The following instances of cruelty, exercised towards the prisoners
taken at Salmon falls, are mentioned by Dr. Mather. Robert Rogers, a
corpulent man, being unable to carry the burden which the Indians imposed
upon him, threw it in the path and went aside in the woods to conceal
himself. They found him by his track, stripped, beat, and pricked him
with their swords: then tied him to a tree and danced round him till they
had kindled a fire. They gave him time to pray, and take leave of his
fellow prisoners, who were placed round the fire to see his death. They
pushed the fire toward him, and when he was almost stifled, took it away
to give him time to breathe, and thus prolong his misery; they drowned
his dying groans with their hideous singing and yelling, all the while
dancing round the fire, cutting off pieces of his flesh and throwing them
in his face. When he was dead they left his body broiling on the coals,
in which state it was found by his friends and buried. Mehetabel Goodwin
was taken with a child of five months old; when it cried they threatened
to kill it, which made the mother go aside and sit for hours together in
the snow to lull it to sleep; her master seeing that this hindered her
from travelling, took the child, struck its head against a tree, and hung
it on one of the branches; she would have buried it but he would not
let her, telling her that if she came again that way she might have the
pleasure of seeing it. She was carried to Canada, and after five years
returned home. Mary Plaisted was taken out of her bed, having lain in
but three weeks: they made her travel with them through the snow and “to
ease her of her burden,” as they said, struck the child’s head against a
tree, and threw it into a river. An anecdote of another kind may relieve
the reader after these tragical accounts. Thomas Toogood was pursued
by three Indians and overtaken by one of them, who having enquired his
name, was preparing strings to bind him, holding his gun under his arm,
which Toogood seized and went backward, keeping the gun presented at him,
and protesting that he would shoot him if he alarmed the others who had
stopped on the opposite side of the hill. By this dexterity he escaped
and got safe into Cocheco; while his adversary had no recompense in his
power but to call after him by the name of Nogood.