that fishes swim, the birds fly, and the very beasts strive to escape the snare and the line; blame not him, therefore, who is a man. He would ask you to recollect what pains he took, when you were a prisoner, to save your life. If he has injured you since, you have taken ample vengeance and greatly to our cost. We know that your purpose is to destroy us; but we are here to desire your friendship, and to ask you to permit us to enjoy our houses and plant our fields. You shall share in their fruit; but if you drive us off, you will be the greatest losers by our absence. For we can plant any where, though it may cost us more labor; but we know you cannot live, unless you have our harvests to supply your wants. If you will promise us peace, we will trust you; if not, we will abandon the country."

This "worthy discourse," as it is justly called by the writer of the narrative, had its desired effect. Captain Smith made peace with them on condition that they would supply him with provisions. This good understanding continued so long as Captain Smith remained in the country.

When Smith returned to Jamestown, complaint was made to him, that the people of Chickahominy, who had always seemed honest and friendly, had been guilty of frequent thefts. A pistol, among other things, had been recently

stolen and the thief escaped; but his two brothers, who were known to be his confederates, were apprehended. According to the President's usual summary mode of proceeding in such cases, one of these was sent home with a message, that if the pistol were not forthcoming in twelve hours, the other (who meanwhile was imprisoned) should be hung. The messenger came back before midnight with the pistol, but a sad spectacle awaited him. Captain Smith, pitying the poor naked Indian who was shivering in his dark, cold dungeon, had sent him some food and charcoal to make a fire with. The simple savage, knowing nothing of the mysteries of carbonic acid gas, soon fainted away under its deleterious influence, and was brought out to all appearance dead. His brother, seeing his confident hopes so cruelly disappointed, broke out into the most passionate lamentations, and Captain Smith, to pacify him, told him that he would restore him to life. By the application of brandy and vinegar, he was restored to consciousness; but his faculties remained in such a state of confusion and disorder, as alarmed his brother hardly less than his seeming death. But a night's sound sleep restored him to his senses, and they were both pre

*

* The English writer was not much wiser; he says the Indian was smothered with the smoke.

sented with a piece of copper and sent home. From this circumstance, a report was spread far and wide, among the Indians, that Captain Smith was able to restore the dead to life.

Another incident took place about this time, which increased the awe in which the English were held. An "ingenuous savage" at Werowocomoco had by some means obtained possession of a bag of gunpowder and of the backpiece of a suit of armor. Wishing to display his superior accomplishments to his countrymen, he proceeded to dry the powder over the fire, upon the armor, as he had seen the soldiers do at Jamestown. Many thronged around him and peeped over his shoulders, to watch the process, when suddenly the powder exploded, killed the unfortunate operator and one or two others, and wounded several more, which gave the whole nation a great distaste to gunpowder. "These and many other such pretty accidents," as we are told, so amazed and alarmed Powhatan and his whole people, that they desired peace from all parts, bringing in presents and restoring stolen articles, which had long been given up in despair. After this, if any Indian was detected in stealing, he was apprehended and sent to Jamestown to be punished, and the whole country became as free and safe to the English as to the Indians themselves.

The English, thus unmolested from without, were enabled to devote their undivided energies to the internal affairs of the colony. They set themselves to labor with industry and success. In the space of three months, they had made a considerable quantity of tar, pitch, and potash; produced a sample of glass; dug a well of sweet water in the fort, an article which they had not had in abundance before; built twenty new houses; new covered the church; provided nets and weirs for fishing; and built a block-house on the isthmus of Jamestown, in which a garrison was stationed to trade with the Indians, and which no one was allowed to pass without an order from the President. Thirty or forty acres of ground were also dug and planted. A block-house was likewise erected on Hog Island, and a garrison stationed there to give notice of any vessels that might arrive. At leisure times they exercised themselves in cutting down trees and making clapboards and wainscoting. About this time Captain Wynne died, so that Captain Smith was left with the whole and absolute power, being both President and council.

Their prosperous and contented industry received a sudden interruption. On examining their store of corn, they found that half of it had rotted, and the rest was nearly all consumed by the rats, which had been left by the ship, and in

creased in great numbers. This put a stop to all their enterprises and obliged them to turn their whole attention to the procuring of food.

The Indians were very friendly to them, bringing in deer and wildfowl in abundance, and Powhatan spared them nearly half his stock of corn. The river also supplied them with sturgeon and oysters; so there was no danger of their starving to death. But then food could not be procured without considerable toil and trouble; and many of them were so intolerably lazy, that, as the narrative says, "had they not been forced nolens volens perforce to gather and prepare their victual, they would all have starved or have eaten one another." These men were very clamorous that he should sell their tools and iron, their swords and muskets, and even their houses and ordnance, to the Indians for corn, so that they might enjoy the luxury of idleness.

Ne

They endeavored also by all means in their power to induce him to leave the country. cessity obliged Captain Smith to overlook for a time their mutinous and disorderly proceedings; but, having detected and severely punished the principal ringleader, he addressed the remainder in the following terms. "Fellowsoldiers, I did not think that any one was so false as to report, or that you were so simple as to believe, either that I intended to starve you, or