He then commanded them to leave the Council as he had business to do with the English.

The influence of the Six Nations was too powerful to be disregarded, and the speech of Connassatego had its full effect; the Delawares immediately left the disputed country; some removed to Shamokin and some to Wyoming.

On their arrival at Wyoming the Delawares found the valley in possession of the Shawanese; but as these Indians acknowledged the authority of the Six Nations, and knew that the removal of the Delawares was in consequence of their order, resistance was thought to be inexpedient; and the Delawares having taken quiet possession of a part of the Valley, built their Town of Maughwauwame on the east bank of the River upon the lower flat below the mouth of a small stream, and nearly opposite the first Island above the mouth of Toby's Creek.* Such was the origin of the Indian Town of Wyoming. Soon after the arrival of the Delawares, and during the same season, (the summer of the year 1742,) a distinguished foreigner, Count Zinzendorf, of Saxony, arrived in the Valley on a religious mission to the Indians. This nobleman is believed to have been the first white person that ever visited Wyoming. He was the Revivor of the ancient Church of the United Brethren, and had given protection in his dominions to the persecuted Protestants who had emigrated from Moravia, thence taking the name of Moravians, and

Just below the present Town of Wilkesbarre.

who two years before had made their first settlement in Pennsylvania."

Upon his arrival in America, Count Zinzendorf manifested a great anxiety to have the Gospel preached to the, Indians; and although he had neard much of the ferocity of the Shawanese, formed a resolution to visit them. With this view he repaired to Tulpehocken the residence of Conrad Weiser, a celebrated Indian interpreter, and Indian agent for the Government, whom he wished to engage in the cause and to accompany him to the Shawanese Town. Weiser was too much occupied in business to go immediately to Wyoming, but he furnished the Count with letters to a Missionary of the name of Mack, and the latter, accompanied by his wife who could speak the Indian language, proceeded immediately with Zinzendorf on the projected mission.

The Shawanese appeared to be alarmed on the arrival of the strangers who pitched their tents on the banks of the River a little below the Town, and a Council of the Chiefs having assembled, the declared purpose of Zinzendorf was deliberately considered. To these unlettered children of the wilderness it appeared altogether improbable that a stranger should brave the dangers of a boisterous ocean three thousand miles broad, for the sole purpose of instructing them in the means of obtaining happiness after death, and that too without requiring any compensation for his trouble and expense; and as they had observed the anxiety of the white people to purchase lands of the Indians, they nat

urally concluded that the real object of Zinzendorf was either to procure from them the lands at Wyoming for his own uses, to search for hidden treasures, or to examine the country with a view to future conquest. It was accordingly resolved to assassinate him, and to do it privately lest the knowledge of the transaction should produce a war with the English who were settling the country below the mountains.

Zinzendorf was alone in his tent, seated upon a bundle of dry weeds which composed his bed, and engaged in writing, when the assassins approached to execute their bloody commission. It was night, and the cool air of September had rendered a small fire necessary to his comfort and convenience. A curtain formed of a blanket and hung upon pins was the only guard to the entrance of his tent. The heat of his small fire had aroused a large Rattle-snake which lay in the weeds not far from it ; and the reptile to enjoy it more effectually crawled slowly into the tent and passed over one of his legs undiscovered. Without, all was still and quiet except the gentle murmur of the river at the rapids about a mile below. At this moment the Indians softly approached the door of his tent, and slightly removing the curtain, contemplated the venerable man too deeply engaged in the subject of his thoughts to notice either their approach, or the snake which lay extended before him. At a sight like this even the heart of the savage shrunk from the idea of committing so horrid an act, and quitting the spot they hastily returned to the Town

*

and informed their companions that the Great Spirit protected the white man, for they had found him with no door but a blanket, and had seen a large Rattle-snake crawl over his legs without attempting to injure him. This circumstance, together with the arrival soon afterwards of Conrod Weiser, procured Zinzendorf the friendship and confidence of the Indians, and probably contributed essentially towards inducing many of them at a subsequent period to embrace the Christian Religion. The Count having spent twenty days at Wyoming, returned to Bethlehem, a Town then building by his christian brethren on the north bank of the Lehigh about eleven miles from its junction with the Delaware.

The English settlements were about this time rapidly increasing in the Colony of Maryland, and difficulties arising with the Indians in that quarter, a great number of the tribe called the Nanticokes, who inhabited the eastern shore of the Chesapeak Bay, removed to Wyoming in May 1748 with their chief Sachem called White.

Finding the pricipal part of the Valley in possession of the Shawanese and Delawares, the Nanticokes built their Town at the lower end of the Val

*This circumstance is not published in the Count's memoirs, lest, as he states, the brethren should think the conversion of a part of the Shawanese was attributable to their superstition. The author received the narrative from a companion of Zinzendorf who afterwards accompanied him to Wyoming.

ley on the east bank of the river just above the mouth of a small creek still called "Nanticoke Creek." About this time Colonel Cornwallis, who had been appointed Governor of Nova Scotia, arrived in that Colony and laid the foundation of the Town of Halifax. While the French, whose settlements had become extensive in North America, began to manifest great alarm at the encreasing power of the British Colonies, and with a view to check their growth and to provide for events in case of hostilities, they endeavored to engage in their interest the different Indian tribes that were scattered along the waters of the great Lakes.The powerful influence possessed by the Six Nations over the other aborigines, and their contiguity to the French Colonies, rendered an alliance with them particularly desirable on the part of the French, and a good understanding was accordingly effected by means which seldom fail of success. A war it is true had not actually broken out between the English and French, but circumstances gave such strong indications of an approaching rupture, that the colonies of the respective nations began to apprehend such an event, and the Indians. who were in the French interest attempted also to bring over to their views those tribes which still remained friendly to the English, or to provoke hostilities between them. The Shawanese upon Ohio were among the first to form an alliance with the French, and as that portion of their tribe which

*Smollet.

the