The Senecas gave them arms, removed from ing alliances. them the petticoat, and bade them take the hatchet the " six ;

.

different nations of French Indians

"2

plead their cause with the " to break the entreated them

" advised and Mohawks, and " have some consideration for those Albany sales, and to they 'called brothers;" the council at Onondaga repudiated the offensive

October came, and no sooner had the

contracts.

biting frost reddened the maple and hardened the yellow corn in the husk, than, with their allies, painted black for war, in bands

of two or four abreast, they moved eastward with murderous and the line of the Blue mountain, from the Delaware

intent,

to the Susquehanna,

became the scene of the

carnival

which

they held with torch and tomahawk during many coming months.

The

defenseless settlers were harassed by an unseen foe by and Some were shot down at the plow, some day by night. were killed at the fireside ; men, women and children were

promiscuously tomahawked or scalped, or hurried away into There distant captivity, for torture or for coveted ransom.

was literally a

of fire by night and a pillar and cloud by day going up along the horizon, marking the progress of the relentless Indians, as they dealt out death, and pillage, and con pillar

flagration, and drove before them, in midwinter's flight, hundreds of homeless wanderers, who scarce knew where to turn for safety or for succor in the swift destruction that s was come upon