[523] Gookin, _op. cit._, in _American Antiquarian Society Collections_, ii, 1836, p. 449. One of the arguments used by the warring Indians to persuade the Praying Indians to join with them, was that the English proposed to destroy all the Praying Indians, or sell them out of the country as slaves. _Ibid._, pp. 462, 476. The feeling against the Praying Indians was so strong that a council in Boston, August 30, 1675, disbanded them, and distributed them among five of their own villages. Gookin, _op. cit._, in _American Antiquarian Society Collections_, ii, 1836, p. 450. Most of the Indians were sent to Deer Island. Some of them were transported before harvests were gathered, and the government neglected to provide them with sufficient food, clothes and shelter. _Ibid._, ii, 1836, p. 433 _et seq._ [524] Belknap, _The History of New Hampshire_, i, p. 245. [525] Sumner, _A History of East Boston_, etc., p. 197. [526] Gookin, _op. cit._, in _American Antiquarian Society Collections_, 1836, ii, p. 449. [527] Some of the Praying Indians fought on the English side. It was reported among the Indians that these Christian Indians never shot at their Indian opponents, but into the tops of trees, and that they sold to Phipp’s agents the ammunition provided them. _Massachusetts Historical Society Collections_, series 5, i, p. 106. [528] It is estimated that there were probably between 30,000 and 40,000 white inhabitants in the United Colonies at the time of King Philip’s War, and that of these, 6,000 to 8,000 were able to bear arms. Mather, _A Brief History of the War with the Indians of New England_, p. xxix. No estimate of the number of Praying Indians at the time of the war seems available. Palfrey, _A Compendious History of New England from the Discovery by Europeans_, etc., ii, p. 124, states their number, when at the highest, as 4,000. In 1685, Mr. Hinckley, governor of Plymouth, estimated them at 1,439, not counting children under twelve years of age. Hutchinson, _The History of the Colony of Massachusetts_, i, p. 349. [529] _Plymouth Colony Records_, v, pp. 173–174; xii, p. 242; Baylies, _op. cit._, ii, pt. iii, p. 188.