und herself ill." [Her child was
born here].... There she lay till the next Night, with none but
the Snow under her, and the Heaven over her, in a misty and rainy
season. She sent then unto a French Priest, that he would speak
unto her _Squaw Mistress_, who then, without condescending to
look upon her, allow'd her a little Birch-Rind, to cover her Head
from the Injuries of the Weather, and a little bit of dried
Moose, which being boiled, she drunk the Broth, and gave it unto
the Child."

"In a Fortnight she was called upon to Travel again, with her
child in her Arms: every now and then, a whole day together
without the least Morsel of any Food, and when she had any, she
fed only on Ground-nuts and Wild-onions, and Lilly-roots. By the
last of May, they arrived at _Cowefick_, where they planted their
Corn; wherein she was put into a hard Task, so that the Child
extreamly Suffered. The Salvages would sometimes also please
themselves, with casting _hot Embers_ into the Mouth of the
Child, which would render the Mouth so sore that it could not
Suck for a long while together, so that it starv'd and Dy'd...."

"Her mistress, the squaw, kept her a Twelve-month with her, in a
Squalid Wigwam: Where, in the following Winter, she fell sick of
a Feavour; but in the very height and heat of her Paroxysms, her
Mistress would compel her sometimes to Spend a Winters-night,
which is there a very bitter one, abroad in all the bitter Frost
and Snow of the Climate. She recovered; but Four Indians died of
the Feavour, and at length her Mistress also.... She was made to
pass the River on the Ice, when every step she took, she might
have struck through it if she pleased."

"...At last, there came to the fight of her a Priest from Quebeck
who had known her in her former Captivity at Naridgowock.... He
made the Indians sell her to a French Family.... where tho' she
wrought hard, she Lived more comfortably and contented.... She
was finally allowed to return to her husband."[90]

The account of Mary Rowlandson's captivity, long known to every New
England family, and perhaps secretly read by many a boy in lieu of the
present Wild West series, may serve as another vivid example of the
dangers and sufferings faced by every woman who took unto herself a
husband and went forth from the coast