be fuppofed, enquiring of him how he came to be hurt; and who, 'tis very rational to believe, told them that a flash of fire first, and immediately after that, thunder from their gods, had killed those two, and wounded him: This, I fay, is rational; for nothing is more certain than that, as they faw no man near them, fo they had never heard a gun in all their lives, or fo much as heard of a gun; neither knew they any thing of killing or wounding at a distance, with fire and bullets; if they had, one might reafonably believe, that they would not have ftood fo unconcerned, in viewing the fate of their fellows, without fome apprehenfion of their own.

Our two men, though, as they confeffed to me, it grieved them to be obliged to kill so many poor creatures, who at the fame time had no notion of their danger; yet, having them all thus in their power, and the firft having loaded his piece again, refolved to let fly both together among them; and fingling out by agreement which to aim at, they fhot together, and killed, or very much wounded, four of them; the fifth, frighted even to death, though not hurt, fell with the reft; fo that our men, feeing them all fall together, thought they had killed them all.

The belief that the favages were all killed, made our two men come boldly out from the tree before they had charged their guns again, which was a wrong ftep; and they were under fome furprise, when they came to the place, and found no less than four of the men alive, and of them, two very little hurt, and one not at all: this obliged them to fall upon them with the ftocks of their mufquets; and

firft, they made fure of the run-away favage, that had been the caufe of all the mifchief; and of another that was hurt in his knee, and put them out of their pain; then the man that was not hurt at all came and kneeled down to them, with his two hands. held up, and made piteous moan to them by geftures and figns, for his life; but could not fay one word to them that they could understand.

However, they signified to him to fit down at the foot of a tree thereby; and one of the Englifhmen, with a piece of rope-twine, which he had by great chance in his pocket, tied his feet faft together, and his hands behind him, and there they left him; and, with what speed they could, made after the other two which were gone before, fearing they, or any more of them, should find the way to their covered place in the woods, where their wives, and the few goods they had left lay: they came once in fight of the two men, but it was at a great diftance; however, they had the fatisfaction to fee them cross over a valley, towards the fea, the quite contrary way from that which led to their retreat, which they were afraid of; and, being fatisfied with that, they went back to the tree where they left their prifoner, who as they fuppofed, was delivered by his comrades; for he was gone, and the two pieces of rope-yarn, with which they had bound him, lay just at the foot of

the tree.

They were now in as great a concern as before, not knowing what courfe to take, or how near the enemy might be, or in what numbers; fo they refolved to go away to the place where their wives were, to fee if all was well there, and to make them

eafy, who were in fright enough to be fure; for though the favages were their own country folks, yet they were most terribly afraid of them, and perhaps the more, for the knowledge they had of them.

When they came thither, they found the favages had been in the wood, and very near the place, but had not found it; for indeed, it was inacceffible, by the trees standing fo thick, as before, unless the perfons feeking it had been directed by thofe that knew it, which these were not; they found, therefore, every thing very fafe, only the women in a terrible fright; while they were here, they had the comfort of feven of the Spaniards coming to their affistance ; the other ten, with their fervants, and old Friday, I mean Friday's father, were gone in a body to defend their bower, and the corn and cattle that were kept there, in cafe the favages fhould have roved over to that fide of the country; but they did not spread fo far. With the feven Spaniards came one of the favages, who, as I faid, were their prisoners formerly, and with them alfo came the favage whom the Englishmen had left bound hand and foot at the tree; for it seems they came that way, faw the flaughter of the feven men, and unbound the eighth, and brought him along with them, where, however, they were obliged to bind him again, as they had done the two others, who were left when the third ran away.

The prifoners began now to be a burden to them; and they were fo afraid of their escaping, that they thought they were under an abfolute neceffity to kill them for their own preservation: however, the Spaniard governor would not confent to it; but or

dered,

dered, that they should be fent out of the way to my old cave in the valley, and be kept there, with two Spaniards to guard them, and give them food: which was done; and they were bound there hand and foot for that night.

When the Spaniards came, the two Englishmen were fo encouraged, that they could not fatisfy themselves to stay any longer there; but taking five of the Spaniards, and themfelves, with four mus_ quets and a piftol among them, and two ftout quarter ftaves, away they went in queft of the favages; and first, they came to the tree where the men lay that had been killed; but it was easy to fee, that fome more of the favages had been there; for they attempted to carry their dead men away, and had dragged two of them a good way, but had given it over; from thence they advanced to the first rising ground, where they had ftood and feen their camp deftroyed, and where they had the mortification still to see some of the smoke; but neither could they here fee any of the favages: they then refolved, though with all poffible caution, to go forward towards their ruined plantation: but a little before they came thither, coming in fight of the fea fhore, they faw plainly the favages all embarking again in their canoes, in order to be gone.

They seemed forry at first that there was no way to come at them, to give them a parting blow; but upon the whole, were very well fatisfied to be rid of them.

The poor Englishmen being now twice ruined, and all their improvements deftroyed, the reft all agreed

to come and help them to rebuild, and to affift them with needful fupplies. Their three countrymen, who were not yet noted for having the leaft inclination to do any thing good, yet, as foon as they heard of it (for they, living remote, knew nothing till all was over) came and offered their help and affistance, and did very friendly work for feveral days, to restore their habitations, and make neceffaries for them; and thus, in a little time, they were fet upon their legs again.

About two days after this, they had the farther fatisfaction of feeing three of the favages canoes come driving on fhore, and, at fome distance from them, with two drowned men; by which they had reason to believe, that they had met with a storm at sea, and had over-fet fome of them; for it blew very hard the night after they went off.

However, as fome might mifcarry, fo on the other hand, enough of them efcaped to inform the reft, as well of what they had done, as of what happened to them; and to whet them on to another enterprife of the fame nature, which they, it feems, refolved to attempt, with fufficient force to carry all before them; for, except what the first man had told them of inhabitants, they could fay little to it of their own knowledge; for they never faw one man, and the fellow being killed that had affirmed it, they had no other witnefs to confirm it to them.

It was five or fix months after this, before they heard any more of the favages, in which time our men were in hopes they had not forgot their former bad luck, or had given over the hopes of better; when, on a fudden, they were invaded with a most