“The savages no sooner understood Smith was gone, but they all revolted, and did spoil and murther all they encountered.”—Smith’s Virginia.
[[NOTE 26—CANTO SEVENTH, SECT. III.]]
We ran to rescue, but in vain;
They bore her from the shore,
Away, away, and much I fear
Thou’lt never see her more.
Whatever account Japazaws may have given of the capture of Metoka, or Pocahontas, history attributes the incident altogether to his own treachery. She was carried away by Captain Argall, who was up the Potomac with his vessel for the purpose of trading with the natives. The following account is copied from Burk.
“By the means of Japazaws, king of Potomac, he discovered that Pocahontas was concealed in the neighborhood, and he immediately conceived the design of getting her into his power; concluding that the possession of so valuable an hostage would operate as a check on the hostile dispositions of the emperor, and might perhaps be made an instrument of peace and reconciliation. The integrity of Japazaws was not proof against the seducing appearance of a copper kettle, which was fixed as the price of his treachery; and this amiable maiden, whose soul nature formed on one of her kindest and noblest models, was betrayed by her perfidious host into the hands of a people, whom her tender and compassionate spirit had often snatched from famine and the sword.
“For the causes of this princess’s absence from her father, we are left to bare conjecture. Her avowed partiality for the English had probably drawn down on her the displeasure of this high-spirited monarch; and she had retired to avoid the effects of his immediate resentment.”
[[NOTE 27—CANTO SEVENTH, SECT. VIII.]]
Sir John had led him by the hair
With pistol at his breast;
The rankling thought was a raging fire,
That never let him rest.
“The president, (Smith,) some time after this, being on a visit to Pamunky, an attempt was made by Opechancanough to seize him; for which purpose he beset the place, where they had met to trade, with seven hundred Indians, well-armed, of his own tribe. But Smith, seizing him by the hair, led him trembling in the midst of his people, who immediately laid down their arms.”—Burk’s Virginia.