On the 19th of December, 1606, we set sail from Blackwall, but by unprosperous winds were kept six weeks in the sight of England.…

We watered at the Canaries. We traded with the savages at Dominica. Three weeks we spent in refreshing ourselves among the West India Isles. In Gaudaloupe we found a bath so hot, as in it we boiled pork as well as over the fire; and, at a little isle called Monica, we took from the bushes with our hands, near two hogsheads full of birds in three or four hours. In Mevis, Mona, and the Virgin Isles, we spent some time, where, with a loathsome beast like a crocodile,called a gwayn,[272] tortoises, pelicans, parrots, and fishes, we daily feasted. Gone from thence in search of Virginia, the company was not a little discomforted,seeing the mariners had three days passed their reckoning,[273] and found no land; so that Captain Ratliffe, captain of the pinnace, rather desired to bear up the helm to return for England than make further search. But God the guider of all good actions,forcing them by an extreme storm to hull[274] all night, did drive them by his providence to their desired port, beyond all their expectation; for never any of them had seen that coast.

The first land they made they called Cape Henry, where thirty of them, recreating themselves on shore, were assaulted by five savages, who hurt two of the English very dangerously. That night was the box opened, and the orders read, in which BartholomewGosnoll, John Smith, Edward Wingfield, Christopher Newport, John Ratliffe, John Martin, and George Kendall, were named to be the council, and to choose a president among them for a year, who, with the council, should govern. Matters of moment were to be examined by a jury, but determined by the major part of the council, in which the president had two voices. Until the 13th of May,they sought a place to plant[275] in; then the council was sworn, Mr. Wingfield was chosen president,and an oration made[276] why Captain Smith was not admitted of the council as the rest.

Now falleth every man to work: the council contrive the fort, the rest cut down trees to make place to pitch their tents, some provide clapboard to relade the ships, some make gardens, some nets, &c. The savages often visited us kindly.The president’s overweening jealousy[277] would admit no exercise at arms, or fortification but the boughs of trees cast together in the form of a half-moon. By the extraordinary pains and diligence of Captain Kendall, Newport, Smith, and twenty others,were sent to discover the head of the river.[278] By divers small habitations they passed. In six days they arrive at a town called Powhatan, consisting of some twelve houses pleasantly seated on a hill, before it three fertile isles, about it many of their cornfields. The place is very pleasant, and strong by nature. Of this place the prince is called Powhatan, and his people Powhatans. To this place the river is navigable; but higher within a mile, by reason of the rocks and isles, there is not passage for a small boat. This they callthe falls.The people in all parts kindly entreated[279] them, till, being returned within twenty miles of Jamestown, they gave just cause of jealousy. But had God not blessed the discoverers otherwise than those at the fort, there had then been an end of that plantation; for at the fort, where they arrived the next day, they found seventeen men hurt, and a boy slain by the savages.And had it not chanced a cross-bar shot[280] from the ships struck down a bough from a tree amongst them, that caused them to retire, our men had all been slain, being securely all at work,and their arms in dry-vats.[281]

Hereupon the president was willingthe fort should be palisaded,[282] the ordnance mounted, his men armed and exercised, for many were the assaults and ambuscades of the savages; and our men, by their disorderly straggling, were often hurt, when the savages, by the nimbleness of their heels, well escaped. What toil we had,with so small a power to guard our workmen a-days,[283] watch all night, resist our enemies, and effect our business, to relade the ships, cut down trees, and prepare the ground to plant our corn, &c. I refer to the reader’s consideration.

II.—The Virginia Colonists.

Being, for most part, of such tender educations, and small experience in martial accidents, because they found [neither] English cities, nor such fair houses, norat their own wishes any of their accustomed dainties, with feather-beds and downy pillows, taverns and alehouses in every breathing-place, neither such plenty of gold and silver, and dissolute liberty, as they expected, had little or no care of any thing but to … procure their means to return for England. For the country was to them a misery, a ruin, a death, a hell, and their reports here and their actions there according.

Some other there were that had yearly stipends[284] to pass to and again for transportation. And those with their great words deluded the world with such strange promises as abused the business much worse than the rest. For the business being builded upon the foundation of their feigned experience, the planters, the money, and means have still miscarried; yet they ever returning, and the planters so far absent, who could contradict their excuses? Which, still to maintain their vain glory and estimation from time to time, have used such diligence as made them pass for truths, though nothing more false. And, that the adventurers might be thus abused, let no man wonder; for the wisest living is soonest abused by him that hath a fair tongue and a dissembling heart.

There were many in Virginia merely projecting,verbal and idle contemplators,[285] and those so devoted to pure idleness, that, though they had lived two or three years in Virginia, lordly necessity itself could not compel them to pass the peninsula or palisades of Jamestown; and those witty spirits,what would they not affirm in behalf of our transporters[286] to get victual fromtheir ships, or obtain their good words in England to get their passes! Thus from the clamors and the influence of false informers are sprung those disasters that sprung in Virginia;and our ingenious verbalists[287] were no less a plague to us in Virginia than the locusts to the Egyptians. For the labor of twenty or thirty of the best only preserved in Christianity by their industry the idle lives of near two hundred of the rest, who, living near ten months of such natural means as the country naturally of itself affordeth. Notwithstanding all this, and the worst fury of the savages, the extremity of sickness, mutinies, faction, ignorances, and want of victual, in all that time I lost but seven or eight men, yet subjected the savages to our desired obedience, and received contribution from thirty-five of their kings, to protect and assist them against any that should assault them. In which order they continued true and faithful, and as subjects to his Majesty, so long after as I did govern there, until I left the country.