After the voyagers had been in Chatham eight or nine days, the Indians, tempted by the implements which they saw about the forge and bakery, conceived the idea of taking forcible possession of them, in order to appropriate them to their own use. As a preparation for this, and particularly to put themselves in a favorable condition in case of an attack or reprisal, they were seen removing their women, children, and effects into the forests, and even taking down their cabins. De Poutrincourt, observing this, gave orders to the workmen to pass their nights no longer on shore, but to go on board the barque to assure their personal safety. This command, however, was not obeyed. The next morning, at break of day, four hundred savages, creeping softly over a hill in the rear, surrounded the tent, and poured such a volley of arrows upon the defenceless workmen that escape was impossible. Three of them were killed upon the spot; a fourth was mortally and a fifth badly wounded. The alarm was given by the sentinel on the barque. De Poutrincourt, Champlain, and the rest, aroused from their slumbers, rushed half-clad into the ship's boat, and hastened to the rescue. As soon as they touched the shore, the savages, fleet as the greyhound, escaped to the wood. Pursuit, under the circumstances, was not to be made; and, if it had been, would have ended in their utter destruction. Freed from immediate danger, they collected the dead and gave them Christian burial near the foot of a cross, which had been erected the day before. While the service of prayer and song was offered, the savages in the distance mocked them with derisive attitudes and hideous howls. Three hours after the French had retired to their barque, the miscreants returned, tore down the cross, disinterred the dead, and carried off the garments in which they had been laid to rest. They were immediately driven off by the French, the cross was restored to its place, and the dead reinterred.