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THE LORD DE LA WARRE.
of war-whoops; and when the thunder of Smith's can- non, summoning the mutineers to " stay or sink," had taken the place of the Sabbath bells.
Lord Delaware did not remain long in Virginia. His health became so bad that he was compelled to return, but during his sojourn in the colony he proved himself an energetic ruler. He built forts Henry and Charles on Southampton River; sent Percy to punish some depredations of the Paspahegh tribe above Jamestown ; procured full supplies of corn from the Potomac Indians ; and dispatched Sir George Somers to the Bermudas for more food -a voyage from which, as we have seen, the good Admiral never returned. He commanded in person in an engagement with the Indians at the present site of Richmond, and left no doubt in any mind of his capacity as a soldier and ruler. But his strength gave way. He was seized with a violent ague, and (March, 1611) sailed for England, on which voyage he is said to have been driven northward, and named the harbor in which he took refuge Delaware Bay. Seven years afterwards he set out again for Virginia, but died on the voyage.
Delaware remains one of the most popular of the early Virginia Governors. Between summer and spring he established the colony on a firm basis. He ruled the unruly without resorting to harshness, added to the public defenses, inculcated respect for religion, and dur- ing his short stay in the country all things prospered. His sudden death on the voyage back to Virginia was sincerely lamented, and he is remembered still as one of the most gallant and picturesque personages of the early Virginia history. Memory takes hold of figures rather than generalities. The public services of "the
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VIRGINIA: A HISTORY OF THE PEOPLE.
Lord La Warre " are unknown or forgotten, but what is still remembered is the affecting scene when he landed at the deserted town, and fell on his knees, thanking God that he had come in time to save Virginia.
XV. DALE'S " CITY OF HENRICUS."
IN these first years of Virginia history, the stalwart figures rapidly succeed each other. Lord Delaware went away in March, and in May (1611) came Sir Thomas Dale, " High Marshal of Virginia."
He had a hard task before him. George Percy had been acting in place of Sir Thomas Gates, who had gone to England, and the idlers had taken advantage of his amiable temper to neglect work. In place of plant. ing corn, they resorted to the more agreeable occupation of playing bowls in the grass-grown streets of James- town ; at which employment the High Marshal found them, on his arrival. The drones saw that they had a master. Sir Thomas Dale was a soldier who had seen hard service in Flanders, "a man of good conscience and knowledge in divinity," but a born ruler and un- shrinking disciplinarian. The " unruly " class soon felt his iron hand, upon which there was no velvet glove whatever. He had brought with him one of the worst " supplies " that ever came to Virginia, but he had also brought a "Code of Martial Law," and made prompt use of it. A conspiracy was entered into by a num- ber of the malcontents, but Dale promptly arrested the leaders, and crushed it by inflicting upon them the death penalty, in a manner " cruel, unusual, and barbarous."
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DALE'S "CITY OF HENRICUS."
This is the guarded phrase of the chronicle, which only adds that the mode of punishment was one at the time customary " in France." But many years after- wards the mystery was cleared up. In 1624, a num- ber of the Burgesses signed a " declaration " of what they had witnessed at Jamestown. One offender " had a bodkin thrust through his tongue and was chained to a tree till he perished," and others were put to death " by hanging, shooting, breaking on the wheel, and the like." The strange fact is thus established that this horrible punishment, inflicted by the Kings of France for political conspiracy, was inflicted by Sir Thomas Dale also for the same offense on the soil of Virginia. But the death penalty, in some form, seems to have been a necessity, and Dale was apparently obliged to be merciless. " If his laws had not been so strictly executed," says one of the fairest of the contemporary writers, " I see not how the utter subversion of the colony should have been prevented." The man of good conscience and great knowledge of divinity did not hesitate. He had to deal with desperate characters, and thrust bodkins through their tongues, broke them on the wheel, and there was no more trouble.
In the summer occurred an incident which clearly indicates the ever-present dread of the Spanish power. The settlements in Florida were a standing menace to the English, and the foes were ever watching each other, and expecting an attack. At any moment the Spanish hawks might swoop on the Jamestown dove-cote ; and one day in the bright summer season, a fleet was seen in the distance slowly coming up the river. Suddenly all was in commotion. The ships were apparently Span- iards, and Dale hastened to man " the two good ships,
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VIRGINIA: A HISTORY OF THE PEOPLE.
the Star and the Prosperous, and our own Deliverance, then riding before Jamestown," with plain intent to go out and fight. The heart of the Marshal was evidently in the business, and he "animated " his men with a brave speech. He meant to attack the new comers, he said : if they were too strong for him he would grapple with them, and both would sink together ; " if God had ordained to set a period to their lives, they could never be sacrificed in a more acceptable service." It was the spirit of Grenville in his famous combat off the Azores, and of the old sea voyagers in general ; there were the hated Spaniards, and it was necessary to overcome them or die. Dale was no doubt in earnest when he said that he meant to do that, but a "small shallop witlı thirty good shot " was first sent to reconnoitre. Soon the shallop came back quietly - the ships were Eng- lishmen, not Spaniards. Sir Thomas Gates, the Lieu- tenant-Governor, was returning with a supply of pro- visions and three hundred additional colonists ; and the Marshal fired a salute, doubtless, instead of opening upon them with his culverins.
With the return of the Lieutenant-Governor, the High Marshal found himself at liberty to carry out a favorite project - to establish a new city. His opinion of Virginia was enthusiastic. "Take four of the best kingdoms in Christendom, and put them all together," he wrote, " they may no way compare with this country, either for commodities or goodness of soil." Having resolved to found his city, he selected the plateau within Dutch Gap, nearly surrounded by James River, above the present City Point, the centre of a fertile and pic- turesque domain called Varina. In September he went thither with three hundred and fifty men, built a pali-
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DALE'S " CITY OF HENRICUS."
sade across the narrow neck, and another without, from water to water, and in this strong position erected his " City of Henricus." It had three streets, store-houses, a church, and regular watch-houses. Across the stream, on the south bank, a large inclosure, " twelve English miles of ground," was shut in also by stout palisades, and defended by forts Charity, Patience, and others. Hope-in-Faitli, the name of a part of this tract, sug- gests a Puritan origin, and it is not improbable that a portion of Sir Thomas's settlers were of that faitlı. He had his official residence in the town on the plateau, and Rock Hall, the parsonage of the good Alexander Whitaker, the " Apostle of Virginia," was in sight across the river. The name Henrico, or City of Henri- cus, was conferred upon the place in honor of Prince Henry, son of James I., of whom Dale wrote these noble words, on his sudden death : "My glorious master is gone, that would have enameled with his favors the labors I undertake for God's cause and his immortal lionor. He was the great captain of our Israel ; the hope to have builded up this heavenly New Jerusalem be interred, I think ; the whole frame of this business fell into his grave."
Having founded the City of Henricus, the High Mar- shal proceeded to found another at Bermuda Hundreds, and the new communities were illustrations of society in its first stage of social-military organization. Each group of families had its " commander," in peace a magis- trate, and in war a captain. Excellent Mr. Whitaker looked after the morals of all. "Every Sabbath day," he writes to a friend in London, "we preach in the forenoon, and catechise in the afternoon. Every Satur- day, at night, I exercise in Sir Thomas Dale's house."
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The picture is a cheerful one. The Apostle of Virginia and the High Marshal are excellent good friends. For this " worthy and experienced soldier," who has lived so rough a life in Flanders, who has bored peoples' tongues, and inflicted cruel and barbarous death penal- ties, is not, after all, so great a monster. He enjoys converse with the mild clergyman, who calls him " our religious and valiant Governor," and draws the full portrait of the High Marshal in a sentence : "Sir Thomas Dale, with whom I am, is a man of great knowledge in divinity, and of a good conscience in all things, both which be rare in a martial man." This was said by one of the purest of men, who knew the Mar- shal well, and must be taken for his true likeness.
So the City of Henricus was established and went on its way. After a while there was another attraction there. Pocahontas came to live in the vicinity. That worthy gentleman, Master John Rolfe, who had married the maiden, had a plantation near the place, and he and his little brunette wife went in and out with their In- dian connections. Pocahontas, we are told by the old historian Stith, who afterwards lived at Henricus, "held friendly trade and commerce " with her father the Em- peror ; and thus Varina is full of figures, and is a charmed domain to the antiquary and romance lover. To-day the figures have all disappeared - apostles and marshals, soldiers and axe-men, women and children, and the mild face of the girl-wife, Pocahontas. The city is gone also, with its outlying dependencies, Coxendale, Hope-in-Faith, and its forts, Patience and Charity. The past has vanished, but here, nearly three centuries ago, the first Americans were laying the foundation of the republic.
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ROLFE AND POCAHONTAS.
XVI.
ROLFE AND POCAHONTAS.
AFTER the departure of Smith from Virginia, Poca- hontas did not reappear at Jamestown - a fact which occasioned surprise, as she had made frequent visits and was known to take a warm interest in the English. It was now discovered that she had left Werowocomoco, either in consequence of some misunderstanding with Powhatan, or to visit her relatives on the Potomac. Raphe Hamor, the contemporary historian, attributes her absence from the York River country to the latter cause. "The Nonparella of Virginia in her princely progress," he says, "took some pleasure to be among her friends of Potomac." Another account speaks of her as " being at Potomac, thinking herself unknown," which leaves the impression that she had taken refuge there. But this is all conjecture.
She was now (1612) taken prisoner, and conducted to Jamestown by that roving adventurer, Captain Samuel Argall, who had brought Smith the intelligence of his deposition. Sent in a sloop to procure a supply of corn from the Potomac country, Argall was informed by a chief named Japazaws that Pocahontas was on a visit to him ; and the offer of a copper kettle induced him to betray her into the rover's hands. She was brought on board the vessel, and taken weeping to Jamestown, - Argall's object being to hold her as a hostage for the good behavior of Powhatan.
When the Emperor heard of her capture he was bitterly offended, and when the English sent him word that she
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VIRGINIA: A HISTORY OF THE PEOPLE.
would be released as soon as he restored some captured men and arms he took no notice of the message. Poca- hontas therefore remained at Jamestown in custody of the English until the spring of the next year (1613), when Sir Thomas Dale, the High Marshal, set out with one hundred and fifty men to visit Powhatan, taking her with him, to negotiate the proposed exchange. Sailing down the James, and then into York River, the Marshal reached Werowocomoco, but found the Em- peror absent. His reception was not encouraging. A swarm of Indians appeared on the bank and shouted defiance. Had the English come to fight ? they cried. If so, they were welcome, and might remember the fate of Ratcliffe. A flight of arrows followed, and one of the Englishmen was wounded; whercupon Dale, who was a man of decision, pushed ashore, killed some of the party, burned their cabins, and then, reembarking, sailed up the York, looking for the Emperor.
At Machot, an Indian village near the present West Point, several hundred savages were drawn up and awaited him. They defied him to come on shore, and he promptly did so ; but no fighting followed. A truce was agreed upon until Powhatan could be heard from, and "Master John Rolfe and Master Sparks " were sent with a message to him. They penetrated to his retreat in the woods, but the Emperor refused to grant them a personal interview. Vague promises only were held out by Powhatan's representatives, and the two emissaries returned to Dale at Machot.
A scene had meanwhile taken place there which induced Sir Thomas to change all his plans. He had fully resolved to carry fire and sword into the Indian realm ; in the comprehensive plirase of the chronicle,
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" to destroy and take away all their corn, burn all their houses on that river, leave not a fish-wear standing nor a canoe in any creek, and destroy and kill as many of them as he could." From this fell purpose he was now diverted, and the change in his plans is explained by the old writer, Master Raphe Hamor, who was present. The details of the scene are entertaining, and have es- caped the historians. They are found only in the work of Hamor, until recently nearly unknown.1
Pocahontas had landed at Machot, but would scarcely take any notice of her own people. She complained that "if her father had loved her he would not value her less than old swords, pieces, and axes ; wherefore she would still dwell with the Englishmen, who loved her." What this meant was soon seen. Two of her brothers hastened to meet her, - one of them the Nan- taquaus, whom Smith described as " the most manliest, comeliest, boldest spirit he ever saw in a savage," - and expressed the utmost delight at again seeing her. Poca- hontas replied by making them an unexpected confi- dence. She was going to marry one of the Englishmen -- a Master John Rolfe; and the affair was communi- cated to Sir Thomas Dale at the same moment. Rolfe had written a long letter to Sir Thomas, asking his "advice and furtherance," and this was now handed by Raphe Hamor to the Marshal. It produced a magical effect. Sir Thomas saw in the marriage the promise of peace and good-will between the two races, and abandoning his hostile designs returned to Jamestown, taking Poca- hontas back with him.
This is the first mention of Rolfe in Virginia. He
1 The rare old Present Estate of Virginia till the 18th of June, 1614, was reprinted at Albany, in fac-simile, in the present century.
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VIRGINIA: A HISTORY OF THE PEOPLE.
was young ; "a gentleman of much commendation," ac- cording to Raphe Hamor ; "honest and discreet," ac- cording to Mr. Whitaker ; and " of good understanding," according to Sir Thomas Dale. He had been wrecked in the Sea-Venture, and was married at that time, as a daughter was born to him on the islands, and named Bermuda. It is to be inferred that his wife died either there or in Virginia, as we now find the honest and dis- creet gentleman paying his addresses to Pocahontas. She had impressed his fancy, it seems, soon after her ar- rival from the Potomac as a prisoner. " Long before this time," the date of the York River raid, " a gentle- man of approved behavior and honest carriage, Master John Rolfe, had been in love with Pocahontas," and the historian adds, "and she with him." Thus for a whole year the affair had been in progress. The little Indian maid had come weeping to Jamestown, but had soon dried her tears; and when she went to the York with the Marshal she had made up her mind to marry Rolfe.
The only hesitation seems to have been on his part ; and his scruples, which were of a religious character, were set forth in full in the letter delivered by Hamor to Sir Thomas. It is a very curious production, and may be found in Hamor's work. Rolfe lays bare his whole heart - " the passions of his troubled soul." What is he to do? he asks Sir Thomas, that man of good conscience and great knowledge in divinity. The Scriptures forbade marrying " strange wives," and Po- cahontas belonged to "a generation accursed ; " but his love caused " a mighty war in his meditations," and the great question was whether it was not his solemn duty to marry and convert this "unbelieving creature, namely, Pokahuntas."
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ROLFE AND POCAHONTAS.
What most touched and decided him was " her desire to be taught and instructed in the knowledge of God ; her capableness of understanding ; her aptness and will- ingness to receive any good impression ; and also the spiritual besides her own incitements stirring me up hereunto." Doubtless the latter were the main incen- tives. Rolfe seems to have conceived a genuine passion for the Indian maid, now eighteen and in the early flower of womanhood; and, no doubt, seeing what all this dis- course meant, Sir Thomas Dale at once advised that the marriage should take place.
The ceremony was performed without delay, the Em- peror having given his consent. He would not come to Jamestown in person, but sent an uncle and two brothers of Pocahontas to attend in his place. The scene was the church at Jamestown, and the time the month of April (1613). Sir Thomas Dale had assidu- ously labored to impress the truths of Christianity on the Indian maid, and she had renounced her " idolatry," and been baptized. The name of Rebecca was selected for her, no doubt in allusion to the Rebekah of Genesis, and the verse, "The Lord said unto her, two nations are in thy womb, and two manner of people shall be separated from thy bowels." The " Apostle of Vir- ginia," the good Whitaker, seems to have performed the marriage ceremony, which was, no doubt, attended by the colonists from far and near. The scene must have been picturesque. The church was probably dec- orated with the first flowers, as Lord Delaware had brought that into fashion, and the bride's dusky rela- tives mingled with the adventurers.
As Sir Thomas Dale had anticipated, the alliance brought the blessing of peace. The tribe of Chickahom-
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VIRGINIA: A HISTORY OF THE PEOPLE.
inies, the fiercest of all the Indians, sent an embassy to conclude a treaty by which they were to become Eng- lishmen and subjects of the English King, and this union of the two races was consummated in the midst of gen- eral rejoicing. John Rolfe and his bride " lived civilly and lovingly " together, we are informed, first at James- town, then at Rolfe's plantation, near the City of Hen- ricus. Varina was possibly the birthplace of her child, " which she loved most dearly," says a contemporary writer ; and the latter spot continued to be her resi- dence until she left Virginia. The most cordial rela- tions continued to exist between herself and Powhatan. He would not visit her, having apparently made a vow not to put himself in the power of the English ; but lie sent her messages and presents, which indicated his af- fection for her. This was also seen from an incident of the time, which affords a last glimpse of the eccentric old ruler in his sylvan court.
Sir Thomas Dale sent an embassy to Powhatan with a singular proposal : to confer upon him the hand of a favorite daughter in marriage. The request was strange indeed, more especially on the part of one with a good conscience and a great knowledge in divinity, since the girl was less than twelve, and Sir Thomas had a Lady Dale in England. Raphe Hamor, the ambassador and a truthful gentleman, is, however, explicit. He was sent to Machot to inform the Emperor that his Brother Dale had heard "the bruit of the exquisite perfection of his youngest daughter, and would gladly make her his nearest companion, wife, and bedfellow." He meant to live for the rest of his life in Virginia, he said, and his object was to conclude with Powhatan a " perpetual friendship."
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ROLFE AND POCAHONTAS.
It is impossible to regard the incident otherwise than as a ruse ; and it is a very curious commentary upon the men of that time. The message was delivered on the York to the Emperor, who solaced himself with a pipe, and listened in grave silence, but with manifest impatience. Then he briefly responded : he could not give Brother Dale his daughter ; she was " as dear as his own life to him, and he delighted in none so much as in her." Besides, he had sold her to a great werow- ance for two bushels of roanoke, and she had " already gone with him three days' journey." The ambassador urged Powhatan to annul the marriage, but he refused, and there the strange proposition ended. The Emperor asked particularly after Pocahontas and Rolfe, " his daughter and unknown son, and how they lived, loved, and liked." Informed that they were well, and that Pocahontas was so happy that she never wished to return to her own people, the philosophic old ruler "laughed heartily, and said he was very glad of it ;" and Master Raphe Hamor soon afterwards took his de- parture.
Powhatan's message to his Brother Dale was emi- nently reasonable, and full of wild-wood dignity. The English already had one of his daughters, he said ; when she died they should have another, "but she yet liveth." He wished to remain friends with the white people ; he was old, and would "gladly end his days in peace." If the English wronged him, his country was large, and he would remove to a distance from them. None of his own people should annoy them, or in any manner disturb them ; and he added the kingly assurance, "I, which have power to perform it, have said it."
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Such is the last scene in the old chronicles in which Powhatan appears as one of the dramatis persona of Virginia history.
XVII.
LAST DAYS OF POCAHONTAS AND POWHATAN.
THE narrative of the career of Pocahontas in Vir- ginia here ends ; but her last years and those of the Emperor, Powhatan, ought to be briefly noticed. These two figures, with a third, the figure of Smith, dominate the early annals. His after life has been spoken of ; let us say a few words also of the last days of the two persons with whom he was so closely associated.
About three years after her marriage, Pocahontas accompanied her husband on a visit to England. She arrived in London early in the summer of 1616, and was received with great distinction at court. She was treated as " the daughter of a king," and Stith, one of the oldest of the Virginia historians, says that it was a "constant tradition " in his time that "the King became jealous, and was highly offended at Mr. Rolfe for mar- rying a princess." The statement seems absurd, but according to the theory of the time the alliance was important. If Virginia descended to Pocahontas, as it might do at Powhatan's death, at her own death the kingdom would be "vested in Mr. Rolfe's posterity." The constant tradition is, therefore, not improbable. It exactly accords with the character of James I., and has the right to exist. It is certain that the arrival of Pocahontas caused a great sensation in London. She was the New World personified in the gracious form of a little beauty of twenty-one. It is true that she was a
LAST DAYS OF POCAHONTAS AND POWHATAN. 101
brown beauty, and her black hair was too straight for the English taste, but this was not noticed. She sud- denly became the fashion. The courtiers called on her, and went away with the declaration that they had seen a great many English ladies who were less attractive in face and manners. The curious eyes of the fine gentle- men and ladies of London noticed the fact that there was no trace of awkwardness or embarrassment in ler demeanor. Lady Delaware presented her at court, where she was "graciously used " by the King and Queen. They invited her to be present at the masques, and the Bishop of London, who was delighted at the conversion of the young Indian princess to Christianity, gave an entertainment in her honor, which Purchas, the historian, described as full of splendor. It was a curi- ous contrast to the first years of Pocahontas, in the Virginia woods - thiis fine life of London, with its rich costumes and brilliant flambeaux, its gilded coaches and high revelry ; but it does not seem to have affected in any degree the simplicity of her character.
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