Bernard saw that he had entirely mistaken the character of his companion. The vengeance of the Indians being once aroused, they failed to discriminate between the authors of the injuries which they had received, and those who sought to protect them; and they attributed to the great werowance of the long-knives (for so they styled the Governor of Virginia) all the blame of the attack and slaughter of the unoffending Susquehannahs. But the wily Bernard was not cast down by his ill success, in attempting to arouse the vengeance of Manteo against his rival.
“Your sister is at the hall often, is she not?” he asked, after a brief pause.
“Ugh,” said the Indian, relapsing into this affirmative grunt.
“So is Hansford—your sister knows him.”
“What of dat?”
“Excuse me, my poor friend,” said Bernard, “but I came to warn you that your sister knows him as she should not.”
The forest echoed with the wild yell that burst from the lips of Manteo at this cruel fabrication—so loud, so wild, so fearful, that the ducks which had been quietly basking in the sun, and admiring their graceful shadows in the water, were startled, and with an alarmed cry flew far away down the river.
The Indian character, although still barbarous, had been much improved by association with the English. Respect for the female sex, and a scrupulous regard for female purity, which are ever the first results of dawning civilization, had already taken possession of the benighted souls of the Indians of Virginia. More especially was this so with the young Manteo, whose association with the whites, notwithstanding his strong devotion to his own race, had imparted more refinement and purity to his nature than was enjoyed by most of his tribe. Mamalis, the pure, the spotless Mamalis—she, whom from his earliest boyhood he had hoped to bestow on some young brave, who, foremost in the chase, or most successful in the ambuscade, could tell the story of his achievements among the chieftains at the council-fire—it was too much; the stern heart of the young Indian, though “trained from his tree-rocked cradle the fierce extremes of good and ill to bear,” burst forth in a gush of agony, as he thus heard the fatal knell of all his pride and all his hope.
Bernard was at first startled by the shriek, but soon regained his composure, and calm and composed regarded his victim. When at length the first violence of grief had subsided, he said, with a soft, mild voice, which fell fresh as dew upon the withered heart of the poor Indian,
“I am sorry for you, my friend, but it is too true. And now, Manteo, what can be your only consolation?”