To the natives, the English fur-trader was the representative of his race; and as they gradually found themselves no match for his methods or his morals, their simple faith in the white man's honesty, their debasing fear of his prowess, their reverence for him as a superhuman being, little by little died out. They saw themselves wronged, despoiled, and abused, with less and less power to assert their rights and maintain their independence; and their hearts became more and more filled with a sullen desire for revenge. In the ethics of the North American Indian, there was but one mode of gratifying this feeling. Nothing would suffice but the blood of the offender. This fearful code, with all its horrors, was felt alike by the innocent and the guilty, when Philip and the hour came.
Meanwhile the plantation at Pocomtuck was increasing in strength and prosperity. The rich soil of the meadows yielded an abundance of Indian corn, wheat, rye, barley, beans, and flax. Game of every kind was plenty and easily secured. Flocks of turkeys, pigeons, geese, and ducks were all about them in the woods and waters. The forest also furnished condiments, in the form of sugar from the sap of the maple tree, and honey from the heart of the "bee tree." The rivers teemed with choice fish; herds of deer were so common as to impress the name of "Deerfield" permanently upon the settlement. Peace and plenty smiled on all, and the foundations of the little community seemed firmly established. The planters had come to stay. In 1673, a minister had been secured in the person of Samuel Mather, a Harvard graduate of 1671. In 1675, they had already "a little house for a meeting-house, yt they meete in," and were building a dwelling for the minister. None dreamed that the horrors of an Indian war were so soon to overwhelm them and change the whole aspect of nature and of human affairs in this quiet valley. The news of the outbreak at far-off Plymouth, in June, 1675, raised no fears in them. The attack on Brookfield, August 2, opened their eyes, and preparations for defence were pushed with vigor. The swamp fight under the shadow of Wequamps brought the war to their very doors; and, on the first of September, the settlers were called upon to defend their homes against the attack of those who had hitherto been considered trusty friends.
The days of peace and plenty were over for this unhappy people. On the slaughter of Lothrop and the "Flower of Essex," at Bloody Brook, September 18, this chosen land was deserted and given back to the wilderness.
After seven years of wandering, such of the survivors as had courage enough returned to the desolate scene of their former prosperity; but the progress of resettlement was slow and painful. Fortifications were built, old and young trained for soldiers, watch and ward kept night and day, scouts ranged the surrounding forests, and all were constantly on the alert. All hunting or fishing, all labor in forest or field, all journeying, was at the imminent risk of life or liberty. From the nearest swamp or thicket, from behind some fence, stump, or clump of brake, at any moment might appear the flash of the musket or gleam of the scalping-knife. Never ending toil under these conditions, and unceasing vigilance, were the price of existence, and the stern realities of life closed in upon them on every side. Labor they must, or starvation was at the door; for their sustenance must be drawn from their own acres. They could not look back for aid, as the towns below were in the same condition. Women and children were not exempt from laborious toil. Of relaxation there was little, and recreation was unthought of. Even parental love was constrained and formal. Children were born into a cold and cheerless atmosphere, and it is not to be wondered at that they grew up hard and austere men and women, whose chief or only solace was the hope of an eternity of rest and psalm-singing, in a heaven earned by the endurance of trials with piety, patience, and faith that all their sufferings would in some way redound to the glory of God.
There was little desire or opportunity for cultivating the mind. A dense ignorance of letters was the rule. Hardly a woman born of the generation preceding Queen Anne's War could write her name, and many of the most active and useful men could do no better. The people lived wholly off the land. Their clothing and bedding were either from flax, raised, pulled, rotted, broken, and swingled by the men; and hatchelled, carded, spun, and woven into cloth, and cut, and made up by the women; or else of wool sheared from the flocks, carded and spun by hand, and knit into stockings, or woven into blankets or rugs, or into flannel, to be fulled for men's wear; or into linsey-woolsey, for the women and children. To the material for men's garments must be added buckskin for breeches and leggins. Shoes were often made of untanned hide, moccasin fashion, a method borrowed from the Indians. Thorns took the place of pins in woman's gear, and thongs did duty for buttons, with men. If the maiden did have "genuine bear's oil" for her hair, for lack of a mirror her head must be dressed by the pool or placid spring.
The imports were the metals for the smith, guns, swords, lead, powder, rum, salt, sickles, razors, jack-knives, scissors, needles. There was seen occasionally, in the most forehanded families, a show of red shag cotton, calico, or Manchester. Very rarely some ambitious woman would appear with a silk wimple, scarf, or ribbon. In such extreme cases, be she dame or maiden, the stern hand of the law fell heavily upon the culprit, and certainly with more weight if she wore the unseemly and offending article "in a flaunting manner."
They had neither tea nor coffee. Their drink beside water was cider or malt beer. Spirituous liquors were a luxury, used principally in sickness, at weddings, funerals, or other special occasions. Indian corn and wheat were staple articles of diet; the former eaten as hulled corn, or beaten in a mortar into samp or hominy; and probably wheat was prepared in the same manner. Their dishes were of wood or pewter; gourd-shells answered for dippers and vessels of various use; and clam-shells made acceptable spoons. The household utensils were largely home-made.
Artisans were few. The wood-work of their carts, ploughs, yokes, and other farm implements, was generally made at home. The cart-irons, ploughshares, chains, axes, billhooks, scythes, and other cutting instruments, were hammered out on the anvil of the village blacksmith; and the work turned out by them is unequalled by any of the craft to-day.
With all their hardships and poverty, with all their distress and danger, the people were strict in the observance of all the established rites of their faith. The meeting-house burned in Philip's War was at once replaced on the second settlement. Within a score of years this had been outgrown, and a third edifice erected. It was two stories, square, with the roof rising from each of the sides to the turret in the centre. Of the interior finish a little is known. There were no pews; the worshippers were "seated" in fixed places, according to rules established in town-meeting, where the "dignity" of each rude bench was formally discussed and declared by vote. The women sat on the right of the minister, and the men on the left. The boys and girls were stored away somewhere in nooks and corners, under the eye of the tythingmen. On each side of the entrance places were reserved where, on entering, the men could deposit their loaded guns under the care of an appointed guard. While the faithful pastor was warning his devout hearers against the wiles of the tempter within, the sentinel, stationed in the turret above, watched all approaches, to guard against surprisal by an enemy without.
The communities of this period are often referred to as pure democracies, where each man was ranked equal to every other. This is far from the fact. There were real aristocratic distinctions in every town, nowhere more apparent than in meetings for religious worship. The truth appears to be that the settlers were still bound by the fetters of habit and custom brought from the mother-land. Emancipation from its aristocratic practices and social distinctions came only with the slow growth of democratic ideas and the overthrow of kingly rule.