The Nobscussett Indians had a single, tiny village of barely one hundred people, in the summer of 1600. Their Chief, Sagem, was not remarkable in appearance or ability. The tribe survived from one moon to the next, but never prospered.

The Wampanoags had as many as thirty villages from one end of Cape Cod to the other. The Mashpee had several settlements; as did the Nauset, the Massachuset, and a number of others.

Altogether, there were probably more than two dozen tribes, a hundred and fifty villages, and as many as 5000 people on Cape Cod, as the new century began.

There were dynamic leaders among the people. Chief Massasoit could assemble and equip a war party faster than an arrow and could speak words hotter and smokier than a campfire. His villages all prospered and grew.

Many moons in the future, when the giant boats would cross the Big Water, it would fall to Massasoit to meet them and wrestle out the agreements that would keep the people safe.

Chief Sagem of the Nobscussetts may not have been a strong leader, but he was kindly and his people, though poor, were happy.

The chief had no sons and only one daughter. Her name was Scargo and she was uncommonly beautiful.

So pretty was Princess Scargo, that warriors would come from either end of Cape Cod to the middle of the land where the Nobscussett village was, just to see Scargo. Often, they brought gifts that helped sustain the people when the farming was poor as it often was in soil that was mostly salt and sand.

The village was built around a small fresh-water spring that threatened to dry up during the long-sun days. Twelve wigwams circled the spring and formed the entire settlement.

Princess Scargo lived in the largest one, with her father, her grandmother, and her father’s brother and his family -ten people altogether. Each wigwam had between eight and twelve people living in it.

If the tribe grew, they would simply add more wigwams. They were easy to make. The women would get six spruce poles and tie them together at the top with the roots. The poles would be stood up and spread out to make a cone. The covering was fashioned from large overlapping strips of birch bark. Birch trees were so plentiful that it took only a few hours to get enough bark to completely cover a large wigwam.

The season of long-suns was more than two moons old when a warrior came to the village one morning not long after sunrise.

“My name is Weaquaquet, and I seek the beautiful Princess Scargo,” the stranger announced to the first person he saw.

Directed to the spring, he walked until he saw her, standing at the edge drawing water.

She was even more beautiful than he had been told. Unlike his tribe, her skin was light and yet it was beautiful as it contrasted with her hair that was the color of a night with no moon.

Her eyes were as wide as a clam shell and sparkled like a knife ready to slit a cod. She had full lips and wide hips and Weaquaquet was filled with love.

“Everywhere there is a campfire, men talk of you,” Weaquaquet told her. “The old ones, the magic ones, the warriors too…all speak of your beauty and your gentle nature. Chief Massasoit sends me to all his villages to bring his messages to his chieftans. Some distant villages are five running days away. But no matter how far I go, I hear of you.”

Scargo listened as the young warrior spoke. He was handsome like many of the young men who had come to visit her. But he had something more. His calm, smooth voice hinted at a gentleness that she found very attractive.

By the time the sun crossed to mid-point Scargo and Weaquaquet had joined hearts. She took him to meet her father and Weaquaket gave Sagem the greatest of respect. He shared news from Massasoit and suggested that the great chief would be willing to offer protection and assistance to the Nobscusset people.

“I have to return to the ‘end of the earth,where my people live,” Weaquaquet announced as sunset neared. “The ‘end of the earth’ is only one arrow-shoot wide.The Big Water surrounds us to the East, the North and the South.

In the middle of the arrow-shoot is rich earth that grows giant food. Only as wide as 10 wigwams and as long as 20, this farm is able to grow enough food to feed two big Wampanoag villages.

And even during the long-sun days when all the waters in ‘end of the earth’ start to dry up, the rich-farm continues to thrive. “

Reluctantly, the young lovers parted, for Weaquaquet had to return to his village where orders from Massasoit awaited him. Orders that would take him on a long journey of not just moons, but whole seasons.

Before he left, he promised Scargo and Sagem that as he next passed their village on his business for Massasoit, he would bring a gift from the rich-farm. It would be a gift unlike anything they had seen….a secret present of something unknown outside of the Wampanoag capital city.

He left on a kiss from Scargo and ran non stop to the ‘end of the earth’, compressing a two day warrior’s journey into less than one sun.

Standing on a flat stone at land's edge, with Big Water all around him and a brisk wind whipping salt into his eyes, Weaquaquet met with Massasoit to receive his orders.

Squinting, due to a relentless sun in a cloudless sky, he gazed at Massasoit. The Chief, tall and immoveable on the rock, had his face painted in war colors - half red and half black, His bow was in his left hand. His right clutched his lucky amulet, made from the tooth of a fox. It looked for a moment like the big man was actually formed of rock and not of flesh.

Massasoit spoke and shared tribal secrets with young Weaquaquet. Through his nation, the great leader was known by many different names. The Masachuset and the Nauset called him 'Yellow Feather." The Mashpee knew him as Naumkeg. In other villages he was known by other names and other titles.

"The Masachuset do not know that Chief Yellow Feather is also Chief Naumkeg. They think that the two are different chiefs! I do this so that no people will know my true strength. But the time is coming when I will have to make myself known to all," he explained.

“You know of only thirty villages of our people, but there are many more. The Wampanoag nation stretches not for five days run, but for ten times five days run."

" My two brothers are Chiefs of villages in a land far away where there are hills so high it takes half a sun to climb them."

" I have picked you Weaquaquet, to take twenty braves with you and visit my brothers and all my villages as far away as the nation of the Mohegan.”

“When you return, you must bring all of my Sachems to the ‘end of the earth’. We will meet here to talk about the Big Water.”

“What about the Big Water?,” Weaquaquet wondered.

“Do not speak of it to the Chiefs, but the magic men have told me there are giant boats on the Big Water and they are coming to our shore. A giant boat is so big that it would take more than two hundred canoes to fill its belly."

"This is why I must reveal myself to all the tribes and unify all my nations."

Massasoit’s brothers Quadequina and Pokanoket were his main Sachems to the West (often Sachems were called Kings) - but he had at least seven other Sachems and dozens of minor leaders in all parts of the known world. Visiting every settlement would require Weaquaquet to devote as many as three seasons to his mission.

“I will go as soon as you like my Chief. But I have met and fallen in love with Princess Scargo of the Nobscussetts. May I take her a gift from the rich-farm?”

“You may take her anything,” the chief replied. “and when you return I will give you and Scargo a wedding next to rich-land right here in ‘end of the earth’. It will be a wedding fit for a sachem and his princess - for a king is what I will make you when you return from your mission, with all my chiefs.”

Weaquaquet looked at ‘Yellow Feather’ and realized perhaps for the first time, that Massasoit would be spoken about by people for as long as there is campfire, fellowship and pipes to smoke. He had lived under the Chief’s protection for all his life but only just now realized what an incredible leader the huge, rock-faced man was.

Sunrise, the next morning, found Weaquaquet directing his braves loading supplies for the journey. The last thing they did before leaving was to go to the garden of ‘rich-land’ to find a present for the princess.

Scargo sat by the small spring which was nearly dry as the end of the long-sun days approached. Slowly she ran her hand through her hair, lifted her arm and watched as the wind snatched it from her skin and blew black, silken strands straight out like so many arrows from a hunter’s bow.

Her skin was the shade of the lightest of the maple leaves, in that time when they have changed color after the long-sun days, just before they are ready to fall off and signal the start of the white-blanket days - the dreary period when the village is covered by a cold, snowy shawl.

The laziness of the hot day was erased by the bustle of a large group of warriors who entered Nobscussett bearing many bundles. At the head of the group was her handsome

Weaquaquet.

“We have brought food and skins and tools to help your people in the white-blanket days,” he told Scargo as his Braves began offering bundles to Chief Sagem. “And I have something special for you. If you accept it, then it will seal our engagement. It will remind you of me and it will grow just as my love for you. When I return we shall marry.”

At that moment, from a clearing in the woods, two Braves appeared carrying a massive orange pumpkin. It was as wide as a cow is long and almost as tall. The huge vegetable was placed in front of Scargo who examined it.

The pumpkin had been hollowed out and filled with water. Swimming inside were four shimmering fish.

“I will be back when these fingerlings are the size of your hand. Will you wait for me?”

“I will,” replied the beautiful princess. “I will keep these silvery creatures alive and growing like my love for you.”

After dining and smoking a pipe with Sagem, Weaquaquet and his warriors left on their mission. Through knee deep snow in short-sun, and blistering heat in long-sun; the men followed ‘Yellow Feather’s directive.

 They traveled to village after village laying the groundwork for the historic alliance  - that in future would save the people from slaughter by the big-boat people.   

The magic men said that the strangers could carry in their hands, fire-sticks so powerful, one burst could do the work of 25 arrows in bringing down a fox, a bear or a moose.

For her part, Scargo, fed the fish every day through the short sun and into the long-sun that followed. As the fish began to grow, the massive pumpkin, that was grown in the magic earth of rich-land, began to deteriorate so she released the fish into the village’s tiny spring.

The long-sun days wore on. After two moons, the spring was almost dry and the four fish had barely enough water to keep covered. One morning when she went out to the spring she saw to her horror that one of the shimmering fish had died. The next morning another was lifeless.

“Father, Father,” she moaned. “Please come to the Spring. Please help me. My fish are dying.”

“I don’t know what to do daughter,” Sagem said sadly. “It has been many moons since your Weaquaquet left. Do you really believe he is coming back?”

Through sobs and tears that ran the length of her face, Scargo wept, “He’s coming. He will be here before the arrival of short-sun days. But we must keep the fish alive,” she begged.

One of Scargo's tears fell from her eye, ran down to her chin and dropped into the water of the spring causing a small ripple that drew both remaining fish to it.

They nibbled at the salty tear and began joyfully splashing in the inch or two of water that remained. Before the tear, they had been dull and lifeless, but after touching the ripple of the tear, the fish shimmered anew.

Never a man moved much to talk, or to action - Sagem found inspiration in the weeping and in the fish.

He knew in an instant what he had to do

Running to the large rock next to the spring, he lept on top of it like a young panther and shouted: “People of Nobscusset, Our spring is dying, our fish were almost lifeless and in two or maybe three days time, we will have no water and our whole nation will die.”

Surprised villagers gathered around the rock to listen to their chief. It was the first time in anyone’s memory the sachem had ever spoken like a chief and the first time for sure that he had mounted the rock--that long ago with other chiefs, had been a council rock.

“My daughter is crying big tears. She weeps for Weaquaquet who is far away. She cries for the fish who have no water, and for the tiny village of Nobscussett.”

“But today,” he continued, “we will save our nation.” We will transform our little spring into a lake."

"Our strongest bowman will shoot an arrow from the edge of the spring. Where that arrow lands will be the other end of our lake."

"We will get clamshells from the Big Water and dig our lake into the shape of a fish."

"When we are done, we will have a lake big enough to revive our tribe and make it grow.”

“Chief Sagem, how will we fill this lake with water?,” several of the people asked at once.

“We will fill it with my daughter’s tears. It will rise to the level of the shore and will never go dry,” Sagem affirmed.

In three days of digging with clamshells, the one hundred men, women and children of the Nobscussett nation did indeed dig Scargo Lake and like a miracle - in the hot, dry afternoon - Scargo's lake swelled with clear, cold water. It filled to the top and changed the Princess's tears to laughter.

The two fish not only survived but multiplied. Their descendants swim in Scargo Lake today. Weaquaquet returned from his mission and helped ‘Yellow Feather’ form a strong alliance that would hold for more than three score years. The alliance kept all the people safe from the big-boat strangers.

The alliance helped the strangers just when the land was about to defeat them and send them back across the big water.

Some of the elders say even today (in 2009 - almost 400 years later) that the Strangers never would have survived if it had not been for the help of Massasoit.

Scargo and Weaquaquet married and had many children. Both survive today in spirit at their lakes. Weaquaquet at his in what is called Centerville and Scargo in her lake in the town of Dennis.

The legend says that Scargo Lake was filled by the Princess’s tears.

The scientists say that glaciers dug and filled Scargo’s lake.

In the early 1900’s a stone tower was built at the lake. It still stands today. For free, you can go up the 28 foot tower which stands on the tallest hill in all of Cape Cod.

The legend says that hill was made from the dirt scooped out by the clamshells when the lake was made by Scargo and her family.

Scientists doubt that.

Why is Scargo Hill about the only hill on the Cape...as well as its tallest? There are dozens of other lakes in the area but none has a hill beside it!

One thing is for sure….if you go up to the top of Scargo tower and look out…you can see all the way to Provincetown some thirty miles distant.

You can see the famous Provincetown Monument erected to commemorate the Pilgrims landing there and meeting Yellow Feather himself in 1620.

You can see miles and miles out upon the big-water. You can see where Cape Cod is connected by three bridges to the state of Massachusetts.

Oh yes….you can see something else.

Just as in the legend…..Scargo Lake is in the shape of one of the fish that Weaquaquet gave to his princess!

Scientists.....what do you have to say to that?