[FN] Report of Commissioners appointed in 1683 by Charles II. to enquire into the claims and titles to the Narraghansett Country. _5th Vol. of Mass. His. Coll. 1st. Series._ Mr. Winthrop states, that he died June 4th, 1647. Mr. Hubbard says 1648, and he has been copied by late writers (including Holmes;) but the former date is believed to be the better authenticated of the two. One or two historians indeed seem to confound the old sachem with a younger man, who was killed in Philip's war, by the Mohawks, in June 1676. This person bore the same name, and may have been one of his descendants. Between twenty and thirty years before this, Mr. Williams, (the best authority on all that relates to the Narraghansetts,) writes, that "their late famous long-lived Caunnonicus so liv'd and died, and in ye same most honorable manner and solemnitie (in their way) as you laid to Sleepe your Prudent Peace-Maker, Mr. Winthrop, did they honour this, their Prudent and Peaceable Prince." [FN] * * * * * [FN] _Ms. Letters._ CHAPTER XI. Canonicus succeeded by Pessacus--Mexham--Ninigret, Sachem of the Nianticks--Proposals made by them to the English, and by the English in return--They commence hostilities against Uncas--The English resolve to make war upon them--They make concessions--Their visits to Boston--Subsequent movements against Uncas. An armed party sent against Ninigret and Pessacus--They are accused of a league with the Dutch against the English. Strictly speaking, there was no _successor_ to Canonicus in the government of the Narraghansetts, the lineage, talents and age of that sachem having given him a peculiar influence over his countrymen, which none other among them could command. At his death, therefore, the authority which he had monopolized at one time, and afterwards shared with Miantonomo and others, reverted into that form of dominion (half way between oligarchy and democracy, and occasionally vibrating to each extreme,) which is common among the Indian tribes.