His warriors followed his example, and were speedily lost in the solitude and silence of the forest. Their flight was so instantaneous into the glooms which surrounded them, that scarcely one moment elapsed ere not an Indian was to be seen, and the demoniac clamor of war gave place to the sacred quietude of the untenanted wilderness. Captain Standish led his heroic little band, driving before them they knew not how many hundreds of Indians, nearly a quarter of a mile. Then they shot off two muskets and gave three loud cheers, “that they might see,” Governor Bradford writes, “that we were not afraid of them, nor discouraged. Then the English, who more thirsted for their conversion than their destruction, returned to their boat without receiving any damage.” The first act of these devout men, upon returning to their encampment, was to give thanks to God for their great deliverance. There was a sublimity in this _Te Deum_, from the lips of these exiles, as in the twilight of the wintry morning, exposed to wind and rain, they bowed reverently around their camp fire, which never could have been surpassed by peals from choir and organ, resounding through the groined arches of the cathedrals of Saint Peter, Notre Dame or Saint Paul. The escape of the Pilgrims, unharmed, from this shower of missiles, was indeed wonderful. The arrows of the Indians were thrown with great force, and being pointed with flint and bone, would, when hitting fairly, pierce the thickest clothing. Some of them were barbed with brass, probably obtained from some fisherman’s vessel. When striking any unprotected portion of the body, they would inflict a very dangerous and painful wound. But no one was hurt. Some overcoats which were hung up in the barricade were pierced through and through. Arrows were sticking in the logs, and many were found beneath the leaves. They collected quite a number of them, and sent them back to England as curiosities. It is supposed that the scene of this conflict, was at what is now called Great Meadow Creek, in Eastham, about a mile northeast from Rock Harbor. The Pilgrims named the place The First Encounter.