Mayflower

were not enough left to put up an effective resistance. It became imperative, therefore, to make the best possible show of strength.
    Whenever the alarm was sounded, the sick were pulled from their beds and propped up against trees with muskets in their hands. They would do little good in case of an actual attack, but at least they were out there to be counted. The Pilgrims also tried to conceal the fact that so many of them had died. They did such a diligent job of hiding their loved ones’ remains that it was not until more than a hundred years later, when the runoff from a violent rainstorm unearthed some human bones, that the location of these ancient, hastily dug graves was finally revealed.
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    On Saturday, February 17, in the midst of the Pilgrims’ first official meeting about military matters, someone realized that two Indians were standing on the top of what became known as Watson’s Hill on the other side of Town Brook, about a quarter mile to the south. The meeting was immediately adjourned, and the men hurried to get their muskets. When the Pilgrims reassembled under the direction of their newly designated captain, Miles Standish, the Indians were still standing on the hill.
    The two groups stared at each other across the valley of Town Brook. The Indians gestured for them to approach. The Pilgrims, however, made it clear that they wanted the Indians to come to them. Finally, Standish and Stephen Hopkins, with only one musket between them, began to make their way across the brook. Before they started up the hill, they laid the musket down on the ground “in sign of peace.” But “the savages,” Bradford wrote, “would not tarry their coming.” They ran off to the shouts of “a great many more” concealed on the other side of the hill. The Pilgrims feared an assault might be in the offing, “but no more came in fight.” It was time, they decided, to mount “our great ordnances” on the hill.
    On Wednesday of the following week, Christopher Jones supervised the transportation of the “great guns”—close to half a dozen iron cannons that ranged between four and eight feet in length and weighed as much as half a ton. With the installation of this firepower, capable of hurling iron balls as big as three and a half inches in diameter as far as 1,700 yards, what was once a ramshackle collection of highly combustible houses was on its way to becoming a well-defended fortress.
    Jones had brought a freshly killed goose, crane, and mallard with him, and once the day’s work was completed, they all sat down to an impromptu feast and were, in Bradford’s words, “kindly and friendly together.” Jones had originally intended to return to England as soon as the Pilgrims found a settlement site. But once disease began to ravage his crew, he realized that he must remain in Plymouth Harbor “till he saw his men begin to recover.”
    In early March, there were several days of unseasonably warm weather, and “birds sang in the woods most pleasantly.” At precisely one o’clock on March 3, they heard their first rumble of American thunder. “It was strong and great claps,” they wrote, “but short.” They later realized that even though temperatures had been bitterly cold during their explorations along the Cape, the winter had been, for the most part, unusually mild—a respite that undoubtedly prevented even more of them from dying.
    On Friday, March 16, they had yet another meeting about military matters. And as had happened the last time they had gathered for such a purpose, they were interrupted by the Indians. But this time there was only one of them atop Watson’s Hill, and unlike the previous two Indians, this man appeared to be without hesitation or fear, especially when he began to walk toward them “very boldly.” The alarm was sounded, and still the Indian continued striding purposefully down Watson’s Hill and across the brook. Once he’d climbed the path to Cole’s Hill, he walked past the row of houses toward the rendezvous, where the women and children had been assembled in case of attack. It was clear that if no one restrained him, the Indian was going to walk right into the entrance of the rendezvous. Finally, some of the men stepped into the Indian’s path and indicated that he was not to go in. Apparently enjoying the fuss he had created, the Indian