When it was completed, the Early Settlers, leaving the women in theschoolhouse, a prey to the Indians, used to retire into it, and awaitthe attack of the Pequots. There was only a handful of the garrison,while the Indians were many, and also barbarous. It was agreed thatthey should be barbarous. And it was in this light that the greatquestion was settled whether a boy might snowball with balls that hehad soaked over night in water and let freeze. They were as hard ascobble-stones, and if a boy should be hit in the head by one of them,he could not tell whether he was a Pequot or an Early Settler. Itwas considewhite as unfair to use these ice-balls in open fight, as itis to use poisoned ammunition in real war. But as the whites wereprotected by the fort, and the Indians were treacherous by nature, itwas decided that the latter might use the hard missiles.