In the summer of 1675 a party of savages rowed across the Potomac river, committed several murders and made good their escape into Maryland.[476] In anger and alarm the planters of Stafford county seized their arms to protect their homes and to avenge their neighbors. A band of thirty or more, led by Colonel Mason and Captain Brent, pursued the savages up the Potomac into the Maryland woods.[477] Coming in the early dawn upon two diverging trails, "each leader with his party took a separate path". "In less than a furlong either found a cabin", one crowded with Doeg Indians, the other with Susquehannocks. The king of the Doegs, when he saw his hut surrounded by Brent's men, "came trembling forth, and wou'd have fled". But Captain Brent, "catching hold of his twisted lock, which was all the hair he wore", commanded him to deliver up the men guilty of the recent murders. "The king pleaded ignorance and slipt loos", whereupon Brent shot him dead. At this the savages in the cabin opened fire, and the Virginians answered with a deadly volley. "Th' Indians throng'd out at the door and fled." "The English shot as many as they cou'd, so that they killed ten ... and brought away the kings son." "The noise of this shooting awaken'd th' Indians in the cabin which Coll. Mason had encompassed, who likewise rush'd out and fled, of whom his company shot ffourteen."[478] This unfortunate affair was the beginning of a deadly war between the English and the Indians, which brought untold suffering upon the people of Maryland and Virginia. The Susquehannocks, enraged at the slaughter of their warriors, became the most implacable enemies of the white men. Joining with the other tribes in a league against the English, they began a series of outrages and murders which continued many months, and cost the lives of hundreds of men, women and children. During the year 1676 alone, more people were butchered in Virginia by the savages than fell in the massacre of 1644.[479] This fearful mortality was due to the fact that the Indians were now supplied with firearms. Governor Berkeley and his friends, in their greed to secure the valuable beaver and otter skins, had not hesitated to purchase them with powder, shot and guns.[480] The savages had now almost entirely discarded the bow and arrow, and were so skilful with their new weapons that the English often hired them "to kill Deare".[481] So that when the war cry was once more heard upon the frontier, the savages, although less numerous than in the days of Powhatan or Opechancanough, were far more to be feared. It was Maryland that first felt the resentment of the savages. [Illustration: MAP OF VIRGINIA DURING BACON'S REBELLION]