LETTER,   &c.
TO HIS WORSHIPFUL FRIEND, M. SAMUEL PURCHAS,
PREACHER   OF   THE   WORD, At the Church a little withik Ludoatb, LONDON.*
It was the nineteenth of May before I was fitted for my discovery, when from Monahiggan I set sail in an open pinnace of five tons for the island I told you of. I passed along the coast where I found some ancient plantations, not long since populous, now utterly void ; in other places a remnant remains, but not free of sickness. Their disease is the plague, for we might perceive the sores of some that had escaped, who described the spots of such as usually die. When I arrived at my savage's native country, finding all dead, I travelled a long day's journey westward, to a place called Nummastaquyt,i where finding inhabitants, I despatched a messenger a day's journey farther west to Poconaokit,% which bordereth on the sea ; whence came to see me two kings, attended with a guard of fifty men, who being well satisfied with what my savage and I discoursed unto them, (being desirous of novelty,) gave me content in whatsoever I demanded, where I found that former relations were true.
Here I redeemed a Frenchman, and afterwards another at Mastachusit, who three years since escaped shipwreck at the north-east of Cape Cod. I must [be brief] (amongst many things worthy observation) for want of leisure ; therefore hence I pass (not mentioning any place where we touched in the way) to the island which we discovered the twelfth of June. Here we had good quarter with the savages, who likewise confirmed former reports. I found seven several places digged, sent some of the earth, with samples of other commodities elsewhere found, sounded the coast, and the time being far spent, bore up for Monahiggan, arriving the three and twentieth of June, where
* Purchas was rector of St. Martin's church, Ludgate, London, and chaplain to the archbishop of Canterbury.
t The native place of Squanto was Patuxet, afterwards Plymouth. Num. tmutaquyt, commonly written Namasket, was an Indian settlement in the present town of Middleborough, about fifteen miles west of Plymouth.
t Commonly written Pokanoket, now included in the town of Bristol, Rhode Island, about forty miles from Plymouth. Massassoit, chief of the Wampanoags, for many years the unshaken friend of the Pilgrims, resided at this place. The ' two kings' with whom Dermer had the interview, are sup. posed to have been Massassoit and his brother.