For the Indians had the
idea that the whites were not settled enough, and used to come nights
to settle--them with a tomahawk. It was called Fort Hill. It was
very steep on each side, and the river ran close by. It was a
charming place in summer, where one could find laurel, and
checkerberries, and sassafras roots, and sit in the cool breeze,
looking at the mountains across the river, and listening to the
murmur of the Deerfield. The Methodists built a meeting-house there
afterwards, but the hill was so slippery in winter that the aged
could not climb it and the wind raged so fiercely that it blew nearly
all the young Methodists away (many of whom were afterwards heard of
in the West), and finally the meeting-house itself came down into the
valley, and grew a steeple, and enjoyed itself ever afterwards. It
used to be a notion in New England that a meeting-house ought to
stand as near heaven as possible.
The boys at our school divided themselves into two parties: one was
the Early Settlers and the other the Pequots, the latter the most
numerous.
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