CHAPTER I_Metipom's hostage

METIPOM’S HOSTAGE

[Illustration: KING PHILIP]

METIPOM’S HOSTAGE

BEING A NARRATIVE OF CERTAIN SURPRISING

ADVENTURES BEFALLING ONE DAVID LINDALL

IN THE FIRST YEAR OF KING PHILIP’S WAR

RALPH HENRY BARBOUR

WITH ILLUSTRATIONS

[Illustration]

BOSTON AND NEW YORK

HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY

The Riverside Press Cambridge

CONTENTS

I. THE RED OMEN 1

II. THE MEETING IN THE WOODS 14

III. DOWN THE WINDING RIVER 27

IV. THE SPOTTED ARROW 41

V. DAVID VISITS THE PRAYING VILLAGE 53

VI. WHAT HAPPENED AT THE POOL 69

VII. CAPTURED 82

VIII. METIPOM QUESTIONS 93

IX. THE VILLAGE OF THE WACHOOSETTS 105

X. SEQUANAWAH PLEDGES FRIENDSHIP 122

XI. THE CAVE IN THE FOREST 135

XII. DAVID FACES DEATH 147

XIII. A FRIEND IN STRANGE GUISE 159

XIV. EMISSARIES FROM KING PHILIP 172

XV. THE SACHEM DECIDES 180

XVI. MONAPIKOT’S MESSAGE 193

XVII. METIPOM TAKES THE WAR-PATH 204

XVIII. IN KING PHILIP’S POWER 219

XIX. THE ISLAND IN THE SWAMP 234

XX. DAVID BEARS A MESSAGE 249

XXI. TO THE RESCUE 260

XXII. THE ATTACK ON THE GARRISON 272

XXIII. STRAIGHT ARROW RETURNS 281

ILLUSTRATIONS

KING PHILIP _Frontispiece_

IN THAT INSTANT DAVID KNEW, AND HIS HEART LEAPED INTO

HIS THROAT 80

THERE WAS A SWIFT _whiz-zt_ BESIDE HIM AND AN ARROW

EMBEDDED ITSELF IN A SAPLING 224

THEN DAVID WAS HALF PUSHING, HALF CARRYING MONAPIKOT

THROUGH THE DOORWAY 282

METIPOM’S HOSTAGE

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CHAPTER I

THE RED OMEN

David Lindall stirred uneasily in his sleep, sighed, muttered, and

presently became partly awake. Thereupon he was conscious that all was

not as it had been when slumber had overtaken him, for, beyond his

closed lids, the attic, which should have been as dark at this hour

as the inside of any pocket, was illuminated. He opened his eyes. The

rafters a few feet above his head were visible in a strange radiance.

He raised himself on an elbow, blinking and curious. The light did not

come from the room below, nor was it the yellow glow of a pine-knot. No

sound came to him save the loud breathing of his father and Obid, the

servant, the former near at hand, the latter at the other end of the

attic: no sound, that is, save the soft sighing of the night breeze in

the pines and hemlocks at the eastern edge of the clearing. That was

ever-present and so accustomed that David had to listen hard to hear

it. But this strange red glow was new and disturbing, and now, wide

awake, the boy sought the explanation of it and found it once his gaze

had moved to the north window.

Above the tops of the distant trees beyond the plantation, the sky was

like the mouth of a furnace, and against the unearthly glow the topmost

branches of the taller trees stood sharply, like forms cut from black

paper.

“Father!” called the boy.

Nathan Lindall was awake on the instant.

“You called, David?” he asked.

“Yes, father. The forest is afire!”

“Nay, ’tis not the forest,” answered Nathan Lindall when he had looked

from the window. “The woods are too damp at this season, and I have

never heard of the Indians firing them save in the fall. ’Tis some

one’s house, lad, and I fear――” He did not finish, but turned instead

to Obid Dawkin who had joined them. “What say you, Obid?” he questioned.

“I say as you, master,” replied Obid in his thin, rusty voice. “And

’tis the work of the heathens, I doubt not. But whose house it may be

I do not know, for it seems too much east to be any in Sudbury, and――”

“And how far, think you?”

“Maybe four miles, sir, or maybe but two. ’Tis hard to say.”

“Three, then, Obid: and that brings us to Master William Vernham’s, for

none other lies in that direction and so near. Whether it be set afire

by the Indians we shall know in time. But don your clothing, for there

may be work for us, although I misdoubt that we arrive in time.”

“And may I go with you, father?” asked David eagerly.

“Nay, lad, for we must travel fast and ’twill be hard going. Do you

bolt well the door when we are gone and then go back to bed. ’Tis nigh

on three already and ’twill soon be dawn. Art ready, Obid?”

“Nay, for Sathan has hidden my breeches, Master Lindall,” grumbled the

man, “and without breeches I will not venture forth.”

“Do you find them quickly or a clout upon your thick skull may aid

you,” responded Nathan Lindall grimly.

“I have them, master,” piped Obid hurriedly.

“Look, sir, the fire is dying out,” said David. “The sky is far less

red, I think.”

“Maybe ’tis but a wild-goose chase we go on,” replied his father, “and

yet ’tis best to go. David, do you slip down and set out the muskets

and see that there be ammunition to hand. Doubtless in time this

jabbering knave will be clothed.”

“I be ready now, master! And as for jabbering――”

“Cease, cease, and get you down!”

A minute or two later David watched their forms melt into the darkness

beyond the barn. Then, closing the door, he shot home the heavy iron

bolt and dropped the stout oak bar as well. In the wide chimney-place

a few live embers glowed amidst the gray ashes and he coaxed them to

life with the bellows and dropped splinters of resinous pine upon them

until a cheery fire was crackling there. Then, rubbing out the lighted

knot against the stones of the hearth, he drew a bench to the blaze and

warmed himself, for the night, although May was a week old, was chill.

The room, which took up the whole lower floor of the house, was nearly

square, perhaps six paces one way by seven the other. The ceiling

was low, so low that Nathan Lindall’s head but scantily escaped the

rough-hewn beams. The furnishings would to-day be rude and scanty, but

in the year 1675 they were considered proper and sufficient. In fact

Nathan Lindall’s dwelling was rather better furnished than most of its

kind. The table and the two benches flanking it had been fashioned in

Boston by the best cabinet-maker in the Colony. The four chairs were

comfortable and sightly, the chest of drawers was finely carved and

had come over from England, and the few articles that were of home

manufacture were well and strongly made. Six windows, guarded by heavy

shutters, gave light to the room, and one end was almost entirely taken

up by the wide chimney-place. At the other end a steep flight of steps

led to the room above, no more than an attic under the high sloping

roof.

David had lived in the house seven years, and he was now sixteen, a

tall, well-made boy with pleasing countenance and ways which, for

having dwelt so long on the edge of the wilderness, were older than

his age warranted. His father had taken up his grant of one hundred

acres in 1668, removing from the Plymouth Colony after the death of

his wife. David’s recollection of his mother was undimmed in spite

of the more than eight years that had passed, but, as he had been but

a small lad at the time of her death, his memory of her, unlike his

father’s, held little pain. The grant, part woodland and part meadow,

lay sixteen miles from Boston and north of Natick. It was a pleasant

tract, with much fine timber and a stream which, rising in a spring-fed

pond not far from the house, meandered southward and ultimately entered

the Charles River. The river lay a long mile to the east and was the

highway on which they traveled, whether to Boston or Dedham.

Nathan Lindall had brought some forty acres of his land under

cultivation, and for the wheat, corn, and potatoes that he raised found

a ready market in Boston.

The household consisted of Nathan Lindall, David, and Obid Dawkin.

Obid had come to the Colony many years before as a “bond servant,”

had served his term and then hired to Master Lindall. In England he

had been a school-teacher, although of small attainments, and now

to his duties of helping till and sow and harvest was added that of

instructing David. Considering the lack of books, he had done none so

badly, and David possessed more of an education than was common in

those days for a boy of his position. It may be said of Obid that he

was a better farmer than teacher and a better cook than either!

It was a lonely life that David led, although he was never lonesome.

There was work and study always, and play at times. His play was

hunting and fishing and fashioning things with the few rude tools at

hand. Of hunting there was plenty, for at that time and for many years

later eastern Massachusetts abounded in animals and birds valuable for

food as well as many others sought for pelt or plumage. Red deer were

plentiful, and beyond the Sudbury Marshes only the winter before some

of the Natick Indians had slain a moose of gigantic size. Wolves caused

much trouble to those who kept cattle or sheep, and in Dedham a bounty

of ten shillings had lately been offered for such as were killed within

the town. Foxes, both red and gray, raccoons, porcupines, woodchucks,

and rabbits were numerous, while the ponds and streams supplied

beavers, muskrats, and otters. Bears there were, as well, and sometimes

panthers; and many lynxes and martens. Turkeys, grouse, and pigeons

were common, the latter flying in flocks of many hundreds. Geese,

swans, ducks, and cranes and many smaller birds frequented streams

and marshes, and there were trout in the brooks and bass, pickerel,

and perch in the ponds. At certain seasons the alewives ascended the

streams in thousands and were literally scooped from the water to be

used as fertilizer.

There was, therefore, no dearth of flesh for food nor skins for

clothing so long as one could shoot a gun, set a trap, or drop a hook.

Of traps David had many, and the south end of the house was never

without several skins in process of curing. Larger game had fallen

to his prowess, for he had twice shot a bear and once a panther: the

skins of these lay on the floor in evidence. He was a good shot, but

there was scant virtue in that at a time when the use of the musket,

both for hunting and for defense against the Indians, was universal

amongst the settlers. Rather, he prided himself on his skill in the

making of traps and snowshoes and such things as were needed about the

house. He had clever hands for such work. He could draw, too, not very

skillfully, but so well that Obid could distinguish at the first glance

which was the pig and which the ox! And at such times his teacher

would grumblingly regret that his talent did not run more to the art of

writing. But, since Obid’s own signature looked more like a rat’s nest

than an autograph, the complaint came none too well.

Sitting before the fire to-night, David followed in thought the journey

of his father and Obid and wished himself with them. Nathan Lindall had

spoken truly when he had predicted hard going, for the ice, which still

lay in the swamps because of an unseasonable spell of frost the week

gone, was too thin to bear one and the trail to Master Vernham’s must

keep to the high ground and the longer distance. The three miles, David

reflected, would become four ere the men reached their destination,

and in the darkness the ill-defined trail through the woods would be

hard to follow. It was far easier to sit here at home, toasting his

knees, but no boy of sixteen will choose ease before adventure, and the

possibility of the fire having been set by the Indians suggested real

adventure.

A year and more ago such a possibility would have been little

considered, for the tribes had been long at peace with the colonists,

but to-day matters were changed. It had been suspected for some time

that Pometacom, or King Philip, as he was called, sachem of the

Wampanoags, was secretly unfriendly toward the English. Indeed, nearly

four years since he had been summoned to Taunton and persuaded to sign

articles of submission, which he did with apparent good grace, but with

secret dissatisfaction. Real uneasiness on the part of the English was

not bred, however, until the year before our story. Then Sassamon, a

Massachusett Indian who had become a convert of John Eliot’s at the

village of Praying Indians at Natick, brought word to Plymouth of

intended treachery by Philip. Sassamon had been with Philip at Mount

Hope acting as his interpreter. Philip had learned of Sassamon’s

treachery and had caused his death. Three Indians suspected of killing

Sassamon were apprehended, tried, convicted, and, in June of the

following year, executed. Of the three one was a counselor of Philip’s,

and the latter, although avoiding any acts of hostility pending the

court’s decision, was bitterly resentful and began to prepare for

war. During the winter various annoyances had been visited upon the

settlers by roaming Indians. In some cases the savages were known to

be Wampanoags; in other cases the friendly Indians of the villages and

settlements were suspected, perhaps often unjustly. Even John Eliot’s

disciples at Natick did not escape suspicion. Rumors of threatening

signs were everywhere heard. Exaggerated stories of Indian depredations

traveled about the sparsely settled districts. From the south came the

tale of disaffection amongst the Narragansetts, and from the north like

rumors regarding the Abenakis. There was a feeling of alarm everywhere

amongst the English, and even in Boston there were timorous souls who

feared an attack on that town. As yet, however, nothing untoward had

occurred in the Massachusetts-Bay Colony, and the only Indians that

David knew were harmless and frequently rather sorry-looking specimens

who led a precarious existence by trading furs with the English or who

dwelt in the village at Natick. Most of them were Nipmucks, although

other neighboring tribes were represented as well. Save that they

not infrequently stole from his traps――sometimes taking trap as well

as catch――David knew nothing to the discredit of the Indians. Often

they came to the house, more often he ran across them on the river

or in the forest. Always they were friendly. One or two he counted as

friends; Monapikot, a Pegan youth of near his own age who dwelt at

Natick, and Mattatanopet, or Joe Tanopet as he was known, who came

and went as it pleased him, bartering skins for food and tobacco, and

who claimed to be the son of a Wamesit chief; a claim very generally

discredited. It is not to be wondered at, therefore, that David added a

good seasoning of salt to the tales of Indian unfriendliness, nor that

to-night he was little inclined to lay the burning of William Vernham’s

house at the door of the savages.

And yet, since where there is much smoke there must be some fire, he

realized that Obid’s surmise might hold more than prejudice. Obid was

firmly of the belief that the Indian was little if any better than the

beast of the forest and had no sympathy with the Reverend John Eliot’s

earnest endeavors to convert them to Christianity, arguing that an

Indian had no soul and that none, not even John Eliot, could save what

didn’t exist! Nathan Lindall held opposite views both of the Indian and

of John Eliot’s efforts, and many a long and warm argument took place

about the fire of a winter evening, while David, longing to champion

his father’s contentions, maintained the silence becoming one of his

years.

The fire dwindled and David presently became aware of the chill, and,

yawning, climbed the stair and sought his bed with many shivers at the

touch of the cold clothing. A fox barked in the distance, but save for

that all was silent. Northward the red glow had faded from the sky and

the blacker darkness that precedes the first sign of dawn wrapped the

world.