History of the United States in Words of One Syllable

by Helen Wall Pierson

There were some in Eng-land who had a great wish to see this new world. They thought they would like to live in a land with no King, and have a church where they could pray to God in their own way. They were called "Pil-grims," for they went from place to place and would sing psalms and pray, and they were full of joy at the thought of their new home.

Do you know the name of the ship they came in? It is a sweet name, and you must keep it in your mind—The May-flow-er. They did not have a smooth trip, and a storm blew them on to the coast of Mass-a-chu-setts. It was bare and cold, but it was nice to see land at all. There were all sorts of fowl there, and they saw a whale; but when they went to shoot it the gun burst. They made their way to a vale where there was a spring, and there they took their first drink in the new land.

IN-DI-AN FLINT-HEADED ARROW.

There was a rock called Plym-outh Rock, and here they made their homes and built the first house. It was in 1620, in a cold time of the year, that the May-flow-er brought her crew to Plym-outh Rock. There was not much food, and they had from the first a foe whom they could not trust or make a friend. These were a new race of men. They had brown skins; were tall and straight, with long, coarse black hair. They had no books, and got their food in the hunt, or caught fish in the streams. They made boats of birch bark—queer, long things, with a point at each end. They could make bows, and would pound their corn with two stones for their bread. They took the skins of beasts for their clothes, for they knew how to dress them. Each tribe had its head man, called a chief, and their great joy was in war. When their foes took them, they would not pray for their lives. They were brave in their own way, and would show no fear at the sight of the fire that was to burn their flesh.

Their wives, the squaws, would dress the food and do all the hard work at home. They were the ones who dug each small patch of ground and put in the beans and corn. The men had a scorn for work. They were made to fight, they thought. They would say, "The Great Chief gave the white man a plow and the red man a bow, and sent them in the world to gain food, each in his own way."

In this new land there was not a horse, cow, sheep, cat, dog, or hen to be found. You would not like such a place, would you? What did the young people do for pets in those days? No chicks to feed, no puss with her soft, warm fur, for small hands to stroke.

But the new homes were not left in peace. The red men saw that their doom was near. They felt that they would have to move on and on, to give place to these men who knew so much; who read books and had schools, and taught their young ones to pray. So they took the guns that they had bought from the white men and went to war with them. When they took them they would tie them fast to stakes, burn them to death, and all the time the flames were at work, these fierce red men would dance a war dance of joy. They bought rum from the white men, and it made them like brutes.

They knew that the white men had come to take their land, and that was cause for their hate. And so the white men, in their turn, felt no love for the red skin, and thought they did well to push him back more and more, and take all they could from him. The white men were to blame, for they first gave the vile rum to the red men, and that made them wild. They would burn down the white man's house at night, and kill his wife and babes. Think how sad it must be to wake up in the night and find the hot blaze of a fire in your face, and the wild war-whoop of an In-di-an in your ears. But you can lie down in your bed in peace, for there is no one to harm you—you live in good times.