386 NEW FRANCE AND NEW ENGLAND. [1697. 



he told them to run to the nearest fortified house, 

 a mile or more distant, and, snatching up his gun, 

 threw himself on one of his horses and galloped 

 towards his own house to save his wife. It was 

 too late : the Indians were already there. He now 

 thought only of saving his children ; and, keeping 

 behind them as they ran, he fired on the pursuing 

 savages, and held them at bay till he and his flock 

 reached a place of safety. Meanwhile, the house 

 was set on fire, and his wife and the nurse carried 

 off. Her husband, no doubt, had given her up as 

 lost, when, weeks after, she* reappeared, accom- 

 panied by Mary Neff and a boy, and bringing ten 

 Indian scalps. Her story was to the following 

 effect. 



The Indians had killed the new-born child by 

 dashing it against a tree, after which the mother 

 and the nurse were dragged into the forest, where 

 they found a number of friends and neighbors, 

 their fellows in misery. Some of these were pres- 

 ently tomahawked, and the rest divided among 

 their captors. Hannah Dustan and the nurse fell 

 to the share of a family consisting of two warriors, 

 three squaws, and seven children, who separated 

 from the rest, and, hunting as they went, moved 

 northward towards an Abenaki village, two hun- 

 dred and fifty miles distant, probably that of the 

 mission on the Chaudiere. Every morning, noon, 

 and evening, they told their beads, and repeated 

 their prayers. An English boy, captured at Wor- 

 cester, was also of the party. After a while, the 

 Indians began to amuse themselves by telling the 



