"No, no; the wail of that curse still troubled the air around her lodge, and its spirit worked slowly but surely in the white settlements. Years wore on; another little child laughed and clapped its hands in the doorway of King Philip; and now, when the kingly husband and wife were in their prime, the whites, who had grown powerful, began to cast rapacious eyes on the hunting-grounds of the Pomperoags. It was the old story of the wolf and the lamb--causes of offence were soon found. The colonies arose and armed themselves. King Philip of Mount Hope was a formidable enemy. It took brave men to cope with him. He was a statesman as well as a warrior, wise as a serpent and brave as steel. The most powerful tribes flocked to his alliance, some won to his aid by the eloquence of his wife, others by sympathy and common danger. You have read in your school books how the war against King Philip was conducted. You have heard old men and women call him a fiend, and speak of him as the companion of fiends." "Yes, yes, the old women tell us stories of his cruelty." "And of his wrongs, of his courage, his wonderful magnanimity, his noble statesmanship--do they tell you nothing of this?" "No; only of his cruelties." "And your heart, how does that receive the lie? calmly, or bursting with indignation?" "My heart aches within me when I hear these legends--aches and burns as if a wound at its core were rudely touched." "Ah! and there is a wound, a cruel wound, deep in your life. It shall spread and burn through your whole being. Listen: These Englishmen voted themselves munitions of war, raised regiments, linked colony to colony, and made each settlement the rivet of a chain which swept the coast. Their bravest men took the field--the whole country was astir. These very preparations were a tribute to the heroism they were intended to crush--all this force was brought against the kingly savage. He met it bravely where courage was most likely to prevail; cautiously where prudence promised to husband human life. He seized upon their own tactics, and turned them in his favor; marched, countermarched, and manoeuvred as no general of Europe has ever done. This queen went side by side with him upon the war-path. She was his council, the companion of his danger. There was not a warrior in the tribe who would have refused to lay down his life for her. But why tell you this history? You know how the strong man was betrayed by a traitor, murdered in cold blood, hacked limb from limb. Oh, Great Spirit, hear me, and kindle in her breast the rage that consumes mine! Listen, girl: His wife and son were taken prisoners; the wife of King Philip was dragged out of the forest with her son at her side and the last-born in her arms!