companies ranged the Narraganset country, and harassed the hostile Indians. Between the spring and the succeeding autumn, the volunteer captains, with their flying parties, made ten or twelve expeditions, in which they killed and captivated two hundred and thirty of the enemy, took fifty muskets, and brought in one hundred and sixty bushels of their corn. They drove all the Narraganset Indians, excepting those of Ninnigret, out of their country.

The assembly of Connecticut raised three hundred and fifty men, who were to be a standing army, to defend the country, and harass the enemy. Major John Talcot was appointed to the chief command. Early in June, he marched from Norwich, with two hundred and fifty soldiers, and two hundred Moheagan and Pequot Indians, into the Wabaquasset country; but found the country entirely deserted. On the 5th of June, the army under his command marched to Chanagongum, in the Nipmuck country, where they killed nineteen Indians, and took thirty-three prisoners; and thence marched by Quabaog to Northampton. On the 12th of June, four days after their arrival at Northampton, about seven hundred Indians made a furious attack upon Hadley; but major Talcot, with his gallant soldiers, soon appeared for the relief of the garrison, and drove off the enemy.

On the 3d of July, the same troops, on their march towards Narraganset, surprised the main body of the enemy, by the side of a large cedar swamp, and attacked them so suddenly, that a considerable number of them were killed and taken on the spot. Others escaped to the swamp, and were immediately surrounded by the English, who, after an action of two or three hours, killed and took one hundred and seventy of the enemy. Shortly afterwards, they killed and captured sixty-seven, near Providence and Warwick. About the 5th of July, they returned to Connecticut, and, on their way, took sixty prisoners.

The enemy, thus pursued, and hunted from one lurking place to another, straitened for provisions, and debilitated by hunger and disease, became divided, scattered, and disheartened. In July and August, they began to come in, and to

surrender themselves to the mercy of their conquerors. Philip, who had fled to the Mohawks, having provoked that warlike nation, had been obliged to abandon their country, and was now, with a large body of Indians, lurking about Mount Hope. The Massachusetts and Plymouth soldiers were vigilant and intrepid, in pursuit of him; and, on the second of August, captain Church, with about thirty English soldiers, and twenty friendly Indians, surprised him in his quarters; killed about one hundred and thirty of his men; and took his wife and son prisoners: but Philip escaped.

About ten days after this surprise, an Indian deserter brought information to captain Church, that Philip was at Mount Hope Neck, and offered to guide him to the place, and help to kill him. Church instantly set out, in pursuit of him, with a small company of English and Indians. On his arrival at the swamp, he made a disposition of his men, at proper stations, so as to form an ambuscade, putting an Englishman and an Indian together, behind coverts. These commenced a fire on the enemy's shelter, which was on the margin of the swamp. It was open, in the Indian manner, on the side next to the swamp, to favour a sudden flight. Philip, at the instant of the fire from the English, seizing his gun, fled towards the thickets; but ran in a direction towards an English soldier and an Indian, who were at the station assigned them by captain Church. The Englishman snapped his gun; but it missed fire. He then bade the Indian fire; and he instantly shot him dead.

The death of Philip was the signal of complete victory. The Indians, in all the neighbouring country, now generally submitted to the English, or fled, and incorporated themselves with distant and strange nations. In this short but tremendous war, about six hundred of the inhabitants of New England, composing its principal strength, were either killed in battle, or murdered by the Indians. Twelve or thirteen towns were entirely destroyed, and about six hundred buildings, chiefly dwelling houses, were burnt. In addition to these calamities, the colonies contracted an enormous debt, while,

by the loss of their substance, from the ravages of the enemy, their resources were essentially diminished.

The fall of Philip was then considered as the extinction of a virulent and implacable enemy. It is now viewed as the fall of a great warrior, a penetrating statesman, and a mighty prince. It then excited universal joy and congratulation, as a prelude to the close of a merciless war. It now awakens sober reflections, on the instability of empire, the peculiar destiny of the aboriginal race, and the inscrutable decrees of Heaven. The patriotism of the man was then overlooked, in the cruelty of the savage; and little allowance was made for the natural jealousy of the sovereign, on account of the barbarities of the warrior. Philip, in the progress of the English settlements, foresaw the loss of his territory, and the extinction of his tribe; and made one mighty effort to prevent these calamities. He fell; and his fall contributed to the rise of the United States. Joy for this event should be blended with regret for his misfortunes, and respect for his patriotism and talents.

In this distressing war, the New Englanders comforted themselves, that it was unprovoked on their part. The worthy governor Winslow, in a letter, dated May 1st, 1676, observed: "I think I can clearly say, that, before these present troubles broke out, the English did not possess one foot of land in this colony, which was not fairly obtained, by honest purchase, from the Indian proprietors."*

* For the preceding details of Philip's war, and for many other particulars, the author is indebted to the American annals of Dr. Holmes; a work of the greatest merit and utility. In it, there are more ample materials for American history, correctly stated, and a greater variety of facts, relative thereto, brought into view, than can be found in any other work whatever. To him, writers on American history, are under peculiar obligations; for he has greatly facilitated their labour, by furnishing them with facts and dates, in the order of time, of every important transaction, respecting not only the United States and British America, but the insular and continental possessions of all European powers, in the New World. The author of this history, while acknowledging his obligations, embraces the opportunity of tender. ing his grateful thanks to Dr. Holmes, for the information he has derived from his much esteemed annals.

In the year 1712, the Tuscarora Indians, in North Carolina, alarmed at the increasing population of the whites, formed a plan for cutting them off, by a general and instantaneous massacre. Twelve hundred bow-men concurred in this horrid plot. All of them had agreed to begin their murderous operations, in the same night. When that night came, they entered the planters' houses; demanded provisions; affected to be displeased with them; and then murdered men, women, and children, without mercy or distinction. To prevent the alarm spreading through the settlement, they ran from house to house, slaughtering the scattered families, wherever they went. None of the colonists, during the fatal night, knew what had befallen their neighbours, until the assailants had reached their own doors.

The destruction at Roanoke was great. One hundred and thirty-seven of the settlers were put to death, in a few hours. Those who escaped were collected together, and guarded by the militia, until assistance was received from their neighbours. Colonel Barnwell, of South Carolina, was detached, with six hundred militia, and three hundred and sixty-six Indians, to their relief. He had to march through an intermediate wilderness, of two hundred miles. On his arrival, he attacked the Indians of North Carolina, with great resolution and success. Of them, three hundred were killed, and one hundred taken prisoners. The survivors sued for peace; but many of them abandoned the country, and, uniting with the five nations of Indians, made the sixth of that confederacy. These several Indian wars seem to have been systematic attempts of the aborigines, to rid their country of the new comers. The rapidly increasing population, and regular encroachments of the latter on the former, gave a serious alarm to the ancient lords of the soil, who discovered, when it was too late, that their destruction was likely to result, from their having too readily permitted strangers to take possession of their land. These, and other less important wars, were purely Indian: but, from about the year 1690, the Indians, in addition to private and personal sources of contention, were stirred up to hostilities against their white neigh,

bours, by the French and Spaniards, whose colonies were conterminous. The morality of civilized Christian kings did not restrain them from employing the heathen savages of the wilderness, to harass and destroy the settlements and Christian subjects of each other.

The particulars of Indian wars have already been given, sufficiently in detail. A general view of the subject is now more proper. These wars took place, more or less, along the whole western frontier of the colonies, from New Hampshire to Georgia, and from the year 1690, to the peace of Paris, 1763. Through that wide range, and for that long period of seventy-three years, with occasional intermissions, Indian hostilities, fomented by the French in the north, and the Spaniards in the south, disturbed the peace, and stinted the growth of the English colonies. The mode, in which these wars were waged, was very different from that usual among civilized nations. The Indians were seldom or never seen, before they did execution. They appeared not in the open field, but did their exploits by surprise; chiefly in the morning, keeping themselves hid behind logs and bushes, near the paths in the woods, or the fences contiguous to the doors of houses. Their lurking holes could be known only by the report of their guns. They rarely assaulted a house, unless they knew there would be little resistance. It has been afterwards known, that they have lain in ambush, for days together, watching the motions of the people at their work, without daring to discover themselves.

Their cruelty was chiefly exercised upon children, and such aged, infirm, or corpulent persons, as could not bear the hardships of a journey, through the wilderness. If they took a woman, far advanced in pregnancy, their knives were plunged into her bowels. An infant, when it became troublesome, had its brains dashed out against the next tree or stone. Sometimes, to torment the wretched mother, they would whip and beat the child, till almost dead, and then throw it to her, to comfort and quiet it. If the mother could not readily still its crying, the hatchet was buried in its skull.