Chapter III.
Clouds of War.
1621-1622
Canonicus.
His hostility toward the Puritans.
The Narraganset Indians occupied the region extending from the western shores of Narraganset Bay to Pawcatuck River. They were estimated to number about thirty thousand, and could bring five thousand warriors into the field. Canonicus, the sovereign chief of this tribe, was a man of great renown. War had occasionally raged between the Narragansets and the Wampanoags, and the two tribes were bitterly hostile to each other. Canonicus regarded the newly-arrived English with great jealousy, and was particularly annoyed by the friendly relations existing between them and the Wampanoags. Indeed, it is quite evident that Massasoit was influenced to enter into his alliance with the English mainly from his dread of the Narragansets.
Corruption at court.
A rebellion.
Flight of Massasoit.
Bribery and corruption are almost as common in barbarian as in civilized courts. Canonicus had brought over to his cause one of the minor chiefs of Massasoit, named Corbitant. This man, audacious and reckless, began to rail bitterly at the peace existing between the Indians and the English. Boldly he declared that Massasoit was a traitor, and ought to be deposed. Sustained as Corbitant was by the whole military power of the Narragansets, he soon gathered a party about him sufficiently strong to bid defiance to Massasoit. The sovereign of the Wampanoags was even compelled to take refuge from arrest by flight.
The colonists heard these tidings with great solicitude, and learning that Corbitant was within a few miles of them, at Namasket (Middleborough), striving to rouse the natives to unite with the Narragansets against them, they privately sent Squantum and another friendly Indian, Hobbomak, to Namasket, to ascertain what had become of Massasoit, and how serious was the peril with which they were threatened.