Then the Black Robe chief, the prophet, Told his message to the people, Told the purport of his mission, Told them of the Virgin Mary, And her blessed Son, the Saviour: How in distant lands and ages He had lived on earth as we do; How He fasted, prayed, and laboured; How the Jews, the tribe accursed, Mocked Him, scourged Him, crucified Him; How He rose from where they laid Him, Walked again with His disciples, And ascended into heaven." The sermon lasted an hour and a quarter, but the Indians are a dignified and patient people, prone to long discourses themselves, and apt to listen to them from others. When he finally asked if they had understood, many voices replied that they had; and, on his encouraging them to ask questions, many intelligent inquiries were made. The whole conference lasted three hours, and Mr. Eliot was invited to come again, which he did at intervals of about a fortnight, and again with good promise. In one of these meetings they asked, very reasonably, why the English called them Indians, a question it could not have been easy to answer. The Powaws, or priests, began to make some opposition, but Waban was continually going about among the people, repeating portions of the instructions he had received, and teaching his friends to pray--for some had at first supposed that the English God might not be addressed in the native tongue, but only in English. After some little time, he thought the Indians ripe for being taught to live a settled life, and obtained for his congregation--"the praying Indians," as they were commonly called--a grant of the site of his first instructions. The place was named "Rejoicing,"--in Indian, a word that soon got corrupted into Nonantum; and, under Mr. Eliot's directions, they divided their grounds with trenches and stone walls, for which he gave them tools to the best of his ability. They built wigwams of a superior construction, and the women learnt to spin; there was a continual manufacture of brushes, eel-pots, and baskets, which were sold in the English towns, together with turkeys, fish, venison, and fruits, according to the season. At hay and harvest times they would hire themselves out to work for their English neighbours, but were thought unable or unwilling to do what sturdy Englishmen regarded as a fair day's work.