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The Mayflower

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The Mayflower
Over the summer, I had to read the book, “The Mayflower” by Nathaniel Philbrick. When I first started to read this novel I thought it was going to be boring and a waste of time, but after finishing the book, my opinion has changed. I originally thought that the Native Americans were cruel people who killed innocent people for no reason. Since I read this book, I see that’s not true. In this novel, a sachem decided to befriend the pilgrims who came to America on the Mayflower. He saw the pilgrims settle down and decided it was time to learn about them and trade with them. When the pilgrims first arrived at the new world, they saw Native Americans who attacked them and tried to kill them. Once they moved locations, they were still nervous about the Natives. When one of the members of a near by tribe came to make peace, the pilgrims were scared. Once they saw they were not going to harm them, they made peace and traded frequently. The only problem with this was that once they began trading, the Native Americans developed “White Man” ways. They taught the pilgrims how to farm and what to grow. Everything was going well until the other colonists began to come in ships from the old world. When they reached the new world, they were friendly with the Natives, but traded guns and other weapons that the Natives would eventually use against them. The colonists became greedy. They took all of the Natives land and in return gave them guns. When the Natives couldn’t take it anymore, they fought back. Therefor, when the colonists gave them guns, they pretty much dug their own graves. The Natives were normal peaceful people. When the colonists came, they messed everything up. The fact is, the Europeans made the Natives savage. The Europeans were the cruel ones. After finishing this novel, I learned a lot of things. But most importantly, I learned that the Europeans were the cruel ones, while the Natives started out friendly. If it wasn’t for the Europeans being greedy and wanting more food and land than what they needed, none of the wars would have happened.

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