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The victory thus asserted, and the foe offering no response, the little army retired in good order upon the randevous, where they only tarried long enough to pick up the rest of their possessions and make a sheaf of arrows, pointed not only with eagle's claws, but with the tips of deer's horns and bits of brass and iron gathered from the various European vessels touching for provisions or traffic at these shores.
So, night coming on, they made their randevous & set out ther sentinels, and rested in quiete y^e night, and the next morning followed their tracte till they had headed a great creeke, & so left the sands, & turned an other way into y^e woods.
"Salvages! Indians! They are men!" and, as if to prove his words, a shower of arrows came rattling into the randevous, one of them transfixing the lump of boiled beef laid ready for breakfast. "Why didn't you bring up your pieces again, ye fools!" cried Standish angrily. "Run, now, and recover them before the enemy seizes them, while we men of wit cover your course."
Perhaps a premonition of his own terrible fate crossed his brain, perhaps the hooting of the owl just then skimming across the thicket stirred his superstitious fancy, but without a word he reëntered the wigwam; and Kamuso concealing the knife went back to the randevous, where already the first watch slept, and Standish, in command of the second, stood beside the fire leaning on his snaphance, and, deep in meditation fixed his eyes upon the approaching savage so sternly that he believing that all was discovered was on the point of springing at his prey, and risking all upon one sudden blow, when the captain, awaking from his reverie, sighed profoundly, and perceiving for the first time Kamuso's approach quietly said,
"What say you, Master Carver? Shall we land and make some sort of randevous upon the shore?" "The place may be full of salvages, who, drawn by the light of a fire, can come upon us unaware," replied Carver hesitatingly. "As well risk another encounter as to perish here of cold and exhaustion," suggested Winslow. "Safety most often lies on the side of courage," declared Standish sententiously.
We must hold the randevous at all odds, for here is half our stuff, and our lives depend upon not losing it. Hasten ye laggards! Run Tilley! Run men!" "He is spent!" cried John Howland, throwing down his piece and dashing out into the open, where he seized John Tilley round the waist and half carried, half dragged him into the inclosure.
He stood a moment at the point of his promenade furthest from the randevous, his back to the fire, his gaze fixed upon the sea whose lapping waves seemed whispering with sobbing sighs, Rose! Rose! Rose!
Marching six or seven miles on foot, the party encamped, building a barricade, or as they called it a "randevous," of pine boughs to protect them from savage beasts or men, and within it kindling a fire beside which they sat down to eat such provisions as they had brought, and to solace themselves with modest draughts of the strong waters they used but not abused.
The second night found them only as far as what we now call Eastham, and again building a "randevous" and gathering firewood, a difficult task at any time in this vicinity, for the trees were lofty and the underbrush annually burned away by the Indians to facilitate hunting.
The tract lying north and east of this river is yet new to us, and, since you will be led by me, we will march for some hours hither and yon through its length and breadth, making our randevous where night may overtake us, and returning hither to meet the shallop to-morrow."
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