plot against the white men and suddenly
attacked them with great fury. Hundreds of the English settlers
were slain. The author of the novel, taking the bare outline of the
massacre as given in the early histories, has woven around it the
graphic story of Captain Ralph Percy and his saving of the colony.
Percy, unlike Miles Standish, is not a historical character.

I.

A man who hath been a soldier and adventurer into far and strange
countries must needs have faced Death many times and in many guises. I
had learned to know that grim countenance, and to have no great fear of
it. The surprise of our sudden capture by the Indians had now worn away,
and I no longer struggled to loose my bonds, Indian-tied and not to be
loosened.

Another slow hour and I bethought me of Diccon, my servant and companion
in captivity, and spoke to him, asking him how he did. He answered from
the other side of the lodge that was our prison, but the words were
scarcely out of his mouth before our guard broke in upon us, commanding
silence.

It was now moonlight without the lodge and very quiet. The night was far
gone; already we could smell the morning, and it would come apace.
Knowing the swiftness of that approach and what the early light would
bring, I strove for a courage which should be the steadfastness of the
Christian and not the vainglorious pride of the heathen.

Suddenly, in the first gray dawn, as at a trumpet's call, the village
awoke. From the long communal houses poured forth men, women, and
children; fires sprang up, dispersing the mist, and a commotion arose
through the length and breadth of the place. The women made haste with
their cooking and bore maize cakes and broiled fish to the warriors, who
sat on the ground in front of the royal lodge. Diccon and I were loosed,
brought without, and allotted our share of the food. We ate sitting side
by side with our captors, and Diccon, with a great cut across his head,
even made merry.

In the usual order of things in an Indian village, the meal over,
tobacco should have followed. But now not a pipe was lit, and the women
made haste to take away the platters and to get all things in readiness
for what was to follow. The [v]werowance of the [v]Paspaheghs rose to
his feet, cast aside his mantle, and began to speak. He was a man in the
prime of life, of a great figure, strong as a [v]Susquehannock, and a
savage cruel and crafty beyond measure. Over his br