,
I diligently marked the difference of their grammar from ours; when I
found the way of them, I would pursue a Word, a Noun, a Verb, through
all the variations I could think of. We must sit still and look for
Miracles; up, and be doing, and the Lord will be with thee. Prayer
and pains through Faith in Christ Jesus, will do anything."

In 1646 Mr. Eliot began to preach to the Indians in their own tongue.
About the middle of September he addressed a company of the natives in
the wigwam of Cutshamoquin, the Sachem of Neponset, within the limits
of Dorchester. His next attempt was made among the Indians of another
place, "those of Dorchester mill not regarding any such thing." On the
28th of October he delivered a sermon before a large number assembled
in the principal wigwam of a chief named Waban, situated four or five
miles from Roxbury, on the south side of the Charles river, near
Watertown mill, now in the township of Newton. The services were
commenced with prayer, which, as Mr. Shepard relates, "now was in
English, being not so farre acquainted with the Indian language as to
expresse our hearts herein before God or them." After Mr. Eliot had
finished his discourse, which was in the Indian language, he "asked
them if they understood all that which was already spoken, and whether
all of them in the wigwam did understand, or onely some few? and they
answered to this question with multitude of voyces, that they all of
them did understand all that which was then spoken to them." He then
replied to a number of questions which they propounded to him,
"_borrowing now and then some small helpe from the Interpreter whom
wee brought with us, and who could oftentimes expresse our minds more
distinctly than any of us could_." Three more meetings were held at
this place in November and December of the same year, accounts of
which are given by the Rev. Thomas Shepard in the tract, entitled,
_The Day-Breaking, if not the Sun-Rising of the Gospell with the
Indians in New England_, London, 1647. I have quoted these letters and
remarks from the interesting notes on John Eliot's life, contributed
to Pilling's Algonquian Bibliography,[7] by Mr. Wilberforce Eames of
the Lenox Library, New York.

As Mr. Eliot in the foregoing letters has testified to what extent he
was indebted to this young Indian, there can arise no question
whatever as to the great influence which the instruction and
information thus obtained must have had on his sub