Carlyle's laugh, and other surprises

by Thomas Wentworth Higginson

MASSASOIT, INDIAN CHIEF

There was paid on October 19, 1907, one of the few tributes ever openly rendered by the white races to the higher type of native Indian leaders. Such was that given by a large company at Warren, Rhode Island, to Massasoit, the friendly Indian Sachem who had first greeted the early Pilgrims, on their arrival at Plymouth in 1620. The leading address was made by the author of this volume.

The newspaper correspondents tell us that, when an inquiry was one day made among visitors returning from the recent Jamestown Exposition, as to the things seen by each of them which he or she would remember longest, one man replied, “That life-size group in the Smithsonian building which shows John Smith in his old cock-boat trading with the Indians. He is giving them beads or something and getting baskets of corn in exchange.”[1] This seemed to the speaker, and quite reasonably, the very first contact with civilization on the part of the American Indians. Precisely parallel to this is the memorial which we meet to dedicate, and which records the first interview in 1620 between the little group of Plymouth Pilgrims and Massasoit, known as the “greatest commander of the country,” and “Sachem of the whole region north of Narragansett Bay.”[2]

“Heaven from all creatures hides the book of fate,” says the poet Pope; and nothing is more remarkable in human history than the way in which great events sometimes reach their climax at once, instead of gradually working up to it. Never was this better illustrated than when the Plymouth Pilgrims first met the one man of this region who could guarantee them peace for fifty years, and did so. The circumstances seem the simplest of the simple.

The first hasty glance between the Plymouth Puritans and the Indians did not take place, as you will recall, until the newcomers had been four days on shore, when, in the words of the old chronicler, “they espied five or sixe people with a Dogge coming towards them, who were savages: who when they saw them ran into the Woods and whistled the Dogge after them.” (This quadruped, whether large or small, had always a capital letter in his name, while human savages had none, in these early narratives.) When the English pursued the Indians, “they ran away might and main.”[3] The next interview was a stormier one; four days later, those same Pilgrims were asleep on board the “shallope” on the morning of December 8, 1620 (now December 19), when they heard “a great and strange cry,” and arrow-shots came flying amongst them which they returned and one Indian “gave an extraordinary cry” and away they went. After all was quiet, the Pilgrims picked up eighteen arrows, some “headed with brass, some with hart’s horn” (deer’s horn), “and others with eagles’ claws,”[4] the brass heads at least showing that those Indians had met Englishmen before.

Three days after this encounter at Namskeket,—namely, on December 22, 1620 (a date now computed as December 23),—the English landed at Patuxet, now Plymouth. (I know these particulars as to dates, because I was myself born on the anniversary of this first date, the 22d, and regarded myself as a sort of brevet Pilgrim, until men, alleged to be scientific, robbed me of one point of eminence in my life by landing the Pilgrims on the 23d). Three months passed before the sight of any more Indians, when Samoset came, all alone, with his delightful salutation, “Welcome, Englishmen,” and a few days later (March 22, 1621), the great chief of all that region, Massasoit, appeared on the scene.

When he first made himself visible, with sixty men, on that day, upon what is still known as Strawberry Hill, he asked that somebody be sent to hold a parley with him. Edmund Winslow was appointed to this office, and went forward protected only by his sword and armor, and carrying presents to the Sachem. Winslow also made a speech of some length, bringing messages (quite imaginary, perhaps, and probably not at all comprehended) from King James, whose representative, the governor, wished particularly to see Massasoit. It appears from the record, written apparently by Winslow himself, that Massasoit made no particular reply to this harangue, but paid very particular attention to Winslow’s sword and armor, and proposed at once to begin business by buying them. This, however, was refused, but Winslow induced Massasoit to cross a brook between the English and himself, taking with him twenty of his Indians, who were bidden to leave their bows and arrows behind them. Beyond the brook, he was met by Captain Standish, with an escort of six armed men, who exchanged salutations and attended him to one of the best, but unfinished, houses in the village. Here a green rug was spread on the floor and three or four cushions. The governor, Bradford, then entered the house, followed by three or four soldiers and preceded by a flourish from a drum and trumpet, which quite delighted and astonished the Indians. It was a deference paid to their Sachem. He and the governor then kissed each other, as it is recorded, sat down together, and regaled themselves with an entertainment. The feast is recorded by the early narrator as consisting chiefly of strong waters, a “thing the savages love very well,” it is said; “and the Sachem took such a large draught of it at once as made him sweat all the time he staied.”[5]

A substantial treaty of peace was made on this occasion, one immortalized by the fact that it was the first made with the Indians of New England. It is the unquestioned testimony of history that the negotiation was remembered and followed by both sides for half a century: nor was Massasoit, or any of the Wampanoags during his lifetime, convicted of having violated or having attempted to violate any of its provisions. This was a great achievement! Do you ask what price bought all this? The price practically paid for all the vast domain and power granted to the white man consisted of the following items: “a pair of knives and a copper chain with a jewel in it, for the grand Sachem; and for his brother Quadequina, a knife, a jewel to hang in his ear, a pot of strong waters, a good quantity of biscuit and a piece of butter.”[6]