All the Indians were not friendly, however. Ca-non´i-cus, chief of the Nar-ra-gan´setts, an enemy of Massasoit, hated to see the land occupied by the English, so he soon sent them a rattlesnake's skin full of arrows. Governor Bradford looked at it wonderingly and then asked Squanto what it meant. The Indian said it signified that unless the white men crept away like serpents the Indians would slay them all with their arrows. Hearing this, Bradford coolly took the arrows out of the skin, stuffed it full of powder and bullets, and silently handed it to the messenger to carry back to Canonicus. The savage glided rapidly away, and gave the skin to Canonicus, who, afraid of the powder, passed it on to another Indian. The snake skin went thus from hand to hand, but was finally sent back to Plymouth, with an offer of friendship. The Indians, seeing that the English governor was not afraid of them, now begged for peace, promising to bury the war hatchet so deep that it could never again be dug up. The fact is that powder at first seemed a very mysterious thing to the red men. They were afraid of it, but at the same time longed to have some. One Indian is said to have bought powder from a colonist, who gravely told him that if he wanted any more he must plant the black seed. The savage obeyed, but as nothing came up from it, the shrewd Indian declared that he would pay the colonist only when the powder grew! The Pilgrims, fearing the Indians might attack them, built a log meetinghouse on a hill, and used it as a fort, placing their cannon on its flat roof. This place was also surrounded by a palisade, or great fence of tree trunks, so that it could afford the colonists a safe shelter in time of danger. Generally, however, it served as a meetinghouse, for the Pilgrims were all very religious, and when the drums beat on Sunday morning all came out of their houses and marched in solemn procession to church. At the door the men stacked their arms, leaving them in charge of a guard, who was to give the alarm at the first sign of danger. In the meetinghouse men and women sat apart, listening to the long prayers and sermons, or slowly singing very sober hymns. The boys sat on the pulpit steps, in full view of the congregation, to make sure they would behave properly. The sexton, armed with a long stick, rapped the boys on the head if they proved unruly, or poked the men when they fell asleep. But if the girls or women dozed, he gently tickled their cheeks with the foxtail hanging at the other end of the same stick. Sometimes, too, it was he who turned the hourglass when all its sands had run out, for the minister was then only halfway through his two hours' sermon.