USA > Virginia > Virginia, a history of the people > Part 5
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Toward spring a fire broke out at Jamestown, and completely destroyed the place ; but the reed-thatched huts were rebuilt, and the incident was soon forgotten in the excitement of what, in our time, is called the
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VIRGINIA: A HISTORY OF THE PEOPLE.
gold-fever. A yellow deposit had been discovered in the neighborhood of Jamestown, and suddenly a craze seized upon the adventurers. The deposit was taken for gold, and all heads were turned : "There was no thought, no discourse, no hope, and no work but to dig gold, wash gold, refine gold, and load gold." Newport and the Council caught the fever, like the rest, and Smith was the only one who remained incredulous. He reasoned with them in vain, and at last lost all patience. He told them roughly that he was "not enamored of their dirty skill to fraught such a drunken ship with so much gilded dirt," and went about among the gold-dig- gers "breathing out these and many other passions." They would not listen to him, and Newport carried to London a full cargo of the gilded dirt, which was duly found to be worthless, and no more was heard of it. What was much more important, he took with him twenty turkeys -- the first introduction of that fowl into Europe. With the yellow dirt and the turkeys went also to England the disgraced Wingfield. He never returned to Virginia, but spent his leisure, tlience- forth, in maligning his old opponents there.
Another joyful event of these spring days of 1608 was the arrival of a second ship, which had sailed with Newport, but had been driven to the West Indies. This was the Phoenix, commanded by Captain Francis Nelson, "an honest man and expert mariner." He turned his back on the "fantastical gold," and laid in a cargo of cedar ; and when he sailed for home in June, took back with him Smith's "True Relation of Vir- ginia." This was printed in the same year at "The Grayhound, in Paul's Churchyard," and was the first book written by an Englishman in America.
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A YEAR OF INCIDENTS.
Smith, who had determined to make an exploration of the Chesapeake, accompanied the Phoenix in his barge as far as the capes. There he took final leave of the honest man and expert mariner, Captain Francis Nelson, and the good ship disappears in the old years on her homeward voyage. We may see the white sails fade and the men in the barge standing up and looking seaward. Then the mist swallows the speck, and it is gone.
Smith's voyage with fourteen companions to explore the Chesapeake was a remarkable expedition. It was made in an open barge, and resembled a journey into an unknown world. All was new and strange. At one time they meet with the Indian king of Accomac, who relates how the faces of two dead children remained bright and fresh, and all that looked on them at once expired. Then a terrible storm beats on the adven- turers in the small barge -" thunder, lightning, and rain, with mighty waves." Driven far to the north, and nearly out of provisions, the voyagers become faint- hearted, but Smith encourages them. They ought to remember " the memorable history of Sir Ralph Layne, how his company importuned him to proceed in the discovery of Moratico, alleging they yet had a dog, which being boiled with sassafras leaves would richly feed them on their return. Regain, therefore, your old spirits," adds the persuasive orator-soldier, "for return I will not, if God please, till I have seen the Massa- womecs, found Potomac, or the head of this water you conceive to be endless." He found and entered the Potomac, the Rappahannock, and other rivers, often fighting with the Indians ; and near what is now Sting- ray Point, was wounded in the wrist by one of these
F
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fish. His arm swelled to an alarming extent, and, think- ing he would surely die, he selected a spot to be buried in. The swelling soon disappeared, however, and the voyagers returned to Jamestown, from which place they again set out in July on another voyage. This time they proceeded to the furthest northern limits of the Chesapeake; landing on the site of Baltimore and making the acquaintance of the gigantic Susquehan- nocks. It was the daily habit of Smith to offer up a prayer and sing a psalm, and this proceeding struck the simple and impulsive savages with wonder. "They be- gan," says the chronicle, "in a most passionate manner to hold up their hands to the sun, with a fearful song ; then embracing our captain they began to adore him in like manner " - the only intimation that any of the Indians were sun-worshipers. In the first days of September the Chesapeake voyagers returned south- ward, and while rounding Point Comfort nearly per- ished. The brief account of this incident is a good example of the style of the chronicles. A storm struck them in the night, and "running before the wind we sometimes saw the land by the flashes of fire from heaven, by which light only we kept from the splitting shore until it pleased God in that black darkness to preserve us by that light to find Point Comfort."
In these two voyages the adventurers sailed about three thousand miles ; explored both banks of the Ches- apeake ; and Smith drew a map of astonishing accuracy, - that which was afterwards printed in the General History.
The voyagers were back at Jamestown early in Sep- tember (1608). Again the condition of affairs there had become deplorable. The chronicle, written by
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trusty Anas Todkill, and others, sums up the situation : "The silly President [Ratcliffe] had riotously con- sumed the stores, and to fulfill liis follies about build- ing for his pleasure in the woods, liad brought them all to that misery that liad we not arrived, they had as strangely tormented him with revenge." The grim hu- mor of the writer is the commentary on the silly Rat- cliffe's pleasure-house and the general misery for which the adventurers liad " strangely tormented him with re- venge," but for the interposition of Smith. On one point, however, they would not be persuaded by the soldier. They would have no more of Ratcliffe, and rising suddenly in their wrath they deposed him and chose Smith, who thus by popular election became President of Virginia.
And now at the end of autumn, Newport again made his appearance. He brought a number of settlers, among them Mistress Forrest and her maid Anne Bur- ras, who was soon afterwards married to Master John Laydon, the first English marriage on American soil.
Newport brought orders from the London authori- ties which showed that they had grown irate. No profit had come from Virginia, and Ratcliffe had written home that Smith and his followers meant to seize upon the country and " divide it among themselves." Thence wrath on the part of the Right Honorables, who had no doubt been enlightened by the disgraced Wingfield. The Virginia adventurers were to discover and return one of the lost Roanoke colonists ; to send back a lump of gold; and to find the South Sea beyond the mountains. If these orders were not obeyed they were to "remain as banished men." Smith listened in the Council and declared the orders absurd, whereat New-
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port and himself came to daggers draw. For the mo- ment, however, their differences were smoothed over, .and Newport proceeded to carry out another of his or- ders, - to crown Powhatan. Smith was sent to invite the Emperor to come to Jamestown for that purpose, and finding him absent dispatched a messenger to sum- mon him. A curious scene preceded his arrival. The party of English were seated in a field by a fire when they heard singing, and turning their heads they saw a number of Indian girls emerge from the woods. They were nearly nude and stained with puccoon, and the leader of the band was Pocahontas, who wore a gir- dle of otter skin, and carried in her hand a bow and ar- rows, and behind her shoulders a quiver. Above her forehead she wore "antlers of the deer," and led the masqueraders, who after elaborate dancing conducted the English to a neighboring wigwam, where supper was supplied them and they were treated with the ut- most kindness. The ceremonies wound up with a grand torch-light procession, in honor of the Englishmen. They were escorted to their lodgings when the maids retired to their own, and the picturesque proceedings came to an end.
Powhatan appeared on the next morning, but pos- itively declined to go to Jamestown. "I also am a king," he said, "and this is my land. Your father is to come to me, not I to him nor yet to your fort ; neither will I bite at such a bait." This response was delivered " with complimental courtesy," but was plainly final. He did not propose to visit Jamestown ; and find- ing his resolution fixed Smith returned to Newport. The result was that Newport went to Werowocomoco and performed the ceremony there. The scene was
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comic, but indicated the regal pride of Powhatan. It was plain that he welcomed the bed, basin, and pitcher brought as presents, and he cheerfully submitted to in- vestment with a scarlet cloak. But there his submission ended. He positively refused to kneel and have the crown placed on his head. When they forced him to do so, and a volley was fired in honor of the occasion, he rose suddenly to his feet, expecting an attack. Finding that none was intended, he regained his " complimental courtesy;" consented thenceforth to be Powhatan I., under-king, subject to England; and sent his brother James I. his old moccasins and robe of raccoon skin, in return for the scarlet cloak and the crown.
This was the only order of the Company carried out by Newport. He marched to the Monacan country to- ward the upper waters of James River to discover gold or the South Sea ; found neither in that region, and re- turned foot-sore to Jamestown, where he and Smith came to open quarrel. But the men were unequally matched; the brusque soldier was too much for the courtier. Smith threatened, if there was more trouble, to send home the ship and keep Newport a prisoner, whereat the man of the world gave way, "cried peccavi," and sailed for England. He took with him, doubtless against his will, Smith's " Map of Virginia and Description of the Country," and also a letter styled his " Rude An. swer" to the reprimand sent him by the authorities. This curious production must be read in the original chronicle. The writer is a soldier, and forgets to ap- proach the dignitaries with distinguished consideration. The machine of his eloquence is not oiled, and goes creaking harshly, but the sound attracts attention if it grates on the nerves of the Honorables. "The sailors
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say," he writes, " that Newport hath a hundred pounds a year for carrying news. Captain Ratcliffe is a poor counterfeit impostor, I have sent you him home lest the company should cut his throat." It is probable that if Captain Newport had suspected the character of this " Rude Answer " he would have dropped it into the Atlantic. But he duly took it to England, and the Right Honorables no doubt gasped at its truculence.
Such is a glimpse of these old feuds. The actors in the scenes are now mere shadows, - Smith the soldier, Newport the courtier, Ratcliffe the agitator, and all the rest ; but these minutiæe of the chronicles bring back the actual figures. It is only by stopping to look at them that we are able to obtain some idea of the real drama, of the daily worries, the spites and personal antago- nisms of the men who played their parts during these first years of American history.
IX. THE STRONG HAND AT LAST.
THE snow had begun to fall with the approach of winter (1608), and again the unlucky adventurers were reduced to dire extremity. Once more they were in want of food, and, huddled together behind their pali- sade, were " affrighted " at the thought of famine.
To this at the end of nearly two years had the Vir- ginia enterprise come. A company of two hundred men were in the wilderness without resources. It is true they had the immense boon of a gracious charter securing their rights, granting them trial by jury, estab- lishing the English Church, liberally authorizing them
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to hold their lands by free tenure as in England ; and here they were, a wretched handful wasting away with famine, who had much ado to hold their lands by any tenure whatever against the savages.
In their extremity there was but one man to look to. The old rulers had disappeared. Of the original Council, Gosnold was dead of the fever of 1607 ; Newport had retired ; Wingfield and Ratcliffe had been deposed ; Martin had gone off in disgust; and Kendall had been shot. Smith only remained, the man whom all this bad set had opposed from the first, arrested for treason, tried for murder, and attempted in every manner to de- stroy. In the dark hour now, this man was the stay of the colony. Three other councilors had come out with Newport, Captains Waldo and Wynne and Master Mat- thew Scrivener, all men of excellent character ; but the colonists looked to Smith as the true ruler.
With the snow-fall came the question of food. New- port, it seems, had left them little. The supply was nearly exhausted, and the only resource was to apply to the Indians. But it was found that times had changed. The tribes of Powhatan were not going to furnish any ; they had received orders to that effect from their Em- peror. The application was made, refused, and what followed was a decisive trial of strength between the English and the savages, - a series of scenes in which we have the old life of the first adventurers summed up and wrought into a picture full of dramatic interest.
Smith resolved to strike at the central authority. "No persuasion," we are told, " could persuade him to starve," and what he meant now to do was to go to Powhatan and procure supplies by fair means or force. The old Emperor gave him a pretext for visiting Wero 4
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wocomoco. He sent inviting Smith to come and bring some men who could build him a house. Some " Dutch- men " were sent at once, and at the end of December (1608) Smith followed. His force was about fifty men, and they went by the water route in the Pinnace and two barges. Among them were George Percy, now an " old settler," and a man who could be implicitly relied upon ; Francis West, of Lord Delaware's family ; and many other "gentlemen." The enterprise was going to be a decisive affair. These fifty men led by a soldier like Smith were a dangerous engine.
The voyagers went down James River in the cold winter season, and stopped here and there to enjoy the hospitality of the tribes. They thus coasted along, past Hampton, Old Point, and the present Yorktown, and about the middle of January (1609) sailed up the York, and came in sight of Werowocomoco. On the way they had received a warning. The king of Warrasqueake had said to Smith, " Captain Smith, you shall find Pow- hatan to use you kindly, but trust him not; and be sure he have no opportunity to seize on your arms, for he hath sent for you only to cut your throats." The soldier " thanked him for his good counsel," but probably did not need it. He was not confiding and meant to guard himself ; for the rest this intimation of the friendly Warrasqueaker no doubt gratified him. He was going to make war on the host who had invited a visit; it was satisfactory to know that the host designed cutting his throat.
When the Englishmen came opposite the " Chief Place of Council," they found the river frozen nearly half a mile from the shore. The vessels, however, broke the ice, and when near the shore Smith leaped into the water
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with a party and got to land. Powhatan received him in his great wigwam, but the imperial demeanor had un- dergone a change. There was no more " complimental courtesy " - so the English had come to see him. When were they going away? He had not invited them to visit him ! Whereat Smith pointed to the crowd of braves, and retorted that there were the very envoys who had brought the invitation. At this the Emperor showed his appreciation of the trenchant reply by laugh- ing heartily, and requested a sight of the articles brought by Smith to exchange for corn. He had no corn, but they might trade. In fact the corn would be produced if the English came for it unarmed. And then the Em- peror proceeded to deliver a pathetic address. He was weary of war, and wished to spend his last year in peace, without hearing incessantly the alarm, "There . cometh Captain Smith!" He desired to be the friend of that "rash youth," and meant well. His feelings were moved, and induced him "nakedly to forget him- self." Take the corn; it should be delivered, but the English guns frightened his poor people. Let the men come unarmed.
Smith's view of this eloquent address is set forth suc- cinctly in the chronicle: "Seeing this savage did but trifle the time to cut his throat, he sent for men to come ashore and surprise the king." The response was prompt. The English were heard breaking the ice and approach- ing, and Smith, cutting his way out, joined the party on the beach. Night brought a new peril. Smith and his men bivouacked on the shore, when their friend Pocahon- tas stole through the darkness and warned them that an attack was to be made upon them. When presents were offered her, she said, with tears in her eyes, that her
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father would kill her if he saw her wearing them ; went back as she came ; and a party duly appeared to attack Smith, who awaited them. No assault was made, and the night passed in quiet. In the morning the boats were loaded by the Indians with corn, and the rash youth who had thus overcome his aged adversary re- embarked. Going up the York River, he landed near West Point, at the residence of Prince Opechancanough. As before the demand was - corn, to which the smiling Opechancanough made no objection. They should have plenty of corn - when suddenly one of the soldiers rushed into the wigwam crying that they were "be- trayed." Smith looked and saw a force of about seven hundred Indians surrounding the place, whereupon he exhibited his habitual resolution. Seizing the cordial Opechancanough by his scalp-lock, he placed his pistol upon his breast, dragged him out among his people, and presented to him the alternative - corn or your life. This proceeding was too much for the nerves of the In- dian prince. He promptly supplied the corn, and the English reembarked, after which they sailed back in triumph to Jamestown.
This raid on the capital city of the land of Powhatan was a decisive event. The material result was a full supply of food ; the moral, a lasting impression on the Indian imagination. It is the nature of ignorant and inferior minds to believe what they see rather than what is reasoned out to them. What the Powhatans had seen was this. Fifty Englishmen had invaded their country, driven the Emperor from his capital, humbled Prince Opechancanough in the midst of his braves, threat- ened to destroy their towns, exacted what they wished, and returned to Jamestown without the loss of a man.
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This was plain to the simplest comprehension, and it produced a grand effect. These formidable intruders were best conciliated, not defied. Their commander, above all, was an adversary whom it was useless to fight against ; and there is ample evidence that from this moment, to the end of his career in the colony, the savages regarded Smith with a mixture of fear and admiration. They never again exhibited any hostility toward the English as long as he remained in Virginia. They became his firm friends, brought him presents, punished with death - as will soon be shown - those who attempted to harm him ; and the chronicle sums . up all in the sentence, " All the country became as ab- solutely free for us as for themselves."
The martial figure of the soldier-ruler will not in- trude much longer on the narrative. He is going away from Virginia, and the fainéants are coming back. Let us see what he accomplished before their arrival. He forced the idle to go to work - the hardest of tasks. There was pressing necessity for that. A swarm of rats, brought in Newport's ship, had nearly devoured the remnant of food, and unless corn were planted in the spring days the colony would starve. All must go to work, and the soldier made it plain to the sluggards that they now had a master. He assembled the whole " company " and made them a public address. There was little circumlocution about it. A few sentences will serve as examples of his persuasive eloquence to the murmuring crowd : --
" Countrymen," said Smith, " you see now that power resteth wholly in myself. You must obey this, now, for a law, -- that he that will not work shall not eat. And though you presume that authority here is but a shadow,
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and that I dare not touch the lives of any, but my own must answer it, yet he that offendeth, let him assuredly expect his due punishment.""
This was plain, but the soldier made his meaning still plainer. " Dream no longer," he said sternly, " of this vain hope from Powhatan, or that I will longer for- bear to force you from your idleness, or punish you if you rail. I protest by that God that made me, since necessity hath no power to force you to gather for your- selves, you shall not only gather for yourselves, but for those that are sick. They shall not starve !"
The idlers " murmured " but cbeyed. The corn was planted, and the drones in the hive were forced to aid, the working bees in another enterprise. This was to build a fort as " a retreat " in case of an Indian war. Smith took nothing on trust. The friendly relations with Powhatan might end at any moment, and the re- sult was the erection of a rude fortification, of which this is the account: " We built also a fort, for a retreat, near a convenient river, upon a high commanding hill, very hard to be assaulted and easy to be defended, but ere it was finished this defect caused a stay - the want of corn occasioned the end of all our works."
Was this the curious " Stone House " still standing on a ridge of Ware Creek, emptying into the York ? No traces of the fort here described are found in the neighborhood of Jamestown. The Ware Creek ruin answers the description, and nothing is known of its origin. It is near a convenient river, on a hill hard to assault and easy to defend; a massive stone affair, with thick walls built without mortar, with loop-holes to fire through ; is roofless, and appears never to have been completed. It stands on a wooded ridge and can
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THE STRONG HAND AT LAST.
be approached only by a narrow defile. No other build- ings are found in the vicinity, and it is difficult to be- lieve that it was intended for any other purpose than defense. If this was the place of " retreat," it is doubt- less the oldest edifice in the United States.
A few words will now carry the narrative forward to important events. The colony continued to suffer for want of food while the corn was growing, and the men went in parties among the Indians, who treated them with the utmost kindness. Smith's influence was all- powerful, and no one was harmed; and an incident now took place which defined the full extent of this regard and respect. While walking in the woods near Jamestown the soldier was attacked by a gigantic In- dian, but he dragged him into the water and took him prisoner. Conducted to the fort and interrogated, he confessed that he had been employed by the house-build- ers; and George Percy and others, deeply incensed, offered to go and "cut their throats before Powhatan." That great justiciar eventually saved them the trouble. When Lord Delaware arrived in the colony in the fol- lowing year, the house-builders proposed to Powhatan to send them as envoys to conciliate him. His response was eminently just : "You," he said, "that would have betrayed Captain Smith to me, will certainly be- tray me to this great lord;" whereupon, as the chroni- cle adds, "he caused his men to beat out their brains ; " -and this was the end of the builders of the old relic, Powhatan's chimney.
The colony was now to lose the competent ruler who had made it prosperous. The blow deposing him from authority had already been struck. With the summer came a ship on a trading expedition, commanded by a
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certain Captain Argall, who brought intelligence that the Virginia government had been reorganized and Smith removed. The reasons for his disgrace were his " hard dealings with the savages, and not returning the ships freighted " - a bitter charge against a man who had derided the yellow dirt and only seized the corn necessary to save the life of the colony. But all was now decided : a new charter from the King (May 23, 1609) had changed the whole face of affairs. The lim- its of the colony were extended to two hundred miles north and two hundred miles south of the mouth of James River ; the London Council was to be chosen by the Company, not appointed by the King; and 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 already appointed : Sir Thomas West, Lord Delaware, was to be Governor and Captain-General ; Sir Thomas Gates, Lieutenant-Governor ; and Sir George Somers, Admi- ral - all of theni men of character. They were to go with a considerable fleet : nine vessels, containing full supplies and five hundred new settlers, men, women, and children - a great contrast to the little trio, the Susan Constant, the Good Speed, and the Discovery, which had dropped down the Thames in December, 1606.
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