882 



MISSIONS 



[b. a. e. 



naki missions in Maine were restored 

 after the Revolution and are still con- 

 tinued by Jesuit ])riests among the Penob- 

 scot and the Passamaquoddy. 



Among other names distinguished in 

 the Abnaki mission the first place must 

 be given to the Jesuits Aubery and 

 Lesueur. Father Aubery, after 10 years' 

 work among the Indians of Nova Scotia, 

 went in 17U!» to St Francis, where he re- 

 mained until his death in 1755. He ac- 

 quired a fluent use of the language, in 

 which he wrote much. Most of his 

 manuscripts were destroyed in the burn- 

 ing of the mission in 1759, but many are 

 still preserved in the mission archives, 

 including an Abnaki dictionary of nearly 

 600 pages. Father Lesueur labored first 

 at Sillery and then at Bci'ancour from 

 1715, with a few interruptions, until 

 1753, leaving as his monument a manu- 

 script 'DictionnairedeRacines' (Abnaki) 

 of 900 pages, now also preserved in the 

 mission archives. To the later period 

 belong Rev. Ciquard, who ministered 

 from 1792 to 1815 on the Penobscot, the 

 St John, and at St Francis; Father Ro- 

 magne, with the Penobscot and the Pas- 

 samaquoddy from 1804 to 1825; Rev. 

 Demilier, a Franciscan, who labored with 

 marked success to the same tribes from 

 1833 to 1843, and the Jesuit Father Eu- 

 gene Vetromile in the same field from 

 about 1855 to about 1880. Each one of 

 these has made some contribution to the 

 literature of the language, the last-named 

 being also the author of a history of the 

 Abnaki and of two volumes of travels 

 in Europe and the Orient. 



The beginning of I-'rotestant work among 

 the Indians of s. New England may fairly 

 be credited to Roger Williams, wlio, on 

 being driven from his home and min- 

 istry in INIassachusetts for his advocacy 

 of I'eligious toleration in 1635, took refuge 

 among the WampanoagandNarraganset, 

 among whom he speedily acquired 

 such influence that he was able to 

 hold them from alliance with the hostiles 

 in the Pequot war. In 1643 Thomas 

 Mayhew, jr (Congregational), son of 

 the grantee of Marthas Vineyard, Mass., 

 having learned the language of the tribe 

 on the island, began among them the 

 work wliich was continued in the same 

 family for four generations, with such suc- 

 cess that throughout the terror of King 

 Philip's war in 1675-76 the Christian In- 

 dians on the island remained quiet and 

 friendly, although outnumbering the 

 whites by 1 to 1. Thomas Mayhew, the 

 younger, was lost at sea in 1657, while on 

 a missionary voyage to England. The 

 work was then taken up by his father, of 

 the same name, and tlie native convert 

 Hiacoomes. It was continued from about 

 1673 by John Mayhew, son of the first- 



named, until his death in 1689, and then 

 by Experience Mayhew, grandson of 

 Thomas the elder, nearly to the time of 

 his death in 1758. Each one of these 

 learned and worked in the Indian lan- 

 guage, in which Thomas, jr, and Expe- 

 rience prepared some small devotional 

 works. The last of the name was assisted 

 also for years 'by Rev. Josiah Torrey, in 

 charge of a white congregation on the 

 island. In 1720 the Indians of Marthas 

 Vineyard numbered about 800 of an esti- 

 mated 1,500 on the first settlement in 

 1642. They had several churches, and 

 schools, so that most of those old enough 

 could read in either tlieir own or the Eng- 

 Ush language. The last native preacher 

 to use the Indian language was Zachariah 

 Howwoswe (or Hossweit), wlio died in 

 1821. 



As far back as 1651 a building had been 

 authorized at Harvard College for the ac- 

 commodation of Indian pupils, but only 

 one Indian ( Caleb Cheeshateaumuck ) is 

 on record as having finished the course, 

 and lie died soon afterward of consump- 

 tion. 



The most noted mission work of this 

 section, however, was that begun by the 

 noted Rev. John Eliot (Congregational) 

 among a remnant of the Massachuset 

 tribe at Nonantum, now Newton, near 

 Boston, Mass., in the fall of 1646. He 

 was then about 42 years of age and had 

 prepared himself for the task by three 

 years of study of the language. The work 

 was extended to other villages, and the 

 reports of his and Mayhew's success led 

 to the formation in 1649 of the English 

 "Corporation for tlie Propagation of the 

 Gospel among the Indians in New Eng- 

 land" for the furtherauce of the mission. 

 As early as 1644 the Massachusetts gov- 

 ernment had made provision looking to 

 the instruction of the neighboring tribes 

 in Christianity, Eliot himself being the 

 pioneer. In 1650 a community of Chris- 

 tian Indians, under a regular form of gov- 

 ernment, was established at Natick, 18 

 m. s. w. of Boston, and became the head- 

 quarters of the mission work. In 1674 

 the "Praying Indians," directly under 

 the care of Eliot and his coadjutor, Sam- 

 uel Danforth, in the Massachusetts Bay 

 jurisdiction, numbered 14 principal vil- 

 lages with a total population exceeding 

 1,000, among the Massachuset, Pawtuck- 

 et, Nipmuc, and other tribes of e. Mas- 

 sacliusetts, each village being organized 

 on a religious and industrial basis. The 

 Christian Indians of Plymouth colony, 

 in s. E. Massachusetts, including also 

 Nantucket, Marthas Vineyard, etc., un- 

 der Revs. John Cotton and Richard 

 Bourne, were estimated at nearly 2,500 

 more. Most of the converts however 

 were drawn from broken and subject 



