Note 17 — Chapter 2 OF THEIR BEING MENACED BY THE NARRAGANSETTS, AND THEIR SECOND VOYAGE TO THE MASSACHUSETTS.
Reading edition
“There is a remarkable coincidence in the form of this challenge with that of the challenge given by the Scythian prince to Darius. Five arrows made a part of the present sent by his herald to the Persian king. The manner of declaring war by the Aracaunian Indians of South America, was by sending from town to town an arrow clenched in a dead man’s hand.” Holmes, Annals, i. 177. See Rollin, Anc. Hist. b. vi. s. 4; and Mass. Hist. Coll. xv. 69.