stern and the other on the southwestern side. Between
six and seven hundred Indians were within the fort.

The English troops were divided into two parties, one headed by
Captain Mason, and the other by Captain Underhill, who had been in
command of the fort at Saybrook. They decided to make a simultaneous
attack upon each of the entrances. Though the moon shone very
brilliantly, rendering it almost as light as day, yet the Indians,
unsuspicious of danger and soundly asleep, gave not the slightest
indication of alarm until the two parties had each silently approached
within a rod of the entrances. A dog was then heard to bark, and
immediately one solitary voice shouted frantically, "Englishmen!
Englishmen!" The entrances were merely blocked up with bushes about
breast high. The assailants instantly poured a volley of bullets in
upon their sleeping foes, and, sword in hand, rushed over the feeble
barriers. Notwithstanding the surprise and the appalling thunder of
the guns, the Pequots sprang to arms and made a fierce resistance.
The two parties, advancing from the opposite entrances, forced their
way along the main street, firing to the right and the left, and
making fearful slaughter of their foes. They speedily swept the street
clear of all opposition. The savages, however, who still vastly
outnumbered their assailants, retreated into their wigwams, and,
taking advantage of every covert, almost overwhelmed the compact bands
of the English with a shower of arrows and javelins. The conflict was
now fierce in the extreme, and for a time the issue was very doubtful.
Several of the colonists were already killed, and many severely
wounded.

The wigwams, composed of the boughs and bark of trees, and covered
with mats, were as dry as powder. Captain Mason, at this critical
moment, shouted to his exhausted men, "Set fire to the wigwams."
Torches were immediately applied; the flames leaped from roof to roof,
and in a few moments the whole village was as a furnace of roaring,
crackling flame. The savages, forced by the fire from their
lurking-places, presented a sure mark for the bullet, and they were
shot down and cut down without mercy. It was no longer a fight, but a
massacre. The Indians, bewildered with terror, threw down their arms,
and rushed to and fro in vain attempts to escape. Some climbed the
palisades, only to present a sure target for innumerable bullets;
others plunged into the eddying flames which were fiercely d