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diff --git a/old/44229.txt b/old/44229.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..4ff07d9 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/44229.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6631 @@ +Project Gutenberg's The Birth of the Nation, by Mrs. Roger A. Pryor + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Birth of the Nation + Jamestown, 1607 + +Author: Mrs. Roger A. Pryor + +Illustrator: William de Leftwich Dodge + +Release Date: November 18, 2013 [EBook #44229] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE BIRTH OF THE NATION *** + + + + +Produced by Melissa McDaniel and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was +produced from images generously made available by The +Internet Archive) + + + + + + + +Transcriber's Note: + + Inconsistent hyphenation and spelling in the original document have + been preserved. Obvious typographical errors have been corrected. + + Italic text is denoted by _underscores_. + + + + +THE BIRTH OF THE NATION + + + + + [Illustration: The First English Church in America.] + + + + + 'Tis just three hundred years ago + We sailed through unknown Narrows + And landed on an unknown coast + Amid a flight of arrows. + We planted England's standard there, + And taught the Western savage. + In its defence we lightly held + His tomahawk and ravage. + + And there, between two forest trees, + We raised our first rude altar; + Roofed by a storm-rent sail we read + Old England's Prayers and Psalter, + An echo in the strange, new land + Awoke to slumber never: + It caught old England's battle-word-- + "God and my Right" forever! + + + + + THE BIRTH OF THE NATION + + JAMESTOWN, 1607 + + BY + MRS. ROGER A. PRYOR + + AUTHOR OF "THE MOTHER OF WASHINGTON AND HER TIMES," "REMINISCENCES + OF PEACE AND WAR" + + + ILLUSTRATIONS + BY WILLIAM DE LEFTWICH DODGE + + + New York + THE MACMILLAN COMPANY + LONDON: MACMILLAN & CO., Ltd. + 1907 + + All rights reserved + + + + + COPYRIGHT, 1907, + BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY. + + + Set up and electrotyped. Published March, 1907. + + + Norwood Press + J. S. Cushing & Co.--Berwick & Smith Co. + Norwood, Mass., U.S.A. + + + + + To + M. GORDON PRYOR RICE + + IN TOKEN OF + HER MOTHER'S LOVE + AND ADMIRATION + + + + +CONTENTS + + + CHAPTER I PAGES + + Jamestown Celebration. Legends of the Discovery of America. 1-7 + Columbus. The Cabots. Pope Alexander VI. Amerigo Vespucci. The + Power of Spain. Queen Elizabeth's Patent. Sir Humphrey + Gilbert. Our Shores only sighted by the English before 1600 + + CHAPTER II + + Sir Walter Raleigh. Expedition to Islands near North Carolina. 8-15 + Glowing Reports. Failure of First Colony. Enmity of Indians. + Second Colony to Roanoke Island. Virginia Dare. Expedition for + Relief of Colony. Colonists had Disappeared. Fate never Known + + CHAPTER III + + Death of Queen Elizabeth. James I., Appearance and Character. 16-33 + Corrupt Court. Poverty of Common People. Highway Robbers. + London Company undertakes Virginia Colony. The Necessities of + a Countess. Extravagance. Political, Religious, and Literary + Aspects of the Time. Royal Charter obtained for New Colony + + CHAPTER IV + + England's First Colony. Emigrants Subject to Commercial 34-44 + Corporation, to Domestic Council, to Superior Council, to + Arbitrary Rule of King. The Three Ships. Christopher Newport. + Allowance for Each Man. Cargo of Ships. Sealed Orders. Robert + Hunt. Books Brought. Character of Colonists. Names of Most + Prominent. Captain John Smith. Motives of Adventurers. + Attitude toward Indians. Little Interest in England. Drayton's + Poem + + CHAPTER V + + Story of Voyage by Thomas Studley. George Percy. Dissensions 45-55 + among Voyagers. Career of John Smith. Ships enter Chesapeake + Bay. A Virginia Welcome. Council as appointed by Sealed + Orders. Wingfield elected President, April 26, 1607. Indians. + Colonists land at Jamestown, May 13. Smith excluded from + Council. Appearance of Forest. Religious Service. First Night + in the New Land + + CHAPTER VI + + Appearance of New Country. Percy's Description. Flora. Fruits. 56-63 + Fauna. Condition and Customs of Indians. Their Implements + + CHAPTER VII + + Religion of Powhatan's Tribe. Kiwassa. Okeus. Sacrifice of 64-84 + Children. Conversion of Indians almost Impossible. Temple at + Uttamussac. Dress and Chants of Priests. Immortality. Fables + taught by Priests. Enmity of Powhatan to English. Suspected of + Massacre of Roanoke Colonies. Prophecies of Priests. No + Written Language of Indians. The Will of the King Law. Law of + Succession. Cruelty of Powhatan. Indian Habitations. No + Furniture. Fire. Light. Occupations and Games of Men. Work + done by Women and Children. Henry Spelman's Story. Indians' + Provision for the Future. Maidens and Young Braves. Music and + Dancing. Traits of Indian Women. Tenderness toward Children. + Powhatan's Unconquerable Hatred. Fate of Indian settled by + Massacre of 1622 + + CHAPTER VIII + + Chief of Paspahegh Tribe welcomes Newport. His Appearance. His 85-95 + Behaviour. Work of Colonists. Interviews with Indians. + Wochinchopunck. Indians' Skill in Archery. Expedition up the + River. Town of Powhatan. Percy's Description. Site of + Richmond. Cross Erected. Indians' Assault upon Jamestown. Fort + put in Fighting Order. John Smith under Suspicion. First Trial + by Jury. Smith Acquitted. Reconciliation through Hunt. Smith + admitted to Council. The Eucharist. Savages desire Peace. + Newport leaves for England + + CHAPTER IX + + The First Mail to England. Enthusiastic Praise of New Country. 96-115 + Policy of Colonists to encourage Immigration. Sir Walter + Cope's Letters. Council discuss Abandonment of Colony. Zuniga + and Newport. Council decides to send Colonists and Provisions. + Letters from Zuniga to Philip III. of Spain. Letter from + Dudley Carleton. Affairs at the Colony. First Church. Illness. + Percy's Narrative. First Graves in Virginia. England's + Selfishness. John Smith's Narrative. Diverse Elements in + Colony. Character of Wingfield. Deposed, and Ratcliffe put in + his Place. Wingfield's Defence. Indians bring Food. No True + Friendship. Smith seizes Image of Okeus. Savages ransom it + with Provisions. Game of Southern Virginia. Smith takes the + Helm. Log Cabins and Church Built + + CHAPTER X + + Winter of Unusual Severity. Starvation Threatened. Idleness 116-132 + and Waste. Corn procured from Indians. Plans made and + Abandoned. Newport Long Overdue. John Smith explores the + Chickahominy. Important Voyage. Spends a Month with the + Powhatans. Description of Region. Murder of Two of Smith's Men + by Indians. Smith's Adventures. Captured by the Savages. March + to Powhatan. Incident told by William Symondes. Smith's Life + in Danger. Opechancanough tempts Him. Message sent Jamestown. + Indian Orgies. Banquets for Prisoner. Conducted to Powhatan's + Residence on York River + + CHAPTER XI + + Werowocomoco. Powhatan's Absolute Power. His Cruelty. Indian 133-155 + Cookery. Bathing. Worship. Powhatan's Wives and Children. His + Affection for his Children. Pocahontas. The Dress of Indian + Women. The Mirror in the Woods. Smith received by Powhatan. + Powhatan's Costume. A Feast. Pocahontas saves Smith. He is + assigned to her Service. Powhatan asks the Cause of the Coming + of the English. Smith's Reply. Flatters Powhatan. Powhatan's + Attempt to terrify Smith. Professes Friendship. The Truth of + the Pocahontas Incident Discussed. Her Kindness to the English + + CHAPTER XII + + Indians conduct Smith to Jamestown. His Enemies There. He is 156-176 + sentenced to be Hanged. Newport arrives and releases Smith and + Wingfield. Smith sends Gifts to Powhatan. The Character of the + New Colonists. "Newport's News." The King and Carr. Contrast + between Elizabeth and James. Newport's Visit to Powhatan. The + Feast. Finger-bowls and Napkins. Exchange of a Christian for a + Savage. Ill-advised Gifts to Powhatan. Newport Outwitted. A + Disaster from Fire. The Gold Fever. Wingfield and Archer + return to England. Twenty Swords for Twenty Turkeys + + CHAPTER XIII + + The Church Rebuilt. The Arrival of the _Ph[oe]nix_. Smith's 177-186 + "True Relation of Virginia." Powhatan's Plot. Indian Thieves + Captured. Released at the Prayer of Pocahontas. Age of + Pocahontas. Her Visits to the Fort. Her Attire and "Wheels." + Chanco. A Comparison and a Contrast + + CHAPTER XIV + + Exploration. Greed of the London Company. Dread of Banishment 187-205 + to Virginia. A Voyage of Adventure. Smith's Map of Virginia. + Golden Dreams Dispelled. Mutineers. Smith made President of + Virginia. A New Ship and an English Maid. Orders from England. + A Violent Quarrel. Foolish Gifts from James I. to Powhatan. + Indian Ceremonies. Nymphs. Diplomacy. The Coronation of + Powhatan. The Departure of Newport. Illicit Traffic. Flying + Squirrels. "A Rude Answer" + + CHAPTER XV + + Famine Threatened. "Gentlemen" and Hard Work. A Remedy for 206-227 + Profanity. "Noblesse Oblige." Indian Summer. Soap and the + Plague. The First Marriage. A Fortunate Family. Powhatan + Hostile. Indians refuse Supplies. Smith secures Food. Heavy + Snow. The Colonists in Terror of Starvation. Smith's Daring + Plan. Powhatan's Cunning. A Friendly Chief. Smith's Interview + with Powhatan. The Long Harangues and an Apologia. Powhatan's + Scheme foiled by Pocahontas. A Savage Lear. Smith wrests + Supplies from Opechancanough. The Perfidy of Two Dutchmen. Ten + Colonists Drowned. Pocahontas again to the Rescue. Smith + returns to Jamestown + + CHAPTER XVI + + Smith's Enemies in England. A New Charter. Its Most 228-242 + Significant Article. Limits of the Colony Defined. New Rulers + for Virginia. The Governor's Arbitrary Power. This Nation's + Real Founders. The King's Position. His Poverty. Interest of + the Clergy in Virginia. Strachey's Description. Zuniga's + Anger. Nine Vessels sail to Virginia. John Rolfe and his First + Wife. A Hurricane and the Plague. Many of the New Settlers + Worthless and Profligate. The _Sea Venture_. Sir George + Somers. The Bermudas. The Scene of Shakespeare's "Tempest." + Andrew Marvel's Poem. Prayer, Marriage, and Birth. Ambergris. + New Ships Built + + CHAPTER XVII + + Smith Hard at Work. The Traitor Dutchmen. Wochinchopunck 243-271 + captured and Escapes. Smith's Retaliation for Indian Outrage. + An Indian's Eloquence. Smith gains Influence over Indians. + Search for Raleigh's Lost Colony. Silk Grass. Smith's Energy. + Rats. Argall's News. Seven Vessels reach Jamestown. Ratcliffe + claims Authority. Resistance and Chaos. New Colonies Planted. + Smith buys Place near Present Site of Richmond. Mutineers. + Relations with Indian Emperor Closed. Career in Virginia + Ended. Percy made President _pro tem._ Character of Smith. + Visits and names New England and Boston. Extracts from + Writings. Diverse Opinions of Smith. Thomas Fuller's View. + Smith's Closing Years in London. His Poverty. Grave and + Epitaph in St. Sepulchre. Attitude toward Pocahontas. English + Unwilling to marry Indians. Indian Resentment. Smith's Offer + to subdue Indians after Massacre of 1622 Declined. America's + Debt of Gratitude to Smith + + CHAPTER XVIII + + Unruly Youths returned to England. Mischievous Letter from 272-293 + Ratcliffe. Ratcliffe's Death. Percy's Administration. + "Beggar's Bush." Loss of Smith Disastrous. Indian Risings. + Disease. Famine. "The Starving Time." Coming of the + _Deliverance_ and the _Patience_. Condition of Jamestown. The + New Governor. Machumps and Namontack. All the Colonists embark + for England. Turned back by Lord Delaware. A New Order of + Things. The Church repaired and Adorned. Services Frequent. + Mortality of Early Settlers + + CHAPTER XIX + + Delaware's Wise Rule. A Nemesis for Traitors. Delaware's 294-313 + return to England. Strachey's Manuscripts. Friendly Indians. + The Marriage of Pocahontas to Kocoun. Indian Marriage Customs. + The Costume of an Indian Princess. Human Sacrifices to Okeus. + Pocahontas held for Ransom. John Rolfe's Letter to Governor + Dale. The Baptism of Pocahontas. Her Marriage to John Rolfe. + "The Lady Rebekah" + + CHAPTER XX + + Governor Dale asks in Marriage Powhatan's Youngest Daughter. 314-321 + Powhatan's Reception of the Messenger. The Alliance Politely + Declined. The Last Years of the Old Emperor. His Successor. + The Great Massacre. Jamestown saved by Chanco. The capture and + Death of Opechancanough + + CHAPTER XXI + + Pocahontas at Court. Smith writes the Queen of her Goodness to 322-331 + the Colony. Her Dignified Deportment. King James's Jealousy. + Pocahontas reproaches John Smith. Her Death and Burial. Her + Son and his Descendants. John Randolph of Roanoke + + CHAPTER XXII + + The Patriots of Jamestown. Their Services as Founders of the 332-339 + Freedom of America. Address of Hon. Roger A. Pryor. The Town + after Seat of Government was removed to Williamsburg. The Old + Graveyard. The Lone Cypress. The Gift of Jamestown, by Mr. and + Mrs. Barney, to the Association for the Preservation of + Virginia Antiquities. Gift of the Government to Women of the + Association. Restoration by Them. The Old Town Exhumed. Relics + found beneath the Mould of More than Two Centuries + + CHAPTER XXIII + + Legends of the Old Stone House: Pocahontas; Smith; Blackbeard 340-352 + and his Hidden Treasure; Nathaniel Bacon. Conclusion + + + + +LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS + + + The First English Church in America Frontispiece + + FACING PAGE + + Queen Elizabeth 8 + + King James I. 20 + + Old London--1607 44 + + Memorial erected by Clergy of the Episcopal Church at 52 + Jamestown Island + + "The trembling Indian in his canoe hurried past it 68 + with bated breath" + + Smith's Island, where John Smith was captured by the 124 + Indians + + The Mirror in the Woods 138 + + "She rushed forward, and laid her own head upon his" 144 + + King James and a Petitioner 162 + + Powhatan Oak, over Three Hundred Years Old 166 + + Old Fort--Jamestown Island 180 + + "The newly crowned potentate started with terror" 200 + + "'Powhatan comes to kill you all'" 222 + + Captain George Percy 258 + + St. Luke's, near Smithfield, built in 1623. The 266 + Oldest Protestant Church in America + + Captain John Smith. From the Bust by Baden-Powell 270 + + Lord Delaware 286 + + Pocahontas Memorial Window 290 + + Marriage of Pocahontas 312 + + Powhatan Rock, under which the Indian Chief is said 320 + to be Buried + + Pocahontas at Court 322 + + Royal Palace, Whitehall 328 + + Jamestown Church Tower 336 + + + + +THE BIRTH OF THE NATION + + + + +INTRODUCTORY + +CHAPTER I + + +We are about to commemorate the settlement of the English at Jamestown +three hundred years ago. Under God's blessing, we are not only at peace +with all the world, but are bound by ties of close friendship to the great +kingdoms and republics on earth. Therefore, we may confidently expect to +welcome numbers of their representatives to our three hundredth birthday +celebration. Many will be the banners unfurled in waters which ebbed and +flowed in awful silence but three hundred years ago, or were stirred only +by the paddle of the Indian canoe; and loud the thunders of welcome and +greeting from shores which echoed then with the scream of the eagle and +the war-whoop of the savage. + +The story of a world emerging from the darkness in which it had been +hidden for countless ages will always thrill the imagination. Phantom +ships loom dimly out of the mists of a far-off time. Strange names are +whispered in vague traditions, which are found in no written record--names +of mighty mariners, who were blown by tempests upon a strange +coast,--Arthur; Malgro; Brandon; a "Fryer of Lynn," who by reason of his +"black art" reached the North Pole in 1360; Madock, "sonne of Quinneth, +Prince of Wales," a man of peace, who sought refuge in a wilderness +because of strife among his brethren; Leif, the Norwegian; Nicolo Zeno, +the Venetian; Hanno, the Carthaginian! Colossal figures tremble for a +moment on the horizon, and are lost in fog and doubt. + +At last the great Genoese sails forth, and becomes a tangible figure +in history. Often as his story may be told, familiar as it is to every +schoolboy in the land, we can never hear it without a keen realization of +its personal relations to ourselves. "It would be impossible," said Daniel +Webster, "for us to read the discovery of our continent without being +reminded how much it has affected our own fortunes and our own existence. +It would be unnatural for us to contemplate with unaffected minds that +most touching and pathetic scene when the great discoverer of America +stood on the deck of his shattered bark, the shades of night falling +on the sea, yet no man sleeping; tossed on the billows of an unknown +ocean, yet the stronger billows of alternate hope and despair tossing his +own troubled thoughts; extending forward his harassed frame, straining +westward his anxious and eager eyes, till Heaven at last granted him a +moment of rapture and ecstasy, in blessing his vision with the sight of +an unknown world." + +Intensely interesting are the narratives of the daring adventurers who +followed Columbus--of the Cabots who landed and claimed the country +for the English crown; of the Spaniards and Portuguese upon whom Pope +Alexander the Sixth generously bestowed the world, giving to the Spaniards +the western, and to the Portuguese the eastern part of it,[1] for in those +days it was but necessary for any pirate or sea adventurer from either +nation to land and erect a stone or stick on the coast, to constitute a +valid claim to possession in the name of Spain or Portugal and a right to +drive out or exterminate the ancient inhabitants and owners of the land. + +But of all the early adventurers none is so interesting to us as Amerigo +Vespucci, whose name we bear. He won for himself this honour simply and +solely because of his literary ability, which enabled him to write an +interesting narrative of his adventures. The historian is fortunate who +has no one to contradict him. He may draw his pictures from imagination +and make them as gorgeous as he pleases. There is no reason to believe +that Vespucci failed to make liberal use of this privilege; but that did +not in the least retard the success of his book. It has been repeatedly +asserted that it was not through his fault that the name of this continent +was given to him, rather than to the man who deserved that honour; that +his German translator, Martin Waldsemueller, suggested it; that the idea +was comical enough to catch the fancy of the Portuguese, who at once +adopted it. The Spaniards, on the other hand, resented it, and complained +bitterly that the honour was stolen from the rightful possessor. On +the death of Columbus, Vespucci entered the service of Spain, and was +stationed at Seville, with the title of pilot-major. Part of his duty was +to mark out on charts the tracks to be followed by Spanish navigators, +and he always distinguished the new world, first, by the words "Amerigo's +Land," and presently, "America"! This settles his responsibility for a +fraud which never did and never will deceive anybody. He was a skilful +navigator,--a great man in his day and generation,--but no renown to him +has gone with the name he strove to make immortal. Vespucci has ever been +deemed a very inconsiderable person in comparison with Columbus, although +it has come to pass that half the world bears his name. + +The Spaniard, with fire and sword, swiftly followed Vespucci. He took +possession of Florida, overthrew the temples and idols in Mexico, +conquered Peru! The French were already here,--that did not signify,--the +power of Spain was speedily established. Before the English flag "floated +over so much as a log fort, Spain was mistress of Central America." Her +ships crept along the coast, peered into Chesapeake Bay, and explored +harbours and inlets with reference to future possession. + +It was quite time for England to remember and confirm her claim. Spain +was her enemy. Spain was growing rich from American gold, and powerful +by reason of American possessions. Already four hundred vessels came +annually from the harbours of Portugal and Spain (and some from France and +England), to the shores of Newfoundland. Queen Elizabeth granted a liberal +patent[2] to one of her bravest soldiers, Sir Humphrey Gilbert, with the +right to establish a colony. With Sir Walter Raleigh's aid, he equipped +a squadron of three ships, but misfortunes befell his little vessels, +and he attempted to return to England with two ships, the _Hind_ and the +_Squirrel_. A great storm arose; the oldest mariner had "never seen a more +outrageous sea," and in it the _Squirrel_ perished. The _Hind_ returned +to tell the story of Sir Humphrey's devotion and courage; how out of the +darkness a brave voice rang out--the voice of the good old knight to whom +the Queen had given with her blessing a golden anchor set with pearls--"Be +of good cheer, my friends! We are as near to Heaven by sea as by land," +and how his ship went down in the night! + +Such was the spirit of the few Englishmen who came hither before 1600 on +fruitless voyages--sighting our shores only--like sea-birds which hover +on restless wing near the coast for a moment, then wheel and return to +their nests in some far-away island. + + + + +CHAPTER II + + +With Sir Walter Raleigh the history of the English colonies in America +begins. He was a prime favourite with Queen Elizabeth, and she knew how +to exalt and abase, to create and destroy. To Raleigh she gave viceregal +powers over any and all of England's prospective colonies, with no limit +to his control over territories, of which he could bestow grants according +to his pleasure. He sent out an exploring expedition to the islands +near North Carolina. The adventurers returned with glowing accounts of +the country. The season was summer--seas were tranquil, skies clear; no +storms ever gathered on those peaceful shores; all was repose. The gentle +inhabitants were in harmony with the scene; flowers and fruit abounded, +grapes were clustered close to the coast and cooled by the spray of a +quiet sea; there was no winter, no cold. A hundred islands clustered along +the shores, inhabited by "people the most gentle, loving, and faithful, +void of all guile and treason, and such as lived after the manner of the +golden age." No wonder a new expedition of one hundred and eight colonists +was soon organized. Seven vessels were equipped, and sailed under the +happiest auspices. But, alas! the "gentle people" living after the manner +of the golden age proved thievish and deceitful; disasters, many and +varied, followed; the adventurers forsook the "paradise of the world," +and the enterprise came to naught. + + [Illustration: Queen Elizabeth. + From an engraving after the painting by Zucchero.] + +History has preserved no stranger, more mysterious story than the next +experiment of Sir Walter Raleigh. To insure the permanence of his second +colony, he decided to send families, women and children, to the fruitful +Islands of Roanoke, to make a permanent home, and found "the City of +Raleigh." A fleet of transport ships carried eighty-nine men, seventeen +women, and eleven little children, with every appliance for comfort, and +ample provision of implements of husbandry. The colony arrived in August, +after a five months' voyage, and were dismayed to find the island strewn +with human bones. They had "expected sundry decent dwelling-houses"; they +found the ruins of the houses and forts their predecessors had erected. +The men who had been left behind by the first governor had been murdered +by the loving, gentle, and faithful people. + +There was nothing to do but make the best of it. But the charm was +broken. The colonists were alarmed and disheartened. The Indians were not +friends--that became evident at once. Realizing their danger, weakness, +and utter dependence upon England, the heartsick immigrants looked with +dismay upon the departure of the ships, and they implored their Governor +to return and represent their true condition to Elizabeth, "the Godmother +of Virginia," and to the powerful Raleigh, her servant. + +On the 18th of August, according to the ancient author's report, "Ellinor, +the Governour's daughter, and wife to Ananias Dare, was delivered of +a daughter in Roanoke, which being the first Christian there borne, +was called 'Virginia.'" The Governor was loth to leave his colony, his +daughter, and grandchild, but they "thought none would so truly procure +theire supplyes as he, which though he did what he could to excuse it, +yet their importunitie would not cease till he undertooke it; and had it +under all their hands how unwilling he was but that necessity and reason +did doubly constraine him." + +Of course, the Governor promised to hasten his return. The story is a +strange one--of feeble effort, cupidity, indifference. + +The Governor did not reach England until November. Raleigh at once fitted +out two small vessels which sailed the following April, but the crew,[3] +"being more intent on a gainful voyage than the relief of a colony, ran +in chase of prizes, were themselves overcome and rifled." In this maimed, +ransacked, and ragged condition, they returned to England, and, the writer +adds, "their patron was greatly displeased." After this, for a whole year +no relief was sent. Raleigh had now spent forty thousand pounds on his +colonies with no return, and he turned them over to Sir Thomas Smith. When +White sailed again with three ships, history was repeated. He "buccaneered +among the Spaniards, until three years elapsed before he actually arrived +at Roanoke." + +Nothing was to be seen of the settlers there! The Governor seems to have +taken things with admirable coolness! His own account is an amazing bit of +narrative, when we remember the one hundred and fifteen men, women, and +little children, his own Ellinor, and Virginia Dare! He tells first of +his troublesome voyage. The sea was rough and his "provisions were much +wet"; the boat when they attempted to land tossed up and down, and some +of his sailors were drowned, so it was late when he arrived. The Governor +was romantic. He and his company sang old familiar English songs, but no +chorus came in response from the silent shore. "Seeing a fire through +the woods we then sounded a trumpet, but no answer could we heare. The +next morning we went to it, but could see nothing but the grasse and +some rotten trees burning. We went up and downe the Ile and at last found +three faire Romane Letters carved: C. R. O., which presently we knew to +signifie the place where I should find them, according to a secret note +betweene them and me: which was to write the name of the place they would +be upon some tree, dore, or post: and if they had beene in any distresse, +to signifie it by making a crosse above it. But we found no sign of +distress" (doubtless the writer had been tomahawked before he finished +his signal), "then we went to a place where there were sundry houses, and +on one of the chief posts, carved in fayre capitall Letters, C. R. O. A. +T. A. N., without any signe of distresse." Lead and iron and shot were +scattered about overgrown with weeds, and some "chists were found which +had been hidden and digged up againe, which when I saw I knew three to be +my owne, but books, pictures, and all things els were spoyled. Though it +much grieved me, yet it did comfort me to know they were at Croatan." + +But the Governor never went in search of them at the Indian village +indicated! He weighed anchor to that end, but cables broke, etc. +Considering they had but one anchor and their "provision neare spent," +they determined to go to Trinidad or some other island "to refresh +ourselves and seeke for purchase that winter, and the next spring come +againe to seeke our countrymen." But they met in the meantime with "many +of the Queene's ships and divers others," and "left seeking our colony, +that was never any of them found nor seene to this day 1622. And this was +the conclusion of this plantation after so much time, labour, and charge +consumed. Whereby we see," continues the Governor, who was poetic as well +as romantic:-- + + "Not all at once nor all alike, nor ever hath it been, + That God doth offer and confer his blessings upon men." + +A most philosophic Governor, truly! Even to this day we feel more emotion +at the possible fate of these hapless Englishmen. Had they perished from +famine? Had they fallen before the Indian tomahawk? Had the women and +children been spared and given to the chiefs according to savage custom? +Alas for Virginia Dare! Three years they had looked for succour, and been +basely forsaken by their countrymen. They were not forgotten altogether. +Part of the errand of every ship thereafter, and part of every order +sent out to the colony, was to "seek for Raleigh's men." But they had +disappeared utterly--as silently and surely as the morning dew before the +sun. Twenty years later friendly Indians told a story of doubtful value +to William Strachey and others; but the secret is still a secret, and this +disappearance of more than a hundred human beings is one of the strangest +events in history. + + + + +CHAPTER III + + +When Lord Bacon was informed that his great Queen Elizabeth had died just +before daybreak, he exclaimed, "A fine morning before sun-rising,"--the +rising of King James the First. Far more appropriate would have been the +words, "The sun has set before the night." + +James the First shambles across the pages of history a grotesque figure +enough,--tottering on weak legs which seem incapable of supporting his +padded dirk-proof doublet, with pockets further distended by the unread +petitions ("sifflications" as he termed them) of his unhappy subjects. +From his mother, so conspicuous for grace and beauty, he seems to have +inherited nothing, unless we may credit the painters, who have given him +beautiful hands. His broad Scotch was rendered more uncouth by a thick +tongue which filled to overflowing his coarse mouth. His lips never closed +over his teeth. This body was a fitting casket for a depraved mind and +heart. In vain may the elder D'Israeli and others modify, apologize, and +cunningly seek out redeeming traits! His was a low, base nature, proven +by every action--and never disproven by the brave words and pious formula +with which he adorned his speech. + +Only three years before the Virginia colonists set forth upon their +momentous enterprise, Sir Charles Percy and Thomas Somerset had posted +down to Scotland to hail James Stuart King of England. As King James +of Scotland he had led rather a hard life--and although his mother's +beautiful head had but lately fallen under an English axe, and although +he had vowed eternal vengeance upon her murderers, he accepted the crown +with childish eagerness. + +His first request was peremptory: he must have money forthwith for his +journey to London, and the crown jewels of England must be immediately +forwarded for the use of his homely wife. The Council ventured to ignore +the latter. They thought he would hurry to London to attend the funeral +of Elizabeth--seeing she had herself named him as her successor. "Give +not my crown to a _rascal_!" she had said with her dying breath; "My +cousin of Scotland is a _king_!" It was not to be supposed, however, +that he would hasten his movements to honour "the defunct Queen," as he +called her (seeing she had cut off his mother's head), so he dawdled on +the way, hunting, feasting, and discovering the charms of "Theobald's" in +Hertfordshire, where he afterwards spent so much of his royal time. All +the way, in season and out of season, he would indulge in the oft-repeated +words, "I am the King," as if to reassure himself of the fact and recall +his powers and privileges. Casting about for opportunities to use them, +his eye fell upon a petty thief, a cut-purse who had stolen some trifling +coin from a courtier, had confessed his guilt, and begged for mercy. James +had the man hanged without legal trial, and when some cringing follower +suggested that this procedure was irregular, had exclaimed, "God's wounds! +I make what likes me law and gospel." (His oath--and each one of England's +sovereigns had his own favourite profanity--was a little milder than +Elizabeth's "God's death" and stronger than previous kings' "God's blood," +"God's eyes," etc.) "God's wounds," stammered King James, "I make what +likes me law and gospel!" + +He also made what liked him knights and lords. Shutting his eyes, which +could never endure the sight of a naked blade (and good reason!), he laid +the knight-conferring sword on shoulders which might well tingle under +the accolade, seeing how narrowly eyes escaped being put out, and ears +cut off. He bestowed this distinction upon nearly every person he met +during his journey. By the time he set foot in his palace of Whitehall, +he had knighted two hundred individuals, without respect to distinction of +merit or station. Before he had been three months a king, he had bestowed +the hitherto highly esteemed honour of knighthood upon seven hundred. It +seemed to be a relief to his feelings, immediately after a tedious oration +or ceremony, to create twenty or more knights. + +Nor was he chary even of the honour of the English peerage, which +Elizabeth had held at so high a value. He presently added sixty-two names +to the list of peers. By that same token those of us who hunger for noble +descent are very shy of the strawberry leaves that grew in James the +First's time, and diligently seek for those that flourished under the +smiles of earlier potentates. + + [Illustration: King James I.] + +This was the grotesque figure before which England's great noblemen +kneeled down and did their homage: Lord Bacon, Cecil, the Earl of +Northumberland, Lord Grey, and hosts of others. To Northumberland Lord +Bacon had written: "Your Lordship shall find a prince the furthest from +vain-glory that may be, and rather like a prince of the ancient form +than of the latter time. His speech is swift and cursory, and in the full +dialect of his nation, in speech of business short, in speech of discourse +large," etc. Other persons, however, were less indulgent than Bacon. They +marked his "legs too weak to carry his body, his tongue too large for +his mouth, his goggle eyes, rolling and yet vacant, his apparel neglected +and dirty, his unmanly fears and ridiculous precautions," and expressed +their consequent astonishment and disgust. As time went on, these personal +defects paled in importance compared with the low tastes and principles +he developed. It matters not that he was learned in the Latin tongue, +and an obstinate supporter, in word at least, of the Protestant faith. +All history of poor human nature proves that taste, beauty, learning may +coexist with diabolical wickedness. It is hard to believe it, although we +see it every day. It was abundantly proven in King James's reign. + +Of course we may imagine the society led by such a court. Never was there +more injustice, outrageous favouritism, disregard of the rights of birth +and property, more vice in high places, more extravagance, drunkenness, +and debauchery. It was unsafe to walk in the streets of London after +nightfall. A portion of the city was set apart as a refuge for murderers +and lawbreakers, whence the law had no power to drag them. Life was held +cheap in King James's time. Heads fell on the block as a matter of course. +Great ladies drove in their coaches to see Mrs. Turner executed. "Saw +three men hanged and so to breakfast," said Samuel Pepys a little later. + +The common people were wretchedly poor. They slept on straw and lived on +barley. Only the servants of the rich could eat rye bread. Vagrants and +beggars swarmed over the kingdom. In a pamphlet entitled "Grievous Groans +of the Poor," the writer complains that "The country is pitifully pestered +with those who beg, filch, and steal for their maintenance, and travel +the highway of hell until the law bring them to fearful hanging." What to +do with these swarming "rogues," in case they could not be hanged, was a +tough question with Lord Coke,[4] conveniently answered later by imposing +them upon the starving colonists. + +The picturesque beggar was not a very costly luxury. A curious pamphlet +entitled "Stanley's Remedy, or the Way to Reform Wandering Beggars, +Thieves, Highway Robbers, and Pickpockets," was published in 1646, in +which the cost of the diet and maintenance of every thievish, idle, +drunken person in the kingdom was estimated at threepence a day at least. + +Of course it was unsafe for "true men" to travel except in numbers and +well armed, and whoever was about to take a journey had to wait until a +tolerably strong caravan had mustered for the same route. Among the chief +places of danger was Gadshill in Kent, where Falstaff achieved the glory +of killing the already dead Percy. + +Thieves are always more interesting in a story than noblemen, but the +Virginia colony was more intimate with the latter than the former; at +least until the King graciously reenforced their numbers with a cargo of +outlaws. The company that undertook to support the colony was a London +Company, and the adventurers were mainly citizens of London. Those who +held the title of "gentlemen" may reasonably be supposed to have known +something of the luxuries they were now exchanging for the hardships of +colonial life. Some idea of the extravagance of the time may be gleaned +from old diaries and letters. + +A very curious letter has been preserved, which reveals the domestic +economy of a family of distinction during the reign of James the First. +It is from the daughter of Sir John Spenser and wife of the Earl of +Northampton to her lord soon after their marriage. It is an amusing list +of the necessities of a lady of rank: "My sweet life, now I have declared +to you my mind for the settling of your estate, I suppose it were best +for me to bethink and consider within myself what allowance were meet +for me," and she proceeds to ask the sum of L2600, to be paid quarterly. +In addition to this, she must have L600 quarterly for sundries not to be +accounted for. In addition, the lady feels that she needs "three horses +that none shall dare lend or borrow," two gentlewomen and a horse for +each; six or eight mounted gentlemen, two coaches lined with velvet, four +horses to each; a coach for each of her women with gold lace, scarlet +cloth; four horses, and two coachmen for each coach; carriages for six +laundresses and other serving women; a gentleman usher on horseback; two +footmen; all of which to be maintained by her husband. For apparel she +needs twenty gowns, L6000 to buy jewels, L4000 to buy a pearl chain, in +all $76,000. For her house she wishes him to furnish beds, stools, chairs, +cushions, carpets; silver warming-pans; fair hangings, and cupboards of +plate, "all things fine and delicate." And in addition to all these she +thinks it would save trouble to have L2000 in case of emergency. The +letter concludes, "It is my desire that you lend no money, as you love +God, to my Lord Chamberlain, who would have all, perhaps your life, from +you." And then, on second thoughts, she asks that when her husband becomes +an earl L2000 more be allowed her and double attendance.[5] A note to the +letter adds, "Her husband went out of his wits." + +We cannot begin to describe the Elizabethan magnificence in dress. The +artificial taste for dainty and costly living was also abundantly evident +in the epicurism of the time. The court that allotted a scanty diet of +cereal, oil, and vinegar to the men it sent out to subdue a wilderness, +could partake of no simple food or drink. The cookery was complicated and +consisted mainly of "villanous compounds" of great cost. Butter, cream, +marrow, ambergris, lemons, spices, dried fruits, oranges, the scarce +sugar--all of these entered largely in the composition of dishes. We read, +among the simple dishes, of an artificial hen made of paste, sitting upon +eggs in each of which, enclosed in paste, was a fat nightingale seasoned +with ambergris, then the most costly of flavours. There were snails stewed +or fried in oil, vinegar, and spices; frogs dressed into fricassees. There +was a wonderful receipt for cooking herring. "In hell they'll roast thee +like a herring," was the warning to Tam O'Shanter, but herrings were not +roasted in King James's time, Scotchman although he was. Here is a receipt +for salted herring[6] or "herring-pie," a little bit of which might serve +as an appetizer: "Take salt herrings being watered (soaked), wash them +between your hands and you shall loose the fish from the skin; take off +the skin whole, and lay them in a dish; then have a pound of almond paste +ready; mince the herrings and stamp them with the almond paste; two milts +or roes; five or six dates, some grated manchet, sugar, sack, rose-water +and saffron; make the composition somewhat stiff and fill the skins; put +butter in the bottom of your pie, lay on the herring, and on them dates, +gooseberries, currants, barberries, and butter; close it up and bake it; +being baked, liquor it with butter, verjuice, and sugar." + +There was once a gathering of marquises, lords, knights, and squires +at Newcastle to celebrate a great anniversary, and each guest was +required to bring a dish. The specimen of Sir George Goring was reckoned +a masterpiece. It consisted of four huge, brawny pigs, piping hot, +bitted and harnessed with ropes of sausages all tied to a monstrous +bag-pudding.[7] The narrator explains that "on some occasions a coarse +and clownish dish was a pleasing variety." + +We can imagine George Percy, John Smith, Gosnold, Newport (all of whom +were doubtless received in court circles), dining on this costly fare, and +drinking healths on their knees when the King was toasted. So much of the +drinking was attributed to Danish influence that it was a common saying +that "The Danes had again conquered England." + +Before we join our colonists in their perilous enterprise we briefly +sketch some of the peculiarities of the life whence they came. This will +help to account for some things that follow. Of the political and literary +aspects of the times, we must be allowed a short notice, in order that +the ensuing story may be better understood. + +A great convulsion, incident upon the Reformation, had passed over +the world. It raged on the Continent, and then extended to England and +Scotland, where it lasted until the death of Queen Elizabeth and the +accession to the throne of James the First, when Protestantism was +firmly established. The Roman Catholics were in high disfavour. The +dreadful Gunpowder Plot had aggravated the bitterness against them. +England, all the corruption at court notwithstanding, was full of +religious enthusiasts. With them the experiment in Virginia was only the +beginning of the conversion of a great multitude of savages. The first +charter expressed[8] a pious longing that "so noble a work may by the +providence of God hereafter tend to the glory of His Divine Majesty in the +propagating of the Christian religion to such people as sit in darkness +and miserable ignorance of the true knowledge and worship of God." "This +is the work we first intended," says a writer of the time, "and have +published to the world to be chief in our thoughts; to bring the infidel +people from the worship of Devils to the service of God." "The end of this +voyage is the destruction of the Devil's Kingdom," said the good clergyman +who preached to the adventurers on the eve of their embarkation. + +A more restless, inconsistent age cannot possibly be imagined. In +literature a race of giants appeared whose works were the expression +of the times. The epoch flowered in the great names which have made the +age of Elizabeth so illustrious. Bacon had published his "Advancement of +Learning," Spenser his "Faerie Queene," Shakespeare was at the head of +a great group of literary giants. A fine stage was set for the monarch, +just three years on his throne. He might have been the central jewel of +a splendid setting! He might have been the inspiration of a noble era. +All the material was at his hand. As it was, it is marvellous he did +not plunge the country into ruin. Old England owes much to her House of +Commons: "A troublesome body," said James, "but how can I get rid of it? +_I found it here!_" + +When Bartholomew Gosnold, Richard Hakluyt, Robert Hunt, John Smith, and +others succeeded in obtaining a royal charter from the King, he busied +himself in drawing up the instrument for the government of the colony.[9] +"Everything began and ended with the King." A council of thirteen in +London, appointed by himself, was to govern, controlling a subordinate +council in Virginia. Trial by jury was allowed to criminals. The Christian +religion was to be preached to the Indians. In other respects, the colony +would have no rights other than those which King James the First chose to +allow it. There were to be two colonies, one hundred miles to intervene +between the boundaries of the two. The boundaries of the southern colony +were enlarged and exactly defined in 1609. It was to embrace the territory +two hundred miles north and two hundred miles south of the mouth of James +River, and "to reach up into the land from sea to sea." + +This vast territory was coolly claimed by the King of England, without +the slightest regard to the present sojourners on the soil. Had they +been wandering tribes never remaining long in one place, had the area +of country been a debatable land, the claim might have been reasonable, +but it soon appeared that the kingdom of Powhatan had descended to him +from generation to generation, or been acquired by conquest. The land was +accurately measured and "staked out," and was owned by his captains, who +knew and respected their boundaries. + +All these things combined, we can better understand the disasters and +sufferings which ensued upon the landing of our adventurers. + + + + +CHAPTER IV + + +The most momentous hour in the history of this country was when three +small ships "fell down the Thames from London," freighted with one hundred +and five Englishmen on their way to plant England's first colony. + +"This was the event," said a great American, "which decided our own fate; +which guided our destiny before we were born, and settled the conditions +in which we should pass that portion of our existence which God allows to +men on earth." + +The story of the company which was organized in London for this +expedition, of the charter granted by James the First, of the means +adopted to insure its success, and the mistakes we can now so easily +perceive--all this has been told in many histories. It is a long story; +also one involving side issues not within the scope of this writing. +It is sufficient to say that the emigrants were subjected[10] to the +ordinances of a commercial corporation of which they could not be members; +to the dominion of a domestic council in the appointing of which they had +no voice; to the control of a superior council in England which had no +sympathy with their rights; and finally to the arbitrary legislation of +the sovereign. + +Of the names of the three little ships which fell down the Thames, +we can be quite sure of two, the _Discovery_ and the _Goodspeed_. The +other--the flagship--is quoted sometimes as _Sarah Constant_, again as +_Susan Constant_. They were small ships, one only a "pinnasse"; and were +under the command of another Christopher--Christopher Newport. Christopher +Columbus discovered us, Christopher Newport colonized us. He was an +"experienced navigator"; but his career in Virginia abundantly illustrated +the fact that England's great hero was not the only admiral who could do +some very foolish things on land. However, he brought our colony safely, +and through many sea perils, to Virginia. + +We happen to know something of his men, and everything of his cargo. Of +the latter, we have a careful list. Each man had one suit of "apparrell, +three paire of Irish stockings, four paire of shooes," and canvas to make +a bed. Of arms and tools he had no stint, also iron utensils for cooking +and wooden spoons and platters. The ration for each man was twelve bushels +of cereal (oatmeal or peas), one gallon of aqua vitae, two gallons of +vinegar, one of oil. This for a whole year! Some of the grain was to be +carefully "kept for sowing." For meat the immigrant must rely on his gun, +and the rivers would yield him food. + +The admiral was provided with a goodly cargo of small mirrors, bells, and +glass beads with which to purchase the friendship of "the naturells," and +also substantial articles of food. The Virginia real estate was not to be +purchased. King James had a simpler method of acquiring it. The tiny ships +afforded small space for furniture, bedding, or other household articles. + +The officers of the colony, Governor, Council, etc., were not yet known, +and could therefore claim no privileges. The eccentric King had ordered +their names to be placed in a sealed box, to be opened when they landed. +Some private packages were, however, allowed. The clergyman, Master Robert +Hunt, carried "a goodly number of books." Master Wingfield had also, as he +tells us, "sorted many books in my house to be sent up to mee in a truncke +at my goeing to Virginia with divers fruits, conserves and preserves, +which I did sett at Master Croft's house at Ratcliff. I understand that +my truncke was thear broken up, much lost, my sweetmeates eaten at his +table, some of my bookes seene in his hands, and whether amongst them my +Bible was there ymbeasiled I knowe not." That his divers conserves and +preserves should have been given precedence over his Bible and books was +not without reason. Books and Bibles could be bought or borrowed, but very +little sugar was imported into England at that time, and sweetmeats were a +rare and costly luxury. The Englishman had no marmalade for his breakfast +until the Queen of Scots introduced it. + +There were, as we have said, one hundred and five men who went forth +to subdue the wilderness. These men were to make the reign of James +the First memorable as the commencement of the English colonies in +America--"colonies," says Hume, "established on the noblest footing that +has been known in any age or nation." They were destined for more than +this--more than the historian's fancy could have foreseen in its wildest +flight into the regions of romance. + +Most of the company were "gentlemen," unused to labour, who probably +had never handled an axe or suffered a physical privation. There were +forty-eight "Gentlemen" and twelve "labourers,"--"a halfpenny-worth of +bread to an intolerable deal of sack,"--one surgeon, one blacksmith, +two bricklayers (for a country where there were no bricks), a drummer, +and some boys. They were going to a wilderness in which not a house was +standing and there were only four carpenters! In the next supply jewellers +and perfumers were sent out to help subdue the American wilderness. + +Their recognized guide and leader, during the voyage, was their captain, +Christopher Newport. To his care was committed the sealed box of +instructions which was to remain unopened until the adventurers reached +Virginia. The box, they knew, contained the names of their future rulers, +and they felt great solicitude on this subject. Every prominent man +was scanned and measured, and strong party feeling grew up immediately +among them. It was not possible, they well knew, that any choice of +their own would decide the matter. Of the two "experienced navigators" +whose services had already been acknowledged by the King--Gosnold and +Newport--one only would be eligible. Captain Newport was to take the +ships back to England, but Gosnold might be their Governor. One who was +preeminently conspicuous was Captain John Smith, who had commenced life +as a poor orphan, and was already famous at twenty-seven. It was possible +he might be their ruler despite his years. He was old in experience, in +suffering, and in those elements which lie at the foundation of greatness. +Then there was the son of the great Earl of Northumberland, George +Percy, of the same age as John Smith, but in striking contrast to him in +every respect,--fresh from the cloisters of the Middle Temple; quiet, +thoughtful; of the ancient powerful family of Percy and yet taking his +place modestly with the rest. Wingfield was on board, also Master Crofts, +and Gabriel Archer, Thomas Studley, John Martin, and Anas Todkill, all +to be heard from again in the colony of which they were to become the +historians. These and others were "gentlemen" and possible rulers. A +certain John Laydon appears among the "labourers," destined to win the +first English maiden who set foot on the soil of Jamestown, and to become +the father of the first child born in the established colony of Virginia. + +Without doubt, Smith, Gosnold, Newton, and some others were possessed with +the prevailing spirit of adventure, the incentive of rivalry, and a high +ambition for the glory and honour of England. Not so, alas, George Percy, +to whom England had been a stern mother indeed; not so Robert Hunt, whose +heart burned with the spirit of the Christian missionary, and (if need be) +of the Christian martyr as well; not so the spendthrift "gentlemen" who +sought the "pearle and gold" promised by the poet; nor the boy who frankly +confessed that he had run away "being in displeasure of my friends." The +company seems to have been gathered at haphazard--not at all with regard +to its fitness, but simply by accepting the few who were willing to brave +the dangers of life among the savages. + +Of the Indian they had learned enough to fear him. He had early dropped +his "gentle and loving" mask, and revealed himself in his true colours. +"An Englishman was his natural enemy to be slain wherever seen,"--shot to +death with arrows if distant, and clubbed by wooden swords if nearer at +hand; ambushed and trapped, deceived and betrayed, whenever circumstances +forbade open warfare. And yet there was no military preparation for this +expedition. Its authors affected to be inspired solely by zeal for the +conversion of the Indian to Christianity, and their messengers were men of +peace. Whatever their station, whatever their motives, these were the men +ever to be held by us in grateful remembrance. They made many mistakes, +of which we learn from their own confessions and criticisms of each other; +but the sacrifices and sufferings awaiting them were beyond all precedent. +They "broke the way with tears which many followed with a song." + +The sailing of the ships awakened so little interest in England that +the event is hardly noticed in history. All England was shaken to its +foundations by the discovery of the Gunpowder Plot, and punishment of +the conspirators. That three little vessels were to depart, as many had +departed before, to seek a footing in America, was, by comparison with +the troubles at home, of small consequence. The poet Drayton, however, +composed a lyric in honour of the occasion, which I commend to the +indulgence of my reader. It is not for me to criticise an Elizabethan poet +or deny him space on my pages! + + "You brave heroique minds + Worthie your Countries' name + That honour still pursue, + Go and subdue; + Whilst Loyt'ring hinds + Lurke here at home with shame. + + "Britons, you stay too long! + Quickly aboard bestow you, + And with a merry gale + Swell your stretch'd sail + With vows as strong + As the winds that blow you. + + "And cheerfully at sea + Success you will intice, + To get the pearle and gold, + And ours to hold + Virginia, + Earth's only paradise. + + "And in regions far + Such heroes bring yee forth + As those from whom we came; + And plant our name + Under that starre + Not knowne unto our North." + +And so with prayer and psalm and song--and doubtless tears--our pilgrims +were sped on their way. New Year's day, 1607, found them on the great +ocean in tiny vessels which were to be their homes for five wintry months. + + [Illustration: Old London--1607.] + + + + +CHAPTER V + + +The voyage of the Virginia colonists began, as it ended, in a storm. One +of their number, Thomas Studley, tells the story in quaint language:[11] +"By unprosperous winds we were kept six weekes in the sight of England; +all of which time, Maister Hunt our Preacher was so weak and sicke that +few expected his recoverie. Yet although he were but 10 or 12 miles from +his habitation (the time we were in the Downes), and notwithstanding the +stormie weather, nor the scandalous imputations (of some few little better +than Atheists, of the greatest ranke amongst us) suggested against him; +all this could never force from him so much as a seeming desire to leave +the businesse so many discontents did then arise; had he not, with the +water of patience, and his godly exhortations (but chiefly by his true +devoted examples) quenched those flames of envie and dissension." + +By "the Atheist of greatest ranke" was meant, doubtless, George Percy, the +Roman Catholic; but in the light of his subsequent career it is impossible +to believe him guilty of "scandalous imputations" or "disastrous designs." +We can imagine young Percy wrapped in his cloak and pacing the deck of +the ship, his face perhaps turned northward where lay his forefathers' +estates, crowned by Alnwick Castle, the princely home for many generations +of the Percys, Earls of Northumberland, "for virtue and honour second to +not any in the country." From Alnwick Castle had gone forth more than one +Harry Hotspur to risk all and lose all in the Border wars, and later in +the intestine wars of England. An Earl of Northumberland had taken arms +in defence of the unhappy Queen of Scots and paid for his devotion on +the scaffold. His brother Henry, Earl of Northumberland, father of George +Percy, had been committed to the Tower, accused of conspiring to liberate +Queen Mary, and had destroyed himself "to balk Elizabeth of the forfeiture +of his lands." Decision between conflicting parties had often been forced +upon these noble earls, and been met openly, bravely, and loyally, whether +or no the cause had prospered. + +Upon the accession of James to the throne, the fortunes of the family +had seemed to revive. To George Percy's brother had been assigned the +honour of announcing to him the death of Elizabeth. The present Earl of +Northumberland (the eldest brother of George Percy) had rapidly risen in +favour. Then the discovery of the fatal Gunpowder Plot--the treason of +fanatic Catholics--had revealed a Percy among its most active ringleaders. +Although a distant relative of the Earl, he was still a Percy; and all who +bore the name suffered from unjust suspicion. The Earl of Northumberland +was now a prisoner in the Tower, accused of no crime except a desire to +be a leader of the detested Roman Catholics. George Percy could hope for +no honour, no career, no home in England. Nor could he expect to find +career, home, honour in the wilderness, but there he could at least hide +his breaking heart! + +That he was a brave, honourable gentleman we know from the testimony of +those who laboured with him for the good of the colony. Without doubt he +held himself aloof from his fellows on the voyage. He was on the deck on +the night of the 12th of February, and perhaps turning his longing eyes +toward his northern home, when he saw a blazing star,--which flashed +out of the sky for a moment and was as suddenly hidden in darkness,--fit +emblem of the fallen fortunes of his house. He simply records the fact +in his calm "Discourse of the Plantation," adding "and presently came a +storm." + +The baleful "flames of envy and dissension" were not altogether quenched +by good Master Hunt's "waters of patience." They broke out again and again +during the long voyage of five months. John Smith appears to have angered +his fellow-travellers in some way, and he was held in confinement during +part of the voyage. It is even stated that when they arrived at the island +of Mevis a gallows was erected for him, but "he could not be prevailed +upon to use it." He was, by far, the ablest man among the first colonists. +In the twenty-nine years of his life he had adventures enough for all the +historical novels of a century. Perhaps he boasted of them too much, and +thus excited "envy and dissension." Have they not filled nearly a thousand +pages of a late story of his life? He could tell of selling his books and +satchel when he was a boy to get money to run away from home; of startling +events all along until he fought the Turks in Transylvania; of cutting +off the heads, in combat, of three of them "to delight the Ladies who did +long to see some court-like pastime"; of inventing wonderful fire-signals +which were triumphantly successful in war; of beating out the brains of a +Bashaw's head; of imprisonment and peril, in which lovely ladies succoured +him. What wonder that all this, and more, told in a masterful way, should +have aroused suspicion that he intended to seize the government of the +colony, aided and abetted by conspirators already at hand in all three of +the ships! + +Evidently the voyage was not a dull one. It was diversified also by +frequent storms--no light matter in the little rolling vessels. The path +of the ships was not the one we now travel in six days. The mariner in the +sixteenth century and the early days of the next knew but one path across +the ocean--that sailed by Columbus. They turned their prows southward, +"watered" at the Bahamas, and then sought the Gulf Stream to help them +northward again. + +Captain Newport's destination was Roanoke Island; part of his duty was to +search for Raleigh's lost colony. Three days "out of his reckoning," his +passengers, like Columbus's crew, grew discontented and discouraged, and +wished to return homeward. At last they sighted the shores of Virginia, +and a tempest blew them within the capes of Chesapeake Bay. Upon one +of these they erected a cross, naming the cape "Henry" in honour of the +Prince of Wales. The opposite point was named after the King's second son, +the Duke of York, afterward Charles the First. Attempting to land here, +they were met with a flight of arrows--a stern Virginia welcome--and two +of their number were wounded. The new nation was born in a storm, its +baptism was of blood, and the Furies relentlessly hovered over its cradle. + +When the sealed box was opened, the appointed council was found to be +Bartholomew Gosnold, Edward Maria Wingfield, Christopher Newport, John +Ratcliffe, John Martin, George Kendall, and their prisoner John Smith. +These were to elect their own President for one year. Later they elected +Wingfield.[12] He and the Council were invested with the government; +affairs of moment were to be examined by a jury, but determined by the +Council. The first presidential election in the United States of America +was held April 26, 1607. + +Seventeen days were spent in quest of a place of settlement, sailing up +and down the river, on the banks of which the Indians were clustered like +swarming bees. Sundry adventures of small moment introduced them rather +favourably to the Indians, who seemed, Percy thought, "as goodly men" as +any he had "ever seen of savages, their prince bearing himself in a proud, +modest fashion with great majesty." What they thought of the English had +already been expressed in an unequivocal manner. They, however, offered +no further violence. + + [Illustration: Memorial erected by Clergy of the Episcopal Church at + Jamestown Island. + + Copyright, 1906, by Jamestown Official Photo. Corp'n. ] + +According to instructions in their locked box, the colonists were +admonished not to settle too near the bay because of the Spaniards, nor +away from the highway--the river--because of the Indians. At last they +found a peninsula which impressed them favourably. It was on the north +side of the river Powhatan, as James River was called by the savages, and +fifty-eight above the Virginia capes.[13] The peninsula, now an island, +was small, only two and three-fourths miles long and one-fourth of a mile +wide. It was connected with the mainland by a little isthmus, apparent +only at low tide; and this was the spot selected for the settlement which +was named, in honour of the King, Jamestown. + +They could hardly have made a worse selection. The situation was extremely +unhealthful, being low and exposed to the malaria of extensive marshes +covered with water at high tide. The settlers landed, probably in the +evening because of the tide, on the 13th of May, 1607.[14] This was the +first permanent settlement effected by the English in North America, +after a lapse of one hundred and ten years from the discovery of the +continent by the Cabots, and twenty-two years after the attempt to +colonize it under the auspices of Sir Walter Raleigh. Upon landing, the +Council took the oath of office; Edward Maria Wingfield, as we have seen, +was elected President, and Thomas Studley, Cape-Merchant or Treasurer. +Smith was excluded from the Council upon some false pretences. Dean Swift +says, "When a great genius appears in the world, the dunces are all in +confederacy against him." + +One reason for the selection of the low peninsula was the fact that the +water was deep enough near the banks of the river for the ships to be +moored close to the land and tethered to the trees, thus facilitating the +transportation of the cargo. These trees presented a novel appearance to +the Englishmen. The Indians had stripped them of their lower branches as +high as a man could reach, for they had no axes to aid them in collecting +fuel. All the tangled undergrowth had been cleared away and burned. +A horseman could safely ride through them. The grove was like a great +cathedral with many columns, its floor tiled with moss and sprinkled with +flowers. We may be sure that good Master Hunt gathered his flock around +him without delay, and standing in their midst under the trees uttered, +for the first time in the western world, the solemn invocation: + + "The Lord is in His Holy Temple; + Let all the earth keep silence before Him." + +The new land had been claimed for an earthly potentate; he now claimed +it for the King of kings. Immediately "all hands fell to work." Every +article, every utensil, was removed from the ships, which were to be +no longer the homes of the colonists. The stores were brought on land +and covered with old sails; a hasty barricade was thrown up for defence +against the savages; tents were set up; but we are told that the soft +May air was so delicious, the men elected to lie upon the warm earth; and +there, having set their watch to "ward all the night," with nothing but +the whispering leaves between them and the stars, they slept the sweet +sleep of weariness of body and contentment of soul. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + + +When the colonists looked around them on the first day in their new home, +they beheld a scene which will never again in the history of this world +be spread before the eyes of man. + +Before them lay a vast land just as God made it. No furrow had followed +the plough or wheel of civilization. The earth had been pressed by nothing +sterner than the light hoof of the reindeer or the moccasined foot of the +Indian. No seed had ever drifted hither on the winds, or been brought by +a bird wanderer from a distant country. The land was bounded by vast, +untravelled seas. The earth had been stirred in cultivation only by +the hands of women and children, unaided by any implement of steel or +iron. In the forests and fields the great mystery of birth and death and +birth again had silently gone on unmarked for countless ages. There was +literally no known past, no record of a yesterday which might explain the +problems of to-day. + +Of course the English colonist would be keenly curious as to the fauna +and flora of the new land. There were "such faire meadowes and goodly +tall trees," says Percy,[15] "with such Fresh-waters running through the +woods, as I was almost ravished at the first sight thereof. My selfe and +three or foure more walking into the Woods, by chance we espied a path-way +like to an Irish pace. We were desirous to knowe whither it would bring +us. Wee traced along some foure miles, all the way as wee went having the +pleasantest Suckles, the ground all bespred and flowing over with faire +flowers of sundry colours and kindes as though it had been any Garden or +Orchard in England." + +Mute witnesses to the truth of Percy's picture will be found at the +opening of our coming celebration, if our guests can find a convenient +forest. In it will be seen just the flowers that so ravished his soul: +the white honeysuckles, the scarlet trumpet creeper, the clematis, white +and purple tipped, the sweetbrier, violets, swamp roses, red swamp lilies. + +"There be many Strawberries," continues Percy, "and other fruites +unknowne. Wee saw the Woods full of Cedar and Cypresse Trees with other +trees (out of) which issues our sweet Gummes like to Balsam, and so wee +kept on our way in this Paradise." There were not many "fruits unknown." +One of these, highly esteemed, was "maracocks"--the seed-pod of the +passionflower,[16] which was not dismissed from the list of Virginia +fruits until the middle of the last century. Until then it was cultivated +in gardens for its fruit as well as its flowers. There was also another +new fruit, still prized by the Virginia schoolboy, and still found by him +to "draw a man's mouth awrie with much torment" if incautiously meddled +with when green or yellow. Only when red is it ripe and "as delicious as +an Apricocke." Need we say this is the Virginia persimmon--a corruption +of the "putchamin" of the Indian? There were no peaches or apples, only +two kinds of plums, grapes, and berries,--strawberries, mulberries, +and whortleberries or "hurts." All other fruits were introduced by the +English. There were no sheep, oxen, goats, or horses, no chickens or other +domestic poultry. There were wild turkeys, none domesticated. The deer +was king, but never used as a beast of burden. Bears, rabbits or hares, +squirrels, the otter and the beaver; birds without number (their king the +eagle)--these were indigenous to the new land, planted there when God made +it, their flesh the food of man, their skins his garment. + +And there, too, was man as God made him. To this day nothing is known +of the origin of the North American Indian--whence he came, or what his +early history. There he was--having evolved little for himself. His one +discovery had been fire. He had used what he found, but manufactured +little except bows and arrows, rude mats and baskets woven of grass, +earthen pipes and pots, and uncouth garments fashioned without scissors +or knives, and sewed with the sinews of the deer. He had no textile +fabric of any kind. When necessary to defend himself against the cold, he +had killed a deer or raccoon and slipped his shivering limbs within the +skin, or fashioned a mantle of the warm feathers of the turkey. In these +he exhibited no perception of grace or beauty. Nature offered him her +loveliest expression of both, but when he essayed ornament on his skin or +scant garment, he elected only the terrible. Even the young girls bound +horns to their heads instead of flowers. Writers of the period often speak +of coral--but there was no coral in the Virginia waters. Pearls they had, +and the teeth of animals to string for beads and fringes. + +The Indian had made no utensil of iron or the copper he so much prized. +When he needed a canoe or bowl, he burnt the wood, then scraped it with +oyster shells, and burned again, until the wood was hollowed out. How +he ever felled a tree is a mystery! Weeks of scraping and burning were +spent on each canoe. He had no written language, no signs recording past +events. He had done nothing for himself except to minister to the needs +of the hour. There was no hieroglyphic, no testimony of the rocks. Even +the humble art of pottery, the earliest trace of the human race, was not +found among the American Indians to any extent. A few broken earthen pipes +and bowls, arrow-heads of flint, remnants of shell necklaces, these are +all that the ploughshare of the labourer or the pick and shovel of the +antiquarian have ever revealed. + +Of the temper and disposition of the "Naturells," as King James called +them, we shall have abundant occasion to learn; but as Powhatan and his +people play a leading role in the following story it is indispensable +that my reader be made acquainted with the religion, customs, and habits +of this tribe of Indians. We have given space to a brief sketch of the +English monarch. The American monarch surely claims some attention before +we enter upon the story of the struggle between the two: between the +Stuarts of England and the Algonquins of America! + +Historians of the Indians have asserted that the tribes under King Philip +and those subject to Powhatan were of a higher class than many other of +the North American Indians, more restrained by social and tribal laws, +more cleanly in their habits, more intelligent in every way. They are an +intensely interesting and mysterious people, and romantic writers love to +invest them with virtues which the Powhatans, at least, did not possess. +John Smith and Strachey argue that "they are inconstant in everie thing +but what peace constraineth them to keepe. Craftie, timerous, quicke of +apprehension, and very ingenious: some bold, most cautious, all _Savage_: +soone moved to anger, and so malitious they seldom forget an injury." +Schoolcraft, the modern Indian historian, said to me "they had not a +single virtue or single trait of true nobility." They never met a foe +in an open field,--cunning was their best weapon,--but some virtues they +surely had, nevertheless. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + +Hidden in a dense forest on the banks of the Pamunkey, was Uttamussac, +the greatest temple in Powhatan's kingdom. In every territory governed by +a "werowance" there were smaller temples and priests. Each of the petty +rulers under the great emperor had his spiritual adviser--some priest +or conjurer, wise in the sacred mysteries and beloved of the gods, from +whose decisions in spiritual matters there was no appeal. According to the +wealth of the werowance were the size and dignity of the temple, varying +from a small arbour of twenty feet to a structure a hundred feet long. +The door opened to the east, and there were pillars and windings within, +with rude black images looking down the church to the platform of reeds; +upon which, wrapped in skins, lay the skeletons of dead priests and kings. +Beneath the platform, veiled with a mat of woven grasses, sat "Okeus," +an ill-favoured black demon, well hung with chains of pearl and copper. +He it was to whom children must be sacrificed, lest he blight the corn, +or cause briers to wound the feet and limbs of travellers through the +forests, or enemies to prevail, or women to be barren or false, or thunder +and lightning to destroy. He it was who had been seen leaping through +the corn-fields, crying "Ohe! Ohe!" just before some signal disaster. +There was also a far-away, peaceable God, variously known as "Ahone" or +"Kiwassa"--"The One All Alone." He too had once walked among them. Are +there not gigantic footprints five feet apart on the rocks yet visible +near Richmond at Powhatan? These are the footprints of the good god as +he once strode through the land of the great chief. To him it was, of +course, unnecessary to sacrifice, inasmuch as he was by nature benevolent. +But he was not as powerful as Okeus--Okeus, who sternly held the scales +of justice, and was to be placated by nothing short of their dearest and +best, their precious, innocent little children. + +The pious men who emigrated to Virginia within the first twenty years +of its settlement firmly believed that Satan had here established his +kingdom; that the priests were his ministers, inspired by him to threaten +the people unless they held to the ancient customs of their fathers. It +was remembered that in all ages of the world this arch-enemy of mankind +had demanded human sacrifice from his followers,--from the times of +the ancient Carthaginians, Persians, and Britons. Now, in Florida, he +claimed the first-born male child, and in Mexico prisoners taken in war. +The priests of Powhatan failed not to instruct the werowances that if +the prescribed number of children were withheld, Okeus, who was sure to +prevail in the end, would then be appeased only by a hecatomb of children. +Nor would any sacrifice avert his wrath if a nation despising the ancient +religion of their forefathers was permitted to inhabit among them, since +their own god had hitherto preserved them and from age to age given them +victory over their enemies. + +The conversion, therefore, of the Indian was next to impossible, unless +indeed the first step could be the destruction of priest and temple. +Chanco and Pocahontas, and possibly Kemps, were for many years the only +fruits of the labours of the missionaries. Taunted by the powers at home +with this fact, the colonists retorted that they had sent many Indians to +England, not one of whom returned converted to Christianity. The Indian +chief Pepisco was long an object of hope at Jamestown, because of his +apparently candid willingness to believe in the God of the Christian; but +the utmost he could attain was a belief that the Indian gods were suitable +for the Indian, but that the greater nation needed the greater God, for +whose good offices he was willing to entreat through the white man. + +Had the fate of the Indian been to live in peace and friendship with his +white brother to this day, it is not probable he would have ever been +at heart a Christian. Druidism long survived, though in obscurity and +decay, the thunder of the imperial edicts. It did more than survive in +Ireland--it flourished until the fifth century, when it fell before the +Christian enthusiasm of St. Patrick. Long after the Druidical priesthood +was extinct, Druidical superstitions, Druidical rites, were dear to the +common people. Nor will they become utterly extinct until we cease to +gather the mistletoe and forget the sports and pastimes at Hallowe'en. + +So grim and mysterious was the principal temple at Uttamussac on the +Pamunkey, that the trembling Indian in his canoe hurried past it with +bated breath, solemnly casting into the waters pieces of the precious +copper, puccoon, and strings of pearls. In this temple, and in two others +beside it, were images of devils, and upon raised platforms the swathed +skeletons of their greatest kings. The place was so holy that none but +priests entered it. There they questioned Okeus and received verbal +answers. + + [Illustration: "The trembling Indian in his canoe hurried past it with + bated breath."] + +The chief priest and his assistants wore a sacred official robe ornamented +with serpent skins. Their faces were painted in the most frightful devices +they could imagine. Their heads were wreathed, Medusa-like, with stuffed +serpents, and in their hands they carried rattlesnakes' tails, as symbols +of their profession. Their devotion was in antiphonal chants or songs, +led by the chief priest, and often interrupted by his starts, passionate +gestures, and ejaculations. At his every pause the attending priests +groaned a sort of fearsome "amen." We may fancy the Indian on dark nights +hurrying past with muffled paddle as the weird songs and groans were borne +by the midnight breeze to his trembling ears! + +They held the belief, common with all mankind, of the immortality of the +soul, of the home--ah! in all faiths, so far away--of the escaped spirit. +But this immortality was the reward only of the faithful. All others +passed into utter nothingness. + +Many fables were taught by the priests to the ignorant. Captain Argall was +once trading with Japazaws, a Potomac chief who had been always friendly, +and the latter came aboard the pinnace one cold night, and seated himself +by the fire while one of the men read the Bible aloud to the Captain. "The +Indian gave a very attent eare, and looked with a very wisht eye upon +him as if he longed to understand what was read, whereupon the Captayne +tooke the booke, and turned to the picture of the Creation of the World in +the begyninge of the booke, and caused a boy, one Spelman who had lvyed +a whole yere with this Indian Kinge and spake his language, to shewe it +unto him and interpret it in his language which the boy did." The king, in +return, offered to relate his own articles of belief on the same subject, +and a string of marvellous exploits followed in which a wonderful hare, +an Indian "Brer Rabbit," bore the chief part. Captain Argall instructed +his interpreter to ask of what materials the original man and woman were +made, but Henry Spelman was unwilling to venture so much. Negotiations +were pending for his release after a long residence with the Indians, and +he dared take no liberties. + +The persistent enmity of Powhatan to the English was planted long before +their arrival in 1608. Strachey and Purchas, men of high character +and great learning, consider it absolutely certain that he ordered the +massacre of both of the Roanoke colonies. He was said, in 1610, to be more +than eighty years old. He had been a daring, ambitious ruler in his youth, +perpetually on the war-path, enlarging his dominions by conquest,--like +Alexander, only quiet when there were no more worlds to conquer. He +"awaits his opportunity (inflamed by his bloudy priests)," says Strachey, +"to offer us a tast of the same cuppe which he made our poore countrymen +drink of at Roanoke. He has established a line of sentinels, extending +from Jamestown to any house where he holds his court, and news of any +movement by the English ships quickly passes from one to another and +reaches him wherever he happeneth to be. He is persuaded that the English +are come to dethrone him and take away his land." + +Prophecies had been made by the priests that a nation would come from +the East which would destroy him and his empire, that twice he should +thwart and overthrow the strangers, but the third time he would fall under +their subjection. This then was the fateful third! "Strange whispers and +secrett, ran among the people. Every newes or blast of rumour struck them, +to which they would open wyde their eares, and keepe their eyes waking +with good espiall of everything that sturred; the noyse of drums, the +shrill trumpets and great ordinances would startle them how far soever +from the reach of daunger. Suspicions bredd straunge feares amongst them, +and those feares created straunge construccions, and those construccions +begatt strong watch and gard especially about their great Kinge, who +thrust forth trusty skowtes and carefull sentinells (as before mencyoned) +which reached even from his owne court down to our palisado gates, which +answeared one another duly." + +The Indian, as we have noted, knew not how to express himself by any +kind of letters, by writing, or marks on trees, or pictures, as do other +barbarians. They had no positive laws, their king ruling only by custom. +His will was law. He was obeyed as a king and as a god. Traditional +laws and rules were well understood by his successors, for the descent +was not from father to son, but all the sons of one kingly father ruled +successively, then all the daughters, so the children of one father were +long the sole custodians and interpreters of the laws. The succession +was through the heirs of the sisters, not through the men of the family. +The ruling of the great Powhatan was most tyrannous, the punishment for +trifling faults cruel to an extreme. He personally superintended the +beating, the burning alive, the dismembering of those who displeased him. + +The habitations of the Indians were all alike. They had but one style +of architecture. They usually built upon an elevation commanding a view +of their only thoroughfare, the river, and not far from springs of fresh +water. They built under the trees, for defence against winds and storms +and the scorching heat of the summer sun. They planted young saplings in +the earth and tied their tops together, covering all closely with the bark +of trees. + +Until the middle of the nineteenth century, beautiful arbours of fragrant +cedar were constructed after the Indian fashion as ornamental features +in Virginia landscape gardening--omitting the bark, and shaving close the +green foliage. + +The walls of the Indian houses were lined with mats. A doorway was hung +with a skin or mat. There were no windows or chimneys. A hole in the +roof provided for the escape of the smoke from the fire kept burning +immediately beneath it. An old writer remarks that they were "somewhat +smoaky"! There was no furniture of any kind in these rude huts. All +around, in the best houses, ran a low arrangement of poles, forming +the sides of the sleeping-bunks, and within, on skins and mats, lay the +household of twenty or more, men, women, and children. One was detailed +to watch and replenish the fire while the rest slept. If more light was +needed, it was provided from a pile of resinous sticks--their only candle +or lamp. In these huts they lived all winter, cooking and working on their +household utensils and various articles of dress. They had no needles +or pins, no knives except sharpened reeds, yet they managed with strips +of deerskin to sew skins together for leggings and moccasins, embroider +them with pearl or shells, hollow the wooden blocks into bowls, and +weave mats from grass. Powhatan's favourite wife, Winganuskie, and the +Princess Pocahontas had no better home than this in winter. Pocahontas +knew no other except during the few years of her married life, and of her +captivity before it. + +The men spent their time in hunting and fishing and in warfare and manly +sports. In time of peace, they exercised in out-of-door games. They +played "bandy" with crooked sticks, "an auncient game," says Strachey, +who indulged abundantly in the _parole_ of literary men, "as yt seemeth +in Virgil, for when AEneas came into Italy at his marriage with Lavinia, yt +is said the Trojans taught the Latins scipping and frisking with a ball." +The Indians also played a game described as "a forcible encounter with the +foot to carry a ball the one from the other, and spurne yt to the goale +with a kind of dexterity and swift footmanship which is the honour of yt; +yet they never strike up on another's heeles as we doe, not accompting +that praiseworthie to purchase a goale by such an advantage." + +All the domestic labour was performed by the poor drudging women and the +children. They also cleared the ground for their gardens and cornfields, +planted corn, beans, pumpkins, "maracocks," and gourds, and kept the +growing plants free from weeds. They pounded the corn in wooden mortars +for bread, sifting it through baskets, and boiling the coarse refuse for +hominy. They dressed all the food and served it. They were also barbers +for their husbands, using two oyster-shells to grate away beard and hair. + +Henry Spelman, an English boy who was sold to an Indian chief, lived as +a servant for many years among the savages. He relates an incident of +domestic life in the household of the king of Paspetanzy, who "went to +visitt another king, and one of his wives after his departure would goe +visitt her father, and she willed me to goe with hir and take hir child +and carye him thither in my armes, being a long days journey from the +place where we dwelt, which I refusing she strook me 3 or 4 blows." This +it appears was too much for the free-born Briton. "I gott to hir and puld +hir downe, giving hir some blows agayne which the other King's wives +perseyvinge they fell on me and beat me so as I thought they had lamed +me." It appears the lady's filial intentions were not carried out, the +heavy child being quite too much for her strength. All awaited the return +of the king, and the indignant Henry boldly told his side of the story. +There had been quarrels and fights before in the king's household, and he +knew how to deal with them. The remedy was at hand. Taking up a "paring +iron" he struck his wife and felled her to the ground, whereupon Henry, by +no means sure upon whom the instrument of domestic discipline would fall +next, fled to a neighbour's house and hid. His position was a perilous +one, his fate uncertain. The Indian baby settled the question. Henry had +been an affectionate nurse and perhaps bedfellow to the little pappoose, +who now lifted up his voice in loud lamentations, howling for his white +friend until midnight. The king was weary and longed for sleep. Search was +made for Henry, and at midnight the child was sent to him, as he says "to +still; for none could quiet him so well as myself." + +The king, having had a good night's rest, was up early next morning to +interview Henry, and to assure him that no evil intent was cherished +against him, that his "Queene" was all right, that everybody loved him, +and none should hurt him; his Majesty content, as we all can understand, +to eat a good bit of humble-pie rather than lose a good nurse! "I was loth +to goe with him," says Henry, "and at my cumminge the Queene looked but +discontentedly at me, but I had the Kinge's promise and cared ye less for +others frownes." There is something very pathetic in the boy's narrative. +He was the son of an eminent scholar, Sir Henry Spelman, but, impatient +of restraint, had run away from a comfortable English home, and here +he was in the great wilderness, soothing the hunger of his heart in the +companionship of a savage baby. + +The Indian knew no means of providing for the future, except the +husbanding, in great baskets, of his corn, drying persimmons on hurdles +and oysters on strings. He never herded wild cattle or tamed the wild +turkeys. Each season Nature brought of her abundance to these her +untutored children, fish, game, fruits, melons, and in the hardest times +acorns and roots. When famine seemed imminent, they would migrate in +great companies to hunt the deer, the women going before, bearing on their +backs mats, household utensils, skins for bedding, and even poles for the +temporary huts. They would stake out the camp and make all ready for the +men. Then in leisure hours the young maidens, round, pretty creatures with +small hands and feet, would freshly paint themselves a brilliant red, and +seated at the door of the sylvan arbour watch the young braves,--heavy, +thick-lipped, thick-nosed fellows, but active and straight-limbed; +magnificent and terrible in skins decorated with the dried hands of their +enemies, claws of beasts and birds; and with green and yellow snakes +thrust alive through their ears,--while they practised shooting arrows +at a mark. The straightest, surest marksman would find no trouble in +winning the prettiest maiden. Pretty maidens, all the world over, have +realized that they needed game, furs, pearls, and copper. The arrow won +them in 1607 as surely as a _coup_ in Wall Street or in trade wins them +in 1907. The comment of our historian seems to us as reasonable as it is +quaint: "Every man in tyme of hunting will strive to doe his best, for +thereby they wyn the loves of their women, who will be sooner contented +to live with such a man by the readyness and fortune of whose bow they +perceave they are likely to be fedd well, especially of fish and flesh; +for indeed they be all of them huge eaters, and these active hunters by +their continuall ranging and travell do know all places most frequented +and best stored with deare or other beasts, fish, fowle, roots, fruits, +and berries." + +The Indians, like all barbarous people, danced to some kind of metrical +sound, either from a cane on which they piped as on a "recorder," or +drums stretched over hollow bowls or gourds, or rattles contrived from +shells. These accompanied the voice in "frightful howlings." They had +also "amorous ditties," and scornful songs inspired by their hatred of +the English. The historian Strachey gives a copy, in the Indian language, +of one of these, of four stanzas,--not rhyming but metrical, in which +they not only exult over the men they had killed in spite of our guns, +but they tell how Newport had never deceived them for all his presents +of copper and the crown for Powhatan; and how they had continued to kill +and take prisoners, "Symon" and others, for all their bright swords and +tomahawks, ending each verse with the chorus or cry, "Whe, whe! yah, ha, +ha! Tewittawa Tewittawa!" expressive of scornful, mocking exultation. + +The Indian women, unless frantically insane from revenge, were tender and +gentle, especially to children. George Percy witnessed one of the horrible +sacrifices, when the women themselves with tears and lamentations gave +their babes up to the priests. The dead children were cast in a heap in a +valley, and the poor women returned, singing a funeral dirge and weeping +most bitterly. They were faithful, poor souls, to the instincts of nature. +Surely life held small compensation for them. A nurse was once captured, +and ordered to reveal the hiding-place of her foster-child, now her +mistress, or suffer death. She chose the latter, and her mistress escaped. +Vindictive and merciless as was Powhatan, he had his tender emotions and +even caressing words for his daughters. + +But for the massacre of 1622 much might have been said in praise of the +Indian. That event proved that no kindness, no confidence, could eradicate +his deep-rooted hatred of the white man. For years he kept the secret of +the promised universal butchery, and rose as one man at the appointed +hour. He gloated over the mangled corpses, insulting, spurning, and +mutilating them, sparing none, not even the devoted missionary, Thorpe, +who was giving to their welfare, comfort, and instruction all his life +and energy. That massacre settled the fate of the Virginia Indian, and +yet to a Virginia Indian the colony at Jamestown was indebted for its +preservation. Chanco, whose master "treated him as a son," was visited on +the eve of the massacre by his own brother, with whom he slept that night. +The dreadful secret of the impending slaughter of every white man, woman, +and child was confided to Chanco, with the command of the chief as to his +own part therein. He was to rise at daybreak and not later than eight in +the morning murder his master and all his household! The brother then went +on his way with similar orders to the Indians residing near the settlers. +Chanco immediately awoke his master, and warning was given in time to save +Jamestown. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + + +As Newport had settled his men on land owned by the Paspaheghs, that +tribe was the first to hold intercourse with the colonists. Before the +landing, when Captain Newport was exploring the river, the chief, or +"werowance," of the Paspaheghs had come down to the bank playing on a +flute made of reed to welcome him. His body was painted all over with +crimson puccoon,[17] his sole garment a chain of beads around his neck, +and bracelets of pearl on his arms. His face was painted blue, besprinkled +with shining powder, which Newport's men mistook for silver. A bird's +claw was in each ear and feathers in his hair. We can imagine him piping a +welcome to the wonderful white man whom he had not yet been commanded by +the great Emperor Powhatan to hate. He could utter but two intelligible +words, one, "wingapoh," with gestures which interpreted the word to mean +"friends"; and his own name, "Wochinchopunck"; but he made the Englishmen +understand that he desired to entertain them at his own "palace," and +conducted them thither with great ceremony, through "fine paths[18] having +most pleasant springs which issued from the mountains, and through the +goodliest cornfields ever seen in any country. Arrived at the palace" +(which is not described), "he received them in a modest, proud fashion, as +though he had been a prince of civil government, holding his countenance +without laughter or any such ill-behaviour. He caused his mat to be spread +on the ground where he sate down with a great majesty." How little could +he foresee a not distant day when he would fiercely resent the intrusion +upon his own land--land to which he now welcomed the strangers with +every gesture and expression of friendship, and yet another day when the +avenging sword of the Englishmen would reach his own heart! + +A week later the colonists were busy clearing their ground, strengthening +their half-moon barricade of brushwood, laying off ground for corn and +vegetables, making seines for catching fish, felling trees and shaping +them (with only axes and hand-saws) into clapboards for freighting the +returning vessels, when they were visited by two great savages "bravely +drest" in the lightest possible summer attire--for the weather in May is +extremely warm in lower Virginia--wearing nothing whatever except crowns +of coloured deerskin. I often marvel at the long discourses which our +historians record as having occurred in the first days of their residence, +remembering that there were no interpreters, that the Indian language is +unlike any other, ancient or modern, upon the globe, and that the sign +language of a savage must have been unimaginable to an educated Briton. +However, these two "bravely drest savages" conveyed the information that +they were "messengers from the Paspaheghs, and that their Werowance +was coming" and would "be merry" with them "with a fat Deare"! As the +Englishmen had quietly settled themselves without leave or license upon +land owned by this prince, the suggestion of a surprise party bringing +its own refreshments must have been reassuring. + +A few days later the werowance, Wochinchopunck, arrived, with one hundred +armed men at his back, guarding him in a very warlike manner with bows +and arrows; "thinking," says George Percy, "at that time to execute their +villany." The chief made great signs to the Englishmen to lay aside their +arms, but finding that he was regarded with some suspicion, he desisted +and made pacific gestures of good will, indicating that they were quite +welcome to the land they had taken. But unfortunately, while this was +going on one of his men contrived to steal a hatchet from one of the +Englishmen, who detected him in the act and struck him over the arm. +A fight was imminent, and the colonists took to their arms, which the +werowance perceiving, he went away with all his company in great anger, +leaving, we trust, the fat deer done to a turn on a spit before the +camp-fire. + +But curiosity prevailed over distrust, and in a few days the same +werowance "sent fortie of his men with a Deere, but they came," says +Percy, "more in villany than any love they bare us. They faine would have +layne in our Fort all night but wee would not suffer them for feare of +their treachery."[19] + +The Indian is proud and vain, and when the Paspaheghs saw our wonderful +firearms, they were filled with envy. Unerring aim with bow and arrow is +the Indian's great accomplishment, learned by practice from infancy. When +the Indian woman prepared breakfast for her children, she sent her boys to +practise at a mark, and the smallest boy knew he could have none unless he +had shot well. One of the Paspaheghs observed that a pistol bullet failed +to penetrate a thick target, and proudly "took from his back an arrowe +an elle long, drew it strongly to his Bowe and shot the Target a foote +through and better." An Englishman then set up a steel target; the Indian +shot again and shivered his flint arrow-head into pieces. He pulled out +another, bit it savagely with his teeth, seemed to fall into great anger, +and went away in a rage, a pathetic instance of the wounded pride of the +poor savage. + +On[20] the 4th of June, Newport, Smith, and twenty others were despatched +to discover the head of the river on which they had planted themselves. +The natives everywhere were delighted to exchange their bread, fish, +and strawberries for the wonderful things Newport gave them, needles and +pins, bells, small mirrors, and beads, and they followed him all the way +from place to place. At last they reached a town of twelve wigwams called +Powhatan. It was situated on a bold range of hills overlooking the river, +with three islets in front. This spot, on which a colonial mansion was +afterward erected, is still known as Powhatan. + +The voyagers were in every way delighted with the river. Percy says, +"This River[21] which wee have discovered is one of the famousest Rivers +that ever was found by any Christian." "They were so ravisht with the +admirable sweetnesse of the streame and with the pleasant land trending +along on either side that their joy exceeded, and with great admiration +they praised God." + +On a high hill was the habitation of the great "King Pawatah"[22] (a son +of Powhatan). There, on Whitsunday, they feasted the king, giving him +beer, aqua vitae, and sack, and making him so ill he feared he had been +poisoned. They also "saw a Savage Boy about the age of ten yeeres which +had a head of haire of a perfect yellow and a reasonable white skinne." +Was this a descendant of Ellinor Dare, or some other of the lost colony? +Alas, nobody inquired. + +Leaving "Pawatah" very drunk, Newport visited one of the islets at the +mouth of the falls in the river, where Richmond now stands, and there +erected a cross with this inscription, JACOBUS REX, 1607, and his own +name beneath. They then prayed for their King, for their own prosperous +success in his service, and proclaimed his majesty King of the country +"with a greate showte." Of course the Indians wished to know the meaning +of all this, but they were satisfied with the explanation that the upright +staff connected and bound in friendship the two arms: one the English, the +other the Indian nation. That night Newport returned to the sick king, +and found him still suffering and attributing his "greefe" to the "hot +drinks," but he was all right next morning. + +The personal accounts of this pleasant excursion are all interesting. The +adventurers turned their faces homeward full of hope, and much refreshed +and reassured by the apparent kindness of the natives. But just here they +learned their first lesson of savage perfidy. There is very little doubt +that the King Powhatan had commanded an assault upon Jamestown, while its +force was weakened by Newport's absence. Two hundred Indians had attacked +it fiercely, killed one boy, and wounded seventeen men, including the +greater part of the Council. During the assault a cross-bar shot from one +of Newport's little vessels had struck down a bough of a tree among the +assailants and caused them to retire, but for which all the settlers would +probably have been massacred, as they were, at the time of the attack, +planting corn and without arms. Wingfield, who had contended that the +Indians might be suspicious and estranged if the fort were palisaded, now +consented to put it in fighting order, with cannon mounted and men armed +and exercised. From that time attacks and ambuscades on the part of the +natives were frequent. The English, by their careless straggling, were +often wounded, while the fleet-footed savages easily escaped. + +Newport was now about to return to England. All this time John Smith had +been under a cloud of suspicion. His enemies had never slept. They now +proposed, affecting pity, to refer his case to the Council in England +rather than overwhelm him on the spot by an exposure of his criminal +designs; but he defied their malice, defeated their base machinations, +and all saw his innocence and the malignity of his enemies. Says Thomas +Studley, "He publicly defied the uttermost of their cruelty. Hee wisely +prevented their pollicies, though he could not suppresse their envies." +He demanded trial at Jamestown,--there was the charter,--and in this, +the first trial by a jury of his countrymen in the new home, he was +triumphantly acquitted, and a fine enacted from his enemies, which he +turned over to Studley for the good of the colony. "Many[23] were the +mischiefs that daily sprong from their ignorant (yet ambitious spirits), +but the good doctrine and exhortation of our preacher Maister Hunt +reconciled them and caused Captain Smith to be admitted to the Council." + +The next day all received the Communion. The day following some of the +savages voluntarily desired peace, and tendered their friendship and +support as allies. On June 21 Captain Newport dined with the colonists, +partaking of their "dyet from the common Kettell," and on the 22d, "having +set things in order he set saile for England, leaving provision for 13 or +14 weeks." + + + + +CHAPTER IX + + +Captain Newport found the friends of the colony eager for news from +Virginia. He had brought over the first mail from America--a small +package of letters which he could easily bestow in one of his pockets. +He represented, in his own person, our entire Foreign Postal Service. The +mail was small, but important. It contained a "Relatyon of the Discovery +up the James River," and letters to Prince Henry, to his Majesty's Prime +Minister, and other persons of authority. + +Virginia had few presents to send home, only the clapboards, a barrel +of yellow earth (afterwards irreverently termed "Fool's Gold"), and a +very small sample of real gold, the result of the experiments of John +Martin, who was supposed to possess skill as a mineral expert. Was he not +the son of Sir Richard Martin, Master of the Mint in England? Practical +experience might surely be expected of him. The letters contained the most +enthusiastic praise of the new country--of the grand river, the trees, +fruits, flowers; "such a land as did never the eye of man behold, with +rocks and mountains that promised infinite treasure." + +Such representations were in accordance with the policy of the colonists +to encourage immigration. Nothing was said in these early letters of +privation or anxiety for the future; nothing of any scheme for the +conversion of the heathen. Master Hunt doubtless wrote to his bishop, +but a discouraging letter was sure to be suppressed. Sir Walter Cope, a +member of the Council, received Newport's report, and wrote to the Earl +of Salisbury:[24]-- + + "RIGHT HONOURABLE MY GOOD LORD: + + "If we may believe words or letters we are fallen upon a land + that promises more than the land of promise. Instead of milk we + find pearl--and gold instead of honey. There seems a kingdom full + of the ore. You shall be fed by handfuls or hatfuls!... + + "To prove there is gold your Lordship's eyes I hope shall + witness. To prove there is pearl the King of Pamont[25] came with + a chain of pearl about his neck, burnt through with great holes + and spoiled for want of the art to bore them and shewed the shells + from whence they were taken. Pohatan, another of their kings, came + stately marching with a great pair of buck's horns fastened to + his forehead, not knowing what esteem we make of men so marked." + +It seemed that the poet's dream of "pearle and gold" was already realized, +but unfortunately a few days later Sir Walter was constrained to write +another letter to Cecil:-- + + "SIR: + + "It hath ever been incident to the Secretary's place to receive + with the same hand both the good and the bad news. This other day + we sent you news of gold, and this day we cannot return you so + much as copper. Our new discovery is more like to prove the land + of Canaan than the land of Ophir. This day we seal up under our + seals the golden mineral till you return. We have made four trials + by the experienced about the city. In the end all turned to vapor. + Martin hath cozened the poor Captain" (Newport), "the King and + State, and meant as I hear to cozen his own father" (the Master + of the Mint), "seeking to draw from him supplies which otherwise + he doubted never to obtain"-- + +by which token we can better understand John Martin's mistakes. + +When the Council met, it was seriously discussed whether so unpromising a +venture should not be abandoned. But there was the country, so fruitful +and delightful; and here at court was Zuniga, the Spanish ambassador, +urging its abandonment. Here, too, was Captain Newport, refusing to +relinquish the enterprise and stoutly adhering to his first opinion, that +gold would finally reward their search. + +The fate of the colony hung upon a slender thread, but finally the +president of the Council informed Cecil that they had decided to send +Newport out again with one hundred settlers and "all necessaries to +relieve them that be there," hoping to arrive the next January, and taking +out with his ship a "nymble Pinnace" in which to return quickly and make +report. + +The advice of the King could not be had. He was away at Theobald's for the +August shooting, and woe to that man who should interrupt him! Zuniga's +ears were wide open to the news from Virginia, and he wrote to the King +of Spain: "It is very desirable that your Majesty make an end of the few +who are now in Virginia, as that would be digging up the Root so it could +put out no more. It will be serving God and your Majesty to drive these +villains out from there, hanging them in time which is short enough for +the purpose." + +Philip III wrote regularly to his minister, agreeing with him, but doing +nothing. The Spanish Council of State advised the King instantly to +make ready a fleet "and forthwith proceed to drive out all who are in +Virginia," and this, they argued, "will suffice to prevent them from again +coming to the place." + +After the resolution of the London Council, Zuniga again urges Philip: "I +hear that three or four ships will return to Virginia. _Will your Majesty +give orders that measures be taken in time:_ because now it will be very +easy; and very difficult afterwards when they have taken root. If they are +punished in the beginning the result will be that no more will go there." + +But Philip was disposed to take his own time--overruled by that Providence +which brought us safely through so many perils. He had his own private +schemes. A princess of England was growing up, and he meant to ask her +hand in marriage. + +Finally he agreed that the colonists were to be driven out, but the thing +must be done secretly. Zuniga continued to be his faithful spy, reporting +every step taken by the London Council. It was Zuniga, we remember, +who was sent to London a few years afterwards to ask for the Princess +Elizabeth. + +Before we return to the little colony, happily unconscious of its +many enemies, we must be allowed one more of the letters incident upon +Newport's return. All of them are extremely interesting as illustrative +of the time, but we must not pause too long in our history--a history so +rich in events that it is difficult to choose the most important. + +The letter is dated August 18, 1607, and informs John Chamberlain that-- + + "Captaine Newport is come from our late adventures to Virginia, + having left them in an Island in the midst of a great river 120 + mile into the land. They write much commendation of the aire and + the soile and the commodities of it: but silver and golde have + they none, and they cannot yet be at peace with the inhabitants + of the country. They have fortified themselves and built a small + towne which they call 'Jamestowne,' and so they date their + letters; but the towne methinks hath no gracefull name, and + besides the Spaniards, who think it no small matter of moment how + they stile their new populations, will tell us, I doubt, it comes + too neere 'Villiaco.' + + "Master Porie tells me of a name given by a Dutchman who wrote + to him in Latin from the new towne in Virginia, 'Jacobopolis,' + and Master Warner hath a letter from Master George Percie who + names their town, 'Jamesfort,' which we like best of all the rest + because it comes neere to 'Chemes-ford.' + + "Yours most assuredly, + "DUDLEY CARLETON." + +The "small towne" was a bit of prophetic imagination. Up to the hour of +Newport's sailing the colonists had been employed, with infinite labour +and toil, in felling trees and hewing them into clapboards for freighting +the two returning ships, the _Goodspeed_ and _Susan_ (or _Sarah_) +_Constant_. The _Discovery_, a little pinnace of twenty tons, was left +behind for the use of the colony, in case of flight from the savages. It +is wonderful, in view of ensuing events, that the colonists did not at +once reembark in the pinnace and seek some healthier spot for the proposed +town. The river--the "famousest river in Christendom"--seems to have held +them with a strange fascination. + +There was absolutely no dwelling of any kind erected during the +summer.[26] Some of the settlers slept in holes in the ground, roofed with +rails. A rough palisade had been made of boards, and rude cabins covered +with sail cloth sheltered the ammunition and stores. The first church +was a log between two trees to serve as a lectern, and a rotten sail was +stretched overhead in case of rain; for in all weathers, rain or shine, +the good Master Hunt ministered to his flock, morning and evening, leading +them in supplication for protection to Almighty God; and from an unhewn +log as an altar, administered to them the holy emblems of the Christian +faith. + +Before the men could begin to build comfortable quarters, they were +smitten with illness, which continued until September. More than half of +their number perished. The story is told so well by George Percy that I +will be pardoned for giving it in his own words:-- + +"Our men were destroyed with cruell diseases, as Swellings, Flixes, +Burning Fevers, and by warres; and some departed suddenly; but for the +most part _they died of meere famine_! + +"There were never Englishmen left in a foreigne Country in such miserie as +wee were in this new discovered Virginia. Wee watched every three nights, +lying on the bare, cold ground, what weather soever came; and warded all +the next day; which brought our men to bee most feeble wretches. Our +food was but a small Can of Barlie sodden in water to five men a day. +Our drinke, cold water taken out of the River; which was at a flood verie +salt; at a low tide full of slime and filth; which was the destruction of +many of our men. + +"Thus we lived for the space of five months in this miserable distresse, +not having five able men to man our Bulwarkes upon any occasion. If it +had not pleased God to put a terrour in the Savages hearts, we had all +perished by those wild and cruell Pagans, being in that weake estate as +we were; our men night and day groaning in every corner of the Fort most +pitifull to heare. If there were any conscience in men, it would make +their harts to bleed to heare the pitifull murmurings and outcries of +our sicke men without reliefe; every night and day for the space of six +weekes; some departing out of the Worlde, many times three or foure in +a night; in the morning, their bodies trailed out of their Cabines like +Dogges to be buried. In this sort did I see the mortalities of divers of +our people." + +Among those who perished was our friend, Thomas Studley, the "Cape +Merchant," and another was Elizabeth's brave mariner, Bartholomew Gosnold, +the projector of the enterprise, and one of the Council. How strange +that he should, after his many voyages, have so eagerly insisted upon +this colonization of Virginia, to find there his own grave--far away +from the England whose honour he loved so ardently! His unhappy comrades +did what they could. Smitten with fever and weakened by starvation, +they bore him to his humble grave, reverently and decently, "having all +ordinance of the fort shot off, with many vollies of small shot." Thus +old Virginia received her first-born into her bosom! She lovingly holds +him there still. We can imagine these scenes, softened by the faithful, +untiring care of Thomas Walton, the surgeon, and the priestly offices and +consolations of good Master Hunt. + +It seems unthinkable that England should have so starved her colony. In +Elizabeth's reign the narrow, selfish charter and the meagre outfit would +have been impossible. All things were possible to James that could in +any way contribute to his own self-aggrandizement. Bitter as was the lot +of the unhappy adventurers, they were too manly to complain. "When some +affirm," says a historian of the time,[27] "that it was ill done of the +Council to send forth men so badly provided, this incontradictable reason +will show them plainly they are ill-advised to nourish such ill conceits: +first, the fault of going was our own, what could be thought fitting or +necessary we had; but what we should find or want or where we should be, +we were all ignorant, and supposing to make our passage in two months, +with victuall to live, and the advantage of the spring to work; we were +at sea five months where we both spent our victuall and lost the time +and opportunity to plant by the unskilful presumption of our ignorant +transporters that understood not at all what they undertook. Such actions +have ever since the world's beginning been subject to such accidents +and everything of worth is found full of difficulties; but nothing so +difficult as to establish a commonwealth so far remote from men and means +and where men's minds are so untoward as neither to do well themselves +nor suffer others." + +The closing sentence was a very mild commentary indeed upon the state of +things at Jamestown. The miniature republic--for such it rapidly grew to +be in nearly everything except in name--held within its borders just the +elements that distinguish the great republic of to-day: some noble spirits +with high aims and fervent patriotism; some sordid souls intent alone on +gain; some unprincipled, desperate characters; others simply useless, +idle, and ignoble. Of the latter class, the President, Wingfield, was +notably conspicuous. It was evident, from the first, that he was utterly +unfit for his position. One of the earliest efforts of the convalescents +was to get rid of him. + +The store held in common, of "oyle, vinegar, sack and aqua vitae," being +nearly all spent, the Council ordered that the sack should be reserved +for the Communion table, and all the rest sealed up against greater +extremities--if there could be greater. John Smith accused Wingfield of +using the reserved stores for his own benefit and that of his friends. +Wingfield soon appeared in his true character, and added cowardice to +incapacity. He made an effort to seize the pinnace and escape to England, +thus leaving the colony to the mercy of the savages. This baseness +roused the indignation even of the emaciated survivors, and they deposed +him and appointed Captain Ratcliffe in his place. Wingfield's defence, +addressed to his government, now preserved among the manuscripts of +Lambeth Palace Library, is a curious mixture of dignified, not to say +lofty, sentiments--for all the colonial writers used a formula of pious +aspiration--and of fierce invective and very petty unworthy gossip; but +if England has seen fit to preserve it all, we may quote a representative +part of it. + +He attributes many of his misfortunes to John Smith, others to Master +Archer. His old enemy, Master Crofts--whom we remember as having thriven +so well upon the precious preserves and conserves prepared for Wingfield's +voyage--comes well to the fore in the long discourse addressed to the +Council in England. "Master Crofts feared not to saie that, if others +would joyne with him, he would pull me out of my seate and out of my +skynne too." He could hardly have threatened more, but this was not all: +"I desired justice for a copper kettle which Master Crofts did deteyne +from me. Hee said I had given it him; I did bid him bring his proofe of +that. He confessed he had no proofe. Then Master President [Ratcliffe] did +aske me if I would be sworne I did not give it to him. I said I knew no +cause whie to sweare for myne owne. He asked Master Crofts if hee would +make oathe I did give it to him which oathe he tooke and wann my kettle +from me, that was in that place and tyme worth half its weight in gold." + +He protests against the charge of using the "oyle, vinegar, and aqua +vitae." "It is further said I did deny the men and much banquet and ryot +myself. I allowed a Bisket to every working man for his breakfast by means +of provision brought by Captain Newport. I never had but one squirrell +roasted whereof I gave part to Master Ratcliffe then sick; yet was that +Squirrell given me. I did never heate a fleshe-pott but when the common +pott was so used likewise," and much more to the same purpose. The matter +resulted in the impeachment of the President and appointment of Ratcliffe +to fill his unfinished term of office. Kendall also, a prime aider and +abettor of the deposed President, was "afterwards committed about hainous +matters which was proved against him." + +And so the fifty colonists had their troubles at home and abroad, but they +held on bravely notwithstanding. + +For some mysterious reason the Indians ceased to molest them, possibly +because their own great harvesting time was at hand, and also the hunting +season for more profitable game than a few starved Englishmen. However +that may be, they still had their eyes on the intruders, and in order +to enter their fort appeared with a present of "Bread, Corne, Fish and +Flesh in great plentie." Thus the representatives of the proudest nation +on earth suffered the humiliation of becoming pensioners upon the bounty +of savages whose country they had invaded, and whose land they had taken +without purchase or permission. + +That there was no true friendship is evident from the fact that John +Smith, going down the river in search of supplies, was received at a +little town with scornful defiance, to which he replied by a volley of +musketry. Following up his advantage, he landed and captured "Okeus," the +god of the Powhatans, and bestowed him, with all his stuffing of moss and +his copper chains, on board the shallop. The terrified Indians, expecting +the sky to fall should Okeus be displeased, immediately ransomed his +Sacredness with a good store of venison, wild fowl, and bread. + +Nothing can exceed the plenty in southern Virginia which swarms in sea and +air in the months of October and November. The splendid solan-goose, sora, +wild ducks, and wild turkey were found in 1607 in even greater plenty +than at the present day. No Thanksgiving dinners had thinned their ranks. +The rivers literally swarmed with fish. These were all at the command +of the settlers. Of corn for bread there was always scarcity--but surely +Newport had not forgotten them! They would boil the roots and gather the +persimmons until he came. Then, too, some of the disturbers of the peace +had been silenced. Kendall had been tried by a jury and shot; Ratcliffe +and Archer had attempted to steal the pinnace, and been foiled by Smith's +vigilance and resolution. + +The helm of affairs had been intrusted to John Smith as Cape Merchant, and +he now took the lead. His strong hand was soon recognized in the colony. +He set the colonists to work and worked with them, mowing, building, and +thatching log cabins,--he himself always performing the heaviest tasks. In +a short time shelter was provided for all,--now numbering only forty-five +individuals,--and a church was built on the site to which pilgrims now +resort as to a Mecca.[28] It was not an imposing structure, but it was +a regular church. The chronicles describe it as a log building, covered +like the cabins with rafts, sedge, and dirt. Thus the Virginians,--despite +their enemies, barbarian and Spanish,--with all their conflicts, illness, +and death, had made a good beginning. They had felled trees, built houses, +and erected a church, and were saying their prayers in it, like honest +people who were bent on doing their duty in that state of life in which +it had pleased Heaven to place them. + + + + +CHAPTER X + + +The month of December found the colonists anxiously apprehensive of +starvation during the ensuing winter, a winter which was long remembered +in Europe as one of unprecedented severity. + +Newport had been for many weeks overdue. The weather was already bitterly +cold. A great central camp-fire was kept burning, day and night, which +they fed from the limbs of the trees they had felled in building their +fortifications, church, and humble cabins. Over this fire hung the "common +kettle," lately redolent with savoury odours of venison and wild fowl, but +now relegated to its original uses,--the boiling of barley in the grain. +Of this only a small portion remained. Captain Smith had carefully laid up +some of the autumn's plenty, and "the idlers had as carelessly wasted it." +Finding upon measurement that only "fourteen daies victualls were left," +he sallied forth to tempt the Tappahannocks[29] to trade, sending Captain +Martin to the nation of the Paspaheghs on a similar errand. They found +the Indians of those tribes sulky and reluctant, at that scarce season, +to part with their provisions, but they managed to secure from kindlier +sources seven hogsheads of corn. + +The "idlers" now began to murmur because no effort had been made to +explore the country; and complained that the royal order to go in search +of the "South Sea"--that sea which was to open to them the riches of the +East--had not been obeyed. The great sea perhaps lay not far distant. +Communication with it would be found, they had heard, through some river +running from the northwest. There was the Chickahominy flowing in that +direction,--why was this river not explored? + +Their number had now been so much reduced that they hesitated to send any +of their strong men far away from the fort. They remembered the fate of +the Roanoke colony. Perhaps, after all, they had better keep together, +antagonistic as was their attitude towards each other. + +Plans were made and abandoned: to return to England or send thither for +supplies; to send to Newfoundland, or to the southern islands. Finally +they resolved to wait as long as possible, and hope for Newport's return. + +Anxious eyes scanned the horizon from the moment the sun streamed up from +the sea in the east until he sank behind the mysterious hills in the west. +No sail appeared upon the silent waters. Perhaps they had been abandoned! +Perhaps Newport would never come! + +But the frost and snow had already come. The birds had long ago sought +a warmer climate, and the fish would soon be locked in the ice-bound +streams. They durst not wander far enough away from the fort to track +the deer or capture the wild-fowl that abound in winter upon the Virginia +marshes. More than one of their number had ventured only a short distance +away, and been shot full of arrows. Wherever there was a tangle of grass, +or of thick-growing reeds, there would some savage lie in hiding with his +evil eye upon the hated white man. + +Finally John Smith yielded to the complaints of the "idlers," and +taking Emry, Casson, and six others, set forth in a barge to "discover +up the Chickahominy river." They set out December 10, in a very severe +spell of cold weather, "to make the famous discovery of the great South +Sea," according to the orders of the London Council. The attempt in the +dead of winter to penetrate a country swarming with savage enemies was +extremely hazardous. In describing his perils and privations, Smith seems +constrained to apologize for the risk to which he exposed himself and his +party. "Though some men," he says,[30] "may condemn this too bould attempt +of too much indiscretion, yet if they will consider the friendship of +the Indians in conducting me" (his two guides), "the probability of some +lucke, and the malicious judges of my actions at home--as also to have +some matters of worth to incourage our adventures in england--might well +have caused any honest mind to have done the like, as well for his own +discharge as for the public good." + +This voyage was destined to be an important event in the history of +the birth of our nation, and every step of it merits our attention and +interest. + +Captain Smith spent about a month with the Indians and became thoroughly +acquainted with them in their own homes, observed their habits of domestic +life, their rites and ceremonies, and learned something of their strange +language. His residence was solely with the tribe of the Powhatans, +who inhabited the tide-water region of Virginia. Of the Indians in the +interior beyond the mountains he learned nothing except through vague +traditions. But for this voyage we should have lost the beautiful romance +so dear to the hearts of Virginians, and now so sternly challenged and +defended by the historians of the present day. + +The barge or shallop proceeded about forty miles up the river without +interruption. At one point a great tree, which he cut in two, hindered the +passage. The land was low and swampy--"a vast and wilde wilderness." Many +years ago, before the days of steam-engines and railway cars, I traversed +this region in a high-swung old Virginia chariot; and the dark river, +coloured from juniper berries, the oozy swamps, the tangled undergrowth, +the rotting trees, with mottled trunks like great serpents, the funereal +moss hanging from the twisted vines, the slimy water-snakes, filled me +with childish fear. I saw it all as John Smith had seen it. + +When at last the barge could advance no farther, he returned eight miles +and moored her in a wide bay out of danger. Leaving her in charge of all +his men except two, and taking an Indian guide with him, he went up the +river twenty miles in a canoe. He expressly ordered the men in the barge +not to land until his return. This order they disobeyed, being minded to +make some discoveries of their own. Two of the number left behind were +murdered in the most cruel manner by the savages. The others escaped, +and reached Jamestown in safety. "Having discovered," says Smith, "twenty +miles further in this desart, the river still kept his depth and breadth, +but was much more combred with trees. Here we went ashore, being some 12 +miles higher than the barge had bene, to refresh ourselves during the +boyling of our victuals. One of the Indians I tooke with me to see the +nature of the soile and to cross the boughts [windings] of the river. +The other Indian I left with Maister Robinson and Thomas Emry, with their +matches lighted and order to discharge a peece for my retreat at the first +sight of an Indian." + +Doubtless this Indian left behind betrayed the party. Doubtless every +step Smith took from the mouth of the Chickahominy was reported by the +spies of Powhatan. No warning shot was fired, and it afterwards appeared +that Robinson and Emry had been slain. Within a short time he heard the +savage war-whoop. His guide, a submissive, peaceful fellow, stood by +him; but Smith thought it unwise to trust in the fidelity of a savage, +and unbuckling one of his garters tied the Indian to his left arm as +a shield. The poor savage "offered not to strive." The two retreated, +walking backward, Smith firing all the way, hoping to reach the canoe; +but he was presently surrounded by two hundred savages with drawn bows. +The great chief Opechancanough was at their head. He writes: "My hinde +treated betwixt them and me of conditions of peace; he discovered me to +be the Captaine. My request was to retire to the boate: they demanded my +arms, the rest they saide were slaine, onely me they would reserve. + +"My Indian importuned me not to shoot. In retiring, being in the midst +of a low quagmire and minding them more than my steps, I stept fast in +the quagmire and also the Indian. Thus surprised I resolved to trie their +mercies; my armes I caste from me, till which none durst approach me, +whereupon they drew me out and led me to the king." + + [Illustration: Smith's Island, where John Smith was captured by the + Indians. + + Copyright, 1906, by Jamestown Official Photo. Corp'n.] + +The Indians chafed his benumbed limbs and warmed him by their fire. +His old friend Wochinchopunck, king of the Paspaheghs, interceded for +his release, but he was taken into the presence of Opechancanough. He +presented the chief with a small compass. This incident is told in so +remarkable a manner by William Symondes, "Docteur of Divinitie," that I +venture to give it in his own words. He was the friend of "good Maister +Hunt," and his "Discoveries and Accidents" bore the _imprimatur_ of John +Smith's signature. + +"They shewed him Opechakanough, king of Pamawnkee; to whom he gave a +round Ivory double compass Dyall. Much they marvailed at the playing of +the Fly and needle which they could see so plainly and yet not touch it, +because of the glasse that covered them. But when he demonstrated by that +Globe-like Jewell the roundness of the earth, and skies, the spheare of +the Sunne, Moone and Starres, and how the Sunne did chase the night round +about the world continually; the greatnesse of the Land and Sea, the +diversitie of Nations, varietie of complexions, and how we were to them +_Antipodes_ and many such like matters, they all stood as amazed with +admiration." If this address was really spoken as quoted, one cannot fail +to admire the courage and self-possession of a captive who could deliver +a comprehensive address, including land, sea, and the heavens, in a new +language, and in the most unfavourable circumstances that can well be +imagined. We dare not challenge the truth of the assertions. There is the +signature of the Docteur of Divinitie, the friend of good Maister Hunt! +There is the signature of Captain John Smith. + +Presently the Indians bound him to a tree and were about to shoot him to +death when the chief, holding up the compass, commanded them to lay down +their bows and arrows. He had not fully understood the "cosmographicall +lecture," and he wished to have the mysterious needle, which he could +see and not touch, made clear to his comprehension. Besides, he was +fully persuaded that he held captive the white man's great commander, +and so important a personage must be brought before his king. Smith was +accordingly fed and refreshed, and they set out with him on a triumphal +march through the land of Powhatan. Marching in Indian file, they led +their captive, guarded by fifteen men, about six miles to a hunting town +in the upper part of the swamp, for this was a hunting party; their women +and children, according to their custom, had built their arbours covered +with mats, kindled the fires, and made ready for the hunters when they +should return laden with deer. All these women and children swarmed forth +to meet the hunters and stare at the strange white man. The chief was +in the finest spirits. He and his followers indulged in the wild Indian +dance of triumph, and their barbarous shouts reached the ears of Smith, +as he lay in the "long house," closely guarded, and trying to solve the +problem of their intentions with regard to himself,--seeing that they +sent him enough bread for twenty men, but refused to eat with him. Were +they fattening him for the sacrifice? Were they cannibals? Alas, he knew +not! "For supper," he writes, "the Captain sent me a quarter of venison +and 10 pounds of bread, and each morning 3 women presented me three great +platters of fine bread, and more venison than ten men could devour I had." +He might well dread, with Polonius, that he was to eat that he might be +eaten. True, William White, one of the boys brought out with the colony, +had run away, and lived among them six months, and had been returned +through some caprice. The boy had discovered they were "noe Cannabells." +Still their god, Okeus, might demand a human sacrifice; and who so +acceptable to the deity as the irreverent white man who had captured his +image but a short time before! + +Opechancanough had deeper reasons for his clemency than the desire to +possess and understand the mariner's compass. He had long meditated an +attack upon Jamestown, and he now sought to entice Smith to join and aid +him. We read that he offered him life, liberty, and as many wives as he +wanted,--and although there were no interpreters, Captain Smith seems +to have understood him. Indian words go far--there are few of them. By +gesture, intonation, accent, the Indian can give to one word as much +meaning as an Englishman can express in half a dozen. It is a strange +language, this of the Powhatans, but it had one excellence: under no +circumstances could a dialect story be evolved from it! + +The information of a projected assault upon Jamestown filled Captain +Smith with alarm. He managed to make Opechancanough understand that +presents would be sent to him if he could communicate with Jamestown, +and finally three men were placed at his disposal as messengers. Tearing +a blank leaf from the little book he carried, he wrote a note, probably +to George Percy, telling of the proposed assault, directing what means +should be used to terrify the messengers, and what presents should be sent +to placate his captors. Three naked savages set forth on his errand "in +as bitter weather as could be of frost and snow; and in three days they +returned with the presents to the wonder of them all that heard it, that +he could either divine, or the paper could speake." The colonists had +done their part. The messengers brought thrilling reports of the terrors +by which the fort was environed, the mines, and the monstrous guns, +exploding with infernal smoke, and belching with thunder. The attempt +upon the colony was abandoned for the present and the march resumed, no +doubt undertaken in the same spirit that inspired the Roman conquerors, +when they led their captives in triumph. The route of the procession was +arranged to gratify the curiosity of all the tribes who were on terms +of friendship with the chief. Their priests and conjurers were brought +to terrify the prisoner with their infernal incantations. Smeared with +oil and paint, begrimed with black and red, garbed in the skins of wild +beasts, they danced around him for three days, shaking snake-rattles +over his head with shrieks and howling, "as if," writes the "Docteur of +Divinitie," + + "neere led to hell + amongst the Devills to dwell." + +The details of their orgies are too disgusting for repetition. No wonder, +as the captive tells us, he had hideous dreams! As our rhyming clergyman +hath it:-- + + "His wakynge mind in hideous dreams did oft see wondrous shapes + Of bodies strange and huge in growth and of stupendous makes." + +But he preserved a bold front, this stout-hearted Briton, and for aught +his enemies knew to the contrary his courage never forsook him. They had +captured a bag of gunpowder in the barge, and he encouraged them to keep +it for the spring-sowing that it might yield an abundant crop like grain. +They returned his pistol, that he might instruct them in its use, but he +contrived to break the lock of the weapon as if by accident. + +When near the end of their journey, they received an invitation from the +great chief, Opitchipan, Powhatan's brother and heir to the kingdom, +to spend a few days at his house. There a banquet was spread for the +prisoner, whether to impress him with a sense of the chief's grandeur, or +to strengthen him for enduring the fate that awaited him, we cannot tell. +Great platters of bread, venison, and wild fowl were spread before him, +"but not any one would eat with him." The fragments in every case were +collected in baskets and hung over his head while he slept, or feigned to +sleep, and if rejected a second time were given to the women and children. + + +At length, after a long journey by a circuitous route which brought him +within twelve miles of Jamestown, he was conducted to Werowocomoco, the +residence of the great Powhatan, situated on the north side of York River. +He was not immediately conducted into the presence of the emperor, but +remained for several days in the forest at some distance. His reception, +it appears, was to be the occasion of much pomp and ceremonial, far +exceeding anything he had yet seen. These despised palefaces, who wore +outlandish garments and hair on their faces, who could fire great guns +that battered down the limbs of trees, who had no wives of their own and +declined to accept them from others--these fellows should see how the +great Powhatan held his court. Kept in waiting, accordingly, the captive +was thronged by curious crowds who watched him from morning until night. +"Grim courtiers," he tells us, "more than two hundred, who stood gazing +as they had seen some monster." + + + + +CHAPTER XI + + +The Emperor Powhatan was now living at Werowocomoco, twelve miles +from Jamestown. This had been his favourite residence until the +arrival of the English, but he soon "tooke so little pleasure in their +neighbourhood--seeing they could visit him against his will in six or +seven hours--that he retired himselfe to a place in the desarts at the +top of the river Chickahomnia." + +In all the countries which had come to him by inheritance he had houses +"built after the manner of arbours"--of saplings, thatched with boughs of +trees, and lined with mats. Some of these houses were a hundred and twenty +feet long, and at every house provision was kept for his entertainment +when it pleased him to make a royal progress through his dominions. +Besides these, he kept for his own use a treasury building at Orapakes, +filled with skins, copper, pearls, beads, bows and arrows, also a store +of the precious red paint, with which the ladies of his court adorned +themselves. At the four corners of this house were four images rudely +carved out of the trunks of trees--one represented a dragon, another a +bear, the third a leopard, and the fourth a man, signifying that the great +Emperor was lord of beast and man. Indeed, his power was absolute. He had +under him inferior kings of his own kindred, and all paid him tribute. +Eight of ten parts of everything they acquired--game, corn, skins, beads, +dye-stuffs, and the precious copper--were reverently laid at his feet. At +his least frown they trembled with fear, for cruel and ingenious he could +be in devising tortures for the punishment of those who offended him. +The arrow and the tomahawk were his most merciful agents in despatching +them. Before the door of his rural palace many a victim had been, in the +presence of his women and little children, flayed alive, dismembered by +degrees, thrown alive into a pit of fire. + +On this fifth of January some such divertisement was keenly anticipated. +His family and retainers were awake early, and bustling about in +preparation for an unusual event. + +There was to be a great gathering of the neighbouring +chiefs,--Opechancanough and Opitchipan, his brothers and successors, and +others. Early in the morning fires were kindled all over the settlement, +and before them haunches of venison were spitted for the slight roasting +deemed essential before the boiling, according to the invariable custom of +the Indians in preparing flesh and fowl. Beneath the fires flat rocks were +heating, to be withdrawn for the baking of bread. Some of the loaves were +laid in the ashes, as they are to-day by the Virginians, who are indebted +to the Indian, not only for his corn, but for his peculiar methods of +cooking it. Now, as then, the "hoe-cake" is baked before the fire, and +turned to brown on both sides; the homelier "ash-cake" is washed as soon +as withdrawn from its humble bed of ashes, and dries immediately from +its own heat. Now, as then, the Indian corn is beaten into "hominy," and +boiled for food. We have not lost its Indian name, nor the Indian's name +for the small loaf. He called it "pone"--where did he find a word so near +kin to the Latin _panis_ and the French _pain_? + +Every morning men, women, and children ran down to the river and plunged +into the ice-cold water. There were no bathing-houses for an after-toilet. +They were unnecessary. Then, at the first peep of the sun, the entire +assembly would turn, with uplifted hands, eastward, and in a wild chant +of invocation worship the rising luminary, the men strewing the water with +powdered tobacco as sacrifice. The Indian, as we have seen, worshipped no +God of mercy! If God was good, why, then, it was unnecessary to placate +him by adoration or sacrifice. He feared and worshipped "Okeus." And he +also worshipped strength and force,--the fire that burned him, the water +that drowned him, the great mysterious orb that was the source of the +destroying fire. + +When an Indian made a solemn oath, he laid one hand on his heart, raising +the other reverently to the sun. "These people," says Percy, "have a great +reverence to the Sunne above all other things; at the rising and setting +of the same they lift up their hands and eyes to the Sunne, making a +round Circle on the ground with dried Tobacco; then they begin to pray, +making many Devillish Gestures with a Hellish noise, foming at the mouth, +staring with their eyes, wagging their heads and hands in such a fashion +and deformitie as it was monstrous to behold." Thus they ever strove to +avert evil. + +The settlement at Werowocomoco was a large one. Besides Powhatan's own +house with many rooms, there were houses or arbours for his bows and +arrows, and for his granaries, and stores of dried fish and venison. +He had ten or twelve wives, and a number of young women of inferior +position always in attendance upon him. He had many children around him: +Nantauquas, "the handsomest, manliest savage ever seen," and his brothers; +Matachanna, Pocahontas, and Cleopatre, and other princesses whose names do +not appear. Matachanna was married, or about to be married, to Tocomocomo, +"a wise and knowing priest." Pocahontas was a small maiden about ten +years of age; Cleopatre (where did Powhatan get the name Cleopatre?) was +destined to figure in history as soon as she reached the marriageable +age of twelve. None of these young people lived with their own mothers. +Powhatan never kept a wife after the birth of a child, but made a present +of her to some chief or captain. But he was extremely fond of his own +offspring, a sentiment which civilized man deems a high virtue, but which +is shared with keen intensity by savage man, and savage beast as well. + + [Illustration: The Mirror in the Woods.] + +Powhatan's favourite wife at this moment was Winganuskie, his favourite +child Pocahontas. She was doubtless a mischievous maiden, active, +adventurous, and daring. Strachey calls her "a wanton daughter of +Powhatan." We read, among other adventures, of her attempting to swim +across the Piankatank River, of her rescue by one of the Englishmen, and +the consequent gift by Powhatan of Gwynne's Island to the colony; of the +wild entertainment she devised and led for her friend, Captain Smith, all +before she was a year older than at the time of which we are writing. +She was small, slender, and graceful. Of her beauty a few years later, +my readers are able to judge for themselves from the authentic portrait +we present in this book. These, with all the other wives, and attendant +females of a more doubtful position, with Matachanna and Cleopatre, and +the minor princesses, made haste, upon coming up from their bath, to array +themselves for the coming ceremonies. They had no mirrors of polished +steel or glass, but the Indian woman must have been a very dense woman +indeed if she had failed to recognize and regard critically the picture +reflected in the pool or bowl of water. In their dark hair they fastened +pompons and aigrettes of white marabout feathers (down), after the manner +of modern dames. They painted themselves freshly with brilliant red +"puccoon," faces and all. On their arms above the elbow they had long worn +elaborate bracelets tattooed into the skin, and just below the knee were +others, quite as elaborate and quite as durable. On certain wider spaces +of their bodies were ornaments of similar material--lizards, serpents, +turtles, birds. All these their enlightened sisters wear in emeralds +and diamonds. The Indian could, however, rival her civilized sister in +pearls. Many chains of these hung from their necks--large, fresh-water +pearls--somewhat discoloured, it is true, by rude boring. They wore brief +aprons of skins, and moccasins on their feet. Besides these,--_rien de +tout_! + +My chivalrous friend, John Esten Cooke, the Virginia historian, takes the +liberty, after the manner of latter-day society reporters, of arraying the +lady he describes according to his own taste. He has dressed Pocahontas +on the occasion of Captain Smith's reception in a robe of doe-skin, lined +with down from the breast of the wood pigeon, with coral ear-rings, coral +bracelets on wrists and ankles, and a white plume in her hair, the badge +of royal blood. Thus my friend saw her, casting his eyes backward two +hundred and seventy-five years; but John Smith, who saw her face to face, +has, in his picture of the scene which made her famous, presented her +clad in her own charms and in these alone. Before the age of thirteen, +the early historians[31] tell us, Indian children wore no garments. +Their mothers rubbed into their skins ointments which rendered them proof +against "certaine biting gnats such as the Greekes called _scynipes_ that +swarm within the marshe,"--our snipelike long-billed mosquitoes,--and +also against extremes of heat and cold. The paint-pot could furnish the +little maid with a new dress every day, if she desired it--red, white, or +even black! I am afraid the little princess whose statue is to adorn the +Jamestown Park, fared like the rest of her people, unless the severe cold +constrained her to encumber her active limbs with a "mantell of feathers." + +When a loud shout announced the approach of the escort conducting the +distinguished prisoner, Powhatan made haste to put himself into position +to receive them. Forty or fifty of his tallest warriors stood without +and formed a lane through which the captive was conducted. Within, the +emperor was discovered lying in an easy Oriental fashion before a great +fire, and upon a dais a foot high covered with ten or twelve mats. "He[32] +was hung with manie chaynes of great Pearles about his neck, and covered +with a great covering of raccoon skins and all the tayles hanging by. On +either hand did sit a young wench of 16 or 18 years, and along on each +side the house two rowes of men and behind them as many women with all +their heads and shoulders painted red, many of their heads bedecked with +the white down of birds but every one with something; and a great chayne +of white beads about their necks. Powhatan held himself with such a grand +majesticall countenance as drave me into admiration to see such state in +a naked savage. He is of personage a tall, well-proportioned man with a +sower looke. His head is somewhat gray, his beard so thinne it seemeth +none at all. His age neare 60,[33] of a very able and hardy body to endure +any labour. This King will make his own robes, shooes, pots, bowes, and +arrows; and plant, hunt, or doe anything as well as the rest." + +At the entrance of the escort with their captive all the people cheered +and shouted. The Queen of Appamatuck was ordered to bring him water to +wash his hands. Another queen offered a bunch of feathers to be used as +a towel. These ceremonies concluded, platters containing food were served +of which we may well believe he partook with an anxious heart. The rhyming +Docteur of Divinitie quaintly comments upon the situation:-- + + "They say he bore a pleasant shew + But sure his heart was sad + For who can pleasant be, and rest + That lives in fear and dread: + And having life suspected, doth + It still suspected lead." + +After the dishes were removed, the captors stated their case in several +heated orations and then held with the emperor a long consultation. +Smith had ample time to look around him. He was always gentle to +children, giving back to them in the starving-time half the corn he +had been compelled to exact from their parents,--"the bravest are the +tenderest,"--and it may be that his eyes softened as they fell upon the +little Pocahontas so gravely silent and observant. She probably thought +him the most beautiful creature she had ever seen. At all events, when two +great stones were brought, and she saw the certain reenactment of scenes +to which she was familiar, she implored her father to spare his life, and +when he was dragged forth and his head laid upon the stones, she rushed +forward, gathered him into her arms, and laid her own head upon his. + + [Illustration: "She rushed forward, and laid her own head upon his."] + +The Indians are extremely superstitious. Anything contrary to nature, +as they saw nature,--such as madness or idiocy,--they construed into a +manifestation of supernatural agency. Evidently John Smith was destined +to be spared, and for the sake of the little maiden. To her service he +was accordingly assigned, "to make her bells, beads, and copper." He was +retained some days as the guest of the emperor, who soon put to him the +crucial question, "What was the cause of the coming of the Englishmen?" + +Captain Smith must have had command, not only of his feelings but of the +Indian language. He quickly invented a plausible story.[34] He told the +emperor that being in a fight with the Spaniards (Powhatan's enemies) +and being overpowered, and almost forced to retreat, they had, because +of extreme weather, made for the shore, and landing at Chesapeake been +received with a flight of arrows. At Kequoghton,[35] however, the people +had been kind, and in an answer to their inquiry about fresh water, had +directed them up the river to find it. The pinnace had sprung a leak, and +they were forced to stay and mend her to be ready for Captain Newport when +he came to take them away. + +But the shrewd old emperor was not satisfied. He had something more to +ask: Why had they gone up the river to the falls? That was not the way +to mend a pinnace or take on fresh water! The captain was ready with a +perfectly satisfactory reply. His father Newport, in that fight with the +Chesapeakes, had a child slain, whose death they intended to revenge. They +attributed the murder to the Monocans, the enemies of Powhatan, etc., etc. + +"A lie," defined the Sunday-school boy in answer to a catechism question, +"is an abomination unto the Lord, and a very present help in time of +trouble." Powhatan saw no reason to doubt the plausible statements of +Captain Smith, and entered upon a friendly discourse about the South +Sea and other matters of interest, the Monocans and tribes beyond the +mountains, and his own very great power and grandeur. His whilom captive +made good use of his opportunities, admired the greatness of Powhatan, and +flattered him into an avowal of friendship, with the promises of corn and +venison in return for hatchets and copper. + +All this seems marvellous in view of the difficulty in understanding the +uncouth Indian tongue. But Captain Smith seems to have instructed himself. +He has been accused of colouring his narratives too highly, indeed, of +inventing some of them. For myself I admire him too much to concede more +than the _cum grano salis_, with which, alas, we daily and hourly season +much that we hear. + +He has given us a practical illustration of his success in mastering the +language of the Powhatans. After a short list of Indian words, he has +given us a whole sentence, which doubtless he used on this occasion when +parting with Powhatan, and inviting him to send his daughter to visit +him. It is this: "Kekaten pokahontas patiaquagh niugh tanks manotyens neer +mowchick rayrenock audowgh," which means, "Bid Pocahontas bring two little +baskets, and I will give her white beads to make a chain." + +The captain was not allowed to return to Jamestown without a further +trial to his nerves, and another opportunity of noting the family likeness +between kings. It must be remembered he saw all these fearful things at +night--but without the help, in Powhatan's camp, of sack or aqua vitae.[36] +The night before he left, Powhatan caused him to be brought to a great +house in the woods, and there upon a mat by the fire to be left alone. +Not long after, from behind a mat that divided the house, came the "most +dolefullest" noise that was ever heard. Presently Powhatan, who had hidden +(like King James behind the arras), appeared, painted more like a devil +than a man, and with two hundred men painted black like himself. After +sundry fearful contortions and wild antics,--seeing he could not smite +the captain dead with fear,--he expressed himself in a friendly manner, +and offered to be a father to him, and esteem him as he did his handsome +son Nantauquous, also to give him the country of Capahowsick in return +for two great guns and a grindstone. + +I have told you this story as it was told by Captain Smith. "The Newes +from Virginia," which he wrote immediately upon his return to Jamestown, +contained no word of complaint of the Indians. On the contrary, it is +full of grateful appreciation of their kindness. Nor does it relate +the incident of Pocahontas as the saviour of his life! "The Newes from +Virginia" was carefully worded to encourage immigration. He could not +frighten away immigrants by stories of bloodthirsty savages; he could +not tell of the heroism of Pocahontas without revealing the fact of his +own imminent danger. He told the whole again and again afterward. None of +the early historians questioned it. All repeated, accepted, and admired +it,--Hamor, Strachey, and Stith, who read every written word, and knew +every tradition relating to the subject. The later historians--John +Burke, Bishop Meade, Gilmore Simms, Charles Campbell, and John Esten +Cooke--accept the story without any thought of questioning its truth. So +do James Graham and Edward Arber, in England. There seems to have been +no adverse suggestion until a few years ago. Those who incline to doubt +the truth of John Smith's story will be strengthened by reading Doyle's +"English Colonies in America," and "The First Republic," by Alexander +Brown. These are only a few of the writers _pro_ and _con_ upon this +interesting question. Melvin Arthur Lane in _The Strand_, London, August, +1906, thus bewails our possible loss of the beautiful romance: "For years +antiquarians and other iconoclasts--worthy men, no doubt, but terrible +shatterers of other men's ideals--have taken from us, one by one, the +historic objects of our love and scorn. Henry VIII, they tell us, was +a very good fellow, much less black than he was painted. Richard III +likewise was a perfect gentleman. He sent the little princes to the Tower +that he might be near them and take a kindly interest in their welfare, as +became such a benevolent uncle. Paul Jones, whom we have just reinterred +with great honour at Annapolis, is said by some people to have been the +bloodiest of pirates, most cruel of men. Captain Kidd may soon turn out +to have been a distributer of tracts, Columbus a lifelong landsman, and +Bluebeard a model of all the domestic virtues." + +He might have made his list longer, and included George Washington and +many others whom we have been taught to honour and revere. John Smith, +like all strong characters, had good haters as well as devoted lovers. He +had the misfortune of living in an age which did not appreciate him. But +one must belong to the former prejudiced class, and be a very good hater +indeed, to believe him capable of weaving a romance "out of the whole +cloth," and retailing it in a dignified letter to his Queen; at a time, +too, when Pocahontas was at court and could herself have contradicted it. +It is not possible that the attendants upon Queen Anne's Court should have +been ignorant of the interesting feature in the letter from John Smith, +or failed to refer to it in conversing with Pocahontas and her husband. +Nor is it possible that the Christian woman would have assented, even by +silence, to a falsehood. + +For myself, I see nothing improbable in her action. A reckless, impulsive +child will face dangers and take risks that appall those of mature years. +Nor was she the only Indian maiden who saved the life of her father's +enemy.[37] Hakluyt tells of "John Ortiz, who was captured in Florida in +1528. The Indian chief Ucita was about to have him put to death, but at +the intercession of an Indian princess, one of Ucita's daughters, his life +was spared. Again, when her father was about to sacrifice him to their +god (they being worshippers of the devil), the same maiden rescued him by +night and set him in the way to escape, and returned because she would not +be discovered." She would have been quite capable of daring even more had +she been a little child of ten or eleven years. + +I do not believe Pocahontas was an inspired maiden, like Joan of Arc, +nor that she was actuated by purely lofty and unselfish motives. I +believe that she was a very ardent, impulsive child, fond of trinkets, +grateful for favours, absolutely uncontrolled, and with plenty of wild +Indian blood in her veins. Whether or no she saved John Smith's life, +she deserves our homage for her kindness in warning him of danger, in +rescuing Henry Spelman, in bringing food to the colonists during the hard +winter of 1608-1609. She knew John Smith for only sixteen months, and yet +in that brief time the two have occupied the stage to the exclusion of +many noble and good men, such is the eagerness with which we welcome the +romances that enliven the prosaic pages of history. She owes much of the +interest attending her life to the fact that the child of a savage should +be presented at court, and receive attention from the highest lords and +ladies in the land. The Beggar-maid was as nothing compared with her, and +Cophetua a very humdrum prince indeed beside Captain John Smith. + +In his usual style, he was wont to repeat that but for her succour when +the colonists were starving, the enterprise would have probably come to +naught. The colonists were in worse condition two winters after John Smith +left them, and Pocahontas never entered Jamestown after he departed. The +colony did not "come to naught." God had planted it; and although it was +watered with blood and tears, forgotten often by its friends, constantly +threatened and devastated by its enemies, and more than once in peril +of utter extinction, it grew and prospered. Never was the prophetic +declaration that "a little one shall become a thousand and a small one +a strong nation," more wonderfully exemplified than in the planting and +rearing of this colony. + + + + +CHAPTER XII + + +The sun was just rising, on a frosty morning in February, when the +sentinels on guard at Jamestown challenged a company of Indians who +were seen defiling through the woods; and were answered by the shout +"wingapoh," on their part, and "friends" in a voice they knew. These +were the Indians sent by Powhatan to conduct Captain Smith to Jamestown. +Doubtless his heart swelled with grateful emotion at the sight of the +humble huts of the little town which meant home to him. He was joyfully +welcomed[38] back after his seven weeks' absence by all except Archer +and two or three confederates. Archer, who had been illegally admitted +into the Council, had now the audacity to indict Smith for the death of +Robinson and Emry, who were slain by the Indians on the Chickahominy, +claiming that he had led them into the snare which caused their death, +and should be executed, according to Levitical law. + +The little town proved no city of refuge to the weary captain. True, +he had friends, but his enemies were stronger than his friends. The +turbulent, selfish, and ignoble were often in the majority in the +colony, and nothing short of the interposition of Providence could +have prevented their being in the ascendant as well. The miracle of its +enduring life lies in the fact that a mere handful of men were enabled, +through superhuman courage and patience, to overcome obstacles, the most +tremendous that ever confronted a company of adventurers. + +In vain Captain Smith explained that Robinson and Emry had fallen victims +to their own imprudence, and neglect of his express orders. In vain was +he sustained by George Percy, Robert Hunt, and other true men. His story +was not believed by the men who had been his enemies from the hour he left +the shores of England; and now, on the day of his return, he was tried +and sentenced to be hanged the next day. + +But the Divine Power that had guided him through so many difficulties +did not forsake him now in his extremity. Early in the night, as he +lay closely guarded, he heard shouts and signals all along the line of +sentinels. They had descried, in the moonlight, a ghostly sail on the +river, and Newport, the long overdue Newport, was coming in with the tide. + +Probably Newport's first inquiry was for Wingfield, his second for John +Smith. Learning of their imprisonment, he indignantly released them +both,--Smith from the hands of the guard, and Wingfield from the pinnace, +where he was still in duress. + +Smith now bethought himself of his promise to send guns and a grindstone +to Powhatan. His guides, with Powhatan's trusty servant, Rawhunt, were +still in the fort, without doubt amazed at the turn things had taken. +Smith now appeared, and conducting them to a spot where two demi-culverins +and a millstone were lying, gave them permission to carry them home to +their king. Of course such a formidable present could not be borne on +the men's shoulders. To give them an idea of the power of the guns, a +cannon was charged with stones and fired at the boughs of a tree. As +the icicle-laden branches came crashing down, the "savages took to their +heels," but presently returning, the captain loaded them with gifts for +Powhatan, his wives and children, and sent them on their way. Doubtless +Pocahontas had not forgotten to entrust to Rawhunt the two little baskets +for white beads to make her a chain. + +Thoughtful men among the first settlers must have regarded Newport's +addition to their number with dismay. There were a few "labourers," +a great many "gentlemen." A jeweller, a perfumer, two refiners, two +goldsmiths, and a pipe-maker were sent out to help subdue the wilderness! +There was not one soldier to aid in protecting the colony against an army +of savages. But there were six tailors! These professors of the fine arts +were evidently intended for the service of the "gentlemen." + +Newport had brought stirring news, and we can imagine the eagerness +with which the homesick exiles listened. He had left England with two +vessels, but the _Ph[oe]nix_, well equipped with men and supplies, had +been separated from his ship in a storm, and he had reason to fear she +was lost. He could report the disappointment of the London Company at the +failure of the gold test, and their discontent that no immediate return +of value seemed likely to reward and reimburse them for all they had +adventured. Surely Newport had tarried in Virginia long enough to bring +home some treasure, some news of Raleigh's lost colony, or some hope of +finding the South Sea! His Majesty's subjects in the rich new land had +evidently been remiss. Of course, letters were received by Percy, Master +Hunt, and the "better class." Percy learned that his noble brother, the +Duke of Northumberland, was still with Sir Walter Raleigh, confined in +the Tower, and that London's learned and scientific men flocked thither +to be entertained by them. Will Shakespeare had written a new play, "King +Lear," and although the distinguished prisoners were not allowed to join +the ardent crowds at the Globe and Blackfriars, they could read and enjoy +the great master as well perhaps in their comfortable apartments in the +Tower, as in the "dingy pit under the smoking flambeaux." John Smith was +especially interested, as his own "fatal tragedies," he once complained, +"had been acted on the stage." + +But the cream of Newport's news was the London gossip. What story could +he tell of the court? Was peace concluded with Spain? Was the Guy Fawkes +conspiracy forgotten? How did the new King promise, and what nobleman was +now in power? The answer to the latter was interesting. A young Scotchman +had broken one of his legs at a tilting in the King's presence, and had, +with this unfair starting, won more than halfway in the race to royal +favour. In one hour he had found all that is meant by the magic word +"favourite." He was poor, even beyond the limits of Scotch poverty, but he +was straight-limbed, well-favoured, strong-shouldered, and smooth-faced, +"with some sort of cunning and show of modesty." The King adored him, +loaded him with jewels and fair raiment, and conferred upon him the honour +of knighthood. People predicted (and truly) that Sir Robert Carr would +rise to be a peer of the realm. The highest dignitaries, Cecil, Suffolk, +and all, vied with each other which should most engage his favour. +When Lady Raleigh on her knees begged her king not to take her captive +husband's estate from her children, he replied, "I maun have the land! I +maun have it for Carr!" + + [Illustration: King James and a Petitioner.] + +As to the King, he was continuing to lead his life of indolence and ease, +hunting much of the time, and lying in bed the greater part of the day +when he had no amusement on hand. His subjects could but rarely gain +access to him. They lay in wait for him whenever he stirred abroad, and +thrust their "sifflications" into his unwilling hands, to be stuffed +unread into convenient pockets. He went so far as to say he would rather +return to Scotland than be chained to the Council table. He dressed in +fantastic colours and wore a horn instead of a sword at his side. His +queen, however, covered her plain person with jewels and behaved with no +more personal dignity than her husband. They were both extravagant beyond +precedent, squandering great sums upon their favourites and their own +pleasures, and always in want of money. Of course the king was cordially +hated by all except his sycophants and men like himself. His perpetual +refrain was, "I am the King! My subjects must honour and fear me." "Your +Queen Elizabeth," said Lord Howard, writing to Harrington, "did talk of +her subjects' love and affection, and in good truth she aimed well: our +King talketh of his subjects' fear and subjection, and herein I think +he doth well too--_as long as it holdeth good_"--all of which seemed a +fantastic fairy tale to his Majesty's starving exiles in Virginia. Some +of them, George Percy for example, felt the pressure of "sorrow's crown +of sorrow, remembering happier things," but there were others, always +present in the colony, and little better than cutthroats, who exulted +in the royal example, and who revelled in the license and freedom of the +remote province, safe from swift chastisement at the strong hands of the +English law. For these, strong hands, cruel hands, were sent out later. +At present, however, the coming of Captain Newport was the occasion of +feasting, trading with the sailors, and a general relaxation from all +labour. + +Powhatan soon heard of Newport's arrival, and sent a present, with an +invitation to Werowocomoco. Newport returned his courtesy with presents, +and began to prepare the pinnace to visit him. + +He was accompanied by Captain Smith and Master Scrivener, "a very wise, +understanding gentleman, newly arrived and admitted to the Counsell," +and thirty or forty chosen men for their guard. But when they reached +the point on York River nearest the residence of Powhatan, a wholesome +fear of that potentate seized Newport. Would the savage king keep faith? +How about ambuscades, arrows, and tomahawks? What was the meaning of the +traplike contrivances over the small streams that must be crossed before +audience could be had of the monarch? Newport shook his head, and finally +Smith, who feared nothing, dead or living, volunteered, with twenty men, +to go ahead and "encounter the worst that can happen." To this Newport +gladly consented, and while he remained beyond range of arrow-shot in +the pinnace with half the escort, Smith set out with his "twenty shot, +armed in Jacks"--_i.e._ quilted jackets then in use which afforded +partial protection against Indian arrows. A novel way this, to accept a +house-party invitation to a palace! + +Powhatan received Smith with a great show of rejoicing and state. He had +much to say to his former captive. "Where is your father [Newport], and +where are the guns and grindstone you promised?" Satisfactory answers +being ready for these questions, he proceeded to promise Smith corn, +wives, and land, provided the twenty men then present would lay their +arms at his feet, as did his subjects. "I told him," said the Captain, +"that was a ceremonie our enemies desired, but never our friends," so that +request, which was to be made perpetually afterwards, was waived for the +present. + +Powhatan then called his guest's attention to certain embellishments he +had made in his grounds since Smith's last visit. A long line had been +stretched between two trees, and upon it, waving in the crisp air, were +the bloody scalps of an entire tribe--the people of Piankatank, his +nearest neighbours and subjects. How they had displeased their emperor +does not appear. Numbers of their women were at work in the royal kitchen +and gardens, and hapless little children, destined to lives of slavery, +were scattered about among them. Great ostentation was made of these to +Smith, and afterwards to Captain Newport. + + [Illustration: Powhatan Oak, over Three Hundred Years Old. + + Copyright, 1906, by Jamestown Official Photo. Corp'n. ] + +The emperor then walked about his ground with Captain Smith, and down to +a bend in the river where lay his fleet of canoes--a fleet in which the +savage king felt as much pride as did our President in a recent review of +our magnificent North Atlantic squadron. + +But while indulging in this affable and amiable conversation, a fanfare +of trumpets arrested Powhatan's attention, and he saw in the distance +Newport--who seems to have found means to strengthen his nerves--with his +escort, making their way inland; whereupon Powhatan hastily retreated to +prepare the reception ceremonies. + +These repeated, in every particular, the tableau we have already +described: the pose on the dais, the embroidered pillow, the robes and +chains, the two seats of honour for the two beauties, the wives and their +attendants all in full dress, beads, pearls, paint, and girdles--and +without doubt Pocahontas, Matichanna, and Cleopatre. His "chiefest men" +also sat in the arbour-house, and forty platters of bread, or more, were +in two rows before the door, while five hundred people stood without as +a guard. Beyond, the mute but eloquent scalps waved ominously in the air +as it was rent by a mighty shout of welcome. + +Powhatan feasted his guests at an abundant dinner of venison, wild fowl, +dried persimmons, nuts, and bread. Mats were laid in order and each guest +sat upon his own small square mat of woven grasses. Indian civilization +had not yet demanded a table. Women, before the feast, handed wooden +finger-bowls and feather napkins. Each guest had his portion in a wooden +platter, gravely laying the platter beside him when empty. From gourds or +wooden bowls they drank the not unpleasant liquid prepared with crushed +walnut-meats and water. There were no knives or forks, but for that matter +neither were there forks in Queen Elizabeth's time. She, and all her +court, used nature's first implement, and found it perfectly convenient +and satisfactory. The dinner knife of the Indian was simply a sharpened +reed. Before eating, each Indian solemnly uttered a few words and cast +a morsel of food into the fire. After the meal finger-bowls were again +offered with the bunch of feathers. Not for one moment did the guests +abate their vigilance! Matches were kept burning to touch off the powder +in their pieces at a moment's notice. Powhatan once argued that the arms +must always be left behind, because these "smoking[39] things made his +women sick!" + +Newport had brought his host a suit of crimson cloth, a white greyhound, +and a hat. He now presented him with a boy named Thomas Savage, whom +Newport called his son, for whom Powhatan gave "Namontacke his trustie +servant and one of a shrewd and subtill capacitie." Purchas remarks in +a marginal note, "The exchange of a Christian for a Savage,"--refraining +from the suggestive pun (a favourite species of English wit at the time) +as being beneath his dignity. The gift, however, was really a loan, and +not understood to mean permanent possession. + +Namontack, the savage of a shrewd and subtle capacity, was intended by +Powhatan to accompany Newport to England, and bring reliable information +thence of the strength of the country. The poor little Christian boy was +to live in constant companionship with these "devils" that he might learn +their language and serve the colony as interpreter. + +Captain Smith, after three or four days spent in feasting and dancing, +and a little traffic in toys, at last proposed trade on a larger basis. +But Powhatan demurred. "It is not agreeable to my greatness," he said +to Newport, "to traffic for trifles in this peddling manner. You, too, I +esteem a great werowance.[40] Therefore lay me down all your commodities +together. What I like I will take, and in recompense give you what I think +their fitting value." + +Captain Smith, who was acting as interpreter between the traders, at +once detected Powhatan's cunning, and implored Newport to be chary of his +goods. But Newport, wishing to express a lordly indifference to commercial +interests, offered his entire outfit of mirrors, copper, bells, hatchets, +cloth, and received in return something less than four bushels of corn! +Newport was astounded. He had expected to freight his pinnace! He lost his +temper and quarrelled with Captain Smith, in consequence probably of the +reproaches of the latter. But the captain contrived to display some blue +beads, simply as objects of interest, and not for barter, seeing "they +could be worn only by royalty." Powhatan fell neatly into the trap, and +bought them for two or three hundred bushels of corn! Blue beads rose in +value. Opechancanough was allowed to buy a few, but "none durst weare any +of them but their greate kings, their wives and children." + +The outwitted Newport retired in chagrin to his pinnace. Before he sailed, +Powhatan sent a feast of bread and venison, and Nantauquas to beg Captain +Smith to visit him again, but to leave his sword and pistol behind. "But +these," said Smith, significantly, "are requests made by our enemies, +never by our friends." + +The next morning there was a parting interview, with promises from +Powhatan to help avenge Newport's son (slain as reported by Smith) by an +invasion of the Monacans. After a good deal of insincere palaver, the +English proceeded on their homeward way, first making a short visit to +the arch-enemy, Opechancanough, at his urgent solicitation. + +Powhatan sent thither for the party to return to him, but upon receiving +their respectful regrets, he sent again, this time by little Pocahontas. +With her, they returned for another short visit to Werowocomoco: more +courtesies, more protestations of friendship, and the loan of another +Indian (probably Machumps) with instructions to report the strength and +wealth of the white man's country. + +And now a new disaster awaited our unhappy colonists. I like the +temperate, homely words of the old writers,--Anas Todkill, William +Phetiplace, and others--and I shall again borrow them. "Wee returned to +the Fort where this new supply being lodged with the rest, accidentally +fired the quarters; and so the Towne, which being but thatched with Reeds, +the fire was so fierce as it burnt our Pallizadoes, though ten or twelve +yards distant, with all our Arms, Bedding, Apparell, and much private +provision. Good Master Hunt, our Preacher, lost all his Librarie, and +all that hee had (but the clothes on his backe), yet none ever saw him +repine at his losse. Upon any alarme he would be as readie for defence as +any; and till he could speake he never ceased to his utmost to animate us +constantly to persist: whose soule questionlesse is with God." + +Newport remained fourteen weeks at Jamestown. He should have left in +fourteen days. Thus his crew again consumed supplies which had been +provided for the colony. But a "small stream of water issuing from a bank +near Jamestown was found to deposit in its channel a glittering sediment +which resembled golden ore. The depositation of this yellow stuff was +supposed to indicate the presence of a gold mine," and presto! all the +little world except Captain Smith "went crazy!" The axe was left in the +tree, the spade in the corn-hill. There was no more thought of tilling or +planting or building. "There was no talke, no hope, no worke, but digge +Gold, wash Gold, refine Gold, load Gold; such a bruit of Gold as one mad +fellow desired to bee buried in the sand least they should by their Art +make Gold of his bones. Little neede there was and lesse reason the shippe +should staye, their wages run on, our victuall consumed,"[41] &c. Purchas, +whose quaint marginal notes bring back our "Pilgrim's Progress" days (he +antedated Bunyan, however), says in the note opposite this page, "Certaine +shining yellow sand (I saw it!) with great promises of gold, like the +promises yeelding sandy performances." + +Captain Smith set his face like a flint against this gold-fever, which +seemed likely to rival Frobisher's experiments and failures in 1577, and +declared he was not enamoured of the golden promise, nor could he bear to +"see necessary business neglected to fraught such a drunken ship with so +much gilded dirt." "Till then," continue our historians (Anas Todkill _et +al_.), "we never accounted Captaine Newport a refiner, who being fit to +set saile for England, and we not having any use for Parliaments, Playes, +Petitions, Admirals, Recorders, Interpreters, Chronologers, Courts of +Plea, nor Justices of Peace, sent Master Wingfield and Captaine Archer +with him for England, to seeke some place of better imployment." + +Newport carried with him twenty turkeys, a present from Powhatan, who +received in return twenty swords, the beginning of his acquisition of the +arms he so coveted. Newport could hardly have done a more unwise thing. +His foolish prodigality prevented all profitable traffic with the Indians +thereafter, and he put into their hands the weapons destined to reach the +hearts of his own countrymen. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII + + +The church that was burned in the Jamestown fire of January 17, 1608, +was the wretched affair of logs, sedge, and dirt, built by the colonists +to take the place of the awning between two trees under which they first +worshipped. In a map of the Virginia settlement sent by Zuniga to Philip +the Third in September, 1608, the site of a church is indicated enclosed +within the fort. Captain Newport employed his mariners in rebuilding this +church, "all which works they finished cheerfully and in short time." The +time, it appears, was short indeed. Anas Todkill and his collaborators +assert that it was "little need they should stay and consume victuall +for fourteene days, that the Mariners might say they built such a golden +Church, that _we_ can say the raine washed neere to nothing in fourteene +days." + +Our "docteur of Divinitie" duly records that when Newport departed +"Captain Smith and Master Scrivener divided betwixt them the rebuilding +Jamestown, the repairing our Pallizadoes, the cutting down trees, +preparing our fields for planting our Corne and rebuilding our Church." +This, at best only a flimsy affair, was the second Church (we suppose the +mariners' work was mended, not destroyed), and the good preacher, Master +Hunt, was still alive. The day of his death is not known. He was certainly +living in December, 1608, for somebody--and doubtless in the church--then +married John Laydon to Ann Burras; and we know of no minister who came +over until 1610. In the interval between his death and the arrival of Mr. +Bucke, daily prayers, and homilies on Sunday, were said in the church, +although there was no minister. We are aware that it behooves us to be +pretty careful in this matter of churches, now that the shovels and picks +of the Association for the Preservation of Virginia Antiquities are busy +with the foundations of the Jamestown churches. They will never find the +foundation of the first one, nor of the second, for the very good reason +that they had none. + +The 20th of April all hands were at work hewing down trees and planting +corn, when an alarum from the guard caused every man to drop axe and hoe +and take up arms, each one expecting an assault from the savages. But +presently a trumpet blast reached the ear, and a ship was seen sailing +up the James with the red cross of St. George flying from the masthead. +This was the _Ph[oe]nix_, a marine ph[oe]nix, rising from the sea after +"many perrills of extreame storms and tempests." This happy arrival of +Captain Nelson, "having been three months missing after Captain Newport's +arrivall, being to all our expectations lost, having been long crossed +with tempestuous weather and contrary winds, did so ravish us with +exceeding joy that now wee thought ourselves as well fitted as our harts +could wish both with a competent number of men as also for all other +needful provisions till a further supply could come to us." Captain +Francis Nelson, "an honest man and expert mariner," turned his back on +the "fantastical gold," and freighted his ship for her return voyage +with cedar; and when he sailed for home he took with him the gold-hunting +Captain Martin, and Smith's "True Relation of Virginia,"--the first book +written by an Englishman in America,--which was printed at the Greyhound +in Paul's Churchyard in London. + + [Illustration: Old Fort--Jamestown Island. + + Copyright, 1906, by Jamestown Official Photo. Corp'n. ] + +Our colonists were living so near the Indian Court, that stirring +incidents were constantly occurring to prevent indulgence in peace and +security. Powhatan soon sent Captain Smith a present of twenty turkeys, +upon condition he should in return receive twenty swords. Smith knew that +Newport had been most imprudent in putting arms in the Indians' hands, so +he accepted the turkeys and returned the usual gifts,--copper kettles, +toys, etc.,--at which his Savage Majesty was hugely displeased. He had +sent his "Christian" boy, Thomas Savage, with the turkeys, but certain +indications of Powhatan's treachery induced Smith to keep the boy. An +Indian was captured and frightened into disclosure of Powhatan's plot to +murder the English as soon as the Indian Namontack should be returned by +Newport. Thefts of spades, shovels, swords, and tools were continually +occurring, and it was discovered that Powhatan had received these stolen +goods. Finally several Paspaheghans were arrested and imprisoned in the +fort. The Indians could never suffer the capture of their men, but would +always ransom them with fair words, presents, and promises. + +Powhatan, hearing that his braves were detained, "sent his Daughter +a child of tenne years old," accompanied by "Rawhunt, exceeding in +deformitie of person, but of a subtil wit and crafty understanding," to +beg their release. The little girl, he knew, would be refused nothing +by the man whose life had been spared for her sake. She had crossed the +York in a canoe, and walked twelve miles through the woods. We can see +Captain Smith, delighted with the sight of her pretty face and graceful, +childish figure, and refreshing her with the best of the dainties Captain +Nelson had left. His sympathy with children we have already noticed. +Indeed, there is no doubt that Pocahontas was a high favourite with all +the colony. No other female, child or woman, ever visited it until Madame +Forrest and Ann Burras arrived in the following December,--nearly two +years after the coming of the English. + +"Rawhunt" (says Smith, whose words are always better than mine), "with +a long circumstance told mee how well Powhatan loved and respected mee; +and in that I should no doubt any way of his kindnesse, he had sent his +child which he most esteemed to see me; a Deare and bread besides for +a present: desiring me that the Boy [Savage] might come againe which he +loved exceedingly. His little Daughter hee had taught this lesson also, +not taking notice at all of the Indeans that had beene prisoners three +daies, till that morning that she saw their fathers and friends come +quietly, and in good tearmes to entreate their libertie. In the afternoon +we guarded them to the Church, and after prayer gave them to Pocahontas, +the King's Daughter, in regard of her father's kindnesse in sending her. +After having well fed them, as all the time of their imprisonment, we gave +them their bowes, arrowes or what else they had and with much content sent +them packing. Pocahontas also we requited with such trifles as contented +her, to tell that we had used the Paspaheyans very kindly in releasing +them."[42] The "Boy" evidently was not returned. The ambassador of a +subtle wit and crafty understanding, failed, it appears, to accomplish +everything. + +I give the age of the little princess as Smith gives it. Other historians +have advanced it two years.[43] Yet another class of her admirers fondly +hope she was fourteen years of age, for then she would have been old +enough to fall in love with Captain Smith, pine at his coldness, break her +heart at finding him after her marriage alive, and broken-hearted die in +England. I am personally anxious to believe she could have been not more +than ten or eleven years old when she came with Rawhunt to beg for the +release of the prisoners. Smith says "tenne years old." + +It must have been during this summer that she came so often to Jamestown. +Strachey, our learned, reliable historian, describes the dress of Indian +maids and matrons, and informs us that girls before twelve years of age +wore none at all in summer. He says, "the before-mentionde Pocahontas, +a well-featured, but wanton young girle, Powhatan's daughter, sometymes +resorting to our fort, of the age then of eleven or twelve years; would +get the boyes forth with her to the market place, and make them wheele, +falling on their hands, turning their heeles upwards; whome she would +follow and wheele soe herselfe, naked as she was, all the fort over." + +This could not have happened had she been older than eleven or twelve, +nor could it have happened in winter. The next summer she would have +been too old for such a pastime and such attire. A recent journal tells +us that Alphonso of Spain was fond of this sport (wheeling on hands and +feet) the summer he went a-wooing before his marriage. I might, therefore, +imagine it to be an amusement of royalty, had I not seen little negroes in +Virginia excel in it. Evidently it was not given us, by the Indians, along +with corn and tobacco. Those wild English "boyes" at the fort taught it +to our little American princess, and if Strachey failed to admire her,--to +find Helen's beauty in a brow of Egypt,--he was unfortunate, besides being +wofully in a minority. All the other Englishmen delighted in her, whatever +she did; and she cordially liked them, and dearly loved the captain who +taught her to call him "father." + +We may be sure that she could not have visited the fort so familiarly +without attracting the notice and interest of the good missionary and +clergyman. An Indian boy named "Chanco" was also a favourite with the +colonists, and was the means, like Pocahontas, of rendering essential +service to them. Like her he became a Christian; and I can but think +that both were taught in their early years by that holy man of God, +Robert Hunt. But here the similitude ceases. She saved the life of John +Smith, and perhaps one other: he saved the lives of all the colonists at +Jamestown. She is justly to be immortalized in bronze on the soil that +but for him would have been bathed in Christian blood; yet no statue of +Chanco will tell the world of his heroic action. + +"There was a little city and few men within it, and there came a great +king against it.... Now there was a poor man and he delivered the +city--yet no man remembered that poor man." + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + + +Now that the _Ph[oe]nix_ had left food enough to sustain the colony all +summer, Captain Smith had leisure to heed the restless stirrings of his +adventurous spirit. He had long wished to explore the great bay, and he +now accompanied the _Ph[oe]nix_ as far as the capes. As the ship "bore +up the helm," and entered her long path on the great sea, he turned the +prow of his little barge northward to the mysterious unexplored waters of +the Chesapeake. Relying upon Indian information, he had sent, by Captain +Newton, almost a pledge that he would find the outlet to the South Sea +through the northern waters, rather than the James or Chickahominy rivers. + +Personally, he had nothing to gain, the crown would be sure to claim +everything; but it behooved him to satisfy the London Company. Christians +and patriots had swelled his sails with paeans and prayers when he left +England, but he had reason to fear that the existence of the colony did +not depend upon the Christian who thought of nothing but the coming of +God's Kingdom on earth; nor upon the patriot who sought only the honour +of old England; but upon a king and company seeking the present gold, and +a path whereby gold-bearing regions might be reached in future. + +The colonists had always been reluctant to cultivate food products, and +were by consequence always starving. This was, in part, because they +were not allowed to plant on their own account, except upon condition +of contributing part of their crops and one month's service annually for +the benefit of the London Company. Neither could they leave the country +without special permission. Private letters from England were constantly +intercepted. It is narrated that a passport from the King for the return +of one of the colonists was sewed in a garter to ensure its delivery. The +settlers were, as a matter of fact, slaves and prisoners, chained hand and +foot to a life of privation and peril. Their true position was concealed +for a while from the English people, but the secret was kept for a short +time only. Banishment to Virginia was worse than death. Scott makes his +profligate apprentice consider the alternative of suicide or life in +Virginia. "I may save the hangman a labour or go the voyage to Virginia," +said "Jin Vincent." Three thieves, under sentence of death, were offered +pardon and transportation to Virginia. One of the three preferred hanging. +The other two were sent to the long-suffering colonists. "The first +country in America," says Stith, "is under the unjust scandal of being +another Siberia, fit only for the vilest of people." + +Captain Smith's voyage, made in an open barge, was full of adventure. He +explored every river, every inlet. He visited the site of the future city +of Baltimore, and rowed close under the hill known to-day as Mt. Vernon. +He was sometimes assailed by the arrows of the Indian, and sometimes +adored by him as a god. His adventures were peculiar and thrilling, and it +is my readers' loss that I cannot relate them all in this modest volume. +Perhaps no one of them is more dramatic than the picture he draws of the +dusky crowd that once gathered around him; when, according to his daily +custom, he offered a prayer for God's protection and guidance, and joined +with his comrades in a psalm of praise. All at once the savages turned +their faces eastward, and raising their hands with passionate gestures, +"began a fearful song," and ended by embracing Captain Smith. Poor +fellows! They too had a god! They recognized in the strange white man a +brother! + +In these two voyages (for the explorers returned for food once) Smith +sailed about three thousand miles. They returned to Jamestown early +in September (1608), having encountered a terrible hurricane near the +peaceful spot they had named Point Comfort when they first passed between +the capes. Smith made haste to draw his wonderfully accurate map of +Virginia. This map was the recognized authority for many years, and +indeed survives in the maps of to-day. All subsequent researches have only +expanded and illustrated Smith's original view.[44] + +He had not found the passage to the South Sea, nor the gold mine that +Powhatan's people had led him to expect. The rainbow still spanned the +continent, and the pot of gold was still at the end of the rainbow, and +there, sure enough, it was found, more than two hundred years afterward! + +While this expedition was in progress, the golden dreams of the colonists +were finally dispelled. They awaked to all the miseries of the preceding +summer, sickness, scarcity, disappointment, and discontent. Smith returned +to reanimate their drooping spirits, and refresh their physical wants by +provisions he collected on his voyage. + +The chronicles written by one of our trusty "first planters" sums up the +situation at Jamestown, "The silly President (Ratcliffe) had notoriously +consumed the stores, and to fulfill his follies about building a house +for his pleasure in the woods, had brought them all to that misery that +had we not arrived they had as strangely _tormented him with revenge_." +We are left to imagine the grim inventions of the mutineers. The "strange +torment," however, was prevented by Smith, who strove to be a peacemaker; +but the colonists were inexorable. Again was their President deposed, or +allowed to resign; and John Smith, by a popular election, became President +of Virginia. + +And now in October an unexpected ship appears on the broad bosom of the +James. The London Company has hurriedly fitted out the _Mary & Margaret_, +and sent Newport back to hasten Smith's discovery of the northward passage +to the South Sea. As the ship approaches, the keen eyes of the crowd on +shore discern something besides the red cross of St. George fluttering in +the autumn breeze. What means this white pennon like a flag of truce? The +amazed watchers rub their eyes and gaze again. "It looks like--but no, +that cannot be--it certainly _looks_ like--yes, _it is_--an APRON!" + +Sure enough, on the forward deck a small slip of a maiden stands beside +a matron in ruff and farthingale, and the little maid's apron signals +a greeting to the shore. This is little fourteen-year-old Ann Burras. +Her brother, "John Burras, Tradesman," is on board. She is going to be +a famous woman very soon, young as she is. She is going to marry John +Laydon, and hers will be the first marriage, and her little daughter will +be the first English child born in Virginia, and the London Company will +be proud of her and look to her dower; and so she and her John will found +the genuine "first family" in Virginia. She is very unconscious of all +this as she stands in her ruff and short petticoat, beside her mistress, +Madame Forrest, who is brave in a farthingale, long, pointed bodice, lace +ruff, and broad-banded hat. Her husband, "Thomas Forrest, Gentleman," is +on board, but the "Gentleman" and his Madam signify very little beside +the rosy English maiden who serves them. + +The news brought by Newport this time was too exciting to leave room +for interest in Zuniga's hysterics and the court happenings. Ratcliffe +had written home by the last mail that Smith and his followers intended +to seize the country and divide it among themselves. This the Right +Honourables were ready and willing to believe, having been enlightened, +doubtless, by the disgraced Wingfield. The orders were now explicit. There +were to be no more evasions, no more apologies, no more subterfuge. The +Virginia colonists were to discover and return one of the lost Roanoke +men, to send back a lump of gold, and to find the South Sea--eastward or +northward, or beyond the mountains. Moreover, the returning ship was to be +freighted with goods, the sale of which would reimburse the company for +its present outlay. Failing in obedience to these orders, the settlers +must "consider themselves an abandoned colony," and "remain in Virginia +as banished men." In order to facilitate the progress to the South Sea, +the company had kindly sent out a barge in sections, to be borne on the +men's backs across the intervening mountains, and to be pieced together +when the river running into the South Sea should be reached. + +Captain Smith suspected Newport of having instigated these orders, and +a violent quarrel ensued. Smith threatened to send the _Mary & Margaret_ +home, and keep Newport for a year, put him to work, and let him see for +himself how matters stood at Jamestown. However, differences were smoothed +over for the present. + +King James the First had foolishly amused himself by causing a trumpery +crown of copper to be made for Powhatan the First, and sent it with +instructions for a formal coronation ceremony. Sundry presents were to +accompany the crown--a bedstead, scarlet cloak, ewer, and basin. Smith +was sent overland to invite the Emperor to come to Jamestown for his +coronation. + +When he arrived at Werowocomoco, he found Powhatan gone on a journey to +one of his several country houses. A messenger was despatched to fetch +him. Meanwhile a great fire was kindled in a field near a wood, and +before it mats were spread for the party of Englishmen. They were probably +smoking comfortably, after the manner of tired men, when they heard such +a "Hideous noise and shrieking that the five Englishmen betook themselves +to their arms and seized two or three old men by them, supposing Powhatan +with all his power was come to surprise them. But presently Pocahontas +came, willing them to kill her if any hurt were intended; and the +beholders, which were men, women, and children, satisfied the Captain +there was no such matter."[45] + +In all our descriptions of Indian ceremonies hitherto, as well as now, it +must not be forgotten that we describe the fashions of the Sylvan Court, +or, if you please, the Court Barbarian. Masques were in high vogue at +this time at the Court of St. James. Here, also, in the western wilderness +was to be a masque, the melodrama to be produced by an amateur company in +private theatricals. + +"Presently," says our historian, "thirty young women came naked out of +the woods (only covered before and behind with a few greene leaves), their +bodies all painted, some white, some red, some black, some parti-colour; +but every one different. Their leader had a faire paire of stagge's hornes +on her head, and an otter skinne at her girdle, another at her arme, a +quiver of arrowes at her backe, and bow and arrowes in her hand. The next +held in her hand a wooden sword; another a club; another a pot-stick: all +horned alike. The rest every one with their severall devises. + +"These fiends, with most hellish cries and shouts rushing from amongst +the trees, cast themselves in a ring about the fire, singing and dauncing +with excellent ill varietie, or falling into their infernall passions and +then solemnly again to sing and daunce. Having spent neere an hour in this +maskarado; as they entered in like manner they departed. + +"Having re-accomodated themselves, they solemnly invited Smith to their +lodging; but no sooner was hee within the house, but all these nimphes +more tormented him than ever with crowding and pressing and hanging upon +him, most tediously crying '_Love you not mee? Love you not mee?_' + +"This salutation ended the feast was set consisting of fruit in baskets, +fish and flesh in wooden platters: beans and pease there wanted not (for +twenty hogges), nor any Salvage daintie their invention could devise; some +attending, others singing and dancing about them. This mirth and banquet +being ended, with fire-brands (instead of torches), they conducted him to +his lodging."[46] + +The next day Powhatan arrived. There were no more "antics," no more mirth. +Diplomacy and cunning ruled the hour. As to the "maskarado," the less we +say perhaps the better, seeing it was meant in kindness. It could hardly +have been an improvised entertainment! Pocahontas had possibly been drawn +to the fort by news of the arrival of the two ships, and had learned of +Smith's proposed visit. It is stated by one of the chroniclers that _she_ +was the leader. We will give her the benefit of a doubt. Perhaps she had +already met Madame Forrest and Ann Burras, and been given some Christian +garments; and having ordered the dramatic performance, was seated in +grave dignity among the spectators. We think this is possible. There is no +reason, because she wheeled on hands and feet the last summer, she should +go this length in the autumn. + +I can hardly imagine a more brilliant _mise en scene_; the forest in its +gorgeous autumnal splendour, the brightly painted, party-coloured young +girls with deer's antlers on their dusky brows, the fitful footlights of +a blazing fire, the shimmering curtain of smoke! The audience seated in +picturesque groups on the mats of reeds fill in the picture. + +Smith was coldly received by the emperor, nor was the latter softened +by the promise of presents, the invitation to Jamestown, and the return +of Namontack. He curtly replied: "If your King have sent me presents, I +also am a King, and this is my land. 8 days will I stay to receive them. +Your father is to come to me, not I to him; nor yet to your fort: neither +will I bite at such a bate. As for the Monacans, I can revenge my owne +injuries; as for the place where you say your brother was slain, it is a +contrary way from those parts you suppose it. As to any salt water beyond +the mountains, the relations you have from my people are false."[47] + +This was decisive and squarely to the point; so Newport sent the presents +by water, and he, with fifty of the best shot, went himself by land and +awaited the arrival of the barge. + + [Illustration: "The newly crowned potentate started with terror."] + +All things ready, a day was fixed for the coronation. The basin and ewer +were presented, the bedstead set up (probably a great four-poster), and +the scarlet cloak with much ado put upon the emperor, "being persuaded by +Namontack they would do him no hurt." But kneel to receive the crown his +Majesty would not. He positively refused to bend his knee. Finally, by +leaning hard on his shoulders, he was made to stoop a little, and Newport +hastily clapped the crown on his head, when at the signal of a pistol +shot, the boats fired such a volley that the newly crowned potentate +started with terror, and could with difficulty be reassured. Regaining +his wonted serenity, he gravely presented his old shoes and his mantle of +raccoon skins trimmed with raccoon tails to Captain Newport. After some +complimental kindness on both sides, he also presented Newport with a +heap of wheat ears, that might when winnowed yield seven or eight bushels; +wherewith the coronation party returned to the fort. There the consensus +of opinion may be briefly stated: "As for the Coronation of Pawhatan, and +his presents, they had been better spared than so ill spent. This stately +kind of soliciting made him so much overvalue himselfe that he respected +us as nothing at all." It was an absurd piece of folly on the part of "the +wisest fool in Christendom." + +This was the only order of the company that Newport was able to carry out. +He travelled far in the Monacan country, where the "Stoics of the woods" +received him in an impassive, noncommittal manner. He hunted up and down +for Raleigh's men, for gold, for the South Sea. He found none of these +things, and so, having no greater treasures than pitch, tar, glass, and +soap ashes wherewith to satisfy the Company for its outlay of two thousand +pounds, he was fain to sail away, leaving behind none to regret him. + +The colony had suffered much from the presence of the two ships. The +sailors, as usual, consumed a large part of the supplies, and they also +engaged in an illicit traffic with the Indians and men "of the baser sort" +in the colony. + +The latter traded "chisels, hatchets, pickaxes, and mattocks with the +sailors for butter, cheese, beefe, porke, aqua vitae, beere, bisket, and +oatmeale." Out of three hundred hatchets, not twenty could be found when +the ship sailed. And these implements, so much coveted by the Indians, +had been traded again with them for "furres, baskets, muscaneekes [?] and +young beasts." One mariner boasted that he had collected enough furs to +sell for thirty pounds, having paid, probably, a hatchet for them. The +young beasts were great curiosities in England. The Earl of Southampton +in a letter to the Earl of Salisbury wrote in 1609:-- + + "MY LORD, + + "Talkinge with the King by chance I tould him of the Virginia + squirrills which they say will fly, whereof there are now divers + brought into England, and hee presently and very earnestly asked + mee if none of them was provided for him, sayinge that hee was + sure you would gett him one of them. I would not have trobled you + with this but that you know so well how he is affected by these + toyes, and with a little enquiry of any of your folkes you may + furnish yourself to present him att his comminge to London which + will not bee before Wensday next: the Monday before Theobald's + and the Saterday before that to Royston. Your lordships most + assuredly, + + "to doo your service, + "H. SOUTHAMPTON." + +Captain Smith indulged himself in writing an imprudent, sharp letter +to the "Right Honourables" in London. He entitled his epistle "A Rude +Answer," in which he exhibited in caustic terms the preposterous folly of +expecting a present profitable return from Virginia. As to gold, he had +from the first discouraged all hope of it. The pieced barge for the South +Sea? That, at least, was a feasible project. True, it could not be borne +many hundreds of miles and over mountains on the backs of his men, but he +could burn it and have the ashes carried over in a bag! + +He then rallies the company for its prodigality in giving Newport a +hundred pounds a year for carrying news, and informs them that he sends +Ratcliffe home lest the colonists should cut his throat. + +All this did but little good to our captain, as he had cause to realize +afterward. "Had Newport suspected the character of the Rude answer," says +Cooke, "it is probable he would have dropped it into the Atlantic. But he +duly took it to England and the Right Honourables no doubt gasped at its +truculence." + + + + +CHAPTER XV + + +In December, 1608, there were two hundred men within the palisades at +Jamestown; already, although the weather was delightful, "affrighted with +famine." The little wooded peninsula, small and marshy as it was, might +with proper foresight and industry have yielded corn and garden products, +but as Captain Smith in his "Rude Answer" had stated: "The one-half of us +are sicke, the other little better. Our diet is usually a little meale +and water, and not sufficient of that. Though there be fish in the sea, +fowles in the aire, and beasts in the woods, their bounds are so large, +they so wilde, and we so weake and ignorant, we cannot trouble them. And +we must long lodge and feed the men you send before they can be made +good for anything. In over-toyling our weake unskilful bodies, we can +scarce recover ourselves from one supply to another. If you would send +out carpenters, husbandmen and diggers-up of trees' roots, they would be +worth more than a thousand of such as we have." + +It was always the old "question of bread and cheese," which has settled +adversely many a good cause. Smith, however, did his best with the +effeminate gentlemen who had come in Newport's latest ship. He himself +shrank from no toil, no exposure. Neither danger nor labour discouraged +his manhood, and with his example before them--grappling as he did with +the hardest tasks--his followers were deprived of all excuse for complaint +or discontent. Two very choice "gallants"--Gabriel Beadle and John +Russell, "both proper gentlemen," were among the thirty whom he invited +to join him in the noble art of wood-craft--felling trees, splitting +them with wedges, and shaping them with hatchets into clapboards for +the additional shelter needed by themselves. Meantime they were to lie +in the woods at night. The _Mary & Margaret_ had brought over six mares +and a horse, so these new "gentlemen" would not be forced, as were their +predecessors, to bear this timber on their backs out of the forest. + +The novelty had its charm of pleasurable excitement.[48] "Strange were +these pleasures to their conditions, yet lodging, eating, drinking, +working or playing, they doing but as the President, all these things +were carried so pleasantly as within a weeke they became Masters; making +it their delight to heare the Trees thunder as they fell. But the Axes so +oft blistered their tender fingers that commonly every third blow had a +lowd Oath to drowne the Echo." + +Captain Smith rarely indulged in the courtly luxury of profane swearing, +and was not inclined to grant privileges to others he did not allow +himself. He resolved to have none of it in his Majesty's colony. As for +himself he did not need it. He could command vigorous English without it; +and so he set about the reformation of the "Gallants and proper Gentlemen" +lately come from the English court. He adopted, as a remedial agent, a +novel punishment. "He had every man's Oathes numbered, and at night for +every Oath a Kan of water was powered down his Sleeve, with which every +Offender was so washed (_himselfe and all_) that a man should scarce +heare an Oath in a Weeke." And so, we gather, the Captain was after all +sometimes overtaken, as well as other people. + +The narrator of this incident, Richard Pots, wishes us to make no mistake. +"By this," he continues, "let no man thinke the President or these +Gentlemen spent their times as common Wood-hackers at felling Trees or +such like labours: or that they were pressed to anything as hirelings +or common slaves; for what they did (beeing but once a little inured) it +seemed they conceited it only a pleasure and a recreation. Yet thirty or +forty of such Gentlemen would doe more in a day than one hundred of the +rest that must be prest by compulsion." + +This was doubtless due to their President's excellent humour and judgment. +Had he played the martinet with his volunteers, he might have had their +axes about his ears. Doubtless he was highly pleased with his "Gallants +and proper Gentlemen," but he afterwards confessed that "twentie good wor +men had been better than them all." + +The haze of the Indian summer (when "the sun looks back with regret") was +hanging over river and forest, and softening the outlines of the hills. +Smoke from many fires in the woods mingled with the purple haze. These +fires were under the kettles of the Dutchmen who were making potash by +evaporating the lye obtained from leaching wood ashes. Alkalis were in +great demand in England, hence the quantity of soap ashes with which +the early ships were freighted. Soap itself was a forbidden article of +domestic use. There was a severe penalty against throwing soap suds in the +open street. The dreadful Oriental plague had appeared in London, and it +was thought then that "not only soap-boilers and vendors of soap, but all +the washerwomen and all they whose business it was to use soap--nay they +who only wore shirts washed with soap--presently died of the Plague."[49] + +All hands were called from the forest and the kettles early in December +to attend the first English marriage in Virginia. Of course pretty Ann +Burras found many admirers in a colony of two hundred men, and equally, of +course, she could accept but one. Her bridegroom, John Laydon, Carpenter, +was twenty-seven. They were all young men. Captain Smith and George Percy +were not yet thirty, and they were among the elders. + +The ceremony was performed, doubtless, in the church, and by good Master +Hunt, who was soon to be called to the reward of a noble Christian life. +It is altogether probable that Pocahontas was present. "She came as freely +to the fort as to her father's house, bringing corn and game and whatever +she could get for Captain Smith." She was known by all as the "Deare & +Darling Pocahontas," and when a wedding was to the fore we may be sure +she was apprised of it. + +Little Ann Burras brought good fortune to her honest carpenter. More +than once they were given land in Virginia, at one time as much as five +hundred acres. She bore many children. There was a Catharine, an Alice, +and a Margaret; but the first child was named "Virginia." The family lived +long, and survived all the hard times--the starvation, the sickness, and +the great massacre of 1622. How different was the fate of Ellinor Dare, +and her hapless little Virginia! + +One is tempted to linger in the sweet Indian summer time, and listen to +the wedding bells and cheery talk of the woodsmen in the forest--for these +were the last "good times" these hapless colonists were to know for many +a long day. Just at the moment they were happily unconscious that war, +pestilence, and famine stood hand in hand at their door. + +Autumn lingers long on the banks of the lower James. There, near +Jamestown, I have gathered roses on Christmas Day. One peculiarity of the +climate is that summer can depart in an hour,--the sun hidden in darkness +and the face of the earth thickly blanketed under snow. This had not yet +happened, however, and the newcomers rejoiced in the belief that they +had fallen upon a heavenly climate. Captain Smith, George Percy, and the +survivors of the first winter knew better. + +They were dependent upon the Indians for corn, as usual, but Powhatan had +evinced no friendship since he perceived that the colony was regularly +reenforced from abroad. Indeed, his attitude was distinctly hostile. + +Captain Smith attempted to draw supplies from the Nansemond Indians, but +was repulsed with the message that the emperor had not only forbidden +them to surrender their corn, but ordered them not to allow the English +to enter their river. Whereupon Smith put a torch to one of their houses, +and signified that such should be the fate of all unless the grain were +forthcoming. The argument was answerable in but one way. They made haste +to load his boats, and he set out on his return to the fort. That night +the untimely snow came and covered them in their open barge, so they +landed, dug a space in the deep snow, and built a fire. When the heat had +sufficiently dried the spot, they threw off the fire, swept the ground, +and covering it with a mat, "slept as if it had been a palace." "To keepe +us from the winde we made a shade of another mat; and the winde turned, +we turned our shade; and when the ground grew cold, we renewed the fire. +Thus many a cold winter night have we laine in this miserable manner: yet +those that most commonly went upon these occasions were always in health, +lusty and fat." + +Scarcely had the Captain brought his captured supplies in safety to +Jamestown, than he was off upon another foraging expedition. Percy also +set forth with Scrivener on a similar quest, but returned disheartened, +having procured nothing. Powhatan's orders had been general. + +But the President, "whom no perswasions could perswade to starve," was +full of resource. There was no time to lose. All nature was now shrouded +in a heavy mantle of snow, and there were few stores in the fort. The +common kettle held only coarsely crushed corn, which was boiled into a +thick porridge. There was absolutely nothing more, except dried sturgeon +and of this a limited supply. The colonists huddled together behind their +palisade, sorely "affrighted" at the thought of famine. + +Their President called his Council together--George Percy, Captain Waldo, +Scrivener, and Francis West, brother to Lord Delawarre. He had a plan, +daring beyond precedent; but desperate men are capable of desperate +measures. He proposed to take a number of armed men to Werowocomoco, and +by stratagem or force capture Powhatan, hold him for ransom, and thus +extort supplies. His scheme was thoroughly approved, and the Council set +about the preparation of the pinnace and two barges. + +Powhatan was also snow-bound, and he, too, had a plan. If he could +slay Captain Smith, and secure some arms, the rest would be easy. But +he must do everything by cunning. His arrows, in open combat, availed +little against the Englishman's firearms. He now professed to covet +sundry domestic comforts. He sent an invitation to Captain Smith with a +request for men to build him a house,--the four-poster had inspired his +ambition,--and to come himself and "bring him a Grindstone, fiftie Swords, +some Peeces, a Cocke and a Henne, with Copper and Beads, and he would load +Smith's ship with corne." + +The Captain, although "not ignorant of his devices," fell neatly into +the trap. He immediately despatched four of his eight Dutchmen overland +to build the house, promising to come by water as soon as he could get +his pinnace ready. But first he wished to reconnoitre a little and to +that end visited on his way the friendly chief of Weraskoyack.[50] The +chief endeavoured to dissuade him from his journey, "advising him in +this manner: Captaine Smith, you shall find Powhatan to use you kindly +but trust him not; and be sure he have no opportunitie to seize on your +armes for he hath sent for you only to cut your throats." This was not a +popular view to take of the situation. Smith thanked him for his counsel, +and departed, leaving his page, Samuel Collier, with the friendly savage +to learn the Indian language. He then, mindful of the express orders from +London, detached from his company a soldier, Michael Sicklemore, gave +him guides and directions to search for the lost company of Sir Walter +Raleigh, and also to "find Silke Grasse,"[51] and set forth on his voyage. + +The route was a circuitous one, down the James, around Point Comfort, +then some distance up the bay to the mouth of York River, and thence up +the river to Werowocomoco, nearly opposite to Jamestown. It was the 12th +of January (they had set sail the 29th of December), when their barge +broke the ice at ebb tide opposite Powhatan's settlement. "Master Russell +(whom none could perswade to stay behind) being somewhat ill and exceeding +heavie, so over-toyled himselfe as the rest had much adoe (ere hee got +ashore) to regain his benummed spirits," so they rested in the first house +they could find, and sent to Powhatan for provisions! The next day they +had audience of the emperor, who surprised Smith by coolly enquiring when +they proposed to leave the country, and why[52] had they come to visit +him at the present time?--adding that if provision was the object he had +little corn and his people less, nevertheless for forty swords he would +sell forty bushels. + +Smith answered by showing him the men there present who had brought him +the invitation, whereat the king concluded the matter with merry laughter: +asking, however, for "Gunnes and swordes, and valueing a basket of Corne +more precious than a Basket of Copper, saying hee could eate his Corne +but not his Copper." + +After more sparring, the truth came out. "Captaine Smith," saith the king, +"some doubt I have of your comming hither, that makes me not so kindly +seeke to releeve you as I would; for many doe informe mee your comming is +not for Trade, but to invade my people and possesse my Country; who dare +not come to bring you corne seeing you thus armed with your men. To cleere +us of this feare leave aboord your weapons for here they are needlesse, +we being all friends and Powhatans." + +The captain answered that he had many courses to have made provision, but +had neglected everything to oblige his Majesty in the matter of the Cock +and Henn, Beads, and copper; and also had neglected the building of his +own house to send his carpenters for Powhatan's building. As to swords +and guns, he respectfully reminded his Majesty that he long ago told him +he had none to spare, etc., etc. + +As our captain had no stenographer, we are amazed at the great length, +minuteness of detail, and apparent accuracy of the long harangues that +filled all that day and the next. His memory was good. His enemies have +argued that his imagination was better. He undoubtedly laid himself +open to this criticism, but although we may indulge ourselves in the +hope that so great a man betrayed no foible, still we are all human; and +which of us, having a good story to tell, can resist the temptation to +embroider it a little? Does not Talleyrand say that he who can suppress a +_bon mot_ deserves canonization? Is not a gorgeous bit of history worth +more than a poor little _bon mot_? The brave Captain has suffered much +at the hands of his stern, truth-loving fellow-man. But if we must take +something _cum grano_, must we reject all? "No one thinks Herodotus a liar +because he relates in minute detail conversations which no man could have +remembered." Smith lived in an age of bewilderment, and amid scenes of the +wildest intoxication. No doubt he had his dreams, visions, and exaggerated +fancies. It is hard, but if a historian sees men in buckram in a moment +of hallucination, he may really meet and overthrow an army with banners, +and a wicked world will remember those men in buckram! + +Powhatan and our captain may have made all those long speeches, which +were so creditable to the latter. At the conclusion of every one of the +emperor's utterances, he demanded that the English should come to him +unarmed. One of Smith's speeches--nay, all of them, I should like to +repeat here, but one of them pleases me more than the rest. At the end of +two days' travail the Captain sums up:-- + +"Powhatan, you must knowe as I have but one God, I honour but one King; +and I live not here as your subject, but as your friend (!) to pleasure +you with what I can. By the gifts you bestowe on me you gaine more than +by trade; yet would you visit mee as I doe you, you should knowe it is +not our customes to sell our courtesie as a vendible commoditie." + +The story is too long to relate here. The struggle was between an angry, +jealous savage and a very hungry Englishman. It ended in Smith's attempt +to carry out his plan and capture Powhatan, in the flight of the latter, +in two or three perilous positions in which Smith came near falling +into traps set for him and losing his life,--and finally, in a scheme of +Powhatan's to make friends again, load the pinnace with corn, and invite +all the visiting party to a series of merry entertainments, feasting, and +dancing. A great banquet was to follow this merriment. At this banquet +every white man was to be massacred. It is a peculiarity of the Indian +that when he means mischief he feeds his victim with one hand and brains +him with the other. + + [Illustration: "'Powhatan comes to kill you all.'"] + +"The eternal all-seeing God did prevent Powhatan, and by a strange meanes. +For Pocahontas, his dearest jewell and daughter, in that darke night came +through the irksome woods, and tolde our Captaine great cheare should be +sent by and bye: but that Powhatan and all the power he could make, would +after come and kill us all, if they that brought it could not kill us with +oure owne weapons when we were at supper. Therefore, if we would live, +shee wished us presently to be gone. + +"In requital for this information, our President would have given her such +things as she delighted in, but with teares running downe her cheekes, +she said she durst not be seene to have any; for if Powhatan should know +it she were but dead; and so she ranne away as she came."[53] + +Touching as is this proof of the devotion of the Indian girl to Captain +Smith, one cannot but pity the old emperor. He had just declared himself +the sole survivor of three generations of his people--generations who were +lords of the inherited lands of their fathers. The stranger from across +the seas was slowly but surely increasing in strength and numbers. He +could hope for nothing while the intruder fought behind those terrible +things with eyes of lightning and a voice of thunder. Possessing these, +the Indian might be the peer of the white man, and drive the usurper from +the country. Evil as were the designs of this savage, cruel as were his +methods of revenge, his instincts were perfectly natural; instincts born +of a consciousness of his own rights and desire to protect them which in +civilized rulers have ever been reckoned noble. + +We can but sympathize with this King Lear of the western world, betrayed +in his old age by his "dearest jewell, his darling daughter." Well might +he exclaim with the ancient Briton:-- + + "How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is + To have a thankless child!" + +Of course it is not for us to blame Pocahontas for her humane treason. +She, too, had her instincts. The man she adored was about to be murdered +in her father's house. It is useless to affect that the devotion she +constantly expressed was for the colony. She never set foot in Jamestown +after Captain Smith left it! She never brought corn in that terrible time, +the winter after he sailed away. It was for his sake, I am constrained to +believe, that she hid Wyffin, and rescued Henry Spelman. + +Smith's next attempt was to wrest his supplies from Opechancanough, and +here he succeeded by seizing the chief by his scalp-lock, and with a +pistol pressed to his bosom, held him thus until the corn was forthcoming. + +So in the end his "plan" was not wholly unsuccessful, while that of the +subtle savage seemed to fail utterly. He too was partially successful, +however. He availed himself of the perfidy of Adam and Francis, two of +the house-building Dutchmen, and sent them quickly overland to the fort, +to say that the interview had ended happily, but that Captain Smith, +having need of all the arms he could get, had sent for a supply from +the fort. These two men, Adam and Francis, had confederates there, and +savages waited outside to carry the arms away. A great number of swords, +pikes, pieces, etc., were stolen and sent to Powhatan. Another consort, +"Samuel," who had remained with the emperor, had also acquired three +hundred hatchets, fifty swords, and eight pikes. These Dutchmen persuaded +Powhatan that he was not safe at Werowocomoco, and advised him to leave +the building of his house and move to Orapakes, one of his interior seats. +Before Captain Smith could reach home, a bearer of bad news sought him +at Werowocomoco. Scrivener, Antony Gosnell, and eight others had been +drowned near Hog Island. The messenger Wyffin perceived such "preparation +for warre at Werowocomoco that he did assure himselfe [the President not +being there] that some mischief was intended. Pocahontas hid him for a +time, and sent them who pursued him the cleane contrary way to seeke him, +and by her meanes and extraordinary bribes and much trouble in three days +travell" at length he found the President with Opechancanough, "in the +middest of turmoyles." + +"And so," continues our historian (Wyffin, or Abbot, or Phettiplace, or +Todkill, we know not which, for all sign it), "the President finding his +intent frustrated and that there was nothing now to be had and an unfit +time to revenge abuses, sent Master Michael Phettiplace to Jamestown, +whither we sayled with all the speed we could; wee having in this journey +kept 46 men six weeks, and for 40 lbs. of Iron and Beads, and 25 lbs. of +Copper, we got neere 200 lbs. of deere suet [which was used as butter] +and delivered to the Cape Merchant 479 Bushels of Corne." They arrived at +Jamestown February 8, 1609. + + + + +CHAPTER XVI + + +While Captain Smith was engaged in the life-and-death struggle for food +with the Indian Emperor, Newport was arriving in England and unloading, +along with his clapboards and soap-ashes, a large budget of news adverse +to the President of the Virginia colony. Wingfield, Archer, Martin, +Nelson, Ratcliffe, and Newport were willing contributors. + +The "Governors and Councillors established for the Plantation of Virginia" +were apprised of sundry errors which it was necessary to rectify, besides +"outrages and follies" committed by the President of the Council of +Virginia. The managers of the enterprise, "perceivinge that the plantation +went backwards rather than forwards," held special meetings at the +Earl of Exeter's house and elsewhere in London, and after consultation +with Hakluyt, Hariot, and others, "of all the inconveniences in the +three supplies (1606, 1607, 1608), and finding them to arise out of two +rootes--_the forme of government_, and length and danger of the passage +by the southerly course of the Indys, they determined to petition the King +for a special charter,"[54] etc. + +Accordingly a new charter was drawn up by Sir Edwin Sandys, then leader +of the independent party in Parliament. The twenty-first article of this +charter was, in view of future events, most significant. It inserted these +words in italics: "_and every of their children which shall happen to be +born within any of their Limits ... shall have and enjoy all Liberties, +Franchises and Immunities of free Denizens and natural subjects with +any of our other Dominions, to all intents and purposes as if they had +been abiding and born within this Realm of England or any other of our +Dominions_." To this chartered right--"the unalienable rights of freeborn +Englishmen," our forefathers appealed when they protested against the +royal form of government in America. + +The special charter was promptly granted by James the First, but it had +to go through a long routine before it could be signed and sealed by the +King. + +By the new charter, the limits of the colony were extended two hundred +miles north and two hundred miles south of the mouth of James River; +the western boundary, the undiscovered ocean. The members of the London +Council were to be chosen by the Company, not appointed by the King; +Virginia was to be ruled by a Governor, Lieutenant-Governor, and Admiral, +who were empowered, in case of necessity, to declare martial law. These +officers were now appointed: Sir Thomas, Lord Delaware, was to be Governor +and Captain-General; Sir Thomas Gates, Lieutenant-Governor; Sir George +Somers, Admiral. These were men of rank and high character. It was +supposed that Wingfield, Ratcliffe, and Smith had been too obscure for +their position. A fleet of nine vessels and five hundred settlers, men, +women, and children, were to be sent out to do the work which the little +trio, _Susan Constant_, _Discovery_, and _Goodspeed_, had undertaken when +they dropped down the Thames in 1606. + +By the provisions of the new charter the Virginia colony became indeed +more independent and republican, but under the new system the Governor +was endued with arbitrary power and authorized to declare martial law; +and the condition of the colonists was infinitely worse than before. +This they found to their bitter cost a few years later, when the hapless +sojourners at Jamestown fled from their homes and hid among friendly +Indians to escape the brutality of one of their governors. The sudden +repeal of the old charter evinced a cold ingratitude for the services of +Captain Smith and his associates, who had endured the toil, privations, +and dangers of the first settlement. These "true men" were not consulted. +They were utterly ignored, or branded as injurious to the interests of +the plantation. They will always live in history, which honours their +memory, as the real founders of this nation; while the motley multitude +sent to supersede them perished and came to naught within a very few short +months.[55] + +Remembering the King's jealousy of his own honour and rights, one is +naturally surprised at his prompt acquiescence in the new charter. Those +around him knew him well. It was explained to his satisfaction that he was +now relieved of embarrassment in his relations to the Spanish government; +and that under the company's charter he could "owne it at his pleasure or +disavowe it as might be best for his honour and service." + +"If it take not success, it is done of ther owne heddes. It is but +the attempt of private gentlemen: the State suffers noe losse, noe +disreputation. + +"If it takes success, they are your subjects, they doe it for your +service, they will lay all at your Majesty's feet, and interess your +Majesty therein."[56] + +This suited James exactly. He had much to interest him at home without +being bothered about colonial matters. He could always divide his time +"between his inkstand, his bottle, and his hunting." If he had a mind +for politics, there was plenty across the Channel, in the negotiations +between the Hollanders, Spain, France, and last and _least_ himself. +The Hague Treaty was signed this year (March 29, 1609), and James, +although distinctly snubbed by the Powers, regarded himself a mediator +and peacemaker. Besides, he had much ado to maintain himself,--this +heaven-descended pauper King,--a ruler of whom his subjects complained +that his hands were always in their pockets, and if they did not look +out he would keep them there. Often he could neither pay his servants nor +decently supply his own table. + +Early in March, the Virginia Council in London addressed a letter to +the Mayor and Aldermen, beseeching them to take an active interest in +Virginia, as "an action concerning God and the advancement of Religion, +as well as the honour of the Kingdom." The Lord Mayor responded by sending +copies of their letter to the several city companies, asking them to "make +some adventure in so good and honourable an undertaking." The clergy of +the Church of England now evinced the warmest interest in the movement. +Sermons and tracts were written and sent broadcast throughout the country. +Among the prominent bishops, deans, and reverends who earnestly pleaded +for the conversion of the savages, we find our "Docteur of Divinitie," +Rev. William Symondes. + +The enthusiasm for Virginia caused by these efforts of the clergy, the +change in the charter, and the news of the decay of the plantation are +thus described by Strachey, in the elaborate style of the day:-- + +"Not a yeare of a romain-jubilee, noe, nor the Ethnick Queene of Ephesus, +can be said to have bene followed with more heate and zeale; the discourse +and visitation of it took up all meetings, times, termes, all degrees, +all purses, and such throngs and concourse of personal undertakers, as +the aire seemed not to have more Lights than that holie cause imflamed +Spirits to partake with it." Zuniga was almost beside himself. He wrote +to his King, entreating him in the most earnest manner to "give orders to +have those insolent people in Virginia quickly annihilated." + +On May 11 Edward Reed wrote from London to Mr. Coke of Wedgnocke: "The +sickness increaseth. The Virginians go forward next week." The expedition +of nine vessels, carrying men, provisions, and the plague, sailed from +Plymouth toward the end of May, 1609.[57] Gates and Somers were each +severally authorized, whichever might happen first to reach Jamestown, +to supersede the existing administration until the arrival of Lord +Delaware, who was not to embark for several months, and did not reach +Virginia until more than a year after the fleet sailed. Newport, Gates, +and Somers, finding it impossible to adjust the point of precedence among +themselves, embarked together by way of compromise, in the same vessel, +the _Sea Venture_. In the same ship John Rolfe and his first wife sailed +(the second was Pocahontas), also George Sandys, Strachey the historian, +and the Rev. Mr. Bucke; also Namontack and Matchumps (Machumps?), two of +Powhatan's Indians who were, it appears, in England in May, 1609. + +The fleet, contrary to directions, followed the old circuitous route, +_via_ the Canaries and West Indies, and, of course, as always, were +"caught in the tail of a hurricane." Some of the vessels lost their masts, +some their sails from the sea breaking over the ships. One small vessel +was lost and never heard from again, and the _Sea Venture_, with Governor, +Lieutenant-Governor, Admiral, charter, and all, was separated from the +other ships of the fleet. The other vessels, badly shattered by the storm, +their stores spoiled with sea water, and many of their passengers dead or +dying with the plague, arrived at Jamestown in August, 1609. + +They brought back the early agitators, Martin, Archer, and Ratcliffe, +together with "sundry other captains, divers gentlemen of good means +and high birth, and about three hundred settlers; the greater part of +them profligate youths, packed off from home to escape ill destinies, +broken-down gentlemen, bankrupt tradesmen, and the like, decayed tapsters, +and ostlers, trade-fallen; 'the cankers of a calm world and long peace.'" + +Among the "youths"--we hope only a wild youth and not "profligate,"--was +the Henry Spelman, son of Sir Henry Spelman, of literary fame, whom we +remember as a fine fellow and good nurse. He came over in the _Unity_, and +had a career of adventure second to none in the colony. He was rescued +once from massacre by Pocahontas, was a valiant soldier and expert +interpreter, and fell at last, in 1623, under the tomahawk of the Indian. + +The story of the _Sea Venture_ is a thrilling one. Who can read unmoved +of Sir George Somers, the brave old Admiral, who scarce took leisure +to eat or sleep day or night, but stood at the helm and kept his ship +upright until she was jammed between the ledges of two rocks on one of +the Bermudas! His crew had given themselves up as lost, and some having +"comfortable waters" on board, drank themselves into oblivion after +pumping vainly night and day. "Neither living or dying are we the better +for being drunk," said the old Admiral. + +They found themselves castaways on the "Isles of Devils," as the Bermudas +had been named by the buccaneers who had visited them. This was the +wreck which is said to have suggested Shakespeare's "Tempest." The author +had evidently read Strachey's "True Repertory," and followed it in his +descriptions of the "vexed Bermoothes": the cries of the mariners, the +trembling star, flaming among the shrouds, which had appeared to the +excited imagination of the weary and fasting Admiral at the helm. "On this +strand at moonlight, the hag-born Caliban might roll and growl: Sycorax, +the blue-eyed witch, might hover in the cloud wracks: and the voices of +the winds whisper strange secrets." + +The shipwrecked voyagers found an earthly paradise; and long afterward +Andrew Marvel immortalized, in a lovely poem, the boat song of the exiles +while they dreamed away the long months before they could reach the haven +to which they were bound. May I, too, be allowed to dream awhile, pausing +in my story of misery, cold, ingratitude, war, famine, and pestilence? +Perhaps some of my readers may have forgotten the poem, and will forgive +me for recalling part of it:-- + + "Where the remote Bermudas ride + In the ocean's bosom unespied, + From a small boat that rowed along + The listening winds received this song: + + "'What should we do but sing His praise + That led us through the watery maze + Unto an isle so long unknown + And yet far kinder than our own? + Where He the huge sea-monsters wracks + That lift the deep upon their backs; + He lands us on a grassy stage + Safe from the storms and prelate's rage. + He gave us this eternal spring + Which here enamels everything. + He hangs in shades the orange bright-- + Like golden lamps in a green night; + And does, in the pomegranites close + Jewels more rich than Ormus shewes. + He makes the figs our mouths to meet, + And throws the melons at our feet: + And makes the hollow seas that roar + Proclaim the ambergrease on shore. + He cast (of which we needs must boast) + The Gospel's pearl upon our coast; + And in these rocks, for us, did frame + A temple where to sound His name. + O let our voice His praise exalt + Till it arrive at heaven's vault; + Which then perhaps resounding may + Echo beyond the Mexique bay!' + + "Thus sang they in the English boat + A holy and a cheerful note, + And all the way, to guide their chime + With falling oars they kept the time." + +The brave old Christian Admiral immediately set about the building of a +cedar ship in which to return to his duty. From the wreck of the _Sea +Venture_ he brought a bell ashore, hung it on a tree, and rung it for +morning and evening prayers and for Sunday services. There was one "merry +English marriage" on the island and two births--a boy and a girl, to whom +the names "Bermudas" and "Bermuda" were given. The latter was the daughter +of John Rolfe. And here too was found the largest piece of ambergris in +the then known world, weighing eighty pounds. Ambergris, so highly prized +and so costly, was long "a beauty and a mystery" to its admirers. Was +it the solidified foam of the sea or the tears of the mermaid? Science +declares that the whale's intestines, irritated by starfish, evolves the +gum. + +They are an interesting party, these sea adventurers on the lovely +island--these finders of treasure; but our stage is set on an island of +a far different character, where the actors neither smile nor sing, nor +build boats for escape, but are chained by inexorable fate to a hard lot. +Our place in this story is with them. + +And so we leave the grand old Admiral, settling his differences with the +Lieutenant-Governor in the best way,--by dwelling apart from him on the +island (each to build his own ship); and while they hew the fragrant cedar +trees, and prepare for their return to Virginia, we will go thither and +watch over the storm-rocked "Cradle of the Republic"--Jamestown. + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + + +Utterly unconscious of the mine about to be sprung under his feet, Captain +Smith mustered all his forces for effective work in the planting season. +He probably gave no thought to affairs in England; he had plenty of +trouble with his enemies at home. + +The traitor Dutchmen continued to live with Powhatan and to instruct +his people in the use of powder, shot, swords, and tools, which they +constantly obtained through their confederates in the fort. The rendezvous +of the thieves was a building in the woods which had been erected as a +house for the manufacture of glass, and seems now to have been abandoned. +There the thieves "lay in Ambuscades," together with forty men sent +by Powhatan under the guidance of "Francis," one of the Dutchmen, with +instructions to waylay, capture, or kill Captain Smith and seize firearms +and tools. The latter heard of these visitors, and with twenty men set +out to destroy them. But upon arriving at the glass house they found the +conspirators fled. The Captain's men pursued them to drive them out of the +peninsula, while he returned alone to Jamestown. To his surprise he met +in the woods his old acquaintance Wochinchopunck, king of the Paspaheghs, +who had piped a welcome at the coming of the English. The king now saluted +with an arrow-shot, and Captain Smith, grappling with him, was drawn unto +the water. There the Captain held the savage by the throat and was about +to cut off his head (he was an expert in this!) when the savage begged so +piteously for his life that Smith pitied him and hesitated. Just then two +of the Polish potash-boilers ran up, and helped him draw the savage out +of the water and conduct him to the fort and lock him up. + +Francis was soon brought in by the other party. He had a plausible story +to relate in broken English: he and his comrades were detained by Powhatan +against their will, he had escaped at great hazard, and was on his way +home. Hungry and weary he had paused in the wood to gather a few walnuts. +He was not believed, but "went by the heeles" (was put in irons), the +Paspaheghan king also fettered, and held until the return of all the +Dutchmen who had run away to the enemy. + +Wochinchopunck's relatives and friends came daily with presents entreating +his release, and were sent to Powhatan with the captors' terms--the +surrender of the Dutchmen. To this the old gentleman with the "sour look" +returned churlish replies: what cared he for the Dutchmen? they might go +and welcome; he had told them so again and again, but they refused to +stir. What more could he do? Could he put them on the backs of his men +and send them? His men were unable to carry those heavy Dutchmen on their +backs fifty miles from Orapakes! It was quite clear the captive king had +nothing to hope from his emperor. He settled the matter by keeping awake +while his jailers slept and made good his escape; whereupon George Percy +and Captain Winne were sent out to recapture him. They burned the king's +houses, and took two prisoners, Kemps and another. The savages became +exceedingly insolent and aggressive, and the matter ended by Smith's +wholesale assault upon their town, burning their houses, taking their +boats and all their fishing-weirs, and planting the latter in the waters +around Jamestown. This is one of the incidents of "cruel and inhuman +treatment of the Naturells" which helped to swell the long lists which his +enemies in London arrayed against him: ignoring the fact that he could +protect the lives of the colonists only by swift and sharp retaliation +for every Indian outrage or breach of faith. + +The native eloquence of the Indian has often been noted. In his translated +speech, as the interpreters render it, there was a marvellous dignity, +and excellence of expression. As Smith was returning from the raid, a +party of the Paspaheghs overtook him and threw down their arms: and one, +a stout young man called Ocanininge, thus addressed him, according to the +interpreter:-- + +"Captain Smith my master (the King) is here present in this company +thinking it Captain Winn and not you; and of him he intended to have been +revenged, having never offended him. If he have offended you in escaping +your imprisonment, the fishes swim, the fowls fly, and the very beasts +strive to escape the snare and live; then blame not him being a man. He +would entreat you remember your being a prisoner what pains he took to +save your life. If since, he hath injured you, he was compelled to it, but +however you have revenged it to our too great loss. We perceive and well +know you intend to destroy us, that are here to entreat and desire your +friendship, and to enjoy our houses and plant our fields, of whose fruit +you shall participate; otherwise you will have the worst by our absence. +For we can plant anywhere, though with more labour: and we know you cannot +live if you want our harvest, and that relief we bring you. If you promise +us peace we will believe you; if you proceed in revenge we will abandon +the country." Upon these terms the Captain promised them peace until they +did some injury, upon condition they should bring in provision. So all +departed good friends and so continued until he left the country. After +he left, Wochinchopunck, again found hanging around Jamestown, was "thrust +twice through the body with an arming sword." + +Smith now addressed himself with all his might to the defences of the +colony. Although he had inspired the Indians with a wholesome fear of +offending him, he knew their servile obedience to Powhatan, and that +monarch had forfeited all claim to his confidence and respect. Powhatan's +one dominant desire was to obtain the arms of the colonists, and with +these arms drive them from the country. A fortunate circumstance changed +the attitude for the present, even of that implacable enemy. A pistol +was stolen from the fort, and an Indian arrested, to be hanged unless +the pistol was returned. The prisoner was committed to the "dungeon." +The night was bitterly cold, and Captain Smith pitied the poor savage and +sent him a good supper and charcoal for a fire. At midnight his brother +brought back the pistol, but upon opening the door of the dungeon the +prisoner was found, stifled by the fumes of the charcoal, badly burned and +apparently dead. His brother's lamentations touched the Captain's heart +and he promised to make him alive again. Accordingly, with aqua vitae and +vinegar, he was restored, his burns dressed, and he was sent home after +being well rested and refreshed. + +The whole country rang with the wonderful news that the Englishman could +raise the dead, and henceforth there was, during his administration, +no trouble from the Indians. They frequently brought presents to the +colonists of game and fruits, and no doubt Pocahontas visited them as of +yore. It is expressly stated that she came as freely to the fort as to +her father's house. + +Another party was soon sent into the interior to the country of the +Mangoags, in search of Raleigh's lost colony, and returned with "no newes +except that they were all dead." Sicklemore, who had been despatched to +Chowanock, returned after a similar fruitless search. He found the Chowan +River not large, the country overgrown with pines. As to the "pemminaw," +the silk grass growing like hemp, there was but little, only a few +tufts here and there. Queen Anne was not yet to have a gown of Virginia +grass-linen. Elizabeth's robe had been woven from North Carolina grass, +and was probably a present from Sir Walter Raleigh. + +A marginal note in Purchas's "His Pilgrimes" distinctly states that +Powhatan confessed he had been cognizant of the massacre of Raleigh's +men: also that the Indian king had in his treasure-house articles that had +belonged to them. Strachey, writing in 1610-1611, asserted that Powhatan +himself was their murderer. Expeditions were sent out, for several years, +in search of them. No clew was ever found to their fate. Indians are good +keepers of secrets, as was proven by the great massacre of 1622. + +In March, 1609, a few months only remained of Smith's residence in +Virginia. Had he known them to be his last, he could not have worked +with more energy and efficiency. He "dug a well of most excellent sweet +water," he built block-houses in various places--one at Hog Island to +protect his fast-growing herd there. He built the "fort for retreat neere +a convenient river, easie to be defended, and hard to be assalted," around +which in the next century clustered the "Legends of the Stone House." +But scarcity of food constrained him to abandon the work of defence and +address himself to the ever recurring struggle for bread. There were two +hundred men behind the palisades, and only thirty who were willing to +work. He issued a stern threat that every idler would be sent across the +river to shift for himself. No empty porringer would be filled from the +common kettle unless the owner were sick, or had earned his meal. He was +beset with disloyal, unmanly complainers, who were clamorous that the +tools, arms, nay, the very houses should be bartered for corn. Newport had +brought them a terrible, warlike colony of rats, "thousands on thousands," +which destroyed all the contents of his casks of grain, and baffled the +colonists' efforts to exterminate them. It was supposed that Newport +introduced them into Virginia--they had come originally to England from +the "poisonous East"--but in the early descriptions of the dress of a +savage he is represented as clothing himself with skins, and then adorning +his garment with the dead hand of an enemy or paw of a beast, while a +dead rat hung from his ear, through which the tail was thrust. This rat +was, however, evidently scarce--a rare gem--and not in common use for an +ear-ring like a living green and yellow serpent. I think we shall have to +thank Captain Newport for our rats, as we thank England for our colonists, +and the Dutch for the negroes, who arrived in 1619. + +The early spring before the ripening of fruits and berries was always the +scarce season. Captain Smith sent some of his people to feed on Lynnhaven +Bay oysters: and others were billeted with the savages, who treated +them kindly. Roots and acorns were gathered for food. Smith perceived +the folly of keeping the colony crowded into the narrow limits of the +Jamestown peninsula, and projected a settlement in Nansemond, a fort +at Point Comfort, and yet another on the high ground near the present +city of Richmond. But his ardour was soon to be chilled. With the summer +came Captain Argall in his trading-ship, who brought the astounding +intelligence that the present charter and government had been overthrown, +everything reorganized, and President Smith removed. + +The reasons for his disgrace were known to Argall. He had been accused +of cruelty to the "Naturells," and of suffering the ships to return +unfreighted. No allowance had been made for Indian outrages, for sickness, +or for any of the difficulties of which I have written. + +The seven vessels, shattered by storm and having lost the greater portion +of their supplies, and many passengers by sickness, reached Jamestown +in August, 1609. They brought back the old ringleaders:[58] "Ratcliffe +the mutineer, Wingfield the imbecile, Newport the tale-bearer, Archer an +agitator, Martin a cat's-paw." They had wrangled through the early days of +1607 and 1608, been opposed by the hard workers and fighters, and crushed. +They had, in England, effected by intrigue what they had failed to effect +by force. They had their revenge! Ratcliffe, whose epitaph Hamor wrote in +a few pithy words, "He was not worth remembering but to his dishonour," +had gained the willing ear of the disappointed London Company, and had +laid the blame of the failure in Virginia wholly and solely upon John +Smith. The "Rude Answer" of the honest fighting man had offended the Right +Honourables, and so they rid themselves of him. + +Now, upon landing, Ratcliffe claimed authority. Smith refused to allow +it, until the charter and leaders, who were in the _Sea Venture_, should +arrive. Ratcliffe declared they were lost at sea. All Jamestown was in an +uproar. Ratcliffe and his followers paraded the town denouncing Smith. +His men "drank deep and uttered threats and curses," and their leader +nursed the storm and inflamed them more and more against the tyrant. Chaos +had come again.[59] Those "unruly gallants would dispose and determine +of the government sometimes to one, sometimes to another: to-day the old +commission must rule; to-morrow the new; the next day neither; in fine +they would rule all or ruin all. Yet in charity," continues our early +historian, "we must endure them thus sent to destroy us; or by correcting +their follies bring the world's censure upon us to be guilty of their +blood. Happy had we been had they never arrived, and we forever abandoned, +and as we were left to our fortunes: for on earth, for their number, was +never more confusion, or misery than their factions occasioned. + +"The President seeing the desire of these Braves to rule; seeing how his +authority was so unexpectedly changed, would willingly have left all and +have returned for England. It would be too tedious, too strange and almost +incredible should I particularly relate the infinite dangers, plots and +practises he daily escaped amongst this factious crew: the chief whereof +he quickly laid by the heels. Master Percy had his request granted to +return to England, being very sick; Master West with an hundred and twenty +of the best he could choose, he sent to the Falles; Martin with near as +many to Nansemond." These were to establish new settlements according to +a previous plan. + +As the term of Smith's presidency was about to expire, he made Martin +President, but the latter soon proved his cowardly incompetency, for, +growing alarmed at the attitude of the Indians at Nansemond, he ran away +and "left his company to their fortunes." + +Captain West, returning to Jamestown, after seating his men at the Falls +(near the present site of Richmond), the President concluded to look after +matters there, and found the colony planted on low marshy ground subject +to the river's inundation and other inconveniences. + +He had taken with him the bright boy, Henry Spelman, whom (according to +the latter) he now sold to Powhatan in part payment of the place then +(and now) called Powhatan. The rest of the payment he proposed to make +in a promise to aid Powhatan in his wars against the Monacans, and a +"proportion of Copper," with sundry provision for future supplies. But, +lo and behold, the colony at Powhatan rebelled against these terms and +scornfully rejected the scheme! It is supposed they had already built +their huts on the marshy ground and objected to the additional labour of +moving them. Smith regarded them as mutineers, and with five men landed +among them and arrested the ringleaders; but they overpowered him, and +forced him to retire on board of a vessel lying in the river. He set +sail for Jamestown, but his vessel ran aground; and to his surprise the +mutineers thronged him with appeals for protection, for the Indians had +fallen upon them as soon as Smith left, and had slain many of West's +party. + +Accordingly the Captain again arrested the ringleaders, and, returning to +Powhatan, settled the colony there in the purchased palisade fort, which +was well fortified and contained good dry cabins and ground ready to be +planted. Smith named it "Nonsuch" after a royal residence of that name in +England. + +This incident concluded his relations with the Indian emperor. He was +nevermore to see him; indeed, he had transacted his present business +through agents. + + [Illustration: Captain George Percy. + + Copyright, 1906, by Jamestown Official Photo. Corp'n. ] + +Our brave Captain's career was over in Virginia. He fell asleep on his +return voyage to Jamestown with his match lighted, and a bag of powder +in his pocket was ignited, "burning him very shrewdly," says the quaint +narrator. His agony was great, and there were no surgeons in Jamestown. He +lay that night in the fort, and there an attempt was made to murder him, +which failed. The murderer looked at him in his delirium, and the "steel +dropped from his nerveless hand." His faithful soldiers flatly refused +to submit to Ratcliffe, Archer, and their confederates, and George Percy +was prevailed upon to surrender his hope of returning to England, and +consented to remain as the President of the colony until news of the _Sea +Venture_ could be had. + +At Michaelmas, 1609, the stern soldier and strong writer and true patriot +set sail for England. He had brought only his sword to Virginia, and he +took thence nothing more. Not an inch of the ground he had dug nor a plank +of the houses he had built belonged to him. + +"What shall I say,"[60] writes the old historian, "but thus we lost him, +that in all his proceedings made Justice his first guide, and experience +his second, ever hating basenesse, sloath, pride, and indignitie more than +any dangers; that never allowed more for himselfe than his soldiers with +him; that upon no danger would send them where he would not lead himselfe; +that would never see us want, what he either had or by any means could +get us; that would rather want than borrow or starve than not pay; that +loved action more than words, and hated falsehood and covetousness worse +than death; whose adventures were our lives and whose losse our deaths." + +Nobody denies the services John Smith rendered to the infant colony--and +yet such was his arrogance, his boastfulness, his intolerant, dogmatic +temper, that men took offence, and grudgingly yielded him the honour which +was his due. It is true he never failed to put himself well to the fore, +and never omitted an opportunity to record his fine achievements. For +this men hated him. Diligent as were his enemies, they could not crush him +utterly. He filled positions of trust after he left Virginia, visited the +northern colony, was allowed to name it "New England," gave the name to +Boston and other places on the coast; and thus proved that his colonial +career was highly esteemed at home. Whether he deserves it or not, he +still holds the foremost place in the early history of Virginia. + +With all his hauteur and arrogance, he knew how to be gracious and +winning, especially to women. We know of the supreme moment between the +raising and falling of the club to beat out his brains when + + "An angel knelt in human form + And breathed a prayer for him." + +But there were others--one indeed in every crisis, in every country he +visited--"Princesses and Madams," who befriended or saved him, and we +cannot but suppose that with them his personality possessed the charm of +fascination. But in regard to his soldierly qualities nothing is left +to inference or supposition. We know him to have been beyond compare +brave, enduring, capable of bearing extreme misery and danger with noble +fortitude. He was pitiful to the sick and weak, tender to children, +watchful of the comfort and rights of the unfortunate. His writings +sound a clear, high note of patriotism and devout aspiration. They bear +the impress of the rough mariner and soldier, but nobler writing I know +of nowhere. "The rude sentences rise to the height of eloquence, as he +exhorts his contemporaries in noble words to noble achievements." We give +a few of them. + +"Seeing we are not born for ourselves, but each to help the other," he +writes, "and our abilities are much alike at the hour of our birth and +the minute of our death; seeing our good deeds or our bad, by faith in +Christ's merits, is all we have to carry our souls to heaven or hell, +... let us imitate the virtues of our ancestors to be worthily their +successors." + +"Who would live at home idly or think in himself any worth, to live only +to eat, drink and sleep, and so die?" + +"Who can desire more content that hath small means or but merits to +advance his fortunes than to tread and plant the ground he hath purchased +by the hazard of his life? If he have but the taste of virtue and +magnanimity, what to such a mind can be more pleasant than planting and +building a foundation for his posterity, got from the rude earth by God's +blessing and his own industry without prejudice to any?" + +"What so truly suits with honour and honesty as the discovering things +unknown, erecting towns, peopling countries, informing the ignorant, +reforming things unjust, teaching virtue and gain to our native mother +country:--so far from wronging any as to cause posterity to remember thee, +and, remembering thee, ever honour that remembrance with praise?" + +"What can a man with faith in religion do more agreeable to God than to +seek to convert these poor savages to Christ and humanity?" + +These are the words of a Christian soldier. Men of his temperament, +however, are never regarded with indifference. They are loved devotedly or +hated relentlessly. One writer of his day calls him a "dear noble captain +and loyal heart"; another, "a wonder of nature, mirror of our clime"; "a +soldier of valorous policy and judgment"; another says of him:-- + + "I never knew a warrior but thee + From wine, tobacco, debts, dice, oaths so free." + +On the other hand, his contemporaries brand him as "tyrant and +conspirator"; "full of the exaggerations and self-assertions of an +adventurer"; "a Gascon and a beggar." The adverse opinions, for some +mysterious reason, have crystallized around the Pocahontas incident, and +so eager are his critics to disprove the assertion that she saved John +Smith's life, they would like to believe she never existed at all! The +simple truth is that in the first two of his letters he omitted the fact, +in the third he related it. This inconsistency was observed in 1866 by Dr. +Charles Deane of Massachusetts. Until then no one had doubted the truth +of the story. + +Of course the party that had all along questioned the marvellous +Transylvanian adventures eagerly welcomed the new ally to their ranks. A +warfare of words had been going on for more than two hundred years. It +was now given fresh impulse. Boastfulness and arrogance are unpleasant +foibles; lying is a sin. He had been disliked for his foibles, he was +now despised for his sins. Candid, able historians, like Dr. Doyle of +England and Alexander Brown of Virginia, honestly wrote against him; James +Grahame, Dr. Edward Arber of England, and all the Virginia historians +except Brown defended him. The charges remain on the pages of history "not +proven." To those pages (on both sides sincere) I commend the interested +reader. Old Thomas Fuller, however, is not much read by latter-day folk, +and although his opinion of the prisoner at the bar differs from my own, +his ill-concealed sarcasm is expressed in words so delightfully quaint +that I venture to quote him. He certainly gave the key-note to all the +critics that lived after him, for he wrote only thirty years after our +captain's death:-- + +"John Smith, Captain, was born in Cheshire, as Master Arthur Smith, his +kinsman and my schoolmaster, did inform me. He spent most of his life in +foreign parts. First in Hungary, under the emperor, fighting against the +Turks; three of which he himself killed in single duel; and therefore (so +it is writ over his tomb) was authorised by Sigismund King of Hungary +to bear three Turk's heads as augmentation to his arms. Here he gave +intelligence to a besieged city in the night, by significant fire-works +formed in the air, in legible characters, with many strange performances, +the scene whereof is laid at such a distance, they are cheaper credited +than confuted. + + [Illustration: St. Luke's, near Smithfield, built in 1623. The Oldest + Protestant Church in America. + + Copyright, 1906, by Jamestown Official Photo. Corp'n. ] + +"From the Turks in Europe he passed to the pagans in America where +towards the latter end of the reign of Queen Elizabeth (!) such his +perils, preservations, dangers, deliverances, they seem to most men above +belief, to some beyond truth. Yet have we two witnesses to attest them, +the prose and the pictures, both in his own book; and it soundeth much to +the diminution of his deeds, that he alone is the herald to publish and +proclaim them. + +"Two captains being at dinner one of them fell into a large relation of +his own achievements, concluding his discourse with this question to +his fellow: 'And pray, Sir, what service have _you_ done?' To whom he +answered: 'Other men can tell that.' However, moderate men must allow +Captain Smith to have been very instrumental in settling the plantation +in Virginia whereof he was Governor, as also admiral of New England. + +"He led his old age in London, where his having a prince's mind imprisoned +in a poor man's purse, rendered him to the contempt of such who were +not ingenuous. Yet he efforted his spirits with the remembrance and +relation of what formerly had been and what he had done. He was buried +in Sepulchre's Church choir, on the south side thereof, having a ranting +epitaph inscribed in a table over him, too long to transcribe. Only we +will insert the first and last verses, the rather because the one may fit +Alexander's life for his valour, the other his death for his religion:-- + + "'Here lies one conquered who hath conquered kings!' + 'Oh, may his soul in sweet Elysium sleep!' + +The orthography, piety, history, and divinity are much alike." + +As to his feelings with regard to Pocahontas, I can do no better than +quote the words of his contemporaries:-- + +"Some propheticall spirits calculated that hee had the savages in such +subjection, hee would have made himselfe a king by marrying Pocahontas, +Powhatan's daughter. It is true she was the very nonpareil of his Kingdome +and at most not past 13 yeares of age. Very oft shee came to our fort, +with what shee could get for Captaine Smith; that ever loved and used the +Countrie well, but her especially he ever much respected: and so well she +requited it, that when her father intended to have surprized him, shee +by stealth in the darke night came through the wild woods and told him of +it. + +"But her marriage could no way have entitled him by any right to the +kingdome, nor was it ever suspected hee had ever such a thought; or +more regarded her of any of them than in honest reason and discreation +he might. If he would, he might have married her, or have done what him +listed; for there was none that could have hindred his determination."[61] + +The Indians[62] eagerly courted intermarriage with the white man, and were +painfully stung by the disdain with which the English receded from their +advances and declined to be the husbands of Indian women. The colonists +forgot that they had inflicted this mortification; but it was remembered +by the Indians, who sacredly embalmed the memory of every affront in +lasting, stern, silent, and implacable resentment. We have seen how often +"wives" were offered to John Smith, and Powhatan eagerly hastened his +daughter's marriage to John Rolfe. Her engagement was no sooner announced +than her old uncle appeared at Jamestown to witness the marriage ceremony. + +Captain Smith never returned to Virginia, but after the massacre of 1622 +he offered his services as commander of a company to drive the Indians +out of the country. For some unexplained reason this offer was declined. +The king thought it unnecessary! He indeed offered a few of the rusty arms +in the Tower to be sent to the survivors--this much and only this was he +willing to do. + + [Illustration: Captain John Smith. + From the bust by Baden-Powell. + + Copyright, 1906, by Jamestown Official Photo. Corp'n. ] + +The "old age" of which Thomas Fuller speaks would be now thought the +noonday of manhood. The captain died the 21st day of June, 1631, about +fifty-five years old. The tablet which so offended Fuller has long +ago disappeared. Americans do not need it. American pilgrims visit St. +Sepulchre, sweep the dust from the plate bearing the three Turks' heads, +and render the homage of grateful hearts to the English soldier who served +them so unselfishly in their darkest hour, and then came home to give + + "His body to that pleasant country's earth + And his pure soul unto his captain Christ, + Under whose colours he had fought so long." + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + + +Five only of the ships of the fleet of nine sailed from Jamestown October +14, 1609,--one had been lost at sea, one had been wrecked at Bermuda; +two, the _Virginia_ and the _Swallow_, were left with the colony, "to +procure the victuals whereof they were exceedingly much in need." Thirty +newly arrived, unruly youths were returned--as they were not wanted in +Virginia,--to their affectionate relatives in England, who doubtless +confronted with dismay the vexed problem of their future disposal. + +Among the letters sent abroad at this time was one from Ratcliffe to +the Earl of Salisbury, telling the earl in a candid and confidential +manner the "Truth of some late accidents befalne His Majesties Virginia +Collonye,"--how Captain Smith had "reigned sole Governour without +assistantes, and would at first admit of no councell but himselfe. This +man," he continues, "is sent home to answer some misdemeanours, whereof I +persuade me he can scarcely clear himself from great imputation of blame." +He then gives a list of certain superior persons now in power, including +himself; and adds, "Some few of the best and worthyest that inhabit at +Jamestown are assistantes to us!" + +The career of this mischievous hypocrite was destined to be brief. +Remembering Captain Smith's successful visits to Powhatan, he made bold +to seek an interview with that monarch. He was not received with the +pretentious pageant--the dais, the crown and heads, the many wives, +children, and retainers; but was sharply met at the threshold with arrow +and tomahawk, and slain, with all that were with him, except Henry Spelman +and one other, who escaped to tell the story. + +Captain Percy now addressed himself to the comfort, advancement, and +protection of the colony. The danger of Spanish invasion was ever present +with the leaders at Jamestown. With perfect ease the Spanish caravels +could sail up the James, anchor immediately before the hamlet which they +called a "Cittie," and make short work of its slender defences. It is +known[63] that Philip, importuned day by day to strangle the colony in +its infancy, had ordered a vessel to be manned and sent from Florida, as +a scout, to the Virginia waters. This ship had seen a great vessel flying +the red cross in the waters near the capes, had ventured near enough to +reconnoitre; and, convinced that this was a lookout ship of a formidable +squadron, had run away as fast as tide and wind could carry it. In reality +there was no ship at the spot,--none whatever,--and the threatening sail +had been a phantom of Spanish imagination. + +Captain Percy sent "some 16 proper men" to build a fort at Point +Comfort near the site of the present Fortress Monroe. Percy named the +fortification in honour of the founder of the Percy family, "Algernoune +Fort." This fort was afterward destroyed by fire and another commenced +by the colonists, but not finished. The name was unfortunate. The early +settlers were fond of short alliterative names: "Pace's Pains," "Piping +Poynt," "Pryor's Plantation," "Beggar's Bush." Had the President called +his fort "Percy's Point," I am persuaded it could have held its name until +to-day. + +"Beggar's Bush," as a name for a country place, is peculiar. Historians +invariably explain that Fletcher's play suggested the name, but I am +by no means sure that its owner was a reading man. He was probably a +Huntingdonshire man, who remembered in the wild, new country a familiar +saying of the old. "He is on the way to Beggar's Bush," was the comment +when a man lived beyond his means or evinced extravagant tendencies. +Beggar's Bush was a tree on the left hand of the London road from +Huntingdon to Caxton, halfway between the rich and the poor part of the +country. "I have heard," says old Thomas Fuller, "how King James being +in progress in these parts with Sir Francis Bacon, the Lord Chancellor, +and having heard that morning how Sir Francis had prodigiously rewarded a +mean man for a small present: 'Sir Francis,' quoth he, 'you will quickly +come to Beggar's Bush, and I may even go along with you if both be so +bountiful.'" + +The numbers at the plantation had again been reduced by sickness to about +two hundred people, who were at war with the Indians, and in need of +ammunition. "The hand of God was heavy on the Colony, and the hand of God +reacheth all the earth! Who can avoid it or dispute with him?" + +The Indians had heard of the powder accident from which Captain Smith had +suffered so much, and missing him from the fort, concluded he was dead. +They saw their opportunity. "They all revolted and did spoil and murther +all they encountered." Powhatan resolved to press the war in earnest. +All now felt the loss of the strong, fearless captain. Beverley, the old +historian, says, "as soon as he left them, all went to ruin." + +George Percy, enfeebled from illness, was utterly unable to cope with +the difficulties that beset him. His crew at home was a motley one--some +thirty "true men;" some honest labourers, the rest detrimental in every +particular. There were now outlying forts and plantations to be cared for. +At Jamestown,[64] "there was but one Carpenter (John Laydon) and three +others who were only learners; two Blacksmiths; two saylers; and those +we write 'laborers' were for the most part footmen, and such as they that +were adventurers brought to attend them, or such as they could perswade to +goe with them, that never did know what a daye's work was. All the rest +were poore Gentlemen, Tradesmen, Serving-men, libertines and such like; +ten times more fit to spoyle a Commonwealth than either begin one or but +helpe to maintaine one. For when neither the feare of God, nor the law, +nor shame, nor displeasure of their friends could rule them in England, +there is small hope ever to bring one in twentie of them ever to be good +in Virginia." + +There was one way to remedy this state of things, and but +one,--annihilation! Many died from yellow fever, many from the London +plague. The rest hastened to destruction from starvation. The hand of God +was heavy--who could avoid it or dispute with Him? + +As the days passed on, the disorder increased, and the inevitable +dissolution hastened. Martin's men at Nansemond and West's at the Falls +were assailed by the savages and took refuge in Jamestown. Percy was +now so ill "he could neither goe nor stand." Lord Delaware's kinsman had +sailed in despair for England. With every passing hour the prospect grew +darker. Thirty men seized one of the vessels and became buccaneers. Utter +hopelessness took possession of those left behind. [65]Every day death +visited some house, and when the master was buried, the house was pulled +down for firewood, the living not being able to gather fuel in the woods. +Parts of the defending palisade were burnt, although the inmates trembled +with fear of the Indians. Only the blockhouse was the safety of the few +who lived. + +The Indians knew all this weakness and forebore to assault the fort or +hazard themselves in a war on those whom they were assured in a short time +would of themselves perish, yet they killed all stragglers found beyond +bounds. Every particle of food was devoured, and the miserable women and +children begged from the savages, to receive insult and mortal wounds. +Roots, acorns, and the skins of horses were boiled for food. At last dead +Indians were dug up and devoured "by the baser sort." + +A horrible, ghastly tragedy froze the blood of the "better sort." A +man killed his wife, and had devoured part of her body, when he was +discovered. He was executed, but that only added horror to horror. + +This time marked one of two terrible epochs,--"the starving time" and +the great massacre of 1622. Nearly five hundred persons had lately been +landed at Jamestown, and six months afterward "there remained not past +sixty men, _women and children_, most miserable and poor creatures." Of +five hundred, more than four hundred had perished,--dead of starvation or +brained by the Indian tomahawk. + +In May, 1607, the Englishmen had landed in what they termed "a Paradise." +Over the moss-green earth "bespred with faire flowers" the branches of +the stately trees threw lacelike shadows. Flowering vines hung from their +boughs, brilliant birds darted among them, or swooped down to dip their +blue and crimson wings in the clear rivulets. All was happiness, activity, +and hope. + +Now, in May, 1610, the earth was trampled bare of all verdure, ragged +stumps of the felled trees were rotting in the ground, noisome vapours +rose from the neglected, filthy yards of a pestilence-smitten town. Men, +women, and children, gaunt and wild-eyed from famine, perishing by inches +slowly but surely, lay about the town, moaning and despairing. The last +agony was near. They knew that without help they could not survive many +hours. Long ago they had ceased to expect it. + +We can imagine the frantic joy when two vessels appeared on the river! +These were the cedar ships we left Admiral Somers and Sir Thomas Gates +building at Bermuda: the _Deliverance_ and the _Patience_! The Admiral +and Sir Thomas cast anchor and at once went on shore. The scene that +ensued baffles description. The two mariners looked upon wretchedness +and desolation indescribable. The shipwrecked on sea looked into the eyes +of the shipwrecked on land. Jamestown was in ruins, the town encumbered +with filth. The torn-down palisades, the gates swinging to and fro on +rusty hinges, the church ruined and unfrequented, the dismantled houses, +the emaciated faces, the hollow hungry eyes, and voices hardly able to +articulate the prayer to be "taken home to die,"--these were the piteous +sights and sounds which greeted the commanders as they landed from their +cedar ships. All hope of Virginia was over forever! Even the stout hearts +that had borne storm and wreck in the _Sea Venture_ were appalled by the +spectacle. + +Gates and Somers had heard at Algernoune Fort of the sad condition of +the colony. Captain Percy had happened to be in the fort directing the +preparations for its abandonment. "From hence," says Strachey, "in two +days (only by the help of Tydes no wind stirring) we plyed it sadly up the +River; and the three and twentieth of May we cast Anchor before Jamestowne +where we landed, and our much grieved Governour first visiting the church +caused the Bell to be rung, at which all such as were able to come out of +their houses repayred to the church where our Maister Bucke made a zealous +and sorrowful Prayer, finding all things so contrary to our expectation, +so full of misery and misgovernment. After service our Governour caused +me to read his commission, and Captain Percy delivered up to him his +commission, the old Patent and the Councell Seale." + +There was another witness to this scene besides the actors therein. +Namontack, Powhatan's man, had returned to England with Newport before +the sailing thence of the fleet, and with him Machumps, the brother of +the king's favourite, wife Winganuskie. These[66] two Indians were on the +_Sea Venture_ when she was wrecked at Bermuda. There, in a lonely spot, +the two had quarrelled and fought, and Machumps killed Namontack, buried +him, and kept the secret from his own people. He revealed it, however, +to his English friends, and told how he had buried Namontack--the whole +of him--for, finding he could dig only a small grave, he had taken the +trouble to cut off his legs and very neatly lay them in order beside him! +Machumps was much esteemed by the colonists. He aided the first explorers +of the James River, and they had named a creek "Machump's Creek," in +his honour. He lived a year or more at Jamestown with Kemps, a former +prisoner, who had also become a friend. The two were more intimate in +their relations to the Englishmen than any other Indians except Pocahontas +and Chanco. + +John Rolfe, "an honest gentleman and of good behaviour," was also a +passenger in one of the cedar ships. The little "Bermuda" had died, +perhaps on the voyage, and his wife died soon after, so he was left free +for the romance, a few years later, of his marriage with Pocahontas. + +Upon reckoning up the stores brought in the tiny cedar ships, the +Admiral and Gates perceived there were only enough to last sixteen days, +allowing two cakes a day to each person. They accordingly, to the joy +of the colonists, concluded to abandon Jamestown and sail for England +_via_ Newfoundland, where English fishing vessels were supposed to be in +condition to victual the company for England. The wretched remnant of +the colony was overjoyed at this decision. The fort was dismantled and +the cannon buried at the gate. There was little else to take away. Some +of the unhappy sufferers wished to set fire to the houses where they had +endured so much, but the commanders elected otherwise; and to prevent +the destruction of the houses, church, and palisades, Sir Thomas Gates +remained on shore with a party to preserve order, and was the last man +to step into the boat. On June 7, every man, woman, and child, at the +beating of the drum, repaired aboard the _Discovery_, the _Deliverance_, +the _Patience_, and the _Virginia_, and at noon a salvo of small arms +announced to the listening echoes that all was over--all the hope, +expectation, struggle, and despair! + +That night they fell down the tide to Hogg Island, and bright and early +next morning set sail again with glad hearts, the tide bringing them to +Mulberry Island. + + [Illustration: Lord Delaware. + + Copyright, 1906, by Jamestown Official Photo. Corp'n. ] + +There, to their amazement, they met Captain Edward Brewster in a rowboat, +his sailors bending to the oars in great haste to intercept their farther +advance. Lord Delaware was at Point Comfort with three vessels laden +with all things needful, and hearing there of the movements of Somers and +Gates, sent his long boat to command their return to Jamestown. Had the +latter been a few moments earlier, or Captain Brewster a trifle later, +they would not have met. "This was the arm of the Lord of Hosts who +would have his people pass through the Red Sea and the Wilderness, and +then possess the Land of Canaan," exclaims the old writer, who bursts +forth into exclamations of "thanks and praise for the Lord's infinite +goodness! Never had poor people more cause to cast themselves at his very +footstool." The poor people themselves felt differently at the time. "Sir +Thomas Gates the next day, to the great grief of all his company, as wind +and weather gave leave, returned his whole company with charge to take +possession again of those poor ruinated habitations at Jamestown which +they had formerly inhabited. Himself in a boat proceeded down to meet his +Lordship, who making all speed up shortly arrived at Jamestown." Meanwhile +the _Deliverance_, _Discovery_, _Patience_, and _Virginia_ "bore up the +helm," went in advance, and relanded that night. The fires were rekindled, +the guns dug up, and preparation hastily made to receive his Lordship. + +[67]Lord Delaware reached Jamestown on Sunday, June 10, 1610, and in the +afternoon went ashore, landing at the south gate of the palisade. Sir +Thomas Gates caused his company in arms to stand in order and make guard, +William Strachey acting on this special occasion as colour-bearer. As soon +as the Lord Governor landed, he fell upon his knees before them all, and +made a long and silent prayer to God. Then arising, he marched up into +the town, Strachey bowing with the colours as he entered the gate, and +let them fall at his Lordship's feet, who passed on into the chapel, where +evening service was read, followed by a sermon by Rev. Richard Bucke, and +after that "caused his ensign to read his commission as Lord Governour +and Captaine Generall during the life of the Colony and Plantation in +Virginia, upon which Sir Thomas Gates delivered up to his lordship his +own commission and the counsell seale." His Lordship then delivered some +few words of warning and encouragement to the colony, and as no fitting +house could be had for him in the town, repaired again to his ship for +his lodging. + +Events had followed each other like scenes in a theatre. The curtain had +slowly descended upon a desolate picture of death, darkness, and despair; +it rose with the morning sun on an animated scene of hope and activity. +In the space of three days the Virginia colony had perished and come to +life again. + +The government was now invested in one over whose deliberations there +could be no control, and with whom there could consequently be no +rivalry.[68] Steady obedience was required and enforced. Things soon +assumed a wholesome and active appearance. Every man had his own duty and +officers were appointed to see that duty done; and it was not long before +the disturbances and confusion which had been the natural consequences +of disaffection and revolt were succeeded by the happy fruits of peaceful +industry and order. + +Let it never be forgotten that in all the time of sore distress there +were steadfast souls who never lost their trust in God or failed in their +religious duties. They were never without a church--in less than six +years they had built or re-built five! In their darkest hour they had +built a church. In it, although the edifice during the starving time fell +into a "ruinous condition," they held daily prayers; and in the absence +of a minister met on Sunday for "prayers and homilies." At their lowest +estate they had faith to pray to be delivered from "battle and murder, +plague, pestilence, and famine," and to implore help in all their "time +of tribulation." Although to their human apprehension the supplication +was not answered, the faith of these pious souls failed not. A prayer +for daily use was sent to them from the mother church in England--a +petition for strength to bear their heavy burdens, for a blessing on all +their work, for the conversion of the savages, and ending with a fervent +invocation, "God bless England, our sweet native country!" + +Lord Delaware repaired the church, and in it Pocahontas was baptized and +married. The edifice was of wood, and it was known as the third church. It +was sixty feet long by twenty-four wide, and before the arrival of Lord +Delaware was probably plainly furnished within. He had it fitted with a +chancel of cedar and a communion table of black walnut. + + [Illustration: Pocahontas Memorial Window, St. John's Church, Hampton, + erected by the Indian Girls of Hampton Institute. + + Copyright, 1906, by Jamestown Official Photo. Corp'n. ] + +"All the pews and pulpit were of cedar, with fair, broad windows, also +of cedar, to shut and open as the weather should occasion. The font was +hewn hollow like a canoe, and there were two bells in the steeple at +the west end. The church was so cast as to be very light within, and the +Lord Governor caused it to be kept passing sweet, trimmed up with divers +flowers." + +There was a sexton in charge of the church, and every morning the bell +rang for prayers at ten and again at four in the afternoon. + +There was also a sermon every Thursday, and two on Sunday. "Every Sunday +when the Lord Governour went to church, he was accompanied with all the +councillors, captains, other officers, and all the gentlemen, and with +a guard of fifty halberdiers--all in his Lordship's livery, in fair red +cloaks." His Lordship sat in the choir in a green velvet chair, and the +council, captains, and officers on each side of him. + +We have the two pictures,--a starved, ragged handful, prostrate before +the altar, responding in feeble accents, "Good Lord, deliver us"; and +the light and colour, the _corps de garde_ in crimson, the Lord Governor +kneeling on his green velvet cushion, the bright flowers filling the +chancel. They are all gone now! "Whose souls questionless," whether proud +or humble, "are with God." Jamestown Island is a graveyard. After Lord +Delaware landed with his accessions to the colony, 900 persons had been +sent from England to Virginia, of whom 700 had perished.[69] In 1619 it +was estimated that 2540 immigrants had landed at Jamestown, of whom 1640 +had died. + +The total mortality in less than one score years was 6040, out of 7280. +Around the church thousands are buried, the victims of the first season +of starvation and those of the last: good Master Hunt, hardy adventurers, +knights and ladies, paupers and "gentlemen," gentle and simple; and on the +island also Kemps, the Indian; the poor victim of military execution; and +Opechancanough, the savage instigator of three massacres,--friend and foe +they lie together. The kind mother earth covers them all! In winter they +lie beneath the pure snows from heaven, and the summer daisies look up to +God from their ashes: and so they all sleep together "untill the generall +day." + + + + +CHAPTER XIX + + +Lord Delaware followed his prayer at the gate of Jamestown with his own +earnest efforts to bring about its fulfilment. He was a wise ruler and +generous friend to the colony. The terrible old gentleman with the "sour +look" silently observed him, and made no demonstration, friendly or +otherwise, for a few months. He had heard of Captain Smith's death with +mingled feelings of relief and admiration. Machumps had, without doubt, +told him of the pomp and ceremony attending Lord Delaware, who held his +court on board his own ship, disdaining the humble huts of his inferiors. +Robed in crimson and gold, this was altogether a different person from the +rough soldier, John Smith. The Dutchmen, relieved of their fear of Captain +Smith, now proposed to return to Jamestown and ingratiate themselves +with the new administration. They had built a house for Powhatan, with +an immense Dutch chimney, which stood like a giant sentinel until it +was blown down a few years ago. They now came forward and requested +the emperor to send them as ambassadors to Lord Delaware with gifts and +proposals of peace, but Powhatan received their overtures with scorn and +replied sternly, "You that would have betrayed Captaine Smith to mee, will +certainly betray me to this great Lord for your own peace," and so "caused +his men to beat out their braines." + +[70]Lord Delaware soon found it impossible to live in the unhealthy +climate of Jamestown, and returned home, leaving Percy once more in charge +of the colony, until a Governor should arrive from England. The number of +colonists was now about two hundred; the stock of provisions sufficient +for ten months, and the Indians, after two or three sallies and as many +sharp rebukes, apparently peaceable and friendly. + +We have noted Strachey's account of the wreck of the _Sea Venture_, which +it is said by some inspired Shakespeare's "Tempest." He wrote another +book, "The Historie of Travail into Virginia Britannia," covering the +years 1610-1611 and 1612. Of this book he made two copies in his own +handwriting, one of which, dedicated to Sir Francis Bacon, was deposited +in the British Museum; the other, dedicated to Sir Allen Apsley, +lieutenant of the Tower, and father of Lucy Hutchinson, was preserved +among the Ashmolean Manuscripts. There these two priceless manuscripts +slept unnoticed more than two hundred years! They were finally unearthed +in 1849 by R. H. Major of the British Museum, and printed for the Hakluyt +Society. + +The book is especially valuable because it treats of the time immediately +following John Smith's residence at Jamestown, of which we have no other +record except Raphe Hamor's later book. Moreover, it is the production +of a highly educated and religious man, who seems to have told his story +with no regard whatever for the prejudices of his readers, but simply as a +matter of duty. He does not appear to have offered it for publication. He +gives a graphic account of Powhatan and his realm, and a reliable picture +of savage manners and customs, having possessed an advantage over the +earlier historians by reason of his intimate association with intelligent +Indians who spoke English, and with the interpreters, Savage and Spelman, +who had lived among the Indians for the express purpose of learning their +language. As compared with John Smith, Strachey is a writer of superior +elegance. Although somewhat pedantic in his classical citations, his style +is clear and interesting. Coming to light after more than two hundred +years, his book has the charm of novelty with the venerable authority of +age. Evidently the author was a man of sober and observing mind, and of +learning after the model of King James, whose taste flavoured much of the +literature of his day. + +An intelligent English-speaking Indian, Kemps, lived a year at Jamestown; +and a frequent visitor was Machumps, Winganuskie's brother. "They came to +and fro as they dared, and as Powhatan gave them leave--for it was not +otherwise safe for them, no more than it was for Amarice, who had his +brains knocked out for selling but one basket of corn, and lying in the +English fort two or three days without Powhatan's leave."[71] Why Kemps +and Machumps were thus favoured we know not. The former died in the arms +of his new friends in the winter of 1611. "Machumps was a frequent guest +at Sir Thomas Dale's table, where (upon request) he sometimes repeated the +words with which the Indian always prefaced his meals. Kemps was much made +of by the Lord General, spoke a pretty deal of English and came orderly +to church every day to prayers, and observed with us the keeping of the +Sabbath both by ceasing from labour and repairing to church." + +Of course inquiry was made of Pocahontas, who had not been seen at +Jamestown after Captain Smith left. Kemps and Machumps concurred in +explaining her absence. She was "married to a private captaine called +Kocoun, some two years since."[72] + +She married, then, the year Captain Smith sailed, and doubtless after +she was told of his death. It is astonishing that so interesting a fact +has not been mentioned by any one of the Virginia historians who have +written since 1849--Charles Campbell, Esten Cooke, or Alexander Brown. +Dr. Doyle, of England, however, relates it. It was not agreeable to the +romantic Virginians that their Indian maiden should have been a widow when +she married John Rolfe. The first news we had in America of Strachey's +book came to us in a _Princeton Magazine_ in 1850. The writer frankly +confesses, "Some of the accounts of Pocahontas are unexpected: _nor dare +we copy them_!" The wheeling in the Jamestown market place was one of the +"accounts." Can it be that Virginians would hold her less "a thing enskyed +and saintly" if they knew her to have been a widow? + +This may be natural. Perhaps we would not enshrine the Maid of Orleans +nor the Maid of Saragossa as we do, had one been the "widow Joan" and +the other the "widow Augusta." Very capricious and unreasonable is poor +human nature in matters of love and romance. Pocahontas is to be honoured +all the more inasmuch as she conquered every instinct of her savage +nature, becoming reverent, gentle, pitiful, and patient; and corrected +every blemish in her "manners barbarous," learning to "live civilly," and +behaving, in all situations, with discreet gravity. Like the lovely pond +lily, the root was in slime and darkness; but at the first touch of the +sun the golden heart was revealed of a perfect flower. + +Of one thing we may be sure: she was not won unwooed. The customs of her +people forbade any such procedure. Her father may have sold her for a +bushel or two of "rawrenoke," as he sold one of her sisters, but Kocoun +must have followed the prescribed rule of his people. + +[73]"Yf a young mayden live under parents," says Strachey, "the parents +must allow of the sutor; for their good-wills the wooer promiseth +the daughter shall not want of such provisions, nor of deare-skynns +fitly drest for to weare; besides he promiseth to doe his endeavor to +procure beades, perle and copper; and for handsell gives her before them +something as a token of betroathing or contract of a further amity. And +he presents the young woman with the fruits of his labours, fowle or fish +or berries--and so after, as the likeing growes; and as soone as he hath +provided her a home (if he have none before) and some platters, morters +and matts he takes her home;" not, however, before the simple marriage[74] +ceremony. Her father calls together his kindred and friends, and in their +presence joins the hands of the contracting parties. The bridegroom's +father or chief friend, having provided a long string of beads, breaks it +over the clasped hands, giving the beads afterward to the bride, and "soe +with much mirth and feasting they goe together." + +Thus we are constrained again to observe a strange kinship among all the +children of men. The string of beads endows the bride with all the worldly +goods of her husband. The clasped hands express their mutual interests +and affection. As to the "skynnes, beads and perles," they are quite as +essential to the "further amity" of our brides of the twentieth century as +they were to the savage brides of the seventeenth. Even the copper would +be by no means despised. + +After this first marriage, the Indians permitted others--temporary +marriages--marriages on trial! After the trial period expired, the "trial" +wife might be dismissed; if not sent away then, she must be kept always, +"however uncompanionable." + +Of the poorer class of Indians we know little. Our society records have +been of the court only. Strachey was immensely exercised in them. There +was an interesting werowance named Pepisco, a religious sort of fellow, +who awakened hope that he might become the third Indian convert in the +little company of two--Pocahontas and Chanco. He must have been a very +proud and spirited savage. He was certainly an imprudent one. This Pepisco +possessed by right of succession a fine principality, where he might +have reigned happily all his days, but he must needs steal the affections +of Opechancanough's chief wife, and in due time stole the lady herself. +[75]"Powhatan conceaved a displeasure against him, and deposed him. Yet +is Pepisco suffered to retaine in this country a little small kassun, or +village, uppon the rivadge of the streame with some few people about him, +keeping the said woman still whome he makes his best beloved. She travels +with him upon any remove in hunting-tyme or in his visitation of us, by +which meanes twice or thrice in a summer she hath come unto our towne; +nor is she so handsome a savadge woman as I have seene amongst them, yet, +with a kind of pride she can take upon her a shewe of greatnes; for we +have seene her forbeare to come out of her quintan or boat through the +water as others, both mayds and married women usually doe, unless she were +carryed forth betweene two of her servants." + +The society reporter would not have been at all competent had he omitted +a careful description of the princess' gown. He had peculiar advantages +for observing it. + +"I was once early at her howse (yt being sommer tyme), when she was layed +without dores under the shadowe of a broad-leaved tree, upon a pallet +of osiers spred over with four or five fyne grey matts, herself covered +with a faire white drest deer skynne or two. When she rose, she had a +mayd who fetcht her a frontall of white currall, and pendants of great, +but imperfect-couloured and worse drilled pearles, which she put into +her eares; and a chayne with long lyncks of copper which came twice or +thrice about her neck and they acompt a jolly ornament; and sure thus +attired with some variety of feathers and flowers stuck in their heires, +they seem as debonaire, quaynt, and well pleased as (I wis) a daughter +of the house of Austria behune with all her jewells; likewise her mayd +fecht her a mantell which is like a side cloake, made of blew feathers, so +artificyally and thick sewed together that it seemed like a deepe purple +satten and is very smooth and sleeke; and after she brought her water for +her hands, and then a braunch or two of fresh greene asshen leaves as for +a towell to dry them." + +A very observant Briton was William Strachey, Gent.! We are grateful for +this glimpse of one of the royal family, whose dress and customs must have +been those of all the others--although, as there was a decided coolness +between the Princess Pepisco and the emperor, probably she did not visit +the Princess Pocahontas. + +The mantle of skins or feathers was, however, worn by Indian queens as +late as 1676, when the Queen of Pamunkey, a niece of Powhatan's, appeared +in the House of Burgesses clad in a buckskin robe cut into long fringes. +When Pocahontas, in the painting in the Capitol at Washington, is pictured +in an aesthetic robe of chiffon or some such soft, clinging material, +with a long flowing train (as at her baptism), the artist does her great +injustice. We presume that some good Christian woman at Jamestown may +have provided a garment suitable for the Christian ceremonial, but if +so, it was a short petticoat and ruff! And the Oriental dress swathing +her lithe form in the painting representing her marriage is just as +improbable as the sublime, heroic attitude of her prosaic bridegroom, +as he, with lifted hand and eyes, invokes the Almighty as witness of his +pious self-sacrifice. + +The publication, in 1849, of Strachey's "Virginia Britannia" aroused quite +as much interest in London as in this country. I wish I could quote all +of his descriptions of Indian life. The _London Athenaeum_ of 1850 calls +attention to the prophetic motto which prefaces the volume: "This shal +be written for the generations to come: and the people which shal be +created shall praise the Lord." It slept in obscurity for nearly twelve +generations--allowing four to a century. + +The _Athenaeum_ epitomizes the dress, customs, and descriptions of the +Virginia Indians. All these are interesting to us, now that the mysterious +savage is so far away from our observation, but for all these things I +must refer my readers to other historians. The _one_ point which must ever +be accentuated in our estimate of the character of the Virginia Indians +is the secrecy and cruelty of their human sacrifices. Once every year +the tribes were summoned to listen to the dread call of Okeus, for young +children to pacify his anger and ensure success in war, the hunt, and +the harvest. There at Utamussac--the spot that no Indian passed without +trembling--pitiful women surrendered their babes, and when all was over +returned "weeping bitterly," while the men rejoiced and sang. Now all +would be well! The arrow would be directed swiftly and surely to the heart +of the foe, or the deer; no blight would fall upon the corn; the women +would be faithful, the men strong. + +Pocahontas was living retired (in her widowhood we are forced to believe) +when Powhatan's old enmity awoke, and more arms were stolen from the +fort, more sneaking depredations made upon the settlements now beginning +to creep along the banks of the river. Captain Argall, who was sent by +Sir Thomas Dale to the Potomac to trade for corn, contrived to ingratiate +himself with Japazaws, a friendly chief, and from him learned that +Pocahontas was living with him. Japazaws had seen a gorgeous copper +kettle on board of Argall's ship, and the latter conceived the design +of exchanging it for Pocahontas, holding her prisoner, and forcing her +father to ransom her. Japazaws had much more interest in the kettle than +in his wife's guest, and Pocahontas was easily persuaded to accompany the +latter on board to "see the ship." The kettle was transferred while she +was alone for a few minutes, and her treacherous friends descended with +it to their quintan and were well on their way to shore when she was told +the truth.[76] She burst into tears, poor little widow, but soon dried +her eyes upon learning that she would be kindly treated and conveyed to +the spot of all others most interesting to her. + +Powhatan was enraged! He, however, after thinking the matter over for +three months, sent back some prisoners and a few unserviceable muskets +with many promises of further restitution, of corn, of peace, and amity. +The captors refused to surrender their willing prisoner, Pocahontas, until +full satisfaction should be rendered. Powhatan was deeply offended, and +nothing more was heard from him until another overture from Argall. + +Meanwhile Pocahontas found favour in the eyes of Sir Thomas Dale, "a man +of good conscience and knowledge in divinitie," and he ordered that she +should be carefully taught, cared for in every particular, and instructed +in the Christian faith. The pious Rev. Mr. Whitaker was only too happy +to undertake her religious education. As to the rest, her English was +imperfect, and she never learned to write. Everybody at Jamestown knew +of her early devotion to Captain Smith and to the starving colonists, +and honoured her accordingly. Master John Rolfe soon became interested +in her, and it was not long before he wrote the most remarkable letter +to Governor Dale that was ever penned by lover to a lady's guardian. He +tells of the throes of conscience that came near tearing his soul from +his body. He remembers "the heavy displeasure which Almighty God conceived +against the sons of Levi and Israel for marrying strange wives," and he is +fully aware that "her education hath been rude, her manners barbarous, her +generation accursed"--and as these were times when belief in a personal +devil was universal, and also in the malignant influence of witches (only +the latter were never young and beautiful), he is "full of feare and +trembling." His love has caused "a mighty war in his meditations." Nor +does he forget his own social position. He belongs to a very good family +indeed in England, "nor am I so desperate in estate that I regard not what +becometh of mee, nor am I out of hope but one day to see my countrie, nor +so void of friends, nor mean in birth, _but there to obtain a match to my +great content_." How he proposed, in that event, to dispose of Pocahontas +does not appear. He goes on in this strain for fully thirty or more pages +of the foolscap paper of the present time, and we can see the wild-eyed, +haggard widower lover tearing along by the light of a dim wick in oil, +with his quill pen diving deep into his ink-horn. + + "Was ever maiden in such humour wooed? + Was ever maiden in such humour won?" + +Of course the man of good conscience and knowledge in divinity had a +right to the reasons which overcame all these objections. They were three. +First and always, the desire to convert this unbelieving creature, namely +Pokahuntas." "Shall the base feare of displeasing the world overpower +or withhold me from revealing unto man the spirituall works of the Lord? +Shall I despise to actuate the pious duties of a Christian? God forbid!" +(But just here the Governor with his knowledge in divinity might hesitate, +inasmuch as marriage with the heathen in order to his conversion is no +part of the plan of salvation.) + +Second. "The great appearance of her love to me!" + +Third. "Her incitements hereunto stirring me up!" + +All these things working together, the end is accomplished. She is a +_fiancee_ when Argall takes her up the York to make another appeal to +Powhatan, burns a few villages to show he is in earnest, and finally +brings about an interview with her brothers (her father refuses to see +her), in which her engagement is announced. Powhatan is delighted! Before +Argall can reach Jamestown with the little bride, her old uncle Opachisco +and her two brothers are there before him to witness the marriage +ceremony, bearing with them her father's wedding present--a nicely dressed +deerskin. + + [Illustration: THE MARRIAGE OF POCAHONTAS AT JAMESTOWN. + + Halberdiers + Gov. Sir Thos. Dale + Alex. Whittaker + Mrs. John Rolfe and Child + Mrs. Ed. Easton and Child + Choristers + Mattachanna and Cleopatre + Pocahontas + John Rolfe + Indian Attendants + Capt. George Percy + Brother to Pocahontas + Henry Spilman + William Spence + Thos. Savage + Master Sparkes + Thomas Powell, Wife and Child + Mrs. Horton and Grandchild + Sir Thos. Gates + Opachisco, Uncle to Pocahontas + A Younger Brother to Pocahontas] + +Before this time, in April, 1613, Pocahontas had been baptized in the +church Lord Delaware had repaired and beautified. Her savage father had +given her three names,--Matoaca, Amonate, and Pocahontas. Her spiritual +sponsors gave her "Rebekah" at her baptism--no doubt in allusion to the +Rebecca of Genesis, and she was thereafter known in England as "the Lady +Rebekah." + +As Sir Thomas Dale had wisely foreseen, the alliance brought the blessing +of peace. The Chickahominies sent an embassy to conclude a treaty by which +they were to become subjects of the English king. John Rolfe and his dusky +bride lived "civilly and lovingly together" at "Varina," which continued +to be her residence until she left Virginia.[77] + + + + +CHAPTER XX + + +We must soon take our leave of the troublesome old gentleman with the +sour look. Governor Dale sends Raphe Hamor on a delicate errand--to ask +for his young daughter in marriage--a proceeding which gives us pause, +remembering that the Governor had a Lady Dale in England. However, we +leave him, wherever he is, to settle that little matter with her, and +avail ourselves once more of a solitary eyewitness to our narrative +in which he figures so mysteriously, as we perforce must do in the +much-challenged Pocahontas incident. Of her marriage with Kocoun, however, +we had two witnesses,--Machumps and Kemps. Hamor took with him two Indian +guides, and Thomas Savage as interpreter; also two pieces of copper, +five strings of white and blue beads, five wooden combs, ten fish-hooks, +and two knives; and, thus equipped, presented himself at Mathcot, one of +Powhatan's residences on the Pamunkey. + +Powhatan received him coldly, and, turning to Thomas Savage, whom he at +once recognized, said, "My child, I gave you leave, being my boy, to go +see your friends, and these four years I have not seen you, nor heard +from my own man Namontack I sent to England, though many ships since have +returned thence." Machumps, it appears, had never had the courage to tell +him of the Bermuda incident. + +Thomas Savage, we remember, was given to Powhatan by Captain Newport in +exchange for Namontack. Pory, writing in 1624, says that he had "with much +honestie and success served the publique without any public recompense, +yet had an arrow shot through his body in their service." The friendly +Accomac chief known as the "Laughing King" became so much attached to him +that he gave him land upon which his descendants have continued to the +present day. This family enjoys the distinction of being the only one in +Virginia (as far as we know) that can trace in a male line to one of the +first settlers of 1607. + +Powhatan had received Hamor out of doors, but after a little more talk +he conducted him to his house, where his guard of two hundred bowmen was +drawn up for whatever might happen. + +"The first thing he did," says Hamor, "hee offered me a pipe of tobacco, +then asked mee how his brother Sir Thomas Dale did, and his daughter and +unknowne sonne, and how they lived and loved and liked. I told him his +brother was well and his daughter so contented she would not live againe +with him, whereat he laughed and demanded the cause of my cumminge." Hamor +was ill at ease in the presence of the two hundred bowmen, and informed +the king that he bore a private message from the Governor, upon which +the king granted him audience, with only two wives and the interpreter +present. Hamor presented the Governor's plea. "I told him his brother +Dale, hearing of the fame of his youngest daughter" (this may have been +Cleopatre) "desired him to send her by me unto him, in testimony of his +love, as well for that he intended to marry her, as the desire of her +sister to see her,"[78] and ended with the usual assurances of friendship. + +Powhatan, after collecting himself a moment, answered gravely: "I gladly +accept the salute of love and peace which, while I live, I shall exactly +keep. His pledges thereof I receive with no less thanks although they are +not so ample as formerly I have received; but for my daughter, I have +sold her within this few days to a great Werowance for two bushels of +Rawrenoke, and she is gone three days' journey from me." + +Hamor seems to have thought this a small obstacle to his Governor's +wishes. He represented that Powhatan could easily recall his daughter, +and repay the rawrenoke to gratify his brother; especially as the bride +was only twelve years old; and that three times the value of the rawrenoke +would be sent him in beads, copper, hatchets, etc. + +"His answer was that he loved his daughter as his life, and though hee had +many children hee delighted in none so much as shee, whom if he could not +behold he could not possibly live, which living with us hee could not do, +having resolved on no termes to put himselfe in our hands or come amongst +us, continuing: 'returne my brother this answer: that I desire no more +assurance of his friendship than the promise he hath made. From me he +hath one of my daughters which so long as she lives shall be sufficient. +When she dies he shall have another: I hold it not brotherly to desire to +bereave me of my two children at once. Farther tell him though he hath no +pledge at all he need not distrust any injurie from me or my people. There +have been too many of his men and mine slain, and by my occasion there +shall never be more (I, which have power to perform it, have said it), +although I should have just cause, for I am now old, and would gladly end +my days in peace; if you offer me injury my country is large enough to go +from you. This much I hope will satisfy my brother. Now because you are +weary and I sleepy we will thus end.'" And so the alliance, which would +have been a brilliant one for the Princess Cleopatre, was declined with +thanks. + +It is the privilege of royalty to begin and end a conversation, so Hamor +retired, and "the next morning he came to visit us, and kindly conducted +us to the best cheer he had." + +After this we hear occasionally of the emperor, now, according to +Strachey, eighty years old. He was once found in possession of a handsome +blank-book, in which he requested an English visitor to write a list of +the articles to be sent to him as presents. His guest coveted the useful +book, but Powhatan refused to part with it, "It gives me pleasure," he +said, "to show it to strangers!" + +His crown (sent him by King James) was kept in his treasure-house. Every +autumn his people assembled to husk, shell, and store his corn, bringing +him eight parts out of ten of all grain, game, skins, or pearls they had +acquired; and when the grain was stored it was his custom to put on his +crown, and present beads to those who best pleased him. + + [Illustration: Powhatan Rock, under which the Indian Chief is said to be + buried. + + Copyright, 1906, by Jamestown Official Photo. Corp'n. ] + +The old emperor lived to hear of the birth of Pocahontas's son. When he +died, a great meeting of all his people took place in the dense woods +around Orapakes, and then and there, it is said, Opechancanough, his +successor, revealed his plan to massacre the English; and bound each man +to secrecy and fidelity. Accordingly, on a day appointed (Pocahontas +being now dead), the savages rose in the morning at eight and wreaked +their vengeance and fury on the English. In some instances the Indians +were breakfasting with the colonists when the hour arrived! Nearly four +hundred men, women, and children perished,--among them John Rolfe and +the good minister Thorpe, who had built a house for Opechancanough, +and established schools for the Indian children, and many other good +friends of the savages. Jamestown alone escaped of all the settlements, +having been warned, as we have seen, by the Christian boy, Chanco. The +horrible brutality of this massacre it is impossible to describe. Nothing +approaching it had ever been known even among the vindictive, cruel +savages. But their punishment was sharp. The entire policy regarding them +was changed, and the colonists ceased not for years to repulse and destroy +them. + +Twice again Opechancanough led in attempts to kill all the English. +Finally he was captured and taken to Jamestown, and there shot in the back +by some unknown hand. As the body of a captive was never restored to the +enemy, he was probably buried there. + + + + +CHAPTER XXI + + +Pocahontas seems to have led a quiet life on her husband's tobacco +plantation near the city of Henricus, until she visited England in 1616. +Captain Smith, learning of her presence there, wrote a noble letter to +Queen Anne, beseeching her kindness and relating in detail the story we +have given of her goodness to him and to the starving colony. + +She was well received at court. The high dignitaries of the church +entertained her, and she conducted herself with the grave dignity and +propriety demanded by the long, stiff stays which imprisoned her lithe +body. The court was not conspicuous for the gravity or dignity of its own +manners: but it found no fault with those of the American princess. + + [Illustration: Pocahontas at Court.] + +The shy little Indian woman could hardly have understood the interest she +awakened in the bosoms of those grave and reverend seniors. Archbishops, +bishops, and lesser clergy were all alike to her, differing only in the +cut and richness of their robes. But to them she represented an answer +to fervent prayer, the reward for lavish expenditure of health, hope, +life, and fortune. As she stood before them, dignified in her enforced +reticence, she seemed to them a miracle, the manifest incarnation of the +Holy Spirit--nothing less. + +Writers love to dwell upon the wonderful serenity of her manner, "softened +by the influence of the court." The court manners were anything but soft, +gentle, and serene. No coarser age, socially, finds record in English +history. Pocahontas owed much to her limited knowledge of the language +of the court. The coarse jest, the offensive _double entendre_, fell +upon unhearing ears. Her Indian training forbade the least betrayal of +emotion or surprise, and her incomprehensible Indian tongue spared her +the merriment of the volatile court ladies, which might have been provoked +by her _ingenue_ remarks. Mighty is silence,--placing those who adopt it +upon a plane the chatterer never attains. + +And so it came to pass that poor little Pocahontas, stiff and +uncomfortable in her long stays and quilted robes, behaved in a manner +which demanded no indulgence and challenged no criticism. Lord and Lady +Delaware were her sponsors and instructors in court etiquette. When +her lips touched the hand of the Queen, no one could find fault with +her demeanour. The clergy declared that less dignity was not to have +been expected, since the hand of Divine Providence was manifest in her +conversion. The _blase_ courtiers, with small appreciation of spiritual +charms, protested they had "seen many English ladies worse favoured, worse +proportioned, worse behavioured,"--which indeed we can easily believe. + +Tradition preserves the astonishing fact that King James was greatly +offended with John Rolfe for marrying a princess without his consent; not +that he proposed to claim an alliance for "Baby Charles" or "Steenie," +the new favourite and candidate for the peerage, or for any noble of his +realm; but just from pure gossipy meddling, pure fussiness, pure folly; +than which nothing was too foolish for "the wisest fool in Christendom." + +Our Indian lady was introduced to Samuel Purchas, and he was present at +the entertainment given in her honour by Dr. King, the Bishop of London; +exceeding in splendour anything the author had ever witnessed. Probably +Sir Walter Raleigh attended this fete. He had just been released, after +thirteen years' confinement in the Tower, having walked out of the iron +doors just as the degraded Earl of Somerset, Robert Carr, and his guilty +wife walked in. It is certain he could not fail to meet Pocahontas. He +was nothing to her, but her presence meant much to him. He had sowed, and +others had reaped. Moreover, he must have scanned the peculiarly feminine +lineaments of her face with wonder and keen interest. Through her he was +brought face to face with the destroyer of his two colonies, so loved and +so betrayed, upon which he had exhausted his treasury. + +Her son was born while she was in England, or shortly before her coming +thither, and the London Company made provision for him and for her. The +smoke of London so distressed her that she removed to Brentford. The tiny +smoky hut of her childhood she could bear--but not the London fog. At +Brentford John Smith visited her. In mortal fear of offending the king by +familiarity with a princess, he addressed her ceremoniously as the "Lady +Rebekah," and this[79] wounded her so deeply that she covered her face +with her hands and turned away, refusing to speak for two or three hours! +It appears that he awaited her pleasure, and presently she reproached him +for his distant manner, thinking perhaps that he was ashamed to own her +before his own people. She reminded him that he had always called Powhatan +"father," and so she now meant to call him, and be his child, and forever +and ever his countrywoman; adding, "they did tell me you were dead, and +I knew no other till I came to Plymouth; yet[80] Powhatan did command +Uttamatomakkin to seeke you and know the truth because your Countriemen +will lie much."[81] + +The Indian with the long name was Matachanna's husband, also known on +these pages as "Tocomoco." Powhatan had sent him to number the English, +which he proceeded to do by notches on a stick, but soon grew weary of +such a hopeless task. He took great offence because King James paid him +no attention, and never ceased abusing the English after his return, thus +helping along the massacre of five years later. + +Pocahontas was on her way home, "sorely against her will," when she was +smitten with illness on board ship and taken ashore at Gravesend. There +she died, March 1, 1617, sustained by the faith and hope of the true +Christian. She was interred in the chancel of St. George's Church; the +exact spot of burial is, however, not known. + +Before she left England her portrait was painted by an unknown artist, and +presented to Mr. Peter Elwin, a relative of the Rolfe family, by Madame +Zucchelli. As Zucchero was a painter of the time, the name Zucchelli might +have been mistaken for his. Zucchero painted a beautiful portrait of Queen +Elizabeth with a marvellous jewelled stomacher, but without the monstrous +fanlike wings of gauze at the throat with which we are familiar. + + [Illustration: Royal Palace, Whitehall.] + +John Rolfe left his son in England to be educated, and he found his +"match" once more, and married the daughter of a rich man at Jamestown. +Pocahontas's son married also, and was the progenitor of some of +Virginia's most distinguished citizens and statesmen. He visited his uncle +Opechancanough and his aunt "Cleopatre" after he returned to Virginia. +He was not ashamed of his Indian relatives! Nor are his descendants. The +names of Pocahontas, Powhatan, and Matoaca are still borne by them. + +It has been said that Pocahontas died of smallpox. We know nothing from +printed record or parish register except that she was buried in the +chancel of the church at Gravesend in the County of Kent; that the church +was destroyed by fire in 1727, and a new church, St. George's, erected +upon the site of the old one; and that the Rev. John H. Haslam, later +rector, placed a commemorative tablet in the chancel recording all that +careful investigation has yielded of the spot where her ashes lie. One +could wish that she might have found her last resting-place under the +skies of her native country; that from her "unpolluted flesh violets"--the +lovely wild violets of Virginia--might "spring" with every return of +summer. + +The infant son of Pocahontas, Thomas Rolfe, was placed under the care +of Sir Lewis Stukely, Vice Admiral of Devon; and here again the story +of the Indian girl touches that of Sir Walter Raleigh.[82] It was this +Stukely who afterwards basely betrayed his friend, Sir Walter, and by this +treachery covered himself with infamy. The son of Pocahontas did not long +breathe the atmosphere polluted by this traitor. He was removed to London +and educated by his uncle, Henry Rolfe. + +Thomas Rolfe's immediate descendants married into the families of Bolling, +Randolph, Gay, Eldridge, and Murray. No trace of the Indian in feature +or character survives in those highly esteemed Virginia families. The +haughty, vindictive spirit of the cruel Powhatan may have burnt itself +out in the veins of John Randolph of Roanoke, who left no descendants. + +Pocahontas will always be interesting to the student of colonial history. +The story of her life was a strange one, and stranger the story to its +end. Her father and her kindred were consigned to the tomb with the rites +and lamentations of the savage, and with wild heathenish invocations to +the Devil of their imaginations. She, alone of all her tribe, simply as +a consequence of one noble act, received Christian burial, in hallowed +Christian soil, and is embalmed forever in grateful Christian hearts. + + + + +CHAPTER XXII + + +The time is at hand when the curtain must be rung down upon the scenes I +have tried to present. I was constrained to follow the fortunes of John +Smith and Pocahontas, for do what we will we cannot eliminate them from +an all-important place in the early history of Virginia. Others were just +as deserving, but the historians of their day failed to leave us material +regarding them. Like my great favourite, the modest, brave George Percy, +who lived long at Jamestown, they quietly slipped back into the shadows +from which they only emerged to suffer and toil awhile for the common +good. + +I find it hard to leave my story. A glorious chapter in the history +of Jamestown awaits a stronger pen than mine. At Jamestown, "in 1619, +a year before the _Mayflower_ skirted the coast of Massachusetts, +the Virginians inaugurated representative government on the American +continent--'an example never lost but ever cherished as the dearest +birthright of freemen.' There, on June 21, 1621, the Virginians extorted +the concession that 'no orders of court shall bind the said Colony unless +they be ratified by the General Assemblies.' In 1624 they there asserted +the right of self-taxation and control of the public purse, protesting +that 'the Governor shall not lay any imposition upon the Colony, their +land or commodities otherwise than by the authority of the General +Assembly, and employed as the said Assembly shall appoint.' Though loyal +to the King, in 1635, at Jamestown, Governor Harvey was 'thrust out,' +for encroaching upon the rights of the people. Nay, after the downfall +of monarchy they confronted Cromwell himself (who sent his threatening +ships to Jamestown) and only yielded to his usurpation upon an honourable +capitulation, acknowledging their submission as 'a voluntary act not +forced or constrained by conquest,' and guaranteeing them 'such freedom +and privileges as belong to the free-born people of England.' After the +Restoration they broke out in open rebellion against the oppressions of +government and anticipated by a century the final and victorious struggle +for the liberties of America. On the untimely death of their leader--the +well-born, the gallant, the accomplished, the eloquent Bacon--their +revolt was quenched in blood; but even so, without any surrender of their +chartered rights."[83] + +These events are the glory and honour of our country, but my plan was to +tell only of the birth of the nation, not its restless youth or strong +manhood. My task was an humbler one: to honour the men who failed,--but +not in courage or fortitude; who put their hands to the plough and never +looked back; who devoted their lives, with no hope of reward, to carrying +on the work assigned them; who fought the battle and fell on the field, +regardless of the discouragement, disloyalty, and detraction meted out +to them. They sowed; but others reaped the rich harvest. They laid the +foundation; others built the fair structure. God be thanked, they suffered +not in vain! When the kings of the earth send their navies into Virginia +waters, when multitudes throng the gates, when cannon speaks to cannon, +when orators bring their choicest words to grace the hour, a voice more +eloquent than all these will rise from the sands of the desolate little +island of Jamestown,--"We who lie here in unmarked graves died for _you_!" + + * * * * * + +Ninety-nine years after Jamestown was settled the seat of government +was removed to Williamsburg. There was then no further excuse for the +existence of a town on the little peninsula. Mrs. Ann Cotton, writing +soon after Bacon's Rebellion, gives sufficient reasons for this. "It is +low ground, full of marshes and swamps, which make the aire especially +in the sumer insalubritious and unhealthy. It is not at all replenished +with springs of fresh water, and that which they have in their wells +brackish, ill-scented, penurious and not grateful to the stomach ... and +(in the town) about a dozen families are getting their living by keeping +of ordinaries at extraordinary prices."[84] + +So it appears that "the town, even though measured by what would appear to +be a standard of its time, was small, poor, and insignificant. This fact +invests the place with the deepest interest, when it is remembered that +from such a small beginning in the wilderness has sprung what bids fair +to become, if not so already, the greatest nation of the earth."[85] + +The town, deserted by all its best citizens, rapidly fell into decay +and ruin. The brick houses tumbled down, the church left nothing but its +sturdy old tower to stand sentinel over the graves of those who had built +it and worshipped within it. + + [Illustration: Jamestown Church Tower, Rear View, showing Old Foundations. + + Copyright, 1906, by Jamestown Official Photo. Corp'n. ] + +The peninsula, to-day an island, was divided into farms, and "martial +ranks of corn" stood in the plain on which John Smith exercised his men in +military evolutions. Around the church the young trees had it all their +own way, clasping the gravestones and bearing them aloft in their strong +young arms. There was nobody to hinder or protest. + +In 1856 the peninsula had become an island, and access to it was by +a rowboat. A large portion of the island was already engulfed by the +waves. The bank was giving away within one hundred and fifty feet of the +old tower of the church. Travellers in the excursion boats to Old Point +Comfort began to observe the singular behaviour of a large cypress tree +in the river opposite the tower. The cypress seemed to be slowly moving +onward. An old traveller remembered that the tree in 1846 stood on land; +it was now two hundred and ninety feet in the water from the shore! +Evidently the shore itself was receding. Through the munificent gift +of Mr. and Mrs. Edward Barney, in 1895, twenty-two acres of the island, +including its historic area, came into the possession of the Association +for the Preservation of Virginian Antiquities--a band of daughters of +Virginia organized to rescue from decay and oblivion the sites of her +early history, carving anew, like the Antiquary at the graves of the +slaughtered Presbyterians, the story of those who "broke the way with +tears." + +Our guests on our anniversary day will not find the picturesque old church +tower standing alone, looking toward the sea to which the anxious eyes +of the sleepers beneath had been cast in the early days of starvation. +Weakened by the storms of nearly three centuries, the old tower demanded +support. The church has been rebuilt upon the old plan and the old +foundations. A splendid sea-wall has been given by the government to the +women of the Virginia Association--to do what their feeble hands tried +but could not do. All is changed--except the old cypress far out in the +water, which keeps its own secret, and refuses to yield to time, or wave, +or change. Who knows? Perhaps his clasping roots may hold that other child +of the forest, the old brave chieftain Opechancanough. + +Part of the humble little town has been exhumed. The walls and foundations +of the third and fourth churches, and of some few houses have been laid +bare. Very few relics have been discovered; the bones of a gigantic man, +the cenotaph of a knight, skeletons which crumbled at the touch of the +air, shot from some alien gun, a bit here and there of broken crockery. +But beneath the mould of two centuries was found evidence of another and +lasting foundation, the fundamental basis of all happiness, all moral +good, and all national prosperity--that of the simple, wholesome domestic +life of the fireside. A pipe, scissors, thimble, and candlestick lay +together in one of the uncovered chambers. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII + +LEGENDS OF THE OLD STONE HOUSE + + +The "Old Stone House" on Ware Creek, according to the Virginia historians, +was the resort, at three different times, of the disembodied spirits +of famous historical characters. "This unfinished stone edifice, +evidently designed for a fortification, stands on a hill facing the +water, and is difficult of access by reason of the impenetrable thickets +and ravines overgrown with mountain laurel by which it is surrounded. +Only by following a narrow path on the top of a wooded ridge can it +be approached."[86] In consequence of its evil name nobody two hundred +years ago ever visited it; and if a belated huntsman stumbled upon it +by accident, he made haste to retrace his steps, frightened by the dark +corners suggestive of hiding-places, and awed by the warning whispers of +the wind as it sighed through the pines. + +The country around it is desolate. The ravines are filled with poisonous +vines and tenanted by the deadly rattlesnake. The house itself is a +roofless ruin, embroidered by ivy and caressed by the Virginia creeper, +the long boughs of which, like long arms, wave in the air to warn away +all intruders. + +The building is small, of solid masonry, the walls two feet thick, pierced +with loopholes for musketry. There is one door from which stone steps +descend to an underground chamber. This is probably the first stone +house ever built by the English colonists, and is generally conceded +by historians and antiquarians to be the edifice of which in 1609 Anas +Todkill and others wrote to the London Company, "We built a fort for a +retreat neere a convenient river, upon a high commanding hill very hard +to be assaulted and easie to be defended; but the want of corne occasioned +the end of all our worke, it being worke enough to provide victuall." + +In this provision of "victuall," the starving colonists, as we have seen, +were aided by Pocahontas, who brought, it is supposed, her "wild train" +laden with baskets of food as far as this house, and there dismissing +them, waited for Captain John Smith. The spot was favourable as a +hiding-place from the fury of her father, the old king whose house was not +far away, with its substantial chimney built by the treacherous Dutchmen. +Here Pocahontas may have rested when she came "through the irksome woods +with shining eyes" to warn her hero of danger and treachery from her own +people. + +These are the bits of folk-lore gleaned by that patient and accurate +historian, Charles Campbell. Sixty years ago he visited the Stone House, +and verified the existence then in the minds of the common people of +three distinct legends belonging to the locality. No one doubts the +romantic attachment of the Indian princess to Captain Smith. It sprang +into existence perhaps at the heroic moment when she shielded his doomed +head with her own bosom, and became the dominant influence of her short +and eventful life. + +Who can doubt that he early learned enough of her tongue to tell her of +his mighty deeds, of the court of the great Sigismund, of his triumphal +procession thither preceded by the heads, borne on lances, of the three +slaughtered Turks; drawing, the while, pictures in the sand similar to +the marvellous creations with which he illustrated the maps with which +we are familiar? It is pathetic to know that the time was to him only an +episode in a life of adventure. Even the saving of his own life, so often +miraculously preserved, was a matter of little importance, remembered +only in a generous moment, to secure for her an interest with his Queen. +To Pocahontas he was more than a hero--he was little less than the Great +Father himself. To him she was an attractive, beautiful child, and yet of +a nation despised--"all savage," as he termed them. + +One does not like to mar the romance by accepting the story of her +marriage to one of Powhatan's captains. So dear is the romance of the +Indian girl's devotion to John Smith, that we are tempted to be unjust to +John Rolfe and to explain her marriage at Jamestown as the consequence +of her longing to belong to the people of her hero,--to be "forever and +ever his countrywoman,"--and to find in the Puritanic John Rolfe, with +his tiresome throes of conscience and long-drawn apologies for loving her, +a counterpart of her gallant captain. When she met John Smith in London, +very pitiful must she have appeared to him, as her portrait does to us, in +her stiff brocade, high, starched ruff, and English hat; she, the swaying, +graceful windflower of the forest! + +She must have appeared to him strangely unlike her charming self. Her dark +locks, shaven closely on her temples, as was the custom of her people +while she was a maid, had been suffered to grow since she had become a +matron, and hung rebelliously about her pearl ear-rings; her lithe wrists, +primly sustaining her fan of three feathers, were fettered by broad +English cuffs. Those feathers were the only familiar connecting links +between her past and her present! All else was strange. + +We read that she neither smiled nor spoke for two hours when she was +visited by Captain Smith. Presently she said, "They did tell me you +were dead, and I knew no other until I came to Plymouth," and then in +response to his deferential devoirs to "the Lady Rebekah," indignantly +declares that she will have none of such talk! She means always to call +him "Father," and be to him a "child," as she had been in Virginia. + +And so the legend begins; and when she finds "her grave," as the quaint +old writer says, "at Gravesend," she could not rest "in ye chauncell of +ye church," but John Rolfe having married another wife, and Captain Smith +having died, she was free to return to her old haunts, to meet her hero +without let or reproof, and explain all that had been so wrong and so +unfortunate. The belated fishermen, returning to their homes on the Ware, +grew accustomed to seeing a thin thread of smoke issuing from the Old +Stone House, and flitting past the loopholes might sometimes be discerned +the dusky form of Pocahontas, with the white plume, the badge of royalty, +in her dark hair. Here she awaited as of yore the coming of Captain Smith, +and here he came and held converse with her. At last the troubled soul is +comforted--the "deare and darling daughter" of Powhatan fades away from +the legends of the old Virginians and is seen no more. Let us hope she +is happy in a state where there are no separations and no mysteries, and +that if she ever revisits the pale glimpses of the moon her errand may be +one of beneficence to her many descendants. + +The grim old fortress was untenanted, except by this Indian maiden, +for nearly a hundred years, and then "the dreadful pyrate Blackbeard" +secretes his ill-gotten treasures in the subterranean vault. To and fro +he moves with muffled oars, mans the port-holes with his guns, and rests +secure from assault. With his rifles he can pick out every man who dares +to thread the defile. Presently his outgoing is watched, and one fine +day he is assailed, and conquered on board his own sloop. He was a bold +buccaneer, and had given orders that at a signal his magazine should be +fired and friend and foe perish together. But his followers preferred +surrender to death, and were all brought captive to Jamestown. Very brutal +was the triumph of his captors. He had given trouble and resisted long, +and now they would make sure of him. They returned with his gory head +hanging from the prow of their vessel, and out of the skull that had +housed his busy brain they fashioned a drinking-cup and rimmed it with +silver, after the manner of their fathers in the old days of England. +He became the Captain Kidd of Virginia waters. His phantom ship could be +seen on moonlight nights on the York River, and his headless body would +disembark therefrom and hover over his buried treasure. The treasure +was never found; perhaps it is there still under some stone of the old +fortress. + +After this we hear nothing for many years of the Old Stone House. +It crumbled away very little, being so strong; but nobody is tempted +to approach it or use it in any way. The luxuriant vines bear great +trumpet-shaped flowers, and clothe the walls with a brilliant beauty, seen +only by the bats, hanging by crooked black fingers from every projection, +and ready to fly in the face of the intruder, or the noxious serpents +which wind in and out and increase and multiply with no check from man, +their enemy. + +Finally, about the year 1776, tenants appear again in the little fortress, +ghostly forms throng the wide door, strange sounds of exultation are borne +by the winds, and fitful unreal lights flit about or hover over the spot. +From a distance these are observed, but there is no investigation, indeed +the times are too stirring to admit of investigation. The Governor of +Virginia has fled from the irate Commonwealth, and digests his chagrin on +board his own sloop, riding at a safe distance near Yorktown. Men are in +arms, burning words leap from lip to lip,--a great crisis is at hand, a +great cloud is rising, soon to darken the land and break in the thunder +and lightning of a mighty tempest. + +What wonder, then, that it should be believed that the bugles of the +fast-coming Revolution have reached Nathaniel Bacon in his long sleep +in the York River, where "thoughtful Mr. Lawrence" had sunk his gallant +young body lest it meet with ignominy at the hands of Lord Berkeley; that +Drummond and Carver, and Bland and Hansford, and all the grand spirits +who, with their leader, had lived a hundred years too soon, should meet +him now, to exult and triumph! + +What matter, now, that they had bled and suffered, and laid down their +bright young lives, so full of promise, for a "lost cause"! The _cause_ +had lived, and soon the young republic would break its shackles and stand +forth with its foot upon the tyrant's neck. The mills of the gods had +not been idle, and here in the mysterious Old Stone House, the fortress +in which no living man had ever dwelt, they met to plan, to rejoice, to +triumph, night after night, until the foes of the country they loved so +well should be driven from her shores in disgrace and defeat. + +These are the legends--if they are not too recent to be classed as +legends--with which, a century ago, Virginians dignified the Old Stone +House. The early settlers were firm believers in supernatural influences +and warnings. A blazing star had appeared before a storm when the three +ships set forth to find this country, another in the year of the massacre +of 1622, and yet another on the eve of Bacon's Rebellion. Tongue-like +flames flitted to and fro over the early graveyards, and ghostly lights +hovered over the undrained marshes. The "boat of birchen bark" lighted by +a firefly lamp of the lost lovers in the Dismal Swamp was seen as late +as the nineteenth century. Huntsmen in the cold, freezing nights would +sometimes find themselves suddenly enveloped in a warm cloud,--this was +because a ghost had met them and passed over them in the dark. Sterner +than all these was the belief that witches--malignant spirits--were +suffered to enter human bodies and bend men and women to their evil +purposes. + +Ghost stories have long been out of fashion. They have no longer a place +in literature or even beside the winter fireside. The American of to-day +may be a dreamer of dreams and seer of visions, but they are of the +future, not the past. His phantoms are all ahead of him. Perhaps I should +apologise for admitting them into a serious work. And yet I think that +everything connected with the story of the birth of our nation deserves +preservation. I believe, with Carlyle, that "the leafy, blossoming Present +Time springs from the _whole_ Past, remembered and unrememberable." + +As Time goes on and touches with effacing finger one and another of the +events that have marked, like milestones, the onward march of the great +Anglo-Saxon race, we may be sure that the birth of this Western nation +will ever be "remembered." "We shall not," said Daniel Webster, "stand +unmoved on the shore of Plymouth while the sea continues to wash it, nor +will our brethren in another early and ancient colony forget the place of +its first establishment till their river ceases to flow by it. No vigour +of youth, no maturity of manhood, will lead the nation to forget the spots +where its infancy was cradled and defended." + + +FOOTNOTES: + + [1] Hume's "James I," p. 83. + + [2] Hakluyt, III, 174-176. + + [3] Stith's "History," p. 25. + + [4] Coke, 2 Inst. 729 and 734. + + [5] Harleian MS., quoted by Miss Aiken in her "Memoirs of the + Court of James I." + + [6] "The Accomplished Cook," by Robert May; London 1685. + + [7] Letter of Philip Mainwaring to the Earl of Arundel, Lodge's + "Illustrations," Vol. III, p. 403. + + [8] Cooke's "Virginia," p. 8 _et seq._ + + [9] Ibid., p. 8 _et seq._ + + [10] Bancroft's "History of the United States," Vol. I, p. 122. + + [11] Purchas's "His Pilgrimes," Vol. VIII, p. 469. The quotations + from Purchas in this volume are from the Macmillan edition. + + [12] Quoted by Campbell, p. 39, from Stith. + + [13] "Site of Old Jamestown," by Samuel Yonge, p. 11. + + [14] Stith's "History," p. 46. + + [15] Purchas's "His Pilgrimes," Vol. XVIII. + + [16] _Passiflora incarnata_ of Linnaeus. + + [17] _Anchusa Virginiana_ of Linnaeus. + + [18] Percy's "Narrative," quoted by Campbell, "History," p. 40. + + [19] Percy's "Discourse," Smith's "Works," p. lxviii. + + [20] Campbell's "History of Virginia," p. 41. + + [21] Brown's "First Republic," p. 29. + + [22] His true name was Parahunt. This was the birthplace of King + Powhatan. + + [23] Smith's "Works," p. 93. References to the "Works of John + Smith" in this volume are from Professor Edward Arben's edition. + + [24] Brown's "The First Republic," p. 43 _et seq._ + + [25] Possibly "Pamunkey" was meant. + + [26] Smith's "Works," p. 957. + + [27] John Smith, quoted in Campbell's "History," p. 382. + + [28] Cooke's "Virginia," p. 20. + + [29] Living in the region now known as Prince George and Surry. + Their chief was Pepisco--otherwise Pepiscumah. + + [30] "Newes from Virginia," quoted in E. Arber's "Works of John + Smith," p. 14. + + [31] Strachey. + + [32] "Newes from Virginia," by John Smith. + + [33] Other historians place his age at eighty years. + + [34] "Newes from Virginia." + + [35] A district near the mouth of James River, on which now + stands the town of Hampton. + + [36] Smith's "Works," p. 400. + + [37] Brown's "First Republic in America," p. 82. + + [38] Campbell's "History of Virginia," p. 49. + + [39] The matches were long coils of cord, chemically treated to + burn slowly, and kept lighted at both ends. The coils were hung + over the shoulder or hooked to the bandolier. + + [40] Prince or chief. + + [41] Purchas, Vol. XVIII, p. 477. + + [42] Smith's "Works," p. 39. + + [43] John Smith, in his letters to Queen Anne, gave her age as + "twelve or thirteen yeares." + + [44] Cooke's "Virginia," p. 44. + + [45] Smith's "Works," p. 436. + + [46] Smith's "Works," p. 123. + + [47] Smith's "Works," pp. 124-125. + + [48] Purchas's "His Pilgrimes," Vol. XVIII, p. 449 _et seq._ + + [49] "The First Republic," p. 131. + + [50] The present county of Isle of Wight. + + [51] The colonists wished to send silk grass for a robe to Queen + Anne. Queen Elizabeth had worn such a robe--made of Virginia + grass. + + [52] Purchas, p. 507 _et seq._ + + [53] Smith's "Works," p. 455. + + [54] "The First Republic," p. 73 _et seq._ + + [55] Campbell's "History of Virginia," p. 76 _et seq._ + + [56] "The First Republic," p. 76. + + [57] Campbell's "History of Virginia," p. 77. "The First + Republic" gives a later date. + + [58] Cooke's "Virginia," p. 63. + + [59] Smith's "Works," p. 480. + + [60] Smith's "Works," p. 486. + + [61] Smith's "Works," p. 168. + + [62] Grahame's "History of North America," Vol. I, p. 70. + + [63] "The First Republic." + + [64] Smith's "Works," p. 487. + + [65] Delaware's Report, in "Virginia Britannia," p. xxvi; Cook's + "Virginia," p. 79. + + [66] Smith's "Works," p. 635. + + [67] "The First Republic," p. 128 _et seq._ + + [68] Virginia Britannia, p. xiii. + + [69] "The First Republic," pp. 285, 329, 612. + + [70] Campbell's "History of Virginia," p. 103. + + [71] "Virginia Britannia," p. 53 _et seq._ + + [72] _Ibid._, p. 54. + + [73] _Ibid._, p. 109. + + [74] Spelman's "Relation"--Smith. + + [75] "Virginia Britannia," p. 57. + + [76] Campbell's "History of Virginia," p. 107. + + [77] Cooke's "Virginia," pp. 97-98. + + [78] Smith's "Works," p. 517 _et seq._ + + [79] Smith, pp. 533-534. + + [80] One of her descendants, Mr. Robert Bolling of Chelowe, + thus annotated those words in his "Smith": "To find Smith and + inquire of him whether he was dead! A very comical commission, + Grand-mama!" + + [81] Smith's "Works," p. 533. + + [82] Campbell's "History of Virginia," p. 122. + + [83] Address of Hon. Roger A. Pryor before the Virginia Bar + Association, 1895. + + [84] "The Cradle of the Republic," p. 51. + + [85] "The Site of old 'James Towne,'" by Samuel H. Yonge, p. 8. + + [86] Howe's "History of Virginia," p. 390. + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Birth of the Nation, by Mrs. Roger A. 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