Campfire Girls' Lake Camp; or, Searching for New Adventures

by Irene Elliott Benson; Stella M. Francis

Sturdy, rugged, honest John Smith saw all this with anger and disgust. He knew what was surely coming, and calmly waited for it to come. Although shut out from the Council, he did not sulk, though he felt the injustice. "By and by they will ask for me," he thought, as he went vigorously to work. He impressed upon his friends the necessity of keeping on good terms with the Indians. The season was far advanced, but corn was planted with the certainty that it would ripen fast in that favoring climate and soil. But the food brought over the ocean would not last more than two or three months, when it would be necessary to obtain supplies from the Indians. If they chose to withhold it, it would go ill with the white men.

Now if you will look at your map again, you will note the situation of Jamestown on the northern shore. Tracing the course of the James River towards its source, you will observe the city of Richmond, the capital of Virginia, on the same side of the river, but well up in Henrico county. Below the site of Richmond, in the direction of Jamestown, was the principal residence of Powhatan, chief of thirty tribes, his own immediate tribe being scattered inland and along the river to the south and east. It was a two-day's journey between the village of Powhatan and Jamestown.

Distrustful of the old chief's temper towards them, Captain Smith and a party of his men took the first chance to sail up the river and pay a formal visit to the Emperor of the country. The name of the town itself was Powhatan, from which fact the same title has been given to the famous chieftain, whose Indian name was different. The aboriginal capital stood on a small hill, and numbered twelve houses, in front of which were three small islands in the river. The "palace" was a large, native structure of bark and skins, with a sort of bedstead at one side, on which Powhatan sat. With his majestic mien, his robe of raccoon skins, and the feathers in his grizzly hair, he suggested a king upon his throne.

When Smith and two of his companions were brought into the presence of this Emperor the scene was striking. Along each wall of the dwelling stood two rows of young women at the rear, and two rows of men in front of them. The faces and shoulders of all the females were stained with the red juice of the puccoon, and a number wore chains of white beads about their necks. Almost any man would have been embarrassed when introduced into the presence of royalty of this character. Smith's companions were mute, but he was too much a man of the world to betray any fear. He doffed his hat, made a sweeping bow, and addressed the old chieftain with as much outward respect as if he had been, indeed, the King of England.

One of the most marked proofs of the ability of Captain John Smith was that during his brief stay in Virginia he had been able to pick up enough knowledge of the Powhatan tongue to make himself fairly well understood, being helped thereto by his gestures, of which he was master. There had been Indian visitors from the first at Jamestown. All were treated so well that several spent much of their time at the settlement, studying the white men and their ways with never-ending interest. Smith became a hard student, and was thus able to tell Powhatan that he and the other pale-faces had come across the Great Water with feelings only of love for him and his people. They had no wish to take away their hunting-grounds, not to kill their game, nor to do them harm in any way. He hinted that the whites might prove to be of great help to Powhatan, for they brought strange and deadly weapons with them, which they would be glad to use in aiding him to conquer other tribes of Indians.

Captain Smith was a man of rare tact, but he blundered when he made this offer to the old Emperor. It said, in truth, that Powhatan was not able to do his own conquering of rebellious tribes. Such was the power and self-confidence of this sachem, that any hint that he could need help in carrying out his own will was an insult to him.

Smith was quick to see his mistake, and did what he could to correct it, but he did not succeed. Powhatan was sour, and nothing was clearer than that he felt no good will toward those who had dared to make their homes in his country. He pretended not to understand the broken sentences of his visitor, until after one of his warriors had helped to interpret them. Having met with no success, Smith and his friends withdrew and set sail down the river for Jamestown.

During the interview both he and his companions used their eyes in searching for the youth and the girl who had met them when first on their way up the James. But neither Nantaquas nor Pocahontas was present, a fact which proved they were absent from the town, for, were it not so, nothing would have kept them from the "palace" on such and an interesting occasion.

The boat in which the Englishmen had sailed up the river had to lie by for one cloudy night while on the way, and now the explorers found themselves overtaken by darkness, when hardly half the return voyage was made. But the sky was clear, and again they were favored with a bright moon, which so lit up the stream that they kept on their course, with the prospect of reaching home quite early the next day.

While one of the men held the old-fashioned tiller, with nothing to do but to keep the boat well away from shore, Smith sat at the bow, thoughtfully smoking a long-stemmed pipe which he had bought from one of the friendly Indians who often visited Jamestown. The others of his associates were doing the same at a little distance, for most of the English were quick to learn the habit from the red men. The night was so still that a single sail hardly felt the touch of the gentle breeze, and only now and then did the faint ripple at the bow show that the boat was making any progress toward Jamestown.