s arms, having been left outside,
were seized by the English. Some accounts state that Alexander went
voluntarily towards Plymouth, others say that the Governor told him
that if he did not go he was a dead man. But all accounts agree that
he was soon violently sick, and that the efforts to relieve him were
unavailing. He was allowed to return home and was borne away upon the
shoulders of his faithful warriors. Hubbard says, "Such was the pride
and height of his spirit, that the very surprisal of him so raised his
choler and indignation, that it put him into a fever, which,
notwithstanding all possible means that could be used, seemed mortal."
And so it proved.

Philip witnessed this unjust arrest of his brother, chief of a proud
and free race; he remembered his father's services and fidelity; he saw
his people dispossessed of their hunting grounds, and an unknown
religion zealously pressed upon them. To him there was in the present
only humiliation and disgrace, in the future only ignominy and death.
With this history and these gloomy anticipations of the future, Philip
became the sachem of the Pokanokets. He had never been a favorite
with the English, yet early in life they had named him Philip, and
his brother Wamsutta, Alexander; a singular yet just appreciation of
their high spirit and warlike character. The colonists justly regarded
these young men as dangerous to the public peace, and there was never
a moment of true friendship after the death of Massasoit.

The particular occasion of the war was the murder by Philip's agents of
one Sassamon, an educated Indian, who had been his private secretary.
Having in this confidential station obtained a knowledge of Philip's
plans, he went to the English, by whom he had been educated, and
probably disclosed his master's secrets. Philip secured his death, and
of all who fell in fight or fray, or on the gallows swung, none
deserved death before Sassamon. The comprehensive mind of Philip saw
at once the terrible nature and probable consequences of the war thus
brought upon him. It is said that he wept, and that from that time
forth he never smiled. But he laid new sacrifices upon the altar of
his people's liberty, invoked the spirit of his ancestors, and
exhibited resources and courage worthy of a heroic age.

He stood in a position of great and manifest peril. The English were
superior in numbers, comparatively well equipped, and above all united.
They had garr