At Pemaquid we enter the domain of Samoset, that chivalric New Englander whom historians delight to honor. He was a sagamore without guile. Chronologically speaking, he should first appear at Plymouth, in the act of offering to those doubting Pilgrims the right hand of fellowship. He told them he was sagamore of Morattigon, distant from Plymouth "a daye's sayle with a great wind, and five dayes by land." In 1623 he extended a kindly reception to Christopher Levett, to whom he proffered a friendship, to continue until the Great Spirit carried them to his wigwam. All the old writers speak well of Samoset, whom we call a savage.[52] [Illustration: CHARLEVOIX.] I next visited the little point of land on which are the ruins of old Fort Frederick. Little difficulty is experienced in retracing the exterior and interior lines of a fortress designed as the strongest bulwark of English power in New England. It was built upon a green slope, above a rocky shore, commanding the approach from the sea; but was itself dominated by the heights of the western shore of John's River, a circumstance that did not escape the notice of D'Iberville in 1696. At the south-east angle of the work is a high rock, overgrown with a tangle of climbing vines and shrubs. This rock formed a part of the old magazine, and is now the conspicuous feature of the ruined fortress. A projecting spur of the opposite shore was called "the Barbican." The importance of Pemaquid as a check to French aggression was very great. It covered the approaches to the Kennebec, the Sheepscot, Damariscotta, and Pemaquid rivers. It was also, being at their doors, a standing menace against the Indian allies of the French, with a garrison ready to launch upon their villages, or intercept the advance of war-parties toward the New England settlements. Its presence exasperated the Abenaquis, on whose territory it was, beyond measure: the French found them ever ready to second projects for its destruction. On the other hand, the remoteness of Pemaquid rendered it impracticable to relieve it when once invested by an enemy. Only a few feeble settlements skirted the sea-coast between it and Casco Bay, so the same causes combined to render it both weak and formidable. Old Pentagoët, which the reader knows for Castine, and Pemaquid, were the mailed hands of each nationality, always clenched ready to strike. The fort erected at Pemaquid in 1677, by Governor Andros, was a wooden redoubt mounting two guns, with an outwork having two bastions, in each of which were two great guns, and another at the gate.[53] This work was named Fort Charles. It was captured and destroyed by the Indians in 1689.