The landing at Plymouth took place on the 22d of December, 1620. On the 16th of March, 1621, Samoset--one of the Indians who had been kidnapped by the English, and found his way back to his people, and who had acquired some knowledge of our language--came to Plymouth, and saluted the colonists with the agreeable words, “Welcome, Englishmen!” We may imagine how joyfully they listened to his story, as he portrayed to them the kindly character of Massasoit, the sachem who bore rule in that vicinity. For days exposed to cold, hunger, and sickness, they had waited the opening of spring, doubtless with many anxious fears as to what evils might threaten them from the savages of the wilderness; and to be now assured that the principal chief was kindly disposed must have been cheering indeed. Samoset was soon despatched to the sachem, charged with a message of peace, and Massasoit himself, and his brother Quadequina, with sixty armed men, came to pay a visit to Governor Carver. After exchanging hostages, Massasoit advanced to a brook with twenty unarmed men, where he was met by a file of musketeers, and was conducted to a house and seated on a green rug, with a number of cushions. Here the two chiefs saluted each other, kissed hands, and entered into a league of friendship, commerce, and mutual defence. This treaty gave peace to all that part of the country, and Massasoit always continued to be a firm friend to the colonists. The first attack on the Europeans, by the Indians of New England, was at Connecticut, in 1636, by the Pequod tribe. They felt jealous of the strangers who had come upon their ancient soil, over which they had so long roamed as the sole possessors. With the hope, therefore, of expelling or exterminating the intruders, they attacked the fort at Saybrook, and slew and took captive the inhabitants of that early settlement. Determined on more extensive and fatal measures against the colonists, the Pequods sought to gain over the adjacent tribe of the Narragansets, with whom they had before carried on a bloody warfare. They represented to them that these foreigners were mere intruders, dispossessing the original inhabitants, and that, unless, by a general combination, they were driven off or destroyed, they would become masters of the whole country. They also bade them reflect, that, if the English should destroy the Pequods, they would soon root out the Narragansets themselves. In consequence of their attacks, the colonists felt it necessary to take vigorous measures for carrying the war even into the intrenchments of the enemy. Captain Mason, with ninety Englishmen and seventy Mohegan and River Indians, who had been secured as allies, was accordingly despatched from Hartford, to search out the enemy, and give them battle. These were joined by Captain Underhill, of Saybrook, with nineteen men.