Part 5

But they did not find the natives so kindly disposed as in the year before, and no wonder; for the first thing the English did after landing on Roanoke Island was to accuse the Indians of stealing a silver cup, for which they took revenge by burning a village and destroying the standing corn. Whether this method was copied from the Spaniards or not, it proved a most unwise one, for at once the colonists found themselves surrounded by warlike foes, instead of in intercourse with confiding friends.

The English colonists had the same fault as those of Spain. The stories of the wonderful wealth of Mexico and Peru had spread far and wide over Europe, and the thirst for gold was in all hearts. Instead of planting grain and building homes, the new-comers sought the yellow evil far and wide, almost as if they expected the soil to be paved with it. The Indians were eagerly questioned and their wildest stories believed. As the natives of Porto Rico had invented a magic fountain to rid themselves of Ponce de Leon and his countrymen, so those of Roanoke told marvellous fables to lure away the unwelcome English. The Roanoke River, they said, gushed forth from a rock so near the western ocean that in storms the salt sea-water was hurled into the fresh-water stream. Far away on its banks there dwelt a nation rich in gold, and inhabiting a city the walls of which glittered with precious pearls.

Lane himself, whom we may trust to have been an educated man, accepted these tales of marvel as readily as the most ignorant of his people. In truth, he had much warrant for it in the experience of the Spaniards. Taking a party of the colonists, he ascended the river in search of the golden region. On and on they went, finding nothing but the unending forest, hearing nothing but the cries of wild beasts and the Indian war-cries, but drawn onward still by hope until their food ran out and bitter famine assailed them. Then, after being forced to kill their dogs for food, they came back again, much to the disappointment of the Indians, who fancied they were well rid of their troublesome guests.

As the settlers were not to be disposed of by fairy-stories of cities of gold, the natives now tried another plan. They resolved to plant no more corn, so that the English must either go away or starve. Lane made matters worse by a piece of foolish and useless cruelty. Wisdom should have taught him to plant corn himself. But what he did was to invite the Indians to a conference, and then to attack them, sword in hand, and kill the chief, with many braves of the tribe. He might have expected what followed. The furious natives at once cut off all supplies from the colonists, and they would have died of hunger if Sir Francis Drake, in one of his expeditions, had not just then appeared with a large fleet.

Here ended the first attempt to plant an English colony in America. Drake, finding the people in a desperate state, took them in his ships and sailed with them for England. Hardly had they gone before other ships came and the missing colonists were sought for in vain. Then fifteen men were left on the island to hold it for England, and the ships returned.

In 1587 Raleigh's last colony reached Roanoke Island. This time he took care to send farmers instead of gold-seekers, and sent with them a supply of farming tools. But it was not encouraging when they looked for the fifteen men left the year before to find only some of their bones, while their fort was a ruin and their deserted dwellings overgrown with vines. The Indians had taken revenge on their oppressors. One event of interest took place before the ship returned, the birth of the first English child born in America. In honor of the name which the queen had given the land, this little waif was called Virginia Dare.

Now we come to the story of the mysterious fate of this second English colony. When the ships which had borne it to Roanoke went back to England they found that island in an excited state. The great Spanish Armada was being prepared to invade and conquer Elizabeth's realm, and hasty preparations were making to defend the British soil. The fate of the Armada is well known. England triumphed. But several years passed before Raleigh, who was now deep laden with debt, was able to send out a vessel to the relief of his abandoned colonists.

When the people sent by him landed on the island, they looked around them in dismay. Here were no happy homes, no smiling fields, no bustling colonists. The island was deserted. What had become of the inhabitants was not easy to guess. Not even their bones had been left, as in the case of the hapless fifteen, though many relics of their dwelling-places were found. The only indication of their fate was the single word "Croatan" cut into the bark of a tree.

Croatan was the name of an island not far from that on which they were, but it was the stormy season of the year, and John White, the captain, made this an excuse for not venturing there. So he sailed again for home with only the story of a vanished colony.

From that time to this the fate of the colony has been a mystery. No trace of any of its members was ever found. If they had made their way to Croatan, they were never seen there. Five times the noble-hearted Raleigh sent out ships to search for them, but all in vain; they had gone past finding; the forest land had swallowed them up.

It has been conjectured that they had mingled with a friendly tribe of Indians and become children of the forest like their hosts. Some tradition of this kind remained among the Indians, and it has been fancied that the Hatteras Indians showed traces of English blood. But all this is conjecture, and the fate of the lost colonists of Roanoke must remain forever unknown.

THE THRILLING ADVENTURE OF CAPTAIN JOHN SMITH.

For those who love stories of the Indians, and the strange and perilous adventures of white men in dealing with the forest tribes, we cannot do better than give a remarkable anecdote of life in the Virginia woodlands three centuries ago.

On a day near the opening of the winter of 1608 a small boat, in which were several men, might have been seen going up the James River under the shadow of the high trees that bordered its banks.

They came at length to a point where a smaller stream flowed into the James, wide at its mouth but soon growing narrow. Into this the boat was turned and rowed briskly onward, under the direction of the leader of the expedition. They were soon in the heart of the wildwood, whose dense forest growth clustered thickly on either bank of the stream, which ran in a narrow silver thread through the green wilderness. The stream they pursued is that now known as the Chickahominy River, so called from an Indian tribe of that name, the most daring and warlike of all the savages of the region.

As they went on the stream grew narrower still, and in time became so shallow that the boat could go no farther. As they sat there in doubt, debating what had better be done, the bushes by the waterside were thrust aside and dusky faces looked out upon them through the leaves. The leader of the whites beckoned to them and two men stepped out of the bushy thicket, making signs of great friendliness. They pointed to the large boat, and indicated by gestures that they had smaller craft near at hand and would lend one to the whites if they wished to go farther up. They would go along with them and show them the way.

The leader of the party of whites was named John Smith. This is a very common name, but he was the one John Smith who has made the name famous in history. He had met many Indians before and found most of them friendly, but he had never seen any of the Chickahominies and did not know that they were enemies to the whites. So he accepted the offer of the Indians. The boat was taken back down the stream to a sort of wide bay where he thought it would be safe. Here the Indians brought him one of their light but strong canoes. Smith wanted to explore the stream higher up, and, thinking that he could trust these very friendly looking red men, he got into the canoe, bidding two of his men to come with him. To the others he said,--

"Do not leave your boat on any account. These fellows seem all right, but they are never to be trusted too far. There may be more of them in the woods, so be wide awake and keep your wits about you."

The two Indians now got into the canoe with Smith and his men and began to paddle it up the stream, keeping on until they were miles from the starting-point. Undergrowth rose thickly on the banks and vines hung down in green masses from the trees, so that the boat they had left was quickly lost to sight. Soon after that the men in the large boat did a very foolish thing. Heedless of the orders of their leader, they left the boat and strolled into the woods. They had not gone far before a party of savages came rushing at them with wild cries, and followed them fiercely as they turned and ran back to their boat. One of them was caught by the savages, and as the fugitives sprang into their boat they were horrified to see the hapless fellow killed by his captors. This lesson taught them not to leave the boat again.

Ignorant of all this, Smith went on, the boat being paddled here under a low canopy of vines, there through open spaces, until far up the stream. At length, as passage grew more difficult, he bade his guides to stop, and stepped ashore. Taking one of the Indians with him, he set out, carbine on shoulder, saying that he would provide food for the party. He cautioned his two followers, as he had done those in the large boat, to keep a sharp look-out and not let themselves be surprised.

But these men proved to be as foolish and reckless as the others. The air was cool and they built a fire on the bank. Then, utterly heedless of danger, they lay down beside it and soon were fast asleep. As they lay slumbering the Indians, who had started up the stream after killing their prisoner at the boat, came upon them in this helpless state. They at once killed the foolish pair, and then started into the woods on the trail of Smith.

Daring and full of resources as Captain John Smith was, he had taken a dangerous risk in thus venturing alone into those forest depths, peopled only by prowling and hostile savages. It proved to be the most desperate crisis of his life, full of adventure as this life had been. As a youthful soldier he had gone through great perils in the wars with the Turks, and once had killed three Turkish warriors in single combat between two armies, but never before had he been in such danger of death as he was now, alone with a treacherous Indian while a dozen or more of others, bent on his death, were trailing him through the woods.

He was first made aware of his danger when a flight of arrows came from the low bushes near by. Then, with fierce war-whoops, the Indian braves rushed upon him with brandished knives and tomahawks. But desperate as was his situation, in the heart of the forest, far from help, surrounded by foes who thirsted for his blood, Smith did not lose his courage or his coolness. He fired his pistol at the Indians, two of them falling wounded or dead. As they drew back in dismay, he seized his guide and tied him to his left arm with his garter as a protection from their arrows, and then started through the woods in the direction of the canoe. Walking backward, with his face to his pursuers, and keeping them off with his weapons, he had not taken many steps before he found his feet sinking in the soft soil. He was in the edge of the great swamp still known in that region, and before he was aware of the danger he sank into it to his waist and his guide with him. The other Indians held back in fear until he had thrown away his weapons, when they rushed upon him, drew him out of the mud, and led him captive to the fire where his two companions lay dead.

Smith's case now seemed truly desperate. He knew enough of the savages to have very little hope of life. Yet he was not inclined to give up while a shadowy chance remained. Taking from his pocket a small compass, which he carried to aid him in his forest journeys, he gave it to the Indian chief, showing him how the needle always pointed to the north. But while the chief was looking curiously at this magic toy, as it seemed to him, the other Indians bound their captive to a tree, and bent their bows to shoot him. Their deadly purpose was prevented by the chief, who waved the compass in the air and bade them stop. For the time the mystery of the compass seemed to have saved the captive's life.

Smith was now taken through the woods, the journey ending at an Indian village called Orapakes. Here the dusky women and children took the captive in hand, dancing wildly around him, with fierce cries and threatening gestures, while the warriors looked grimly on. Yet Smith bore their insults and threats with impassive face and unflinching attitude. At length Opechancanough, the chief, pleased to find that he had a brave man for captive, bade them cease, and food was brought forth for Smith and his captors.

While they were in this village two interesting examples of the simplicity of Indian thought took place. Smith wrote a message to Jamestown, the settlement of the whites, sending it by one of the Indians, and receiving an answer. On his reading this and speaking of what he had learned from it, the Indians looked on it as the work of enchantment. They could not comprehend how "paper could talk." Another thing was the following: They showed him a bag of gunpowder which they had somehow obtained, saying that they were going to sow it in the ground the next spring and gather a crop of this useful substance. After spending some days in this and other villages, the captive was taken into the woods, his captors making him understand that they were going on a long journey.

Whither he was being taken or what was to be his fate Smith was not aware. The language of gestures, which was his only way of conversing with the savages, soon reached its limit, and he was quite ignorant of what they proposed to do with him, though his heart must have sunk as they went on day after day, northward through the forest. On they walked in single file, Smith unbound and seemingly free in their midst, but with a watchful Indian guard close beside him, ready to shoot him if he made any effort to escape. Village after village was passed, in each of which the women and children danced and shrieked around him as at Orapakes. It was evident they knew the value of their prisoner, and recognized that they had in their hands the great chief of the Pale Faces.

In fact, the Chickahominy chief felt that his captive was of too much importance to be dealt with hastily, and was taking him to the village of the great chief Powhatan, who ruled like an emperor over a powerful confederation of tribes. In summer his residence was near the Falls of the James River, but he was in the habit of spending the winter on the banks of York River, his purpose being to enjoy the fish and oysters of the neighboring Chesapeake. Wesowocomoca was the name of this winter residence, and here the captive was at length brought, after the long woodland journey.