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the open air,' and would readily do it, to make room for Englishmen. While fishing, during the winter, they went quite naked. This was the costume of their children, and frequently of men and women, except a slender leathern girdle about their loins. Their coats of skins covered but little of their bodies, and were worn as ornaments, or while at leisure in cold weather. They showed the usual barbaric disesteem of cleanliness. When one of their wigwams, "those filthy smoakie, holes,” had been inhabited until even a Narragansett Indian could endure its vermin no longer, the method of housecleaning was, to burn it, and build another elsewhere. Wood' says that the Indians "preferred to be naked rather than lousie." Apparently they knew no other alternative. Their whole manner of life was in harmony with their barbarian ignorance of comfort. The Narragansetts lived during the warmer months in villages near the sea and removed to sheltered valleys during the winter, having no ownership of the soil, or fixed places of abode. Their migratory habits, between their winter quarters and their "summer fields,' were never fully overcome, and among the Narragansetts as among their brethren of the Northwest, were among the chief obstacles to their civilisation.

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They could be taught few of the industries of the English.

(1)Their fire is instead of our bed cloaths." Key, pp. 38, 39.

(2) Key, pp. 104, 106.

(3) New England's Prospect," page 73.

(4) Key, p. 58. To a similar reason may be ascribed the barbarian fondness for short hair. Gookin, p. 181. To the end of their tribal existence, they preferred wigwams. Houses were "more chargeable to build and not so warm, and cannot be removed so easily as their wigwams, wherein there is not a nail used, to avoid annoyance by fleas." The "praying Indians were so full of fleas that Eliot could not sleep among them. During his visits to Natick, he occupied a comfortable chamber, carefully set apart, for himself. These ancient companions of the Indians adhered to them, with unwavering constancy in the lowest ebb of their fortunes. So late as January, 1707-8, Boston housekeepers declined to entertain Missionary Indians, but provided them quarters at a tavern. See Sewall's Diary, Mass. Hist. Soc. Coll., 5th series, Vol. 6, p. 212-13,

(5) Key, p. 56.

(6) Key, p. 56.

3

The Indians had no fowls before the settlers came.' Nor would they keep cattle, even after they had been taught how to make cows and goats profitable for milk and butter." Wild game was their only animal food. It was abundant, and did not diminish when hunted stealthily and noiselessly with Indian traps and bows. Deer were especially numerous. There was, says Williams, "wonderful plenteous hunting." Sometimes "they pursue in twentie, fortie, fiftie, yea two hundred in a company (as I have seene) when they drive the woods before them.” They were ingenious trappers, well knew the haunts and habits of the waterfowl and land birds, of the deer and wolf, and ready to take advantage of them. From their wild game they derived some supplies of leather. The smoke of their wigwams served for an imperfect process of tanning, which added its pungent savours to the atmosphere of their abodes. Their mocassins, leggins and garments of deerskin they preferred to those of English cloth. These skins of moose and deer, they painted with bright colours and used for personal ornaments, and for the warmth and decoration of their wigwams.

Their knowledge of the vegetable resources of their country was but slender." Indian corn boiled, or parched and coarsely pulverized in a mortar, and prepared with a cookery equally simple or even rude, was their chief vegetable support. They knew nothing of the easy process of making sugar. They first learned from the English the value of many herbs which grew spontaneously around them, and whose uses, (unlike many other barbarous races) they had never felt the curiosity to test.

(1)Key, p. 56.

(2) Key, p. 74. See Williams's letter to the Gen. Court of Mass. Narr. Club Pub., Oct. 5, 1654, VI. 276.

(3) Key, pp. 141-2.

(4) Key, pp. 85, 86, 87. Pigeons were everywhere abundant, and wild birds, devourers of the Indian corn. They caught waterfowl asleep at night by stealthy approach.

(5) Key, pp. 106, 107-8.

(6) Key, p. 33.

Tobacco was almost their only medicine and luxury.' They were not excessive in the use of it. It was the only plant upon which the men did not think it beneath their dignity to labour. The women planted, dressed, gathered, beat, and "barned" the corn, and did all the rest of the field work. "It is almost incredible what burthens the poore women carry of corne, of fish, of beanes, of mats, and a childe besides." The Narragansetts had but two lessons to teach to the English. One was the manuring of lands with fish, the other was the method of baking clams with seaweed. These are the sole legacies of an ancient race, to the civilisation of the world.

6

As Williams became more familiar with the Narragansetts he was impressed by their active and industrious habits. They made paths through the wilderness, acted as guides even in dangerous or hostile neighbourhoods, carried provisions for their escort, and prepared their lodgings, and were surprisingly quick of foot. They were keen, shrewd, suspicious, and had the ready, perceptive faculties of a rude people, who learned everything by their own experience. The Indians" of the higher class were generally grave, and sober, yet cheerful and good humoured. These were careful to distinguish between those of their own order, and the lower and baser sort who had little selfrespect, and were not even furnished with names." Williams cheerfully accords to the Narragansetts praise for kindliness in their households, for whom their affections were exceedingly

(1) Key, pp. 35, 55.

(2) Key, pp. 50, 51.

(3) Key, p. 51.

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(4) Bradford's "History of Plymouth," Mass. Hist. Soc. Coll., 4th series, III. 100. Mourt's Relation, 2d series, Mass. Hist. Soc. Coll., IX. 60. Manuring with fish, a process learned from the Indians. Savage's Winthrop, ed. 1853, I. 101.

(5) Key, p. 72.

(6) Key, pp. 30, 38.

(7) Key, pp. 74, 135.

(8) Key, p. 58.
(9) Key, p. 27.
(10 Key, p. 29.

strong, even to unwise indulgence, and that they never suffered their fatherless children, to be left unprovided, or to starve.'

2

Their nearest approach to English arts or letters was in the painting of deerskins, or their own faces with divers emblems and with significant colours, in which their vanity found gratification. In a like spirit, they were eager for the small looking glasses of the English traders, though to Williams it seemed wonderful that they saw anything in them to excite their admiration. They had separate trades and handicrafts.3 Some were makers of bows, others of arrows-or of dishes. The women made all the earthen vessels. There were separate classes of hunters, fishers and makers of wampum money. This was of a very uncertain value, easily connterfeited' and liable to depreciation. The Indians learned from the English traders some at least of the means of guarding against loss. With grains of Indian corn they learned to reckon large sums, with as much expertness as Europeans, with pens or counters."

The Narragansetts practiced the rude hospitality of savage life, inviting strangers freely, and courteously, and offering them a participation in their meals, though but little had been prepared for themselves. They displayed a formal and ceremonious kindness toward those whose friendship they did not distrust. Williams found that his acts of benevolence towards them, were gratefully remembered and repaid, long after he had forgotten that he had ever rendered a service. They were not

so scandalous in their vices as people in Europe. At Williams's first acquaintance with them, they were not drunken or gluttonous, nor were there such crimes among them,-robberies, adulteries, murders, &c.,—as among the English. They purchased (1) Key, p. 45.

(2) Key, pp. 107-8, 136, 154.

(3) Key, p. 133..

(4) Key, pp. 128-9, 134.

(5) Key, p. 42.

(6) Key, p. 36.

(7) Key, pp. 30, 31, 32.

(8) Key, pp. 77, 121.

their wives, after the old Asiatic fashion, and in the low state of morals accompanying polygamous households, showed the same watchfulness over their families' as did their remote ancestors.

Neighbourhoods were ready to unite for mutual aid. "Men and women, forty, fifty, one hundred, joine, & come in to help freely,”—“breake up their fields, build forts, hunt & fish by common assistance,"-"a very loving sociable speedy way," says Williams.

4

The barbaric traits of the Narragansetts were peculiarly offensive to the traders with whom they came in contact. They had the savage lack of truthfulness, and therefore felt but little confidence in each other. The practice of private revenge was common. "It is a rule among them that it is not good for a man to travel without a weapon," and they seldom journeyed unarmed or alone. Their bad faith greatly increased the difficulty arising from a quarrel with an Englishman, as but little confidence could be reposed in ordinary Indian testimony. They were punctual in observing their bargains, but their virtue was easily overcome by temptation. Perhaps it was from the fear of private revenge that they did not steal from each other, but only from the English. Towards white men they showed barbarian cunning, and not more than barbarian honesty. "Commonly they never shut their doores, day nor night, and 'tis rare that any hurt is done." When away from home, they trusted their goods with Englishmen rather than with their own people. Williams wrote from his own experience, as the Narragansetts stole his goats from Prudence, though they

(1) Key, pp. 124, 125.

(2) Key, p. 92.

(3) Key, p. 76.

(4) Key, p. 45.

(5) Key, p. 139.

(6) Key, pp. 50, 139.

(7) Key, p. 52.

(8) Williams to Winthrop, February 15, 1654.

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