f Massachusetts, and it is said that
five hundred of them begged Dudley for leave to make a raid into Canada,
on the characteristic condition of choosing their own officers. The
governor consented; but on a message from Peter Schuyler that he had at
last got a promise from the Caughnawagas and other mission Indians to
attack the New England borders no more, the raid was countermanded, lest
it should waken the tempest anew.[82]

What was the object of these murderous attacks, which stung the enemy
without disabling him, confirmed the Indians in their native savagery,
and taught the French to emulate it? In the time of Frontenac there was
a palliating motive for such barbarous warfare. Canada was then
prostrate and stunned under the blows of the Iroquois war. Successful
war-parties were needed as a tonic and a stimulant to rouse the dashed
spirits of French and Indians alike; but the remedy was a dangerous one,
and it drew upon the colony the attack under Sir William Phips, which
was near proving its ruin. At present there was no such pressing call
for butchering women, children, and peaceful farmers. The motive, such
as it was, lay in the fear that the Indian allies of France might pass
over to the English, or at least stand neutral. These allies were the
Christian savages of the missions, who, all told, from the Caughnawagas
to the Micmacs, could hardly have mustered a thousand warriors. The
danger was that the Caughnawagas, always open to influence from Albany,
might be induced to lay down the hatchet and persuade the rest to follow
their example. Therefore, as there was for the time a virtual truce with
New York, no pains were spared to commit them irrevocably to war against
New England. With the Abenaki tribes of Maine and New Hampshire the need
was still more urgent, for they were continually drawn to New England by
the cheapness and excellence of English goods; and the only sure means
to prevent their trading with the enemy was to incite them to kill him.
Some of these savages had been settled in Canada, to keep them under
influence and out of temptation; but the rest were still in their native
haunts, where it was thought best to keep them well watched by their
missionaries, as sentinels and outposts to the colony.

There were those among the French to whom this barbarous warfare was
repugnant. The minister, Ponchartrain, by no means a person of tender
scruples, also condemned it for a time. After the attack on We