curtis, Curtis, too, was a captain and 
 others were there. But no one among them is so silent 
 as Captain John Wing ; none seems to feel so little his 
 importance. He defers to everybody ; occasionally re- 
 marks, but gainsays none. 
 
 And yet, our landlord is known the country wide. 
 Known for his skill with a rifle, for his superb equestri- 
 anship, and he has no rival as an athlete from Boston to 
 New Amsterdam. He is known also as a terror to maraud- 
 ing Indians, more than one of whom he has sent with a 
 leaden billet of introduction to the Great Manito. And 
 Captain John was known for other things, for although 
 the devoutest Churchman all were Churchmen ; it was 
 contrary to law to be other than such the devoutest 
 Churchman I say, must confess that the young captain 
 was first to Church on Church days, and the most liberal 
 giver when the hat was passed; and beside, he paid with 
 the exception of Daniel Henchman, and of his own father, 
 the heaviest tax in the plantation. Yet rumor had it that 
 Captain John gave royal suppers in Boston at least twice 
 in a year, that he consorted with men of the city who 
 dared dispute the doctrines of Calvin, and who even de- 
 clared their blasphemous surmises that God was more 
 than six literal days in the work of creation ; and aside
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. If 
 
 from this, Captain John had been known to gallop his 
 thoroughbred toward Long Pond after nightfall of a Sat- 
 urday. And was not the eve of Saturday holy as a Sab- 
 bath morning? when, as the law reads, "no man shall 
 ride or walk except to and from Divine Service, or on a 
 mission of mercy." And what was at Long Pond 1 except 
 those heathenish wretches for whom the sulphurous flames 
 were leaping and licking the battlements of hell ? 
 
 Captain John Wing had been the subject of much secret 
 and earnest prayer ; for many a comely lass, both in the 
 plantation and at Marlborough, took in his spiritual welfare 
 a most decided interest, and the spinsters who had turned 
 the first corner, and spinsters who had turned all corners, 
 and passed all reasonable hopes of matrimonial alliances, 
 the further they had gone in such direction the more 
 they declared that Captain John was ripening for the 
 harvest of eternal damnation. 
 
 There was one figure moving about the bar-room un- 
 concernedly, but with something of a restless air, as if 
 suffering from ennui, and now and then casting a glance, 
 as of contempt, upon the plain old farmers in their home- 
 spun attire. He was perhaps five feet ten in height, ad- 
 mirably proportioned, with slightly curling dark hair, 
 and eyes of dark, grayish blue, and ever restless, as if 
 impatient of his surroundings. 
 
 He was dressed in a velvet hunting suit, riding boots 
 and spurs, and with wide open shirt collar exposing much 
 of the throat and white symmetrical column of his neck. 
 
 1 Long Pond Lake Quinsigamond. 
 2
 
 1 8 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 His only display of beard was a dark line upon the upper 
 lip, drooping at the corners of a firmly closed mouth. 
 A visorless cap of otter skin, tipped forward almost to the 
 eyebrows, partially shading features strong, well balanced 
 and mobile, but with an expression of pride amounting 
 to almost insolence, completes his picture. 
 
 His speech and usual manner marked him for a man 
 of education, accustomed to society much more polished 
 than, with an exception or two, was to be found in the 
 plantation. But the exceptions were not here notice- 
 able, so adroitly did they adapt themselves to their sur- 
 roundings. 
 
 This man is Eugene Archer. He came here as the 
 invited guest of John Wing. We may notice him in 
 particular as he is destined to occupy important positions 
 in many of the subsequent incidents of this drama of 
 mystery and blood, of constancy, treachery and despair, 
 of witchery, wickedness and retribution. 
 
 Not a penny does this man care whether things go right 
 or wrong in the plantation. And why should he, being 
 alien to it ? He likes hunting, can ride or shoot with any 
 man in America ; will not turn his back upon a bear, a 
 lynx or an Indian, and he is capital company for such 
 as happen to suit him. 
 
 It was now early candle-light, and one by one the farm- 
 ers and the blacksmith, the wheelwright and the house- 
 joiner, having finished the labors of the day, came into 
 the Castle Tavern and drew their chairs before the glow- 
 ing, crackling, chestnut log fire that eagerly devoured the
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 1 9 
 
 frequent armfuls of birch wood bestowed upon it by the 
 negro, Jake, the serving man. And as he dropped his 
 light but bulky burden, the roar and crackle of the dancing, 
 leaping, white flames, with their yellow red borders deep- 
 ening into the sooty blackness of the chimney back, red- 
 dened the faces of the guests, gleamed in reflected light 
 from the polished emerald tinge of the semi-transparent 
 bull's-eye panes of English window glass, and sparkled 
 from the eye-balls of the house cat in a far corner. 
 
 " Well, Parson," said Deacon Henchman, to the Divine, 
 who sat by the chimney corner, stirring with the pewter 
 spoon the sugar which the toddy stick had failed to quite 
 reduce to solution in his evening dram, "what success 
 are you having up in Washakim ?' ' 
 
 "I think, Deacon, we have five hopeful ones in that 
 branch of the Nipnets. Five poor souls plucked as brands 
 from the burning. ' ' 
 
 ' ' Who labors mostly with the converts ? ' ' asked the 
 deacon. 
 
 ' ' I preach to them of the atonement, which by the 
 way they so little understand that they frequently break 
 out with such questions as, 'Why didn't the other two 
 Gods help Jesus? ' To their unregenerate minds the idea 
 of the Trinity seems utterly incomprehensible. ' ' 
 
 ' ' Do you labor long with them ? ' ' 
 
 ' ' Not at present, if I can keep the exhorters up to 
 their work. I left the two converted Packachoags, Israel 
 and Jacob, to minister to their spiritual needs. They are
 
 20 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 competent to do all but to baptize the penitents. Jacob 
 is very apt at expounding Scripture." 
 
 "I'm mighty 'fraid," said the deacon, "that we shall 
 have up-hill work with them Washakims. If you'd be- 
 lieve me, I offered Shonto five pounds sterling for a 
 thousand acres of intervale along the lower Quinnapoxit, 
 but he only grunted, and said, ' You big buy man. Pale 
 face better buy tree Ian'.' I pocketed his scorn. He's 
 a tough Injun, you know. They're treacherous fellers, 
 these unconverted. ' ' 
 
 "They don't keer a snap for rum, nuther," chimed in 
 Jim Pyke, who seemed to combine ignorance of language 
 with native wit and critical talent. "It'll be mighty 
 hard to fetch 'em, 'less ye Christianize 'em. If they'd 
 on'y fill up like the Tatnik and Bumskit Injuns, there 'd 
 be some hopes on 'em." 
 
 "What about the Packachoag converts, Parson Meek- 
 man? Did you fix rum rations for them? their stay '11 
 be short unless you manage to keep up a little en- 
 thusiasm." 
 
 "Why, yes, Deacon; I couldn't forget to 'feed my 
 sheep.' Realizing that ' man cannot live by bread alone,' 
 I promised them two quarts of rum every Saturday, and 
 an extra pint for every candidate for baptism. They must 
 be encouraged in the work of the Lord, and we must not 
 stint them beyond reasonable limit. They will come to 
 your store for rations, Deacon. Of course you will charge 
 it to the Parish. ' ' 
 
 "Of course, Parson, but we must hound them out of
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 21 
 
 the settlement as soon as they get their rum. They '11 
 both be drunk within an hour and may be troublesome. 
 The two kinds of spirits don't always harmonize, you 
 know." 
 
 If the reader supposes that the author affects the style 
 of expression here introduced, either because he regards 
 with complaisance a pernicious habit, or that by putting 
 into the mouths of professed Christians language respect- 
 ing the natives which can but seem, when considered by 
 itself, heartless in the extreme, he delights in holding up 
 to obloquy the characters of those stern old pioneers, or 
 of ridiculing the tenets by which they were guided, he is 
 assuredly mistaken. The sentiments they expressed were 
 but the result of an education, which itself was the out- 
 growth of conditions. 
 
 All Europe had, up to this period, imbibed as an article 
 of faith the literal interpretation of Scripture regarding 
 the heathen and all their belongings, and presumed them- 
 selves to be heirs, through acceptance of the new dispen- 
 sation, to the promises made by Jehovah to His chosen 
 people, and, for the matter of strong drink, they had yet 
 to resolve the discrepancy between ' ' a little is good for 
 the stomach's sake," and, "in the end it biteth like a 
 serpent and stingeth like an adder." 
 
 Popular habits and sentiments change with dates ; with 
 generations. Your forefathers the colonists, held black 
 men and their children, some of whom were not so black, 
 as slaves, and they made slaves occasionally of red men,
 
 22 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 and even sold them into perpetual servitude to far off 
 countries. 1 
 
 And the}'' could give good scriptural authority for so 
 doing. And your New England fathers, aye ! and mothers, 
 with their pastors, and all men and women, even well 
 into the nineteenth century, drank New England rum 
 and thought it neither more harmful, nor sinful, than do 
 you in imbibing coffee. Coffee and tea are your stimu- 
 lants ; spirituous liquors were theirs. They had no coffee, 
 and tea at pound sterling for pound avoirdupois was ex- 
 pensive for frugal men to indulge in, and their wives, or 
 the one in fifty who knew whether to infuse a teaspoouful 
 or a teacupful of the drug for a party of three, must needs 
 reserve their costly compliments to decorate a table for 
 guests numbered among the elite, as visitors from Boston. 
 
 Shall we belie history to avert a spasm of disgust ? or 
 shall we be true to the customs of the times to which we 
 date? 
 
 " Probably," broke in Gershom Rice, who, till now, had 
 been a silent listener, " probably Tehuanto is now chief 
 of the Washakims. Since the taking off of Shonto he'll 
 be apt to be sulky, won't he, Deacon? By the way, Dea- 
 con, something must be done about that matter of the 
 murder. The Whashakims say we have taken the Hill 
 Injuns under our wing, and they affect to hold us respon- 
 sible in some way for Shonto' s death." 
 
 r The child a boy of King Philip, was placed upon the auc- 
 tion block in Boston and sold to a sea captain, who in turn sold 
 him in the Bermudas.
 
 DOOM OF Vv'ASHAKIM. 23 
 
 "How sure are they, 'Gershorn, that a Quinsig killed 
 Shonto?" asked Henchman. 
 
 "It don't matter, as I see, Deacon, what evidence they 
 have of it ; the result is all the same, so they believe it. 
 These Injuns are onreasonable critters, they jump from 
 premises to conclusion without much care for follerin' a line 
 of evidence, and I 've noticed that they are giner'ly about 
 right ; at any rate they 're allus ready to hazard their for- 
 tune on an intuition, as I call it. But they do say that 
 two or three arrers from Waudee's quiver were found by 
 the body. Wandee's arrers, ye know, are allus headed 
 with them black p'ints of quartz from the ledge back er 
 the little mountain, 1 and he's the only Injun that uses 
 "em." 
 
 "Proof enough, I guess, Gershom. In fact there's 
 not another Indian this side of Mount Hope that would 
 dare to tackle Shonto. We shall have to move in the 
 matter, or the Washakims will plant corn on the Quin- 
 napoxit until doomsday. I will appoint you, Pyke, to 
 arrest and bring in Wandee for trial." 
 
 " 'P'intme, do ye? Did I understand you to say Pyke? 
 Well, I swanny? I'm obleeged for the compliment, but 
 I'll be excused if you'd jest as lief. That ar Injun's a 
 bad man ter take. If yer want I should bring in the old 
 painter that 's been er killin' the cattle, I'll undertake it. 
 I might outwit the painter an' shoot him, but ye can't 
 fool that Injun." 
 
 Specimens of black quartz are found at the coal mine between 
 Millstone and Wigwam hills.
 
 24 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 " Well, as I 'm Justice of the Peace, and have authority 
 in the matter, I suppose I must commission somebody. 
 I don't want to send in a ferret that 's afraid of the game." 
 
 "You can think me a coward, Deacon, and call me so, 
 but when yer find yer man that's brave enough for this 
 eer job, jest let me know." 
 
 ' ' You are excused, Jim. What do you say, Comfort ? ' ' 
 asked the deacon, addressing Comfort Hart, of Packachoag. 
 "You are a match for any Injun living. Will you do 
 it?" 
 
 " Not while I 've a wife and children dependent on me. 
 What dew you take me fer, Deacon ? A Samson, or an- 
 other David? You may as well make up your mind, if 
 you want that Injun, to send a file of militiamen, and 
 then you 've got to coax him away from the Hill alone, 
 or you '11 leave your scalps at Wigwam." 1 
 
 " I don't seem to be very fortunate in my appointments. 
 What do you say, Gershom ? Can I dispose of this trust 
 to you ? ' ' 
 
 "No, sir, you can't. That 's settled. I have my doubts 
 if the whole community could take him. You 'd have 
 two hundred scalp-knives about your ears in as many 
 seconds. ' ' 
 
 " Cap'n John, you seem to be the only hopeful one left. 
 This matter must be brought to a head, Cap'u, or the 
 Washakims will give us trouble. Tehuauto 's not to be 
 trifled with now his blood is up. He is no good-natured 
 
 1 Wigwam Hill, two miles from Worcester, and on the shores 
 of " Long Pond " Lake Quinsiganiond.
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 25 
 
 Pegan, no pious Packachoag. If you can quiet the Washa- 
 kims I shall have some hope of getting the intervales ; 
 but justice is the thing we're looking for, Cap'n John. 
 Justice, you know, and the intervales afterward. What 
 do you say, Cap'n?" 
 
 "I say, Deacon, that if Wandee is to suffer the 
 ignominy of an arrest, and the others, married men with 
 families, hesitate, why then I say, as I have the least at 
 stake, it is but fair that I undertake the unpleasant 
 duty. When shall I produce the prisoner, if I can do it 
 at all?" 
 
 " I beg pardon, Your Honor," interrupted the Boston 
 man, Archer, walking up before the fire, ' ' I am a stranger 
 here, and it may appear unseemly in me to tender services 
 unasked, but if the planters here are too busy, as would 
 seem, I, being at leisure and half dead with ennui, will 
 make a tender. Don't you want a deputy, Captain? 
 Sort of a lieutenant? I 'm dying for exercise." 
 
 The captain smiled at this seeming braggadocia, but he 
 had reason to know it was not such, and by an apt and 
 ready answer turned the attention, as also the facial ex- 
 pression of the sturdy planters who, up to this moment 
 were leering, half in surprise, half in contempt, at the 
 dandy in velvet breeches, top boots and silver spurs, whose 
 presumption so overmatched their preconceived ideas of 
 his personal prowess. 
 
 " If I find the task too difficult for me to accomplish, 
 Eugene, there's not a man within forty miles I could 
 sooner rely upon to serve me in my need. ' '
 
 26 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 Respect for courage is as much a part of sturdy man- 
 hood as is the love for women and children, or for a^'thing 
 comparatively helpless. The one commands deferential, 
 the other sympathetic regard, and this off-hand guarantee 
 of Archer's reliability had the effect to divert the farmers' 
 eyes again, and this time to produce an expression of 
 respect, bordering upon admiration, which found vent in 
 an audible murmur of applause. 
 
 "Tuesday morning then, Cap'u, Tuesday morning of 
 next week, ten o'clock of the day. Fail npt at your 
 peril. I believe that is the term, Cap'n. You can com- 
 mand what aid you need, but I doubt if you'll get any 
 but this gallant gentleman from Boston. You don't need 
 any warrant to take him. He's only an Injun. Tues- 
 day morning, a week. It will take me some time to 
 scratch together the law part of it. Parson Meekman, 
 you must loan me your copy of the Colonial Statutes. He 
 must have justice, you know, Parson, If he's innocent 
 it won't do to let any personal motives stand in the way 
 of acquittal, not even for the benefit of the Washakims, 
 who own the intervales. But he's only an Injun. I 
 believe they make distinctions, don't they, Parson? In 
 the Colonial Courts, I mean." 
 
 ' ' Justice is justice, Deacon, ' ' answered the parson. ' ' I 
 recognize no such distinction; and being, by virtue of my 
 office, patriarch of the flock and expounder of the higher 
 law, I will submit to no misconstruction of the term. This 
 man seems to be made in the image of God and is there- 
 fore my neighbor. To be sure he belongs to a race of
 
 DOCM OF WASHAKIM. 27 
 
 unprofitable servants; sons who have wasted their patri- 
 mony, servants who have made no wise use of the talents 
 loaned them by the Master, and as such are, by the letter 
 of the law, doomed. But there is a difference between 
 God's justice and that which he delegates to us, His ser- 
 vants. We have no warrant to execute His justice, except 
 in actual war, and under the Mosaic dictum. I shall put 
 my foot down solidly against any abuse of power, or any 
 corruption of justice in deference to Colonial Statutes, as 
 against the higher law, until such time as by some overt 
 and aggressive act these children of the Father restrain 
 the spread of the Gospel, or trespass upon the chosen 
 people of God. ' ' 
 
 "I guess you're about right, Parson. It don't quite 
 agree with some of your sermons, but there's often quite 
 a difference between preaching and practice. I notice 
 that while you brandish the flaming sword of the Almighty, 
 and cry ' Vengeance is mine saith the L,ord,' as if intent 
 on its execution upon this Sodom of the wilderness, you 
 feed their hungry, nurse their sick, and shed womanly 
 tears over their distress. Tuesday morning a week. Get 
 pen and ink, Cap'n. I may as well impanel my jury at 
 once; or had I better serve him with a simple Justice trial ? 
 The law allows it, you know. He's only an Injun." 
 
 "Jury trial, Deacon," said Captain John. "You said 
 he should have justice, and justice is safer in the hands 
 of twelve men than of one. Jury trial, or you may get your 
 prisoner as you can. I '11 be party to no mockery in this 
 matter."
 
 28 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 "All right, Cap'n. I merely wanted the benefit of 
 your judgment. Please write while I call my jury., Digory 
 Sergent, Comfort Hart, Ephraim Curtis, Jonas Rice, John 
 Payne, Gershom Rice, Samuel Henchman, George Dan- 
 son, David Fisk, Hopeful Creswait, Peter Goulding, Wil- 
 liam Weeks. If any man in this list of names has already 
 formed an opinion with regard to the guilt or innocence 
 of the accused, or from conscientious scruples cannot with 
 peace of mind serve upon this jury, he will so declare it. 
 George Danson, what have you to say?" 
 
 " Your Honor is aware that I belong to the Society of 
 Friends, and as it is among the possibilities that a true 
 verdict might call for blood, I cannot conscientiously 
 serve." 
 
 "George Danson is excused. James Pyke, will you 
 occupy the position vacated by George Danson ? ' ' 
 
 "Wall, yas! I don't keer if I dew. I ain't got no 
 scruples, and right's right. If 'taint, we ken make it so; 
 but I'd like ter know if ye've made out an indictment 
 yet. Ye've 'paneled a jury, but what's the offence? 
 and who's the feller to be tried? Seems like ye'r gitting 
 the keart afore the horse." 
 
 "It doesn't matter, Jim. The prisoner is only an 
 Injun." 
 
 " Funny 'bout the prisoner. Haven't ketcht him yet, 
 have ye, Deacon?" 
 
 " If it wan't so late in the day, Jim, I 'd arrest you for 
 contempt of court. Put down Jim Pyke, Cap'u." 
 
 The Justice now rose, or rather got down from his seat
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 29 
 
 upon the bar, with all the dignity stipposable in a Judge, 
 with the first trial day fixed, when he is to preside. 
 
 " I say, jedge," called out Jim Pyke, "I've got my 
 chores ter dew, an' ef you' 11 excuse me I '11 tottle." 
 
 "One moment, Jim. It's not often that we get into 
 formal conditions, unless it's at meeting time, and the 
 parson looks after that? Let 's have this thing right." 
 
 The deacon had been too much in command of the 
 volunteer militia to admit of any oversight or omission in 
 point of ceremony. 
 
 "Attention! Right dress! No, no! that's not the 
 order, the language I mean, for the occasion. Attention, 
 company ! Out again ! ' ' 
 
 "Fault's in the bar, ain't it, Deacon?" roared out Jim 
 Pyke, and twenty suppressed chuckles announced a recog- 
 nition of the pun. 
 
 " It '11 come ' round all right, Jim, ' ' answered the appre- 
 ciative but good natured Justice; "but speaking of the 
 term bar reminds me that the Court is bound to furnish 
 an advocate for the murderer, the accused I mean. Please 
 to nominate. That 's as good a way as any. If I appoint 
 one, somebody '11 say I'm partial." 
 
 "John Wing," called out a dozen voices, with no 
 counter nomination. 
 
 "John Wing it is. It's no use to put unanimity to 
 vote. You are hereby notified, warned I should have 
 said, to appear next Tuesday week, at ten A. M. of the 
 clock, armed and equipped as the law (that can't be right,
 
 30 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 Cap'n). Come, anyway. He's only an Injun. Fail not 
 at your peril." 
 
 "That kinder sounds like the judicial side er civiliza- 
 tion. Shouldn't wonder if ye had a real court house 
 here sometime in the futer. Try him, anyhow, shan 't ye, 
 Deacon ? ' ' chimed in Pyke. 
 
 "Of course, Jim, we shall try him. Shan't waste all 
 this powder for nothing. ' ' 
 
 "That's ef yer ketch 'im; ye must ketch yer wood- 
 chuck, yer know, afore yer eat him. Going ter try him 
 for the murder, or fer the intervales? He is only an Injun 
 yer know. The bar '11 fix it, if it's well patronized." 
 
 Suppressed laughter was no longer the rule. The house 
 roared at Jim's last sally ; but the Justice, good-naturedly 
 seeing the point, rapped to order, and replied: 
 
 "Justice, Jim! Justice first, and the intervales after- 
 ward, if there 's no bar to the last. Cap'n, you may give 
 us something warming all 'round, if you please. Wait, 
 Jim. About four mugs, Cap'n, if you think that'll go 
 'round. Will you jine us, Pastor? " 
 
 " I '11 have a hot Scotch, Deacon, if there is no objection. 
 That egg batter doesn't agree with my stomach. No 
 Scotch, you say? Well, you've a lemon, and may give 
 me a rum sour." 
 
 "Yes, Parson," said the captain who, although not 
 doing bar service, was yet acting master, "the express 
 is just in and the lemons are here. These six horses have 
 done pretty well, only twelve hours on the road from 
 Boston. Forty-five miles, and more than a ton load."
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 31 
 
 Four quart mugs were arranged along the bar, and 
 in each mug was placed a portion of egg batter. A one 
 gallon tin measure half full of home brewed malt beer 
 received the red-hot loggerheads as they were drawn 
 sparkling from the bed of live coals, and as the beer 
 frothed and sputtered under the fierce influence of heat, 
 it roared like a beach surf, and gradually the white foam 
 rose to the top and crowned the measure. Into the mugs 
 was now poured the boiling liquid, and when the serving 
 man had duly flavored the concoction with a gill of New 
 England rum to each mug, and had heightened the ex- 
 quisite aroma by a sprinkling of nutmeg, the mugs were 
 passed from hand to hand around the seated circle and 
 was sipped at first, while the heat was at its utmost fer- 
 vency, and then as it cooled, was drained by successive 
 attacks even to the nutmeg dregs, when each bade each 
 good night and all went home. 
 
 A sound of clattering heels died away in the direction 
 of Packachoag, Sagatabscot and the Curtis hills, and all 
 was still again. 
 
 As the last glimmer of candles faded from the windows 
 of the Castle Tavern, and night, solemn and earnest night, 
 shut down upon the village clearing and its far-reaching, 
 sombre environs of primal chestnut woods, a nimble foot- 
 step, as of a fiery horse, was heard at the log stable, and 
 the whites in the eyes of a black Barbary stallion gleamed 
 in the moonlight as the saddled beast pawed and champed 
 upon his bit, and tossed his thin, wiry neck and head, 
 impatient for his rider's mounting.
 
 32 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 Let us look over this desert angel, this combination of 
 every grace which Deity deigned to bestow, as the climax 
 of animated creation. 
 
 Blacker than the coal stone that crops out of the hill- 
 side to the west of Wigwam Hill a glossy, jet black, with 
 not a false hair from croup to muzzle, was the hue of 
 Pompey, as men called him, and by the glare of the tal- 
 lowed wick, as its light shot out in a thousand radiating 
 spears through the perforations of the tin lantern, or as 
 the fickle moonbeams broke through parting, fugitive 
 clouds, the eyes pitched forward, half their orbs in white, 
 to watch the master as he moved about, while the sharp 
 pointed ears were sprightly in their movements as the 
 speckled woodpecker dancing at morning to the flickering 
 sunlight as it leaps from leaf to leaflet, from knob to knob 
 on the rough bark of the old chestnut trunks. 
 
 And that thin mane and tail, straight back-line, deep 
 shoulders, withers high, clean fetlock and pastern, with 
 the long and muscular forearm, told of speed and endur- 
 ance as well as grace. 
 
 Pompey, the beautiful, the wise, half human brute, is 
 a character in the unfolding drama. 
 
 As the captain swings by the stirrup to his seat in the 
 saddle, Pompey is in the air, and is now sweeping at a 
 twelve-mile lope up along the Boston bridle-path, now 
 Lincoln Street.
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THERE is, at the foot of Wigwam Hill, upon the east- 
 ern side and forming part of the shore of Lake Quinsig- 
 amond, a little green plat, a green it is now, and a green 
 it was two hundred years ago. But in the interim it has 
 three times grown up a forest, to be again and again 
 denuded as its sturdy growth gave promise of a lumber 
 harvest. 
 
 Every lover of the beautiful in scenery will thank the 
 fortune that recently placed the property in hands whose 
 interests are a guarantee for its future preservation as the 
 tidy lap of the little mountain in its rear. 1 
 
 The hill, and this bit of tabled lake shore land of which 
 we speak, may be hereafter considered as the culminating 
 point of more than one design, some of which were bright, 
 some dark, some sweet, some awful. 
 
 That little piece of greensward, perhaps three acres 
 in extent, was bordered by a deep ravine upon the north, 
 a sharp boulder-ridden ridge and glen upon the south, the 
 lake some twenty feet below it on the east, and westward, 
 steep rising land for perhaps ninety feet, with here and 
 there a primitive chestnut tree, or a dark green hemlock, 
 and above, a bald, black precipice, which we surmount 
 
 1 Mountain and plat are at present the property of the Natural 
 History Society of Worcester.
 
 34 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 by following zig-zag ledges, to find above still other ground 
 rising abruptly, to terminate in still another scarp of rock 
 much less in height, and over and beyond a nearly level 
 acre or more of earth, forming the crown of the hill. 
 That piece of green sward with its protecting elevation 
 in the rear and its equally assuring liquid frontage, was 
 the stronghold and home of that little tribe of Nipnet In- 
 dians called the Quinsigamonds, the constant friends of 
 the whites, while the most dreaded among the sister tribes 
 of New England for their courage, skill, and warlike pro- 
 clivities. 
 
 In passing up the precipitous face of the hill we have 
 reached an altitude of perhaps one hundred and eighty 
 feet. In looking downward you scarcely observe that bit 
 of green plain below so beautiful to you at first. You 
 are impressed that your standpoint is nearly vertical to 
 and overhangs the liquid base, and the more so because 
 your observation is momentarily distracted by the thousand 
 charms that burst upon the now enraptured sense of sight. 
 
 It is a moonlit midnight at the lake, and your attention 
 is caught up by the shimmering, glittering surface of five 
 miles of water, rocked into semi- quiescence by the languid 
 south wind as it creeps stealthily up the valley of Quin- 
 sigamond. 
 
 The moonlight, hooded now, and now unmasked by 
 the white, swift-winged aerial scuds, now dances up and 
 down the lake, kisses the glowing spaces, and in its fer- 
 vency lights fires upon the opalescent ruffle-crowns, or 
 gleams in rifts and patches far down among the islands.
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 35 
 
 At the time of which we write, birch-bark canoes were 
 gliding in and out of those deep bays, and the wild geese, 
 halting in their angular migrative processions, now hissed 
 in the shadows of pine headlands, or rose with defiant 
 honk, upon majestic wing as the whistling, flint-headed 
 bolt stung the fluttering gander to his death. Then some 
 fifty tent-like structures made of poles converging upward 
 from the base, bound together at the top with walnut withes 
 and covered with the bark of the white birch, might have 
 been seen on the little plat, and up and down among the 
 chestnut trees the gleaming white of other wigwams 
 assured one that he overlooked an Indian town. 
 
 On this night, where but a moment ago all was silent, 
 we hear a clattering of hoofs, and discern dark bodies 
 moving by every wigwam and coming from every nook 
 and glen for fifty yards around to gather about the mid- 
 night rider of that fretful black stallion, for it is he, 
 and the quick ears of the Indians had heard the horse 
 pounding down through the valley after leaving the bridle- 
 road, and were on foot to greet him. No beast ever bore 
 a more welcome visitor, for the tribe was assuming a 
 condition of anxiety. The praying Indians had played 
 the eavesdropper and brought to Wigwam Hill, in broken, 
 half-heard sentences, the burden of the white men's con- 
 ference. Captain John they could trust ; and while they 
 half feared they wholly loved him. 
 
 He had halted at the lodge more times than the people 
 of the plantation dreamed of. 
 
 Dismounting, the rider passed the rein to the young
 
 36 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 bucks who were only too glad of an opportunity to handle 
 and caress the fiery specimen of equine beauty. 
 
 The last to approach, although the first afoot, was a 
 tall Indian wrapped in a bear-skin blanket, and in the 
 uncertain light from a mottled sky in a moonlit midnight, 
 together with the almost wholly mantled figure, even 
 noting his great height, we might, but for the verbal salu- 
 tation, fail to recognize in him the Chief of the Hill In- 
 dians, Wandee the Quinsigamond. 
 
 After a few words of conversation, conducted chiefly 
 on the part of the captain, he touched the key of the 
 main subject. 
 
 " Wandee, I am here upon a very important matter." 
 
 "Cap'n'shunt?" 
 
 " No; not my hunt. It concerns Wandee most." 
 
 " Cap'n guess Wandee no take care heself? " 
 
 " Not so much that, if you were even-handed, but you 
 are not; snares are set for you. You will be called to 
 answer for what may be another's fault, a mistake, or an 
 accident, and I came to serve and save you if it is in my 
 power. ' ' 
 
 " Cap'n John save strength, save breath, Wandee take 
 care Washakim. ' ' 
 
 "No doubt of that, Wandee ; and if that were all, I 
 needn't have ridden here to-night." 
 
 " Ha! me know. Ole witch say all tings." 
 
 ' ' Witch or no witch, Wan dee, you can't know all. Tell 
 me this, for time flies. It will soon be morning, and I
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 37 
 
 must ride in before daylight. We shall never get on at 
 this rate. Did you kill Shonto ? ' ' 
 
 "Ha! Cap'n John, me kill Shonto." 
 
 "How? and why did you kill him, Wandee?" 
 
 " What for you know? You Shonto's brudder? " 
 
 ' ' No, Wandee, but I have reasons for wanting to know 
 about it. Tell me, if you will." 
 
 "Me no care. Shonto dead. Me no talk. Squaw 
 talk. Squaw cry, me no cry; me glad, you guess." 
 
 "Wandee, we have hunted, we have fished, we have 
 camped together. Storms, distance, and deep snows have 
 been nothing to us so we might tire out the deer that had 
 tipped its muzzle in defiance to white hunter and his 
 hounds. Twice you have stepped between me and certain 
 death. Once by Podunk, and once near 'Bumskit, when 
 a furious bull moose had me under his sharp feet. And 
 I must pay the debt. Bull moose has you now, Wandee. 
 But you must tell me all." 
 
 "Cap'n John, Wandee no like big talk. No 'fraid 
 knife, no 'fraid tomahawk. 'Fraid long tongue." 
 
 ' ' But this is my battle, now. Bull moose has you, I 
 say! Talk, and I will save you if I can." 
 
 " Ha ! Cap' n John fight ? Fight white brudder ? Fight 
 own men ? ' ' 
 
 ' ' Yes, Wandee. But I shall fight with my tongue this 
 time. Tell me all. You must have had some cause, some 
 provocation. Say how it was, and you shall see whether 
 I will fight." 
 
 "Ha! Cap'n John big brave. Got sharp tongue, hit
 
 38 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 Injun in stomach. Hit bad, make Injun feel sick. In- 
 jun stan' fire, no stan' tongue. Ha! Injun feel pale. 
 Cap'n John, me kill Shonto, me kill two Shonto, me like 
 kill, me glad." 
 
 ' ' But why did you kill him ? What had he done to 
 you ? ' ' 
 
 "Shonto say kill deer; me kill deer. Shonto no shoot. 
 Me shoot deer. Shonto take him; me take deer, too. 
 Shonto strike tomahawk. See big hole?" (parting the 
 hair on his scalp). "Shonto strike 'gain, strike knife. 
 See bosom all cut?" (parts the bearskin on his breast). 
 "Big bleed. Me kill Shonto. Me glad. Me kill any 
 man Great Spirit make live he strike Wandee. Me glad. 
 Ha! Big talk you guess. " 
 
 " Wandee, I am here to-night to warn you." 
 "Warn! Say 'gain! Who warn Wandee ?" 
 "Well; we won't say warn. Say, will you go with me to 
 the plantation on Tuesday of next week, sun up two 
 trees' length ? I will come and go in with you the whites 
 think you murdered Shonto, that is that you killed him 
 for some grudge, some old spite, and without good cause, and 
 they wish to try you for it as they would try a white man 
 for some bad act; nothing else will satisfy them. They 
 know the Washakims are ready to make trouble except 
 you are tried for your life, for they think we instigated 
 the murder. They dare not face the Hill Indians, but 
 they will murder us, or some of us." 
 
 "Ha! White man love Ian'. Washakim got Ian'. 
 White man love Washakim."
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 39 
 
 "Well, Wandee, we've hardly time to discuss that 
 now. Go with me at the time named and I will promise 
 at least, to place you back here at Wigwam as safe and 
 well-to-do as now; for if they convict you, you shall 
 appeal and I will act as surety for your reappearance. 
 They '11 hardly want to contend against me." 
 
 Ha ! Big talk. No much say, all talk. Me know. 
 Me hear. Ole squaw make big fire. Ole witch squaw 
 what you call. See face ole warrior, all dead long time. 
 Ole warrior talk. Talk in tree, me no un'stan', squaw 
 un'stan'. Talk low down; squaw say ole warrior talk 
 in ear all way out ole squaw mouth. Say white man want 
 sell Wandee, buy Ian' up Quinnapoxit. Ha! Ole squaw 
 live two places all same time ; squaw know, you guess." 
 
 "Wandee, you know Cap'n John, or you ought to. 
 He has promised you, will you go with him ? Or are 
 you afraid of the white man ? ' ' 
 
 "Ha! 'Fraid? Me no 'fraid bear. Me sleep, me 
 'fraid bear. Tell white man come fetch Wandee. Tell 
 deacon come. Me swap scalp. ' ' 
 
 "You will not go, then? Is that your answer, 
 Wandee ? 
 
 "Ugh! Yes, me go. Deacon talk hell. Talk fire; 
 me no care. Bes' keep off han's ; me make hell fire 
 short time. You guess. Me go, Cap 'n John." 
 
 "All right, Wandee. Sun up two tree's length. I 
 will be here. ' ' 
 
 "Ha! Bes' go, Cap'n John. Day waking up. See! 
 Stars go sleep over Quinsigamuck.
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 A SABBATH DAY SERVICE. 
 
 A BEAUTIFUL Sunday morning up here on Sagatab- 
 scot 1 Hill. Far away to the north, in the blue distance, 
 we see that paragon of fire-blown symmetry, the leaden- 
 hued Wachusett, and over the mountain's left shoulder, 
 craggy, broken, storm racked, gray old Monadnock 
 shows his cleft scalp and wrinkled visage dimly in the 
 haze of a New Hampshire sky. 
 
 West of north is a rich confusion of November's 
 foliage, where the reddish brown of the mottled oak 
 mingles with the deep green hemlock, the yellow chest- 
 nut leaf, the glowing fire of scarlet maple, and the royal 
 purple of the lowly sumach in a rich kaleidoscope. It is 
 Asnebumskit Hill. 
 
 Due west is Rattlesnake, 2 and beyond, but still so 
 much in the foreground as to make its color definite, are 
 the sombre pines of Strawberry Hill, 8 an emerald set in 
 autumn's aigrette of more dazzling jewels. 
 
 This great log cabin, one story high, with floor cut 
 into four rooms, windows set with bull's-eye glass, 
 
 1 Sagatabscot Hill is south of the city (approached by Vernon 
 Street) and east of Packachoag Hill. 
 2 Rattlesnake Hill. 
 8 Leicester.
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 4! 
 
 glass five by seven, an inch thick in the middle, and 
 tapering each way to an edge, greenish and semi-trans- 
 parent ; roof shingled with oaken splits ; this is Digory 
 Sergent's castle, the house that Digory lives in, with 
 the wide field in front and on either flank. This clearing, 
 still covered with stumps five feet high (for the trees 
 were cut by men standing on the crust of snow) , this, one 
 half of it, is Digory'scorn field, and the other half, cut off 
 from the corn by a zig-zag split pole fence, is his hay field. 
 
 The nine rail fence around the cornfield serves to keep 
 the deer from trampling down the crop. The bears will 
 enter, anyhow. 
 
 There is that monster chimney, but all the houses have 
 such ; and the well-sweep, but that is common also. 
 
 Outside, we see a pile of logs, and one of limb wood. 
 Fifty cords. If Digory is provident or frugal with that 
 mass of wood it will last him until after next year's hay- 
 ing time. 
 
 That low shed, open to the south and shingled like the 
 house, is Digory 's barn, where he folds his live stock. 
 The hay he stacks near by. The five tons of mixed 
 timothy and swale, with the seventy bushels of corn in 
 bin, will carry his horses and four head of neat stock 
 " through," if the Indians do not kill Digory and drive 
 the ' ' critters ' ' off. 
 
 The fine matronly woman at the door is Mrs. Sergent, 
 and by her side the sweetest pair of little, pouting lips 
 and large blue eyes. Seven years old, is that little girl, 
 Netty, of the pouting lips and blue eyes.
 
 42 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 Coming from the milking shed, the " len-ter," from 
 the barn, that superb specimen of womanhood turned the 
 first corner, is Martha. It is time to begin to make the 
 acquaintance of the family. 
 
 That seventeen years old lass, less stately, less mature 
 than Martha, she with a face bright as the sunlit frost- 
 cicles on the trees after a winter's rain storm, and with a 
 step so graceful, so like a swan upon the water Did you 
 ever see a ghost ? There are such things, and they are quite 
 as real as the grosser forms of materiality they represent. 
 Ghosts seem to glide, to swim, to float. But this was no 
 ghost, and yet it had a ghost's prime attributes: the 
 ethereal grace, the soundless tread, and all that awe-in- 
 spiring yet fascinating presence. This is Susan, second 
 daughter of Digory Sergent. She who owns the best 
 library in the plantation. She is just from school in 
 Boston. 
 
 But here comes Sergent from the stable with the horses. 
 Sergent is a man of sixty years, hair tinged with gray, 
 thick necked, wide shoulders, heavy set, and very 
 erect carriage. He is a bold, brave man. Too brave. 
 A man may be brave to temerity. But Digory had cleared 
 much land, had ploughed acres not a few, and neither 
 white nor red man should dispossess him of the benefits 
 of six years' toil. 
 
 Stand to it, Digory! but keep your powder dry, and 
 your Sabbaths holy, and omit no prayers, for an old witch 
 squaw has cast your horoscope, and from the vapors of a 
 brew she saw a white arm stretched, and beckoning, and
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 43 
 
 heard a woman's voice whisper, "Come, Digory." It 
 may mean nothing, but the white women of the planta- 
 tion take counsel of that squaw; and so, Digory, did your 
 first wife. The men all say " she is possessed," and were 
 she white would burn her at the stake, but the women 
 court her by stealth, and, without naming it, regard her 
 as a seer. 
 
 Two horses now stand at Sergent's door, and on the 
 back of each a saddle and a pillion. Sergent and wife 
 step from a horse-block and seat themselves upon one. 
 Martha takes the bridle seat upon the other, while Susan, 
 the tall, yellow-haired girl with full, fair cheeks red 
 cheeks red with mantling blood, red with the wind and 
 sun, pats the neck of the horse, and half laughing, half 
 imploring, says: "Now Martha, you might let me hold 
 the rein on Jenny this one Sabbath morning. You know 
 I ride well enough. Didn't I ride black Pompey up to 
 Strawberry Hill? And John said I rode splendidly. 
 You older sisters always want to lead off. It's only 
 vanity. I don't think I should care so much for at- 
 tention. ' ' 
 
 " Come, come, Susan. Do seat yourself and take the 
 baby up behind you." 
 
 "Did you ever? You needn't call me the baby. I 've 
 just a good mind not to go now; Ma says I'm a little lady, 
 I'm seven years old next Christmas." 
 
 "And so you are a lady, Netty; she should not call 
 you the baby. But you can pay her off by and by. Folks
 
 44 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 get to be old maids sometimes," said Susan, laughing at 
 the shade of chagrin that seemed to follow the sally. 
 
 " You needn't teach her that now, Susan. The I/ord 
 knows it will come to her soon enough. One must always 
 be either too young or too old in these little communities. 
 I wish we had stayed in Boston. There now, just take 
 your seat. The parson will call our names in meeting if 
 we are late again." 
 
 Susan sprang from the horse-block to her seat on the 
 pillion, took the child up behind her, and away they gal- 
 loped toward the little village on the Bimelick, and the 
 site of the Castle. 
 
 "Now don't you run so fast, Martha. Hold on tight, 
 Sue. Oh, m}'! How it jounces! " and the child kept on 
 babbling as they galloped down the bridle-path, forded the 
 Bimelick at the foot of the hill, and sailed away in all 
 the splendor of gay colored ribbons, whitened straw, and 
 whiter home-spun linen, for society at its outposts, and in 
 that far-off day, had not merged into the wild extrava- 
 gancies of costly calicoes at seventy pence per yard. 
 China and the far East nearly or quite monopolized such 
 delicacies as tea and coffee, and draperies superb as cotton 
 print. 
 
 Some visiting English lord might donate to the gover- 
 nor's wife a calico dress pattern, and she in turn might 
 draw from the hidden treasures of her locker a steeping 
 of celestial herbs. Even others, well-to-do, might have 
 in some deep recess of an oaken chest a metal case her-
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 45 
 
 metically sealed, wherein was lodged a pound of tea to 
 serve the rare occasions of a life-time. 
 
 Our party had reached the plain, after crossing the 
 river, when a magnificent black horse, nervously tossing 
 head and mane, wheeled into line with the staid mare 
 Jenny, and as the two animals bounded along the double 
 pathway, the rider of the black relieved the pillion of the 
 baby, who in high glee over the apparent preference in 
 her favor, hailed her sister from her airy perch upon the 
 stallion's withers: " Good-bye, Sue! I and John is goin' 
 to meetin'." 
 
 The party is doing well, and we have other matters 
 that demand attention. 
 
 Inside the stockade, sheltered from the wind, you 
 might have seen thirty saddled horses saddled, and pill- 
 ion ed for the most part while in the Castle, the place of 
 meeting, on one side were some forty bare head farmers 
 standing, and upon the other side, their wives and chil- 
 dren seated upon chestnut slabs arranged on wooden 
 horses, listened to the Word of God as expounded by 
 Calvin, with Parson Meekman for a proxy. 
 
 Upon an elevated platform, some three feet raised above 
 the earthen floor, were a dozen praying Packachoags, and 
 standing by them mutely meek and shy, as best becomes 
 (I speak the then prevailing sentiment) the black slaves, 
 whom God hath ordained from all eternity to be the 
 helpers of his chosen people, were black Jake's wife, and 
 children half a score. And in a far corner, as if un- 
 worthy (in their own conceit) here in the house of the
 
 46 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 Most High, to risk attention by their non-conformity, two 
 gentle Quakers with their meek-browed offspring, sat 
 covered, waiting for that still, small voice the spirit 
 which is within them. 
 
 It is hardly competent here to give even the gist of the 
 inevitable sermon. The congregation, poor souls, creed- 
 bound were chained by dogmas which to them seemed 
 stronger than if made of triple brass. And yet those 
 same meek bondmen as they were, were haughty in their 
 independence; owned nothing short of Deity their born 
 superiors, and would spurn with foot a king's commis- 
 eration. They bowed to God and to God only. But it 
 was the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and this 
 worship, so far from being to and of the God manifest, 
 was narrowed down to a creed. 
 
 Perhaps I may with propriety, as we are here searching 
 for truths over which the moss and rime of centuries are 
 gathering, perhaps I may say, that the glorious incan- 
 descence of that state where justice purges without puri- 
 fying, where caloric consumption is neither annihilation 
 nor transmutation, where the worm, forever dying, dies 
 not, where the frightful horrors of retribution for unbelief 
 add ecstacies of delight to the regenerate soul of whom it 
 was decreed from the foundations of the world ' ' Enter 
 thou into the joys of thy Lord," as that soul peers from 
 the bosom of hoary contentment across the gulf to mock 
 at the soul of misfortunes was fully and elaborately de- 
 picted to passive, creed-bound acquiescence, save, perhaps, 
 in the minds of the loving and kindly Quakers, and of
 
 DOOM OP WASHAKIM. 47 
 
 two young men, one of whom did not care the snap of 
 his riding whip what should come of to-morrow, so to-day 
 was enjoy ably spent, and the other, who had been taught 
 in the broadest school of religious thought, where science 
 and philosophy were admitted to be the keys which must 
 finally unlock eternal verities. 
 
 The pastor had given out his text: "And the heathen 
 will I give thee for an inheritance, and the uttermost parts 
 of the earth for a possession." And after dilating upon 
 the beauties of the system inaugurated by Moses for the 
 chosen people of God, a system by which was demon- 
 strated the Divinity of Jehovah through an industrious 
 application of the persuasive elements of fire and sword, 
 even to the cutting off of every male thing that lived 
 among such of the wicked idolaters as dared lift hand in 
 defense of country and home ; and after making his 
 identity so throughly manifest, as must needs appear 
 when he ordered the slaughter of infants and mothers, 
 decreeing of the virgins that to the victors belonged the 
 spoils, to the end that the chosen should raise up only 
 such seed as was after His own heart, after so reasonably 
 expounding the Scriptures in general, and the text in 
 particular, as to make it glowingly apparent that the 
 glory of God is measurably enhanced by the utter dis- 
 comfiture of His enemies, and that enmity to God con- 
 sists chiefly in the failure to believe that the children of 
 Israel were of all men best qualified to fix His identity, 
 he proceeded by numbered paragraphs or sections, 
 through the "fourthly," and up to the "tenthly,"
 
 48 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 "lastly" and "conclusively," each of which might be 
 called ah able paraphrase of the section preceding, and 
 at last came down upon his " finally " with a peroration 
 irresistibly convincing, even if it were not logically 
 correct. 
 
 "And now, my dear hearers, since it is patent to your 
 minds that the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, did, 
 aforetime, through the mouth of his chosen prophet, 
 declare that he would give them, you, his chosen people, 
 anywhere, everywhere, in all time to come (for, my be- 
 loved hearers its application is universal among the elect. 
 Hath He not said, ' In me there is no change, nor shadow 
 of turning' ?), that He would give to His people, the 
 heathen for an inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the 
 earth for a possession? And inasmuch as he enjoined 
 upon you to 'cry aloud and spare not,' which command 
 is, by the way, peculiarly applicable to the present con- 
 dition of this plantation, and by numberless examples 
 instigated you, His people, to sweep His enemies from the 
 face of the earth with the besom of destruction, you can 
 but confess that it is conspicuously clear that two things 
 lie palpably within the province of your earthly mission, 
 to wit: First to declare the Word, and to baptize with 
 water such as cheerfully acknowledge God and accept the 
 atonement. Secondly: To fall upon such as persistently 
 turn to their idols and smite them with the jaw-bone of 
 retributive justice. 
 
 ' ' But, my dear hearers, this must not, just at this time, 
 be taken in literal acceptation, for here we have no Moses
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 49 
 
 to direct and no Joshua to lead, while the heathen, in 
 league with the powers of darkness, are numerous as the 
 sands of the sea- shore. Nevertheless, my brethren, it is 
 our manifest duty to labor assiduously in the field to the 
 harvesting of souls until, through the fullness of time 
 and the ripeness of opportunity, we may separate the 
 wheat and burn the impious chaff of idolatry, to the 
 infinite exaltation and glory of God." 
 
 A touching benediction, in which the preacher human 
 stooped from the threatening cloud of Mosaic jurispru- 
 dence, and in seeming metamorphose, gathered in his 
 loving arms those same idolaters, as he melted from the icy 
 horrors of Israelitish precept and example into familiar 
 rapport with the tender and forgiving sweetness of Him 
 who said, "Come unto me all ye that labor and are 
 heavy laden and I will give you rest. ' ' 
 
 Divine services ended for the day and the farmers 
 gathered into little knots, dispersed anon, and grouped 
 again. A shadow of uneasiness was over them. They 
 must and would discuss the merits of that sermon, for 
 although the colonists were, as a rule, bigoted to a degree, 
 and measurably creed-bound; though their whole faith 
 rested upon God and the Scriptural teachings; yet in no 
 sense would they accept the interpretation of a fellow, 
 whether he be ordained or not, except so far as each in- 
 dividual judgment weighed the substance of a proposition, 
 or conclusion, and mentally resolved its own verdict. 
 
 The farmers stood upon uncertain ground. Their 
 preacher had maddened them by a sense of injustice, 
 4
 
 5O DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 as by imprecation he had invoked cruelty, and by 
 instigation had prompted its execution upon unde- 
 serving ignorance. But what about that benediction, so 
 Christ-like in its wide-spreading charity ? 
 
 " Our parson is a standing riddle, an enigma; but there 
 is more to this than he gives out," said Deacon Henchman 
 to a group of farmers. 
 
 Our parson had scented blood had peered into the 
 future, aided or unaided, and had chilled beneath a cloud 
 of undefined disasters. Men must be stirred. It mattered 
 yet but little for direction. The hot blood that waits upon 
 emotion is not soon cooled, but is ready to leap to action 
 at a moment's call. 
 
 Perhaps no body of citizens of any country were ever 
 so purely self-reliant as that early stock of English, Irish, 
 and Scotch who, in the name of God, unfurled the banner 
 of religious freedom over the new world. Perhaps no 
 community of men ever so soon forgot the bitter lessons 
 of intolerance, and bequeathed to their children the 
 merciless rancor themselves had fled from. 
 
 Pity that those who claimed for themselves the largest 
 religious liberty, could not have accorded to Baptist, 
 Quaker, and Papist as much. But other than what 
 ensued could not reasonably have been expected : for 
 individual, sect, or class power, unrestrained by compact 
 or constitution, inevitably merges into intolerance and 
 oppression. And this colony, so far removed from 
 motherland that she dared believe in, if not yet openly 
 declare her independence, and shackled by no legal
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 51 
 
 enactments of her own devising, none but what she 
 inwardly scorned, became, in matters out of statute, a 
 law unto herself and answerable only to a transient wave 
 of public prejudice or opinion. 
 
 Deacon Henchman accosted Rice of Packachoag: 
 
 "How did you like it, Gershom? Did n't he make it 
 pretty evident that we ought to take the intervales? 
 Don't you call it sound doctrine, Gershom?" 
 
 "It may, perhaps, be sound doctrine, but its mighty 
 lame justice; and then again, the pastor turned a somer- 
 sault in that benediction of his'n. I don't quite catch his 
 drift." 
 
 "But don't you take into account the admonition to 
 cry aloud and spare not ? That means preach first and 
 then sacrifice." 
 
 " Yes, Deacon, and I bring to mind another: ' Do unto 
 others ' you remember the rest, Deacon." 
 
 ' ' But the promise, you know, Gershom the promise 
 of inheritance. Its application seems unmistakable, 
 and the word has gone out. It leaves us simple 
 instruments in His hands ; we obey the injunction 
 and assume no part of the responsibility. This is 
 God's warfare, Gershom. We are pitted against His 
 enemies, and whether we unfurl the banner in the 
 name of God or country, the enemy is no longer ours 
 but His, or its, and we absolve ourselves of end and con- 
 sequences under the solemn badge of duty. And don't 
 you remember how it was declared that ' to him that 
 hath shall be given, and from him that hath not shall be
 
 52 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 taken, even that which he hath?' Truly, Greshom, this 
 thing seems to have been foreordained. ' ' 
 
 " But I read, too," said Gershom, " 'Feed my sheep,' 
 and these 'ere Injuns are mighty nigh onto starvin', since 
 the great drought. Mebbe you don't reckon them of the 
 flock, but I take it they 're men jest the same." 
 
 "Thee's right, friend Gershom," broke in Danson, 
 the Quaker; "if God so loved the world that He gave 
 His only begotten Son, that all through Him might be 
 saved, shall we horrify Him by rapine and slaughter per- 
 petrated upon His children? What sa} ? 'st thou, friend 
 Jeems?" 
 
 "Is it me yer askin' ? Well sir, I, Jim Pike, afore 
 God (if there is any), give it as my outspoken opinion 
 that jestice is jestice, whether the subject 's a nigger or an 
 Injun. But 'bout that ar' 'tenement business I can't 
 say; I don't take much stock in it. 'Pears like ter me the 
 Creator must ha' been hard up for kalkerlation, if He 
 couldn't git up a better scheme 'n that ter k' rect His 
 own mistakes with. Mebbe 'ts because I hain' t got much 
 larnin'." 
 
 " Tut, tut! Jeems. Thee's wandering from the subject, 
 Jeems. ' ' 
 
 " You 're an infidel, Jim. Yer sentiments are all right, 
 Jim, till you strike scripter' an' then yer 'way off. But 
 about this business, as sure as my name is Gershom Rice, 
 I 'm mighty glad I hain' t been much exposed ter the 
 weather without my hat, if a tanned hide disqualifies a 
 man either for a free existence or for holdin' property.
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 53 
 
 Some er you fellers 'd be wantin' Packachoag if ye 
 happened to catch me off color. I bought Packachoag of 
 sober Injuns and I paid 'em the price, an' so sure as I'm 
 an honest white man I can't see but their title to what 
 they have left is jest as good an' clear as mine. I '11 help 
 ye buy on 'em Deacon, but I won't rob 'em ? I lived a 
 leetle better 'n two year 1 with them critters afore one on 
 yer come ter keep me company, and I 've got a whole 
 scalp yit. They 've kep' faith with me, and I will with 
 them. I tell ye, Deacon, that barrin' the matter of edica- 
 tion, that Wigwam Hill chief that we 're agoin' ter try for 
 murder, is the ekil of any on us, an' he's ter be trusted, 
 too, if ye treat him right." 
 
 " Well, well, Gershom, we won't dispute about it. I 
 want to be just as I hope to be judged. But I'm mighty 
 'fraid these Injuns will plant corn on the Quinnapoxit 'till 
 Gabriel blows. ' ' 
 
 " And so they may for all I care, if they'll only be 
 civil. When they make a fuss it'll be time enough for 
 us to make reprisals. When they really deserve floggin' , 
 yer may count on me ter help give 'em Joshua. But it 's 
 nigh on ter milkin' time an' I 've got better 'n four mile 
 ter ride, so good evenin' to ye." 
 
 Many of the church goers were now in saddle. Digory 
 Sergent and his wife were mounted, and Digory, just be- 
 fore punching his boot heels into the mare's flank, called 
 out, "Deacon, why don't you an' Gershom git on an' 
 
 1 Greshom Rice was the first permanent white settler in the 
 plantation, and lived there, alone, for two years.
 
 54 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 canter up ter Sagatabscot now an' then? Ye '11 allus git 
 wild turkey or venison for dinner. They dew say that 
 all the game ye git down here in the settlement 's wood- 
 chucks. ' ' 
 
 Gershom was just on the move when Digory's sally 
 brought him to a halt, as also Curtis, Payne, and several 
 more of the Hill dwellers. The opportunity to chaff the 
 lowlanders was quite too good to be lost, but with a little 
 bantering, and a semi-derisive smile they bade them good 
 night, and galloped along their divergent bridle-ways to 
 their airy perches among the hills. 
 
 Martha was now at mount upon the docile Jenny, and 
 Netty's two arms were firmly embracing her waist, while 
 her too short legs ran straight out upon the pillion, not 
 long enough to bend at the knees over its edge. 
 
 "You don't like me any more, John," she said, as 
 she saw Susan usurp her place upon the back of Pompey. 
 
 Pompey was now leisurely loping along the bridle-path, 
 where now is Main Street, tossing his head and toying 
 with his bit, as the loose rein dangled about the serpentine 
 grace of his beautiful neck. The sober Sabbath afternoon 
 seemed to have infused something of its properly peaceful 
 quiet into the usually turbulent temper of the fiery beast. 
 
 ' ' How did you like the preaching, John ? ' ' asked Su- 
 san, as soon as a little familiarity with the horse's gait 
 assured her of a firm seat. She had ridden the horse 
 before, but it was to the saddle, and a pillion seat over 
 the hauiiches is quite another matter. 
 
 " I can't say I admired it, Sue. In fact I rarely pay
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 55 
 
 much attention to what he says. Of course 1 must attend 
 church service, out of respect to my neighbors' prejudices, 
 and to feign regard for their stable opinions I usually re- 
 frain from argument, or even comment." 
 
 The quasi deception may not seem commendable, but is it 
 not better than to disturb settled and satisfying convictions 
 with no hope of leaving anything in place of a broken idol 
 but a painful uncertainty ? It may be prudent enough with 
 young lives where there is promise of time sufficient for 
 unravelling and reweaving the web of a prejudiced faith, 
 to speak plainly, but with older people the result, if results 
 follow, are rarely satisfactory. 
 
 ' ' Parson Meekman appeals too much to the passions 
 and too little to the intellect to please me. He seems a 
 strange compound of contradictory qualities. In the pul- 
 pit he is rash, impetuous and extravagant, while as a 
 citizen he is cool, calculating, politic and conservative. 
 He is often eloquent and always courageous. A natural 
 orator and a born fighter. Good properties for outlying 
 districts like this. ' ' 
 
 "Pa did n't like him at all, to-day, I'm sure. It is 
 easy to know when he is crossed. ' ' 
 
 "The parson's pulpit methods are not calculated to 
 foster good feeling among the Indians, and by creating 
 discontent among them he seriously compromises the 
 safety of the plantation. You saw those praying Indians 
 in the slave box and by the door; and you may think that
 
 56 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 because they pray they are sealed to their religious 
 teachers, and so eminently trustworthy. But I can tell 
 you they talk as well as pray, and the matter of this 
 afternoon's discourse will be rehearsed in every body of 
 the Nipnets, from Lancaster to Brookfield, before the sun 
 sets twice. Pity he must lose his caution when he looses 
 his tongue. ' ' 
 
 But something is happening at the Lake. The birch 
 canoes come up by dozens from the extreme south. Some- 
 thing is strange in the color of their wampum, something 
 unlike the quartz and colored pebble beads of the Nipnets. 
 They are made up of minute sea shells and the little pearls 
 of the native fresh water clam. They row with the double 
 bladed paddle. Their head gear is unlike anything in all 
 the Nipnet country . It seems a coronet of plumes rich 
 with the dissolving hues of the wild turkey's bronze, the 
 yellow breast of meadow lark and the red fire of the 
 tanager. Some of the rowers now and then suspend their 
 labors to converse in abbreviated utterances and hasty 
 gesticulations. Their arms and faces are ablaze with 
 war-paint, and their short, leathern hip - skirts are deeply 
 fringed and ornate with blue and red upon the pale yellow 
 ground of tanned buckskin. 
 
 One, who seems by general aspect, want of occupation, 
 dress and demeanor, a chief among them, sits idly in a 
 birch bark bow, elbow resting, chin placed in open palm, 
 and looking steadily up the lake, occasionally shading his 
 eyes from the glare of a setting sun ; always silent, and
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 57 
 
 always peering northward toward Wigwam Hill, which 
 looms up a murky mass against the glowing concave of 
 a sunset sky. In the great gold buckle of his scarlet 
 coronet is a long, black eagle's plume. Let Black Pom- 
 pey walk or trot to Sagatabscot; we must see who comes 
 to Wigwam Hill.
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 KING PHILIP AT THE NIPNET LODGE. 
 
 UNDER the black crags that form the face of Wigwam 
 Hill upon the lake side, upon the little lawn at its foot, 
 the permanent camping ground of that branch of the 
 Nipnets, were as has been said some fifty wigwams, while 
 scattered in among the chestnuts, to north and south, 
 from Coal Mine Brook to the foot of that steep descending 
 line of boulders, were other wigwams and tent-like struc- 
 tures, making an aggregate of ninety lodges. 
 
 Indians in different parts of North America, although 
 they followed the same general design in the construction 
 of their habitations, that of planting poles in the earth to 
 form a circle, and gathering them together near the top 
 in shape of a double cone with the lesser above, and in- 
 verted, varied widely in the material used. 
 
 The Indians of the west availed themselves of the skins 
 of the buffalo, so easily obtainable and so readily adjusted 
 to form a covering which should break the wind, confine 
 the heat and exclude the snow and rain, while those of 
 the east and north, where no animals larger than the deer 
 (if we except the moose and caribou which were never 
 plenty) were to be found, devised, though with greater 
 labor, a much cleaner and more durable covering by strip-
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 59 
 
 ping the bark entire from the large white birches, then 
 common throughout the north, and applying it while 
 green and easily manipulated. 
 
 The white birch was also utilized in the construction of 
 vessels for containing water, both hot and cold, for in 
 their rude culinary operations they were in the every-day 
 habit of heating stones to redness and dropping them into 
 water vessels, and so continuing until the meat or roots 
 were reduced to a consistency suited to their palates. 
 
 They also wrought the birch bark in its fullness, 
 as stripped from the tree, into canoes, airy as the 
 shell of the nautilus, and in striking contrast with the 
 clumsy southern dugout or the still ruder skin canoes of 
 the western tribes. 
 
 So artistic were these northern Indians in fashioning 
 the bark canoe, with its ashen framework of bows scarcely 
 thicker than the bark itself, its graceful, up-curving ends, 
 its ornate trimmings in highly colored deer's hide and 
 porcupine quills (for they were adepts in the manufacture 
 of gaudy-hued pigments), the carvings in the outer rind 
 which left a scar that soon turned black, showing the 
 design, always graceful, in strong contrast with the snow- 
 white ground, together with its exceeding lightness, they 
 produced a craft which floated on the water, beautiful and 
 buoyant as the white vapor that cloaks the lake, or dallies 
 with soft breezes in shreds, patches and ghost-like columns, 
 idly wandering along the liquid floor, or waltzing to a 
 ripple of the wind in an autumn sunrise. 
 
 Here in sight, as we stand upon the summit of the hill
 
 6O DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 in this year of our I^ord seventeen hundred one, fifty and 
 more of the birchen canoes, white as the snows of winter 
 unpolluted by the mud and slush of civilization, glare 
 from the blackness of the mountain's shadow as the last 
 ruddy glow of sunset dissolves in the leaden hue of night. 
 
 To the north, between the enormous trunks of chestnuts 
 that have shed their autumn harvests for two centuries of 
 time, and to the south under those dismally black hem- 
 locks the great-grand nephews of which are thereabout 
 to-day the wigwams, half discernible, seem to glide about 
 and gibber like spirits flitting among the gloomy shadows. 
 
 Within them the small boys, the male pappooses, twelve 
 years old and under, are dreaming of sunshine and gay 
 feathers, and of bright wampum beads upon the naked 
 bosoms of the mother squaw, dreaming of the little bow 
 and quiver, of mimic tomahawk and fish spear; dreaming 
 of tales of filing through distant, unknown, pathless woods, 
 with star guides for the night, with moss and wind- warped 
 trees to lead them in the day to where at midnight some 
 sleeping foe is waiting to be scalped. But the squaws 
 and the old men (there were never many of the last; they 
 always managed to make their exit just when their use- 
 fulness was over), the squaws, and the old men, and that 
 old squaw, the inevitable ' ' she ' ' who is half devil and 
 half sorceress ; half human and all witch ; she who 
 has outlived her generation and, half oblivious of the 
 present, looks wisely into the future while dwelling in the 
 past. Every community has them; they sit at pianos and 
 at milking-stools, in palaces and huts of mud. They
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 6 1 
 
 dream by daylight and practice occultism at evening with 
 the lights turned down; can turn a tea cup or a card to 
 your bewilderment, read horoscopes in the abstruse let- 
 tering of your palm, brew specifics from unthought of 
 weeds, or say to you " take up thy bed and walk," and 
 you take it up and know not how nor why. She wills it, 
 and the thing is done. 
 
 The old men and this old sorceress, fortune-teller, spirit 
 medium, witch, she who has the gift of seeing sights not 
 practically seeable, and of passing in and out over the 
 threshold of eternity, were gathered in an anxious but 
 dead silent conclave, about a smouldering fire of burned- 
 out brush-wood, waiting for something. 
 
 "I see," said the old squaw, in her native, stomach- 
 spoken unpronounceability, words which in free interpre- 
 tation might be rendered ' ' I see a big cloud of smoke 
 See many Indians Indians from where the summer 
 comes Indians from the great snow country Indians 
 from where the sun sleeps. See Indians cover the whole 
 hill cover the plain over by the plantation. Indians 
 come like bees when the winds blow down the hive-tree. 
 I see old chiefs long time dead up on the hill scarp up 
 on the black ledges. I feel the great hill shake see a 
 hundred warriors go out like a torchlight, go out in the 
 cloud of smoke go out in the hill shake." And as she 
 finished the last sentence she sprang to her feet and 
 wildly gesticulating, pointed here and there, and in a half 
 whisper ejaculated: "See! see old warrior! Big heap 
 warrior ! No see ? Umph ! Got no eye. ' ' And with
 
 62 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 the last word she tossed her head this way and that, with- 
 out volition, and with spasmodic twitches of the muscles 
 of face and shoulders she fell, going off into a swoon. 
 May be it was a trance. Those who tamper with the 
 occult touching the hereafter, and in pretense or other- 
 wise hold intercourse with unseen entities, talk of trances, 
 of temporary spirit disembodiment, and of spirit rehabili- 
 ment in shapely, ethereal luminosity. 
 
 She was gone; was rigid, cold, and to all appearance 
 dead. But she had been so before, and the squaws looked 
 at her and sighed, and passed on, and the men gave that 
 grunt, that combination of gutteral and nasal sound, 
 which, given by an Indian, is not possible of interpreta- 
 tion, inasmuch as it is the ready accompaniment of every 
 sentiment and passion of which he is capable. 
 
 Those seated on the ground by the wigwams now hear 
 the dip of paddles, hear the crackling of twigs under the 
 tread of many moccasins. Friendly feet that wear those 
 moccasins, otherwise no sound would have come of them 
 even though the woods were full. 
 
 Many strange faces in stranger paint and wampum now 
 file past the smouldering fire, turn to glance at the dead 
 squaw, and passing on form a circle. But never an eye 
 among the sitters is turned to inspect them. Every mus- 
 cle, every nerve, every passion is subject to the will that 
 acknowledges a discipline which bars the semblance of 
 curiosity. Stolid as statues they sit and seem to muse. 
 
 Foremost among those just landed is Wandee, and next
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 63 
 
 him a figure that has not its counterpart or likeness in 
 all the Nipnet country. 
 
 It is a rare thing to see a Hercules among the Indians. 
 They may be lithe and vigorous, swift they are, and for a 
 moment strong ; but that grand development of muscle, 
 the product of varied active labors, or of sports and exer- 
 cises governed by scientific rules, which, under guidance, 
 qualify a man for extreme physical endurance and endow 
 him with abnormal muscular power in every part of his 
 system, is in a degree wanting in the mere hunter, who, 
 with rare exceptions, rises to the exercise of mentality 
 only with a view to outwit or outspeed the lower animals, 
 and when the purpose is accomplished, or abandoned as 
 fruitless, falls back into blissful, unthinking repose. He 
 never exercises with a purpose to develop. 
 
 He does nothing except in answer to the calls of 
 emergency. He will not even force the earth to yield her 
 increase. He will sooner starve, and trust to luck. And 
 why not ? He has his domestic beasts his slaves his 
 squaws, and what are they here for except to cater to his 
 needs and his passions, and to breed warriors? 
 
 But here was indeed a thorough and unmistakable 
 athlete. Not one of the stereotyped, American aboriginal 
 men ; squatty, heavy-shouldered and abnormally mus- 
 cular, uncouth, ugly in appearance, with closely shaven 
 head, and scalp lock trimmed into the semblance of a 
 militia man's pompon. The long, straight, black hair, 
 parted in the middle of the forehead, was bound by a cor- 
 onet of red-stained buckskin, ornate with pearls of the
 
 64 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 fresh water clam, crystals, the quills of the porcupine and 
 minute sea-shells, and that was clasped in front by a 
 magnificent gold buckle, the present, or lootage perhaps, 
 of some well-to-do white man. 
 
 Depending from the scarlet band were beads in various 
 colored fringes, and beads in graceful and elaborate trac- 
 ings crossed it, while surmounting all one bronze black 
 eagle plume in the buckle fixed awry, proclaimed him 
 chief, or leader of some clan of the confederation a 
 mugwump in the tribal nation. A red, sleeveless, flannel 
 shirt, wrought in graceful designs and hieroglyphic 
 figures of some occult meaning is bound at the waist by 
 a wampum belt. Close, fringed, leathern leggings, and 
 bead-wrought, brown tanned buckskin moccasins com- 
 plete the stranger warrior's dress, while a beautifully 
 polished steel hatchet with long, conic head, suspended 
 by a loop in the body belt is his only weapon. He was 
 approximately thirty-five years of age, less in height 
 than Wandee, his fairly wide shoulders, massive chest 
 and neck, neck joined with graceful sweep to the figure 
 below, the perfectly erect carriage, so unusual to the race, 
 the full, but not huge development of muscles in the 
 limbs, proud free step and haughty air, his great black 
 eyes showing much of the white against the yellow red- 
 ness of his skin, and beaming more with dignity than 
 fire, gave him a commanding appearance exceeding even 
 that of his lordly host. 
 
 And this stranger, the great red-man who locked his 
 name in perpetuity to the history of the New World, who
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 65 
 
 died a hero martyr and a patriot outlaw the terrible fate 
 of whose descendants is a perpetual blot upon the other- 
 wise fair escutcheon of our brave, but too stern fathers 
 is none other than the renowned Philip of Mount Hope, 
 king of the Wampanoags. 
 
 A pow-wow had been held the night before at Hassi- 
 nomissitt (Grafton) at the south end of L,ake Quinsig- 
 amond, where it breaks away in the Nipnap River, and 
 runs in rapid cascade-broken flow toward Narragansett 
 Bay, and by invitation of the Quinsigamond chief, who 
 had been in attendance, King Philip was, for this night, 
 the guest of Wandee. The subject of the pow-wow had 
 been vengeance upon the white aggressors. Not that the 
 Hill chief had been lured into the brooding conspiracy; 
 not that he was ready or willing to break faith with the 
 white man who, but for the episode of Shonto's demise, 
 had ever been his friends; but that the great warrior, the 
 great politician, renowned for wisdom, renowned for 
 courage, renowned for his surpassing eloquence, had 
 claims at least, upon his hospitality. 
 
 Stirring appeals had been made at Hassinomissitt. 
 Speeches such as Indians make under a fervor of excite- 
 ment, when gesticulation is the supreme factor, and oral 
 communication is condensed into connecting links of here 
 a metaphor and there a pungent, picturesque simile. 
 They had been made by the various chiefs assembled, but 
 not by Philip. Philip's manner was calm and collected; 
 his reasoning clear and logical; his appeals forceful and 
 persuasive without the shadow of personal excitement, 
 5
 
 66 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 but withal so subtle, so conclusive, so convincing and so 
 inspiriting, that while the imperturbable master of reason 
 and discourse was in perfect balance and self-poise, his 
 hearers, by exercise of some magic, unappreciable, unde- 
 fined, went wild with an enthusiasm utterly unaccountable 
 in consideration of their ordinarily stoical or stolid tem- 
 peraments. 
 
 The chiefs of Tehassit, Asnebumskit, Washakim, 
 Pegan, Quaboag, and Wachusett were there and said their 
 say, with more or less ardor, chiefly according as they 
 had more or less grievance to charge upon the whites. 
 Philip's speech was purely oral, beginning with a precise, 
 but concise statement of the object of the gathering, which 
 was to consult as to the best means to pursue in gaining 
 redress for manifold wrongs perpetrated by their white 
 neighbors. 
 
 The burden of the conference, if that may be called a 
 conference where one master spirit dominates all minds as 
 the whirlwind sometimes leads a storm, was war; although 
 as yet Philip had not said it, had not named war. So 
 far it seemed only hovering in space, like some weird 
 fatality, an unspoken premonition. His words were soft 
 and kindly, but the sweet-mouthed blandishments of the 
 astute Warnpanoag were but the voluptuous, sinuous 
 ceilings of the serpent, or the mild saliva that facilitates 
 disaster. The glittering eye told more truly than the tongue 
 how deadly was the scheme in contemplation. It told of 
 war; war so desperate, so relentless, that nothing less 
 could suffice than utter extermination, the wiping out of
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 67 
 
 every vestige and drop of white blood, from the white 
 bear country on the north to where the stone-house dwell- 
 ers in the south still gloried in recited traditions of Monte- 
 zumian magnificence under the vertical rays of a winter 
 sun. 
 
 And Wandee had heard the silvery tongue of Philip 
 rolling as fluently, as grandly, in the Nipnet dialect as if 
 its syllables had been his infant lullaby. It had been 
 poured into his listening ears as sweetly as the musical 
 symphony of that paragon of wildwood vocalism, the 
 brown thrush. 
 
 Nothing could exceed in roughness the Nipnet tongue, 
 as ordinarily spoken. But in the treatment of language, 
 nicety of selection, point, perspicuity, and conciseness of 
 expression, aided by a rhythmical habit in arrangement, 
 can make poetry out of uncouth, local idioms, and music 
 out of jargon. 
 
 Wandee, while he had declined to accept Christianity of 
 the white man, and had utterly refused to exchange his 
 worship of the Great Spirit, the all-pervading, all per- 
 meating, active, intelligent essence of life, for that of a 
 personality of whom he was told he was the image; that 
 to him, incomprehensible combination of three distinct 
 and yet inseparable personalities, had yet pledged himself 
 to bury forever the hatchet. He could not change his 
 form of worship, nor repudiate its object. Probably his 
 incapacity to make one and three identical by combination 
 or interchangeability, had confused him, and he preferred 
 his simple faith which, while it offered no complex problem
 
 68 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 for solution, admitted him into the immediate presence of 
 Deity, and gave him assurance of a life to come as the 
 natural concomitant of an indestructible spirit existence 
 that is, an indestructibility vouched for by repeated 
 personal manifestations and common asseveration of such 
 as pass back and forth from the spirit land ; and in the 
 necessity for appeal he preferred the direct method to 
 submitting to the incumbrance of an intercessor. 
 
 He gave his mind no disturbance on account of the 
 white man's religion, but he could stand by his pledges. 
 
 It was no purpose of the great chief on the occasion of 
 this visit to Quinsigamond to make converts to his way 
 of thinking, or by word or act to show himself other 
 than the friendly guest of Wandee; for however he might 
 wish to exert his influence for the cause so near his heart, 
 even an Indian's idea of etiquette forbade so untimely an 
 introduction of the subject. 
 
 He was at Hassinomissitt through preconcertion, and 
 for a purpose, but he was at Wigwan to enjoy the hospi- 
 tality of a generous and promising young host. 
 
 Already he had shaken peace to its foundation stones 
 by his harangue in the valley below, and the fires of 
 revenge and insubordination to a stranger's dictation he 
 had there kindled, were being carried to every lodge, from 
 the mouth of the Assabett River to the junction of the 
 Connecticut and Chicopee. 
 
 He reserved his great powers of persuasion and insti- 
 gation, and the terrible force by which he was able to
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 69 
 
 raise to a tempest of tumult the minds of men, for 
 occasions worthy of his genius. 
 
 Probably no Indian chief of that or any other age so 
 thoroughly combined the wisdom of the sage, the courage 
 and valor of the hero, the persuasive eloquence of word 
 and action that roll together with rhythmic flow toward 
 the accomplishment of a purpose fixed by a will unalter- 
 able and unconquerable, and the subtle craft of the 
 statesman and diplomat. Master by birth and election of 
 the little peninsula to the south of Wat Cheer, with a few 
 hundred Narragansetts as tribal attaches, he had in a 
 twelvemonth, by force of his genius, aided by his wonder- 
 ful linguistic attainments for he was master of all the 
 northern dialects sundered the bonds of oath, interest, 
 friendship and religion between seventy per cent, of all 
 the red men through a territory of five hundred miles 
 square, from the St. Lawrence to the Dutch settlements 
 on the Hudson, and from the Penobscot to the Alleghanies 
 and Adirondacks. The rude tribes of the Canadas, and 
 that wild, warlike, aboriginal terror the bloody Mohawks, 
 had sworn out of the curling smoke of the calumet, an 
 everlasting fealty to the polished demi-god of Mount 
 Hope. 
 
 Take one more look at the lordly sachem, as his 
 splendid figure gracefully bows good night to the scarcely 
 less grand presence of the young chief of the Quinsiga- 
 monds and retires within the walls of the council wig- 
 wam for a night's repose. 
 
 We shall see him once again before the sun of his
 
 7O DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 day of vengeance and blood shall set in an evening of 
 misfortune and despair. 
 
 By earliest daylight the roaring flames of a huge camp- 
 fire, where spitted upon leaning stakes of green walnut 
 the sputtering fat of wild goose, and the savory odor of 
 crackling, hissing, brown haunches of venison give 
 promise of generous feast. But for the method of feast- 
 ing, it amounts to but this, with king or with witch 
 for that wiry old woman is here (the one we left dead, 
 or who seemed so in the evening, is here, and is mutter- 
 ing or gazing, with face upturned, peering off into space). 
 Slice after slice is cut with a scalp- knife from the breast 
 of the fowl ; and with angling incision at top, long strips 
 are jerked from the venison and devoured by the feasters, 
 standing. King, chief and warrior as one are fed at this 
 open air, want of a table. 
 
 The birches are launched, and are flying over the 
 placid waters of the beautiful lake to disappear among 
 the many islands, but to reappear as they skim the swift- 
 flowing waters of the sparkling Nipnap, 1 and float away 
 in the blue distance to the Narragansett and Mount Hope. 
 
 1 Nipnap, the Blackstone River.
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 IN THE TOILS. 
 
 HAVING before this given a succinct view of the person 
 and character of Eugene Archer, we will now proceed 
 to describe him more minutely, in order that a closer 
 acquaintaince with him may leave us less susceptible to 
 the sensation of surprise at any general or especial 
 breach of good faith or manly decorum. 
 
 He was a young man of excellent family, one with 
 whom John Wing had become partially acquainted while 
 going the rounds with his old school companions in the 
 seaport town of Boston. One whose father, an English 
 trader of no inconsiderable fortune, acquired partly in 
 London, considerable in the slave trade between the 
 coast of Africa and the West Indies, and somewhat in his 
 later venture as ship owner and colonial merchant. 
 
 The elder Archer stood high in the rank of respect- 
 ability. 
 
 He, Eugene, had already manifested an innate adapt- 
 ability for becoming an integral part of the great balance 
 wheel of American institutions and of that popular liberty 
 which was already beginning its century of incubation. 
 He had shown unmistakable aptitude for squandering 
 the accumulations of his latest progenitors, to the end 
 that it might be reaccumulated by more frugal hands,
 
 72 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 thereby defeating the ends of the original purpose, the 
 acquisition and continuance of the power of wealth in 
 perpetuity. 
 
 Eugene's self was an intimate comminglement of good 
 breeding and bad morals; of forward politeness and lurk- 
 ing vulgarity; of presumptive innocence, assumption of 
 integrity, and covert rascality. 
 
 I have said that his height was five feet ten. He was 
 slightly but admirably proportioned, supple rather than 
 strong, and he had more hardy endurance than ready 
 physical force. He was erect in figure, manly of bearing, 
 quick of mental apprehension, bold to extremity where 
 he had a purpose to effect, and just the model out of 
 which to evolve the perfect man were it not for the moral 
 poisons which tainted the blood from unremembered ances- 
 try; that potency for evil which reaches back from the 
 hereafter that moral Kraken recrossing the Styx and 
 involving a soul in its merciless tentacles. Or it might be, 
 indeed, that he had imbibed corruption from personal in- 
 noculation. I don't know. 
 
 The features of Eugene's face were nearly perfect. 
 That is to say they were balanced. The type is of but 
 trifling consequence, so easy it is to take some misplaced, 
 and therefore ugly feature, and by matching up produce 
 a paragon of beauty. The cherished result is the effect 
 of combination. There is no type will stand for a 
 moment as ideal. But Archer's nose was straight, or 
 nearly so, and from its connection with the brow project- 
 ing somewhat from the nearly vertical line of his not
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 73 
 
 high forehead. His chin was, if anything, too heavy 
 and inclined to turn up, nostrils large, eyes dark gray and 
 rather full, mouth medium in size, slightly elevated at 
 the corners, and an inclination to pout with the underlip. 
 The graceful column of a wide-based neck extended to 
 the chest and shoulder without the indication of an angle. 
 His hair was dark and somewhat wavy, but was clipped 
 too short to be considered just the thing by the long- 
 haired yeomen of a country district, and a silken, dark 
 mustache, the badge of budding aristocracy, was the 
 scorn of all mature respectablity. Such things were 
 permissible only in case of a Portuguese or Spaniard. 
 
 As has been said, John Wing made the acquaintance of 
 this man at the clubs in Boston, and at Eugene's persistent 
 importunities had allowed him, by formal invitation, to 
 accompany him to the plantation as his guest. Not that 
 the captain would have been, personally, in any degree 
 averse to his company, but the young man's foppish 
 appearance, his elegant habits, and, what was worse than 
 all, his custom of frequent change of apparel, was sure to 
 arouse contempt in the planters. 
 
 Could he have followed the example of young Wing, 
 who in his periodical visits to Boston most fully affected 
 all that capricious fashion demanded, but on his return 
 put off, as the snake discards his skin, the gewgaws of 
 elite society and settled down to corduroy or homespun, 
 or even to a suit of modest velvet with a single change, 
 these old fellows would have taken him to their bosoms, 
 after having taken the measure of his general character
 
 74 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 and capacity, and provided both were of the current 
 quality. 
 
 The captain knew how it would be with the impudently 
 independent Bostonian. But there was no help for it now. 
 He had accepted courtesies, and as a gentleman must 
 hold himself in readiness to return them. 
 
 However, the feeling partly subsided as the two became 
 better acquainted on their horseback journey to the inte- 
 rior, for the visitor's good sense and wit, his superior skill 
 in horsemanship (few people in the older communities 
 realize how far a glorious, long-continued canter, by ex- 
 pert horsemen on high-mettled animals, tends to bring 
 two souls into unison), and above all the reckless daring 
 exhibited by him as, in passing through what is now 
 Watertown, a surly bull drove at them on the road, and 
 this Eugene, never so much at home as in the presence 
 of danger, teased and goaded the brute, cutting him across 
 the eyes with his riding- whip, wheeling his nimble mare 
 to elude a charge, only to renew the torture, until the 
 worried and despairing beast bellowed a surrender and 
 beat a hasty retreat; the adventure, I say, had fairly won 
 over the captain to cordial liking; and within a week 
 he had made for the new comer many friends among the 
 tough old planters who affected to believe all fashionable 
 traps were arts of Satan's own devising. 
 
 Among the places where the captain introduced him 
 was the house of Digory Sergent, and from the moment 
 the new man first looked upon the rustic beaut)' the 
 second daughter (rustic he took her to be until a slight
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 75 
 
 acquaintance taught him that in the matter of education 
 at least, in both letters and deportment she was fully his 
 equal), his subtle, unscrupulous mind began to scheme 
 for her undoing. 
 
 Could he but get her to Boston, there were ways enough 
 by which her identity could be concealed while he chose 
 to revel in the charms of a new mistress, and should he 
 tire of her and desire to cast her off for mere change's 
 sake, or to avail himself of fresher charms, her shame 
 would be its own, and his best safeguard. 
 
 More than once, when the captain was to be occupied 
 at home, Eugene found excuse in his love of horseman- 
 ship, to make excursions into the country by the many 
 bridle-paths and Indian trails, and invariably brought up 
 at Sagatabscot Hill. If his call chanced to be alluded to 
 at the captain's next visit, it excited no surprise. He 
 was merely taking a whirl among the trails, and nothing 
 could be more natural than to call, if he chanced to be 
 near. Besides, so bold, so frank, so valiant a spirit, could 
 he plot harm? Preposterous! Being so introduced, and 
 seeming so much in favor with Captain Wing, he was 
 always a welcome guest and could at all times prolong 
 his stay and even stroll about the clearing in Susan's 
 company without occasioning especial notice. 
 
 It was on one of these occasions, when they had passed 
 beyond the usual limit of a walk, that the rake began a 
 bolder assault upon her affections than he had hitherto 
 deemed prudent. In her artless innocence her ready 
 tongue had rattled away as humor or as fancy prompted.
 
 76 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 Her mirthful, ever-laughing eyes had often met Eugene's 
 with what might be love, might be her sweet good-nature 
 only. A more complete adept at love lore than was Archer, 
 even, could hardly have divined its real import. So be- 
 witching was she in her ways, while all unconscious that 
 it might work harm, that Eugene found at last that he 
 himself had been entrapped in the very snare he had set 
 for her; for while he had at first regarded her as a mere 
 toy that he might play with and at will discard, he found 
 himself now consuming with a real love. A cruel, fierce, 
 intoxicating fondness that was fast weaving bonds about 
 the slayer as unyielding as the web with which he had 
 purposed to enthrall his victim. 
 
 She had unconsciously twined about him a mesh he 
 could not break and in the end he must succumb or sacri- 
 fice. If sacrifice, then, vulture-like, he might rise cold 
 and cruel from the moral death his arts had compassed 
 and his passions fed upon. 
 
 What in him had been at first but morbid lust, merged 
 into that baser comminglement of love and lust which 
 remorselessly destroys the shrine it confesses but will 
 not worship at, and knows neither conscience nor con- 
 stancy. 
 
 But, failing in every effort, art, and wile to awaken in 
 her affection or sentiment other than a forced regard for 
 the friend and guest of her affianced ; failing in repeated 
 attempts to divert her attachment by arousing in her a pas- 
 sion of jealousy, or by posing as an admiring, sympathetic 
 friend of one who was at best but sharing a divided love; he
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 77 
 
 merely made her uneasy, unhappy. Jealous she really 
 became; for Eugene's statements and insinuations of his 
 friend's irregularities in Boston, a scheme he had woven of 
 half fact and half fiction, just so much fact as could be 
 made demonstrable by tagging together of casual remarks, 
 and partly of deftly interpolated fiction, hardly admitted 
 the supposition of constancy. 
 
 Yet every inuendo and presumption of evil on the part 
 of the captain, as thrown out by Eugene, was so covertly 
 guarded by a plausible alternative in the mouth of the 
 traducer, that she still clung to the hope that after all 
 everything might bear investigation and be capable of 
 explanation. But such hope, at the moment of its in- 
 ception, was doomed to be shattered into a thousand 
 inconsistencies by some countermining device of the 
 arch maligner. 
 
 Still, so persistently did she beat about her and clutch 
 at shadows of excuses and palliations, that Eugene at 
 last wearied of inventing disparagements, and turning 
 from the system in disgust set his heart upon more 
 atrociously effective measures for forever separating the 
 pair, each from its idol.
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 TRIED FOR HIS 
 
 IT was the tenth of December, and December sat 
 down heavily upon the plantation. The snow was already 
 eighteen inches deep upon a level, and the checkered sky 
 of the previous night, together with the rapidly moving 
 grey scuds, like pickets thrown out from the long, black 
 bank of clouds in the southwest horizon, seemed to por- 
 tend an additional encumbrance of this apparently useless 
 material. 
 
 The old English clock that stood in the corner of the 
 tavern hall and at intervals of long seconds wagged its 
 lazy pendulum which hung suspended by a five-foot rod, 
 now told the hour of nine. And to-day was trial day for 
 the proud young chief of the Quinsigamonds, and the 
 hour was fixed at ten A. M. 
 
 Already nearly every man in the plantation had made 
 his appearance, and several had come in on snowshoes 
 from Lancaster, Brookfield and Marlborough. Bestdesthe 
 men, many women were in attendance. Some came per- 
 haps out of mere curiosity to witness the holding of the 
 first court ever convened between Boston and New Amster- 
 dam. 
 
 Some came to look again for the hundredth and last time
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 79 
 
 upon the handsome Nipnet chief whom even Captain 
 John Wing, the idol of female Quinsigamond, 1 had not 
 hesitated to speak of admiringly and to make companion 
 of his wildwood sports by summer and winter. 
 
 Among the people assembled were the Henchmans, 
 Paynes, Noyses, Rices, Prentices and at least fifty others, 
 and last to come, but not least in the estimation of all, 
 particularly of the grown sons of the planters, were Martha 
 Sergent and that large-eyed, sweet-mouthed glory of 
 femininity, Susan of Sagatabscot, who seemed, as was 
 remarked by several solicitous matrons, very much paler 
 than usual, while about her eyes was a tinge of illy con- 
 cealed distress which belied her laughing mouth and 
 cheery volubility of tongue. 
 
 She had been troubled of late, but she had promised 
 secrecy to Kugene Archer, and had now rallied upon the 
 practice of that art which is instinct in the sex when 
 jealousy prompts a woman to detect ,a fault. She could 
 smile with lips and eyes and could prattle with her tongue 
 even while her heart was breaking. 
 
 It was now nearly ten o'clock and the prisoner was not 
 at hand, but Captain Wing had pledged himself for his 
 appearance, and Captain John was absent. They will 
 surely come. Yes! they come. Over the hilltop to east- 
 ward and close at hand, over the top of the crustless snow 
 directly in the line of Wigwam, light as the tread of that 
 flock of snowbirds, sweeping and soaring and stooping 
 
 1 Quinsigamond tribe, and Quinsigamond plantation must not 
 be confounded.
 
 80 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 in front of them, light as that breath of wind that whirls 
 the feathery snow flakes in their faces; over the hill top, 
 striding upon green hide basket-ribbed Indian rackets, 
 come the captain and Wandee wrapped in their mantles 
 of bear-skin. 
 
 Seventy men are now in the Castle Tavern eagerly 
 waiting to see the lassoo of law cast over the neck of the 
 first victim. 
 
 The deacon, Trial Justice by virtue of appointment 
 at Boston, stood in the bar room, running over the jury 
 panel, and mentally reviewing, so far as memory would 
 serve him, legal forms and processes which he had indus- 
 triously sought out and endeavored to memorize within 
 the last few days. Cogitating he was, how far a Trial 
 Justice himself might be amenable to law for irregularity 
 in the form of dispensation, even where the culprit was 
 only an Indian. 
 
 Steaming hot mugs were now resting upon the bar, 
 having been replenished by Black Jake in the master's 
 absence, and were waiting, as were a score of hot rum 
 toddies, for the Justice, the most important man in the 
 plantation, for this day at least, to institute a proceeding 
 not directly in line with the business of the day. 
 
 The planters were coming in from the piazzas, blowing 
 their fingers and rubbing their ears, and were evidently 
 growing impatient, which, the Justice perceiving, he lifted 
 his mug and wished them a happy return of the day, and 
 possession of the intervales in the interim, after which 
 he called out "Attention!" and began to call the roll
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 8 I 
 
 of his jury, but had hardly uttered the first name before 
 observing a fault of omission. 
 
 ' ' Step forward as you answer to your names and fall 
 into platoons at salute! " was given as an order, and the 
 men obeyed. 
 
 Form, however, went for but little, as the prisoner was 
 only an Indian , and after excusing some of the list, among 
 them the two Rices, who confessed to prejudice in the 
 prisoner's favor, and Sergent for predetermining in his 
 mind as to guilt or innocence, others were excused for 
 having expressed opinions, and all such claimed that ex- 
 emption was legal, although assured by the Justice that it 
 mattered but little, as the prisoner was "only an Injun." 
 But substitutes were found; not, however, without includ- 
 ing Black Jake, who, although a slave, and not eligible 
 in ordinary cases, was fully competent in this. 
 
 The Court now adjourned to the Castle, where a roaring 
 fire had been built in anticipation of the event. 
 
 A fire had never been kindled in that house for the 
 comfort of church service since the Castle was built. 
 Faith and zeal might relax under the soothing, satis- 
 fying influence of diffused caloric. 
 
 One zealot in the congregation had said " it is a feeble 
 religious flame that cannot keep one's toes from freezing 
 in the House of God." 
 
 To suffer, was commendable sacrifice; to enjoy, could 
 only savor of sacrilege. 
 
 All was now arranged. The Justice occupied the 
 bench that did service as a pulpit on the Sabbath days, 
 6
 
 82 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 and the trial commenced and proceeded with solemnity, 
 and as much regularity, as much adhesion to barristic 
 forms as might be reasonably expected of men wholly 
 unused to the legal dispensation of justice. To be sure, 
 most of them had attended upon fence-post floggings, 1 
 with the black-snake horsewhip, when justice was admin- 
 istered by the edict of an improvised jury, to some thieving 
 red-skin, or a lazy lout of a white man who had made 
 himself obnoxious to the people of Marlborough or Sud- 
 bury from whence most of them came by lying drunk 
 too many days of the week, thereby jeopardizing the 
 interests of the community that might, if the thing was 
 continued, be called upon to aid in the family's support. 
 
 There were no Washakims in attendance as witnesses, 
 at this trial, although the tribe was in reality the plain- 
 tiff in the case, and a dozen of them had been till now, 
 loud-mouthed with damning evidence, and had been duly 
 cited to appear. One of them had found the body, 
 another the arrows with heads such as no Indian but 
 Wandee used, and several others had sundry tokens upon 
 which to base a theory adverse to the prisoner. 
 
 As no Washakims were present, no evidence, not even 
 circumstantial, could be adduced, at least none ordinarily 
 competent. But, as hearsay and current rumor were fully 
 admitted, not indeed as good and sufficient, but for all 
 the jury might consider them worth, and as the general 
 
 1 Fence-post trials, euding in public flogging and ear clipping 
 were not altogether infrequent as late as the date of the Revolu- 
 tion.
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 83 
 
 impression that Wandee was guilty, could not, in the 
 absence of counsel to question, or judge to rule, other- 
 wise than bias an uninstructed jury, it was easy to see 
 during the trial that a tide was rising which was likely 
 to float the prisoner off into conviction. 
 
 The stories and little items of hearsay having originally 
 a possible indirect bearing upon the case, had, by repeti- 
 tion, like snowballs rolling down a hillside, gathered 
 substance as they ran and now assumed imposing bulk. 
 And they were poured unreservedly into the ears of the 
 jury, however irrelevant or incompetent; and as he or she 
 had rendered his or her testimony, he or she continued 
 without abatement, except as halting to take breath, 
 borrowing from conjecture, probability, and possibility, 
 colors inimical to the interest of the man on trial, as 
 people will who are unused to opening their mouths to 
 the public. If they have the hardihood to commence 
 they usually rattle on, pleased with the music of their 
 emanations, and delighted with their new and important 
 conspicuity, never knowing when to stop, but, like 
 syphons, they run until they have exhausted the fountain 
 head. 
 
 The trouble was chiefly with the Judge, who, although 
 in all respects a sound man, was just now out of his ele- 
 ment. Or, possibly, his mind having predetermined the 
 result, was at present occupying itself with prospective 
 visions of cornfields along the Quinnapoxit. 1 
 
 J The valley of Quinnapoxit is in the town of West Boylston, 
 now soon to be flooded and occupied as the great reservoir for 
 supplying Boston with water.
 
 84 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 The case was evidently going solidly against the 
 prisoner, and many an eye in the assembly dropped a 
 tear upon a bosom where palpitated a heart that loved 
 mercy more than what men call legal justice; that held 
 human life at a higher value than wide cornfields; hearts 
 that, without the aid of heads, without the necessity for 
 duly weighing evidence, jumped, through the faculty of 
 innate perception, to a juster conclusion than acumen with 
 its cold discernment, than wisdom with its doubtful scale 
 of weights and measures. 
 
 And now the evidence was all in, with the exception of 
 that of the prisoner at the bar, and he had, so far, 
 declined to testify; which fact, in the mind of the Court 
 if not of the jury, conclusively nailed his guilt to the 
 wall; for what could be more likely than that the tremb- 
 ling homicide, in view of his close proximity to the land 
 of the hereafter, should shrink from falsifying under the 
 all-seeing eye of the Great Spirit, whoever that might 
 be.. 
 
 More than one juryman looked knowingly at the judge, 
 and throwing an askant look at the prisoner, solemnly 
 raised his eyes toward the rafters with a look of "of 
 course he did it. ' ' 
 
 The chances are decidedly against you, Wandee. The 
 chances are that a Washakim stake fire will toast your 
 limbs after you have run the gauntlet, when every 
 squaw is at liberty to heap indignities upon you. But 
 happily, so far, not a Washakim unless in disguise is
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 85 
 
 here to exult over your conviction and his pleasing antici- 
 pations. 
 
 For some reason they have kept aloof. Indians never 
 like to meet large bodies of white men, unless the whites 
 are asleep. As a rule, Indians are skulkers. Bold men 
 among them are rare, and when such appear they in- 
 stinctively lead, and are, through instinct, followed. 
 They need no election. They are master spirits and 
 gravitate to place. 
 
 If no unforseen circumstances occur in your favor, you 
 proud, Hill Indian, you are as good as doomed. You 
 must run that terribly humiliating gauntlet; must suffer 
 worse than a hundred deaths, as those squaws, standing 
 in double line and each armed with a walnut withe will 
 spit upon you as you pass between them; will lacerate 
 your hide; and you, bound by the bleeding wrists, 
 are helpless to resent it. And then they will send you 
 up in a chariot of fire, for the white men will not execute 
 you but will give you over to the tribe whose chief you 
 have murdered. 
 
 But the Justice is on his feet. 
 
 "It is within the limit of my power as Justice of the 
 Peace for this plantation, to dispose of this case without 
 resort to the jury form of trial prescribed for the white 
 man ; but, as the prisoner stands foremost among his race 
 in talent, power and respectability, if the term respect- 
 able is in any degree applicable to an Indian, I have 
 thought it expedient, somewhat in deference to Brother
 
 86 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 Wing, to give him such benefits as civilization accords to 
 a Christian. In short, to give him a trial by a jury of 
 our peers, notwithstanding he is only an Indian. 
 
 "Of course, Mr. Foreman and the jury, you can but 
 appreciate the Christian charity hereby extended, espe- 
 cially as you take into account the fact that he is j'et a 
 heathen, never having been baptized. 
 
 ' 'And now that the evidence is in on both sides, if indeed 
 the case of an Indian can have more than one side, you 
 must confess gentlemen of the jury, that it looks mighty 
 bad for the Injun. 
 
 " To sum up the evidence would seem wholly superfluous, 
 even were the Court so disposed, for the Court holds, and 
 we submit it to you, gentlemen of the jury, that nothing 
 could be clearer than that the prisoner at the bar is 
 guilty of murder in the first degree. I had no doubt of 
 it from the very first. If it were indeed possible that any 
 lingering vestige of a doubt could still remain in your 
 minds, gentlemen of the jury, such doubts might be speedily 
 dispelled by resort to the proof positive which comes 
 of that ancient and lawful system of ducking in the mill 
 pond, which, as you are well aware, by repeated experience 
 down in Marlborough and by long established precedent, 
 will, if after having seemed to drown he can be resusci- 
 tated and restored immediately to full vigor, give strong 
 assurance of innocence, and if he die, why, being guilty, 
 he deserves his fate. 
 
 " But, gentlemen of the jury, my sympathies with the 
 prisoner in this trying moment forbid that I should force
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 87 
 
 him to the water ordeal, even were it earlier in the day 
 and we had time. 
 
 "Has any one anything to say why we should not pro- 
 ceed at once to hang the culprit to the Tavern sign- 
 post, or otherwise dispose of him as may seem in best 
 accord with the interests of the plantation ? Of course 
 we must wait until the jury return a verdict, for however 
 we may regard the matter of guilt as a foregone conclu- 
 sion, the jury must be entitled to respect from the Court. 
 
 ' ' And now, if any white man has aught to say against 
 passing immediate sentence, let him speak, or forever after 
 hold his peace. 
 
 ' ' Captain John Wing has the floor. The j ury will please 
 give their attention. Right dress, eyes right, weight of 
 the body upon the ball of the foot. Steady, front. Go 
 in Cap'n." 
 
 The captain was already upon his feet, and not a little 
 embarrassed by the situation, All eyes were turned upon 
 him as his name was called, and he scarcely yet out of his 
 teens, and a novice in this new position, was if indica- 
 tions were to be regarded, to undertake to overturn a bar- 
 rier of prejudice already established in the minds, not 
 only of the jury, but of the seventy or more gray-haired 
 men and women whose faces now seemed to wear the un- 
 relenting sternness of a public executioner. 
 
 He began: 
 
 ' ' As advocate for the prisoner at the bar it is my priv- 
 ilege to call a witness in the person of the prisoner, even 
 though he be but an Indian."
 
 88 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 "Is it lawful sir, to place an Indian on the stand to 
 testify ? ' ' interrupted the Judge. 
 
 " I think it is lawful Your Honor, in any Court in Mas- 
 sachusetts Colony, for a man of any color to testify in his 
 own defence. Wandee, please stand up." 
 
 The Indian had no sooner got upon his feet than he was 
 sternly questioned by the Judge. 
 
 " Have you been sworn, sir? " 
 
 " Indian no swear, white man swear "nough." 
 
 ' ' Do you believe in the Holy Trinity ? In God the 
 Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost?" 
 
 " Too much lar'n ; me no "stan." 
 
 ' ' Do you believe in the Bible ?" 
 
 ' ' Do' know him. B'lieve Great Spirit. " 
 
 ' ' Do you believe in God ? ' ' 
 
 "Which God? White man got free Gods." 
 
 " We mean the one God Jehovah." 
 
 "Never heard las' God, 'at make four. Injun got 
 Great Spirit, white man got God. All same." 
 
 ' ' Who is the Great Spirit ? Did you ever see him ? ' ' 
 
 "Great Spirit Big t' ink up dar Down here All 
 roun' me know him. See him in sun see him in tree, 
 see him in Deacon, leetle mite bit, you guess." 
 
 "You may have the witness, Captain. If he hasn't 
 learned to swear we won't teach him." 
 
 " Wandee," asked his counsel, " did you meet Shonto 
 upon the day and date when it is alleged you caused his 
 death?" 
 
 ' ' Me meet Shonto. ' '
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 89 
 
 ' ' And what happened when you met Shonto ? ' ' 
 
 "Me kill Shonto, me kill Shonto dead." 
 
 " That settles it! " said the Justice. " We read, ' out 
 of thine own mouth will I condemn thee. ' There is 
 nothing more to say in this case. We mustn't show the 
 prisoner the disrespect to question his assertion. I think 
 the case may now go before the jury upon the confession. 
 There wan't a doubt in my mind from the first." 
 
 " One moment, your Honor!" exclaimed the captain. 
 "We must n't be too hasty in this matter. I have the 
 witness and have not done with him yet. Wandee why 
 did you kill Shonto ? Tell the Court how it happened. 
 Tell it without much questioning. Try and explain it to 
 the Court. You may tell it in your own way." 
 
 " No big talk, Cap'n. Me no like big talk." 
 
 ' ' But you must talk now, Wandee. Talk for me, talk 
 to me. Never mind these people. It is you and Cap'n 
 John, now. L,ook at me and talk." 
 
 "Yes, me talk. Me talk yes. Me in woods. See 
 deer. Deer run. Me shoot, kill deer. Go fetch him. 
 Shonto out come. Me know where, me don't. Shonto 
 take deer. Wandee take deer 'way off Shonto. Shonto 
 fight." 
 
 "Well, you fought, but who struck the first blow, 
 Wandee?" 
 
 ' ' Me no strike. Shonto strike here. Big, long cut. 
 See? Shonto strike two time. Bad, strike bad; cut 
 stomach all open. See? Big, much bleed. Me mad,
 
 90 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 Me drop deer. Strike Shonto one time, two time, strike, 
 keep strike. Shonto dead. Me glad." 
 
 The last expression, considering the time and place, 
 was quite too bold and savored too much of a spirit of 
 satisfied revenge to suit the ideas of the deacon in his 
 present exalted position of Justice of the Peace. The 
 prisoner must be reprimanded. 
 
 ' ' Does not the prisoner at the bar realize that the kill- 
 ing of Shonto was bad enough without exulting over the 
 crime? The prisoner must retract, or be held to answer 
 for contempt. Are you not sorry, Injun? " 
 
 "Me glad! Deacon strike Wandee, me kill Deacon. 
 Kill any man, white red all. Me no take strike. Me 
 kill, you guess." 
 
 ' ' These heathen are incorrigible. You can go on with 
 the witness, sir." 
 
 ' ' What did you do with the deer, Wandee ? ' ' 
 
 "Me skin deer, take saddle, go home to wigwam. 
 Squaw all hungry." 
 
 " When you had taken the hide from the deer did you 
 observe anything peculiar or unusual about the wound ? ' ' 
 
 " Me see two hole; hole bote side. Me t'ink ole witch 
 cut 'em. Ole squaw all roun'. Come go no see 'em. 
 Me no shoot two arrer. ' ' 
 
 " You may be seated, Wandee." 
 
 "Gentlemen of the jury I know little of law or of 
 the forms and processes by which it is administered. I 
 have so far seen more of camps than courts of law, but I 
 have in mind a legal axiom or two that may serve me in
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 9 1 
 
 some stead, and will aid me where I might otherwise go 
 far astray. 
 
 ' ' You have heard the evidence offered by the govern- 
 ment, with a view to fix upon the prisoner the crime of 
 murder. 
 
 ' ' You have heard the open confession of the accused, 
 and it is duly admitted that Shonto came to his death at 
 his hand, and if the act of killing, under any and all cir- 
 cumstances is to be denominated murder, then it is useless 
 to enter a plea in this prisoner's behalf, for, as the Court 
 has suggested, out of his own mouth has he been con- 
 demned. But before passing sentence upon the accused, 
 or even forming an opinion, which, if unanimous, is when 
 uttered a verdict, it is your bounden duty first to accu- 
 rately define the term murder. Then, as murder is in legal 
 practice divided into degrees, you must ascertain the char- 
 acter of these degrees. And after considering the evidence 
 adduced, you must make each quality or degree of murder 
 a touchstone which you can apply to the case of the 
 prisoner as it now stands. 
 
 "And then, gentlemen of the jury, after you have 
 made the application, and fail to find a correspondence, 
 you can, as the killing is admitted, view its relation to 
 what is termed justifiable homicide, which, if it is so 
 considered by you, is warrant for an acquittal. 
 
 " In considering the case in hand you will understand 
 that murder is, of necessity, an act of premeditation; the 
 execution of a malicious design aforethought, and result- 
 ing in the death of the victim. The difference between
 
 92 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 this, and justifiable homicide, lies between a thought dwelt 
 upon and an unlocked for provocation of the instant with 
 fatality imminent. Even when death ensues upon an at- 
 tack with intent to kill, the act is not necessarily mur- 
 der. 
 
 " If a person is assaulted by another, and with a weapon, 
 it is for him, not you, to decide as to the danger, and 
 upon the probable outcome. Time is then short for delib- 
 eration, and the law of the colonies under which we live, 
 as also the law of the land to which we own fealty, pre- 
 scribes the right of reasonable resistance, and with any 
 weapon at command, and it virtually allows the use of 
 such weapon until the assailant is disarmed or disabled. 
 But who shall decide when that point is reached and the 
 victim of the assault is assured of personal safety ? Who 
 shall determine the conditions? Who among you will 
 say that your judgment, and that alone, shall afford the 
 criterion ? Or shall say that the resistance should have 
 ceased before the assailant was rendered helpless and pos- 
 sibly placed beyond revival, and that because it did not 
 so cease the defendant is therefore guilty of murder ? 
 
 ' ' lyet us look into the nature of the evidence adduced, 
 and see if we find evidence of premeditation. 
 
 ' ' You have heard it said that Wandee uses arrow heads of 
 a peculiar kind, and that near the body were found such 
 arrows; but the painstaking to establish this was super- 
 fluous, as the prisoner confesses that he took the life of the 
 Washakim. He would have confessed as much at the 
 outset of this trial, had he been called upon to plead, as
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 93 
 
 the Court would have been bound to call upon a white 
 man to do. 
 
 ' ' Had this prisoner been arraigned before a simple 
 Justice Bench, the summary method of procedure a few 
 moments ago intimated might have found a legal shadow 
 of excuse, the prisoner being but an Indian; but, fortu- 
 nately, his life or liberty are not now contingent upon one 
 man's ability to sift evidence, but upon the combined 
 judgment of twelve men, who, if too high in the scale of 
 human social existence to be rated as his peers, are the 
 more in duty bound to carefully weigh the evidence, if 
 in reality any such evidence is to be found among the 
 mass of verbiage offered as bearing against him, and to 
 see that justice is duly meted out to the defenceless. 
 
 " Do unto him as ye would that he should do unto you, 
 were he the strong and you the helpless one, never for a 
 moment forgetting that since you have consented to sit 
 in judgment, you have thereby, for the time, acknowledged 
 him your peer. 
 
 ' ' Now, as we have admitted the killing, and as no 
 evidence other than that of the prisoner has been offered 
 in regard to the circumstances attending it, it may be well 
 for us to look behind the scene for a motive, for if it can 
 be established that there was a motive, or a reason which 
 might have instigated it other than self-defence, the fact 
 will weigh heavily against the accused. Has any intima- 
 tion appeared of ill feeling between the two chiefs prior 
 to this event? Has any feud existed between the tribes; 
 any animosity whatever, that has been shown or intimated
 
 94 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 here ? If not, where do we look for a motive ? It certainly 
 was not robbery, for no Indian hunter carries valuables 
 upon his person. What occurred or existed prior to the 
 event that could arouse premeditation of evil ? You have 
 heard nothing in all this mass of hearsay to indicate 
 malice aforethought. Nothing in all this deluge of guess- 
 work to lead you to think it might be the promptings of 
 a spirit of revenge. 
 
 ' ' You have heard the testimony of the prisoner. It is 
 clear, concise, and perfectly easy to be understood. It 
 needs no repetition, no elucidation. It is a plain state- 
 ment of what he says are facts; and the only question 
 for you to decide, in the framing of your verdict, is one of 
 the prisoner's veracity. 
 
 ' ' It is out of the question for anything like corrobora- 
 tive evidence to exist, except you consider as such the 
 wounds he bears upon his person, which we confess are 
 of little weight, as after a battle, from any cause, the result 
 might have been the same. 
 
 " But, gentlemen of the jury, holding fast to the con- 
 fession as one point, and admitting that the hearsay evi- 
 dence offered is true, and that the whole chain of 
 guess-work is probable, nothing of it all can be construed 
 to controvert the testimony of Wandee. 
 
 " Where, then, shall we look for a solution of the mys- 
 tery ? A theory respecting this affair suggests itself, and 
 through your further forbearance I will present it. The 
 parties were both Indians; and, like Indians, each secreted 
 himself upon the discovery of game at rest and made his
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 95 
 
 shot from ambush. Both shafts left the bows at the same 
 instant of time. Now if, as might reasonably have oc- 
 curred, one missed his shot, while the other pierced the 
 body of the game with a force that drove the arrow through 
 and beyond, what is more natural than that a dispute 
 should arise with regard to ownership, and that such dis- 
 pute should lead to blows. If blows, then a battle, and 
 to the victor belonged the spoil. If a battle, it could by 
 no means of argument be construed into a murder, for 
 even the laws that govern Christian nations hold him 
 guiltless of murder who defeats his opponent in a duel, 
 though to one party death ensues. 
 
 ' ' You have heard the story of Wandee ; you have seen 
 his wounds ; you realize the worthlessness of hearsay and 
 surmises, and as you retire to frame your verdict you will 
 not forget that if any doubt exists in your minds as to 
 previously entertained malice, or premeditation of assault, 
 you cannot convict him, as to him belongs the whole 
 weight of your uncertainty. If he killed Shonto in self- 
 defence, you cannot convict him. If he had the provo- 
 cation of a blow, or if Shonto died in battle, you cannot 
 convict the prisoner as you have no means of identifying 
 the aggressor. And you will allow me to suggest to your 
 minds upon retiring, that since his guilt or innocence has 
 been left to the judgment of twelve men to decide, he is 
 fully entitled to every consideration you would feel in 
 duty bound to accord to a white man. I have done." 
 
 A burden seemed to have been rolled from the shoulders 
 of the now happy, smiling judge, and his dignified speech
 
 96 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 and austere manner had entirely forsaken him as he 
 rose to address the jury. 
 
 "The apparently learned counsel for the defense has 
 fully charged the jury and thereby rendered it wholly 
 unnecessary for me to read to you the elaborately pre- 
 pared document upon which the Court has been engaged 
 for the past week. The fact is, gentlemen of the jury, 
 but little remains to be said, for the Court realizes that it 
 has got itself into deep water, and that the safety of its 
 reputation lies in the precipitate abandonment of the 
 works, or in capitulation. 
 
 "Gentlemen of the jury, the exigencies of the case 
 admit of no parley. The attacking party is in possession 
 of the works and has spiked the guns. That happy 
 thought of the counsel in the shape of a theory has 
 utterly demolished and forever knocked out all our pre- 
 conceived notions in respect to this case. If we had been 
 counsel for the defendant he would have hung higher 
 than Haman, through a misconception. But now I 
 think the Indian is all right. The jury will now retire 
 to the northeast corner of the court room and aquit the 
 prisoner without delay, or as quickly as a decent respect 
 for the forms in such cases provided will admit of. 
 
 "It is especially desirable that you arrive at a conclu- 
 sion before this fire goes down, for I see there is no wood 
 left on hand." 
 
 The jury retired, and three minutes had elapsed 
 (already too much time for deliberation, as the prisoner 
 was nothing but an Indian, and as the mercury, if there
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 97 
 
 had been any in the colony, would have indicated five 
 below,) they reported ready to make a return. 
 
 Once more the now crest-fallen but still pleased judge, 
 with a facial expression divided between chagrin at 
 having so palpably erred, and satisfaction that real justice 
 was after all to be administered, came to the front. 
 
 "Dress up men and come to salute. What say you, 
 Mr. Foreman, is the prisoner guilty or not guilty ?" 
 
 " Not guilty," was the quiet response. 
 
 And so ended the trial of the proud chief of the Quin- 
 sigamonds. 
 
 But a more terrible ordeal than that he had just passed 
 was at hand, even at the doors, and for the first time 
 since the trial commenced the Indian gave visible signs 
 of trepidation. It was apparent he was weakening. 
 The stoic was no longer equal to the emergency. The 
 hardy honesty of the Packachoag, whose blood he con- 
 fessed on the one side, and the stubborn heart of the fiery 
 Quinsigamond on the other, cowered to the occasion, for 
 there at the doors in waiting was nearly every young 
 woman of the plantation. While not a few of the 
 mothers were there to supplement the daughters' acts 
 with a pious benediction. 
 
 The young women were there to lavish upon the hand- 
 some and now free Nipnet, hearts full of congratulation, 
 with tongues sweeter to him than the whistle of the red- 
 breast on an April morning. To look lovingly into the 
 sublime depths of his calm black eyes. To even kiss 
 good night upon his soft, tapering, brown fingers, for he 
 7
 
 98 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 had been to them the beau-ideal of a perfect heathen, and 
 when he came to grief, and their instinctive perceptions 
 outran the measured tread of the law, and forestalled the 
 jury's acquittal, they wept at the tardy ways and the 
 purblind sight that rendered his fate so uncertain. 
 
 And he, the now more than ever admired young Indian, 
 with an affectation of blushes, for how could red show 
 redness ? lashed on his snowshoes and glided free as a 
 hawk in his soarings, into the gloomy depths of the 
 hemlocks.
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 A COLONIAL SUPPER. 
 
 IT was the evening of trial day. 
 
 It was four of the clock, noon past, by the thirty-hour 
 sentinel that stood in the corner, and out of his old, 
 black, mahogany dressing-gown frowned upon such as 
 took no note of time, except as he hourly admonished 
 them that ' ' life is short and time is fleeting. ' ' 
 
 The sun that was just dropping behind the close-at- 
 hand western hills, struggled through a portentous haze 
 to make his existence appreciable, as he seemed for a 
 moment to halt while he bade the little, sleepy world of 
 Quinsigamond plantation good night ; and but a few 
 moments more elapsed when here and there a fugitive 
 flake of snow seemed sent as a warning to the women 
 who lived upon the distant hills to be wary of the ven- 
 ture home. 
 
 Captain Wing and Digory Sergent, as also the Rices 
 and Harts, decided that it was best that the matrons and 
 spinsters should lodge at the Tavern, or at least should 
 remain until the storm abated, as the snow was already 
 so deep that even by daylight it was next to impossible 
 for a horse to keep a trail at a gait faster than a walk, 
 And as evening had now shut down upon the plantation, 
 in the midst of the fulfillment of the meteorological
 
 IOO DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 promise of the day, the enormous fire-places blazed and 
 crackled as the giddy flames waltzed and pirouetted in 
 their ample chambers, or chased each other chimney ward, 
 shedding a benign blessing of light and caloric, each over 
 twenty feet square of room. 
 
 Susan was sitting in a far corner of the parlor, her 
 heart fluctuating between hope and fear. Hope that 
 after all, the surmises of Eugene Archer might yet prove 
 unwarranted, and that the conduct she so reasonably 
 deplored in the captain might be favorably explained; 
 fear that the truth might be even more startling than the 
 first intimation was painful. 
 
 But here comes John, and she must at all events appear 
 at ease lest her disconcertion should lead to the detection 
 and betrayal of her secret and forever close the door to 
 further discovery. 
 
 "Tell me, John, how is it you can always speak con- 
 siderately of the deacon ? He seems to me to be an old 
 bear. I would not trust my own life in his hands against 
 a valued stipend. A man who can speak so flippantly of 
 murdering by process of law, as if an Indian was devoid 
 of soul or sense, who can throw his avarice into the scale 
 where a life is being weighed, can have no esteem of 
 mine. ' ' 
 
 "Susan, the deacon is really a much better man than 
 you give him credit for being. He has until now, with 
 some show of reason, as he knew nothing of the facts, 
 regarded Wandee as a murderer, and as such deserving 
 of death. But after hearing Wandee's statement, and
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. IOI 
 
 seeing applied to it tests, and unthought-of explanations, 
 he has changed his mind and would now be the last man 
 in the plantation to do him an injustice. 
 
 ' ' His bluff introduction and procedure in the case, was 
 the result of a settled, though too hasty conviction, that 
 he was dealing with a blood-smirched desperado, and what 
 appeared to you as his heartless manner in retiring the 
 jury was the very reverse. It was abounding good nature, 
 for he had seen his error and looked upon an acquittal as 
 a foregone conclusion. And again, to partially account 
 for appearances which you condemn, you will not forget 
 that by both law and custom, the case of an Indian re- 
 quires less formality than must by the same code of laws, 
 govern a case where a white man stands accused. His 
 allusions to the intervales, though not excusable, are no 
 doubt the effect of the frequent recurrence to his mind 
 of a long-cherished desire to possess them for the general 
 good, and unfortunately it vents itself in expression at 
 inopportune moments. I have never had reason to sus- 
 pect that the deacon would willingly be party to robbing 
 any man, white or red; on the contrary, in every thought- 
 ful discussion of the matter he has invariably favored 
 ample compensation, and the equivalent he has offered 
 is in excess, correspondingly, to anything heretofore paid 
 to, or even asked by them. The deacon is, no doubt, 
 tinctured with the current fallacy that an Indian has no 
 rights a white man is bound to respect, but in practice, 
 his native honesty usually asserts itself. ' '
 
 IO2 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 ' ' And are there many in the colony base enough, wicked 
 enough, to act upon the principle you name?" 
 
 " Indeed there are, and it is the many who are at fault, 
 more than the individual who puts the evil into practice. 
 It is the school that teaches the sentiment, and which 
 honest but indifferent and inconsiderate men float upon, 
 and designing men avail themselves of, which carries the 
 sin, and should pay its forfeit." 
 
 " Upon which side do you range, John? Do you se- 
 riously regard the sentiment an error ? ' ' 
 
 ' ' I thought I defined my position when I called it a 
 sin. I differ from nine-tenths of this community upon the 
 subject. To me it seems absolutely wrong. But that 
 opinion is no virtue in me. It is simply a matter, or 
 rather the effect of reasoning based upon wise suggestions. 
 You might say I was educated up to it. 
 
 ' ' In my school days in Boston I had companionship of 
 men who think beyond the little wall that hems in a city 
 or a township. Men to whom and for whom there are two 
 distinct worlds, and each ever present. The world of mind 
 and the world of material things we have about us. I 
 fell into a course of contemplation, piloted by my elders 
 and betters, which led to opinions respecting rights of 
 races, and other and perhaps more serious things widely 
 at variance with those you observe as commonly accepted 
 here. 
 
 " In such society man takes his problems, and by the 
 methods taught him solves them, works out his own con- 
 clusions, by analyzing, assorting and massing data, and
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 103 
 
 individually takes the responsibility. We have here 
 among us a few such. Men of limited education who have 
 acquired habits of searching for the bottom of things, 
 and working up instead of philosophizing upon surface 
 indications only. But I regard them as accidental entities, 
 who would be out of place, and out of season, could the 
 right be ever out of season. ' ' 
 
 During this long dissertation, the chief intent of which 
 seemed to be to exonerate the deacon, Susan had seemed 
 to listen. But indeed her mind was for the most part 
 absent. She was speculating upon the probabilities of 
 herself becoming number two to masculine selfishness 
 and duplicity. But as the captain finished his remarks, 
 the supper bell in the hands of Black Jake sounded for 
 the second time an impatient call. 
 
 " Come John, we must not keep them waiting longer, 
 or Aunt Betsey will blame me for detaining you." 
 
 For the moment let us glance at the supper table, 
 remembering that it is the details of existence that make 
 life seem real, and that the truest introduction to society, 
 or to individuals of a particular time, is to acquaint one 
 with the particular manners and social adjuncts of the 
 time. 
 
 Do not forget that this is not only a public house, this 
 Castle Tavern, but that the host has private company to- 
 night. The guests at this tavern must not expect to be 
 served in courses, nor to see the host, after he has done 
 the carving, exchange plates with every individual at the
 
 104 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 table. " It is best to help yourselves," was the old-time 
 dictum. You'll have no servants at your elbow here, 
 presenting you with an elaborate ' ' menu ' ' upon torchon 
 board, illuminated in colors upon one side, and delicate 
 typography upon the other, and encased in ornate covers 
 of cloth and gold. Here they are all equals, if you 
 except the slave Black Jake, and his family, and make no 
 account of a half dozen Indians who have, one at a time, 
 dropped in to look and lounge. And you need not listen 
 in the after sitting for that pop! and the burst of white 
 foam to follow, and that supplemented by a gurgle that 
 shall fill the atmosphere with the aroma of Heidsic or 
 Schreider. It may come but don't wait for it if you are 
 tired. Rum and royal loaf sugar, with perhaps a mug of 
 flip, and for the elect a possible swallow of French brandy, 
 is all the stimulant you are likely to get. 
 
 Some of the community had even objected to the use 
 of these, as the meek little Quakeress, Mrs. Danson, who 
 had taken Jim Pyke mildly to task for getting drunk four 
 times in one week. 
 
 "Jeerns," said Mrs. Danson, "thee does very wrong to 
 take into thy stomach that which quarrels with and over- 
 powers thy common sense." 
 
 To which the not now bewildered James made prudent 
 answer. 
 
 "Mardam Danson, you must confess that all sorts o' 
 folks use stimerlants stronger nor water; it's narteral 
 mardam."
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. IO5 
 
 " I 'm not so sure they do, Jeems; I have my misgivings 
 about it." 
 
 "Well now, mardam, we won't beat 'round the bush. 
 S'pose ye begin ter home. Don't you drink tea jest 
 about as often as ye think ye ken afford it ?" 
 
 "Well, yes, Jeems. I can't deny it, I must be honest 
 with thee. I suppose I do. But the cases are not parallel, 
 Jeems. Alcohol is intoxicating and tea is not, as I am 
 aware." 
 
 "Jest you hold right there mardam, and I '11 make a 
 p'int. That 'ar tea 's a stimerlant, ain't it? 
 
 " Go on, Jeems; I can't do thine arguing for thee." 
 
 " Well, it 's er stimerlant an' so 's alkehall. Alkehall 
 mebbe 's a leetle the strongest. It 's accordin' ter how 
 much yer take. You perfer tea ter somethin' a leetle 
 stronger, an' I 'm not er goin' t' object. That '11 dew very 
 well for the women folks, kase they sorter keep in doors. 
 Here, mardam 's the p'int, if you may perfer what stimer- 
 lant you please ter, why may n't I enjoy the same 
 perverlige? unless what 's sarce fer the goose ain't sarce 
 fer the garnder. In which case you 'd orter be made ter 
 drink rum." 
 
 "There's no use arguing with thee, Jeems. Thee 
 stands too much upon the letter." 
 
 "Oh, ho! Please 'scuse me marm; I thought it was 
 mostly the sperit you 're complainin' on. I guess it 's no 
 sort o' use your try in' ter argy, s' long 's I 've got the 
 whip row, as I seem ter have in this yer case. ' '
 
 106 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 The guests and family at this our supper sitting num- 
 bered twenty, including the parson, who was a boarder. 
 
 All being seated, one universal ceremony must be 
 observed. Divine grace must be implored. Even at a 
 public tavern a blessing must be sought and thanks ren- 
 dered. Nor did it matter that several of the party were 
 not members of the Church, or even that at least two of 
 them were guilty of the sin of skepticism, for custom 
 ruled that such observances must be regarded, and not 
 even John cared to provoke criticism by non-conformity. 
 It is the rule, even outside of the circle of the elect, and 
 although you are among the prospectively damned, you 
 will bow at least an affectation of devotion or leave the 
 room. 
 
 The invocation begins, without exception, " Merciful 
 Father ;> The body of it will be as variable as personal 
 command of English and native volubility can render it, 
 but the sentence preceding the final glorification is in- 
 variably "Bless to good use what's now provided for 
 us." 
 
 Having reverently united, or respectfully deferred, we 
 lift our eyes and behold! venison, venison roast and veni- 
 son steak; partridges, partridges are as plenty as black- 
 birds; bear meat, and a joint of moose. The captain says 
 the moose was shot in the Podunk woods, and the bear 
 was killed down by the Assabet River, seven miles this 
 .side of Marlborough. Quails are here: quails split down 
 the back, broiled and laid upon brown bread toast. And 
 woodcock? Not a woodcock. There's not a man in the
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. IOJ 
 
 plantation can shoot one. The bird would be out of reach 
 between the pan flash under the flint and the ignition of 
 the powder within. But there is a fine, fat woodchuck, 
 and a young coon, both taken from the hollow of a log 
 and none the less fat for hibernating. Wild turkey is here: 
 stuffed, and done to that beautiful tawny which the cook 
 calls "brown." Done in that tin kitchen there before 
 the fire, where Black Jake sat for an hour turning the 
 spit to give the sissing fowl its final bath of caloric, while 
 he in his turn, although his skin could never take brown, 
 was almost as thoroughly stewed. 
 
 You have seen the corn-cakes: rich, yellow, and sweet 
 the "johnny-cakes " and then there is that worst of all 
 food; the worst that was ever eaten ; the same our good 
 mothers in the country were stuffing us with, here inYankee 
 land, just half a century back, that soft, soggy 'heavy, 
 rye bread. If I had known it was coming, I would have 
 been born a couple of decades later on. No wheat bread 
 was there at that table the one I write off not a kernel 
 of wheat had been grown in the country, and not a potato. 
 A Massachusetts man had not then seen a potato, but 
 there were turnips instead, for such as like turnips. And 
 the pasty mince pies, the art of making them is lost now. 
 Stratified crusts with three hundred flakes to the layer, a 
 professor of geology might classify them. And there 
 were "punkin" pies, the cook books tell of them, as they 
 are, but not as they were. Their period of primality 
 stretches back to the times Azoic when all good things of 
 the planet were semi-liquescent. No apples were nearer
 
 108 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 than Marlborough. No fruit was there of any kind but 
 native dried "huckleberries;" but our grandams were 
 so skilled in the lore of the kitchen that the dried berry 
 plumped to its full 'neath the spell of their magical cuisine. 
 Coffee there was none; it hadn't been naturalized; was 
 yet alien to the tables of the colonists. Tea there was. 
 Very fine tea; but it cost "two and ten pence" a tea- 
 spoonful, and sugar was worth "four pence ha' penny " 
 an ounce, and was " scurce " at that. Both these articles 
 were excessively dear for most of these ' ' nine-penny ' ' 
 planters, so the poor went without them. 
 
 Our guests had been busy, for the landlord carved 
 zealously, and the mother and sisters were busy ' ' a passin' 
 things. ' ' 
 
 Every one now seemed thankful, as the Parson inti- 
 mated they should be, when he cleared the way for attack 
 by his invocation, or, as Jim Pyke said, "bragged over 
 his victuals, ' ' and now came the liquid blessings. First 
 to come was cider imported from Marlborough, twenty 
 miles away. But the cider was getting hard and the ladies 
 preferred ' ' a little rum and much water, with a trifle of 
 loaf sugar." The maple sugar business had not yet 
 materialized. The Indians held the maple country. 
 
 The china had been set away. Thirty pounds sterling 
 for a china set (and it took three sets for the party), was 
 an item worth keeping in view (of the housekeeper). 
 
 Hot rum in little mugs, hot flip in quart mugs, with 
 half a dozen champagne we did not expect. The table
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. IOQ 
 
 never saw the like before, nor would it now, only that the 
 Sergents are guests to-night. 
 
 With grace dolefully said; cheerful, thankful language 
 uttered in mournful tones, dolorous anticipations of 
 sitting by a great, white throne in night clothes, as an 
 integral part of a white-gowned choir half a-wing with 
 the joy of fruition; woeful intimations of sorrows impend- 
 ing in climatic horrors of intensest torridity, ended that 
 supper of the tenth of November seventeen hundred and 
 one. 
 
 Well for this party if they enjoyed the feast, for before 
 it can be repeated at the Castle Tavern, all will be black 
 with smoke, and fire, and blood, and ashes.
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 STIU, PLOTTING. 
 
 THE whole, cold, dreary winter had now passed away, 
 and April had come. 
 
 The blue-jay and the little, speckled woodpecker no 
 longer reigned supreme in the chestnut forests, as when 
 the bleak winds of winter whistled among the leafless 
 branches, and the occasional crow that had skipped back 
 and forth from L,ong Island to Massachusetts, or left on 
 some sunny day the windless seclusion of a cedar-tangled 
 basin among the hills, where robins and bluebirds roost 
 with the hibernates, 1 now reconnoitered among the pine 
 tree tops for some sheltered fort in which to weave her 
 nest and deposit her eggs, while the robin and bluebird 
 ventured forth from their winter quarters among the 
 hackmatacks and interlacing vines of grape and woodbine 
 to chatter bird love, or to repeat out of time, and out of 
 sequence, half remembered snatches of a summer carol in 
 the sunny clearings, or among the budding branches 
 of scraggy oaks and wide-spread elms by river margin 
 and by hem of lake. The brown thresher had returned 
 
 1 There is no greater common error than the supposition that 
 robins and bluebirds of this climate migrate, or move south- 
 ward to any great distance in winter. They retreat to densely 
 wooded dells and winter there.
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. Ill 
 
 from southerly wanderings, the pigeons, in flocks that 
 seemed like black bands stretched across the sky, wide 
 acres in breadth, and based at either end upon the blue 
 horizon, were escorting the solstice of summer, and the 
 wild geese and great diver sportively bowed to the skulk- 
 ing, red savage, and honked defiance to his stone headed 
 arrows. 
 
 Eugene Archer was still at the plantation, a guest of 
 John Wing, and the recipient of every favor and polite- 
 ness that ample means, warm friendship, and a generous 
 hospitality could bestow. 
 
 But the lurking devil in his bosom could not be ap- 
 peased. Where he was at first intent only upon winning 
 and betraying the unsuspecting woman of Sagatabscot, 
 his thoughts began now to assume more serious phases 
 in the pursuit of his nefarious ends. He was already in 
 humor to harbor suggestions and to take counsel of a 
 determination so unyielding and relentless, that it pointed 
 to success even through the spilling of blood. 
 
 Many times he had been to the house of Sergent, and 
 as often plied his arts, but yet to no purpose further 
 than to keep her mind in a feverish excitement, the effect 
 of jealousy upon one hand, and of his relentless impor- 
 tunities upon the other. Importunities which, while 
 they did not amount to assault, or even unmistakable 
 insult, were trying in the last degree to a woman whose 
 whole nature was absorbed in the contemplation if not the 
 actual worship of one idol; but so adroitly had he played 
 upon her temper, stirring her to jealousy, pushing her
 
 112 DOOM OP WASHAKIM. 
 
 to indignation and resentment, and urging her on to dis- 
 pair; softening her to tears by his full-mouthed, simulated 
 pity; leading her upward to hope only to crush her again 
 with some damning inuendo, while all the while, just out 
 of sight, yet half disclosed; insinuated but not spoken; 
 the demon of a secret, that she dared do no less than to 
 harken to his counsels, keep his company, and smother 
 her dislike of him. She must of necessity endure him, 
 and as she did so she made closer approach to her would- 
 be seducer, fearing, and fluttering to escape the deadly 
 spell, turning to this way and turning to that, but with 
 eye ever fixed, she came nearer and nearer, and not less 
 for the loathing, under the baleful influence of the 
 charmer, almost within reach of his incorrigible passion. 
 
 Again and again, in a paroxysm of despair, lost to 
 herself, lost to consciousness of all about her, reeling from 
 the intoxication of woe, he had caught her falling figure 
 in his arms and loaded her now bloodless lips, half 
 smothered the unconscious beanty with kisses reeking 
 with a poison more deadly than the fabled upas, more 
 fatal than the bite of cobra. 
 
 But he dared go no further. Bold as he was, fierce, 
 unscrupulous, famishing with lust, he dared not ravage 
 the field of his conquest; dared not avail himself of the 
 advantage he had won. The dreaded bullet of old Digory 
 hung over him like the sword of Damocles, like the phan- 
 tom dagger of Macbeth. The ghost of Sergent glided 
 through the imagination of Eugene, and between the 
 daughter and the passion of the ravisher with a something
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 113 
 
 like "Meet me to-morrow at Philippi!" And she es- 
 caped; was yet unpolluted. 
 
 Over and over he had presumed upon the power of the 
 first great, hinted-at but unspoken secret, aided and abet- 
 ted by the many lesser secrets of clandestine meetings, 
 where she had been beguiled by hope of hearing the 
 greater one the one concerning an heiress in Boston to 
 whom John had seemed to pay court, at least to the extent 
 of frequently escorting her to parties and to plays, till the 
 tongue of the town was rife with tales and side-spoken 
 surmises amounting almost to a scandal divulged, to 
 propose to her to accompany him, or to meet him as if by 
 chance in that city, where she might hear all, learn all, 
 and safely cover the true purpose of her absence by a 
 pretended visit to the boarding school she had but a 
 twelve-month since retired from. 
 
 That excuse, or some one of her own devising might 
 do, for was ever a woman without the wit to veil a serious 
 intent, or to thwart suspicion by a specious subterfuge? 
 To such proposals she invariably gave a stern, unqualified 
 refusal and rebuke. From the part of a spy upon her 
 idol she instinctively recoiled, but she saw no farther into 
 the real purpose. To leave her father's house under false 
 guise was base, dishonest, and unbecoming to a woman, 
 in her own view, and she readily acceded to the instinctive 
 prompting of a guileless nature. Her sense of honor 
 overshadowed the tempter and his designs, and, so far 
 from advancing his interests, half exposed his scheming 
 and half betrayed his villainy.
 
 114 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 Balked and vexed beyond endurance, indignant at the 
 frequent miscarriage of his designs, he began to plot for 
 the destruction of the man who stood so much in his way, 
 and not only for his, but for that of Wandee the friend of 
 his rival; the one who seemed to read men by intuition ; 
 who required no teaching to bring him into the possession 
 of knowledge; who seemed in league with omniscient but 
 invisible entities, and whose skill at divination was sure 
 to unravel whatever mystery might hang about the taking 
 off of the captain. The chief of the Hill Indians, he must 
 go first, as being the quickest to suspect, the shrewdest 
 to fathom, and the most desperate to avenge. Wandee 
 must die, but must not die at the hand of Eugene. There 
 was another that would be but too glad to compass his 
 death, if circumstances could be shaped to afford oppor- 
 tunity. In the ordinary course of events opportunities 
 would offer, and it remained only for Tehuanto to be 
 advised in time; and as for the captain's death, time, 
 watchfulness, and seasonable preparation would undo any 
 case of unsuspicious assurance. To the Washakim chief, 
 the feared, and hated because feared, Wandee's scalp 
 would be worth a score of ordinary Indians' lives. Te- 
 huanto the Washakim, wanted one scalp now, and, in the 
 development of a grander feud in process of unfoldment, 
 another would be wanted soon. 
 
 Eugene had more than once consulted Tehuanto at 
 Washakim and was perhaps the only white man who could, 
 at this time, unguardedly pass the secretly hostile Wa- 
 shakim lines.
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 115 
 
 He saw him again and learned that the hatchet had 
 been secretly lifted from the earth in favor of the great 
 Wampanoag, as had to him been previously intimated. 
 
 Upon condition that by arrangement, or by opportune 
 apprisal, the two chiefs the white and red should be 
 placed within the possibility of capture, the man Archer 
 was assured of safe passport at any and all times among 
 the disaffected Indians, and that he should, at reasonable 
 call, be furnished aid to secure the prize he so much cov- 
 eted, the woman of Sagatabscot. 
 
 The almost daily rides of Eugene became longer than 
 was their previous wont, and at the same time he more 
 than ever courted the friendship of Captain Wing, and 
 made him the supposed confidant of gleanings from the 
 strolling Indians whom he met in his peregrinations. 
 
 His finely bred mare frequently entered the stable late 
 at night, reeking with sweat and panting from long con- 
 tinued heavy work. Her step at Digory's clearing was 
 heard at longer intervals of time, and Eugene's manner 
 gradually changed from the ardent but unrequited lover 
 to the outer verge of studied politeness and to a more 
 general attention to the other members of the family. 
 
 Captain John's semi- weekly visits to Sergent's clearing 
 were continued as usual, and no one could have guessed 
 fronv thejnanner or language of Susan the cause of that 
 pallor that was gradually stealing over her sweet face, of 
 the increasing fullness and brilliancy of those large blue 
 eyes, of the frequent compression of those lips from
 
 Il6 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 which the slowly receding blood was filching the halo of 
 carmine. 
 
 She kept her secrets, for they now numbered many; kept 
 them, although they lay upon her tender soul like sins; 
 sins feared, sins dreaded, sins repented of and cancelled 
 by da3^s of mental anguish and by nights of voiceless 
 wailings. Kept them against the violent throes of a con- 
 science that struggled for confession. Kept them because 
 she dared not do otherwise, for who could understand or 
 appreciate the motive, however she declared it, of those 
 clandestine meetings with Eugene ? 
 
 And Eugene had fostered the condition; had bidden her 
 look within, upon her own soul, and discover if possible, 
 the shadow of a fault for which she might be found ac- 
 countable, other than what she knew to be their harmless 
 meetings. 
 
 He coyly commended the impregnable fortress of her 
 chastity, and ardently extolled the constancy with which 
 she regarded the beau-ideal of her faultless fancy. Indeed 
 he frankly confessed to something like abuse, in so per- 
 sistently making her the subject of his desire to sound the 
 depth of womanly faith, at the same time tendering her 
 pity for her misfortune in fixing her choice upon a faith- 
 less object. No harm could possibly ensue from what had 
 so far occurred if only secrecy were maintained, but should 
 the community become aware of the fact it will not readily 
 condone the seeming offence against what it is pleased to 
 regard as proper deportment. Let it once come to the 
 common ear, and the tongue of scandal will run riot and
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 117 
 
 gloat in nothing so much as in consigning a fair fame to 
 the blackness of perdition. The men might pardon the 
 shortcoming, might even excuse a failing or deny a fault, 
 but where in all the human sisterhood was known a heart 
 that would deign to forgive or even palliate ? And now, 
 having bewildered the woman with logically considered 
 consequences, roused her fears, softened her by penitent 
 confessions, soothed her by expressions of pity, and charged 
 her with a self- protecting secret, he, with fiendish simu- 
 lation of pious probity, begged her to consider whether it 
 were possible for him, against whom no man's tongue had 
 ever caviled, to so far forget his duty to a friend and com- 
 rade, his faith in scriptural teachings, his conscience and 
 his God, as to deliberately aim to compass her ruin and 
 moral death by robbing her of a jewel so priceless as a 
 woman's chastity. 
 
 And the woman's heart was at last won, not to his love, 
 not to his unhallowed embraces, but to the duty of 
 shielding the character of one who solemnly declared he 
 was without sin, save the momentary toleration of a pas- 
 sion which her own sweet face had stirred to frenzy. 
 
 Susan contemplated: she could die, die with her secrets; 
 but she could not, would not smirch a fame that vouched 
 for and covered her purity. Nor would she, in deference 
 to a sentimental prompting, soil the name of one who 
 harbored no thought of evil, and whose rashness was the 
 result of what he had blindly fancied were her own 
 fascinations, or, was it indeed blindness ? Was it not
 
 Il8 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 possibly true that some, to self unknown, charms of hers 
 had ravished his probity ? 
 
 But she modestly shrunk from entertaining such 
 vanity. She was to blame. She would shut her lips 
 and endure. She pitied him, and pity between equals is 
 akin to love. It is the green room to the stage of passion. 
 She almost loved him. She looked forgiveness; she 
 looked kindly, trustfully, and what would he more ? 
 She made no sound with her lips, but her eyes gave token 
 so truly of her thought, that Kugene understood her, but 
 he was too wise to make a second mistake. He knew it 
 to be the white flag of truce. There was no further fear 
 of exposure. She was as securely caged and manacled 
 as a prisoner within walls of stone. He had probed her 
 spirit, fathomed every passion, and could read her 
 thought in facial expression. It no longer needed a 
 tongue to assure him that her virtue was bottomless, and 
 that her sense of duty reached from earth to heaven. 
 Neither need she speak to say that he was already half 
 forgiven. That fact would give him rest and opportunity 
 to change his methods. 
 
 His purposes were the same and irrevocably fixed, but 
 their accomplishment must come through other means 
 than he had hitherto resorted to.
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE AMBUSCADE. 
 
 APRII, was now on the wane, and the budding chest- 
 nuts heralded an early summer. 
 
 The winter now passed had been a terror, even for 
 New England. As each succeeding month went by the 
 frost-king had renewed his strength, and the winds piped 
 louder, oftener, and in more threatening tongues. 
 
 A night of dismal bowlings under eaves and over 
 gables was succeeded by a morning where the hoar frost 
 in the atmosphere lent to the nearer view the leaden, 
 semi-opacity of distance, while drift after drift of snow 
 piled each upon the one preceding, with never a ray of sun- 
 shine unobstructed by the whirling, dancing snow, or a 
 fog warm enough to appreciably settle either or any fall. 
 
 Neighbors had burrowed from house to house, and men 
 tunnelled to their barns to reach the lowing cattle chafing 
 in trepidation at the endless twilight. 
 
 No Indian summer in November, no January thaw, 
 no mildness in the months following; but occasionally a 
 frozen sleet would crust the last snow fall and make it 
 possible to move about on foot without snow-shoes, but 
 as a rule a woman could not stir out of doors, and no 
 man could, to any purpose, unless he rode his rackets 
 well.
 
 120 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 And yet, with the frozen rain came a partially compen- 
 sating feature, at least to such as could appreciate the 
 beautiful, when at early sunrise the limbs of leafless, 
 ice-encumbered trees sparkled in a dazzling, prismatic 
 blaze of beauty, as if every mine of gems from the 
 Orient to the Occident had been rifled of its glittering 
 carbon jewels to decorate a New England forest. As if 
 the fractured bosoms of the hills had yielded up their 
 wealth of stalactites, and every sea and ocean bed from 
 India to the Golden Gate had loaned their pearls to beau- 
 tify a landscape where pines and hemlocks bowed and 
 swayed beneath their crackling weight of splendors. 
 
 But yet there was comfort in the plantation, for fuel 
 was abundant. Every master of a house had his shel- 
 tered cords ot wood, all cut and split, and of back-logs 
 and fore-sticks pile on pile. 
 
 And game was plenty, and easily obtained; for what 
 was to the deer and moose an almost insurmountable 
 barrier or at least terribly fatiguing, for at such times 
 the deer could only move about by leaps that cleared the 
 upper crust of snow was nothing to man, whose inven- 
 tive talent enabled him to walk without sinking on a bed of 
 down and to move about with as much rapidity as if a 
 greensward only was beneath his feet. 
 
 The partridge, to escape inclement weather, would 
 burrow in the light and falling snow, leaving traces that 
 a hunter's eye at once detected. Quails gathered in 
 covies, huddled in little pyramids, with heads all pointing 
 to a common centre, waiting until the falling snow had
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 121 
 
 builded a mound above them, as if to say " Here lies." 
 Immense logs, trunks of great chestnuts, windfalls of a 
 century past; hollow trunks five feet in diameter, told by 
 the lately torn inside char, not less than by the snow at the 
 open end wasted by animal heat, where bruin made 
 his winter quarters. Orifices, denoting cavities, high up 
 in the old oaks and walnuts gave token of insect labora- 
 tories teeming with the nectar of daisy, golden-rod and 
 arbutus; and the wild turkey, sorely discomfited, since 
 acorns, chestnuts, checkerberries, and even hazel-nuts 
 were entombed in the all-pervading frost, pecked indus- 
 triously at the hanging pine cones, oblivious of the wily 
 hunter and his noiseless step. 
 
 But the first of April brought warm rains, and the 
 snows melted and left patches of leafy carpet in the woods. 
 
 And the rains and the fogs and the sunshine, and, 
 more than all, the high, hard, but tempered south winds, 
 tempered by the sunshine of Virginia, tempered by the 
 leafing forests of Long Island, rent and tore the crystal 
 coverlet of the lake and drifted, ground up, and dissolved 
 the ice. 
 
 And here, upon the lake, on a soft April evening, by 
 starlight, but more by the light of a huge pitch pine torch 
 borne by an Indian standing in the bow of a canoe, 
 a white man and an Indian, the white man sitting flat 
 upon the bottom of the birch, with a three-tined spear in 
 his hand, were paddling cautiously along and near the 
 shore, looking for, and every moment lifting into the 
 canoe, pickerel, trout and perch.
 
 122 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 They had left Wigwam Hill and were paddling past 
 the round hill on the plantation side to the west of the 
 island by the upper narrows, 1 when a whistling sound 
 close by their ears followed by another and still another, 
 a thud in the water close at hand, a splash and a skip 
 beyond, and a sharp vibrating sound, such as a stiff 
 strung sinew gives out when freed from tension, caused 
 the Indian to drop his torch into the lake, and himself 
 into a sitting position in the canoe. 
 
 Four stout arms now sent the vessel flying through 
 the water and out of bow-shot range. 
 
 "How is that, Wandee? Whose scalp was it meant 
 for? " inquired Captain John. 
 
 ' ' Me do' know shoot good cut leetle bit ear some 
 bleed scalp all good. ' ' 
 
 ''Duck, Wandee !" exclaimed the captain, and both 
 men went flat into the bottom of the boat and heard 
 another thud, and another ominous whizzing sound. But 
 the arrow fell short. They were out of range. 
 
 "Long shoot no Injun. Injun know better. Trow 
 'way arrer." 
 
 " Who but an Indian shoots an arrow, Wandee? " 
 
 " Do' know big fool Injun shoot, Injun big fool 
 maybe Washakim. ' ' 
 
 Both were now sitting upright, satisfied of their safety. 
 
 " See them skip through the hemlocks!" called out the 
 captain, who was already sweeping the shore line with 
 his levelled rifle. 
 
 1 Upper narrows the stone bridge.
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 123 
 
 " Crack!" went the piece, and an Indian fell and rolled 
 down into the lake. 
 
 A second discharge, that from Wandee's rifle, and 
 another fell, but rallied again and went on, supporting 
 himself partly by the low branches, and partly by the 
 scattering spoonwoods, while two of his companions 
 necessarily exposed themselves in their efforts to save the 
 wounded Indian's scalp, either by aiding him in flight, 
 or by secreting him in some near-at-hand thicket, for the 
 scalp .of an Indian is of more value than his life. He 
 could yield up the latter gracefully, as grace in the 
 struggles and contortions of personal conflict goes, but to 
 yield up to an enemy a trophy of that enemy's valor is 
 too humiliating for an Indian. 
 
 " Good shoot!" muttered Wandee, as he dropped the 
 reloaded barrel of the old flint-lock to a level. 
 
 Another opportunity, too good to be lost. 
 
 " Bang! " went the old smooth-bore, and as the reflec- 
 tion of sound zig-zagged down the lake from shore to 
 shore and died away upon the ear, the sharp yell of an 
 Indian, a yell half of pain, half of defiance, was followed 
 by fifty answering voices, for the Hill Indians had been 
 aroused by the first report of fire-arms, and approximating 
 in thought to its import had covered the intervening 
 space and were now darting through the chestnut woods 
 and up the round hill like ground shadows when wind- 
 driven scuds flit across the pathway of the sun. 
 
 "Good shoot! Good shoot! Go for scalp!" and the 
 young chief held the rusty, old Queen's arm up to the
 
 124 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 moonlight, affectionately patting stock and lock, while 
 mouthing his verbal caresses in a spasm of delight and 
 admiration. 
 
 The captain and Wandee were but a moment in reach- 
 ing the shore. There was no fear of ambush now. That 
 yell of the pursuing Quinsigamonds in an almost contin- 
 uous shriek, had warned the Washakims to retreat toward 
 the Twin Lakes as rapidly as feet could carry them. 
 
 Search for the trail was already begun. But a moment 
 had elapsed after landing from the canoe when a gutteral 
 sound from Wandee, uttered scarcely above a murmur, 
 assured the party that he had struck a trail and was 
 following up by slow and cautious steps such indica- 
 tions as the moonlight disclosed, for every tree by its 
 shadow obscured it and necessitated more careful scrutiny. 
 Down from the hill and across the old corn land, land not 
 as now covered with water, land where the City Farm's 
 Brook enters the lake. Here the trail was very distinct. 
 
 This short cut through the opening would have been 
 avoided had not the pursuit been too hot. As the trail 
 was now clearly visible to the eye of Wandee he broke 
 into a shap run. Did the reader ever see a wild Indian 
 run? It is no such hurry-scurry, break-neck, one hundred 
 yard gait as the latter-day white sprinters affect, where the 
 runner must be sponged and rubbed and fanned to restore 
 the lungs to their normal habit of contraction and ex- 
 pansion with healthful regularity, but a swinging lope 
 of ten miles to the hour; one that could be kept up 
 from a meridian to a setting sun. A low bent figure,
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 125 
 
 slouchy, creeping, stealthy and snake-like in movement, 
 flitting past you as does the startled mother cat- bird, 
 here, there, and gone. And Wandee's gait was one that 
 soon put distance between him and the fleetest hunter of 
 the tribe, for he was an Indian athlete and had no peer 
 in the Nipnet nation. / 
 
 The sun rose beautifully over Shrewsbury hills, and 
 fixing his crimson eye upon the flat under Old Wig- 
 wam Hill vainly sought for the gallant young chief of the 
 Quinsigamonds, and in default of finding him screened it 
 in a cloud-tear, the portent of a day of weeping. A well- 
 timed obsequy, for Wandee is in bonds. The tough, 
 green walnut withes are cutting their way into his wrists 
 and ankles and the stake is set to burn him to a crisp. 
 
 The old witch squaw is here at the Hill and is tramping 
 up and down among the wigwams wringing her hands, 
 muttering imprecations and fuming like a wild beast, a 
 goaded lunatic, or a woman in a spasm of anger. Her 
 inner eye has caught on to conditions that never a soul 
 here has dreamed of. The scouts had all returned by sun- 
 rise, and the white man had returned to the Castle two 
 hours in advance of it. No particular alarm was felt ex- 
 cept it was that something which had so wrought upon 
 the old squaw and she as usual took no partners into 
 her seance until, with the sun two hours high it com- 
 menced raining; a cold, drizzling northeaster. 
 
 The chief should have certainly been at home by sunrise, 
 or at least should have known, when it rose and went
 
 126 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 into a cloud that rain would soon follow; should have 
 known by the mottled sky of the evening previous and 
 by the distinct lunar circle inclosing a single star that the 
 day would be stormy, and that a little rainfall would ut- 
 terly obliterate every remnant of a trail. 
 
 Indeed, he had already taken time enough to go to 
 Washakim and return. 
 
 In the afternoon Captain Wing appeared upon the scene, 
 having come on horseback by the Millstone Hill path and 
 wigwam trail. 
 
 The warriors were assembled, and were beginning to 
 regard the absence of Wandee with a feverish excitement, 
 not so manifest in their general manner, as in the eye, 
 often fixed as in absent thought, and an illy concealed 
 nervousness of movement or twitching of muscle. 
 
 The captain made but a brief stay, and started for home 
 puzzled and sad. And now, as the sun neared the 
 western horizon where he makes an early sitting behind 
 the summit of Millstone Hill, suspicion began to be mani- 
 fested that the white men were in some way concerned in 
 t he mysterious absence of their chief. 
 
 No one would for a moment harbor a suspicion that the 
 captain was privy to it, but much had been said from 
 time to time by the praying Indians, of overhearing 
 expressed desire to obtain possession of the Washakim 
 corn lands on the Quinnapoxit, and what if a compact 
 had been made whereby the chiefs murder, or perhaps 
 delivery to the Washakims, should be made the equiva- 
 lent for broad acres ?
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 127 
 
 The Twin L,ake tribe would sacrifice much to avenge 
 themselves of Shonto's death. Tehuanto had said so; 
 said so in the presence of the praying Indians, the Packa- 
 choags. To court their favor and acquire their lands 
 might not the white men have waylaid him and effected 
 with the bullet what few would have the hardihood to 
 attempt in a more equal contest, what no half-dozen 
 Washakims would risk with only arrows and tomahawks; 
 what Tehuanto, himself a warrior of no slight renown, 
 would shrink from in dismay ? 
 
 The Indians of Wigwam Hill were fast verging towards 
 a vicious mood. They said in their dialect, as fairly 
 interpreted, "White men are not all Captain Johns. 
 Some are deacons, and deacon wants land. Some are 
 preachers, and preachers talk of baptism and blood, and 
 of washing in blood as if it was a holy and commendable 
 thing. And if the white men can wash themselves in the 
 blood of one of their own brothers, and suffer no remorse, 
 but rather glory in it, what may we, who are too poor 
 to own houses and have only colored beads for wampum, 
 whose only weapons are a bow and tomahawk, what may 
 we expect at their hands if we stand in the way of their 
 never satisfied greed? However well they may have 
 treated us since they drenched our fathers with fire-water 
 and robbed them, they are at best bad men, and if they 
 do us no harm now, it is because they have nothing to 
 gain of us. ' ' 
 
 Peace, Indians; you shall see your chief again or shall 
 see him terribly avenged.
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 KING PHILIP AT THE COUNCIL FIRE. 
 
 THE prospects of the little plantation began now to 
 wear a gloomy aspect, and the thoughtful ones were full 
 of dark forebodings. The Washakim Mission had been 
 broken up, and the converted Packachoags dismissed 
 with a message in the form of a protest against the clearing 
 of more land on the Quinnapoxit by white men, and also 
 complaints that the whites had commenced breaking land 
 on the lower intervales, lands reserved by the Indians 
 expressly for corn planting. 
 
 The land had been tilled by them, after their rude 
 fashion, from as far back as tradition extended. It was 
 their hope, their reliance, their birthright. 
 
 It had at times, when game was scarce, saved their 
 tribe from starvation, and they were in no mood to 
 relinguish possession for a song, as had the Quinsiga- 
 monds when they sold the hillsides and valley of the 
 Bimeleck. If the Quinsigamonds had been unwisely 
 generous, or, what was more likely, stupid under the 
 influence of that efficient co-worker with the white man 
 when civilization arrays itself against barbarism, strug- 
 gling for mastery without resort to force, they had at 
 least bequeathed an example to the neighboring tribes of
 
 DOOM OF WASHAEJM. 129 
 
 the folly of relying upon strangers to dictate both sides 
 of a bargain. 
 
 Hardly had the planters recovered from their surprise 
 at the temerity of the Washakims in daring to dismiss 
 the Mission and to boldly assert their rights, before 
 delegates from the Quaboags, the Quinnapoxits, the 
 Wachusetts and the near-at-hand Asnebumskits came in 
 with similar complaints, and intimations of trouble if the 
 aggressions were persisted in, and, what was stranger than 
 all else, and from its very strangeness the quickest to 
 awaken the ready apprehension of the white men to a 
 sense of danger, was the absolute refusal of every member 
 of each delegation to taste of spirits. 
 
 Never before had a wayworn Indian declined this 
 proffered politeness, and it was well known that any 
 Indian would go cold, go hungry, go without sleep, to 
 obtain it. They must be acting under authority more 
 feared, more respected, than the white man supposed to 
 exist. 
 
 How came about this unison of purpose and determina- 
 tion? This acting as of one accord by parties blown 
 together from the four winds ? It was indeed a stagger- 
 ing mystery and argued complicity among the tribes or 
 obedience to some dominant will, and in either case 
 conspiracy, but to what purpose could be only a matter 
 of conjecture. 
 
 Nearly the whole plantation were soon in a fever of 
 excitement and alarm. There were exceptions among 
 them. Digory Sergent, whom the neighbors said did not 
 9
 
 130 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 fear the face of red clay; Captain John Wing, who seemed 
 to lead a charmed life, and who had so far in fact 
 ingratiated himself into the good will of the savages that 
 in time of peace they seemed to accept him as a pet 
 leader and oracle of the tribes, and who had ordinarily 
 the most complete control over them without seeming to 
 bear command; Gershom Rice, who had passed two years 
 among the Indians utterly alone, and had commanded 
 not only their respect but love, so far as an Indian is 
 capable of entertaining or manifesting the sentiment; 
 Parson Meekman, he who mingled the love of Jesus with 
 the valor of the Crusader; Jim Pyke, and some others, 
 who had in the course of events actually tasted heathen 
 blood, were among the unterrified. And Eugene Archer 
 was there, indifferent as usual. He neither feared nor 
 cared for them, but simply despised the whole race of 
 red-skins. 
 
 Some others, as the matter was talked over, seemed to 
 have imbibed that contempt which comes of familarity, 
 but even such excepting perhaps the pastor, who had, 
 strictly speaking, no family ties, and whose bovine pluck 
 knew no intermediate sphere between Christian duty and 
 pugnacity had wives and sons, daughters and sisters, 
 and were disposed at least to regard their safety. 
 
 At a casual gathering of the white men at the Castle 
 Tavern it was decided that the Justice ordinarily 
 Deacon Henchman should call a meeting at once, to 
 consider the safety of the plantation, and also such other
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 13! 
 
 business as might, without special warrant, come before 
 the meeting. 
 
 The date of the meeting was fixed for the Thursday 
 following, and as Sergeut, Curtis, and both the Rices 
 were there, it would be easy for them to notify all except 
 such as lived in the immediate vicinity of the Castle. 
 
 Before the party broke up Captain Wing informed 
 them that he had come in possession of certain knowl- 
 edge that bad blood was manifest among the Wigwam Hill 
 Indians. That they had distinctly avowed their belief 
 that Wandee, whom the white men knew to be strangely 
 absent, had been waylaid and murdered by them to gain 
 favor of the Washakims, and to use that power in 
 furtherance of their designs upon the corn lands of the 
 Quinnapoxit. 
 
 "The Quinsigamonds, " said the captain, "will be 
 slow to dig up the hatchet, but unless something is done 
 to disabuse their minds of this suspicion, or from some 
 other source something definite comes to hand respecting 
 the fate of Wandee, no man can fail to see the dangerous 
 tendency of the tribe, which, although the smallest in 
 point of numbers, can easily make themselves the most 
 formidable, from the fact that they possess a score or so 
 of muskets, and ammunition in abundance. You are well 
 aware that they have regarded their young chief with the 
 love'of a brother, and almost the reverence due to Deity. ' ' 
 
 "Then, indeed," said the parson, who had been an 
 attentive listener to the captain's remarks, "then, indeed,
 
 132 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 I for one exult in his timely taking off, for is it not written: 
 ' Thou shalt have no other gods before me ? " ' 
 
 The deacon had been sitting for several minutes, look- 
 ing intently at the great iron crane in the now cold fire- 
 place, and with his cane poking the S shaped pot hooks 
 back and forth, apparently so absorbed in meditation that 
 neither the warnings of the captain nor the gallant re- 
 joinder of Parson Meekman had aroused him. 
 
 But now the face of the old time-piece looked down upon 
 him from its high perch next the ceiling, and in a clear, 
 sharp, bell-like note, called out to him may be to all 
 "one two three four," and gazing down upon its 
 pendulum as it wagged industriously just above the floor, 
 ticked out, " and more to come." 
 
 "Well, well!" called out the deacon, starting to his 
 feet, "this won't do. It's nigh on to milking time and 
 some of you have far to go. I guess the intervales won't 
 be ploughed up by us this year. ' ' 
 
 This was on Monday, and it was arranged that the 
 meeting of the planters should occur at two of the clock 
 p. M. on the day named. 
 
 And while the planters are asleep to-night let us stroll 
 over the great hill 1 and down to Wigwam and the Lake, 
 for far away, down the blue Nipnap, we hear the dip of 
 many paddles. 
 
 The moon shines brightly ; it is nearly full. That long 
 
 i Millstone Hill "The great hill."
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 133 
 
 stretch of lake water gleams, flashes, glitters and dances 
 in the moonbeams as the feeble breath of south wind stirs 
 it into tiny ripples. 
 
 We, under the shadow of the great hemlocks near the 
 summit of Wigwam Hill, stand half appalled as now and 
 then a flying scud spins across the cold white disc, and 
 its transient, unstable counterpart jumps over moonlit 
 ground to lose itself in the dense shadows at our feet. 
 
 Wigwam Hill can never look so wild, so wierd again. 
 And yet within the next two centuries no change shall 
 come, save the felling of a few old trees, to be replaced 
 again; and a green plat covered with snowy tents for 
 vanished wigwams ; and sporting shells in place of birch 
 canoes ; and the bearded white men for the wampumed 
 bare-faced Indian. 
 
 The lake, how altered, and how happy; noise enough, 
 but it is all music; life enough, but it is all peaceful ; 
 enough to see, but it is all the beauty of nature embel- 
 lished by art. The old chestnut forests and the dark pine 
 headlands still linger, still struggle to maintain supremacy 
 among the varied features of the landscape, bold, dark, 
 untamed as when they owned the Nipnets for their master. 
 
 But look! as we now sail up the lake in this harnessed 
 leviathan of the waters, with the pent up fire and smoke 
 in its seething bowels, and emitting from its screaming, 
 groaning, mouth and nostrils the exhaust of a volcanic 
 motor, we see each nook and glen, each hill top, cove and 
 promontory, show flecks of white among the green leaves 
 of the forest. Quinsigamond' s shores have been repeopled,
 
 134 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 twice inhabited within two centuries, and in the interim, 
 desolate as the shoulders of Puebla. 
 
 Before, birch wigwams and the sun-browned figures of 
 the half nude savage, whose highest art was to shape an 
 arrow-head, or to carve a hieroglyphic on the white skin 
 of his birch canoe. This time, the combined results of 
 thirty centuries of an art-fostering and wisdom-gathering 
 civilization have baptized it in immortality. He of two 
 centuries ago draws his bow-string, and believes that were 
 he strong enough, he might transfix the round moon with 
 his arrow; while he, the white man, just on the crown of 
 Wigwam Hill, just over the school encampment, over that 
 new star of promise, levels his weapon at blue ether and 
 leaping into fifty thousand years of space along a single 
 line of light, seizes a planet by its pencilled beard and 
 demands the story of its weight, its course, its composi- 
 tion and its destiny. 
 
 As we stand, this night of April seventeen hundred 
 two, upon the summit of the hill and gaze at the black 
 pine headlands, the bay lands and bluffs of chestnut, pale 
 even by moonlight when contrasted with the points of 
 pine ; as we look along the dazzling brightness of the 
 moonlit waters, passing in vision the narrows on the south, 
 two miles away, passing the many wooded islands that 
 break the waters into sparkling, light-emitting patches j 
 and in imagination rounding our canoes into the great 
 southern basin, we see a line of twenty birches coming 
 toward us, tossing the light spray in white curling sheets,
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 135 
 
 moving steadily, swiftly, but in no apparent spirit of com- 
 petition. 
 
 On come the canoes, now in full view, now out of sight 
 behind some island, and now like some monster serpent 
 wriggling in single file up the open lake, and now let us 
 step back into the deeper shade, for just below us, the 
 canoes are making land and from the foremost steps we 
 have seen him before we recognize him King Philip of 
 Mount Hope. 
 
 A fire is already burning on the plat below us in the 
 midst of the circle of white birch wigwams, and as the 
 canoes are carried to the land the circle of warriors is 
 formed, and outside that the squaws and half-grown 
 children gather to catch a glimpse of the great chieftain 
 whose influence has spread from lodge to lodge and from 
 tribe to tribe over the whole north country, as if his 
 daring spirit permeated the omnipresent air, or rode 
 upon the whispering, tell-tale winds, while in the centre 
 of the group mark for a thousand awe-struck, or 
 admiring eyes stands the commanding figure of the 
 Wampanoag. 
 
 From the shadows of the black hemlocks where we 
 stand gazing down the bald precipice and the steep earth 
 inclination below it to the little plain, we see people from 
 all the tribes that rally under the general name of Nipnets. 
 Even half a score of Washakims are there, and although 
 now the deadly enemies of the Quinsigamonds, they are 
 for this night as safe as if in the forest of the Twin L,akes. l 
 
 1 The two lakes of Washakim twelve miles north of Quin- 
 sigamoud.
 
 136 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 With slight, preliminary remarks, recommending unity 
 of purpose and action, urging the wisdom of abandoning 
 individual, local, and tribal fends and joining hands for 
 the furtherance of the general weal, Philip launches out 
 into the stormy sea of his great subject which is general 
 war; a war against the whites as a race; a war where no 
 quarter is to be asked and none granted. A war of utter 
 extermination. 
 
 To Philip the dialect of the Xipnet nation was an alien 
 tongue. But being born to leadership in the Xarragan- 
 sett country, and being early ambitious of a fame wider 
 than was to be acquired by any act he could perform 
 within its narrow limits, he had set himself while yet a 
 boy to the acquisition of all the spoken tongues, from the 
 St. Lawrence on the north to Long Island on the south, 
 and from the Penobscot country to the Algonquins of the 
 Mohawk Valley, not dreaming in what particular 
 direction it might avail him. 
 
 To show the Xipnets the insincerity of the white man 
 in his often repeated professions of love for his red 
 brothers, he cited the occasion when the planters of 
 Quinsigamond 
 
 To faithfully interpret the Xipnet idiom 
 
 " By promises never to be fulfilled, beyond the payment 
 of the 'twelve pounds sterling,' paid chiefly in red cloth 
 at twice its market value, and aided by all the arguments 
 and persuasive eloquence of the five educated and baptized 
 praying Packachoags. men who had sold themselves to 
 the white man for the promise of fire-water in this world
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 137 
 
 and glory in a world to come; who had been taken into 
 the pay of those men solely with a view to induce them 
 to persuade their brethren to relinguish the last vestige 
 of a title to the soil; and who had been taught to read 
 word pictures of a life to come, of bliss eternal and 
 ineffable for such as would turn their backs upon the 
 Great Spirit, the soul of things, and bow down and wor- 
 ship before their Jehovah and his Son, the man Jesus; and 
 to picture never ending torments in a sea of burning 
 pitch for such as should deny Him and refused to be 
 baptized, or should put stop or hindrance upon the 
 desires or interests of these self-styled men of God. 
 
 "By false promises and senseless warnings, by misrepre- 
 sentation and deceit, and most of all by the effect of that 
 fire-water which makes the warrior or patriot yielding as 
 a squaw, and feeble as a pappoose, they have robbed 
 you of your lands for considerations without value; they 
 have driven the game from your forests with their noisy 
 dogs and guns; have dragged your rivers with their nets 
 until the few trout left are overfed and laugh at your 
 feather flies and hooks of bone. They have pastured 
 their cows where you have planted corn, have robbed the 
 trees from which in winter you have dragged your honey, 
 and in their greed to possess all have chopped them down 
 and forever ruined your sources of supply. They have 
 taken )-our warriors upon groundless charges, and have 
 either murdered them by legal process or sold them into 
 perpetual bondage to some far-off country beyond the sea. 
 They have shot down your brothers in mere wantonness,
 
 138 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 debauched your squaws until your polluted stock, as 
 seen in rusty hairs, in sky-lit eyes, and jaws that in 
 the years to come will bristle like the black bear of 
 your forests, should shame you out of tolerance. 
 And they have taught your children to despise the hope 
 and help of the Great Spirit, the shield and succor of your 
 fathers. And did they not hang your friend and brother, 
 the good Matoona of Packachoag, 1 without the shadow 
 of a trial, and gave him only scorn when he offered to 
 refute their allegation of murder by proving an alibi, and 
 that through Indians that the white men themselves would 
 trust? 
 
 ' ' They have spread fire and ruin in every corner and 
 lodge of the Nipnet nation and brought mourning into 
 every wigwam, in revenge for thoughtless, unimportant 
 acts by individual members of your tribes; and if a mur- 
 der has been done by you, who shall deny that it was 
 prompted by that mad spirit of their earthen jugs? 
 
 ' ' They have been in the darkness of the night, while 
 unsuspectingly you slept without a watch, and from this 
 very spot where the Hill Indians, the Quinsigamonds, for 
 generations past all counting, have lived in peace and 
 quietness, and where their right to live, to hunt, to plant, 
 to fish and to bury their dead has been respected and held 
 sacred, even by the warring Mohawks, and the reckless, 
 roving Penobscots, they have been here, the just men, the 
 good, the praying men of God, and, seen only by the stars, 
 
 1 Hung in Boston after a shadow of trial.
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 139 
 
 and by that Great Spirit who daily chastens you for sloth, 
 for inactivity, for tame submission to unequal foes, have 
 been here, and by stratagem have murdered in stealth the 
 glory of your present and your promise for the future. 
 Have lured away and murdered the son of Sagamore John 
 of Packachoag Wandee, Chief of the Quinsigamonds. 
 
 ' ' And now these white men would charge this homicide 
 upon your brothers of Washakim, as they charged the 
 killing of Shonto upon Wandee. 
 
 ' ' Was ever Indian base enough for such duplicity ? Was 
 ever Indian wicked enough to do two murders that a 
 thousand might ensue ? To kill two chiefs and implicate 
 two tribes in murders, that the two halves of a nation 
 might fall upon each other like lynxes fighting to the death, 
 while he, the white man, left alone, unscathed, might 
 peaceably appropriate the corn lands on the Quinnapoxit ? 
 Warriors of Quinsigamond ! before these strangers, chiefs 
 of tribes throughout the Nipnet nation, do I conjure you 
 in the name of all that is dear in the land of your fathers ; 
 by your love of the forests where you learned to hunt ; of 
 the lake where your dead sires taught you to paddle and 
 to fish ; by your love of home and children ; by the memory 
 of a thousand wrongs inflicted upon you by this alien, 
 moon-faced, spawn of treachery, and by the memory of 
 your dead chief Wandee, whose ghost, all unappeased 
 roams earth-bound, hapless until you, side by side with 
 the Washakims, shall avenge his death. 
 
 ' ' But look ! Can you not see it ! Or do I grow giddy 
 with my conjurations? The picture I would draw for
 
 I4O DOOM OP WASHAKIM. 
 
 you, in bloodless figure stares me in the face. Wandee! 
 Wandee! ! No, no. 'Tisnothe. 'T is but the imagina- 
 tion holds a momentary mastery. And yet, still here? 
 Spirit, shadow, speak; I conjure thee! Say if thou wert 
 slain in battle, or called down by a white man's bullet 
 from an ambush? 'Tis Wandee. There against the 
 black wall of the mountain 'tis he or have these woes 
 unstrung the brain of Philip ? ' ' 
 
 But it is visible, and upon that narrow ledge, half way 
 up the sheer ascent of rocks, where Wigwam faces Shrews- 
 bury hills, Wandee, in or out of the flesh, paces across, 
 halts, looks down, and hurries on into the darkness within 
 easy range of a thousand pairs of startled eyes. 
 
 The old squaw of the second sight, the Witch of Wig- 
 wam, has been performing antics just outside the circle 
 of the fire-light. Her long black hair hangs loosely over 
 breast and shoulders, and her dark, snaky eyes sparkle 
 in the frenzy of some wild hallucination. Is this indeed 
 a real form that she alone can make perceptible, tangible 
 for the moment, as the lookers on ? The spirits may have 
 responded to the sorceress' call. To some witchery of 
 her contriving. It may be such things are said to hap- 
 pen that the veritable ghost of Wandee draws from the 
 sympathetic unity of a thousand minds, or from as many 
 bodies, materiality enough to invest itself for a moment 
 with the semblance of mortality. It may be such things 
 are the subject of a theory that in all their minds the 
 recollections of their chief are wrought up to such inten- 
 sity that it needs but the suggestion of a visible counter-
 
 DOOM OP WASHAKIM. 14! 
 
 part to paint upon these walls of stone a reflex of the 
 ideal. 
 
 Wandee or his ghost appears to them. The Quinsig- 
 amonds espouse the cause of the red king, but the Hill 
 Indians and the Washakims do not bury the hatchet 
 although they quietly part company. 
 
 We observed that the Hill Indians were startled, awed 
 by the apparition. 
 
 To tne Washakims present the ghost of Wandee had a 
 far different but not less strange meaning. The one had 
 seen a ghost, and one but a translation.
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 THE BIG SCARE COUNCIL. 
 
 THE morning of that Thursday, the day appointed by 
 the white man for taking into consideration measures for 
 safety, had come. The hour for the meeting had been 
 fixed at two o'clock p. M. , and at one o'clock nearly every 
 man in the plantation was at the Castle. Captain Wing 
 was absent, having received at the hand of a strolling 
 Indian who had passed early in the morning, a note from 
 an acquaintance in Marlborough, requesting a personal 
 interview on the trail at Shrewsbury Hill, at eleven o'clock 
 that morning, when the writer would make a communica- 
 tion of importance respecting the time of the proposed 
 flight from the plantation, if such flight should at the 
 meeting of the planters be determined upon. 
 
 The captain had said to Black Jake that he should 
 return as early as one o'clock. One o'clock passed two 
 o'clock failed to bring him, and the meeting was called to 
 order. 
 
 Various reports were made of matters that had come 
 to the ears of the planters on the borders within the last 
 few hours, chiefly such as had been obtained of strolling 
 Indians and hunters of the Packachoag tribe. 
 
 Quinsigamond Indians were still in bad humor, and the
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 143 
 
 Washakims were evidently preparing for war. The Has- 
 sinomissitts were sulky and reticent and made no effort at 
 all to disguise their vicious inclinations toward the in- 
 habitants of the plantation. The Asnebumskits and 
 their neighbors, the Tehassits, held nightly pow-wows, 
 but as none but sachems and chief warriors were admit- 
 ted, the object could only be surmised. 
 
 Some great chief from a distance had been arming them, 
 so thought the praying Indians, who were among the 
 gleaners of news and who really knew more than they 
 cared to divulge, being divided between duty to their 
 Christian teachers, and affection for a neighboring and 
 kindred tribe. "It might," they said, "be Philip, or 
 might be Brant, the great Mohawk chief, who had, as 
 rumor gave it, been visiting among the lodges." 
 
 A Packachoag came to the Castle at this juncture, and 
 requested audience with the pastor, giving as a reason 
 that he was a praying Indian, and as such his first duty 
 was to his religious teacher. 
 
 He was admitted, and declared to Parson Meekman, 
 that, from the summit of Strawberry Hill, 1 looking west- 
 ward, he had seen a great smoke, about twelve miles away, 
 and in running towards it he saw at a distance a party 
 of Indians in strange wampum and war paint. 
 
 Secreting himself he saw from the bush twenty Indians 
 pass with many green scalps hanging at their girdles, and 
 a white woman and child as prisoners. 
 
 1 Leicester.
 
 144 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 As near as he could divine they were last from Quaboag. 
 The presumption was based upon the fact that there had 
 been a recent massacre, as was evident from the green 
 scalps, that being strong and fresh, they could have come 
 but little distance ; that there was no white settlement 
 between Quinsigamond and Chicopee except Quaboag 
 (Brookfield) , and near at hand in the direction of Quaboag 
 he had seen the great smoke. 
 
 On his way home this Indian had met a Wachusett, 
 who was following a moose track, and was told by him 
 that on the night before, the Washakims had killed two 
 white men at Lancaster and had attempted to fire the 
 town, but were discovered and repulsed. 
 
 The question now before the meeting was fight or 
 flight. 
 
 It needed no further evidence of malicious purpose on 
 the part of the savages, but to what extent it had pro- 
 ceeded, or how widely it was entertained, was yet a 
 mystery. 
 
 Sergent and the two Rices, with Curtis and half a dozen 
 others, argued that there was really no occasion for 
 alarm; that to put, as far as possible, the plantation in 
 the best attitude of defense, to post some few of the best 
 hunters for pickets, and to use the praying Indians as 
 scouts was all that was necessary. In case of attack, the 
 Castle, they said, was easily accessible to the planters and 
 their families, seasonable warning of the approach of 
 hostile Indians in threatening numbers would be given 
 by the trusty Packachoag scouts, and once within the
 
 DOOM OP WASHAKIM. 145 
 
 Castle walls the position was impregnable. There would 
 be no danger of a long siege. Indians are too impatient 
 to maintain one for any length of time. They soon tire. 
 
 The parson, whose proficiency at exhortation and prayer 
 was only exceeded by his propensity for fighting, a dispo- 
 sition held in laudable abeyance by his sense of duty and 
 propriety as a Christain minister, addressed the moderator 
 according to his usual method with the prelude of a text: 
 
 " ' I came not to bring peace but a sword. ' Hath 
 not the lyord our God said, 'I will scatter them into 
 corners. I will make the remembrance of them to cease 
 from among men. For their vine is the vine of Sodom, 
 and their rock is not as our rock, I will make their feet 
 to slide in due time.' What promise, my dear hearers, 
 could be stronger ? or what imprecation could be deeper ? 
 ' I will whet my glittering sword. Rejoice, oh my peo- 
 ple, for I will avenge the blood of my servants, saith the 
 Lord.' Oh, my dear people; you who are counted among 
 the elect, having been washed in the blood of the I/amb, 
 do you not see in this the promise of Divine aid ? ' I 
 will whet my glittering sword.' That means war, my 
 hearers. And is it not a well phrased and a well timed 
 incentive to you to gird on the armor of righteous- 
 ness and to cleave your way through this Sodom of 
 heathenism as the duly appointed executors of the wrath 
 of God?" 
 
 And now, by copious citations of corresponding emer- 
 gencies, where the chosen people of God had laid waste 
 the substance of idolaters and annihilated the minions of
 
 146 DOOM OP WASHAKIM. 
 
 darkness, he made it perfectly obvious that it was only 
 necessary to march around this Jericho of wickedness, 
 blowing upon the ram's horn of faith, and the walls of 
 this city of abominations would be leveled with the 
 dust. 
 
 But although that method of procedure might have 
 been in an eminent degree adapted to the condition and 
 purposes of the Jews, three thousand years ago, before 
 nature had revised her code, it was difficult to make its 
 present feasibility apparent to the more practical mind of 
 the Parish of Quinsigamond. 
 
 Comfort Hart, of Packachoag, remarked that if the 
 parson's ram's horn was a mere figure of speech, intended 
 to suggest the use of an iron mortar, with gunpowder for 
 a blast, he could quite agree with him, provided they 
 could get the mortar. 
 
 He had always opposed measures intended to injure or 
 defraud the original owners of the soil, but affairs assume 
 a new aspect when the Indians become the aggressors and 
 resort to force. "It's a wild dance we ha' led the 
 heathen, an' it 's nae much wonder they should ' kick ' 
 like Jeshurun of old. In me heart I can nae much bleem 
 them. But if the fault be theirs, or if the fault be ours, 
 i' the commencement, it is nae matter now. They ha' 
 dug up the hatchet, an' we ha' nae choice left but to gie 
 them blaw for blaw. ' ' 
 
 Until to-day the Scotchman had been as non-combative as 
 the Quaker Danson, and this declaration of a readiness 
 to resist, and even to act on the offensive, was pleasing to
 
 DOOM OP WASHAKIM. 147 
 
 the planters, for Comfort was a sturdy man and well 
 known as a bold one. 
 
 Jim Pyke said without rising, " If the Lord has really 
 promised all the parson tells for (and the parson ought 
 to know if he's ter be trusted), I guess it'll be safest ter 
 leave him ter finish up the job. He cuts a bigger swath 
 than we ken." 
 
 No one knew just what to make out of Jim Pyke; none 
 could fix his precise mental status; whether he was a 
 wag, a wit, or a blunderhead, no one felt quite certain. 
 
 Captain Henchman said: " In my opinion there is but 
 one proper course to pursue; we must remove the women 
 and children at once to Marlborough, where they will be 
 safe and cared for, and then we may feel at least more 
 assured, if not quite so desperate when compelled to 
 assume the defensive, for we shall have no non-combatants 
 to look after, and if we must retreat we shall then be able 
 to do better execution upon the savages." 
 
 And the deacon agreed with him. It seemed the pre- 
 vailing opinion that this course was the wisest to adopt, 
 although Sergent and Gershom Rice vigorously opposed it 
 as a virtual abandonment of the soil. 
 
 "To send our families away," said Gershom, "is to 
 show the enemy at once our weakness and to assure them 
 of our distrust of the resources at command. We need 
 only be watchful and ready. If occasion calls for it we 
 may place our women and children in the stockade, while 
 both from the Castle and the Castle Tavern we may ply 
 tham critters with bullets to their hearts' content. But
 
 148 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 I'm only one; majority rules in Ameriky. If the majority 
 says go, I 'm with ye. But you know the Tavern is fully 
 commanded by the Castle, and the open fields about will 
 give us a mighty good whack at 'em. Tham winders and 
 loopholes wan't made for nothin'. Individerwally I op- 
 pose desertion or any manner of retreat. ' ' 
 
 Digory Sergent was not an orator like Gershom. His 
 vocabulary usually exhausted itself in about three syl- 
 lables. 
 
 " I stick! " exclaimed he, as he brought the butt of his 
 old flint-lock down upon the plank floor with a crash that 
 would have ruined it, but for the straps of horseshoe iron 
 the blacksmith had riveted to it to make it good for club- 
 bing in case the ammunition should happen to give out 
 in some unpleasantness with ugly Indians. 
 
 It was now three o'clock by the whittled nicks in the 
 window sill sun-dial, and Captain Wing's continued ab- 
 sence had been several times adverted to, and was begin- 
 ning to excite uneasiness, not to say apprehension. 
 
 It was almost, if not quite indispensable to know his 
 sense of the matter in question. It had been not unfre- 
 quently noticed that his opinion, particularly in emer- 
 gencies, had been equal to turning anything like an 
 approximate to an equal balance in the scales of planta- 
 tion policy. 
 
 The captain, in society or in an informal gathering, was 
 free and easy of speech, without seeming to be loquacious; 
 but in public, where what he said might prove of greater 
 consequence, his reserve was an approach to reticence.
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 149 
 
 His speech was sharp and concise; his sentences abbre- 
 viated snatches; while in action he was quick, resolute, 
 impetuous and persistent. He was of such men as make 
 history. Wordy men shape it, manipulate it; minds 
 glowing with the imaginative, if also analytical and logical, 
 write it. 
 
 In that plantation of ninety adults, to the most of them 
 the captain was a bell-wether. But there were men like 
 the two Henchmans, Sergent, Fisk, Payne, and the two 
 Rices, to say nothing of the parson, who were a law unto 
 themselves; who heard him respectfully, weighed his words 
 profoundly, and then formed their own conclusions. They 
 were too self-reliant to acknowledge leadership except 
 when, for unity of action, they delegated powers. But 
 even these men felt the depressing sense of vacancy in 
 their deliberations as a consequence of the absence of this 
 stripling, scarcely out of his teens. 
 
 Either of them would have been slow to admit as much, 
 even to himself, but the fact was there. 
 
 But something has happened. Black Jake pokes his 
 head into the assembly room. Into the Castle. Black 
 Jake the serving man. 
 
 "Oh, my Lord! My Lord! Gemmans, Cap'n John's 
 done gone for sure. Dem red debbils got Cap'n John for 
 sartin! Oh, Deacon, Deacon! We mus' hab a resurrec- 
 tion! 'T won't do fer ter let Cap'n John go fer toast ter dat 
 'bomination er red wickedness. Oh, Deacon, call on de 
 Lord fer ter help us right away. 'T won't be worf a fo-
 
 150 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 pence ha-penny gin ter morrer. Do coax de Lord, Deacon, 
 fer ter gib us a lift ! ' ' 
 
 Jake had scarcely finished his full-mouthed ejaculation 
 before the Castle was emptied of people, and his plea for 
 a petition went by unheeded. 
 
 Even the parson shouted as he hurried out, ' ' prayer 
 is good in its way, my brethren, but there's a time for all 
 things!" 
 
 Each man was examining his flint and pan, as with 
 scurrying footsteps he made his exit from the Castle. 
 
 Even the poor, meek, non-combative Quaker Danson, 
 fell back upon the natural man and seized the sword of 
 justice that had hung suspended over the Judge's bench 
 since the memorable first court trial. 
 
 4 ' What else would thee have me to do ? Thee sees it 
 is for the women and children this time, my darling, and 
 the spirit of my fathers is upon me," he whispered to his 
 wife, who questioned his carnal-mindedness as he crossed 
 the threshold. 
 
 Outside the stockade, and in front of the Tavern, stood 
 Black Pompey, alone, unattended, and from his bleeding 
 mouth dangled a broken rein. 
 
 Pompey was reeking with sweat and begrimed with 
 dust. His saddle was turned until the girth buckles 
 were just back of the horse's withers; there was a deep 
 gash in his neck, as if plowed by a glancing arrow, and 
 as he stood smoking and panting, his red nostrils dis- 
 tended to their utmost and dripping with blood as a 
 consequence of over-exertion; stamping and pawing, and
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 151 
 
 alternately lifting his head and staring up the north 
 bridle-path down which he had come, or by an askant 
 look rolling into sight the pearly white of his restless 
 eyes, he seemed the impersonation of rage. 
 
 A well-bred horse in a fervor of excitement is a thing 
 to be looked at, to be studied. There is purpose in his 
 every movement, and in every glance of his eyes a mean- 
 ing. He has grander phases of aspect than the casual 
 observer he who is incapable of sympathizing with other 
 inferior brutes might suspect. 
 
 But what could have happened to Captain John? 
 Pompey could not have thrown him if he would, and he 
 would not if he could, for when a rider sets his favorite 
 horse one spirit dominates, and the passive other merges 
 its identity into it. The horse had not fallen, or the 
 knees would show discoloration, if not abrasion. The 
 rider could not have been tossed in a stumble, for then he 
 would have gone headlong and not have displaced the 
 saddle. And what is that blood in the mouth ? and the 
 cut lip at the bit hold? The curb has been terribly 
 jerked, and sideways, too. The gag has lacerated the 
 tongue, but the chin shows no abrasion by the chain. It 
 was done by a man on the ground. The rider was 
 wrenched off his horse and threw his weight into one stirrup 
 in his act of resistance. That turned the saddle. He was 
 not wounded, or saddle or housing would be stained 
 with blood. Who has attacked him ? Not the Hill 
 Indians. They worshipped him. Was it the Washa- 
 kims ? They know absolutely nothing about horses, and
 
 152 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 none but one familiar with them would have caught the 
 dangling curb-rein, and the bar line wouldn't have held 
 the startled beast a second. He would have torn the 
 head-stall into tatters, and whoever did this thing knew it. 
 
 However it might have happened, Captain John was 
 gone, and the men looked into each other's faces question- 
 ingly, but said nothing. There was neither interrogation 
 nor remark. The loss was too great, it was overpowering. 
 Even those robust, headstrong, self-reliant men, who felt 
 assured they were alone equal to any emergency incident 
 to pioneer life; men who believed their own judgment 
 as sufficient counsel in all things, looked watery about 
 the eyes and felt an inexplicable weakness come over 
 them. Felt as we do when some mortal prop, a .wife, a 
 brother, a sister or a son fall out by the way. 
 
 The right arm of the plantation had been lopped off; 
 and what was more than numbers, more than courage 
 and hardihood, more than wisdom even, the genius of the 
 hamlet had gone out from among them. 
 
 Jim Pyke said: " Tham critters have girdled the tree." 
 
 There will be wet eyes at the Castle Tavern to-night 
 wet eyes and an aching heart at Digory Sergent's house, 
 and all the plantation will bow its head in mourning, but 
 a thousand souls shall be wafted to the Great Spirit on a 
 cloud of fire and smoke for this untimely taking off.
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 THE RED MEN'S COUNCIL. 
 
 WHATEVER matters of importance occurred at the 
 plantation were invariably known within an hour at 
 Wigwam Hill, for however much the doctrine of Chris- 
 tianity might tend to restrain the restless spirit and wild 
 habits of the savages, the love of home, which with them 
 meant tribe, was sure to predominate, and in this con- 
 nection it must not be forgotten that the Hill Indians and 
 the Packachoags were of common stock; the Hill Indians 
 being an offshoot from the Packachoags. 
 
 The fidelity of the praying Indians, who were ordin- 
 arily reliable and always ready to hazard their lives even, 
 if need be, for the white men under whose teachings they 
 had been converted, had one vulnerable point which not 
 even the bonds of mutual faith could cover. They would 
 conspire with you to go even to the most cruel extremities 
 in matters relating to Indians of any particular tribe, 
 except the one to which they were born, for patriotism 
 with them did not extend to the nationality of which their 
 tribe was a part, as the tribal compact was solely for 
 purposes of defense against the warlike Mohawks, or the 
 short-legged, roaming Canadian freebooters, but the 
 moment a hand was raised to do violence against their
 
 154 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 natal lodge there was not Gospel enough between Genesis 
 and Revelation to restrain them. 
 
 Of the Hill Indians, the whites had made in all some 
 two or three doubtful converts to Christianity. I say doubt- 
 ful because, unlike the praying Packachoags, they were 
 at best but lukewarm, and never became like them, zeal- 
 ous workers. But all who professed the faith were allowed 
 to come and go at pleasure, in field or forest, in house or 
 wigwam, and being constantly on the move, for they were 
 veritable tramps as espousing the cause of Christ inva- 
 riably upset all habits of self-maintenance nothing es- 
 caped their observation. 
 
 The Wigwam Hill converts, therefore, knew every move, 
 and being the most sly and consummate eavesdroppers, 
 knew almost every secret of their indulgent neighbors, 
 the white men. They knew of the " big scare council," 
 as they termed it, and that very day at sunset it was 
 fully reported at the Hill. They knew also of the rider- 
 less horse. 
 
 The little tribe heard of the first in silence, and of the 
 last with expressions of unmixed sorrow, for Captain 
 John had been much with them, and always as one of 
 them, except as they instinctively paid deference to his 
 obvious superiority, the effect of his life surroundings, 
 civilization and education, added to a strong will and an 
 evident honesty of purpose. 
 
 Upon the matter first spoken of they were silent because, 
 since the night of the last visit of the Great Chief of 
 Mount Hope, partial developments, enlisting hope, fear,
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 155 
 
 and superstition to a nearly equal degree, were accom- 
 panied by intimations of a plot, so startling, that if no 
 hitch occurred in the denouement of a counter, King 
 Philip would himself be proved a liar. 
 
 The Wigwam Hill Indians had already struck a trail, 
 and five of the boldest, shrewdest, fleetest of them had 
 been out a day, charged to their own discretion, no one 
 knew whither. 
 
 Since we last saw these Indians meditating at least upon 
 a compact with the Wampanoag, the old sorceress had 
 been busy, if to be so absorbed with inner sense as to 
 make the mind utterly oblivious to all things outward is 
 to be busy. Had been so busy with brews, invocations, 
 incantations and conjurings, that some of the more im- 
 pressionable of the warriors verily believed they had seen 
 appear at her enjoinment, life-like figures drawn in light 
 upon the black escarpment of the hill at midnight. 
 
 There were impersonations and indications that upset 
 all recent theories and conjectures, beside involving one 
 great name in gross deception for the furtherance of a 
 scheme. Indians have been accredited or discredited 
 with believing that the God of Nature is the same yes- 
 terday, to-day and to-morrow, and that occurrences which 
 were possible in the remote past may not be impossible 
 to-day. They lack sound orthodox education. But how- 
 ever that may be, certain it was that Wigwam Hill was 
 all astir with other matters than the league, the object of 
 which was annihilation. They were even in humor to 
 deprecate the taking off of Captain Wing for other con-
 
 156 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 siderations than their own regard for the man, for as the 
 breach widened between them and Philip, through suspicion 
 of misrepresentation, bordering upon proof, they began to 
 retrograde toward their first love. 
 
 The whites had been their nearest neighbors and they 
 had always lived in peace with them; indeed they had 
 repeatedly been the recipients of favors at their hands, 
 and were many times beholden to them for kind offices. 
 To be sure their chief had been tried in their courts for 
 murder, but even after confession he had been acquitted, 
 and that was evidence at least of standing by justice. 
 
 The Hill Indians had suspected the whites, either of 
 direct murder upon the person of their chief or of com- 
 plicity in effecting his death; but subsequent developments 
 seemed to beggar the assumption, and Wandee, their oracle 
 in life and precious almost to idolization in memory, had 
 while living counselled them to be brothers with the 
 whites. 
 
 Sagamore John, the Hoorawannonit of Packachoag 1 
 the sire of Wandee by a Quinsigamond squaw, now an 
 old man and accredited with wisdom, had paid them a 
 visit at the Hill where he was well received, notwith- 
 standing he had used his utmost endeavors by well-con- 
 sidered and plausible arguments, aided by that verbally 
 pictorial eloquence which facilitates apprehension by pre- 
 senting ideas arrayed in metaphor and allegory to dis- 
 suade the Nipnets from joining issues with Philip or even 
 
 1 The chief's tribal name.
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 157 
 
 seriously considering the subject of offensive alliance, and 
 had with his own little tribe remained firmly aloof, even 
 refusing to promise neutrality in the event of war. 
 
 His visit was in the midst of the awakening of the tribe 
 to the machinations of the king, through the strange 
 intimations, weird, half appreciable conjurings and shad- 
 owy forecasts of that crazy occultist, the squaw sorceress. 
 
 Red John found the Indians in the deepest mourning, 
 as Indians mourn, moody, solitary, taciturn. No two 
 Indians could be seen together. Not even a squaw 
 or pappoose dared intrude upon their silent loneliness. 
 Not an Indian left the Hill for any purpose, not even for 
 food, of which they were sorely in need. 
 
 To stroll about, you might have seen an Indian here 
 and there, seated on a rotting log, seated on a boulder, 
 or a crag, or leaning against a tree, looking down into 
 the lake with his eyes, into the mist of futurity with his 
 mind. To them it was an utter lapse between time past 
 and time to come. 
 
 The Quinsigamonds had lost a leader and John of 
 Packachoag an only son. To the one was left a vacancy 
 that nature refused to span; an indefinite idea of future 
 existence, an idea based upon no revelation, and referable 
 to no authority, other than the vague inheritance of a 
 dogma, the child of irresponsibility, but yet of hope at 
 least the phantom, for had not their sires declared that 
 they themselves had held communion with the long since 
 dead. And could not the old squaw conjure up at will 
 the transient, flitting, semi-transparent mist of something
 
 158 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 that bore semblance to the human form and facial feature ? 
 and did she not, at least in seeming, hold animated 
 converse with the shadow of her conj uring ? 
 
 But to John of Packachoag a life to come was as cer- 
 tain as judgment; judgment as a resurrection; resurrection 
 as the word of God. And to him the interim was simple 
 sleep; and what to him or they that the sleep should last 
 till Gabriel's trumpet sounded? It was folding of the 
 hands at twilight, and wakening with the dawn. And 
 so he argued with the Hill Indians that night in council, 
 and his kindly sympathy, more earnest from the fact of 
 mutual loss, added to his hopeful word pictures of a life 
 to come and the beatific conditions of the hereafter, 
 broke the spell and roused them from the paralytic mood 
 that had oppressed both mind and body. 
 
 Invested with words intelligible to us, this was the ex- 
 pression of Hoorawannonit the Sagamore of Packachoag, 
 given through broken, verbal, impassioned utterance, gar- 
 nished by metaphor and simile and superinforced by 
 profuse gesticulation. 
 
 "He is not dead but sleepeth. Our L,ord and Master, 
 the man Jesus, gave his life that through his death atone- 
 ment might come for an entailed sin, and for the manifold 
 sins of succeeding generations, and that through that 
 atonement we might have everlasting life, since, when 
 those whom we say die, die only in this our visible body, 
 while the spirit, the real essence, and although unseen 
 the counterpart of that which we lay down, and itself as real 
 a body, merely sleeps. As the tired hunter lies down and
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 159 
 
 loses himself to things about him until strength returns 
 to him through rest, so we shall, so Wandee did, lie down 
 for a season of rest, and when that rest shall be complete, 
 and his strength restored, he shall awaken to a new life, 
 with hands that palsy not with age, and with feet that 
 cannot tire; for what is death but a lengthy sleep? and 
 what is the grave but rest ?' ' 
 
 While listening to the comforting promises of Sagamore 
 John, and revolving in mind the not very discordant voice- 
 less assurances of the old squaw in her ghostly machina- 
 tions, the savage mind resolved the discrepancy of time 
 into unity, by attributing to the sagamore an excusable 
 miscalculation, and that partially settled in favor of a 
 like ultimate result, the tribe awoke from its solemn stupor, 
 and as the embers of the council fire were smouldering in 
 their ashes, Sagamore John placed the little tribe under 
 benediction and passed down and out into the night with 
 his moccasins pointing toward Packachoag.
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 ANXIETY AND INDECISION AMONG THE PLANTERS. 
 
 ON the Thursday following the ' ' big scare council ' ' 
 the whites began to collect early in the day, for, beyond 
 chopping wood enough to last from day to day, they were 
 in no mood to labor. 
 
 Digory Sergent had set his foot down firmly that he 
 would not budge, war or no war, and Mrs. Sergent as 
 flatly refused to seek safety in flight and leave her husband 
 behind, while the children, including Martha (who, by 
 the way, was step-daughter to the present Mrs. Sergent), 
 had declared that to leave both father and mother in the 
 woods with hostile Indians lurking about, was greater 
 wickedness than they were capable of. 
 
 But Digory was the first man to put in an appearance 
 that morning. He would not go, but of course he must 
 attend the meeting, for a meeting of the planters was al- 
 most as important as a town meeting, and a town meeting, 
 where a freeholder might exercise his right of suffrage 
 even in general government matters, was too new a 
 wrinkle in the body politic to be relegated to neglect. 
 
 The Rices, Hart, and Curtis were soon at hand, and 
 before ten o'clock in the day every adult male inhabitant, 
 as well as most of the women, were assembled at the 
 Castle anxiously awaiting the result of the conference.
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. l6l 
 
 At ten o'clock the meeting was called to order, and 
 after a few remarks from the moderator, Deacon Hench- 
 man, relative to the present emergency, in the course of 
 which he feelingly alluded to the Providential chastise- 
 ment of the community in the taking off of Captain Wing, 
 and duly admonished the believers to foster a spirit of 
 resignation and trust in Him who ' ' tempers the wind to 
 the shorn lamb," he proceeded to charge, so far as his 
 personal opinion might go, the Washakims with the recent 
 atrocity which had placed in mourning every family in 
 the plantation of Quinsigamond. 
 
 The deacon also called to mind numerous acts of treach- 
 ery on the part of the Washakims, and among other 
 things referred to the continued absence of Archer since 
 the mournful event, and confessed to an impressive sur- 
 mise that upon that day a double murder had been per- 
 petrated. 
 
 He repeated the purport of various vague rumors of an 
 intended uprising of all the savages and mentioned the 
 circumstances of several recent murders which had oc- 
 curred at about the same time, and in widely separated 
 communities, as indications of concerted action intended to 
 arouse the whites to the commission of some overt act which 
 might be used as a pretext for a general massacre in 
 retaliation. 
 
 He warmly deprecated the necessity for abandoning the 
 plantation, leaving their homes and sacrificing the results 
 of toil, patience and privation. 
 
 He remarked that many whose life savings were
 
 162 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 here invested must necessarily become bankrupt by 
 flight, for even should they ever find it practicable to 
 return, it would be to wasted clearings, and to cellars 
 filled with the ashes of their former dwellings; for it was 
 well known in the history of Indian warfare that the 
 savages regarded every form of structural improvement 
 in the light of an encumbrance; a foolish luxury, fit only 
 for the enjoyment of laboring, civilized effeminacy, and 
 beneath the dignity of the free-born sons of earth, who 
 gained a subsistence without toil, and who reaped where 
 they had not sown. 
 
 As the climax of all savage villainy, the very acme of 
 heathenish deviltry, the deacon alluded to the massacre 
 and burning of the peaceable settlement at Quaboag, which 
 an Indian runner had confirmed and reported in detail 
 on the previous day. 
 
 "And now" said the deacon, ''in justice and mercy 
 to those whom a kind Providence has intrusted to our 
 tender care and keeping, such as are allied to us by the 
 bonds of love and blood relationship, by the necessity of 
 reliance and the duty of protection, there seems to be 
 but one course to pursue. To remove, such as cannot bear 
 arms, at once to Marlborough there to await our coming, 
 if driven by superior force to abandon the plantation, or 
 until the threatening aspect of affairs has subsided." 
 
 The deacon's remarks were folio wed in a similar strain 
 by Prentice, Payne, Curtis and others, and when the sense 
 of the meeting was called for, there was hardly a dissent- 
 ing voice. Even old Digory said: " The deacon's words
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 163 
 
 are good and sensible. I don't think myself that this 
 'ere 's any place for women folks." 
 
 But at least one woman in that assembly demurred. 
 
 " If Mr. Sergent stays I shall stay. He can do as he 
 pleases. ' ' 
 
 Jim Pyke's wife also took exceptions to the ruling. 
 She ' ' would not step over into the promised land to drink 
 the milk and honey of safety while Jim Pyke was cookin' 
 his victuals with one hand and shootin' Injuns with t' other. 
 For the Lord's sake! What dew you s'pose I took Jim 
 fer better or wus fer if I couldn't pull an even yoke with 
 him in the wust? You ken make up yer mind Deacon 
 that Pyke's wife stays, an' if wust comes ter wust, Jim 
 may cook while I shoot, or I '11 shoot while Jim cooks. 
 Ivor' sakes-alive! yer may talk desertion ter yer city gals, 
 but Jim Pyke's wife ain't no such a woman. Bless yer 
 heart, Deacon, I an' Jim come here together fer ter settle, 
 an' that are ort ter settle it, an' 'twill, so fur's I 'low yer 
 ter count on me." 
 
 And there was more than a murmur of female applause 
 went up from that log castle. Educated, well-bred ladies, 
 for there were not a few such in the settlement, took Jim 
 Pyke's wife by the hand, looked into her thin, pale, care- 
 worn face, and with tears in their eyes, and in their throats 
 that sense of impeded respiration which comes of deep 
 emotion, they thanked her and called down the blessing 
 of God upon the ' ' dear, little soul ' ' who had taught 
 them what now appeared so plain a duty. And for the
 
 164 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 next five minutes of that hour the female element was in 
 the ascendant. 
 
 Gershom Rice, catching the infection of nobility from 
 the grandeur of personality which woman's trial so often 
 evokes, moved a reconsideration of the vote, humorously 
 remarking: 
 
 " If we proceed to carry the measure into effect, I 'm 
 afraid the war between the sexes will be more fatal to 
 happiness at least than the worst we apprehend from 
 the Injuns." 
 
 The vote was rescinded, notwitstanding the parson 
 labored hard to check the growing revulsion from the 
 original vote while the question was pending. Cool, cal- 
 culating, bovine courage and unswerving persistency were 
 his characteristics. He knew little of the softer moods 
 engendered in the breast of man where woman is ac- 
 knowledged mistress and inspirator. 
 
 ' ' Why in the world a woman should wish to remain 
 here while it is absolutely certain she can be of no manner 
 of use, but, on the contrary, an encumbrance, passes 
 ordinary comprehension," testily ejaculated he. 
 
 The parson was a good enough man, a brave man and 
 a kind one, but he had no wife, no family, no children, 
 and the day in which he might have been susceptible to a 
 young love that grows in wedlock was long past. There 
 were in life, influences to which, being ignorant of, he 
 was not amenable. Affections which he could not fath- 
 om. Depths of love to which celibates and anchorites are 
 strangers.
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 165 
 
 He was an honest man, but lie mistakenly took to be 
 literally construed the precept, ' ' wives obey your hus- 
 bands." 
 
 Furthermore he truly believed that the communicants 
 of the Church of Christ, under Calvin, were the chosen 
 people of God. That this wilderness was a veritable du- 
 plication of the promised land; that America was Pro- 
 testantism's rightful inheritance, and that the command 
 of the Most High, laid upon Israel, to dispossess the 
 heathen and to despoil them of their goods, to cut them 
 off utterly from the face of the earth by fire and sword, 
 was in a notable degree applicable to this particular 
 instance. 
 
 And the parson was a wise man, and very well knew 
 that the weaker half of the social fabric is an ugly en- 
 cumbrance when " Greek meets Greek." 
 
 But it was well for him that the vote to rescind was 
 passed over his head, or the growing feminine indignation 
 would have resulted in his pastoral deposition. 
 
 He would have learned to his dismay that there is a 
 power behind the throne that asks no let and bides no 
 hindrance. 
 
 The meeting was dissolved without action. The women 
 were to stay. Pyke's wife's speech had subdued the gar- 
 rison and invested the Castle. But it is not certain that 
 the temerity of the women did not cost the settlers the 
 plantation, for the refusal to leave hastened the general 
 evacuation, where, if the weak arm had been put out of 
 harm's way, the sound one, armed completely as it was,
 
 1 66 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 and amply fortified, might perhaps have successfully re- 
 sisted any combination of force with which they could 
 have been beset, especially as the rage of the Indian soon 
 exhausts itself. His persistency relaxes ; he becomes 
 impatient of delay, and his fickle temper grasps at new 
 promises and flies to fresher fields of action. 
 
 Discretion, that "better part of valor," was on the 
 parson's side, and he wisely simulated acquiescence.
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 STORMING THE 
 
 WHILE the whites at the plantation were undecided, 
 waiting, in the vain hope that after all the outrages had 
 been committed by predatory bands, and were not the 
 result of a wide spread conspiracy, they had yet been 
 using their utmost endeavors to place themselves in the 
 best possible state of defense, not forgetting to provide by 
 every available means for a safe retreat should it be 
 forced upon them. 
 
 Captain Ephraim Curtis, who with a party of armed 
 men, chiefly from the lower settlements, had been scour- 
 ing the country to the west, and had actually engaged 
 the enemy upon two or three occasions, the last being at 
 Quabog, where for a day and a night after the massacre 
 and burning of the settlement, he with his command had 
 been besieged in a log cabin belonging to the place, was 
 now at hand, and his skill and fame as an Indian fighter 
 served greatly to allay the fears of the timid and feeble 
 and to encourage the strong. 
 
 Being a fearless man and yet commendably cautious; 
 adept in all the wiles and arts of the Indians themselves, 
 and master of their school of warfare; acquainted with 
 the peculiarities of the different tribes and able not only
 
 1 68 DOOM OP WASHAKIM. 
 
 to distinguish between them on sight, or even loose 
 description, but to actually gauge their fighting numbers, 
 and the temper and capacity of each, he was just the man 
 to govern in the emergency, should hostilities open at 
 their doors. 
 
 Meantime the Wigwam Hill Indians had not been idle. 
 Prompted by the significant mutterings of the old squaw 
 sorceress, and by her pretended or other preternatural 
 visions, to attempt the solution of a mystery in which 
 were involved not only interests vital to themselves but 
 of deep concern to their neighbors, the whites, they had 
 sent out spies, they hardly knew exactly what for, as the 
 old squaw's visions, warnings, and intimations, as they 
 came and went, seemed to bear no sequent relation to one 
 another, but were abrupt, disconnected and indefinite, 
 like the vague wanderings of an unbalanced mind. 
 
 These spies had been sent out and had returned, not 
 full masters of the secret they had hoped to unravel, but 
 bringing ample evidence that their suspicions of Washakim 
 treachery had been well grounded, and that the squaw 
 was mistress of more than normal insight. That to her 
 at times, distance was compressed into proximity, that 
 opacity was no absolute bar to vision, and that she was 
 at least partial mistress of the passage way between things 
 seen and the intangible ephemera of spirit life. In con- 
 nection with her strange machinations if machinations 
 they really were they remembered the ghost upon the 
 hill scarp that struck dumbness to the Narragansett king. 
 They remembered the figures of light that glided so
 
 DOOM OP WASHAKIM. 169 
 
 weirdly over the rocks and along the ledges and vanished 
 into thin air into the blackness of midnight. They 
 remembered the voices that seemed to proceed from the 
 cave the cave high up and near the north end of 
 the perpendicular wall, now choked by that mass of 
 debris, fragments of rocks dismembered from the cliff by 
 the action of frosts in two hundred winters. They 
 remembered the whispered warnings that came over the 
 lake at evening, came seemingly in answer to her incan- 
 tations while she brewed her mess of poison ivy, dogwood 
 and noxious weeds, and talked familiarly with things 
 unseen, mental projections upon vacancy, whispered 
 answers, not direct, but like echoes from the opposite 
 bluffs, groans, like the wail of torture long endured, that 
 seemed to burden the air upon the hill top and to roll 
 down like weighty matter upon the hush of the birch 
 wigwams. They had not yet learned of Cotton Mather 
 the super-devilishness of witchcraft, or they would have 
 drowned her in her boiling brew. 
 
 Knough had now come to the ears of the Hill Indians 
 to convince them that the Washakims were not only still 
 their deadly enemies, but that the league, of which they 
 were among the most active members, had conspired: first 
 to deeply injure them, and then to bind them to the 
 interest of the scheming Narragansett, through the basest 
 form of deception. 
 
 So much were they enraged by the actual harm so far ac- 
 complished, and so indignant that Philip should have 
 made them his dupes rather than his free and confidential
 
 170 DOOM OP WASHAKIM. 
 
 allies, that they were not long in deciding to do their 
 utmost to favor the planters by all covert means, while, 
 through apprehension of consequences in event of disaster 
 to their friends, they outwardly seemed to favor the 
 alliance and the general massacre which was the ultimatum 
 of its designs. And the first act of amity toward the 
 planters should be to make them fully aware of the pur- 
 poses of Philip and the methods by which he aimed to 
 effect the extermination of the hated race. 
 
 Three days had now passed, days of the deepest solici- 
 tude the whites had ever experienced since the first time 
 they forded the shallows at the north end of the lake to 
 strike their axes into the old forests of the west and pro- 
 claim their occupancy of the Quinsigamond grant. Day 
 by day, without citation, even without tacit understand- 
 ing, they had regularly convened at early morning at the 
 Castle Tavern. No one could say exactly for what they 
 had assembled, but each instinctively realized that in 
 union only was safety, if safety was to be found, and that 
 a common cause makes common brotherhood its correla- 
 tive. 
 
 I/ittle differences, such as are sure to occur to some 
 degree in small communities where each as a freeman 
 acknowledges none better born; some that grow out of 
 diversities of opinion, some coming of envy, and small 
 jealousies arising in disparity of conditions, of culture, 
 of intellect, property, or of official or social position; all 
 were for the time buried in an oblivion as complete as if that 
 promised day of final adjustment, when " the first shall be
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. IJI 
 
 last, and the last first," was already at hand, and for the 
 time at least, a whole community returned to its primal 
 status, a condition of free and equal. But on the morning 
 of the fourth day, at a time when it happened, though 
 without preconcertion, that beside the men, every woman 
 in the plantation was in or about the Castle or Tavern, 
 some Indians were seen coming down the declivity by the 
 Bell Pond path, 1 and for a wonder they were not recog- 
 nized as praying Indians who invariably wore as a 
 distinguishing badge, an old coat, breeches, or cocked 
 hat, some cast-off garment of white men's wear. They 
 were not of the converts. What could it mean ? They 
 were Quinsigamonds, but the Hill Indians had of late 
 been exceeding chary of their visits, had even more 
 than once expressed malignity toward the whites, and 
 Indian like, had sulked and skulked, But they were 
 Wigwam Hill Indians and were their best fighting men, 
 ten in number. 
 
 A half dozen of the old flint-locks of the time dropped 
 into position of ready ; as many flint hammers clicked above 
 the priming pans, and as many planters stepped to the 
 front and gave the customary challenge: "Halt! Where 
 are you going ? and what have you to say ? " 
 
 No sooner was the party challenged than each laid his 
 tomahawk on the ground as a token of peaceful intent, 
 and moving forward to within a few feet of the planters 
 addressed them: "Hill Injun all good; Hill Injun no 
 
 1 Bell Pond on Millstone Hill, near its summit, and equal 
 distance from the Castle and the lake.
 
 172 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 fight. Dig hole, hide tomahawk. Big heap Injun fight. 
 All Quinnapoxit, all Tehassit, all Washakim, Nipnets all. 
 Big chief come, Philip the Wampanoag. Philip lead all 
 men, Cold country, hot country, and where the sun 
 sleeps. Philip great man, brave man, bad man. Take 
 big heap scalp. White brave die. White squaw cry; 
 pappoose nowhere. Hill Injun cry too. Injun nebber 
 cry 'fore. Hill Injun sorry. Injun hungry, white squaw 
 make bread. Injun tired, white squaw gib drink. Injun 
 gib leetle bit deer meat, white squaw gib big heap salt, 
 say swap. Injun no got salt. White pappoose like Injun. 
 Injun make play. Pappoose all dead; so bad, you guess. 
 White man got book, say Great Spirit talk; do' know; 
 mebbe. Injun 'fraid Great Spirit. Great Spirit talk for 
 Injun, say tell white man go small time; go now, old 
 squaw say go, Great Spirit say go! Go! 'fore sun-up. " 
 And the Indians lifted their tomahawks from the ground 
 and walked rapidly away in single file back by the Bell 
 Pond trail toward the lake. 
 
 There was no mistaking the import of the warning 
 these wild Indians had left that morning with their old 
 friends, the planters. The very worst that could be 
 dreamed of was conveyed in those abbreviated bolts of 
 broken English, but they had given bane and antidote, 
 and cruel as was the alternative the white man must 
 perforce accept it. 
 
 A meeting was convened upon the spot. Short argu- 
 ments were the rule. It needed but a suggestion to call 
 out unanimity in the choice of Ephraim Curtis as die-
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 173 
 
 tator in the emergency. ' ' We may as well be ready to 
 stand at his back," said Comfort Hart. "Every man to 
 his trade. Ephraim's trade is war, but he must have the 
 tools. ' ' Without a dissenting voice Curtis was elected to 
 act upon his own discretion, and without hesitation he 
 announced his intention to retreat upon Marlborough the 
 following morning. 
 
 Digory Sergent approved of the retreat so far as all but 
 himself was concerned. "But," said Digory, "I have 
 ploughed and planted, and, God willing I will reap the 
 harvest." But he "sowed the wind." He urged his 
 wife and daughters to seek safety in flight, but all to no 
 purpose. They would not go. To them desertion looked 
 like fear, and there was too much of old Digory in the 
 blood to take counsel of it. It needed no reflection to 
 bring the daughters to that resolve. They had the stout 
 courage of the father and the dutiful faith of the mother. 
 Even the baby in the mother's arms must abide the con- 
 sequences of the father's temerity. The self-assured, 
 womanly Martha, the beautiful Susan, the half of whose 
 seventeen summers had been passed in all the taste, 
 refinement and culture of the elite of Boston society, 
 where her beauty, sweetness of temper and vivacious 
 humor had been the open sesame to any househould, and 
 where she had been schooled and honored like a rich 
 man's daughter; the little Nettie, years short of her 
 teens, each and all must be sacrificed at the shrine of a 
 father's uncalculating assurance and rash daring. 
 
 Night once again settled down upon the doomed plan-
 
 174 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 tation. The lowing of home-driven cattle was hushed 
 in the sheds; the katydids disputed and quarreled in 
 the solitary chestnut tree by the tavern stoop, and the 
 whip-poor-will chimed in a dismal chorus. But there 
 came up a voice from Bimelick that fatal night, so dole- 
 fully sad, so painfully articulate, so much the prognostic 
 of evil, to a mind alive to fear and susceptible to super- 
 stition, that when it uttered its warning: " Better beware!" 
 as it seemed to say, more than one planter stepped from 
 his bed and pushing aside the curtain peered out into 
 the night to see if the threatened danger was really at 
 hand. 
 
 "Ten." The clock was striking: " Eleven twelve 
 o'clock! Twelve o'clock! ' ' and a long-drawn, clear, cat- 
 like yell. It was not like some house cat's yell, but that 
 more startling, horrible screech of his untamed, tameless, 
 wild cousin. It rang through the tree-tops; rang over the 
 settlement; rang in frightful echoes; rang thousand- tongued 
 like the knell of doomsday over around encompassing 
 covering the plantation with a mantle of vocal horrors. 
 You never heard it, did you? You never will. It belonged 
 to another age and was left out of your legacy. It was 
 not the wild cat. No short-tailed brindled terror 
 crouched in the fork of a tree; no feline utterance ever 
 approximated to it in ferocity. Seven hundred savages, 
 drawn from the four winds of heaven, from every point 
 of the compass; from the St. Lawrence, from the Connecti- 
 cut, and from the promontory which divides the great 
 Fall River bay from the Narragansett and Popsquash
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 175 
 
 harbor, with many Nipnets, had swooped down to 
 execute the decree of Fate upon the plantation. 
 
 But the planters were prepared. The warning of the 
 Hill Indians had not been lost upon them. Every white 
 man, whether in bed or on guard, had by his side a musket 
 and sixty rounds of spherical death, and every man, 
 woman and child, with the exception of Sergent and 
 family, was for the night ensconsed in the Castle or 
 Tavern. The men were mostly in the Tavern, and 
 between that and the Castle was a covered way in the 
 form of a hastily constructed stockade, slit with loopholes 
 for musket practice. 
 
 And the Indians established a burial place. They dug 
 graves at sunrise, under the red oaks south of the 
 Castle an eighth of a league, after the harvest of souls; 
 after the fearful night; and five-score of them were left 
 sitting bolt upright, with arms in their hands and maize 
 on the ear by their sides, facing the morning, waiting for 
 the resurrection. 
 
 There they waited by the east bridle-path, the Black- 
 stone trail; under the red oaks waited; until we of the 
 nineteenth century saw them exhumed. 1 
 
 Captain Curtis was at his post no wit dismayed; only 
 vSeeming to gloat over his opportunity. He had scored 
 for the red men, had lost an ear and part of his scalp, and 
 
 1 Their bones were exhumed at the excavation for the school- 
 house corner of Summer and School streets about the year 1836. 
 Some, by mistake or misinformation, have supposed them to be 
 bones of early settlers but why, then, the stone weapons found ? 
 or the peculiar posture of the skeletons ?
 
 176 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 had charged them with sundry flesh wounds, and the day 
 of reckoning had come. 
 
 The women and children were safe in the Castle and 
 not at their homes as in Brookfield and Lancaster 
 and all the men had to do was to fight. The terraced 
 and battlemented roof of the Castle afforded ample survey 
 of the surroundings, with the glacis at hand and the 
 scattering forest beyond; if only daylight would come. 
 Even as it was the moonlight was sufficient to expose an 
 Indian when crossing the open in front and upon either 
 side, and when thirty or forty lay dead, and their com- 
 rades who tried to carry them off, tarried with them, they 
 desisted awhile. 
 
 The windows in the Tavern, the loop-holes in the 
 stockade and the battlemented roof and tower, manned 
 by sixty sharpshooters, each provided with sixty rounds 
 of shot, were odds against seven hundred bowmen, if 
 under fair discipline, and if only the moonlight would 
 last. But a black cloud was rising up over the hill on the 
 west, the hill toward Tehassit; and moving on, a tempest 
 without rain, it soon enveloped the settlement in darkness, 
 and under its cover both Castle and Tavern were fiercely 
 beset. The Tavern was soon in flames, and by its light 
 the Indians again became the unthinking target for bullets 
 as at word of command sixty fire-locks flashed out as one, 
 and sixty red-skins rolled in the dust, or crept away 
 bleeding and maimed. 
 
 Desultory firing continued until morning. The fire at 
 the Tavern was quenched, but new ones were set, and at
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 177 
 
 eVery such occasion several of the enemy paid the forfeit 
 of their temerity with life. Morning came; the morning 
 the white men had prayed for, but it brought with its 
 light new perils, for, although all were so far safe and 
 sound in person, it was evident that not only was ammu- 
 nition getting low, but that where they had reckoned 
 upon scores for an enemy it was now certain they were 
 numbered by hundreds. 
 
 The odds now apparent were two great, for even could 
 the Castle be kept from fire, the besiegers might suffer, 
 but the garrison must speedily starve. It was evident 
 the Castle must be abandoned forthwith, and Curtis 
 devised a retreat which was speedily put in execution. 
 He, with several young men, accompanied by Parson 
 Meekman who was ever ready for anything like a forlorn 
 hope save the one without Christ made a sally , and reach- 
 ing some sheltering trees, opened the war again according 
 to true Indian tactics. Whether or not we try to account 
 for the white man's superior skill and success in the bar- 
 barous methods of warfare, by giving him credit for 
 greater intelligence, agility, or courage, certain it is that 
 when equally armed, and equal in numbers, the Indian 
 is no match for him. He only excels in the midnight 
 foray, when the whites are asleep. 
 
 Once in position the men opened fire at long range, 
 from behind a tree, a stump, or a log, and their fire told 
 with deadly effect. Whenever an Indian, inspired by 
 hatred, revenge, or ambition for fame among his fellows, 
 aimed to get within bow-shot length, and in doing so dis-
 
 1 78 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 closed enough of his person to be covered with sight and 
 bead, an Indian fell or hurriedly left his post disabled, 
 and as the white men dodged from tree to tree, but little 
 annoyed by bowmen kept at such distance, the fugitives 
 poured out of the Castle, the women and children in the 
 van, while the planters brought up the rear, regardless of 
 consequences to themselves as they made a breastwork of 
 their bodies against the nearly spent arrows that were 
 showered upon them. 
 
 It was now that Parson Meekman began to exhibit in 
 bold relief the other extreme of his dual nature, hitherto 
 manifest chiefly in words. He had, times without num- 
 ber, succored individual savages in distress, had commended 
 them to God in earnest, heart-felt prayer, bound up their 
 wounds, fed their hungry with an unsparing hand, had 
 nursed their sick and done for them manifold little kind- 
 nesses. He had in all things obeyed the injunction laid 
 by Jesus his Master upon Simon Peter. But with the 
 shadow of an uprising or turbulence, or any manner of 
 insubordination for the relative position was always that 
 of ruler and subject the sword of speech had leaped from 
 its scabbard and whirled in a tirade of pious but terrible 
 invective. 
 
 That he was kind, considerate, and even tender, had 
 been a thousand times evinced in the past by little tokens 
 of sympathy and as many self-sacrificing efforts to alle- 
 viate distress among his neighbors, but it remained for 
 this hour to bring out the sterner qualities of his being
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 179 
 
 and to demonstrate that, notwithstanding his proclivity 
 for threatening speech, " a barking dog may bite." 
 
 The rollicking, dare-devil element, true to the blood of 
 his Irish ancestry, unsubdued, but held in laudable 
 abeyance after his espousal of Protestantism and elevation 
 to the dignity of a pastorate, seemed to reassert its exist- 
 ence and exemplify itself in that forward, unflinching 
 courage which utterly abjures that " better part of valor." 
 He handled a fire-lock like an old woodsman. He 
 aimed with the accuracy of a keen eye, a practiced hand, 
 a steady nerve, and an unruffled, even buoyant temper. 
 Every time his flint struck fire an Indian took his ticket 
 of leave and started for the happy hunting grounds, and 
 when, as on more than one occasion occurred, a handful 
 of the most resolute of the enemy ventured a hand-to- 
 hand conflict, they fell back dead, or discomfited, and 
 convinced that the parson was as much an expert in the 
 use of temporal as of spiritual weapons, and that the half 
 broad-ax he carried slung in his belt was quite the equiva- 
 lent of the Indian war-club or hatchet of stone. At one 
 time, when the rear-guard were sorely pressed and for a 
 moment demoralized by the torture of a hundred wound- 
 ing arrows shot at short range, the parson threw himself 
 into the breach, and in the attitude of command shouted 
 ' ' By the God of Abraham ! We will not succumb to this 
 Babylonish whore close up and give the heathen another 
 round ! ' ' And at the next breath a volley tore from the 
 freshly determined guard that struck terror to the too 
 daring archers. What Curtis was as a commander and
 
 ISO DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 scout, Parson Meektnan Mike Rafferty that was proved 
 himself in physical strength and desperate valor as a 
 leader of the forlorn hope, or captain of the rear guard. 
 
 By slow degrees the retreating party made their way, 
 many of them wounded, but none dead nor even mortally 
 hurt, until they passed the ford at the north end of the 
 lake. The well-directed aim of the musket men put it 
 out of the question for the Indians to use their toma- 
 hawks with serious effect, and the arrows, at long range, 
 were not formidable weapons. 
 
 Some new idea seemed now to take possession of the 
 allies, some scheme more promising, and with one mind 
 they abandoned the pursuit and returned to the planta- 
 tion where several score had remained to complete the 
 work of destruction.
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 OLD DIGORY YIELDS TO ENTREATY. 
 
 IN a field so wide as that your scribe has selected, of a 
 period so remote, and with authentic annals so meagre, 
 nothing would seem more invitingly easy supposing 
 that he, the writer, was gifted with the necessary con- 
 structive ability than to abandon the sequence, if not 
 the entire substance of historical events, and to rally upon 
 the imagination for incidents, so endeavoring to enhance 
 interest by startling innovations and fictitious embellish- 
 ments. But as legendary and traditional lore of the 
 epoch still abound, for the ear of him who will stop to 
 hear catches or broken recitals by octogenarians who, 
 through the years have kept green in memory fireside 
 tales of the weal and woe of a township, the course 
 would seem unpardonable, even though it might promise 
 the author some feeble recompense in the way of public 
 acknowledgment of a tithe of originality. 
 
 The whites, with the exception of Digory Sergent and 
 family, had made safe retreat to Marlborough, and the 
 Indians who had found little to compensate them for 
 danger and hardship incurred, while skilled men like 
 Ephraim Curtis and his determined corps fought them in 
 their own fashion and declined leaving them even a scalp
 
 1 82 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 as a trophy; men who could demonstrate their omni- 
 presence and yet be rarely visible had returned to the 
 plantation to review their scene of devastation and to 
 enjoy its fruits. 
 
 The retreat had been consummately planned and so 
 bravely carried into execution that even Black Pompey 
 and Archer's mare had been conducted free from harm 
 by Black Jake and were now safely stalled in Marlborough. 
 Archer himself had been absent from the settlement 
 several days and was, supposably, a prisoner among the 
 Washakims, or had fallen a victim to their murderous 
 inclinations. There were those of the planters who sur- 
 mised that Eugene had tired of country life and made 
 his way on foot to Boston. The tramp was nothing for 
 men of that day, but why should he have left a very 
 valuable piece of horse-flesh ? It was improbable, to say 
 the least. 
 
 There was little left in the way of booty to compensate 
 an Indian for the hazard of an open battle with such an 
 enemy, or even to engage in a midnight foray, as what- 
 ever property not portable, the whites possessed, excepting 
 several barrels of rum, which were stored in the cellars 
 and refused to burn in the cask in the general conflagra- 
 tion, was regarded by the Indians with contempt. 
 Buildings, agricultural implements, such as they were, 
 furniture, everything a white man esteems as personal 
 property, was to them a superfluity, beneath the dignity 
 of a forest lord to put to use, for however ridiculous 
 might seem the assumption of superiority on the part of
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 183 
 
 the savage, certain it was that after the first glamour 
 produced by gay attire, and the long-range death in the 
 white man's weapon was over, they heartily despised a 
 race that yoked its men to one end of a plow and at the 
 same time adorned its women with jewels and painted 
 feathers. 
 
 But two objects engrossed the Indians' care when once 
 the hatchet had been lifted from the earth and his mocca- 
 sins had been turned to the war-path. First his savage 
 pride must be gratified by the possession of those tangible 
 evidences of bravery, those true ornaments of the 
 warrior, finer than blankets of beaver, richer than robes 
 of otter, more beautiful to look upon than the gold of 
 the white man, or than wealth of native wampum, the 
 scalp locks of an enemy. 
 
 The next matter worthy of consideration was the utter 
 destruction of all that an enemy, if a white man, might 
 prize as property, and more especially his abode; and the 
 better the dwelling, the more certain and thorough the 
 destruction. 
 
 With this disposition of mind dominant, the Indians, 
 to the number of seven hundred, less some ninety who 
 fell during the short siege and pursuit, a motley mass 
 gleaned from the four quarters of the north country, from 
 the wilds of Ontario, from the shores of the St. Lawrence, 
 the forests of the Penobscot, from the Mohawk wood by 
 the Connecticut, and from the Narragansett region on 
 the south of the last a few only were sent up by Philip 
 as inspirators and from several of the Nipnet tribes,
 
 184 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 with the spirit of devastation, the effect of the persuasive 
 tongue of that eloquent diplomat and bold leader, the 
 Wampanoag chief boiling in their bosoms, and each bent 
 on working havoc in his own wild way, for as yet they 
 were, in Philip's absence, leaderless as a pack of wolves, 
 except as whim or circumstances threw them for the hour 
 under the fierce guidance of Tehuanto the Washakim, or 
 the still ruder king of the Ontarios, they had returned to 
 the doomed settlement and seizing the smoking embers 
 of the already ruined tavern, castle, and store, were not 
 long in reducing every remaining structure to a bed of 
 ashes. Not all the property was destroyed, for the 
 charred barrels of rum were seasonably rescued from the 
 debris of the tavern and store. So far the houses of 
 Sergent and Jonas Rice of Sagatabscot, and of Gershom 
 Rice and Hart of Packachoag, being far away, had 
 received no part of their attention. 
 
 It was a sorry day for the Sergent family as the smoke 
 of the ruined settlement darkened the northern sky. But 
 Digory was still obstinate and immovable. So utterly 
 did he despise a race incapable of fighting face to face 
 with an enemy, and so much did he rely upon his faith- 
 ful watch dog to give him seasonable warning of prowling 
 Indians by day.or night, and upon his own prowess to make 
 good the defense of his log castle against the dozen or so 
 he imagined had wrought the mischief that, as he saw the 
 towers of smoke climbing the midland and projecting them- 
 selves upon and above the blue bosom of the Wachusett and 
 knew its fearful import, he declared that the planters must
 
 DOOM OP WASHAKIM. 185 
 
 have been remiss in watchfulness and so taken unawares, 
 or perhaps they had fled at the first hostile demonstration 
 of the prowling besiegers. For himself he was more 
 determined than ever. ' ' Would he skulk out and retire 
 because a pack of wolves invested the grounds and 
 threatened the house ? or would he remain in his bullet- 
 proof domicile and pick off his assailants one by one until 
 fatigue and loss should incline them to engage in some 
 more hopeful enterprise ? 
 
 " But, father," urged Susan, who had been an attentive 
 listener to his vocalized revery, " if they have ruined the 
 settlement and murdered, the Lord only knows how many, 
 how can you, single-handed, be able to cope with them ? 
 
 ' ' If they were a handful of Indians, who have done this 
 mischief, possibly four of us, well-armed as we are with 
 muskets, might hope to withstand them until their frenzy 
 would give place to impatience, and they might draw off 
 to the execution of some new and easier scheme, where 
 the people are less prepared and resistance less obstinate. 
 But, father, no few Indians have done this thing. I 
 would not pretend to be wiser than you; but consider if 
 you yourself, with our aid at the loopholes, feel assured 
 you might successfully resist a squad of perhaps twenty, 
 do you imagine that the planters, with sixty stout men, 
 well armed as we are, were likely to succumb to any 
 inconsiderable force ? And did not John tell us when 
 he was alive and here, that a war was imminent ? That 
 the great Narragansett king was poisoning the minds of 
 all the Nipnets ? The Indian murders at Brookfield,
 
 186 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 the destruction of Lancaster, the massacres at Mendon, 
 Manchoag, and that of Deerfield if it is true all at about 
 the same time, argue a wide-spread disaffection, and to 
 cap the whole, what do you think of John's disappear- 
 ance? of the wounded neck of Pompey, and the warning 
 of the Hill Indians to our people ? Do not these things 
 look as if some great, mischievous design had been brew- 
 ing; something worse than the mere venting of spite here 
 and there by individual Indians or mere clans ? John has 
 said for a long time, that our neighbors, the Washakims, 
 were preparing to dig up the hatchet, and who could be 
 better authority than he who has hutted, hunted, and 
 fished with them, as if he had been a born Indian. He 
 knew all their habits and could overmatch the best of 
 them at their own arts, and he seemed to read their 
 thoughts under their facial lack of expression. I think, 
 father, it is time we should all go, and God grant that 
 those about the Castle left in good time. ' ' 
 
 "Well, Susan, I have said all along that mother and 
 the girls should go; that they 'd ought ter go, I mean, 
 ter the folks in Marlborough, and I think so still. 
 There 's no talkin' to a woman, Sue, perticular to an 
 edicated one. There 's half yer words I don't quite 
 understand, and the tother half runs so like a milltail, 
 that ag'in I 've got the fust idee straightened out, there 's 
 a dozen more all el bo win' their way inter my head, until 
 the hull thing is snarled up wus 'n the witch-knots in 
 Jenny's mane. As for what has happened at the Castle, 
 I believe it was all because the folks had no leader; none
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 187 
 
 ekal ter the 'mergency I mean, and they got demoralized. 
 If Cap'n John or Eph Curtis had been there, them red 
 devils wouldn't 'a smoked 'em out ser easy. They must 
 er took 'em unawares. I 've faith ter believe that no 
 Injun ever fit face ter face if there was a chance ter run. 
 I 've sent a baker's dozen on 'em ter the'r last reckoning 
 and I could never git one on 'em ter show more 'n three 
 inches square of hisself till I went up ter see how the 
 old rifle kerried, and ter find out jest where I hit 'em. I 
 don't take skelps, but I never 'low an Injun ter kerry off 
 his'n ef he squints at me over er log. I don't see any 
 sense in mother an' the gals stayin' here. If anybody 's 
 got ter be killed, one 's enough. Come, come! now gal, be 
 good an' say ye '11 go, an' mother an' Martha '11 soon fall 
 in with ye. They seem to think whatever yer do must 
 be right. I can't for the life on me, see how you manage 
 'em. I set my foot down that I won't do a thing an' it 's 
 no use er talkin'; but they keep talkin' jest the same, an' 
 by and by, when I git a leetle of the savage off, I go an' 
 do it; can't help it. How you ken haul them critters 
 into a line I don't see. I wish you would go, Sue. 
 They '11 mind what you say an' do. They did n't like 
 John at fust; they said he was a city fop, and when I 
 didn't make any fuss, they said I 'd spile my darter if I 
 let things go on, an' then they said he was half Injun; 
 that some blue-eyed soldier had been too much about the 
 wigwams. Martha went on ter say that he was a tyrant, 
 and a pompous, overbearin' martinet. I don't know 
 where she got so much quality English. That was a
 
 1 88 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 trainin' day. Tham ar fellers got full and would n't fall 
 into line, an' John locked 'ein up in the guard house. 
 But I noticed that when you got ready ter talk, they fell 
 in love with John wus 'n you did. If John was here ter 
 tell 'em ter go now, they 7 d go, Digory or no Digory. I 
 liked John, but I never said much in his favor 'afore. 
 How mighty clever 'tis ter praise a man arter he's dead. 
 It don't cost anything then, not even condescension, as 
 the parson says, and you needn't be afraid he '11 come 
 round the next day ter borrer money on ye. There ' s many 
 a man starved ter death ter-day for want of half the 
 money it takes ter buy him a monerment ter-morrer. 
 The man they mortalize ter day is giner'ly the feller 
 they kicked off the doorstep yesterday. These women 
 folks don't think I know anything lately, but John knew 
 it all. If I didn't think he was the best man in the 
 colony I'd er been jealous afore this. Poor John! I 
 don't keer much fer the men giner'ly. They allers seemed 
 ter think Digory was a hull arsenal of hisself, didn't 
 never need any help; not even a soft word could they give 
 me. The young men allers looked as if they thought I 's 
 a goin' ter bite 'em, an' the old men was perlite, but as 
 cold as Jenerwary. They never offered to do anything 
 for me. Didn't they think I never needed anything 
 done? Couldn't they see when you were all down with 
 the measles, mother and all, that I needed help ? Must a 
 man cry like a woman ter make his sorrers known ter his 
 neighbors? What 's the use er bein' a man if ye 've got 
 ter act like a woman ? I never held spite ag' in anybody
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 189 
 
 but an Injun, an' I wouldn't let him starve, nor suffer 
 much, when he wan't in fi'tin' trim. If I meet a strange 
 dorg I look ter see if he bellies out, an' if he don't, I 
 know what 's the matter. I give him half my dinner. 
 S'pose I 'd er waited fer the dog ter cry, er ter tell me what 
 ailded him, what 'ud become 'er the dorg? Poor John! 
 He come ter me an' cut my wood, an' did my chores fer 
 me, an' let me nurse my sick ones, an' he wan't half 
 grown then ; an' you wan't nothin' to him then Sue, you 
 hadn't got out er short clothes. There Wan't anything 
 selfish 'bout that. Talk about yer Christian charity. 
 'Twas born in that ar feller. He didn't need religion; 
 'twould be wastin' piety ter feed it ter him. Oh, my! 
 what 'ud the planters say ter see old Digory wipin' his 
 eyes ? Oh, my! I must either cry or swear. I say, Sue, 
 you mustn't cry so. Mebbe John '11 turn up yet. I'd 
 tell you if I darst to, but I darsn't. I had a dream, but 
 I don't b'lieve in dreams. I tell ye, Susan, he may turn 
 up yet, stranger things have happened. An' even if he 
 don't, it's sun thin' to have such a man solid here, dead 
 or alive, solid in the heart here. If I was a gal I'd 
 rather feed my memory on such a man, and know that he 
 was mine, than ter have any other livin' man on top er 
 the turf. It's sunthin', Sue, to know yer had such a 
 man, an' who knows but yer may have him agin. I 
 darsn't say jest what I think, jest what I saw in my 
 dream I mean. I don't b'lieve in dreams. But s'pose 
 he 's dead. Somehow I think the dead ones still walk 
 with us through life, an' when we do right they smile on
 
 IQO DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 us, an' when we do wrong they chide us. Their language 
 is mighty onsartin, but sometimes I think I kin tell it. I 
 darsn't tell you what I saw in my dream, Sue. It might 
 lift you up, an' the fall 'ud be tumble. I ain't no 
 b'liever in ghosts, Sue; I don't b'lieve that story of the 
 graves openin' when Pilate killed the good man of 
 Nazareth, that we see in the picter', an' I ain't no 
 Christian. I ain't good enough ; an' I don't quite 
 swaller the redemption business. 'Pears like it was 
 wasted trouble ; but I do b'lieve in a hereafter, conscious 
 I b'lieve they call it ; I know sunthin' 'bout that, I ken 
 somehow sense it; ken see it without lookin', an' feel it 
 without touchin' ; an' all the little I know, I know by 
 these senses, an' if I see, an' hear, an' feel a thing, I say 
 it is so, if I am me. 
 
 "Your mother is dear to me, Sue; but Martha's mother 
 never leaves her side, 'less I'm mistaken. I see her in 
 my dreams, an' I see her when I'm awake. If I try ter 
 see her I can't; I can't make up her pictur clear. It's 
 blurred, unsartin, unsatisfactory; but when it comes 
 unbidden, asleep or awake, it is so like her I ken see the 
 partin' of her hair, the pupils an' color of her eyes, can 
 hear her voice an' feel her breath upon my cheek ; I never 
 think er doin' wrong but I feel a chill, as if a cold hand 
 was laid on me, an' I stop short an' say : ' No yer don't, 
 Digory ; ' but I ain't ghosty, an' I don't b'lieve in 
 dreams. 
 
 "It's an awful thing ter hev one prop arter another 
 drop out from under ye arter yer begin ter git old. ' '
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 19 1 
 
 "There, that'll do, father. Don't talk about it any 
 more. It pains me more than all to see you struggle so 
 with sorrow. You men don't cry like women; you seem 
 to writhe as if in an extremity of mental torture, as if 
 some great battle were going on between the impulse and 
 the will, as if the soul were in a mortal struggle with its 
 earthly bonds. It is something so dreadful that between 
 sympathy and fright I forget my own sorrow in the fear- 
 ful contemplation of it. But why do you persist in 
 saying John may yet be alive ? Can there be room for 
 hope?" 
 
 ' ' None, except that may be he was taken prisoner, an' 
 in that ar case I doubt if the wust Injuns dars't do more 
 than hold him. The hull nation er Nipnets know him, 
 an' while they fear him as a warrior, they respect him. 
 They e'en-a-most worship him. An' these Injuns are 
 turrible superstitious ; they ' magine that some men are 
 more than human ; that they are links in the chain that 
 connects the Great Spirit with us mortals. An' besides, 
 wicked and treacherous as they may be, they are yet open 
 to a sense of generosity in at least one direction. 
 
 "A great warrior allus commands their respect, even 
 if he be an enemy. Them savages took Cap'n John ter 
 be the greatest warrior livin'. Eph Curtis was allus a 
 terror to 'em, but he had ter take a back seat fer John. 
 
 " He was dignified, but simple in his habits; bold, but 
 yet as kind as a kitten. He bewildered them Injuns by 
 his contradictions in character. He was an Injun puzzle. 
 
 "An' that ar old squaw: I think she's half sister ter
 
 192 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 the devil, but she liked John ; allus called him her boy ; 
 an' I tell ye if she says no, there ain't an Injun short o' 
 forty mile dars't go contr'y. But we was talkin' 'bout 
 leavin' ; what do you say to 't ? Will yer go ?" 
 
 ' ' By all means. But how can we go except under 
 your escort ?' ' 
 
 "I forgot that, gal. Well, I '11 be ready ag'in Thurs- 
 day. Tell the women folks ter klect their fixins. 
 Martha '11 want ter p'rade when she gits ter Marlborough. 
 But mind ye, I won't promise ter stay. I don't fear 
 them critters, but women don't make good Injun fight- 
 ers. ' ' 
 
 And kissing his pretty daughter, first on one cheek and 
 then on the other, and with his horny hand under her 
 chin, turning up her tearful face to his, he said: 
 
 "I doubt me if John is dead, Sue, arter all. Or if he 
 is what men call dead, he still lives. Queer, ain't it, for 
 such an old infidel as I am ter say it? I don't ree'ly 
 b'lieve he 's dead, but I don't b'lieve in dreams." 
 
 And so Susan and the rough old pioneer parted. Susan 
 to tell of the happy decision, Digory to fulfill his promise.
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 THE DELIVERANCE. 
 
 THE work of destruction, so far as was known to the 
 Northmen, was now complete, and the allies, having 
 glutted their appetite for rapine, and despairing of further 
 slaughter in that particular locality, gave little heed to 
 the probability of outstanding domiciles. They heard of 
 Packachoag and of Sagatabscot, but presumably the resi- 
 dent families were with the retreating party, in which 
 case all that could be hoped for was a bootless bonfire. 
 
 But there was one being in Washakim war paint who 
 knew to the contrary, and no one short of a practiced 
 detective would have even guessed, while he held his 
 tongue, that he was not born to the woods. To be sure 
 there was the slightest indication to a wave in his jet 
 black hair, but there were other young warriors of mixed 
 race. The noticeable feature, if there was any such, was 
 that the blue eye had not the dull brownish cast of the 
 half breed. That young warrior, now within the forests 
 of Washakim, whither Tehuanto and his fighting men 
 had retired after wiping out the settlement, was urging 
 his chief to send a band to Sagatabscot to put Sergent 
 out of harm's way. 
 
 The Washakim chief had already been instigated and 
 13
 
 194 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 aided to insure the quiescence of two important persons, 
 and that should have made it easy to effect his long kept 
 purpose to destroy another. But the prompter was alien to 
 the soil and that fact kept constantly alive in the mind of 
 the chief a suspicion of duplicity, of lurking treachery. 
 And again, he was superstitious. He dreaded the effect 
 of what he had already accomplished; not for any aversion 
 to bloodshed, but suppose Philip should, upon the ground 
 of some treaty-making with the whites, or other pretext, 
 withdraw, and the allies from the Ontario country should 
 tire of an expedition that rewarded them with neither 
 cloth nor scalps the only two things, in their estimation, 
 worthy of so much painstaking and actual loss in num- 
 bers and should double on the in trail ? 
 
 And had not the old squaw, whose footstep was in 
 every wigwam, whose right of presence was everywhere 
 recognized, and whose powers of divination and ability to 
 accomplish ends by means unnatural were everywhere 
 acknowledged, had she not pointed at him with her 
 withered fingers, and hissed between her scraggy teeth 
 "Beware?" 
 
 To the frequent, earnest solicitations of the pseudo 
 Indian, the chief demurred, and at last flatly refused to 
 comply. But, as if in no way desirous of hindering the 
 deed, could he escape the responsibility, he suggested 
 that the Northmen, still at Tehassit, were drunk with 
 fire-water and thirsting for blood, and might be in humor 
 to aid him in his designs. 
 
 The Washakim furnished him three warriors to act as
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 1 95 
 
 sponsors for the good faith of the stranger, and with these 
 he set out for the Northmen' scamp, and at midnight was 
 in the council at Tehassit, declaring the unprotected con- 
 dition of Sergent, and bargaining with the Ontario chief 
 for the person of a woman from among the captives they 
 might take, when the prisoners should arrive at the shores 
 of Ontario. Once at home in the great northern forests, 
 the chief should give him guides and a safe passport, with 
 or without his prize, as he saw fit to keep or abandon 
 her, to the lowest bend in the Merrirnac. 
 
 A detail of four hundred warriors was ordered out. A 
 tithe of the number was more than the stranger asked for, 
 but the whole camp was in the condition of beastly 
 debauch, revelling in the rum they had secured at the 
 burned plantation, and the chief relied upon a twelve 
 mile march to bring the men down to sobriety, but when 
 such as could stand at all were fairly on their feet, it was 
 wisely determined to defer the expedition until the follow- 
 ing morning, as they were already quarrelsome, and once 
 out from under the chief's immediate supervision their 
 petty differences might lead to serious results. 
 
 That night the casks of rum that had been dragged by 
 the Indians on a two-wheeled cart from the settlement, 
 were put under a strong guard, but the disappointed 
 warriors were appeased by the promise of a war dance 
 upon the next night following. 
 
 The promise of a war dance was an implied promise of 
 license with the casks. 
 
 Scarcely had the three Washakim warriors, in com-
 
 196 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 pany with the alien, left the Twin Lakes, when Tehuanto 
 half repented of not having taken part in the proposed 
 expedition. His active mind and body, and his innate 
 love of adventure, that had been stirred to effervescence 
 by the scenes of the last few hours, conspired to produce 
 that mental intoxication, the usual accompaniment of suc- 
 cessful exit from thrilling scenes, and he so burned for 
 its continuance that a few hours of the monotony of camp 
 life racked him with the pangs of ennui. Calling together 
 his warriors he ordered them to again prepare for the 
 war-path, and in a brief hour he had passed the swift 
 waters of the Upper Quinnapoxit and was gaining the 
 summit of Maiden Hill, a league north of the burned 
 settlement, on his way to Tehassit, having left in camp a 
 guard of warriors, most of them past the prime of life and 
 unequal to a hurried march, and some of them suffering 
 from wounds. 
 
 Beyond Maiden Hill they followed the valley to, and 
 over, the hill known as Stone House, a rugged, rock)' emi- 
 nence and precipice, and were soon in the lodge of the 
 Tehassits, outside of which and along the Tehassit 
 Brook lay the scattered line of Northmen, stretched in 
 every conceivable attitude of rest or indolence, and buried 
 in the loathsome stupor of alcoholic paralysis. Only the 
 chief and a dozen warriors had abstained, and they had 
 already been compelled to relieve the besotted guard at 
 the rum casks. The Washakim warriors were either less 
 inclined to its free use from having a more intimate 
 knowledge of its effects, or were in dread of kindling the
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 197 
 
 ire of Tehuanto, whose word was law, and whose toma- 
 hawk was its sudden and ruthless executor. 
 
 Half the night was passed in council. Tehuanto urged 
 that twenty warriors was an ample force with which to 
 attempt the dislodgment of Sergent and the capture of 
 the women. To beset him with a larger body would 
 savor of cowardice. He, for one, would hang his head 
 in shame to summon the sturdy old white warrior to 
 surrender to a force exceeding a score. He knew old 
 Digory. He was a great warrior ; a warrior who had a 
 dozen Indian scalps hung up in the spirit land, although 
 he never took one. A brave man was old Digory. He 
 would like his scalp, but he must take it in true warrior 
 style, either when he was asleep, or in something like 
 equal combat. If twenty warriors could not take 
 Digory 's scalp, more ought not to. 
 
 The decision was, however, adverse to the Washakim's 
 pleading, and four hundred men must go on the errand, 
 while the spurious Indian would act as their guide. The 
 four hundred must go, because that number needed the 
 exercise to work off the effects of the debauch and pre- 
 pare them for the promised next night's carousal, the war 
 dance. The Northmen had come a long path and had no 
 booty to carry back ; nothing save a dozen or two of scalps 
 taken at Brookfield and Lancaster. A meagre compensa- 
 tion for a whole moon of filing over pathless mountains, 
 and through tangled swamps. They must at least make 
 the most of what enjoyment was attainable within the 
 twenty hours or more before they took the trail to Canada.
 
 198 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 So said the Ontario chief, and Tehuanto decided to 
 merely accompany them but to take no active part. The 
 mock Indian was to guide the party to Sagatabscot, and 
 was to direct in the disposition to be made of the captives 
 until such time as all were back again in Tehassit and 
 again under the guidance of the northern chief. 
 
 And while the party are doing the bidding of their 
 unscrupulous guide and director, we will pass over to the 
 Twin Lakes. 
 
 The Washakim warriors, all their best fighting men, 
 had accompanied the leaderless, unorganized band that 
 had been collected by King Philip's agents, acting under 
 his general orders, the immediate purpose of which was 
 not real war, but a feint to try the temper of the allies 
 and to involve them in an inextricable mesh of mischief 
 done the whites, that should render peace thereafter next 
 to impossible. And so far his scheme seemed to have 
 thriven, to meet his most sanguine expectations or hopes. 
 Actual war; merciless war; war to the knife; such as 
 Philip had determined upon as an ultimatum; a war of 
 extermination that was to admit of no parley, no capitula- 
 tion, no possible peace, was yet sleeping in embryo, and 
 what had already been done, the ruin and slaughter at 
 Springfield, at Deerfield, Mendon, Brookfield, Lancaster, 
 and the plantation of Quinsigamond, was like the purpose- 
 less movement of incipient life. Philip had but touched 
 here and there a key; had run the gamut to find if the in- 
 strument was in tune. It mattered little to him whether
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 199 
 
 these settlements were in or out of existence afpresent; 
 it mattered much to him whether the whole Nipnet 
 nation would or would not commit the unpardonable sin 
 of breaking a truce without due notice. If they could be 
 brought to do it at his instigation, they were sealed to 
 him and his purposes past all redemption, and when the 
 final trial of strength should come they need give no 
 quarter for they could expect none. 
 
 Nor had the Nipnets alone been entrapped by the great 
 sachem. The Pequots in a measure, enough to bind 
 the tribe, the Nashuas, the Penobscots, and tribes from 
 as far north as Canada, had sent squads sufficient to 
 implicate the several of petty clans, while the warlike 
 Mohawks sent declarations of hostility in favor of Philip 
 directly to the whites, and some of them were present at 
 all the recently committed atrocities. 
 
 Nothing now remained for Philip but to let what had 
 already been done rankle in the bosoms of the enemy 
 until, in their indignation, they should attempt retaliation; 
 and this they were likely to undertake by separating 
 their forces and sending detachments to the nests of such 
 tribes as had broken faith. And in all the country there 
 were but three or four correct examples. Prominent 
 among those who failed to respond to the great chief's 
 summons were the Pegans on the south, the Packachoags 
 and the Quinsigamouds, and for their treason. for it 
 deserves no softer name when men desert their kind in 
 race and blood to give aid and comfort to a hostile 
 stranger, whether the delinquent be called Sagamore John
 
 200 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 of Packachoag, or Uncas of the lower Thames; for their 
 treason they were already billeted by the red king for 
 the spirit land, when time and circumstances should 
 ripen his scheme for execution. And the Wigwam Hill 
 Indians, as being first to break the bond of confedera- 
 tion, must lead the way. It mattered not that they had 
 been feted and feasted and pampered by the other race. 
 They were parting with their birthright for pottage, and 
 selling a nation for the song of a siren. Hoorawannonit, 
 Uncas, and Arnold, are synonymous for treason, while 
 Philip and Squanto were the Tells and Douglass' of 
 barbarism. 1 
 
 But Philip was too wary, too politic to appear even to 
 observe, at present, their disaffection to his cause. He 
 would not hint at displeasure while an Indian with cause 
 might make an enemy to fight. He made no such mis- 
 takes. 
 
 Let us turn back to look over and about the Twin 
 Lakes and see what the squaws and warriors Tehuanto 
 left at Washakim were doing at this time. 
 
 In the forest at the south end of the west lake the curl- 
 ing smoke above the tree tops indicated wigwam fires 
 beneath. There were thirty birch tents only thirty, for 
 the tribe lived in families, cliques or little neighborhoods, 
 
 1 If ever a hero were deserving of an enduring monument to his 
 memory, that man is King Philip of Mount Hope, for however 
 valid Boston's plea for inciting homicide in self-defense, she 
 owes it to the grandest type of patriot heroism in the annals of 
 aboriginal America.
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 2OI 
 
 mostly on the borders of the two lakes but separated as 
 fancied convenience, taste or inclination might induce 
 them to adopt locations. 
 
 In this settlement at the south end of the west lake the 
 squaws seemed occupied, some attending papooses, some 
 carrying water from the lake, and some were bending 
 over a fire where green spits were placed in the ground so 
 as to lean over beds of hot coals. They were evidently 
 broiling fish and preparing a meal, for on the ends of the 
 spits were trout, dangling, and some still alive, or drip- 
 ping their savory fat in sputtering drops upon the fervent 
 coals. 
 
 L,ounging about on blankets, skins, and on the bare 
 ground were warriors, warriors of fifty years, some 
 more, some less, and all, excepting a few wounded, were 
 still, in a degree, able bodied men. 
 
 And there were boys there; boys of six years, up to 
 sixteen, with bows and arrows, and fishing tackle, as 
 spears of sharpened bone, bone hooks and sinew lines, 
 nooses made of sinews and attached to poles were scattered 
 over the ground as they had been dropped by boys 
 fatigued with play, or by some tired fisherman. 
 
 But those lolling Indians. L,ook at them! Nothing 
 in nature can exceed in pure expression of absolute lazi- 
 ness the Indian warrior off duty and at rest. The same, 
 always and everywhere, from the Aroostook to the 
 Rockies. Sleep is nothing to it. Good, sound sleep has 
 an air of business about it. It is a process of recuper- 
 ation; a cause in the active development of an effect; a
 
 202 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 quiescence with a purpose. But the American savage at 
 rest is an incarnate yawn; a type of the utter disuse of 
 every faculty but that of drawing breath, and even that 
 he would gladly omit if it cost him an effort. He can't 
 even afford to dream, as he lies there upon the flat of his 
 back, under an unobstructed broiling sunlight, with 
 mouth wide open, where flies and grasshoppers undis- 
 turbed may congregate and hold high revel. But like 
 his wary neighbor, the fox, every sense, though in no 
 way alert, is so intensely acute that no sound that even 
 a hunted squirrel might detect fails of instant recognition 
 by the ear, and with the slightest real occasion for activ- 
 ity he springs to his feet with the agility of a wild cat, all 
 nerve, all action, all intensity. 
 
 But the occasion for activity was wanting, or so com- 
 pletely masked that no sound nor token was distinguish- 
 able. And yet, while twenty warriors, scarcely out of 
 their prime, lay indolently whiling the hours away, five 
 pairs of sharp, black eyes glared upon them from within 
 half a bow shot distance, and five hatchets only waited 
 discovery to dart like teased rattlesnakes upon their 
 unsuspecting prey. 
 
 Once or twice the boys started up, half erect, listened a 
 moment, and relapsed, in imitation of their elders, into 
 sleep again. All was in the most perfect hush of silence. 
 The squaws even, satisfied that the fish were doing well, 
 lost themselves in a dreamy stupor. 
 
 But one thing only seemed alive, and that uot;half so. 
 The old squaw sorceress of Quinsigamond was there,
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 203 
 
 leaning with her back against a chestnut, motionless as 
 seemed the earth she stood upon, saving that her dark, 
 wild eyes rolled restless in their sockets, peering into the 
 hazel thicket close at hand upon the west. 
 
 Something in the rear of the wigwams, a shapeless 
 mass of brownish yellow, scarcely distinguishable from 
 the dead wire grass upon which it lay, something movable 
 and moving, leaves the thicket, and by some undiscern- 
 ible impulse, some occult power of locomotion, makes 
 its way snail-like toward the great birch tent, the nearest 
 wigwam in the circle. The old squaw's eye is upon it, 
 glaring with all the pent up fury of a disturbed rattler; 
 watching it with feline intensity; yet not a muscle of her 
 wrinkled, withered old face, not a movement of her rigid 
 form gives token of interest. It is simply statuary venom 
 sculptured in breathing inertia. It almost takes one's 
 breath away to see this bunch of dried grass at her feet, 
 and upon which her glistening eyes are bent and staring, 
 take on such dubious phases of animation, where all the 
 semblance of life lies in the fact that it is now two feet 
 nearer the wigwam than it was two minutes ago. 
 
 And now that we, being in the instance out of the 
 visible form, may move in the muffled footsteps of imagi- 
 gination without arousing the supine braves, let us glide 
 to the rear where we may observe, unobserved, the thing 
 that moves without limbs, that stirs without life. Is she 
 really a witch, this crooked, old, red beldam in the deer- 
 skin smock, naked limbs and moccasined feet? Is she so 
 far mistress of occultism that she can at will displace
 
 204 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 realities and substitute a compound of the invisible 
 essences of things in semblance of material actualities ? 
 Witch, conjurer or devil she not only seems to impart 
 life to the inanimate but to guide its movements, and that 
 without word, sign or token. 
 
 The mass, still shapless, is now half erect, and by some 
 unseen movement or device has opened a long gash in 
 the birch wall of the tent, and through the aperture has 
 vanished not vanished only half of its bulk has passed 
 into nothingness, or through the slit, while half remains 
 outside, a thin, flat sheet of sunbrowned wire grass, so 
 light the summer breeze might curvet with it in playful 
 dalliance. 
 
 But hark! That yell! That unearthly screech, such as 
 only a practiced Indian's throat can utter, and such as it 
 utters only when all the sanguinary devilishness of his 
 wild being is in the ascendant. And the whoop is echoed 
 by a chorus of voices which, to the ears of a lounging 
 warrior, means nothing less than scalps. It served to 
 string every fibre of the loungers' systems, and with a 
 bound every brave, with ready tomahawk, stands upon 
 the defensive. 
 
 Toward the lake is, or was, an open flat of green- 
 sward, no place for concealment, no possibility of an 
 ambush, and there by the lake shore stood a trio of 
 warriors in Quinsigamond war paint and wampum; stood 
 brandishing their tomahawks, and by their gestures 
 daring the veterans to come out of camp. 
 
 With a certainty that all was as it seemed, it would
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 205 
 
 have required no second summons from a trio of madmen 
 to call the Washakims out, but as it was, they had no 
 intention of hazarding what might prove an unequal 
 assault, to punish an insult. They were too cautious; 
 something more serious than whoops, menaces or defiance 
 must be offered to induce an action, but they moved 
 down to reconnoitre. The ruse had answered the object 
 of the design. The Washakims had halved the space 
 between the tents and where the strangers stood when 
 another peal from one of those rawhide throats broke out 
 in the very heart of the camp and set the squaws and 
 children, all but the old squaw, flying like frightened 
 partridges, each for a hiding in some thicket. 
 
 Has she, the old squaw, wrought a miracle? or how 
 came three warriors, one of them a white man, stepping 
 through the slit in the wigwam ? 
 
 The now cut cords of rawhide have brought blood to 
 the wrists since last they drew rein on Pompey, and one 
 chiefs face will make old Wigwan burn with delight if 
 it ever gets there. 
 
 As the last menace, the war whoop from the camp, broke 
 upon the startled ears of the little garrison it seemed more 
 like real business, and the warriors caught at the idea 
 that they were ambuscaded. No time was to be lost in 
 making their way back to the circle of wigwams, where 
 they might better act on the defensive. 
 
 But all is quiet again; no sight, no sound of an enemy 
 in or about the lodge. If any have been there neither
 
 206 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 squaws nor children have seen them. They heard the 
 whoop they ran and hid no more. 
 
 Wonder began now to displace a warrior's usual 
 impulses and anticipations. Even the three strangers by 
 the lake were gone, up, or down, no one knew whither, 
 no one had seen them cross the lawn. They had dis- 
 appeared as mysteriously as they came. The Washakims 
 could look far into the forest except in the line of the 
 hazel thicket, but they were not there. That had been 
 probed. No soul was in sight except the old sorceress. 
 She stood leaning against a chestnut tree fast asleep; and 
 deeper became the mystery when one warrior espied the 
 bunch of dried grass curiously plaited. It was merely 
 grass without shape or form and with nothing to indicate 
 a use or design, and yet it had a meaning, it had been 
 subjected to the manipulations of art. But now it is all 
 out clear as daylight, the slit in the tent wall, the cut 
 thongs, the vacant wigwam. Two prisoners have escaped. 
 A white man and a red, and they the two greatest 
 warriors in all the Nipnet country. Two doughty chiefs 
 as ever threw a tomahawk or cast an eye along an iron 
 barrel are free to contrive and execute vengeance upon 
 Washakim. You may hunt for them but you will never 
 find them. 
 
 The old squaw sleeps on through all your vexation.
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 c 
 
 THE COUNCIL AT SAGATABSCOT. 
 
 IN the settlement of Marlborough great indignation 
 was expressed at the obduracy of Sergent in remaining 
 with his family at the plantation in spite of the many 
 warnings and heedless of the terrible danger that 
 encompassed them. Marlborough people said it was 
 worse than foolhardiness; said it was a vain attempt to 
 vaunt his courage; that his declared determination to 
 remain was an inexcusable piece of bombast, unworthy of 
 a man of his acknowledged sense, and without delay 
 they called an indignation meeting at which, after a hasty 
 consideration, it was decided to send a detachment of 
 soldiers to Sergent' s house and bring himself and family to 
 Marlborough whether he would or no. 
 
 The pastor, Meekman, on whose motion the vote had 
 been taken to perform what was at best a disagreeable 
 task, not to say a dangerous one, now the Indians were 
 in full possession, volunteered to place himself in the 
 ranks as one of the twelve men to perform the duty, and 
 as the remaining eleven positions were quickly filled, the 
 list being headed by Ephraim Curtis and Jim Pyke, a 
 choice of commanding officer was in order, and by a vote 
 of the squad Curtis was named.
 
 208 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 The following day, Thursday, was fixed upon to put 
 the scheme in execution, to remove the family, and to 
 place Sergent under arrest should he prove in any sort 
 contumacious. They should not have waited for the 
 morrow, but the way was unbeaten and blind, and an 
 ambush was believed to be imminent. 
 
 It was Wednesday, the day of the meeting in Marl- 
 borough, that a party of seven warriors set out from the 
 south border of Washakim forests, where the Quinna- 
 poxit (now the Nashua River) skirts the upper intervale. 
 
 Five of this party were the picked men of the tribe of 
 Quinsigamond and had been from Wigwam Hill on duty as 
 scouts fora fortnight, subsisting upon raw flesh, roots, and 
 such low growing berries as ripen in the later spring 
 months. But they were accustomed to spare diet and 
 uncooked food when circumstances made it hazardous to 
 induce a column of smoke, and could readily abstain 
 altogether from food or other nourishment than water, if 
 need be, for a week at a time, with no visible effect upon 
 their constitutions, so much does discreet practice of priva- 
 tion inure one to endurance. 
 
 The sixth one of the party, as is already surmised, was 
 the chief, Wandee, while the seventh was a painted 
 warrior, fully armed and accoutred as an Indian except 
 that he carried a rifle and left the trail of a white man. 
 
 The one thing belonging to an Indian that a white 
 man could never fairly counterfeit was his trail. He 
 might learn to take fifty consecutive steps in true aborigi-
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 209 
 
 nal form, and the fifty-first would betray the pseudo 
 savage. When he stood he looked the Indian, saving 
 perhaps he was too erect. A perpendicular line from the 
 top of any Indian's head would fall outside and in front 
 of his body, and this peculiarity is still more noticeable 
 in the lope, the Indian's favorite mode of locomotion, for 
 where a white man leans forward, the savage crouches, 
 runs low down. Again, his shoulders are rarely if ever 
 square, nor well set back, giving prominence to the chest, 
 for, however well made up, his whole appearance is 
 slouchy. Lastly, for a difference in this case, the eyes 
 were off color. 
 
 We first saw this party rising Maiden Hill. Having left 
 the Quinnapoxit River they crossed its tributary, Tide 
 Brook, over Winter Hill, and down the divide between 
 Winter and Stonehouse Hill to the junction of the streams 
 Beaver and Tehassit (now Tatnuck Brook), fording the 
 Packachoag or Half Way River, passing under the hill, 
 by the river to its junction with the Bimelick, and cross- 
 ing to Sagatabscot Hill. 
 
 This long, circuitous route was chosen by advice of the 
 scouts, who had learned through a strolling Indian that 
 an immense cordon of Indians were closing in upon 
 Wigwam Hill, having been posted that morning by the 
 Ontario chief at the request of Tehuanto, who saw his 
 opportunity to crush the hated Quinsigamonds by sheer 
 force of numbers. 
 
 The line of pickets posted this Wednesday numbered 
 two hundred, and was, on the following Friday, aug-
 
 210 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 merited by the four hundred who had been detailed to 
 capture or kill Sergent and family in the meantime. The 
 line extended from the north end of the lake to Weasel 
 Brook, thence south four miles to the Packachoag, under 
 the brow of the hill. By the route the seven scouts and 
 fugitives had taken they had crossed an immense trail 
 and had heard in the distance sounds of hilarity, a thing 
 unusual and unaccountable, as the Hill Indians had no 
 conception as to the cause. The trail was evidently made 
 by mixed Indians, as was seen at many points by the 
 difference in stride. The Northmen stepped short, 
 straggled, and altogether made an awkward path, if that 
 can be called a path where the footsteps cross and 
 wriggle from side to side, much as a herd of strange cattle 
 would do, and altogether unlike homing kine. Most of 
 the steps differed entirely from the sweeping stride of the 
 Nipnets and their southern neighbors the Narragansetts 
 and Pequods. 
 
 Passing the summit of Sagatabscot Hill the seven 
 came upon a log house, half fort, half domicile, and in 
 front of it Digory Sergent at work mending an ox yoke 
 which he must use on the morrow in hauling his family 
 and effects to Marlborough, for it was beyond his knowl- 
 edge that all customary egress from his clearing had been 
 effectually cut off. 
 
 The surprise, not to say consternation, that fell upon 
 one of the party as he heard from Sergent the fate (so far 
 as he was able to judge) of the plantation, was clearly
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 211 
 
 visible under the paint of the blue eyed warrior, for even 
 the scouts were not until now aware of it, 
 
 They knew of the cordon, and had suspected a siege, 
 but not recognizing, from their stolen views, any familiar 
 faces, they had thought it prudent not to reveal them- 
 selves merely to gratify curiosity. Strolling Indians had 
 told them in the morning of the line of pickets, but had 
 said nothing, perhaps knew nothing, of the burning of 
 the settlement, and such ignorance was quite accountable 
 from the fact that many of these native tramps often came 
 from great distances, and frequently in nearly direct 
 lines, following stars by night, and signs of bark and 
 bough by day, collecting and dispensing news from tribe 
 to tribe, and they were quite too wary to place themselves 
 within the power of strange men, with strange paint and 
 wampum, who spoke at best an unintelligible heathen 
 gibberish. 
 
 The white man in war paint fixed his eyes upon the 
 ground, bent his head and leaned upon his rifle, for a 
 moment dumb and apparently confused, but the six 
 Indians scarcely seemed to listen to Sergent's tale of fact 
 and surmises, or at most treated it with indifference, and 
 yet not an Indian of them but would have fought to the 
 death for that same plantation. Had they not for several 
 of the last days hazarded life every hour, gone cold by 
 night and hungry by day to secure the liberty of a 
 planter and the planter's friend? 
 
 But they were Indians, and how could an Indian
 
 212 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 harbor astonishment to a degree obvious in face or 
 gesture ? 
 
 By this time Wandee, whom the reader long since 
 recognized, was seated with the scouts upon a log, list- 
 lessly gazing away into space; thinking, perhaps, but 
 with no facial tokens of thought; sitting with that stolid, 
 changeless look, where expression was ever absent, absent 
 except in quick, desperate action, when ferocity beamed 
 like lightning through a bank of clouds and passed as 
 soon. 
 
 Digory, still oblivious to the fact that the pseudo 
 Indian was other than a real red warrior in Quinsigamond 
 war paint, and even failing, for some unaccountable 
 reason, to recognize the chief sitting upon the log, was 
 now beckoned by Captain John toward the door of the 
 house. 
 
 This last act, at this time, with war first in his mind 
 and last in his ears, was a trifle too great a strain upon 
 Sergent's hospitality. He had little dread of only a few 
 Indians while his old musket was by his side, even 
 although this one intruder carried a rifle, for the scouts 
 had taken the precaution, partly at the old squaw's sug- 
 gestion, to take one from the Hill, not even guessing 
 approximately the purpose for which she had designed 
 it. 
 
 It was all right with Digory so long as the Indians 
 would keep together, and at a respectful distance from 
 the house, but woe to the red-skin who should venture, 
 uninvited, to pass the invisible bound, for there was a
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 213 
 
 limit to Digory's faith in Indians, and by a quick step he 
 placed himself by the doorway and brought his musket, 
 rifle, he called it, to a level with the captain's head, and 
 so suggested a bar to progress. Barred out, the lord of 
 the Castle Tavern that was, and lord of a sweet life that 
 is behind the walls of Digory's Castle and by that barri- 
 caded door. But Sergent's act was well enough. It 
 was his house, and the intruder was an Indian. Would 
 Sergent fire? or would he shrink? He falls back 
 astounded, amazed, scowling his fettered rage, for lo! 
 the Angel of Sagatabscot, the little blue-eyed Susan has 
 fallen forward and is sobbing aloud upon the brown 
 bosom of the make-believe savage. 
 
 There are no eyes so penetrating as love. Suspicion 
 and jealousy scrutinize, hate scowls contempt, looks 
 askance, but love leaps in at the eye takes possession 
 and occupies. 
 
 Digory Sergent was confounded, mortified; confounded 
 by a sequel so unexpected mortified at his own stupidity, 
 for he now saw all, and realized his dull perception and 
 his rude inhospitality. Dress, color, and every conceiv- 
 able aid which Indian cunning and white man's art 
 could devise and procure had all been pressed into service 
 for safety's sake, but all together were but webs of 
 gossamer, transparent as dew to the swiftly divining eye 
 of love. And the joy of that love in the scene of resto- 
 ration brooked no bounds. It was something weird, 
 strange, even awful in its manifestations, as one may 
 guess it will be when loving hearts meet there, over
 
 214 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 beyond, in that border land. For to Susan, John I say 
 was dead, and buried may be, may be left scalpless, a 
 feast for wolves and foxes, or for that black scavenger of 
 earth and air. John Wing, the captain, the might of 
 whose fascination had absorbed the very soul of this belle 
 of the plantation, was dead. Dead in every sense and 
 conception; and young as she, the child widow was, she 
 had even now looked to the beyond for the next meeting. 
 And might not this then be that beyond ? Could she 
 trust her eyes to see him living whom she knew, or 
 thought she knew, to be in that other life? She was 
 startled at her own reflection; frightened at the thought 
 that this sweet scene might prove a blank hallucination. 
 She unclasped his form and sallied back, filled with some- 
 thing akin to dread. Started back and stared, half 
 chiding herself for the presumption that dared to fondle 
 with an apparation. But no. It was no dream, no cruel 
 phantom dallying with desire, and she might give full 
 rein to rapture. 
 
 Digory, for his incivility made ample amends, as virile 
 natures make amends. He shook hands with the captain, 
 clapped him on the shoulder, chuckled over his own 
 purblindness, and charged his faulty vision to the want 
 of his spectacles. That was plenty between two men, 
 however much they love or can love their own sex. A 
 Yankee is no Gaul, to embrace and kiss his man. He 
 reserves such excess of tenderness for more appropriate 
 objects. 
 
 Between Sergent and the captain the purpose of the
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 215 
 
 settlers in so abruptly abandoning the settlement, if in- 
 indeed they were not murdered there, with the immediate 
 causes which led to the determination, were, of course, 
 only matters of conjecture. That seventy or more able 
 bodied men should have succumbed, even to two or three 
 hundred heathens, was, to old Digory, inconceivable, but 
 to the captain the Hill Indians' warning, as related by 
 Sergent, coupled with discoveries by the divining eye of 
 Wandee, who had pronounced the great trail seen in the 
 morning as made chiefly by the short men of the north, 
 gave the clue not only to the hasty abandonment and the 
 burning of the settlement, but also to whom the six mile 
 line of pickets was indebted for its numbers. 
 
 To what extent the settlers escaped harm in the catas- 
 trophe was as much an enigma to Sergent as to his guest, 
 for not an Indian, not even a friendly Packachoag, had 
 cast his shadow on Digory 's clearing since the fatal 
 night. 
 
 It had probably been deemed prudent by Sagamore 
 John to effect neutrality, and however much the old 
 chief, who had been a leader in preaching of the new 
 dipensation, might have been horrified at practicing 
 ordinary deception, he had been no inapt pupil in border 
 politics and understood the saving limits of diplomacy. 
 
 That which most of all puzzled Sergent and the cap- 
 tain, and for a moment seemed to interest Wandee 
 sufiiciently to make him half turn his head towards the 
 speakers, for he had been an attentive listener to the 
 terms of the conference, was the fact that not a Hill
 
 2l6 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 Indian had been on Sagatabscot, notwithstanding that 
 they must have known that Sergent had remained, as 
 not a squirrel could bark but a Hill Indian or a praying 
 Packachoag would hear it. 
 
 "What can be the reason, Sergent, that the Hill 
 Indians have neglected to notify you of what has 
 happened? They knew just how you were situated. The 
 planters would tell them, for more than one Quinsiga- 
 mond has taken a run to Marlborough before this. ' ' 
 
 " Possibly, John, none of the Hill Indians have been 
 to Marlborough. Or it is among the possibilities that 
 the planters themselves never left their homes alive." 
 
 " What do you mean Sergent ? " 
 
 " Simply that we are absolutely in the dark. They 
 may have been scalped in their beds. I despair of ever 
 guessing right again about anything out of gunshot of this 
 clearing er mine. ' ' 
 
 " And I am as much at sea as you. Wandee, can the 
 Hill Indians have dug up the hatchet? Can they, after 
 all, have sided with Philip ? " 
 
 "Hill Injun no dig up hatchet, you guess," said 
 Wandee, without turning, his sight still bent skyward. 
 "King's men got ear; king's men got eye. Big heap 
 woods down Quinsig. King's men watch. Hill Injun 
 stay home. Him no big fool. Come long way roun', 
 you guess. ' ' 
 
 "Well, if that is the case," said the captain, "the 
 woods full of Indians, you and I and the five scouts stand 
 a poor chance of getting to the Hill at present."
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 21 7 
 
 " No so sure. No very bad. Sky all cloud; see! No 
 moon now, watch two free in place. King's men bad 
 watch. Canadaw men, heap long way up. Do' know 
 woods, do' know lake. Cap'n got good ear, hear 'em; 
 scouts got tomahawk, git 'em scalp. Do' know, mebbe." 
 
 " Well, Wandee, I 'm a private. This is your march. 
 I can risk scalping if you can." 
 
 " Me no git scalped. Me got top side. Me know 
 Injun dar; him not know me dar. Me got top side, me 
 keep 'em. Cap'n t'row 'way boots, get moccasin. Dig. 
 got 'um." 
 
 "Yes, John, the Injun's right, I've got a dozen pairs of 
 'em. I take my scalps from t' other end. I never miss a 
 good pair of moccasins when I shoot an Injun." 
 
 At this last remark of Sergent's the Indians never 
 moved a muscle; no witness would have supposed by any 
 obvious recognition on their part that they either heard 
 or heeded it, except, perhaps, as their glances met a 
 suppressed smile which played for a second about the six 
 grim faces. They knew Digory's record, and so long as 
 he respected Quinsigamond scalps, the more he took from 
 either end of an enemy the better they were suited. 
 Digory was a great warrior, and as such they paid him 
 deference in no stinted measure. 
 
 It was now nightfall, and when the darkness fairly 
 settled, they must lose no time in moving on, for with 
 Wigwam Hill their objective point, and that four miles 
 away through an unbroken pathway beset, perhaps, by 
 little bands of a watchful enemy, their movements would
 
 2l8 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 necessarily be slow, and morning, to them, might come 
 too soon. 
 
 Sergent's time for departure had been fixed at ten 
 o'clock the following day, and his proposed route was 
 to pass the south end of the lake, leaving Hassinomissitt 
 on the right. Much of their route would be through a 
 heavy spoonwood and hackmatack thicket, and was little 
 likely to engage the watchful attention of the Northmen. 
 
 Digory's first idea had been to pass by the old, wide trail 
 leading over the hills and direct to Marlborough, but a little 
 reflection satisfied him of its danger, and had reduced his 
 plan from moving with wheels, to back-loading his cattle 
 and beating a path. 
 
 Upon consultation it was arranged that the captain 
 should be in waiting with an escort of Indians, below the 
 lake, at noon, and for an hour they would all proceed in 
 company. 
 
 Wandee, who had apparently been engrossed in a cloud 
 study, now interrupted the conversation. 
 
 "Dig leave ox home. Can't eat 'em. First know, 
 beller. Beller here, all good. Beller mile off, Injun all 
 'roun'. Dig take squaw, take pappoose, take squaw gal. 
 Take no t'ings. Keep hark, go low. Go fo' mile. Den 
 head up march. No want cap'n; cap'n no good; Injun 
 all roun'. No see five, see six. Too much gib. Dig's 
 scalp 'nuff. Cap'n meet 'em on road seven mile. Good! 
 Big talk." 
 
 " What say you, Sergent?" asked John; " shall we use
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 our own judgment or take advice of a man born to the 
 woods?" 
 
 "A woodsman for woodcraft; I begin to doubt my 
 judgment, John. Injun knows Injun." 
 
 " Ah! Dig know some t'ings. Dig old warrior. Dig 
 meet Injun, meet free, dem scout; meet t'irty, dem war 
 party. Dig good for free. Meet t'irty. Dig no good. 
 Get 'em scalp. Cap'n John can't help 'em. One scalp 
 'nuff." 
 
 "The Injun's right, John; one scalp is enough 
 plenty. ' ' 
 
 ' ' Ugh ! Dig ole warrior. Dig take big heap scalp. Take 
 'em from todder end. Dig, me'n you count scalp. You 
 kine scalp. Cap'n John want one, two, scalp." 
 
 " Yes, Wandee," answered Sergent, "I came near for- 
 getting the moccasins." 
 
 ' ' Ugh ! Dig leave ox ?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " Dig leave f ings?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " Dig tie up dog, gib all 'way; no good; bark wrong 
 time. ' ' 
 
 "All right Wandee. Sorry to leave you, Bose; Injun 
 says you talk too much." 
 
 The sun had set and the clouds were getting blacker 
 and heavier every minute. Darkness came on so soon 
 that a candle must needs be lighted to aid in making a 
 selection from the pile of moccasins. One would guess 
 they were taken at scalping time, for not a moccasin
 
 220 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 but bore plain marks of a sometime copious flow of 
 blood. 
 
 "Ugh! Dig ole warrior. Scalp got big bleed. Bal' 
 head scalp mebbe got ha'r on todder side." 
 
 It would be impossible to make a wild Indian laugh 
 outright, but to say they are not susceptible to the force 
 of humor would belie them. They are not a little greedy 
 of the grimmer type, but are such complete masters of 
 expression as to hold themselves habitually expressionless. 
 
 Wandee could not so far forget his manhood as to smile, 
 but the idea of Digory's scalps was amusing enough to 
 set his tongue dizzy, to say the least. His last remark 
 might not have been intended as a jest, but it certainly 
 savored of one. 
 
 It was now dark, pitchy dark, and the Indians were 
 already outside the little enclosure that Sergent called 
 his front yard, standing wide apart, each taking the wind 
 as it rolled up from the valley on the west, in a steady 
 blast, unobstructed in its course over the eight miles of 
 space which intervened between Sagatabscot and the 
 grand swelling ridge and dome of Asnebumskit in the 
 northwest. The wind, however much broken by the 
 woods, or deflected by hill and hollow, must be their only 
 guide in the darkness; no other indication of course was 
 recognizable, and whatever variations might be induced 
 by mound or swale must be nicely calculated. This was 
 practicable, as the Indians were familar with the precise 
 topography of the section which, by keeping in mind, the 
 rate of progress might at any time correctly assure them
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 221 
 
 of their position. Nothing must now be amiss in the 
 calculation, or who knows but they might walk into the 
 very jaws of a hostile camp. 
 
 John and Susan have parted in good heart and confi- 
 dent of a speedy meeting at Marlborough, for certainly 
 there could be but little to fear now. 
 
 Wandee was master of the situation, so far as the 
 party's short flight was concerned, and he had assured 
 Sergent that once on the way, by the route proposed, their 
 passage was comparatively safe, and the walk, only 
 twenty-six miles, a feat scarce worth the reckoning. 
 
 The mother, Martha, and little Netty, had each in 
 their way, as each thought decorous, taken their leave, 
 and even the baby for there was a new-comer to the 
 house of Digory had been passed by a kiss, through the 
 formality of leave-taking. 
 
 Old Digory fumbled John's rifle, and looked it over by 
 candle light, every now and then casting toward the 
 captain's face a furtive, questioning glance, as much, if 
 rightly interpreted, as to say, "I feel a little shaky do 
 you ? ' ' but he said nothing aloud then to indicate solici- 
 tude. 
 
 " Good night, boys," he said to Wandee and the scouts. 
 
 "Good t'ing, old Dig; tie up ox, tie up dog, march low 
 fo' mile. All right." 
 
 "John," said Sergent, hesitating a moment, and seem- 
 ing in an effort to choke back some impediment to speech, 
 "John, there's no use talkin'," and reaching out his 
 hand to the captain's ready, open palm, " my sperits run
 
 222 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 low ter-night. I can't brace up. It ain't because I 'm so 
 old I'm only sixty past, and I ain't no coward, John; 
 you all know that. I 'm ashamed on 't, John, but the 
 fact on't is, John, somehow I can't quite face the music 
 ter-night. Mebbe it's because I've got five lives on my 
 hands. I don't keer a fo' pence ha-penny for my own, 
 but, my God, John! here's mother and the children, and 
 it 's all my fault. I know it, and there's no use er 
 talkin'. It's all my fault. I did wrong in not going 
 away with them sooner. But how was I to know that 
 half er Canada would be about our heels ? I'm afraid it 
 was wicked in me John. I wish I 'd er made 'em go. 
 Tham critters might er killed me, an' they'd er been wel- 
 come ter my scalp, if the women folks was on'y safe." 
 
 "Come, come, now, Sergent, none of this. You acted 
 upon your judgment of conditions; acted in good faith; 
 what more could the best of us do? An error in judg- 
 ment cannot be accounted sin, whatever it entails. Don't 
 be so ready to accuse yourself. But they are moving; 
 good night. To-m0rrow at noon, beyond the Nipuap; 
 lower woods, seven miles. I,uck goes with pluck. Good 
 night!" 
 
 "Take the plantation ridge, John, it's safer than the 
 hollers, and it gives ye the wind. ' ' 
 
 And with this parting injunction old Digory recrossed 
 his threshold and Wandee and his party slid out into the 
 night. 
 
 Good night, Digory! say we, we shall hear of you 
 again in history.
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 THE PARTY OF ARREST. 
 
 THE plantation ridge was reached after crossing the 
 half mile of valley that divided it from Sagatabscot. 
 Great caution was necessary where the Hassinomissitt 
 trail ran between the hills and along the valley, for there 
 Indians might be expected, waiting to intercept any scout 
 sent out from Marlborough. Wandee led, and so noise- 
 lessly that the whip-poor-will started from the ground 
 only when brushed by his muffled foot. The party had 
 gained the ridge and were nearing the summit, when 
 they veered to the right, and passing the clay banks 
 moved directly east, entering the lake forest to the south 
 of the narrows. Hitherto they seemed to have kept their 
 file more by instinct than by aid of any physical faculties, 
 for, to an eye and ear like the captain's no sight or sound 
 was appreciable. Suddenly the white man felt the touch 
 of a hand, from the advance, and the five scouts in his 
 rear seemed to know by intuition that a halt was called. 
 Wandee' s quick ears had detected sounds like those pro- 
 duced by men in sleep; something like hard breathing; and, 
 as he mutely directed his companions to wait, he passed 
 on and could soon scent a dead fire. Could, by listening 
 in such close proximity, count five. But were they
 
 224 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 friends or foes ? They might be Hill Indians, being so 
 near, being less than two miles away, and perhaps over- 
 spent with watching might be their excuse for such 
 gross carelessness. 
 
 The Indian's art availed him in ascertaining the truth. 
 A dry twig fell upon the sleepers, and in an instant they 
 were awake and began to murmur. It might be an owl 
 had lighted upon a rotting twig that yielded to its weight. 
 The wind might have detached it from an overhanging 
 bough. A coon might have been making its nocturnal 
 round and tried the stick before trusting his weight upon 
 it. Coons do that way. But owl, or wind, or coon, it 
 was all the same. The startled sleepers' strange dialect, 
 as they in an undertone discussed the matter, had given 
 them away. They were the short warriors from the 
 north. It would n't be Indian to attack them now. They 
 must quiet down and sleep again. 
 
 Wandee reported to his party what had happened, and 
 what he had learned. They had murmured in an idiom 
 unknown to the Nipnet. They talked scarcely above 
 a whisper, but the quick ear of the Indian, aided by the 
 occasion of his own devising, found it strange to his 
 vernacular. They growled, might be at coon, or wind, 
 or bird and cuddling closer in their blankets, slept. 
 And the Quinsigamonds wore up to Wigwam Hill that 
 night, five good, green scalps, though not a sound was 
 heard that would startle a fox, where they were harvested. 
 
 The fatigue of thirty miles of prowling necessitated 
 rest, and with every care for their comfort that woman's
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 225 
 
 love and warrior's duty might bestow, they were fed to 
 surfeit for their fasting, and lodged in bear skins until 
 the day should break. 
 
 It has been said the morrow had been fixed upon by 
 the people of Marlborough for the summary removal of 
 the Sergent family, and accordingly, at the earliest 
 glimmer of the dawn a squad of twelve men, including 
 the parson and Jim Pyke, with Ephraim Curtis at their 
 head, took up the line of march, in Indian file, for 
 Sagatabscot Hill, with a route laid out almost identical 
 with the one contemplated by Sergent. By the course 
 they had adopted they were without a beaten trail and 
 were compelled to make their way at great pains, cross- 
 ing swamps covered with stunted, dead and dying cedars 
 and hackmatack tangles, or hillsides nearly as impass- 
 able by reason of spoonwood jungles. But on the other 
 hand they could hope for perfect immunity from hostile 
 bands of savages. 
 
 At four of the clock, reckoned by the sun's place upon 
 the day's dial, the house of Digory Sergent was reached, 
 at the end of a twelve hours' march, but as the little 
 squad drew up in front of it, not a sound broke the awful 
 stillness of the little clearing; not even the bark of a dog, 
 not the lowing of a cow, not the purr of a cat. Some 
 crows sat perched upon the tall chestnuts in front of the 
 house, silent, watching may be; waiting expectant; but 
 at the sight of intruders they flapped their reluctant 
 wings and sailed slowly, noiselessly, disappointedly 
 away. A speckled woodpecker did venture upon the 
 15
 
 226 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 chestnut tree's trunk and peck for a moment, but what 
 was that except something to make silence audible ? to 
 make stillness seem the more profound? to make the 
 lack of sound appreciable ? To the startled ear it would 
 seem like the rattle of close at hand musketry, so sharp- 
 ly it broke out of nothing upon the sense auricular. But 
 she flew away and left no sound, no life. The door of 
 the house was open. The axe was still sticking in the 
 log as it was left by the last blow, and there upon the 
 wood-pile were Digory's hat and coat. Aye! and on the 
 chopping block were pipe and spectacles. Sergent would 
 be out in a minute. He had probably seen them coming 
 and just stepped in to slick up a bit. It would be want- 
 ing in courtesy for the militia to enter uninvited, and 
 much more so to storm his castle until after duly chal- 
 lenging a surrender. But the order of the Justice of the 
 Peace was authority from the colony, and so up to Crown. 
 The order must be obeyed, but it must be done with 
 military precision. 
 
 " Digory Sergent, I, Ephraim Curtis, in the name of 
 the King of England, Ireland, Scotland and the Colonies, 
 more especially the Colony of Massachusetts, command 
 you to appear and peaceably deliver yourself into 
 custody. ' ' 
 
 No answer came from within. No reply to the sum- 
 mons. Sergent might be shaving. They would wait a 
 moment. Curtis was becoming impatient; mistrustful, 
 possibly, that something had gone wrong. Sergent might 
 have anticipated their movement and headed for Marl-
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 227 
 
 borough by some other route. He would not harbor a 
 suspicion that was already forcing itself upon his mind, 
 but being impatient, he shouted : 
 
 " Digory Sergent, come to your door and listen to the 
 reading of a warrant for your arrest and removal to a 
 place of safety. Fail not at your peril !" 
 
 Nothing is heard but echo for response. 
 
 "There is something wrong here," said Curtis to his 
 men. There 's his hat and coat, and his pipe and spec- 
 tacles. The door's ajar, and I'm going in." Saying 
 which, he stepped forward and entered. Two seconds had 
 not elapsed when he reappeared, walking backward, with 
 open palm over his brow, staggering as he came; and 
 when he turned, his face was livid as that of death itself. 
 
 What could have so overcome an old Indian fighter, a 
 soldier? for young as he really was, he had seen as much 
 service as any man in the colony. He had seen men fall 
 and die about him. He had killed red-men and had 
 twice been carried to the rear to save his scalp. Indeed 
 an Indian wore a portion of it at his waistband, as a 
 trophy, and also wore a bullet mark in his shoulder for 
 his presumption. What could have so overcome Curtis? 
 
 Howerever much one may accustom one's self to wit- 
 nessing the horrible, until by his real or affected sang- 
 froid his heart seems turned to stone, and his nerves to 
 steel, yet his mind is ever susceptible to emotional shocks, 
 as new and unlocked for terrors become suddenly apparent. 
 Ephraim Curtis had been startled, and was for the 
 moment bewildered, enfeebled, unmanned. His men,
 
 228 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 fortified against surprise by this intimation of horrors, 
 partly from curiosity, and partly from an instant resolu- 
 tion to accomplish what their leader in a moment of 
 weakness seemed to shrink from, entered at the door. 
 Digory Sergent lay there with his scalp-lock gone, face 
 down, across the broken breech and bent barrel of his 
 rifle; dead upon his own floor. Great gouts of blood and 
 bloody clips of long, black hair, were here and there upon 
 the floor, upon the furniture, upon all about him. Tables, 
 chairs, and other household articles lay scattered about, 
 broken, twisted, split and splintered, and in a far corner, 
 the house dog, a black, undershot jawed, mongrel 
 mastiff lay dead, but with eyes still glaring, still blazing 
 with the green fire of frenzied, canine fury, and in his 
 locked and blood-streaked, frothing jaws, the throat and 
 windpipe of a savage, who lay prone in death, stripped of 
 his breech clout, stiff and stark upon the oaken floor, 
 telling of a dormant ferocity that leaped to his master's 
 aid with all its primitive wildness. 
 
 Sergent 's struggle with the red fiends must have been 
 terrible. A wife and children were in his charge and 
 keeping and he was especially accountable for them, since 
 he had spurned the council and protection of his neigh- 
 bors. Digory fought hard; fought manfully; paid the 
 penalty of his temerity, and slept. 
 
 No member of the family was in or about the house, 
 but shreds of women's clothing, unlocked flints and broken 
 ramrods, gave intimation of a quadruple defense of the
 
 DOOM OF WASHAE1IM. 2 29 
 
 Sagatabscot citadel. It was evident the family had been 
 carried into captivity. 
 
 A hurried council resulted in a resolution to pursue 
 the savages and their prisoners with all possible speed, 
 for it was evident that the bloody work had been accom- 
 plished within the hour, and it was among the possibilities 
 to overtake the perpetrators and effect a rescue. There 
 was now no time even to bury Sergent. They would 
 close the door, that prowling wolf or waiting crow 
 might be cheated of an ugly feast. Nothing could indeed 
 do Sergent harm, but his body must be preserved for 
 decent burial, after they had done their best to shield 
 the defenceless women from the untold horrors which 
 otherwise awaited them. 
 
 Hastily overhauling their equipments, inspecting their 
 pieces, and tightening their belts for rapid work, they 
 struck the Indian off trail (but not without misgivings 
 from what seemed the immensity of numbers) and started 
 in Indian file upon a slow, swinging lope for Packachoag 
 Hill toward which the trail seemed leading. 
 
 Quickly descending the western slope of Sagatabscot, 
 crossing the valley and river, and making a diagonal 
 ascent of Packachoag, they were within an hour at the 
 log house so lately deserted by Gershom Rice and family. 
 
 They found the house not entirely tenantless, as a 
 party of praying Indians had entered it but a moment 
 before and were in temporary occupancy. They had 
 halted for the purpose of cooking by the aid of -the fire- 
 place and what utensils of culinary use might be left,
 
 230 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 the carcass of a coon they had just forced by hand and 
 smoke, from the hollow of a tree. They intended to sup 
 and then make their way as expeditiously as possible to 
 Wigwam Hill to report the day's disaster, of which they 
 had, in some way gained knowledge, that by some means 
 (they had but vague ideas of what) the family might be 
 rescued. 
 
 They, the Packachoags, were by no means a fighting 
 people, but they were friendly to the whites, and seemed 
 to think the Quinsigamonds were valorous enough for 
 any undertaking in their friends' behalf. They were 
 now ready to acquaint Curtis with every circumstance 
 that had come to their knowledge. The retreating party, 
 the Packachoags said, numbered several hundred, many 
 of whom were from the North, while a few Nipnets, 
 chiefly Washakims, who, however, took no active part, 
 except as an escort for the women, accompanied them. 
 They said the Washakims were led by a strange warrior, 
 who must have come from a great distance, for his whole 
 manner was unlike anything they had ever seen among 
 the Indians. His face was scratched as if by the upper 
 brush of thickets, which might be, as he always marched, 
 instead of loping like an Indian with bent head, and he 
 often tripped in tangles from toeing out. 
 
 These praying Indians had learned from a straggler or 
 a stroller, that the Washakims, on their return to 
 Tehassit, were to join in a line of pickets that was estab- 
 lished the day before, to act in some way against the 
 Hill Indians. That on their return one-half of the
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 23! 
 
 Northmen would start at once for Ontario with the cap- 
 tives, while the other half remained to effect their purpose, 
 whatever that might be, upon the Hill tribe. 
 
 The white men were now too far spent to continue the 
 pursuit, even were it not the height of presumption to do 
 so in the face of facts as presented by the Packachoags, 
 and Curtis determined to quarter in the log house for the 
 night. 
 
 The Packachoags, the sum of whose knowledge of the 
 use of household utensils consisted in observation of the 
 white women at work, as they themselves had hung 
 around the back doors, for the dogs' morsel where 
 there was no dog had swung out the crane and inserted 
 a pot hook under the hamstrings of the coon, thus sus- 
 pending it head downward by each leg, and swinging 
 the crane back to its place had ignored andirons, poker, 
 tongs and fire-slice, and stepping into the wide-mouthed 
 chimney were arranging wood and kindling according to 
 their ideas of domestic economy, while one Indian was 
 industriously rubbing together two sticks which soon 
 smoked at the point of ignition, and a rousing fire was 
 the quick result. The carcass of the coon with its pelt 
 still on, and its entrails all in position as when on its 
 last noctural round it disturbed the mother robin and 
 stretched out its prehensile paw to retrieve the only 
 remaining egg, while the hair, what remained, was crisp- 
 ing and curling, or passing up the chimney flue in smoke 
 was simmering and stewing, dripping its ammoniacal 
 odorous fat upon the coals and rapidly scorching on the
 
 232 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 outside until it reached the inviting hue of the chimney 
 back, when one very hungry Indian, the self-constituted 
 toast-master of the occasion, called out: "Done, Injun. 
 Done, goot." 
 
 An Indian is always hungry, rarely feasts, and seldom 
 sees food enough before him at any one time to produce 
 a surfeit. Indians always eat when food is at hand, 
 against the next day's chances. This carcass, which 
 might have weighed eighteen pounds, was quartered, and 
 the four aboriginal Christians fell at once to tearing the 
 still bloody flesh with teeth and fingers, and having made 
 a hasty dessert of the less fibrous portion, and pounded 
 the bones into pomace to eat as dressing, were soon out- 
 side this tidbit of a roast. 
 
 Being in a manner not extravagant for an Indian, 
 refreshed, and after giving audible thanks, a custom of 
 invariable observance among the converts, one which 
 usually consumed time in the ratio of two to one of eat- 
 ing if white men were within hearing these Indians 
 who could at the same moment turn one eye to devotion 
 and the other to theft, rising refreshed and happy as 
 Indians can be after feeding upon only four pounds of 
 flesh and bones each, commended the Marlborough 
 soldiers to the kindly keeping of the Great Father of men, 
 and slouched off into the night, with their moccasins 
 pointed towards Wigwam hill. 
 
 Curtis and his men camped upon the floor that night, 
 each wrapped in his blanket, and dreamed dreams of the 
 living, but dreams so wide away from at least one reality,
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 233 
 
 that six hostile Indians 1 in the cellar of that same house, 
 penned in by the soldiers who lay stretched upon the trap 
 door, listened all night long to the threatful mutterings 
 of that armed dozen who slept, and before the sun was 
 an hour high walked away unmolested. 
 
 As the stars that had been gleaming in the leaden blue 
 over the Hassinomissitt hills began to glimmer and go 
 out one by one before the glowing, yellow sheen that 
 slowly crept up from the horizon, Curtis and his file of 
 soldiers raked open the ashes over that huge bed of coals, 
 which, after the converts' leave-taking, had kept the 
 smouldering back-log and fore-stick and that bushel of 
 red hot coals alive since the Indians supped, and casting 
 on a mass of brush wood, placed the contents of a small 
 bag of corn meal in the great iron pot, added a quantity 
 of water and a sprinkling of salt, placed the thick dough 
 in a tin kitchen before the fire, and waited. This was 
 the half hour for council. Would it be judicious to 
 attack a party of several hundred Indians, if indeed they 
 could be overhauled before reaching camp ? That was 
 the question. 
 
 "Decidedly no!" was the verdict of Curtis. "It 
 would be presumptuous to the last degree. It would be 
 sure death to every man of us to attack such a number of 
 Indians, even in their sleep; Indians prepared for any 
 
 1 Six Indians of the raiding party not yet recovered from the 
 effect of the last nighf's debauch were confined in Rice's cel- 
 lar by the white men who slept unconscious of their presence 
 stretched over the trap in the floor.
 
 234 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 emergency of hostilities, to watch, to defend, to assault, 
 and to cover retreat." 
 
 He had yet to hear, and that soon, of an equally rash, 
 but successful feat, and that accomplished by what he 
 would term "only an Indian." 
 
 But in this case the parson would fain proceed to ' ' smite 
 the enemies of God with the edge of the sword." His 
 blood was up ; he was no coward, neither was he vain- 
 glorious. He did nothing for self-exaltation, but every- 
 thing in the fear of the Lord, whose mortal subject and 
 living representative he for the hour was. 
 
 " And hath not the I^ord said 'Vengeance is mine; I 
 will repay ? ' What can this text mean, but that ven- 
 geance taken on these heathen idolaters will bring to 
 this, the seed of Abraham, recompense? " 
 
 The parson's whole physical, mental, and moral consti- 
 tution thrilled, burned to execute judgment upon the 
 enemies of God, regardless of personal consequences. 
 
 And Jim Pyke, the quiet, unobtrusive, peace-loving 
 Jim Pyke ; the conscientious delinquent in canonical re- 
 quirements; conscientious by nature and early teaching, 
 delinquent through habitual carelessness; Jim Pyke was 
 on his nerve this early A. M. He had a wife and children 
 whom he loved, but his love was a generous passion, 
 reaching out to that extent that it embraced all in whom 
 love, as a sentiment or passion, was a welcome habitant. 
 Digory Sergent's "women folks " had many to love them. 
 They were white, and therefore were capable of loving. 
 But Jim Pyke believed in his heart that to like was the
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 235 
 
 highest phase of affection's development in an " Injun," 
 and therefore Jim and the Injun couldn't affiliate. 
 
 Said Jim, "sail inter that ar Injun camp like a wadge 
 inter a log. Go fer the very heart on 't save the women 
 folks ef yer ken, an' if ye karn't, then kill as many er 
 them ar critters as yer ken, and die happy." 
 
 But Curtis' authority, if not his counsel, prevailed. He 
 believed in saving his ammunition for some better, future 
 promise. 
 
 And so the file of soldiers that marched up to Packa- 
 choag yesterday marched back again to-day and left the 
 six hostile Indians, who had lain concealed in the cellar 
 through the night, free to follow the trail of their com- 
 rades, unmolested.
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 MIDNIGHT ASSAUI/T. 
 
 EVENTS were being crowded into a narrow compass. 
 
 Within seventy hours the Castle had been attacked, 
 the garrison had retreated upon Marlborough, and the 
 plantation buildings had been laid in ashes. Sergent had 
 been persuaded to remove to Marlborough, Captain Wing 
 and the Chief Wandee had been rescued from captivity; 
 Tehuanto, the Washakim, had bargained with the On- 
 tario chief to reduce the Hill tribe; Archer, the missing 
 guest of the captain, in or out of the flesh, had more 
 than once put in a mystical appearance, and disap- 
 peared as strangely and as soon. The line of siege to 
 Wigwam had taken position. The captain and Wandee 
 had visited Sergent at his house; Sergent had been scalped 
 and his family taken captives, and Susan was practically 
 the prisoner of Eugene Archer, in an Indian camp. 
 
 On the day fixed upon for Sergent' s retreat upon Marl- 
 borough, Captain Wing set out with the sun four hours 
 high, having in view to cross the path of the family 
 when nearest Hassinomissitt and accompanying them for 
 a few miles, or until, having passed the pathless swamps 
 and spoonwood thickets, they would be less in need of 
 such assistance as he might be able to render. Having
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 237 
 
 crossed the lake at Wigwam, in a canoe, he worked his 
 way down the glens and over swamps until he found 
 himself at the point where the lower lake breaks away 
 and flows with rapid run to the valley of the Nipnap. 1 
 
 He was assuredly in good time; certainly as early as 
 would seem possible for Sergent to reach that point; but 
 not a solitary footprint, not a sign of a trail was to be 
 seen running to eastward. There was a trail, but the 
 dews had fallen since it was made. It was a white man's 
 trail; the trail of several such; and it ran with the sun. 
 There were many evidences that no party of Indians 
 ever made it. There was turning out in several ways to 
 pass the same obstruction, no care for keeping file; 
 straggling, as if each man would select his way, and 
 where the trail was kept by file, it was all too wide. 
 
 What could have been the purpose of a few white men 
 passing to westward, and in the face of overwhelming 
 numbers of the enemy, was past comprehension. That 
 they were very few was certain. An Indian could have 
 numbered them by the variation of footprints in the ten- 
 der sod of early summer, but to do that exceeds the 
 skill of any but a born woodman. How should the cap- 
 tain be able to guess upon what errand these white men 
 were sent, since all the happenings at Marlborough, and 
 much of what had been done hereabouts, were in his 
 mind a blank. 
 
 1 The Half-way River joins the Bimelick at Quinsigamond 
 Village, and the Blackstone or Nipnap at Fisherville, nine miles 
 south of the city of Worcester.
 
 238 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 The day wore on. The night came on, and Sergent 
 with his charge made no appearance. Something was 
 wrong. There was but one way to act. He must return 
 at once to Wigwam, call out a force sufficient for offensive 
 or defensive work, and proceed without delay to ascertain 
 why Sergent had delayed retreat. 
 
 The moon rose with the set of sun, and the moon was 
 up two hours high when the birch canoe landed the 
 nervous, anxious captain at the foot of Wigwam. A 
 brief and sorry tale met him as he stepped on shore. 
 A tale that made the blood at first recoil from the surface 
 and roll back upon its intermittently palpitating source. 
 A tale that seemed to choke the breath and chill the 
 heart with horror; but a moment later the blood bounded 
 flushing to the face, tingling to every extremity and 
 indicating an already half- formed purpose, and a dis- 
 position to execute it. There is no specific for a suffering 
 soul or body like a counter-irritant. A suddenl)^ 
 awakened spirit of revenge; a new conception of a danger- 
 ous hazard; a startling surprise; will in a moment, lull 
 an ache or sear a wounded heart and start it on the way 
 to convalescence. 
 
 Wandee met the captain at the water's edge. 
 
 " Cap'n, new t'ing. Heap bad, Cap'n." 
 
 "Speak out, Wandee. I am prepared. I half 
 expected Sergent had been besieged, or watched, or 
 some such hindrance placed upon him, but speak out 
 what is it?" 
 
 " Cap'n shut ear. Say Wandee never tol' him. Cap'n
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 239 
 
 git mad. Cap'n swear. Feel all better. Den open 
 ear." 
 
 " Oh, speak; out with it ! What have you to say that 
 my ears will shrink from hearing ? ' ' 
 
 "But Cap'n will. Cap'n swear; say dam heap bad 
 Injun! Say cuss say God. Call Great Spirit 'less 
 Cap'n turn whiter 'n moon." 
 
 " Don't kill me with words, Wandee." 
 
 " Heap bad, Cap'n. Old Dig los' scalp." 
 
 ' ' I feared as much. And the mother and daughters ? ' ' 
 
 "All gone. Injun got 'em off; gone long way. Kill 
 pappoose up Tehassit. Prayin' Injun say all t'ings." 
 
 "What Indians did this? Where from? Where 
 gone ? ' ' 
 
 "Cap'n lif head, look up sky. Cap'n swear! Say 
 heap dam' bad Injun ! Cap'n no squaw; Cap'n swear, 
 big swear nen shut teeth. ' ' 
 
 "Goon, Wandee." 
 
 "Big lot Injun. Injun from col' country, way up; 
 top ribber; top big lake. Injun go no furder; 'way up 
 Ontary." 
 
 ' ' Which way went they from Tehassit ? ' ' 
 
 "Go up 'Bumskit. Go home, Ontary. Some go 
 Washakim." 
 
 ' ' Were the Washakims with them ? ' ' 
 
 " 'Bout hundrd you guess. Strange Injun dar. Him 
 look up sky all time. Him no look down same 's Injun. 
 Him chief. Him toe out. No say no talk all time." 
 
 ' ' Could you make out his tribe ? ' '
 
 240 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 ' ' Guess got no tribe. Mohawk, mebbe. Mebbe 
 spirit bad spirit. Do' know. Him no talk Ontary, 
 no talk 'tall. Him witch; him devil; him no Injun. 
 Injun no look up all time." 
 
 " Of course Tehuanto dare not keep the women, and 
 so near his old prisoners. ' ' 
 
 "Tehuanto t'ink him got prisoners, up Twin Lake." 
 
 " Don't you suppose he knew of our escape ? " 
 
 ' ' How should ? Wandee got fast foot. Up Washakim 
 old mans. No run so quick. Tehuanto see Dig las' 
 night. Dig los' scalp sun up tree high." 
 
 'Who brought the story ? " 
 
 " Packachoag meetin' men. Him say all story. Pack- 
 achoag steal. Packachoag no lie. Packachoag pray 
 for meat; nen steal it. Packachoag tongue all true; say 
 Injun have war dance up Tehassit, 'fore soon." 
 
 ' ' When is the war dance ? ' ' 
 
 " Dis time, moon-up tree high. Meetin' men say 
 story. Say Washakim go home, no take white squaw." 
 
 ' ' Curse these red heathen ! no sooner out of one mis- 
 chance than they manage to bring on another. But if 
 they get to Ontario with whole scalps they will do bet- 
 ter than I think. That is, if they take those women. ' ' 
 
 " Goot 'nuf, Cap'n John ! Big brave Cap'n ! Cap'n 
 git mad; swear some; hope some; feel better." 
 
 I will follow those Ontarios; will any Hill Indian vol- 
 unteer to accompany me ? ' ' 
 
 " Cap'n say book words, no un'stan. Cap'n say go? 
 say fight ? Wandee go too. Go one, two days. Heap
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 241 
 
 Injun over hill yon. Big fight mebbe. Cap'n sleep, call 
 Cap'n moon half up. Wandee call council. If go, go 
 quick like deer. Big talk Injun tired." 
 
 ' ' Well, I must wait, and rest while I can sleep may 
 be. May be my last sleep. No matter; it is do or die 
 this time. ' ' 
 
 The programme, as contemplated, and privately ar- 
 ranged by Philip, including the destruction of various 
 settlements near at hand, had so far been carried out to 
 the end. 
 
 Nothing now remained to do for the present, or until 
 the whites, goaded beyond endurance, should assume 
 the offensive, a thing sure to happen, and as the Indians 
 were at once to disperse, no way would be left for the 
 enemy but to send out detachments of armed men to 
 chastise the marauders, each tribe in or about its own 
 lodge. And this was precisely what the great chief 
 wanted, as it would materially weaken the defensive 
 force in Boston and the large towns, and so, when by 
 preconcertion the savages should concentrate upon this 
 and that point, the effective force of the enemy remaining 
 was unlikely to be competent for successful resistance. 
 
 So adroitly had the scheme been fashioned, and so 
 successfully initiated, that it is more than likely, had it 
 not been for the despicable treason of men of his own 
 color and races, who to curry favor for the cheap praise 
 or miserable pittance the white man might bestow, 
 betrayed him at several points his great enemy would 
 16
 
 242 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 have been effectually wiped from this part of the conti- 
 nent. 
 
 However terrible would have been such a result, and 
 unfortunate for mankind at large, no fair-minded man 
 can fail to sympathize with the great chief, surnamed the 
 king, and to hold in abhorrence the red miscreant who 
 slew him, at bullet range, from his hiding place. That 
 the viper whom Philip had nursed, should, in fawning 
 upon the white man, sting his friend and leader to the 
 death. 
 
 The Indians now, by Philip's order, each made his 
 way to his natal lodge, and Philip, who had been active 
 only as the master spirit of design, retired to Mount 
 Hope, there to remain until time was ripe to sound the 
 call for completion of the work of devastation and death. 
 
 The reduction of the Hill Lodge was a private scheme 
 of Tehuanto's, participated in by a portion of the North- 
 men, partly for the love of excitement, and partly as a 
 compliment to the Washakim by the Ontario chief. 
 
 The Washakims must now go out upon the line which 
 was to close in upon Wigwam Hill, ready to make 
 attack when some propitious moment or circumstance 
 should seem to invite it; for to make assault upon the 
 fortified hill without some unusual advantage, even with 
 five times the opposing numbers, would seem, to such as 
 knew the force and temper of the Quinsigamonds, 
 extremely hazardous. 
 
 The Ontarios, to the number of three hundred, had 
 been in line for a day, as were a scattering few from
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 243 
 
 several of the Nipnet tribes, although the majority of 
 such had but little stomach for the undertaking, as they 
 had no private wrongs to redress. 
 
 The remainder of the Ontarios, about an equal number 
 with those posted, were to move on the morrow for home, 
 taking with them the white captives, and accompanied 
 by Archer, who was still in war-paint, and as yet 
 unrecognized by the Sergents. 
 
 Like other people, the Indians must celebrate the con- 
 summation of their scheme, and to do this effectually 
 they were as well prepared as ever Indians were, and 
 their methods were the same the average white man 
 adopts. 
 
 Alcohol must be the propulsive force by which they 
 would be blown to the seventh heaven of hilarity. Their 
 enemies, all within twenty miles, were dead, and their 
 habitations smoking in ruins. The merits of the feud 
 inaugurated by the Washakims against the Hill Indians, 
 the Northmen knew little of, and they cared less, but 
 their chief had promised and they would keep faith. 
 
 Rum, that glorious inspirator, the only gift of civiliza- 
 tion an Indian could appreciate and really prize, was 
 ample in quantity for the present, and nothing remained 
 but to revel to their full content in one grand glorious 
 war dance before bidding adieu to the Asnebumskits and 
 the Washakims, and starting on their long, back trail for 
 the wild borders of the great northern lake. 
 
 An Indian war dance has been variously described, but 
 actually varies only in the minor details, all of which are
 
 244 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 simply disgusting items of revelery, often rendered 
 hideous by beastly intoxication, unmatched outside of 
 civilized society, when alcohol is made the basis of un- 
 bridled riot. A word picture of beastliness is not neces- 
 sary to my present purpose, and is certainly foreign to 
 any tastes I have either inherited or acquired, and I pass 
 the scene, merely stating that the Nipnets present, more 
 wary, perhaps because more familiar with the stupefying 
 and nauseous effects of immoderate indulgence, had been 
 less greedy of the stimulant and were able at early morn- 
 ing to report themselves for duty, leaving the Ontarios to 
 sleep off the effects of a deeper debauch. 
 
 It was nearly noon before the Northmen were in con- 
 dition to commence their journey with the prisoners, 
 among whom were the Sergents and three women from 
 Quaboag. Travelling in a northwesterly direction, stag- 
 gering, straggling, romping and still revelling, they 
 reached Asnebumskit Pond, where a portion, numbering 
 perhaps one hundred, camped, being to far spent to pro- 
 ceed, while the remaining two hundred managed to 
 march as far as Pine Hill, two miles away. 
 
 These last took to their blankets where the brook bends 
 under the west brow of the hill, and utterly careless of 
 surprise, since no enemy was within a day's march, 
 abandoned themselves to sleep without even taking the 
 precaution to post a guard. 
 
 And with the same recklessness of consequences, or 
 rather sense of absolute safety, the band at Asnebumskit 
 had been equally remiss in not providing against the
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 245 
 
 possibility of a night assault. But indeed the habit of 
 posting a watch was almost universally ignored by the 
 American savage, who trustfully relied upon the extreme 
 sensitiveness of the ear, or perhaps upon that occult sense 
 which detects a hostile presence without the aid of any of 
 the natural faculties. Extreme watchfulness, even in 
 sleep, is in their wild natures inherent, as in the lower 
 animals. L,ike the wing-weary wild goose, peacefully 
 sleeping on the forest shaded bosom of some lonely cove, 
 motionless except the breeze shall drift him landward, 
 when, with the backward stroke of a single foot, a stroke 
 without thought, without intent, without conscious pur- 
 pose, he regains his position and sleeps on. 
 
 The frogs may pipe, an owl may scream, the katydids 
 dispute all night, he hears nothing, realizes nothing. But 
 let a prowling fox steal near his liquid bower, never so 
 noiselessly, never so softly, and the air is full of motion. 
 A burst, a flutter, a loud honk ! and the little flock, just 
 over the water, is sailing away for the broader bosom of 
 the open lake. Watchfulness, in an Indian, is in no 
 sense a method, as with white men. 
 
 Night had swallowed Asnebumskit and the Pines, and 
 the moon, risen an hour later than sunset, cast at an 
 hour before midnight a dense black shadow upon the 
 western feet of the two hills where the drunken marauders 
 lay encamped. 
 
 At this hour, just before midnight, two parties of 
 twenty Indians each, armed with tomahawks and scalp- 
 ing knives (ordinary sheath knives) , with here and there
 
 246 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 a musket, or a brace of rusty pistols such as from over- 
 use or want of use and defacement had been discarded by 
 the whites and sold to the Indians might have been seen 
 like flitting, indistinct, black shadows, swiftly moving 
 over the ridge to the west of Stone House Hill. 
 
 One of these parties hurrying on in Indian file, is 
 headed by a white man in whom we recognize Captain 
 Wing, while the other is led by no less a warrior than 
 the fierce red chief of Quinsigamond. 
 
 Wandee led, and was on a heavy trail which as yet 
 required but little skill to follow, even in the semi-dark- 
 ness, but as they approached Asnebumskit L,ake, Wandee 
 came to an abrupt halt, and beckoned to the white man 
 to come nearer. 
 
 " Cap'n John, Injun split in two, in free pieces. Go 
 t'ree way, some go up hill 'bout twenty no squaw 
 some go dis way, go for pond; some go nudder way 
 do' know. ' ' 
 
 " And how shall we do, Wandee? " 
 
 " Me know 'fore soon, you guess." 
 
 And with that the Indian bent himself to the task of divin- 
 ing not only the reason for the division, but with which 
 of the two companies the captives had gone. The third 
 one, the party that had ascended the hill, had not taken 
 them, as was evident, but to unravel the trail of the 
 larger masses was no easy task, especially as the rustle of 
 a bush, or the crackling of a twig under foot might 
 betray the hunter and render the whole scheme abortive. 
 
 He started slowly and alone, crouching, feeling his way,
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 247 
 
 cat-like, carefully scrutinizing the left hand trail, but 
 after a moment returned and reported. 
 
 "Big heap Injun go dis way. All sick. All lame. 
 Too much fire-water. Got two squaws. ' ' 
 
 And now he bent himself as assiduously to examine 
 the trail that ran to the northward, by the east side of the 
 hill. He was now absent a much longer time. So long 
 that the white man became uneasy and paced stealthily 
 with his cushioned feet up and down, peering now and 
 then with eyes shaded by his hand from the glaring 
 moonlight, into the thick of the forest where the chief 
 had disappeared. 
 
 The Indians, meantime, seemed perfectly reconciled to 
 the delay, and in no way anxious for their leader, or dis- 
 turbed by his absence; but observing that the captain 
 was too much concerned to be other than an alert 
 watcher, each Indian stood himself up against a tree and 
 slept, as restful, as quietly as he could have done in his 
 own wigwam. 
 
 A full hour had elapsed and yet Wandee had not 
 returned. Fifteen minutes later, and a dark shadow shot 
 out from the cover of some birches apart from the trail, 
 and stood as composedly, as calm and as free from fatigue 
 apparently, as if he had passed the hour in sleep. But 
 he had been to Pine Hill. Had traversed five miles of forest, 
 half of it following a trail of which he could only catch 
 glimpses as the dim light broke through the forest foli- 
 age, and had effectually reconnoitered the enemy's 
 position.
 
 :.!> DOOM OF WASHAKTM. 
 
 "What has happened, Wandee? Why gone so long? 
 Have you made out who and what was on the trail ? ' ' 
 asked the captain, in a scarcely audible undertone. 
 
 "All goot, Cap'n. Goot t'ing, Injun all 'sleep. Got 
 fo' squaw." 
 
 "You saw them, then ? ' ' 
 
 " See squaw, no see face. Do 1 know who she be. You 
 squaw may be dis trail, may be zat trail. Do' know." 
 
 " But what shall we do? If we split we are too weak 
 for either party. If we go together we may fall upon the 
 wrong one. ' ' 
 
 "Me say split. Big heap warrior bot' way. No mind. 
 All sleep, all 5ick, one wake so goot as two sleep. All 
 sick, crawl to brook, drink. Heap drink, mo' dry as 
 two fish." 
 
 "Very well; give me my squad, with the five scouts 
 who cut us loose, and we will take the short trail. But 
 how much time do you want to get back to the Pines ? 
 We must wait till then. ' ' 
 
 ' ' Half time gone so long. Cap' n know. ' ' 
 
 "Half the time it took you to follow the trail and 
 return? Is that it ? " 
 
 'You guess. All goot, Cap'n wait;" and with a 
 wave of his tomahawk the twenty warriors of his squad 
 fell in behind him and disappeared among the birch trees 
 through which Wandee had returned. 
 
 The captain now selected a young warrior, one of the 
 five scouts, an Indian who had guided the rescuing party 
 at Washakim, and after waiting the prescribed half
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 249 
 
 hour, for Wandee's advance, the Indians fell behind the 
 young warrior and started on the trail that led to the 
 pond. 
 
 The trail had been followed at a slow pace but a few 
 minutes when the new leader halted, and falling back 
 beside the captain said in a low voice, " Injun here. No 
 go much fur. All sick. Me go 'lone, see all come 
 back." And with that he glided noiselessly as a snake 
 into the thicket and was lost to sight and sound. He 
 was gone but a moment, and returning reported an 
 encampment just around the brow of the hill and on the 
 shore of the pond. 
 
 Ever} 7 preparation was now made for an assault, and 
 as the moonlight streaming over the hill tops whitened 
 half the surface of the water, leaving the remainder of 
 pond and hill blacker for its brightness, a rush was made 
 for the centre of the camp, and an indiscriminate 
 slaughter commenced. 
 
 The Ontarios, dazed with surprise at the suddenness 
 of the onslaught, and stupefied by the lingering effects of 
 the previous night's debauch, were long in rallying with 
 anything like effect. Indeed they did not rally, save 
 here and there in groups, but such bands or knots fought 
 with the ferocity of wounded wildcats. Fought like 
 furies, but half at random, often mistaking their own 
 men for their assailants. The Hill Indians made no 
 mistakes, except in the initiatory movement; but what 
 could a brook against an avalanche ? They had under- 
 taken too much. They should have relied more upon
 
 250 DOOM OF WASKAKIM. 
 
 stealth and artifice and less upon prowess. They were 
 turned and twisted like individuals in a popular panic, 
 were rocked and rolled in blind obedience to a blinder 
 surge. They became cloyed of useless killing. They 
 could nowhere find the women. As yet, not one of them 
 was badly hurt, although not one escaped contusion. 
 Men whose heavy chests had rarely responded with 
 heaving to an irksome task, now panted like oxen over- 
 spent. But still they kept on, and every now and then 
 some sharp report of firearms cleft its way along the 
 answering wind to meet its countersound that came like 
 echo from the distant pines. The single rifle carried by 
 each of the attacking parties was the only signal that 
 each was busy with its feast of death. 
 
 An alarm was sounded by a Hill Indian. 
 
 " Cap'n down; Wigwam! Wigwam!" and nineteen 
 answering voices shouted "Wigwam!" 
 
 There was a knot of struggling men there was a 
 circle of swinging tomahawks that encompassed it. 
 Whoops and yells on every hand told of dazed Indians 
 groping in the shadow of old 'Bumskit, slaughtering 
 their own kith and kin as the knot and circle made its way 
 out of the thick of the melee, out of the general riot into 
 the deeper darkness of the forest and along the ridge that 
 stretches away toward Rattlesnake Hill on the southeast. 
 
 The Hill Indians were again out of the turmoil and 
 burying themselves deeper and deeper in the forest. But 
 the Northmen would miss them and soon be upon their 
 trail, if any was discernible. Indian art must again
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 25! 
 
 assert itself. To follow one trail would be easy. To 
 follow ten might lead to mistake. If the ten left but one 
 chance in the number to follow the senseless, bleeding 
 form of the wounded white man, it left but confusion 
 when half the trails were made by two or three fugitives 
 abreast, as its necessity or purpose became a woodman's 
 enigma. 
 
 The Hill Indians scattered like turkeys startled by the 
 report of a hunter's rifle, but the route was quickly 
 developed into system. The young scout was more than 
 a warrior was an accomplished tactician. 
 
 And all this while the Pines had been the scene of a 
 pandemonium. The subtle chief had led his braves 
 unobserved to the very spot, to the square rod upon 
 which lay, wrapped each in an Indian blanket, the 
 exhausted white sleepers the four Sergents. The fifth, 
 the baby, 1 had been slaughtered by a savage on the way. 
 The child had been carried in the arms of its wayworn 
 mother. The infant moaned, the mother groaned, and 
 the Indian dismissed the encumbrance. 
 
 In the circle about the captives, close as men can lie, 
 were sleeping Indians. 
 
 As steals the prowling woodscat on its prey, and with a 
 step as noiseless, Wandee had entered the charmed circle, 
 and five picked braves had followed, while their com- 
 panions crouched outside awaiting their chief's success or 
 
 1 The mother lagged from exhaustion. An Indian took the 
 child, tomahawked it and cast it aside.
 
 252 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 his signal for an onslaught. He had contrived to awaken 
 the women, without a sound that would disturb a drows- 
 ing hare. He had used some necromancy charm, some 
 name, some spell of witchcraft, may be, and had led them 
 out of the circle of the guard. But they are scarcely out 
 when little Netty stumbles over a sleeper in the darkness, 
 and the pantomime has ended in an opening tragedy. 
 
 The stout arm of Wandee has caught up Susan, but at 
 the moment an Indian intercepts him. Is it an Indian ? 
 Paint, forest shadows and dusky moonlight combined are 
 insufficient to cheat the searching eye of the Quinsigamond. 
 Two tomahawks meet in the air, and Eugene Archer's 
 glances and flies off, while he reels, and his blood spurts 
 full in the face of the Indian. The name of Wandee, 
 and an Knglish curse are the only retort, as the sound of 
 flying feet bearing the precious burden dies away in the 
 pines far up the hillside. 
 
 The child and the two remaining women are being 
 carried by strong arms, but against overwhelming opposi- 
 tion, for the Ontarios have swarmed like bees upon them, 
 and the Hill men are battling a living wall. It was the 
 Merrimac against the sea; what could it avail? Torn 
 and tossed, stripped of their living booty, five of them 
 down in their moccasins, what could the fifteen do ? The 
 wounded men, screened by the darkness, creep to a 
 thicket and are gone. Three more shoot down the brook 
 to the far away Quinnapoxit. Some fly along the ridge 
 west of Tehassit, some are gone, no one knows whither;
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 253 
 
 gone where Indians dazed with fire-water can never find 
 them. Gone with their scalps. 
 
 And the girl of Sagatabscot is again free, but her 
 rescuer knows not himself which way to fly for safety. 
 Can her freedom be maintained ? Will she escape her 
 swift pursuers? and can her red gallant break the cordon 
 and set her feet upon the soil of Wigwam ?
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 THE FLIGHT. 
 
 BLIND rage succeeded the bewilderment of the previous 
 night, when, at daybreak, it was ascertained by a close 
 examination of the incoming trails, that a mere handful 
 of warriors had not only slain many of their best men, 
 but had created a panic still more fatal, to say nothing of 
 the rescue of a prisoner whose beauty had already so far 
 compromised her safety that the closest watch and con- 
 stant attendance of the head chief had been necessary to 
 protect her from insult if not from outrage. Upon her 
 appearance in Tehassit as a captive, she had been claimed 
 by the rude Ontario chief as his especial, individual 
 property, notwithstanding his engagement with, and prom- 
 ise to, Archer. 
 
 L,ong before daylight the chiefs at Asnebumskit had 
 been to the Pines to compare notes. It was not, however, 
 until sunrise that the fact stared them in the face that 
 not more than two score men had wrought greater havoc 
 with their numbers than had resulted from all the casual- 
 ties that had been met since they crossed the head of 
 L,ake Ontario. Indeed they had been seriously reduced 
 in the number of fighting men, as not only had very 
 many been killed outright, but the score of badly wounded
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 255 
 
 was such as would necessitate some days delay in the 
 homeward march. 
 
 To aggravate this beyond endurance, not a scalp could 
 be counted as part compensation for their loss; as,* 
 although they seemed to know that some of their assail- 
 ants had been killed, yet they must have secured their 
 own scalps, for not a friend remained to secrete them, 
 none could have carried them away, and still not a 
 stranger's face could be found in all that tally of the 
 dead. 
 
 The truth was, none had been killed, nor even wounded 
 beyond the possibility of taking themselves out of the 
 insane melee that was raging. The northern Indians, 
 thanks to rum, surprise and darkness, had done most of 
 their own killing. But the extreme physical efforts of 
 the night had expelled their worst enemy through the 
 pores of the skin. They were no longer under the in- 
 fluence of alcoholic stimulant, nor subject to the after 
 stupefaction of its fumes. They could now think like 
 sane men. 
 
 It was not difficult to guess out the little tribe that had 
 inflicted this terrible chastisement, even if the sober eyes 
 of Archer had not testified to its reality, for Archer was 
 by no means among the dead, although he was suffering 
 from a wound that would forever disfigure his cheek and 
 scalp. Never mind, Eugene, you will have but little 
 further use for beauty. 
 
 Only the Hill Indians could be guilty of this slaughter, 
 and the Northmen in solemn council determined they
 
 256 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 would never again see Ontario until they could wear the 
 best of the Quinsigamond scalps in their girdles. But 
 how were they to get possession of them ? Did the 
 Northmen dare to beard the lion in his den ? To face two 
 hundred warriors in their own stronghold, after a hand- 
 ful, only two score of their warriors, had at the same 
 time entered two hostile camps and managed to kill twice 
 their own number and not leave a scalp ? 
 
 There was, however, a recourse. Already part of 
 their band was aiding the Twin Lake chief to crush out 
 the Wigwam Indians, and they would make the result 
 doubly sure by joining forces with them. Tehuanto had 
 said he held captive the chief of the Quinsigamonds, and 
 also a white man, his friend, and the white man was a 
 great warrior; said that he was keeping his captives for 
 torture; and although Archer had declared that he held a 
 hand-to-hand encounter with the red chief at the hill of 
 Pines only the night before, and was indebted to Wandee 
 and none other for the hideous scalp and cheek wound, 
 yet his say-so went for naught, or at best for a mistake in 
 recognition, for within a day they had parted company 
 with the Washakim, and it was then he had spoken 
 exultingly of his famous captives. How were the two 
 statements so much at variance to be reconciled ? The 
 white man must have been the victim of bewilderment, 
 the result of surprise and uncertainty of vision in the 
 darkness. 
 
 With their great leader and the valorous white man no 
 longer to lead them, they might possibly, indeed they
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 257 
 
 had already done some severe skirmishing, but they 
 could never stand a siege. 
 
 Nothing was now to be gained by throwing out trail- 
 ers. Enough were already out, and as some hours had 
 passed since the night attack, it was now too late. Some 
 had returned, but brought no intelligence, brought 
 nothing but tidings of trails found only to be lost again. 
 Trails lost like bird tracks, as if the makers had stepped 
 off into the trackless air. The war party must move 
 back upon the plantation. But first they must bury 
 their dead, for no Indian ever, except to save his own 
 scalp, left his comrade for crows and foxes to wrangle 
 over; and to dig ninety graves was no trifling task. 
 
 The graves were dug dug in the earth with toma- 
 hawks and knives, and sharpened sticks, and with human 
 fingers. And ninety warriors, stark and stiff, were bent 
 into a sitting posture, facing the sunrise, with their arms 
 beside them, and with roots and corn cakes and berries 
 for their journeys need sitting bolt upright, waiting for 
 that after-dawn. Ninety Indian warriors, who three 
 hours ago clawed at turf and twig in desperation lest 
 they should lose their hold upon terrestrial things, now 
 sat as mute, as meek and motionless, as if their earthly 
 parts, spirit-driven, had never leaped to the wild notes 
 of discord. 
 
 Animated with the spirit of revenge, the Ontarios pre- 
 pared to retrace their steps and to reinforce the already 
 numerous body that was awaiting orders to advance upon 
 the no less feared than hated Hill tribe.
 
 258 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 Many of the trailers were still out, but they would in 
 time fall back into the main body on its way. 
 
 They had made mistakes fatal to pursuit, both at 
 Asnebumskit and the Pines and We must shift the 
 scene. 
 
 When the young captain was struck down in the fight 
 at the pond and the attack was so summarily ended, he 
 was carried, as has been said, along the ridge south of 
 Asnebumskit. The young warrior whose conduct had so 
 valiantly confirmed the white man's judgment of his 
 parts, had so skillfully managed the retreat that his own 
 route and the way of the white man left but a single 
 trail for half a mile, when one was added, and in the 
 course of a mile four more separate, converging trails 
 increased the little party to seven in number (one of 
 which left no trail whatever), to be again lost, all save 
 one, until they come to the little brook, the Rattlesnake, 
 running due east into the Tehassit, and when the seven 
 men were joined again it was after wading the Rattle- 
 snake to near the summit of the hill, the place designated 
 at the outset as the rendezvous. 
 
 And so the young warrior and his charge escaped. He 
 had borne his senseless burden, being spelled by whiles, 
 as by preconcertion his trail was crossed or met, only to 
 resume it after a running rest, through the six miles of 
 forest. They had reached the ragged, ledgy, boulder- 
 ridden eastern slope of Rattlesnake Hill and were com- 
 paratively safe.
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 259 
 
 But one other spot so wild and unfrequented could 
 have been found this side of Wachusett, and that spot was 
 Stone House Hill, the point aimed at by Wandee when 
 he scrambled up the Hill of Pines with his fair burden. 
 
 Among the rocks at Rattlesnake, now that their 
 pursuers had been beguiled into following other and 
 purposely deceptive trails, the little party and their 
 wounded charge might rest, as nothing on the hill in the 
 way of game offered an inducement even to the near-at- 
 hand Tehassits to approach, while its crouching, fierce, 
 and treacherous ordinary denizens, the yellow rattler, 
 and the brindled, short-tailed prowler with the tufted 
 ears, tendered no hospitable greeting, nor tolerated 
 obtrusion, except, when awed by numbers, temporary 
 retreat was seeming acquiescence. 
 
 The hill served nature merely as a corral to which the 
 higher brutes might round up brutish abominations. It 
 was a lair for lynxes, snakes and wildcats, numbers of 
 which harbored among the rocks, while here and there a 
 bald eagle built his nest secure among the tangles of the 
 gloomy hemlocks; and here, as at Stone House Hill and 
 on the east brow of Wachusett, the great yellow rattler 
 held undisputed dominion over rock and turf. 
 
 But these otherwise waste acres, with their stinted 
 patches of alluvium, were rich in herbage of the character 
 resorted to by the primitive race for medicinal virtues, 
 and the Indians, whose renown as warriors must consist 
 as much in their skill to heal as to inflict wounds, were
 
 260 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 not slow in ransacking the hillsides and culling herbs 
 that might serve them in their present need. 
 
 The captain had recovered consciousness with the first 
 hour's rest, and it was ascertained that his hurts were 
 limited to severe contusions on the back and head, the 
 effect of clubbing, rather than of the more usual imple- 
 ments of Indian warfare. A few day's rest, and the 
 frequent application of bruised herbs, promised a speedy 
 restoration to normal health and vigor. And here we 
 leave him to discover what has become of Wandee, for no 
 weaver ever followed loom but must take up his broken 
 threads or spoil his warp. 
 
 When it was learned by the Hill Indians at the Pines 
 that the women of the Sergent family were there, every 
 other consideration, revenge, booty, glory, scalps even, 
 all were merged in the sole determination to effect a 
 rescue. Cap'n John should learn for once that an Indian 
 can be gallant as well as revengeful and bloody. The 
 reader already knows how nearly they approached com- 
 plete success. But for the fatal stumble of the child, the 
 morning would have found the prisoners free lodgers at 
 Wigwam Hill, for a safe but narrow passage through 
 the lines had been disclosed to them by the Packachoags, 
 and already once taken advantage of. 
 
 But fate was against them, and in a moment they 
 were battling for their lives against ten times their num- 
 ber. 
 
 We have heard the rustling of twigs, heard the crack-
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 261 
 
 ling of dry boughs under foot, and have seen Wandee 
 dash out of the semi-darkness into the denser blackness 
 of shadow at the Hill of Pines with the prime object of 
 his mission within his grasp. 
 
 He lost no time in burying himself deeper and deeper 
 in the protecting gloom of the forest, until the shrieks of 
 battle died away in whispers upon his ear. But although 
 a strong arm might, unassisted, carry a woman for a 
 mile, it was unequal to a much greater task. The foot 
 of the highland that forms the base of Asnebumskit on 
 the east had been reached at a point overlooking the 
 meadow that skirts the precipitous west side of Stone 
 House Hill. 1 Below him was the meadow and Tehassit 
 Brook. Beyond, Stone House looks over 'Bumskit. 
 
 Overtasked nature now rebelled at the extortion, and 
 the warrior staggered tottered fell. Fell without a 
 spoken word. Fell in a swoon, the effect of drawing 
 upon his muscular account to the last item of the spirit's 
 credit. But the woman was there, the brook, the cool 
 of the morning, and a heart still undismayed beneath 
 life's retiring symbols. The woman, the water, the air 
 and the unconquerable stomach of the Indian revived him 
 just in time to see the glimmer of daylight over Stone 
 House. Just in time to hear a shrill screech upon the 
 western hill side. It might be a screech owl just at 
 hand, scolding at the hasty sunlight that robbed her of 
 her sighted feast. It might be a lynx snarling at the 
 
 J The meadow is now the bed of one of Worcester's reservoirs.
 
 262 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 tardy hare, that kept its burrow and prolonged his fast. 
 But the Indian knew better; knew it was neither; knew 
 it was an Indian upon a new-found trail, giving tongue 
 like a wolf to encourage his mates as he unsnarls a 
 double by scenting a divergence. Every muscle of the 
 sturdy chief was swelling for another effort. He was on 
 his feet. He reached forward to take the little white 
 woman in his arms, but she beckoned him on toward 
 the hill, speaking for the first time since she crossed the 
 impounding circle at the Hill of Pines. 
 
 " Go on, Wandee. I will follow. I could chase a fawn 
 across my father's fields, and I can follow an Indian for 
 an hour." 
 
 Smiling from under his low brow, with his large black 
 eyes, while his compressed lips seemed unready to simi- 
 larly respond, he said : 
 
 ' ' Brave, leetle squaw ! ' ' 
 
 And shutting together his heavy jaws, while the kind- 
 ling eyes relapsed into a scowl that darkened with 
 determination over his high cheek bones, the once more 
 savage whirled, and with a sweeping stride went for the 
 bald face of Stone House just where the brook used to 
 break at the declivity and rush away in the fast falling 
 rapids below. Bald, it was, indeed, but here and there a 
 rock crevice, a ledge, or a foot of earth lodged by some 
 ancient land slide, or deposited by that great glacier that 
 hung for ages choking the ravine, gave root room to a 
 scraggy, leaning hemlock, and the hemlock served the 
 double purpose of partially screening the fugitives in the
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 263 
 
 ascent and aiding hand and foot in climbing the rough 
 ledges. When near the summit the Indian halted and 
 beckoning Susan behind a boulder to secure her from 
 observation, availed himself of the now open day to 
 reconnoiter. 
 
 The passing Indians, ten in number, whose wild 
 whoop had startled the fugitives, descended the hill side 
 and turned abruptly toward Tehassit, evidently upon a 
 trail, but probably that of one of their own men whose 
 nimbler foot or less devious course had placed him far in 
 advance of his fellows. 
 
 Their mistake, if mistake it was, left Wandee and his 
 prize secure, for the present at least, provided they 
 could endure remaining in the quarters they then occu- 
 pied until some propitious circumstance occurring should 
 seem to warrant the attempt to pass the lines which at 
 present barred their further progress. But something 
 more than immunity from danger of rambling feet and 
 prying eyes must be provided for. If the woods were 
 full of Indians, as he suspected, they might be compelled 
 to remain where they were for some days, in which event 
 the woman must have food and shelter. 
 
 For a white man to have constructed a temporary 
 dwelling in the midst of acres of rocky debris would 
 have been no serious task. But what could a warrior 
 know of labor, beyond the skill requisite in fashioning 
 an oar, or a canoe, or perhaps his bow and arrow? He 
 did not construct his own wigwan, nor even plant or har- 
 vest his corn, but left it to the squaws to do for him.
 
 264 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 A red squaw might upon this occasion have been put 
 to the task, but this was a white squaw. A squaw whose 
 finger tips were delicate as the petals of the white pond 
 lily, whose lovely skin was tinged with autumn sunsets, 
 whose lips were red like the red of barberry, a neck and 
 forehead crowned her person, bleached to the snow cap's 
 hue upon the great Penobscot mountain, and her eyes 
 seemed cut from the sapphire of the blue dome of space. 
 What could the white squaw do ? She was the idol of 
 the grand captain and so the white parson had said 
 was made in the image of God. And who is God but He 
 who whispers in the wind and bellows in the storm ? He 
 whom the mother of our tribe, the Witch of Wigwam 
 holds communion with the Great Spirit? The white 
 squaw must have a lodge, and the chief of the Quinsiga- 
 monds is none too good to build it for her. 
 
 The early white settlers, parties to the second settle- 
 ment of Worcester, found upon the summit of this hill, a 
 rude stone cabin the same occupied a century later by 
 fugitive Royalists, and it was this structure that gave the 
 hill its name. A cabin thrown together by arms grown 
 sinewy through war and chase; sinews that found a motor 
 in deference to beauty and bravery in another race. It 
 was a king's offering at the shrine of animated splendor. 
 
 The cabin completed, the task of a day, with the hours 
 taken from two, for in the meantime snares must be set, 
 snares strung with the braids of the coarse black hair of 
 the Indian's scalp. 
 
 Four days had passed, as early one morning down by
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 265 
 
 the brook Wandee jumped to cover at the sound of voices. 
 Some praying Packachoags were passing, and apparently 
 hunting closely for something other than game. Nothing 
 a Hill Indian could better trust than one of these peace- 
 ful, quiet-loving neighbors, with whom they had for 
 generations lived in the utmost harmony, even inter- 
 marrying. Indeed, Wandee himself, although reared at 
 Wigwam, was a born Packachoag, son of Sagamore John 
 by a squaw of Wigwam. 
 
 As they passed where the chief lay concealed, they 
 stopped short, looked into one another's faces question - 
 ingly, as if some new light was breaking in upon them, 
 and stooping to the earth, examined the yet dewy sod. 
 A moment's scrutiny sufficed to satisfy them, or at least 
 to awaken surmises approximating to certainty, and in a 
 low voice they pronounced the name of Wandee. 
 
 It is not likely that any peculiarity of footprint or trail 
 that the chief had left led them to the suspicion, but 
 rather the certainty that it was made by a skulker, added 
 to the fact that the chief, of whom they were in search, 
 was uppermost in their minds. 
 
 However it might have happened, Wandee stepped 
 from his hiding place and was warmly greeted in the 
 Nipnet tongue. 
 
 It required but a moment to acquaint him with the fact 
 that the captain was alive and safely lodged at Rattle- 
 snake Hill with six warriors. That all of the forty who 
 were engaged in the midnight adventure, except those at 
 Rattlesnake, had within two days made their way into
 
 266 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 the home lodge, and that throughout the woods between 
 Stone House and the I/ake were scattered parties of the 
 northern tribes, watching every avenue by which a fugi- 
 tive might reach the Hill, for they were thoroughly 
 persuaded that several of them were still lurking in the 
 woods. 
 
 Now that the Packachoags had accomplished the pur- 
 pose of their long search, they turned their steps down 
 the brook and were soon lost to sight. 
 
 Their first object now was to acquaint the white man's 
 party with their success, and to do this without creating 
 suspicion that might lead to detection was no simple task. 
 
 Following Tehassit Brook between banks thickly grown 
 with hazel and black alder, wading the stream for the 
 entire distance, until, at a point near the old Mohawk 
 path, or way to Springfield settlement, they came to the 
 little Rattlesnake Brook, and following this, still keeping 
 the water bed, they had eluded even the suspicion of a 
 trail, except for a single, private mishap, and were with- 
 in the captain's temporary lodge.
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 THE WOMAN IN PERIL. 
 
 UP to this time the captain had hardly a hope that any 
 of the Sergent family had been saved. Certain it was 
 no one of Wandee's party knew of his escape with the 
 woman, although within a few feet of him when he dis- 
 appeared in the forest at Pine Hill. The darkness of the 
 pine shadows had done as much to hide his movements 
 from his friends as from his enemies. 
 
 That Wandee had not returned to Wigwam was of 
 course known to the Packachoags, and through them 
 ever} 7 condition and movement at the Hill, the plantation 
 ruins, and throughout the cordon which had remained now 
 for six days without an advance was made known at Rat- 
 tlesnake, for the praying Indians of Packachoag were 
 regarded by the Northmen as feeble, inoffensive creatures, 
 who cared more for a good dinner than for a green scalp, 
 and as such, were in a manner despised, while at the same 
 time savage superstition wrought in their behalf, so much 
 so that their persons were in a degree respected as sacred, 
 they being by profession agents and representatives of 
 the man God, whom they claimed to be, in their lax ortho- 
 dox mode of expression, one and the same with the Great 
 Spirit. This innocent play upon heathen credulity found
 
 268 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 recompense in something like affiliation and made their 
 presence tolerable, even at the Northmen's council fires. 
 
 The praying Packachoags could go back and forth, up 
 and down, scarcely noticed, except at such times as they 
 fell into religious exhortations, when they were usually dis- 
 missed with a contemptuous grunt or left to bestow the 
 residue of a sermon upon the wind. 
 
 Now that it was revealed at Rattlesnake not only that 
 Wandee was still alive, but that he had in present safe 
 keeping that life of all others on which the white man 
 doted, the captain reconciled himself in a measure to his 
 temporary confinement; not, however, without frequent 
 impulses to hazard life by some midnight venture in the 
 direction of Stone House Hill. But against such a propo- 
 sition the Indians set their faces with a determination 
 unusual to their race, when in opposition to the whites. 
 They would hear nothing of it. They had so far managed 
 with a discretion that had elicited commendation from 
 the white chief, and now he would himself render abor- 
 tive all their efforts, all their pains, and compromise the 
 safety of all, merely to gratify his wish to look for a 
 moment upon his young squaw. 
 
 It needed not half the argument to convince him of the 
 error, and to dissuade him from the undertaking, for in 
 fact the impulse had never approximated to actuation. It 
 was the mere desire, a passing notion that found expres- 
 sion in a careless word, as when one says "I think," but 
 actually does no such a thing, and is merely conscious of 
 a passing notion, is the idle, passive spectator to a mental 
 panorama.
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 269 
 
 Where, above the ledges, the broad acres of Rattle- 
 snake hilltop stretch away to the western slope that sheds 
 its waters into the Lynde 1 (that was), when these acres 
 were covered with the sturdy primeval growth of forest 
 trees, and the soil was so shaded that evaporation was 
 in a great degree retarded, the little brook that falls to 
 eastward, the pathway of the Packachoags, was a rushing 
 flume of ice cold water gathered from a hundred springs 
 that bubbled up among the rocks and trickled into shady 
 pools edged with mint and saw grass, and the broad- 
 leafed fern, with here and there a flock of maiden' s-hair, 
 and creeping upward and athwart from bush to bough 
 the trailing clematis reached outward to where the sleepy 
 sunlight bathed for one hour the yellow cowslips that 
 waltzed among the eddying waves above a bottom paved 
 with pungent water cresses. Then by the side of rotting 
 logs, the windfalls of a century back, from thickets of 
 elder, alder, and sumach, the grouse (the partridge of New 
 England) was sure to pop out with a running burst, a 
 whirr, and disappearance, unless the snare you set an 
 hour before left him dangling between twig and turf. 
 And by the side of brook and spring and water-pockets, 
 between the roots of trees and under thorns sprayed with 
 sweet red berries, or beneath hazel or black alder, where 
 worms might bore, were woodcock and jacksnipe, pecking 
 if not being pecked at, by the sharp arrows of the crouch- 
 ing hunters who were collecting material to make an 
 evening repast for the always hungry Pachachoags. 
 
 1 Lynde Brook that was, now Leicester reservoir.
 
 270 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 A bed of red hot coals, and large flat stones nearly as 
 hot, and green walnut spits stuck in the ground and 
 leaning over the bed of coals, are waiting for the hunters 
 to come in. Partridges, hares, quails, and trout dangling 
 alive upon the birchen twigs, just as the Indians had 
 dragged them with their hands from under the banks, or 
 driven into corrals in the rocky brook bed, were the 
 hunters' recompense. And as the spitted toasting game 
 fries and sputters fat upon the coals, we will without 
 ceremony shift the scene. 
 
 Wounded Northmen to the number of fifty had been 
 left at Asnebumskit Pond after the midnight affray, un- 
 able at once to retire to Tehassit, and many of them 
 lingering between life and death, and for the purpose of 
 seeing them cared for as circumstances would permit, and 
 as the final blow at Wigwam Hill was yet delayed, the 
 Ontario chief proposed to Tehuanto to accompany him to 
 the sick men's camp, for company's sake. 
 
 As the two chiefs were passing up the valley of Te- 
 hassit with a company of ten warriors, drawn equally 
 from the forces of each, a sort of unnecessary body guard, 
 and as they crossed the brook at a point where they pur- 
 posed to ascend the hills Tehuanto stopped and called 
 the attention of the Ontario. For a moment both of them 
 were earnestly engaged, first in examining a naked foot- 
 print in the sand, and afterward in scrutinizing the shore 
 for several rods up and down. A single, naked footprint. 
 That was all. And what could that imply ? That a
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 27 1 
 
 man in crossing the brook had stepped upon the sand, 
 nothing more. It was made with the right foot, and 
 although nearly at right angles with the stream, it 
 inclined downward, with the current. Was it the track 
 of a mere passer-by, who left a single naked foot-print 
 and its counterpart nowhere ? The wily sense, and sharp, 
 divining eye of the Indian told another tale. Whoever 
 stepped upon the sandy shore was following the stream 
 to avoid leaving a trail, and his foot was bared because 
 the wet moccasin might slip upon the slimy stones, and 
 at this place his treacherous foot had slidden from a 
 mossy, water covered rock, and he, the owner, to recover 
 without a fall, had leaped to the little bed of sand left 
 uncovered by the low state of water. 
 
 It was a blind trail, and a blind trail betokened secrec)'. 
 Secrecy at this time and place, when it was believed fugi- 
 tives were lurking in the woods, naturally excited 
 suspicion of something approximating to the reality. 
 Should the trail be followed down the brook, in the 
 direction indicated by the foot-print? No! He might 
 go miles, but the brook above was short, and whoever it 
 was must have entered somewhere, and the trail at that 
 point would lead to the object of his coming. It would 
 at least aid in unravelling the mystery. Tehuanto would 
 follow the trail back; and without ado he and his five 
 men left the Ontario warriors to go their way and started 
 up the stream. 
 
 A mile above, in the meadow just opposite the rocky 
 face of Stone House, an artfully concealed, but still dimly
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 apparent trail was found, and it led directly up the hill. 
 The new, green grass, that had been trodden upon had 
 been lifted after passing, and to the casual observer, or 
 indeed to any but a born woodsman, showed no more 
 depression than might have resulted from a strong wind 
 or a heavy rain, but signs of lodgment from wind or rain 
 would have been obliterated within twenty-four hours, 
 would have been lifted by the influence of sunlight, and 
 neither wind nor rain had occurred for a much longer 
 time. The fox hound's scent is not more acute or 
 reliable than the practiced eye of an Indian. 
 
 Great circumspection must now be used, for they must 
 if possible find the object of their search without being 
 themselves discovered, as perhaps the trail led back to 
 some secreted force. That the naked footprint in the 
 brook bed was not that of a fugitive, was next to certain, 
 as it led by the direction of the stream almost into the 
 Tehassit camp, a region dangerous to the last degree to 
 such, and still, at one end or the other of the trail were 
 fugitives, else why the blind ? 
 
 Cautiously climbing the craggy face of Stone House 
 they soon became aware that the hill was inhabited, but 
 to what extent was far from certain. 
 
 As they neared the top the artificial arrangement of 
 stone where Wandee had erected the cabin, came into 
 view, and was at once surrounded and entered. Once 
 more the little white woman was in the hands of hostile 
 Indians, but not this time to be carried to the wilds of 
 Ontario. She could now be given directly to Eugene
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKTM. : - : 
 
 Archer and the Washakim's debt would be cancelled, for 
 although he had demurred on account of some super- 
 stitious fear to personally undertake the murder of Sergent 
 and the capture of the woman, yet he had committed 
 himself to aid the white man in securing his prize as an 
 equivalent for his services in giving such information as 
 might make it practicable to seize upon the person of the 
 white captain and Wandee. 
 
 That the two had since escaped did not absolve even 
 the Indian from the obligation. Nor was Tehuanto 
 further bound to the Ontario in respect to his lost prison- 
 ers, for the captive in effecting, however it might have 
 occurred, her own deliverance, had severed the bond. 
 
 It was soon found useless to endeavor to learn who 
 were the companions of the woman in this wild isolation. 
 Threats and pursuasions were alike futile, and dis- 
 couraged and baffled he bade his captive follow as he led 
 the way eastward toward Washakim. 
 
 From a position among the rocks where could be 
 seen all that transpired, Wandee, indignant, chagrined 
 and disappointed, had remained inactive, because impo- 
 tent to stay the tide of misfortune. Foolhardiness might 
 have attempted a rescue. That spirit of impatience and 
 impetuosity which snaps its fingers at odds and insanely 
 dares what judgment would rebuke, might have left at 
 this time at least a scalp, and a human carcass far the 
 crows and foxes to feed upon, but an old warrior was too 
 wise to undertake so forlorn a hope. He could bide his 
 time. 
 
 18
 
 274 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 The sun had scarcely disappeared behind Asnebumskit, 
 when the swift foot of Wandee was making its way down 
 the Tehassit stream with a view of joining the party at 
 Rattlesnake and devising some means, if possible, to 
 again come in possession of the twice lost woman of 
 Sagatabscot. But in this he was doomed to disappoint- 
 ment. Indians were sauntering up and down the valley, 
 presumably as guards at post, but really sleepy, listless, 
 and indifferent from self'assurance that no enemy existed 
 throughout the region. 
 
 But one course lay open for the chief to pursue, one 
 alternative remained. The great woods of Quinnapoxit, 1 
 now that its warriors and hunters are occupied with the 
 siege of Wigwam Hill, must be nearly barren of fight- 
 ing material, and as for squaws, when braves are absent 
 they merely huddle. He would lie about the north 
 woods till opportunity for action offered. And so the 
 chief retraced his steps. 
 
 We may leave the twenty hours succeeding the recap- 
 ture of Susan a blank, as in the interim nothing in the 
 line of this narrative in any way important occurred. 
 But at the end of twenty hours, looking over to Wash- 
 akim we see, tied to a stake in the midst of a circle of 
 wigwams, the little woman to whom peril was fast be- 
 coming a normal condition. 
 
 Grouped about her were squaws, and while she seemed 
 to be the immediate charge of three warriors, the only 
 
 1 More recently the " French Woods," or later still, " Quinna- 
 poxit."
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 275 
 
 ones left in the lodge, all others, even the old men, having 
 joined the besieging lines, some to do active service, some 
 from motives of curiosity, or to gain experience at safe 
 positions, from the interest and excitement attendant 
 upon active warfare. The woman at the stake stood with 
 arms swung backward and encircling it, bound at the 
 wrists by raw-hide throngs. Her ankles were not con- 
 fined, as, by maintaining the free use of her lower limbs, 
 she might the more agreeably posture in the contortive 
 agonies of mortal dissolution. 
 
 Crosswise, laid upon four sides of her, were dry sticks 
 of heavy limb wood, while the space between, up to the 
 verge of the stump upon which she stood, was filled with 
 punk and pitch pine knots, as elaborate an arrangement 
 as ever sent a witch's soul with a martyr's carte blanche 
 into paradise. 
 
 All now seemed ready for the frighful consummation 
 of an act more diabolical than ever found its way 
 into the inventive talent of other than an American 
 savage or a religious bigot A blazing torch was in the 
 hand of a warrior. The squaws stood all agape, half 
 pitying the sweet, defenseless pattern of purity. And 
 that psychological accident, that sure to be present only 
 when never expected, the Witch of Wigwam, whose 
 power of divination seemed to reach out into the occult 
 and to fathom the mysteries of time and space, and 
 whose mission seemed to be to occupy strange and un- 
 looked-for positions the Witch of Wigwam was there; 
 marching from somewhere into the circle; stopping and
 
 276 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 standing aloof from all; scarcely turning toward the 
 victim; scarcely heeding the movements of the warriors; 
 standing dumb and passionless as yet appeared, save as 
 without moving muscle or turning head, those spark- 
 ling, wild, black eyes, so full of venom, fire and fury, 
 were taking in each detail of the scene, gloating, maybe, 
 over some fateful promise of the hour to come. There 
 is mystery behind those snakish eyes boding some excess 
 of violence. 
 
 One of the Indians now approaches the woman at the 
 stake. Until now she had looked upon her murderers, 
 upon the pitying squaws, the old squaw sorceress, and 
 the threatening fagots at her feet, as calmly, as benignly, 
 almost smilingly, as ever dying saint looked upon the 
 manner of his martyrdom. But now her soul seemed 
 writhing in affright. She struggled with her bonds, and 
 her eyes protruded, while that mobile under lip rolled 
 up rigidly against its mate, showing that at last, or by 
 some means, a martyr's sang-froid may be conquered. 
 Grief, fear, and loathing were centered in the contortions 
 of that under lip. A word was spoken by the Indian in 
 her ear. 
 
 "I will never ! Never ! Fire the fagots ! I 'm weary 
 with waiting ! ' ' was the reply. She had heard the voice 
 she feared and hated, and had seen her evil genius through 
 his savage disguise, and with this screaming exclamation, 
 the woman's head sank upon her bosom, her eyelids 
 closed, the unbound yellow hair fell forward over face 
 and neck, and all the flesh left visible was livid, semi-
 
 DOOM OP WASHAKIM. 277 
 
 transparent, dead as marble. He who had addressed her 
 started back, in fright perhaps at the effect of his words; 
 perhaps in amazement that so frail a being could be so 
 utterly unconquerable. He had not really intended that 
 denial should be followed by cremation as his threat im- 
 plied. The arrangement was intended to frighten her 
 into acquiescence, but the details were too complete. He 
 had not counted upon the promptness of savage discipline. 
 
 The Indian with the torch leaped forward, eager to 
 perform his part, and so swift was its execution that when 
 his director sprang toward the stake to arrest him, he saw 
 the red flame toying with the pitch to late to remedy 
 saw a dense cloud of thick, white smoke heard the 
 sharp crackle of blazing twigs, and here and there a long, 
 transitory tongue of flame leaped upward, snake-like, to 
 slink back as soon and hide itself within the smoking pile, 
 as if waiting for the spirit to return and sense its other- 
 wise wasted energies. 
 
 And as it waited the sharp crack of a rifle was heard 
 close at hand. 
 
 In view was a little wreath of light gray smoke above 
 the hazel thicket. A groan, a yell of pain, supplemented 
 by an English curse, a flying tread and a swash-like crash- 
 ing through bones, was all the sound; but a dead Indian, 
 and the fractured wrist of Eugene Archer in his war 
 paint, and a tomakawk buried in the skull of a third 
 Indian by the now transported old witch, argued of com- 
 plications in a previous arrangement. 
 
 As we watch the squaws and papooses scatter like a
 
 278 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 brood of young grouse for any shelter, the knife of 
 Wandee has cut the thongs, and himself, scorched and 
 stifled, issues from the stake fire with the twice rescued 
 white woman, and is gone. 
 
 No living thing is now within that circle of wigwams 
 save that old squaw, and she is down upon her knees 
 with hands and eyes upraised. It may be in prayer; may 
 be in thanksgiving. Her Master, the Great Spirit, has 
 nerved her arm and steeled her sensibilities to all but 
 pity for the little white squaw and loyalty to Wigwam 
 Hill. 
 
 We see scattered about, the debris of the plantation's 
 ruin, the booty of the Indian. Bottles, kegs, kegs iron 
 bound, and little kegs with wooden hoops keep them of 
 the wooden hoops away from fire. We see no living 
 thing within the lodge. The squaws are placing distance 
 between themselves and the objects of their terror. The 
 old squaw has vanished, has gone up, or down; and 
 Eugene Archer ? The woods must answer for him. He 
 would turn his back upon no danger visible, but bold- 
 ness will not quench a shade, and courage bows to 
 mystery.
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 A CHAPTER OF DIPLOMACY. 
 
 DURING the twenty-four hours that succeeded the 
 recapture of the white woman by the Washakim chief, 
 the praying Packachoags had once reported at Rattle- 
 snake the condition of things at Wigwam Hill, and the 
 Hill lodge had been fully apprised of all that had trans- 
 pired, both in the enemies' line and concerning the 
 white chief, as also that Wandee had been tracked to 
 Stone House and the white girl recaptured, but whether 
 she was now a captive in the Northmen's camp had not 
 been learned, nor had any information whatever been 
 gleaned of the fate of Wandee. Supposably he was in 
 the woods, for had he been either taken or killed the 
 fact would have been uppermost in the minds, and loud- 
 est upon the tongues of the Washakims who waited 
 impatiently for the settlement of a feud, -and of the 
 Northmen who were yearning for revenge. 
 
 The force comprising the besiegers had been aug- 
 mented, but mostly by that class of strolling savages who 
 travelled almost continually, and chiefly that they might 
 eat the bread of others' providing, and yet, they in part 
 compensated the donors of the little bounty they received 
 by reciting every incident that had occurred for weeks
 
 280 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 along their lines of travel, which often extended over 
 hundreds of miles, and being constantly on the move and 
 finding welcome lodgment among the various tribes, 
 they became in some degree familiar with the different 
 dialects and could easily make themselves briefly enter- 
 taining. 
 
 There were tramps in those days. But shifting, lazy, 
 and vagabondish as they really were, there were perhaps 
 no more useful or important members of society, for they 
 were the only news gleaners and carriers between the 
 St. Lawrence and the Mississippi. By means of them 
 the knowledge of passing events over vast areas of 
 country was made quite general and accurate; and no 
 matter that the natal lodge of a stroller might be at war 
 with, or the deadly enemy of the host, his occupation 
 was carte blanche for all his requirements and a guar- 
 antee of personal safety. 
 
 In all savage and semi-barbarous conditions, as indeed 
 in all stages and phases of civilization, up to the time 
 when the newspaper press became practically efficient as 
 a substitute in the dissemination of current information, 
 the tramp was at worst a necessary evil. A wise and 
 kindly provision of nature. Better men and better com- 
 munities than these aborigines acknowledged their im- 
 portance, and scarce two generations back, here in New 
 England, our grandmothers rarely turned a ' ' walk about ' ' 
 away hungry or shelterless, unless by previous misdoings 
 or a blemished record she counted him unworthy. 
 
 The Irish, Scotch, and Welsh minstrels, the itinerant
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 28 I 
 
 fakirs of the East, the Troubadour of Middle Ages wan- 
 dering through the south of Europe, the Pagan philoso- 
 phers, and all the early poets, and some of the Christian 
 saints, were unmitigated tramps, and fulfilled every 
 function pertaining to the Order. 
 
 But by advice of the Washakira chief it was now 
 ordered that every stranger must either pass to the rear 
 or pass on, for they had stayed their stay, and arrange- 
 ment were being made that none except sworn enemies to 
 the Quinsigamonds must be made aware of, not even a 
 praying Packachoag, should pass the line, although the 
 latter were still allowed to enter freely. 
 
 So closely the combined forces kept watch along the 
 line that it would have been extremely hazardous for the 
 Rattlesnake party to attempt its passage by stealth, and 
 to try and force it would have been the height of pre- 
 sumptuous folly. There was, however, in the near 
 future, a time to corne which, seized at its exact moment, 
 promised success; and to ascertain the precise hour of its 
 occurrence, before the fact, began now to be the all 
 absorbing topic in the minds of the Packachoags to 
 whom the solution had been assigned. 
 
 When the final advance should be ordered, and the 
 lines were leaving their established posts, in the excite- 
 ment and confusion incident to the change, the dread, 
 the longing, the looking forward, the expectancy attend- 
 ant upon compliance with marching orders, many ways 
 would, of necessity be for a while left unguarded and 
 open to a stealthy foot and subtle mind.
 
 282 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 The Packachoags were alive to the importance of 
 ascertaining, prior to the event, the hour fixed upon to 
 move forward, and of this hour the rank and file of the 
 barbarous Northmen could not hope to know. But the 
 Packachoags shrewdly conceived that the trusted little 
 band of Nipnets in actual service would in due time 
 become masters of the secret, as upon them would 
 devolve much of the execution of the plan and all the ill 
 effects of disaster. The moment the all important secret 
 could be probed the swift feet of the converts must carry 
 its burden not only to Wigwam Hill, but to Rattlesnake 
 also. They, themselves, could easily have passed the lines 
 to Wigwam now, but, in the possible event of detection, 
 even if they escaped with their scalps, the suspicion of 
 treachery would have led to strict surveillance, and all 
 hope of rendering further and greater aid to their friends 
 would have been brought to a summary close. 
 
 An Indian may lose courage, lose heart, may break 
 faith, or may do anything but forget his cunning; but 
 when he ceases to be wary he forfeits his manhood and 
 becomes as contemptible as a squaw whose sole mission is 
 to plant corn, to bake bread, and to breed and rear pap- 
 pooses. 
 
 The praying Packachoags maintained their dignity. 
 They cajoled the scalp-takers of repute, and paid marked 
 homage to the great chiefs of the tribes in the alliance. 
 They watched and waited and hourly jabbered with the 
 patrols. They were on the best of terms with them, and 
 so complete became the affiliation that a few hours after
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 283 
 
 the promulgation of the order, they could come or go in 
 any direction unquestioned and unrestrained, but they 
 had now no wish to avail themselves of liberty outside 
 the prescribed limit. They were doing better as they 
 were, passing by threes up and down the lines and meet- 
 ing in some secluded spot to compare advices. 
 
 They became now more than ever loquacious respect- 
 ing the new faith. They declared that having given 
 their hearts entirely to the Master, things of only secular 
 importance were to them lighter than air, and flew from 
 their shoulders like the down from a thistle. That mun- 
 dane existence, to these "worms of the dust" (they 
 had garnered into their vocabulary not a little of churchly 
 expression) was utterly valueless, except as a training 
 school for the life eternal. They pretended to hold verbal 
 communication and discourse with spirits of the air, and 
 were frequently attacked with spasms of proselytism, as 
 they declared, at the instigation of returning souls of the 
 damned. Regeneration, and baptism by water, was ever 
 at their tongues' end. Repentance was urged, with 
 remission of sins as a result, and bliss ineffable from ever- 
 lasting to everlasting, as the promised recompense, was 
 the burden of all exhortation, except, as in pursuance of 
 methods they had been taught, they pictured by word 
 painting, by vocal imitation, and by frantic gesticulation 
 the tortures of the unregenerate dead consigned to limit- 
 less kettles of (they did n't quite understand the substance 
 of ' ' fire and brimstone, ' ' and so substituted) blazing pitch. 
 And they laid great stress upon submission and confidence,
 
 284 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 for to that the converts in reality looked as a key to that 
 ulterior effect the unbosoming of a secret. 
 
 Growing more and more zealous to make converts, 
 they so exaggerated the manners and methods of the 
 white exhorters that they became a coveted amusement 
 with the hard headed warriors upon whose hands time 
 began to hang heavily. They were looked for with 
 greedy expectancy, their antics extolled and themselves 
 cajoled, until nothing seemed too good for a praying 
 Packachoag. They could feed with the Northmen, 
 could pray with the Quinnapoxits, could sing psalms 
 with the Washakims, and they could worm the secrets 
 of every hour out of the too trusting Tehassits. 
 
 Time grew big with happenings, present and prospect- 
 ive, and the wily pietists could almost count upon the 
 hour of accouchment. They had now entirely shaken off 
 the reserve, the reticence, peculiar to the race, and were 
 becoming wholly enthusiastic with an affectation of 
 pious jugglery, performing or pretending to the accom- 
 plishment of feats such as in after times were ascribed to 
 witchcraft, and still later on to the spirits of what are 
 called dead men. But towards the Tehassits, some ot 
 whom were really inclined to religious pursuasion, they 
 applied themselves through more reasonable methods, 
 the true motive being to amuse the infidels and to use 
 the more seriously inclined. 
 
 Time had turned twelve in the day, for the sun had 
 passed the meridian, and the Packachoags, three in num- 
 ber, were at Tehassit post on Beaver Brook, where it
 
 DOOM OP WASHAKIM. 285 
 
 crossed the afterward Joe Bill Road, then but an Indian 
 trail. 
 
 Five of the Tehassits, the whole post, had kneeled in 
 honest, earnest, heartfelt prayer. They had, as instmcted, 
 condemned themselves as sinners " the vilest of the 
 vile," and had declared their utmost readiness to re- 
 nounce "the world, the flesh and the devil," as the 
 Packachoags put it, and were waiting for that new light 
 the praying men had promised them. But it did not 
 come. They had been told it would break in upon them 
 at the moment of entire submission like a full moon 
 through a parting cloud. But the clouds wouldn't part. 
 They had been assured that an inexpressible buoyancy 
 would take occupancy of their souls, and that they would 
 involuntarily leap to their feet and shout Hallelujah ! 
 But they had n't shouted. 
 
 Something was out of joint, and that something was 
 soon discovered through a little tearful conference be- 
 tween the Packachoags. The convicts could never 
 become converts until they had shaken off their minds 
 and consciences something with which their souls were 
 burdened. There must be some sin of past commission, 
 sin of omission, or else some sin in contemplation, and 
 they were now exhorted by the Packachoags to perform 
 that last act of submission the open sesame to perfect 
 absolution the verbal confession of sins. They must 
 confess all they had lately done that was evil, and they 
 must avow all they contemplated doing in the near future. 
 They were told by their religious instructors that killing
 
 286 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 of men was destroying the image of God. That it was 
 murder, against which God Himself, with His own hand 
 had written a commandment. That to know of intended 
 murder and not to reveal it was in itself murder, and that 
 all murderers were under condemnation by the Great Spirit, 
 God, to be cast into a lake of blazing pitch, where, 
 though forever dying, they cannot die, but must burn 
 forever and ever, while their squaws, who have been 
 given to their enemies, will lean over and look down 
 upon them and laugh at their misfortune. But, on 
 the other hand, to confess was to be forgiven, while to be 
 forgiven was to insure them a crown of everlasting glory 
 brighter than the cloak of the scarlet tanager, more 
 dazzling than the sun at noonday, and as beautiful as an 
 October sunset. 
 
 The Tehassits were by this time effectually overcome. 
 It was too big talk for them to withstand, and they sur- 
 rendered. Let us hope that the pious Packachoags 
 valued their poor souls at a higher rate than their rich 
 secret. The Tehassits caught at the gilded bait. They 
 were repentant sinners. They had been lost, and they 
 eagerly clutched at so cheap a salvation. 
 
 Midnight of that very day had been fixed upon to 
 carry Wigwam Hill by storm, and to kill every warrior, 
 squaw, and pappoose of the tribe, so that they should be 
 known no more among the Indians forever. So said 
 the weeping, penitent Tehassits at this cunningly 
 devised confessional. Said they would watch until 
 ordered forward, when they would desert and return to 
 Tehassit, and thus atone so far as might be, for the
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 287 
 
 wicked position they had assumed in this murderous 
 design. They were assured by the praying men that this 
 was the only door left open to salvation. 
 
 And was not this, the Tehassits' extremity, the Packa- 
 choags' opportunity? The Packachoags thought it was. 
 After nightfall there would be an unguarded place in the 
 lines through which the Rattlesnake fugitives might 
 easily and safely pass to Wigwam Hill. 
 
 The Packachoags achieved success through what the 
 white men call diplomacy, with the Indians it was a 
 mere trick. 
 
 Early in the evening the lines by posts were ordered 
 to advance. To creep nearer the intended victims, and 
 to await the summons for a general attack. From Muddy 
 Pond, a feeder of the lake, they were ordered to what is 
 now the city farm's brook. From Burncoat Plain and 
 North Pond, to Green Hill and Bear Brook. Those posted 
 on Kettle Brook at its junction with the Tehassit were 
 ordered to Plantation Ridge, overlooking the lake and 
 the Beaver Brook post, the Tehassits were to move up 
 to the Swamp of Pines and occupy the great trail between 
 the lake and the site of the burned plantation. 
 
 Two hours after sunset that night three Packachoags 
 passed through the swamp without danger of discovery, 
 and later on three of the praying men with the Rattle- 
 snake party came down the Mohawk path, and crossing 
 the little plantation swamp, 1 struck the unguarded lake 
 trail and headed for Wigwam Hill. 
 
 1 Many acres in the very heart of Worcester, were, until 1840, 
 a mere quagmire.
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 THE DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 EARLY in the evening of the day when the penitent 
 Tehassits made their confession to the praying men of 
 Packachoag, the little plat at the foot of Wigwam Hill 
 presented an unusual appearance. The squaws and pap- 
 pooses were being conveyed across the lake where them- 
 selves and the canoes were to be left until fate decided the 
 struggle which the Packachoags had warned the Quin- 
 sigamonds was to begin almost at once. 
 
 The plan of operations, so desperate in design that it 
 left scarcely an alternative to victory or death, was devised 
 by a young chief chosen for the emergency. 
 
 The few warriors who conducted the non-combatants 
 across the lake, were to see them safely landed, to com- 
 plete instructions, and arrange signals which should guide 
 the squaws' movements under possible contingencies, 
 after which they were to swim back to Wigwam and join 
 in its defense. 
 
 Retreat was now practically cut off, and defeat signi- 
 fied nothing short of annihilation; for although this tribe, 
 living always by the water, were almost of it, and nearly 
 as much at home in its embrace as the fishes that swam 
 it, yet, in the event of defeat, when they must avail
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 289 
 
 themselves of that last resort and make the plunge, worn 
 and wasted by the toil of conflict, they knew too well 
 that they must inevitably become a sure and easy prey to 
 the exultant marksmen on the shore behind. 
 
 The hope was indeed a forlorn one, but the warriors 
 seemed no whit dismayed. They moved leisurely about, 
 with as much apparent composure as if waiting only to 
 be called to eat. 
 
 This one overhauled an old flint-lock musket, probed 
 its vent, blew into the muzzle with the piece at half-cock, 
 to learn if the vent was free, snapped the lock, scruti- 
 nized and reset the flint, fumbled the trigger, turned the 
 powder from his horn into the pan and flashed it, counted 
 his bullets, stuffed leaves under his belt for ready wads, 
 and apparently satisfied with the result, set his piece 
 against his wigwam, drew out of his belt his scalping 
 knife, and run the ball of his thumb along its edge, 
 glanced at the stone hatchet in his girdle and sauntered 
 off, jerking pebbles into the lake and stooping, watched 
 them by the moonlight as they skipped along the surface 
 as unconcernedly, as carelessly as a schoolboy shaking 
 off his period of confinement; as if life and death hung 
 not in the balance, with death in the long arm. And the 
 conduct of this one, in point of indifference, was a sample 
 of the whole. 
 
 At intervals of a few minutes a scout came in; some- 
 times came from the north, sometimes from the south, and 
 now and then one flying like a rolling stone down the 
 steep declivity of the little mountain, gave some message 
 19
 
 2QO DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 or information to the chief in short, sharp, verbal 
 snatches, and was off again; off up the rocky scarp like 
 the startled brood partridge leading the trespasser, up, 
 over the scarp, and gone. 
 
 That the enemy's line was moving up slowly, but 
 surely, like a great tidal wave, like a snake upon the 
 bird it charms, elicited nothing more than an inarticulate, 
 gutteral response from the chief, and awakened no percep- 
 tible interest among the warriors, not even curiosity that 
 one might observe. And yet every warrior in the camp 
 knew each moment the precise condition of affairs as it 
 was passed in concise, abrupt sentences from man to 
 man, but every muscle of the face, every nerve of the 
 body, had been schooled to the utmost limit of obedience 
 to the will. 
 
 Here, there, everywhere, were Indians fully armed, 
 standing with their backs against the trees, sleeping with 
 only half-shut eyes, and ears that could distinguish 
 between sounds, and taking notice of their import, pass 
 the unimportant and sleep on. 
 
 Guards had been posted at the summit of the hill to 
 observe and give notice of any hostile approach, but so 
 far nothing had occurred that should demand report; and 
 yet, something beside the guard was in possession of 
 the hill top. 
 
 A shadow seemed to flit now and then from behind the 
 scattered scrub oaks on the summit, to creep, cat-like 
 through the brushy sumachs, or to shoot across an open 
 space half seen, half felt, no more a sight than an im-
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 29 1 
 
 pression. And now it lies flat and wriggles like a snake, 
 here, there, and disappears behind an enormous boulder, 
 a mass of poised rock separated from, and somewhat 
 unlike, the ledges of the hill. 
 
 The rock stood alone, balanced upon perhaps a foot of 
 bed rock, and the power of a man might jostle, but many 
 men could never overturn it. 
 
 The figure, shade, ghost, or whatever it might be, 
 seemed now half erect between the boulder and the verti- 
 cal face of the upper crag there upon Wigwam's 
 summit. 
 
 The space between the crag and boulder served scarce- 
 ly to admit the form, but if it was simply a shade it was 
 infinitely compressible, and, space or none, there was 
 sufficient room. 
 
 The thing bore about it some commodity and once it 
 seemed to use its teeth. Now we saw it, indistinctly, 
 seemingly suspended, or floating like a will-o-the-wisp. 
 That might not be; might be but fancy over- wrought, 
 and yet it might both only seem, and be, for things that 
 only seem are sometimes real in another sense, so like 
 reality is that which is but essence of it, itself reality, 
 except we test it by material sense. 'T is moving still. 
 Now weaving as it were some spell, carving some magic 
 circle in the lower air in the first five inches of the 
 lower strata. Now back, now forth, some wizard conjura- 
 tion. And now so like a snake again it wriggles off into 
 the darkness; into the shadow of the hemlocks; down the 
 east slope of the hill; down the black wall, over the
 
 2Q2 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 precipice into the darkness. It has worked its way in 
 and out among the guards, among eyes as sharp as 
 lynxes, and hearing as acute as the earless wild goose, 1 
 but if an eye has seen it, it dared not challenge. If an 
 ear had heard it, it dared not conjure it. These Indians 
 were very superstitious, and what they saw or heard was 
 doubtless some intangible minister of fate forging of 
 destinies. 
 
 All was quiet on the little flat below. The scouts came 
 and went, and the warriors still slept standing. But now 
 something down here has happened. Something un- 
 locked for, and every warrior is alert, but they give no 
 heed to weapons. They simply walk up to the main 
 wigwam and look down upon the old squaw, seated upon 
 the ground, wrapped in a bear skin, come from no one 
 knows where. But that old squaw is their guardian 
 angel; the sentient talisman of the tribe; the wraith of a 
 forgotten ancestry, and the braves give a gutteral ex- 
 pression of satisfaction and walk back. 
 
 What can be in the wrinkled face, low brow, and fierce, 
 black eye of that old squaw that should give a whole 
 nation of warriors heart? 
 
 The old squaw is just from Washakim. She left but 
 three hours ago. Her hands are still red with the blood 
 of a Twin Lake Indian. Washakim's tents are empty of 
 warriors to-night. The last male soul took flight at her 
 
 1 "The earless wild goose" only seems so as, without ruffling 
 the short feathers, we make a fruitless search for the appen- 
 dage.
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 293 
 
 bidding. Washakim took spoil of the plantation, and a 
 squaw, witch or otherwise, a squaw will steal. 
 
 A fire is being built by the main wigwam, and soon the 
 crackling blaze illumines the whole flat, and the steep 
 beyond, and warms the slowly coursing blood in the veins 
 of the sorceress. Bear skins are brought for her to 
 recline upon; cold meat, and bread of bruised corn are 
 set before her, and soon a steaming pot of earthen, boil- 
 ing sweet herbs savory with pennyroyal, and flavored 
 with honey. And when she had eaten and drank and 
 mused awhile over the fantastic writhing of a pitch pine 
 flame as it worked in and out of the heavy column of 
 smoke, and when she had jabbered in broken, incoherent 
 Nipnap jargon to the shapes and faces waltzing round 
 about among the coals, turned her stiffened, crooked 
 fingers over and over and dwelt with her snakey eyes 
 upon the blood spots, she too leaned back against the wall 
 of the wigwam and slept. 
 
 A courier comes in and reports that the enemy's line is 
 moving up at a rapid pace. Another and another, from 
 different directions, bring a similar report, and away they 
 go again into the darkness. Still not a warrior seems to 
 shake off his lethargy. Still he lounges and broods or 
 sleeps on. But now the heavy bang of an old flint lock 
 on the hill top tells them that the hour has come. 
 
 Was ever such a change in men and manner? The 
 Indian that slept but now, is now a fiery dragon, wilder, 
 fiercer than the maddened lynx of his own forest; not a 
 muscle but seems swelling for action; not a sinew but is
 
 294 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 strung stiff as the gut that holds his bow in form. Each 
 warrior has had his place assigned. A hundred climb 
 to the summit of the hill. Seventy fall in behind that line 
 of boulders which stretches down the southern skirt, and 
 seventy warriors, half with muskets, are lodged in that 
 dry ravine (that was) upon the north. 
 
 These places had been kept for ages as posts of defense, 
 and in front of them, along the shore, the timber had 
 been kept down for a bow shot's length. The moon was 
 now well up, and, except in the forest, a man might be 
 seen for many yards away. Upon the summit of the hill, 
 where but little could grow beside stunted brushwood, 
 and where nothing was, except here and there a clump 
 of scrub oak or sumach, and that rocking boulder, it 
 would seem impossible for an Indian to creep unobserved 
 until within cast of a tomahawk. But there they were, 
 and even the watch had not seen or heard them until the 
 second before he gave the signal that so roused the war- 
 riors, and in answer to which came a whoop so hideous, so 
 frightful. It was like the voice of a locomotive whistle 
 before science reduced that phonic horror to obedience. 
 It came from the besieging party and was the signal for 
 a general onslaught, and at the summit a hand to hand 
 encounter commenced and was waged with varying suc- 
 cess, for although the assailants here outnumbered the Hill 
 Indians as two to one, even after those assigned that 
 post had reached the summit, the Hill men had the 
 advantage of familiar ground and were aided by the 
 darkness which the moonlight only partially dispelled.
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 295 
 
 The assault was made simultaneously upon the summit 
 and the wings. 
 
 The old clearing in front of both boulder barricade and 
 ravine, made it impossible for an enemy to approach 
 without exposing himself to musket shot; and as the first 
 rush was made toward these protected positions a murder- 
 ous volley met the too eager Northmen, and in a moment 
 threw them into the utmost confusion and consternation, 
 for it had not occurred to them that the near neighbors 
 of the white men were likely to be provided with this 
 more effective weapon, and they had rushed pell-mell into 
 the jaws of death. 
 
 That the Quinsigamonds had from time to time become 
 possessed of firearms through their friendly neighbors, 
 sometimes for service rendered, sometimes merely for 
 good will (for a defaced and discarded firearm was a 
 cheap token on one hand, and an inestimable prize upon 
 the other), had become but little known to other than 
 the nearest at hand tribes, who were more wary of attack, 
 and quite ready to place the strangers in the van, and 
 relinquish to them the honor. The ignorance of the facts 
 on the part of the Northmen had cost them a score of 
 lives at the first onset. 
 
 It would be almost unheard of for a body of Indians 
 knowingly to cross open grounds in the face of levelled 
 musketr}'. They readily enter into hand-to-hand con- 
 tests, but take few chances at musket range, opposed 
 to men so armed, and it was this aversion to being picked 
 off like so much defenceless game, that deterred the
 
 296 DOOM OP WASHAKIM. 
 
 enemy from again seriously assuming the offensive at 
 these positions. 
 
 While the battle was being fiercely waged upon the 
 top of the hill, the shore of the lake resounded with the 
 acoustic horrors of a pandemonium, for, like all savage 
 races, they relied upon the terrifying effects of hideous 
 vocalism to inspire courage upon one hand, and excite 
 fear upon the other. 
 
 Up to this time but little effective work had been 
 done beyond the slaughter that attended the volley of 
 musketry, and now, so clearly shone the moonlight 
 across the opening, and in among the tree trunks, where 
 no underbrush obscured the vision, that an Indian could 
 not show an arm, a leg, a shoulder, but it drew fire from 
 behind the boulders, or the protecting earth walls of the 
 ravine, and billeted its owner to the happy hunting 
 grounds. 
 
 Every now and then some rash young warrior, think- 
 ing to make fame by an exploit, hazarded a forlorn hope, 
 and was gathered to his fathers. 
 
 Things remained practically the same at the wings, 
 and might have done so until morning, had not the 
 Washakims, who were engaged in the attack upon the 
 hill top learned by runners of the useless occupation of 
 the Northmen at the wings and ordered them to the 
 summit, in hope to push the Quinsigamonds over the 
 precipice by sheer weight of numbers, as a last resort, 
 where too close fighting, and the consequent confusion
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 297 
 
 and abandonment of method, had so far rendered this 
 struggle abortive. 
 
 Three hundred Indians now clambered up the northern 
 and southern slopes, followed by sharpshooters who 
 recognized in the movement a general retreat, and even 
 after the summit was reached by the pursued, the well 
 armed Quinsigamonds, keeping at a safe distance from 
 the occasional showers of arrows, continued to pour their 
 murderous fire of shot into the black, surging, unde- 
 finable mass, which, in its wild confusion and deafening 
 clamor seemed in no way cognizant of the cause of the 
 shrieks and gasps of such as were stung by the whistling, 
 leaden missiles. 
 
 The weight of increased numbers began now to tell 
 severely upon the already nearly spent Hill Indians, and 
 as they gave way foot by foot, inch by inch, the eager 
 Washakims, with Tehuanto at their head, began to 
 exult in their almost realized revenge. 
 
 Back went the Quinsigamonds, slowly but surely; 
 swinging their sharp stone hatchets in the frenzy of a des- 
 pair that gloats on dealing out that death it looks for, 
 and even at the point of dissolution exults in compassing 
 an enemy's demise. 
 
 They have passed the upper ledge where it crops out 
 at the summit, and have passed that hundred ton boulder 
 that stood beside it. The glare of the great fire below 
 glows upon the painted faces of the Washakims who con- 
 front them. 
 
 The old squaw, wild with excitement, has heaped the
 
 298 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 bed of coals with masses of dry brushwood, until the 
 flames stream upward and shed a ruddy light upon the 
 scene. 
 
 Down go the Quinsigamonds, rank by rank, fairly 
 crowded over the rocks, over the precipice, until hardly 
 a score of them are left to dispute the victors' passage and 
 to bar him from his prize, when the sorceress, the Witch of 
 Wigwam, seizes a blazing brand and scales the hillside, 
 halts for a moment at the first rock foothold to catch 
 breath, then darts up the narrow ledge with the agility 
 of a young warrior, as if the frightful clamor had renewed 
 her prime, had imparted new strength to her withered 
 muscles, and suppleness to joints that for many years 
 had creaked with dryness. 
 
 Crossing zig-zag up the ledges that long decades back 
 her childish feet had climbed in play, the torch blazing 
 as she went, flying like a woods cat up and over the 
 rocks, eager to cast herself, all that was left of her, upon 
 the altar of her home, she hurries to her death. 
 
 The Washakims, awe struck by the apparition, by the 
 presence of her whose necromancy, or whose preter- 
 natural insight, foresight, and strange powers had so 
 often beguiled, bewildered, startled and subdued them, 
 opened to the right and left for the maniac, and for the 
 moment ceased to murder, ceased while the crazy red 
 hag passed; passed, save her flaming torch light, out of 
 sight, into the midst of the now waiting, suspensive 
 crowd of Northmen behind them. Some demon's work 
 is on her hands. The powers of darkness have electri-
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 299 
 
 fied her entire being. Some mad achievement has fore- 
 cast its wild picture upon her sickly brain. But she, the 
 witch, they dare not check her. They, who feared not 
 death, feared nothing earthly, feared that old woman. 
 
 She has passed out of the crowd, and out of sight. 
 Only the lurid light of the torch is visible, up over the 
 great boulder, and at either side. 
 
 While she was still in view, when she first set foot 
 upon the soil above the scarp, might have been seen by 
 the light of the faggot fire below, five strange, new 
 figures. Figures that showed none of the grime and 
 tear of battle. Figures that leap from rock to rock, agile 
 as deer, and sure footed as foxes, and behind them, but 
 separated by only half a bow shot length, still other 
 two, strange, for things familiar, but out of expec- 
 tation, are a strangeness. 
 
 One of the two passed up by the zig-zag ledges, com- 
 ing from the north. One came bounding over the rocks 
 from the south, passed along the narrow ledge to where it 
 parts and runs two ways upward toward the summit. None 
 of the seven had reached the top. The Washakims above 
 had not seen them. Their eyes were fixed upon the light 
 where that she demon had passed from view, while 
 the Northmen, amazed at the antics of what seemed to 
 them some flitting sprite, stood agape. The one was 
 startled, subdued; the other surprised, confounded. 
 
 But now the great hill seemed to move upon its base 
 beneath them. To rock and reel like a forest tree shivered 
 by lightning, and the splintered debris, limbs of trees,
 
 300 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 rock, earth, arms, legs, whole bodies of men cast by 
 scores into the air and hurled in thick confusion over the 
 precipice, are followed by rushing sound so deep and heavy 
 it would seem as if the granite hill itself had parted and 
 was toppling over. Earth, rocks, and mutilated men 
 follow in the wake of a huge flying mass. Uprooted 
 hemlocks snap in splinters like dry weeds, and follow 
 toward the lake. 
 
 A moment's lull has come; and in that moment the 
 seven warriors, who had stopped until the uproar passed, 
 shielded by the overhanging cliffs that two centuries' 
 frosts have crumbled, now sprang toward the top, and as 
 they leave the ledges and half turn towards the light be- 
 low, we see the face of the white captain, and the low, 
 dark brow of Wandee. 
 
 It is their hour of revenge. 
 
 Five picked warriors, fresh as if but an hour from 
 their blankets, and two staunch leaders who have wrongs 
 to right. 
 
 It was a sorry night for the Washakims. Utterly 
 demoralized by the terrible explosion which to them bore 
 no evidence except of earth's convulsions, added to the 
 frantic movements of the witch to whose machinations 
 they could but attribute the outburst of fire from the 
 earth, and the earthquake that followed; they were in 
 neither mood nor condition to defend themselves from the 
 new foes by whom they were beset; for to them, these 
 two were the ghosts of their most dreaded enemies whom 
 they believed dead, and with them were other spirits,
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 3OI 
 
 scarcely less formidable, conjured up to hunt them to 
 despair. 
 
 The scene that followed was what might be expected, 
 where angry barbarians are privileged to glut revenge. 
 
 When the Hill men met no resistance from the bewil- 
 dered allies, the captain vainly strove to stay the bloody 
 hands of his ferocious comrades. 
 
 But their work was brief. A panic ensued, and the 
 herd of tribesmen scattered like a bevy of frightened 
 quails. 
 
 The old squaw went up in the flying ruin she had 
 wrought with the powder stolen at Washakim, and by 
 her dead body, at the foot of the little mountain, was 
 found the mangled remains of Eugene Archer. Ever 
 intent on the evil he had brooded over, he had followed 
 the twice lost girl of Sagatabscot, reckless of danger, 
 heedless of torture from his splintered wrist, into the tents 
 of his dreaded foes. 
 
 That great boulder that was toppled from its airy perch 
 upon the crown of Wigwam Hill, at the beck of the 
 Witch of Wigwam now lies on the little flat below, half 
 buried in the sand, and to this day the deep scar is visible 
 where it tore its way down by the southern edge of the 
 rock escarpment of the hill two hundred years ago. 
 
 The fight was over; the turmoil was at an end; and 
 the captain and Wandee, each unconscious of the other's 
 present existence until they stood side by side at the 
 explosion, now found time for greeting. 
 
 Wandee stood motionless, passionless. The same stern
 
 302 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 
 
 stoic of the woods as when, without a pang, he shouldered 
 his game and left Shonto to gasp his life away in blood. 
 
 He had owed the white man a debt, and had cancelled 
 his obligation. Was it for love ? Who ever heard that 
 an Indian could harbor the sentiment ? He had fulfilled 
 his savage conception of a duty. 
 
 But the captain was cast in a far different mould. He 
 stepped forward with wide open arms, and embracing the 
 still undemonstrative red statue, wept like a child. 
 
 " Bull moose got cap'n 'g'in. Wandee help cap'n." 
 
 "Oh, Wandee, you did, and you tried so hard to save 
 my poor, dear, lost Susan. ' ' 
 
 " Cap'n stop ! Stop cry ! Squaw all right. Squaw down 
 wigwam. See ? Down fire. Squaw look up see ? Scalp 
 all good see? 
 
 We leave the captain and the little woman of Sagatab- 
 scot Hill to their tender meeting. 
 
 The disgraced, defeated, and more than decimated 
 Northmen, soon as their chief could rally the scattering 
 bauds that had stampeded like startled crows at the 
 great hill-shake, started on their long journey to Ontario 
 woods, never again to respond to the summons of the 
 valorous king of the Wampanoags. The ills that attend- 
 ed their first adventure were too disastrous, and not until 
 that generation had passed away, not until the French 
 priests of the Church Immaculate had inspired them with 
 hatred for the Saxon heretic, did they venture again to 
 put distance between themselves and the borders of 
 Canadian forests.
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 303 
 
 The Washakims were crushed in the hour of victory 
 and exultation, crushed and ground to powder like 
 magic, in the stone mortar, under a squaw cook's pestle. 
 
 The weird contrivings of the old red witch, who loved 
 nobody, loved nothing but the memories of a savage 
 home and a wild ancestry, had terrified a continent of men, 
 and it only remained for the powers at Boston to dole out 
 the thirty pieces of silver, 1 and the Judas of Narragansett 
 would betray his master, the great, grand chief of the 
 Wampanoags King Philip of Mount Hope. 
 
 The chief, Tehuanto, lay bruised, almost beyond recog- 
 nition, and dead, half buried beneath the big boulder on 
 the little flat; and from a fierce, warlike tribe, the Washa- 
 kims bent to their fate, a scattered, thriftless, alms-taking 
 race of vagabonds. 
 
 Wandee lived some years with his little tribe at Wig- 
 wam Hill, but their number diminished rapidly, as many 
 of them sickened of contact with civilization and found 
 more congenial haunts among the Penobscots. More of 
 them succumbed to the paralyzing influence of a drink 
 that was ever their master, while those who remained, 
 after suffering indignity and robbery under the letter of 
 drunkenly executed bargains, losing the fee in their 
 ancient heritage on the lake border; losing their corn 
 lands; and all at the hands of those they had, according 
 to their ability, many times befriended, after a while 
 
 1 History tells us how the white man's silver, bribed the great 
 chief's tribesman to slay him at musket range from an ambush 
 at Mount Hope.
 
 304 DOOM OF WASHAKIM.. 
 
 left their old home by the beautiful water the I/ake 
 of Quinsigamond, a miserable remnant of discouraged, 
 broken-hearted mendicants, rigged like buffoons in a 
 lousy array of cast-off English toggery to find preca- 
 rious living among the squaw men of Hassinomissitt, 
 who thought it no disgrace for a warrior to chop or to 
 hoe, and where a baker's dozen remain to this day in 
 worthless indigence. 1 
 
 The wild spirit and proud bearing of Wandee mani- 
 fested itself in some scions of every generation, and 
 finally culminated in the person of the half wild, fierce, 
 erratic Sal Boston, so well known in this region as an 
 aboriginal terror shrouded in legal immunity, as late as 
 eighteen hundred and fifty. Her tall, lank figure, elas- 
 tic step, bold and semi-barbarous manners were familiar 
 sights to the boys of Worcester now turned of sixty. 
 
 The widow of Sergent, and her little daughter Netty, 
 died in captivity among the Indians of Canada. 
 
 Martha was redeemed after seven years dwelling among 
 them, and returning to the plantation and marrying, 
 took possession of the Sergent homestead. 
 
 The morning after the discomfited allies abandoned 
 the siege and scattered, each remnant of a tribe for its 
 home, some swift feet were flying over the hill toward 
 Marlborough, and at midday of the next, twelve saddled 
 horses, only eight of them mounted (for Wandee and 
 
 1 Within two years of the end of the present century the 
 Hassinomissitts have sold to the whites the remnant of land 
 owned and occupied by them for many hundred years.
 
 DOOM OF WASHAKIM. 305 
 
 the chief scout must be Marlborough's lions for a day), 
 filed in among the old chestnut trees at Wigwam Hill. 
 
 Among the riderless horses we see that superb, black 
 stallion, Pompey, led by his old groom, Black Jake, and 
 among the riders we recognize the Deacon and Parson 
 Meekman, Curtis, Hart, Gershom Rice and Jim Pyke, 
 with some of their wives, who purposed to act as especial 
 escort to the little yellow-haired, blue-eyed girl whom 
 we have learned through sympathy, if nothing else to 
 love. 
 
 I dislike, of all things, to hangmy harp on the horn of 
 a precedent. The young lady deserved to become the 
 central figure in a wedding party, but she, with Captain 
 John Wing and their friends, went to Marlborough that 
 day, and Marlborough was then a long way off.
 
 AUTHOR'S NOTE. 
 
 MANY people will cavil at the spelling of some of the Indian 
 names, thinking they know it all. But how many will agree 
 in the spelling of names known only as uttered in a stomach- 
 spoken dialect, a hasty, careless, half developed enunciation? 
 My spelling is in accordance with my interpretation of sound 
 as taken from lips but oii'e remove from familiar acquaintance 
 with the local aboriginal type of utterance. 
 
 Among such names as have been garbled to suit the fancy of 
 alien authors, I will mention Wapiti, a name for the elk, 
 properly accented upon the first syllable, but improperly per- 
 verted by accentuation of the second. Tetassit instead of 
 Tehassit was never heard of until after the expiration of the 
 first quarter of the present century. Hassinomisco, a recent 
 arbitrary substitute for Hassinomissit. Waushacum, a veritable 
 orthographical abortion, an inexcusable distortion of the word 
 Washakim. 
 
 Quinsicamong was the original of Quinsigamond, but as the 
 last is in universal acceptance, and possibly more euphonious, 
 and as it is perhaps the part of wisdom to hand down to 
 futurity unquestioned a local appellation of growing importance, 
 I give it as at present spoken.
 
 MIIII mi inn urn inn minim illinium; 
 
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