sectaries called Mennonists, who were numerous in Lancaster County, professed, like the Quakers, principles of non-resistance, and refused to bear arms.[328] It was upon this mingled population, that the storm of Indian war was now descending with appalling fury,——a fury unparalleled through all past and succeeding years. For hundreds of miles from north to south, the country was wasted with fire and steel. It would be a task alike useless and revolting to explore, through all its details, this horrible monotony of blood and havoc.[329] The country was filled with the wildest dismay. The people of Virginia betook themselves to their forts for refuge. Those of Pennsylvania, ill supplied with such asylums, fled by thousands, and crowded in upon the older settlements. The ranging parties who visited the scene of devastation beheld, among the ruined farms and plantations, sights of unspeakable horror; and discovered, in the depths of the forest, the half-consumed bodies of men and women, still bound fast to the trees, where they had perished in the fiery torture.[330] Among the numerous war-parties which were now ravaging the borders, none was more destructive than a band, about sixty in number, which ascended the Kenawha, and pursued its desolating course among the settlements about the sources of that river. They passed valley after valley, sometimes attacking the inhabitants by surprise, and sometimes murdering them under the mask of friendship, until they came to the little settlement of Greenbrier, where nearly a hundred of the people were assembled at the fortified house of Archibald Glendenning. Seeing two or three Indians approach, whom they recognized as former acquaintances, they suffered them to enter without distrust; but the new-comers were soon joined by others, until the entire party were gathered in and around the buildings. Some suspicion was now awakened; and, in order to propitiate the dangerous guests, they were presented with the carcass of an elk lately brought in by the hunters. They immediately cut it up, and began to feast upon it. The backwoodsmen, with their families, were assembled in one large room; and finding themselves mingled among the Indians, and embarrassed by the presence of the women and children, they remained indecisive and irresolute. Meanwhile, an old woman, who sat in a corner of the room, and who had lately received some slight accidental injury, asked one of the warriors if he could cure the wound. He replied that he thought he could, and, to make good his words, killed her with his tomahawk. This was the signal for a scene of general butchery. A few persons made their escape; the rest were killed or captured. Glendenning snatched up one of his children, and rushed from the house, but was shot dead as he leaped the fence. A negro woman gained a place of concealment, whither she was followed by her screaming child; and, fearing lest the cries of the boy