me upon a brass kettle.

Soon after the dance, King Philip, who was there with his warriors,
but who appears to have taken no part in the carousals, sent for Mrs.
Rowlandson, and said to her, with a smiling face, "Would you like to
hear some good news? I have a pleasant word for you. You are to go
home to-morrow." Arrangements had been finally made through Mr. Hoar
for her ransom.

On the next morning Mrs. Rowlandson, accompanied by Mr. Hoar and the
two friendly Indians, commenced her journey through the wilderness
toward Lancaster. She left her two children, her sister, and many
other friends and relatives still in captivity. "In coming along," she
says, "my heart melted into tears more than all the while I was with
them."

Toward evening they reached the spot where Lancaster once stood. The
place, once so luxuriant and beautiful, presented a dreary aspect of
ruin. The storm of war had swept over it, and had converted all its
attractive homes into smouldering embers. They chanced to find an old
building which had escaped the flames, and here, upon a bed of straw,
they passed the night. With blended emotions of bliss and of anguish,
the bereaved mother journeyed along the next day, and about noon
reached Concord. Here she met many of her friends, who rejoiced with
her in her rescue, and wept with her over the captives who were still
in bondage. They then hurried on to Boston, where she arrived in the
evening, and was received to the arms of her husband, after a
captivity in the wilderness of three months. By great exertions, their
son and daughter were eventually regained. We now return from the
incidents of this captivity to renew the narrative of Philip's war.

CHAPTER IX.

THE INDIANS VICTORIOUS.

1677

Spies.--Attack upon Medfield.--Suspicions.--Energy of Philip.--An
unpleasant surprise.--A conflagration.--The Indians retire.--Philip's
letter.--Indian warfare.--An ambuscade.--A decoy.--The town
burned.--Monoco's threats.--Monoco hung.--Destruction of Warwick.--Alarm
from the Indians.--Exultation of the Indians.--Defeat of the Plymouth
army.--Nanuntenoo.--Plan of action.--A stratagem, and its
success.--Defeat certain.--Heroic defense.--An escape.--Escape of the
Indians.--Their mode of accomplishing it.--Terrible slaughter.--Storming
of Providence.--Roger Williams.--Nanuntenoo's reply.--Cowardly
sentinels.--Alarm of the chief.--Flight of Nanuntenoo.--His
capture.--Young America rebuked.--Execution of t