1829.] 



Domestic and Foreign. 



567 



demic, which thinned their nutnbers and 

 humbled their spirits ; but Metacom, the 

 son of Ulassasoit, better Icnown as King 

 Philip, loolied on the settlers and their en- 

 croachments with a jealous eye, and, finally, 

 getting up a powerful confederacy, kindled 

 a fearful war against them, which broke out 

 in I675. The Narragansetts, a few years 

 before quite subdued, and their chief, IMian- 

 tonimoh, killed by the Piquods, aided by 

 the settlers, were recovering tlieir strength, 

 when Conanchet, ason of the murdered chief, 

 concurred with Bletacom in the attacks on 

 the settlements. The chief scene of Sir. 

 Cooper's story is connected with a foray of 

 these formidable chiefs. 



Captain Heathcote, a man of a Puritan 

 cast, and an old soldier, is supposed to have 

 been of those who quitted England, and first 

 colonized JMassachusetts, about the period 

 when Cromwell and Hampden, by a most 

 unlucky act of authority, were prevented 

 from migrating. After a residence of twenty 

 years, when neighbours were gathering 

 thickly about him, and some of them ap- 

 parently incHned to interfere with his 

 opinions — his praying and preaching — the 

 very reason which drove him from his native 

 shores — he resolved to take a new and deeper 

 plunge into the forests, and actually planted 

 himself, far up the vale of the Connecticut, 

 beyond the limits of all cultivation. Here, 

 surrounded by a considerable family, a son 

 and son's wife and their children, man- 

 servants, and maid-servants, sheep, and 

 cows, and horses, the old patriarch, at the 

 end of ten years, found himself settled with 

 extensive buildings entrenched and paU- 

 sadoed, and broad lands in cultivation, and 

 hitherto undisturbed by the Indians, though 

 not always unalarmed. The story opens with 

 some new alarms. A stranger, ftUl of mys- 

 tery, solicits admission in tlie night ; and 

 after a private conference with the old 

 Puritan, departs the same night. That same 

 night, too, a young Indian was caught in 

 ambush near the palLsadoes, whose capture 

 apparently baffled an intended attack. 

 Though treated with kindness, especially by 

 Ruth, thewife of Heathcote's son, no impres- 

 sion appeared to be made upon his unsuscept- 

 ible nature. Their own security seemed to de- 

 mand his close confinement ; but after the 

 lapse of some months he was permitted to join 

 a hunting party, and thougli scjiarating from 

 the hunters, he returned again in the even- 

 ing. That very night re-appeared the mys- 

 terious stranger, and while he was conferring 

 with the Indian boy, whom he recognized, 

 and who, at last, was found tosjieak English, 

 the wlioops of a thousand Indians were 

 heard close at hand. Tlie attack was at 

 first re])ulsed ; but when arrows failed, the 

 firebrand was cflective. The stranger was 

 active in repelling the assault ; and the 

 Indian boy, thougli apparently taking no 

 part, rescued Rutli's little girl from the 

 tomahawk of a fiery savage ; but finally 

 the whole pile of building was wrapt in 



flame and burnt to the ground, and the 

 party, with two or three exceptions, escaped 

 by concealment in a well. Among the 

 exceptions were Ruth's child, 3 beautiful 

 little girl of eight or nine, a half-witted 

 boy who looked after the cows, and the 

 young Indian. 



No time was lost in vain lamentations. 

 The whole party bestirred themselves ; as- 

 sistance was procured from the nearest 

 neighbours ; and, in another ten years, not 

 only was all replaced, but the settlement 

 was enlarged by the accession of forty or 



fifty families, increasing and multiplying 



some three at a birth. Every thing seemed 

 prospering ; but Ruth stiU mourned for her 

 beautiful child, of whom no tidings could 

 ever be heard, though search was made far 

 and near, and the Indian quarters visited in 

 vain. One fatal Sabbath, while the whole 

 village were assembled at church, a new 

 alarm of " Indians are coming" was made, 

 and suddenly presented himself again the 

 old mysterious stranger, who, in conjunction 

 with Heathcote's son, quickly marshalled 

 the forces of the village, to encounter the 

 new attack. AH resistance was useless. 

 Some twenty of the party were killed, and 

 the rest taken captives. The further 

 slaughter was checked by the influence of 

 Conanchet, who proved to be the Indian 

 boy, the saviour of Ruth's child — the son 

 of the renowned Miantonimoh, and himself 

 of at least equal renown. In a few hours 

 cojiies the young chief's squaw — she is, as 

 the reader will anticipate, Ruth's child, and 

 Conanchet introduces her to her mother. 

 She is become thoroughly Indian — her old 

 associations have wholly vanished — attempts 

 to reclaim her are all in vain, and the con- 

 sequence is nothing but discomfort to the 

 disconsolate parent. 



In the mean while, the old stranger, 

 whose story is very slightly developed— he 

 was, it seems, a fugitive regicide, and, by 

 his intercourse with the Indians, had op- 

 portunities of detecting their schemes is 



engaged in negotiating a treaty between the 

 invading tribes and the Heathcotes ; but 

 unluckily, at the same time, a Wampanoag 

 traitor betrays the chiefs into the hands of 

 some of the villagers and a party of Piquods. 

 IMetacom escapes ; but Conanchet is de- 

 livered up to the chief of the Piquods, and 

 dies, with the heroism of his race, in the 

 presence of his beautiful wife, who herself 

 withered at tlie sight, dies also, recovering, 

 in her last moments, some gleams of her 

 early state, as insane persons sometimes do 

 before deatli. The lialf-witted boy, too, 

 who had disappeared at the time tlie little 

 girl did, returns an Indian — not strength- 

 ened in intellectual vigour precisely, but 

 imbued witli the sentiments of llie savage ; 

 and thougli but an idiot among tlie civilized, 

 ajipears respectable among Indians — pitliy 

 in sentiment, and strong in purjiose. That 

 circumstances modify character, nobody, 

 that considers at all, can doubt ; but such 



