Kieft summoned the people to deliberate on the public danger. Twelve men were chosen, De Vries being at their head, but recommending lenient measures, which not being in accordance with the governor’s ideas, were disregarded. At this juncture, the son of a chief having been made drunk and then robbed, shot, in revenge, the first Dutchman he met. Alarmed at this untoward incident, a deputation of chiefs immediately waited on Kieft, and offered, as a fine and indemnity, two hundred fathoms of wampum; urging with great reason, “You yourselves are the cause of this evil; you ought not to craze the young Indians with brandy. Your own people, when drunk, fight with knives and do foolish things; and you cannot prevent mischief till you cease to sell strong drink to the Indians.” Reasonable as was the remonstrance, Kieft would not listen to it; nothing but the surrender of the young man would satisfy him, and that the chiefs refused. Whilst this question was pending, a small armed party of Mohawks, allies of the Dutch, came down from the neighbourhood of Fort Orange, and claimed the Raritans as their tributaries. At the approach of these formidable enemies, the weaker, though more numerous, Raritans threw themselves at once on the mercy of the Dutch. Kieft, considering this opportunity too favourable to be lost, spite of the remonstrances and entreaties of De Vries and many of the more influential inhabitants of New Amsterdam, determined on a general massacre. In the dead of the night on the 25th of February, 1643, two armed parties, accompanied by an Indian guide, crossed the Hudson, and fell upon the Indian encampments, when not the slightest suspicion of the Dutch existed. Taken thus by surprise, amid the repose of night, scarcely any resistance was made; the noise of musketry and the cries of the murdered reached Manhattan. By daybreak above a hundred were slain, nor then did the slaughter cease. No mercy was shown—men, women, and children all perished alike. “Infants, bound in their bark-cradles, were flung into the icy river; and the poor frantic mothers, who had plunged into the water to their rescue, were mercilessly forced back from the shore, and both were drowned. This fearful massacre continued through the day.”