refuge in Lion Gardiner's fort until the ship was afloat. Then away they went to Boston.

The few who remained at the up-river settlements lived on scanty supplies of corn obtained from the Indians, and on such game as they could shoot, and on groundnuts and acorns dug from under the snow. Spring found them exhausted, and their unsheltered cattle dead, but many more people, cattle, and supplies arrived in the summer.

Hartford's first houses were built along a swiftflowing "riveret," at the mouth of which was the Dutch post, Fort Hope. All the town buildings were small. The meeting-house had only plain hard benches for seats, and this house of worship and its successors were none of them equipped with stoves until about 1815. From the very first, however, the meeting-house had a bell. There was probably no other public or church bell in the colonies then except one at Jamestown, Virginia.

The Dutch fort soon had English homes all around it within a short distance. The garrison erected some farm buildings, cultivated a little land, and set out cherry trees which presently produced an abundance of fruit. There was always friction between the garrison and the English. Some of the latter began to plough up land near the fort, and, when the Dutch interfered, cudgelled them. In the night-time they seized ground that had been made ready for seed and sowed it with wheat. Standing peas were cut down

and corn planted instead. They shut off the fort on the landward side with palisades, and they sold a hog which belonged to the Dutch because, as they said, it had been trespassing on their crops. The Dutch were accused of insolence, of supplying guns and ammunition to unfriendly Indians, buying goods stolen from the English, and harboring fugitives from justice. Yet not until 1654, when war was being waged between England and Holland, were the Dutch expelled.

Trouble with the Indians developed early. A trading vessel came a little way up the Connecticut in the summer of 1634, and moored close to the bank. It had a crew of eight men, and two captains named Stone and Norton. A party of Pequots visited the vessel, and two of them were engaged to pilot two of the sailors in a skiff to the Dutch fort at Hartford. The four departed up the river. At nightfall they landed, and the sailors presently lay down and fell asleep. Then their guides killed them.

The Indians who visited the vessel were entertained in a friendly way for several hours; but by and by the crew went on shore, and the savages slew them and Captain Stone. The other captain defended himself with his musket in the cook-room. That he might load and fire faster he emptied a supply of powder into a dish close at hand. Unfortunately the powder caught fire, and there was an explosion which so burned and blinded the captain that the enemy had little difficulty in killing him.

This slaughter and other depredations led to an English foray against the Pequots in the autumn of

Saybrook Point Light where the Connecticut River joins
Long Island Sound

1636, and then the Indians went on the warpath. The fort at Saybrook was first attacked. They pestered it like wasps, and Gardiner ordered that no one should venture out to fish or to hunt the plentiful ducks, geese, and turkeys. Three foolhardy men disobeyed orders and went a-fowling. When they were returning loaded with game the Indians captured two of them. The other ran to their boat and rowed to the fort.

Gardiner had three acres of ripening corn two miles from the fort. He placed five lusty men with long guns to guard it, and they saved most of the crop.

Sometimes the cows returned from pasture with arrows sticking in their sides. All the buildings outside of the palisade were destroyed, and the fort was beleaguered through the winter. In April Captain Underhill arrived with twenty well-armed men from Boston.

That same month the Pequots attacked Wethersfield, killed nine of the English, and took two maidens captive. The garrison at Saybrook espied the Indians afterward coming down the river in three canoes with fragments of their victims' clothes tied to long sticks fluttering like flags. Lion Gardiner fired the fort's " great gun" at them, but they were not hit, and they hastily drew their canoes over a narrow beach and escaped before he could fire again.

The colony was now fully aroused. Probably it did not number more than eight hundred souls, yet ninety men were summoned to go against the foe. They were placed under the command of Captain John Mason, and, on May 10th, they and seventy friendly Mohegans embarked at Hartford in a pink, a pinnace, and a shallop to sail down the river.

After several delays caused by running aground the Indians insisted on being set ashore to make their way to the mouth of the river on foot. They arrived at Saybrook some time before the vessels came and were eager to go at once in search of Pequots lurking in the neighborhood. But it was "the Lord's Day," and they were held back until Monday dawned. Then

they sallied forth, and presently returned, bringing five gory Pequot heads and one wretched prisoner whom they killed that night and ate while they danced and sang round a large fire they had kindled.

The Pequots had two strongholds near the mouth of the Thames River on its east side. Before proceeding against them twenty of Mason's men were sent back to guard the settlements up the river. The rest and the Boston men sailed eastward, but did not stop at the Thames River. Instead, they kept on as far as Narragansett Bay with the hope that by landing there and marching back they could surprise the Indians.

The Narragansetts had a village in the vicinity. They were enemies of the Pequots, and the English obtained from them permission to pass through their country, and the help of two hundred of their warriors. Thirteen men were left with the vessels which they were ordered to take to the mouth of the Thames. The others pushed forward with their Indian allies, and toward evening of the second day came to a field newly planted with corn. There they stopped for a while, and then made a cautious hour's march by moonlight and camped. The men slept with their guns beside them. Their sentries, who were posted some distance forward, were near enough to the Indian fort to hear the revelry of the garrison, which lasted till midnight. The savages had seen the English sail past some days before, and thought they were afraid and durst not come near them.