This girl was Pocahontas, the favorite daughter of the old king. She was filled with pity for the poor prisoner, and ran and threw her arms about him, looking up to her father as she did so. The heavy club did not fall. The blow would have killed Pocahontas, as Smith's head was clasped to her breast; and Powhatan ordered that the prisoner's life should be spared. He was, therefore, unbound, and Powhatan soon showed him that he had nothing to fear. In a few days he was allowed to go back to Jamestown.
Captain Smith had many other adventures while he was in Virginia, but at last a painful accident changed all his plans. As he was rowing down James River one day some powder in his boat took fire, and he was terribly burned. His clothes were all in flames, and he jumped into the water in order to put out the fire. But he was so overcome by the pain that he could not swim, and he was almost drowned before his men could help him back into the boat.
There was no surgeon in Jamestown to dress his wounds, and he made up his mind to go to England and find one. A ship was about ready to sail, and he at once took passage for home.
That was the last that was seen of John Smith in Virginia. He had come over in the spring of 1607, and he went back in the autumn of 1609. It seems a very short time—not three years in all; but in this time he had laid, broad and deep, the foundations of the Commonwealth of Virginia.
—From "Stories of the Old Dominion."
DEFINITIONS:—Venison, the flesh of deer. Ducats, gold coins worth nearly seven dollars each. Tymor, a Turkish officer. Flail, a wooden club used for beating out grains
EXERCISE.—On the map trace John Smith's various journeys in
Europe. Find England, Holland, the English Channel, France,
Marseilles, the Mediterranean Sea, Rome, Nice, Egypt, Austria,
Transylvania, Turkey, Constantinople, Sea of Azov, Russia, Paris,
Spain, London. Trace the course of John Smith's first voyage to
America. Find the West Indies, Florida, the Carolinas, Chesapeake
Bay, James River, Chickahominy River.
ON THE BANKS OF THE TENNESSEE.
BY WILLIAM D. GALLAGHER.
I sit by the open window,
And look to the hills away,
Over beautiful undulations
That glow with the flowers of May;
And as the lights and the shadows
With the passing moments change,
Comes many a scene of beauty
Within my vision's range.
But there is not one among them
That is half so dear to me
As an old log cabin I think of,
On the banks of the Tennessee.