Roger Williams was, however, but one of many to go forth from the original Massachusetts colonies and found new communities, each of which, while sharing the general character of the Puritan settlements, was distinguished by some special religious peculiarity, into the nature of which none but the initiated could enter with full appreciation. In 1631, intercourse with the Indians of the Connecticut Valley――already, as we shall presently see, colonized by the Dutch――was opened by a visit to Boston of Wahginnacut, a sagamore, or chief, from the river Quonchtacut, on the west of Narragansett, who gave the whites a general invitation to settle in his country, which he reported to be very fruitful. In 1633, one William Holmes, taking with him a few sturdy followers, and also the frame of a house ready to set up in a suitable locality, left Plymouth in obedience to the call of the sagamore, and, in spite of the opposition of the Dutch, opened a successful trade with the Indians, although, so far as we have been able to ascertain, he failed to make any permanent settlement in the new district. This was, however, atoned for by the emigration to the Connecticut Valley, in the fall and winter of 1634, of several different parties from Massachusetts, who made their way on foot, driving their cattle before them through the pathless forests, and settled on the various rivers, enduring terrible hardships in the first winter, but holding their own through privations which would have daunted any but the stern Pilgrim Fathers, already inured to suffering. The little town of Windsor was already a thriving community, carrying on a brisk trade with the natives in furs, when, in 1635, John Winthrop, son of the Governor of Massachusetts, arrived from England, bearing a commission as Governor of Connecticut under the patent of Lord Say and Seal, Lord Brook, and others, to whom the district had previously been granted. Winthrop’s first care was to build a fort at the mouth of the Connecticut, to which he gave the name of Saybrook, in honor of his two noble patrons. The Dutch, who claimed the whole of Connecticut――in right of prior discovery and possession, and, best title of all, purchase from the Indians――had, three years previously, fastened the arms of the States-General to a tree, at a spot they had named Kievit’s Hoeck and now dispatched two vessels from the South to maintain their rights. Before the vessels could arrive, however, the Dutch arms had been torn down, and a hideous, grinning face carved on the tree-trunk in their stead, while the landing-place was defended by two cannon, which were enough, in those primitive days, to scare away a whole party of warriors.