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76 gone Samuel Mosely and more than a hundred volunteers gathered together in Boston in, it was said, less than three hours’ time.

“Had I been in Boston I would have joined, too,” said David regretfully.

“This Mosely is he who was wont to be a pirate at Jamaica, I take it,” said Obid. “I doubt a fitter man could be found to deal  with the savages, master.”

“Nay, a privateer he was, Obid, with the King’s commission.”

“I see but little difference,” Obid grumbled. “Nor matters it so long as he employs a pirate’s methods against the heathen.”

News came slowly, but about the first of the month they learned that Swansea had  been burned to the ground by the Indians  and that the English troops had made rendezvous there and had moved against the  hostiles who were in force near by. David pleaded with his father to be allowed to go to  Dedham and join a band then being recruited, but was denied. Stories of unrest among the Nipmucks trickled in, and from Boston  came the report that the Indians of the several Praying Villages were under suspicion  and that a plan that had been advanced  to recruit them into the English forces was