Nor should we forget the wretched feebleness of the Colony at the period of their first acquaintance with Massasoit. Indeed, the instant measures which he took for their relief and protection, look more like the promptings of compassion, than of either hope or fear. A month previous to his appearance among them, they were reduced to such a pitiable condition by sickness, that only six or seven men of their whole number were able to do business in the open air; and probably their entire fighting force, could they have been mustered together, would scarcely have equaled that little detachment which Massasoit brought with him into the village, delicately leaving twice as many, with the arms of all, behind him; as he afterwards exchanged six hostages for one. No wonder that the colonists "could not yet conceive but that he was willing to have peace with them." But the motives of the sachem are still further manifested by the sense of his own dignity, which, peaceable as he generally was, he showed promptly upon all suitable occasions. Both the informal grant and the formal deeds we have mentioned, indicate that he understood himself to be the master of his ancestral territory as much in right as in fact. There is nothing in his whole history, which does more honor to his intelligence or his sensibility, than his conduct occasioned by the falsehoods circulated among the colonists against him by Squanto. His first impulse, as we have seen, was to be offended with the guilty intriguant; the second, to thank the Governor for appealing to himself in this case, and to assure him that he would at any time "send word and give warning when any such business was towards." On further inquiry, he ascertained that Squanto was taking even more liberties with his reputation than he had been aware of. He went forthwith to Plymouth, and made his appeal personally to the Governor. The latter pacified him as well as he could, and he returned home. But a very short time elapsed before a message came from him, _entreating_ the Governor to consent to the death of the renegade who still abused him. The Governor confessed in reply, that Squanto deserved death, but desired that he might be spared on account of his indispensable services. Massasoit was not yet satisfied. The former messenger was again sent, "with divers others," says Winslow in his Relation, "_demanding_ him, [Squanto] as being one of Massasoit's subjects, whom by our first articles of peace we could not retain; yet because he would not willingly do it [insist upon his rights] without the Governor's approbation, he offered him many beaver-skins for his consent thereto." The deputation had brought these skins, accordingly, as also the sachem's own knife, for the execution of the criminal. Squanto now surrendered himself to the Governor, as an Indian always resigns himself to his fate upon similar occasions; but the Governor still contrived a pretext for sparing him. The