Not only were Frenchmen obliged to huddle within their defences, but far and near their Indian allies were swept from the earth. The Iroquois practically destroyed the Algonquin tribes between Quebec and the Saguenay, as well as the Algonquins of the Ottawa, the Huron, and the Petun and Neutrals of the Niagara district. The fur-trade of New France was for a long period almost wholly destroyed; English and Dutch rivals to the south were friendly to the Iroquois, furnished them cheap goods and abundant firearms and ammunition, and egged them on in their northern forays; while toward the Mississippi, and south of the Great Lakes, Iroquois raiders terrorized those tribes which dared to entertain trade relations with the French. In 1646, however, the blood-stained confederates, after nearly a half-century of opposition, consented to a peace which lasted spasmodically for almost twenty years; until in 1665 the French government found itself strong enough to threaten the chastisement of the New York tribesmen, and thereafter the Iroquois opposition, while not altogether quelled, was of a far less threatening character. SYNOPSIS OF THE PRINCIPAL EVENTS, CHIEFLY MILITARY, BETWEEN CHAMPLAIN’S BATTLE WITH THE IROQUOIS, 1609, AND THE CONQUEST OF THE PEQUOTS, 1637 1609. Henry Hudson ascends the Hudson River. 1610. Henry Hudson explores Hudson Bay. 1614. The Dutch erect a Fort on Manhattan Island. 1619. A colonial assembly is convened at Jamestown. Negro slavery is introduced into Virginia. 1620. Landing of the Pilgrims at Plymouth. 1622. The Dutch West India Company take possession of New Netherlands. Indian massacre in Virginia. 1623. Settlement of New Hampshire. 1624. Dissolution of the London Company. Virginia becomes a Crown Colony. 1626. The Dutch purchase Manhattan Island from the Indians. 1628. Settlement of Salem by the Massachusetts Bay Company. 1629. The English take Quebec. 1630. Foundation of Boston. 1631. Settlement of Maryland by Clayborne. 1632. Canada is restored to France by England. Lord Baltimore receives a charter for a colony in Maryland. 1634. Settlement of St. Mary’s, Maryland, by Calvert. 1634–36. Settlement of Connecticut by the English. Settlement of Rhode Island by Roger Williams. 1636. Foundation of Harvard College. 1637. Conquest of the Pequots by the New England colonists. III THE CONQUEST OF THE PEQUOTS, 1637