Page:History of Barrington, Rhode Island (Bicknell).djvu/54

32 of the soil, and the English at New Plymouth, resulting in the interchange of friendly salutations, and the ratification of a treaty which was faithfully observed for over half a century by both parties. Massassoit acknowledged "himself content to become the subject of our sovereign lord the King aforesaid, his heirs and successors; and give unto them all the lands adjacent, to them and their heirs forever."

This treaty of peace and trade was equally beneficial to the Pokanokets and to the settlers of Plymouth. To the former it offered the opportunity of an exchange of furs and the products of the chase for the implements of husbandry and hunting and other articles of civilized life. This friendship also served as a protection to the Wampanoags against their powerful neighbors, the Narragansetts, who cherished an unfriendly spirit and showed frequent signs of hostility toward the warriors of Pokanoket. It was a shield of strength also to the weak-handed, though stout-hearted Pilgrims, and when Gov. Bradford received from Canonchet the savage challenge of the rattle-snake skin filled with poisoned arrows, he returned it more boldly, filled with powder and shot, since Massassoit and his tribe had sworn to be their faithful protectors. Still further, the fertile peninsulas extending into Mt. Hope and Narragansett Bays were more attractive to the sagacious eyes of Standish, Winslow, Brown, Willett, and Bradford, than the sandy deserts of Cape Cod, and as soon as comfortable homes had been raised at Plymouth Bay, the spirit of western emigration filled the hearts of these earliest pioneers to explore and settle the wilds along the Sowams, the Titicut and Pawtucket Rivers.

The territory of the Pokanokets, of whom Massassoit was the chief sachem, originally extended, as we have stated, from Cape Cod on the east, to the Narragansett Bay on the west, and from the Narragansett Bay and the Atlantic Ocean on the south to the southern boundary of the Massachusetts, the tribe which occupied the territory to the south