The Iroquoians "do not so much as know what it is to correct them,"2 remarked traveler Pierre Charlevoix. The children "do everything that they like under the pretext that they are not yet at the age of reason."3 Iroquois children are therefore treated much like adults, only with less responsibility. It was up to the parents to lead by example, only asking or suggesting a child perform a task, never demanding obedience. Puritans never would think of such a sophisticated or gentle culture, definitely not from these "savages". However once started down this path the converted could never be persuaded to return. Eunice, or now known as Marguerite, died at the age of 89 still cherishing her Native American family.
Puritan conceptions of Native life never reflected the reality of their quite developed culture. For example, Europeans considered native men lazy and irresponsible because they allowed women to do all the farming and harvesting, a traditionally male role in European society. The men, however, earned their peaceful days during harvest because they would hunt all winter, living exposed to the harshness of nature from September through February. Europeans again misunderstood the gravity of the men's work because hunting was a sport practiced by the aristocracy. The majority of the tribe's money came from these hunts when they brought back furs to trade in the spring. Europeans also suffered from imperialistic attitudes of superiority lent them by their respective kings, Puritans even more so because they were the "chosen of God" who were to create the city on the hill in the center of the wilderness. Demos raises the Native Americans from the heathen status by giving them human qualities, not just focusing on the violence of war-party raids. After becoming their definition of human, the puritans could only hate them for being Catholic.
The Puritans possessed a deep-seeded hatred of Roman Catholics who the deemed "papists".
