axe.

But the "weightier matters of the law" were not by any means forgotten,
and there was a continual struggle to cure the converts of their new vice
of drunkenness, and their old habit of despising and maltreating their
squaws, who in the Christian villages were raised to a state far less
degraded; for any cruelty or tyranny towards them was made matter of
public censure and confession in the assembly.

Several more distant journeys were taken by Mr. Eliot, some of them to
the Merrimac River to see a powerful old Sachem of a great age, named
Passaconaway, who his people believed to be able to make green leaves
grow in winter, trees dance, and water burn.

He was so much afraid of the Missionary that he fled away the first time
he heard he was coming, probably thinking him a great sorcerer; but the
next time he remained, listened eagerly, expressed his intention of
praying, and tried to induce Mr. Eliot to settle in his district. He
lived to a great age, and left a charge with his children never to
contend with the English, having convinced himself that the struggle was
hopeless. Several other Sachems gave a sort of attention: and it
appeared that the way had been in some degree prepared by a French
priest, who had been wrecked on Cape Cod, had been passed from one tribe
to another, and had died among them, but not without having left a
tradition of teaching which was by some identified with Eliot's.

Of one Sachem, Mather tells a story: "While Mr. Eliot was preaching of
Christ unto the other Indians, a demon appeared unto a Prince of the
Eastern Indians in a shape that had some resemblance of Mr. Eliot or of
an English minister, pretending to be the Englishman's God. The spectre
commanded him 'to forbear the drinking of rum and to observe the Sabbath-
day, and to deal justly with his neighbours;' all which things had been
inculcated in Mr. Eliot's ministry, promising therewithal unto him that,
if he did so, at his death his soul should ascend into a happy place,
otherwise descend unto miseries; but the apparition all the while never
said one word about Christ, which was the main subject of Mr. Eliot's
ministry. The Sachem received such an impression from the apparition
that he dealt justly with all men except in the bloody tragedies and
cruelties he afterwards committed on the English in our wars. He kept
the Sabbath-day like a fast, frequently attending in our congregations;
he would not meddle with any rum,