robably due to a form of superstition, aided perhaps by the
influence of the missionaries.[67] It is to be observed, however, that
the heathen savages of King Philip's War, who had never seen a Jesuit,
were no less forbearing in this respect.

The hunters of Williams's party killed five moose, the flesh of which,
smoked and dried, was carried on their backs and that of the prisoner
whom they had provided with snow-shoes. Thus burdened, the minister
toiled on, following his masters along the frozen current of White River
till, crossing the snowy backs of the Green Mountains, they struck the
headwaters of the stream then called French River, now the Winooski, or
Onion. Being in great fear of a thaw, they pushed on with double speed.
Williams was not used to snow-shoes, and they gave him those painful
cramps of the legs and ankles called in Canada _mal a la raquette_. One
morning at dawn he was waked by his chief master and ordered to get up,
say his prayers, and eat his breakfast, for they must make a long march
that day. The minister was in despair. "After prayer," he says, "I arose
from my knees; but my feet were so tender, swollen, bruised, and full of
pain that I could scarce stand upon them without holding on the wigwam.
And when the Indians said, 'You must run to-day,' I answered I could not
run. My master, pointing to his hatchet, said to me, 'Then I must dash
out your brains and take your scalp.'" The Indian proved better than his
word, and Williams was suffered to struggle on as he could. "God
wonderfully supported me," he writes, "and my strength was restored and
renewed to admiration." He thinks that he walked that day forty miles on
the snow. Following the Winooski to its mouth, the party reached Lake
Champlain a little north of the present city of Burlington. Here the
swollen feet of the prisoner were tortured by the rough ice, till snow
began to fall and cover it with a soft carpet. Bending under his load,
and powdered by the falling flakes, he toiled on till, at noon of a
Saturday, lean, tired, and ragged, he and his masters reached the French
outpost of Chambly, twelve or fifteen miles from Montreal.

Here the unhappy wayfarer was treated with great kindness both by the
officers of the fort and by the inhabitants, one of the chief among whom
lodged him in his house and welcomed him to his table. After a short
stay at Chambly, Williams and his masters set out in a canoe for Sorel.
On the way a Frenchwoman c