Canoes were fashioned from pine, oak and chestnut trees. After being felled, the trees were burned and hewed into shape. A single Indian working by himself in the forest could finish and launch his boat within ten or twelve days. Some of the larger canoes were big enough to hold thirty or forty men. That they were not always the safest craft for white men is shown by Roger Williams’ story:
“It is wonderful to see how they will venture in those canoes, and how (being oft overset as I have myself been with them) they will swim a mile, yea, two or more, safe to land. I having been necessitated to pass waters divers times with them, it hath pleased God to make them many times the instruments of my preservation: and when sometimes in great danger I have questioned safety, they have said to me, ‘Fear not, if we be overset, I will carry you safe to land.’”
As to food, parched meal seems to have been their main article of diet, mixed with either hot or cold water. A little basket of meal was commonly carried on the back or in a hollow leather girdle. This would last for three or four days.
There was also natural food at hand, of which the Indians made good use. The strawberry was greatly prized. To quote from the “Key”:
“This berry is the wonder of all the fruits growing naturally in those parts. In some parts where the natives have planted, I have many times seen as many as would fill a good ship within few miles’ compass. The Indians bruise them in a mortar and mix them with meal and make strawberry bread.” The natives were also very fond of a dish made of meal and dried currants ground to a powder which was “as sweet to them as plum or spice cake to the English.”
Another natural source of food was the clam-beds, for which New England, and Rhode Island especially, has always been famous. Listen to Roger Williams’ description of the clam:
“This is a sweet kind of shell-fish, which all Indians generally over the country, winter and summer, delight in, and at low water the women dig for them. This fish and the natural liquor of it they boil and it makes their broth and their bread seasonable and savory, instead of salt.”
The Indian wampum, made from shells found along the shores of New England, took the place of money. Six small white beads, or three black ones, were equal to one English penny.
These glimpses into the Indian “Key” give us a little idea of Roger Williams’ friends among the Narragansetts and other tribes. Here and there in the book are hints of his kindly dealings with these savages. One story tells how he gladly went two miles out of his way to visit a Connecticut Indian on his death-bed. The dying brave told Roger Williams he had never forgotten the words in which he had preached the religion of the white men, then added pitifully, “Me so big naughty heart, me heart all one stone!”
In another place, Roger Williams referred to Canonicus, sachem of the Narragansetts and his steadfast friend, as “a wise and peaceable prince.” He tells us how he had hard work to overcome Canonicus’ suspicions of the English. To show he had cause to doubt the word of the whites, the Indian chief picked up a stick and broke it in ten pieces—one piece for each time the English had been untrustworthy. It is not necessary to add that Roger Williams did his best to so improve conditions that the Indians could put greater trust in the colonists.