There can, moreover, be little doubt that the material comfort of the Indians was for a time considerably improved by their dealings with the white men. Hitherto their want of foresight and thrift had been wont to involve them during the long winters in a dreadful struggle with famine. Now the settlers were ready to pay liberally for the skin of every fur-covered animal the red men could catch; and where the trade thus arising did not suffice to keep off famine, instances of generous charity were frequent. The Algonquin tribes of New England lived chiefly by hunting, but partly by agriculture. They raised beans and corn, and succotash was a dish which they contributed to the white man's table. They could now raise or buy English vegetables, while from dogs and horses, pigs and poultry, oxen and sheep, little as they could avail themselves of such useful animals, they nevertheless derived some benefit. [29] Better blankets and better knives were brought within their reach; and in spite of all the colonial governments could do to prevent it, they were to some extent enabled to supply themselves with muskets and rum. [Sidenote: Trade with the Indians] Besides all this trade, which, except in the article of liquor, tended to improve the condition of the native tribes, there was on the part of the earlier settlers an earnest and diligent effort to convert them to Christianity and give them the rudiments of a civilized education. Missionary work was begun in 1643 by Thomas Mayhew on the islands of Nantucket and Martha's Vineyard. The savages at first declared they were not so silly as to barter thirty-seven tutelar deities for one, but after much preaching and many pow-wows Mayhew succeeded in persuading them that the Deity of the white man was mightier than all their _manitous._ Whether they ever got much farther than this toward a comprehension of the white man's religion may be doubted; but they were prevailed upon to let their children learn to read and write, and even to set up little courts, in which justice was administered according to some of the simplest rules of English law, and from which there lay an appeal to the court of Plymouth. In 1646 Massachusetts enacted that the elders of the churches should choose two persons each year to go and spread the gospel among the Indians. In 1649 Parliament established the Society for propagating the Gospel in New England, and presently from voluntary contributions the society was able to dispose of an annual income of £2000. Schools were set up in which agriculture was taught as well as religion. It was even intended that Indians should go to Harvard College, and a building was erected for their accommodation, but as none came to occupy it, the college printing-press was presently set to work there. One solitary Indian student afterward succeeded in climbing to the bachelor's degree,--Caleb Cheeshahteaumuck of the class of 1665. It