Massasoit rose as the governor approached, and when Carver extended his hand laid his own in it, each potentate saluting the other with a punctilious gravity much to be admired. Carver then seated himself at the other end of the settle, and turning to Howland, who stood as a sort of Aid at his elbow, he requested some strong waters to be brought that he and the king might pledge health and amity to each other. This request having been foreseen was immediately complied with, and a great silver loving-cup with two handles and filled with a compound of Holland gin, sugar, and spice, with a moderate amount of water, was brought and presented to the governor who tasted decorously, and then passed it to the sachem, who seizing both handles carried it to his mouth and drank with an air of stern determination, as one who would not allow personal distaste to interfere with public obligations. The cup was then passed to the other guests, and replenished more than once until all had tasted, Squanto remarking to his next neighbor as he handed him the cup,—
"It is the witch water to make a man brave that I have told you of drinking in the house of Slaney in the land of these Englishmen."
"Hugh! It is like the sun in summer," muttered the neighbor passing it on in his turn.
"John Howland!" whispered a low voice at the unglazed window near which the young man stood, and as he leaned hastily out he nearly bumped heads with pretty Elizabeth Tilley, who laughing said,—
"Nay, 't is no such great alarm, but Priscilla bade me tell thee to keep an eye upon the governor's loving-cup, lest some of these wild men steal it."
"Nay, they have no pockets to hide it in," replied John laughing. "Still I will have an eye to it, for we have none so much silverware in the colony that we should be willing to spare it."
The ceremony of welcome over, the business of the meeting began, and Massasoit, albeit a little incommoded by his strange potation, showed himself both dignified and friendly in his intentions. Carver on his side was as honorable as he was shrewd, and in the course of an hour the first American International Treaty was harmoniously concluded, and so much to the advantage of both sides, that not only was it sacredly observed in the beginning, but nineteen years later, when Massasoit felt his own days drawing to a close, he brought his sons, Alexander and Philip, to Plymouth, where this "Auncient League and Confederacy" was formally renewed and ratified before the court then in session.
Business over, the sachem produced his pipe, filled it, smoked a little, and passed it to the governor, and in this manner it went round the assembly, red men and white together each taking a few whiffs, and when it was empty returning it to Massasoit, who seemed to be custodian of the tribal stock of tobacco.
Facts are stubborn things and History is sacred, and the scene just described is in all its details simple matter of History, but is it not a singular irony of fate that we who spend our lives in a crusade against strong drink and tobacco must, nevertheless, despair of rivaling the virtues of these men, who began their solemn covenant with the savages they had come to Christianize, by giving them gin, and ended it by accepting from them tobacco?
After the Council came a feast of the simple dainties furnished by the Pilgrim commissariat, and after that an informal mingling of the two companies, during which the Indians examined and essayed to sound the trumpet whose notes had so startled them, although the fife had seemed to them only the older brother of the whistles they so often made of willow twigs.