ndkerchief is the disguise under which the Elixir Vitae masquerades
among us; certain it is that beneath its benign influence the sachem of
the Pokanokets revived so rapidly that when, twenty-four hours from his
departure, the runner arrived with the chickens and the physic, his
master frankly threw the physic to the dogs, and handed over the fowls
to Pibayo, bidding her guard them carefully, feed them well, and order
them to lay eggs and provide chickens for future illnesses.

So this was the fateful broth of which we spoke but now, and its results
were immediate, for although Massasoit himself said nothing more
than,--

"Now I perceive that the English are my friends and love me, and while I
live I will never forget this kindness that they have showed me," he in
a private conclave with some of his most trusted pnieses solemnly
charged Hobomok with a message for Winslow, only to be delivered however
as upon their return they came within sight of Plymouth. This message,
to hear which the Council had been convened, was to the effect that the
Neponsets had fully determined to fall upon the Weymouth settlers and
cut them off root and branch so soon as two of them, who were
ship-carpenters, had completed some boats they were now building to the
order of the Indians.

The forty braves of the Neponset tribe were fully equal to this task,
and if the Plymouth Colony would remain neutral they had no desire to
injure them; but knowing full well that they would not, and having
moreover a superstitious dread of Standish's prowess and abilities, they
had arranged with all the tribes lying near Plymouth to join with them,
and on an appointed day to massacre the entire colony.

"Ay, ay," interrupted Standish at this point of Winslow's narrative.
"Now do I comprehend some of the figures and parables of Wituwamat's
impudent speech, what time he delivered the knife to Canacum. The bloody
hound--well, brother, get on with thy narrative."

So Winslow told how Massasoit had been urged again and again to join the
conspiracy, but never would, although his pride had been indeed sore
wounded by a lying story of how the governor and captain and Winslow,
his especial friend, having been told of his desperate illness, cared
naught for it, not even enough to send Hobomok his own pniese to inquire
for him; and now, being undeceived, he would himself have killed the
liar, whose name was Pecksuot, but on second thought left him to the
white men w