" Brothers, the commissioners appointed by the twelve United Colonies, attend. We your Brothers, the Stockbridge Indians, take this opportunity most heartily to thank you our brethren . . . for the care you have taken of us since we have been at this place . . . and we beg that you use your influence in our favor that we may have a minister to teach and instruct our old men, women, and children while our young men go to the war; and should a kind Providence crown our united efforts with success, we hope that our Brothers the Colonists will re store us to the peaceable possession of all these lands of which we are at present so unjustly deprived; . . . and be assured, Brothers, of our most entire friendship. Wherever your armies go, there we will go; you shall always find us by your side; and if providence calls its to sacrifice our Lives in the field of battle, we will fall where you fall, and lay our bones by yours. Nor shall peace ever be made between our nation and the Red-Coats until our brothers the white people lead the way.
"This, Brothers, is all we have to say."
" (The Reply of the Commissioners]: Brothers of the Stock- bridge Tribe, attend: We heartily thank you for the kind assurances of your unalterable attachment to us. We assure you, Brothers, that we will use our utmost influence that you shall have a minister to instruct you, [etc.].
" This, Brothers, is all we have to say."

To each Stockbridge Indian enlisted under Jehoiakim Mtohskin, selectman, the Provincial Congress at Concord sent a blanket, a yard of ribbon, and an address, through Colonel John Paterson of Lenox and Captain William Goodrich.

This remarkable tribe kept faith and celebrated the Declaration of Independence on Laurel Hill in Stockbridge. Washington presented them with an ox for a barbecue, whereupon they buried the hatchet on the hill-slope near King Solomon's house, not far from the old fording-place crossed by the graceful Memorial bridge, [1] in an hilarious powwow, adding a sombre, savage postscript by scalping the effigy of the traitor Arnold.

Certain of these' Stockbridge warriors distinguished themselves as scouts, and it must have been an extraordinary scene when Captain Ezra Whittlesey's dark-skinned company marched to their post at the "Ty" Saw Mills by General Gates's orders, wearing blue and red caps to distinguish them from Burgoyne's Indians.