No More Learning

The Indian woman who held the torch that was to light the pile
ran past us, whirling the wood around her head to make it blaze more
fiercely. As she went by she lowered the brand and slowly dragged it
across my wrists. The beating of the drums suddenly ceased, and the loud
voices died away.

Seeing that they were coming for us, Diccon and I rose to await them.
When they were nearly upon us, I turned to him and held out my hand.

He made no motion to take it. Instead, he stood with fixed eyes looking
past me and slightly upward. A sudden pallor had overspread the bronze
of his face.

"There's a verse somewhere," he said in a quiet voice,--"it's in the
Bible, I think--I heard it once long ago: 'I will look unto the hills
from whence cometh my help. ' Look, sir! "

I turned and followed with my eyes the pointing of his finger. In front
of us the bank rose steeply, bare to the summit,--no trees, only the red
earth, with here and there a low growth of leafless bushes. Behind it
was the eastern sky. Upon the crest, against the sunrise, stood the
figure of a man--an Indian. From one shoulder hung an otterskin, and a
great bow was in his hand. His limbs were bare, and as he stood
motionless, bathed in the rosy light, he looked like some bronze god,
perfect from the beaded moccasins to the calm, uneager face below the
feathered head-dress. He had but just risen above the brow of the hill;
the Indians in the hollow saw him not.

While Diccon and I stared, our tormentors were upon us. They came a
dozen or more at once, and we had no weapons. Two hung on my arms, while
a third laid hold of my doublet to rend it from me. An arrow whistled
over our heads and stuck into a tree behind us. The hands that clutched
me dropped, and with a yell the busy throng turned their faces in the
direction whence had come the arrow.

The Indian who had sent that dart before him was descending the bank. An
instant's breathless hush while they stared at the solitary figure; then
the dark forms bent forward for the rush straightened, and there arose a
cry of recognition. "The son of Powhatan! The son of Powhatan! "

He came down the hillside to the level of the hollow, the authority of
his look and gesture making way for him through the crowd that surged
this way and that, and walked up to us where we stood, hemmed round but
no longer in the clutch of our enemies.

"You were never more welcome, Nantaquas," I said to him, heartily.

Taking my hand in his, the chief turned to his frowning countrymen. "Men
of the [v]Pamunkeys! " he cried, "this is Nantaquas' friend, and so the
friend of all the tribes that called Powhatan 'father. ' The fire is not
for him nor for his servant; keep it for the [v]Monacans and for the
dogs of the [v]Long House! The calumet is for the friend of Nantaquas,
and the dance of the maidens, the noblest buck and the best of the
fish-weirs. "

There was a surging forward of the Indians and a fierce murmur of
dissent. The werowance, standing out from the throng, lifted his voice.
"There was a time," he cried, "when Nantaquas was the panther crouched
upon the bough above the leader of the herd; now Nantaquas is a tame
panther and rolls at the white men's feet! There was a time when the
word of the son of Powhatan weighed more than the lives of many dogs
such as these, but I know not why we should put out the fire at his
command! He is war chief no longer, for [v]Opechancanough will have no
tame panther to lead the tribes. Opechancanough is our head, and he
kindleth a fire indeed. We will give to this man what fuel we choose,
and to-night Nantaquas may look for his bones! "

He ended, and a great clamor arose. The Paspaheghs would have cast
themselves upon us again but for a sudden action of the young chief, who
had stood motionless, with raised hand and unmoved face, during the
werowance's bitter speech. Now he flung up his hand, and in it was a
bracelet of gold, carved and twisted like a coiled snake and set with a
green stone. I had never seen the toy before, but evidently others had.
The excited voices fell, and the Indians, Pamunkeys and Paspaheghs
alike, stood as though turned to stone.

Nantaquas smiled coldly. "This day hath Opechancanough made me war chief
again. We have smoked the peace pipe together--my father's brother and
I--in the starlight, sitting before his lodge, with the wide marshes and
the river dark at our feet. Singing birds in the forest have been many;
evil tales have they told; Opechancanough has stopped his ears against
their false singing. My friends are his friends, my brother is his
brother, my word is his word: witness the armlet that hath no like.
Opechancanough is at hand; he comes through the forest with his two
hundred warriors. Will you, when you lie at his feet, have him ask you,
'Where is the friend of my friend, of my war chief? '"

There came a long, deep breath from the Indians, then a silence in which
they fell back, slowly and sullenly--whipped hounds but with the will to
break that leash of fear.

"Hark! " said Nantaquas, smiling. "I hear Opechancanough and his warriors
coming over the leaves. "

The noise of many footsteps was indeed audible, coming toward the hollow
from the woods beyond. With a burst of cries, the priests and the
conjurer whirled away to bear the welcome of Okee to the royal
worshipper, and at their heels went the chief men of the Pamunkeys. The
werowance of the Paspaheghs was one that sailed with the wind; he
listened to the deepening sound and glanced at the son of Powhatan where
he stood, calm and confident, then smoothed his own countenance and made
a most pacific speech, in which all the blame of the late proceedings
was laid upon the singing birds. When he had done speaking, the young
men tore the stakes from the earth and threw them into a thicket, while
the women plucked apart the newly kindled fire and flung the brands into
a little nearby stream, where they went out in a cloud of hissing steam.

I turned to the Indian who had wrought this miracle. "Art sure it is not
a dream, Nantaquas? I think that Opechancanough would not lift a finger
to save me from all the deaths the tribes could invent. "

"Opechancanough is very wise," he answered quietly. "He says that now
the English will believe in his love indeed when they see that he holds
dear even one who might be called his enemy, who hath spoken against him
at the Englishmen's council fire. He says that for five suns Captain
Percy shall feast with him, and then shall go back free to Jamestown. He
thinks that then Captain Percy will not speak against him any more,
calling his love to the white men only words with no good deeds
behind. "

He spoke simply, out of the nobility of his nature, believing his own
speech. I that was older, and had more knowledge of men and the masks
they wear, was but half deceived. My belief in the hatred of the dark
emperor was not shaken, and I looked yet to find the drop of poison
within this honey flower. How poisoned was that bloom, God knows I could
not guess!

By this time we three were alone in the hollow, for all the savages, men
and women, had gone forth to meet the Indian whose word was law from the
falls of the far west to the Chesapeake. The sun now rode above the low
hills, pouring its gold into the hollow and brightening all the world
besides. A chant raised by the Indians grew nearer, and the rustling of
the leaves beneath many feet more loud and deep; then all noise ceased
and Opechancanough entered the hollow alone. An eagle feather was thrust
through his scalp lock; over his naked breast, which was neither painted
nor pricked into strange figures, hung a triple row of pearls; his
mantle was woven of bluebird feathers, as soft and sleek as satin. The
face of this barbarian was as dark, cold, and impassive as death. Behind
that changeless mask, as in a safe retreat, the subtle devil that was
the man might plot destruction and plan the laying of dreadful mines.

I stepped forward and met him on the spot where the fire had been. For a
minute neither spoke. It was true that I had striven against him many a
time, and I knew that he knew it. It was also true that without his aid
Nantaquas could not have rescued us from that dire peril. And it was
again the truth that an Indian neither forgives nor forgets. He was my
saviour, and I knew that mercy had been shown for some dark reason which
I could not divine. Yet I owed him thanks and gave them as shortly and
simply as I could.

He heard me out with neither liking nor disliking nor any other emotion
written upon his face; but when I had finished, as though he had
suddenly bethought himself, he smiled and held out his hand, white-man
fashion.

"Singing birds have lied to Captain Percy," he said. "Opechancanough
thinks that Captain Percy will never listen to them again. The chief of
the Powhatans is a lover of the white men, of the English, and of other
white men. He would call the Englishmen his brothers and be taught of
them how to rule and to whom to pray"--

"Let Opechancanough go with me to Jamestown," I replied. "He hath the
wisdom of the woods; let him come and gain that of the town. "

The emperor smiled again. "I will come to Jamestown soon, but not to-day
or to-morrow or the next day. And Captain Percy must smoke the peace
pipe in my lodge above the Pamunkey and watch my young men and maidens
dance, and eat with me five days. Then he may go back to Jamestown with
presents for the great white father there and with a message from me
that I am coming soon to learn of the white man. "

For five days I tarried in the great chief's lodge in his own village
above the marshes of the Pamunkey. I will allow that the dark emperor to
whom we were so much beholden gave us courteous keeping. The best of the
hunt was ours, the noblest fish, the most delicate roots. We were alive
and sound of limb, well treated and with the promise of release; we
might have waited, seeing that wait we must, in some measure of content.
We did not so. There was a horror in the air. From the marshes that were
growing green, from the sluggish river, from the rotting leaves and cold
black earth and naked forest, it rose like an [v]exhalation. We knew not
what it was, but we breathed it in, and it went to the marrow of our
bones.

The savage emperor we rarely saw, though we were bestowed so near to him
that his sentinels served for ours. Like some god, he kept within his
lodge, the hanging mats between him and the world without. At other
times, issuing from that retirement, he would stride away into the
forest. Picked men went with him, and they were gone for hours; but when
they returned they bore no trophies, brute or human. What they did we
could not guess. If escape had been possible, we would not have awaited
the doubtful fulfillment of the promise made us. But the vigilance of
the Indians never slept; they watched us like hawks, night and day.

In the early morning of the fifth day, when we came from our wigwam, it
was to find Nantaquas sitting by the fire, magnificent in the paint and
trappings of the ambassador, motionless as a piece of bronze and
apparently quite unmindful of the admiring glances of the women who
knelt about the fire preparing our breakfast. When he saw us he rose and
came to meet us, and I embraced him, I was so glad to see him.

"The Rappahannocks feasted me long," he said. "I was afraid that Captain
Percy would be gone to Jamestown before I was back on the Pamunkey. "

"Shall I ever see Jamestown again, Nantaquas? " I demanded. "I have my
doubts. "

He looked me full in the eyes, and there was no doubting the candor of
his own. "You go with the next sunrise," he answered. "Opechancanough
has given me his word. "

"I am glad to hear it," I said. "Why have we been kept at all? Why did
he not free us five days agone? "

He shook his head. "I do not know. Opechancanough has many thoughts
which he shares with no man. But now he will send you with presents for
the governor, and with messages of his love for the white men. There
will be a great feast to-day, and to-night the young men and maidens
will dance before you. Then in the morning you will go. "

When we had sat by the fire for an hour, the old men and the warriors
came to visit us, and the smoking began. The women laid mats in a great
half circle, and each savage took his seat with perfect breeding: that
is, in absolute silence and with a face like a stone. The peace paint
was upon them all--red, or red and white--and they sat and looked at the
ground until I had made the speech of welcome. Soon the air was dense
with fragrant smoke; in the thick blue haze the sweep of painted figures
had the seeming of some fantastic dream. An old man arose and made a
long and touching speech, with much reference to calumets and buried
hatchets. Then they waited for my contribution of honeyed words. The
Pamunkeys, living at a distance from the settlements, had but little
English, and the learning of the Paspaheghs was not much greater. I
repeated to them the better part of a canto of Master Spenser's _Faery
Queen_, after which I told them the moving story of the Moor of Venice.
It answered the purpose to admiration.

The day wore on, with relay after relay of food, which we must taste at
least, with endless smoking of pipes and speeches which must be listened
to and answered. When evening came and our entertainers drew off to
prepare for the dance, they left us as wearied as by a long day's march.

Suddenly, as we sat staring at the fire, we were beset by a band of
maidens, coming out of the woods, painted, with antlers upon their heads
and pine branches in their hands. They danced about us, now advancing
until the green needles met above our heads, now retreating until there
was a space of turf between us. They moved with grace, keeping time to a
plaintive song, now raised by the whole choir, now fallen to a single
voice.

The Indian girls danced more and more swiftly, and their song changed,
becoming gay and shrill and sweet. Higher and higher rang the notes,
faster and faster moved the dark feet; then quite suddenly song and
motion ceased together. From the darkness now came a burst of savage
cries only less appalling than the war whoop itself. In a moment the men
of the village had rushed from the shadow of the trees into the broad,
firelit space before us. They circled around us, then around the fire;
now each man danced and stamped and muttered to himself. For the most
part they were painted red, but some were white from head to
heel--statues come to life--while others had first oiled their bodies,
then plastered them over with small, bright-colored feathers.

Diccon and I watched that uncouth spectacle, that Virginian [v]masque,
as we had watched many another one, with disgust and weariness. It would
last, we knew, for the better part of the night. For a time we must stay
and testify our pleasure, but after a while we might retire, and leave
the women and children the sole spectators. They never wearied of gazing
at the rhythmic movement.

I observed that among the ranks of the women one girl watched not the
dancers but us. Now and then she glanced impatiently at the wheeling
figures, but her eyes always returned to us. At length I became aware
that she must have some message to deliver or warning to give. Once when
I made a slight motion as if to go to her, she shook her head and laid
her finger on her lips.

Presently I rose and, making my way to the werowance of the village,
where he sat with his eyes fixed on the spectacle, told him that I was
wearied and would go to my hut, to rest for the few hours that yet
remained of the night. He listened dreamily, but made no offer to escort
me. After a moment he acquiesced in my departure, and Diccon and I
quietly left the press of savages and began to cross the firelit turf
between them and our lodge. When we had reached its entrance, we paused
and looked back to the throng we had left. Every back seemed turned to
us, every eye intent upon the leaping figures. Swiftly and silently we
walked across the bit of even ground to the friendly trees and found
ourselves in a thin strip of shadow. Beneath the trees, waiting for us,
was the Indian maid. She would not speak or tarry, but flitted before us
as dusk and noiseless as a moth, and we followed her into the darkness
beyond the firelight. Here a wigwam rose in our path; the girl, holding
aside the mats that covered the entrance, motioned to us to enter. A
fire was burning within the lodge and it showed us Nantaquas standing
with folded arms.

"Nantaquas! " I exclaimed, and would have touched him but that with a
slight motion of his hand he kept me back.

"Well! " I asked at last. "What is the matter, my friend? "

For a full minute he made no answer, and when he did speak his voice
matched his strained and troubled features.

"My _friend_," he said, "I am going to show myself a friend indeed to
the English, to the strangers who were not content with their own
hunting-grounds beyond the great salt water. When I have done this, I do
not know that Captain Percy will call me 'friend'. "

"You were wont to speak plainly, Nantaquas," I answered him. "I am not
fond of riddles. "

Again he waited, as though he found speech difficult. I stared at him in
amazement, he was so changed in so short a time.

He spoke at last: "When the dance is over and the fires are low and the
sunrise is at hand, Opechancanough will come to you to bid you farewell.
He will give you the pearls he wears about his neck for a present to the
governor and a bracelet for yourself. Also he will give you three men
for a guard through the forest. He has messages of love to send the
white men, and he would send them by you who were his enemy and his
captive. So all the white men shall believe in his love. "

"Well! " I said drily as he paused. "I will bear the messages. What
next? "

"Your guards will take you slowly through the forest, stopping to eat
and sleep. For them there is no need to run like the stag with the
hunter behind it. "

"Then we should make for Jamestown as for life," I said, "not sleeping
or eating or making pause? "

"Yes," he replied, "if you would not die, you and all your people. "

In the silence of the hut the fire crackled, and the branches of the
trees outside, bent by the wind, made a grating sound against the bark
roof.

"How die? " I asked at last. "Speak out! "

"Die by the arrow and the tomahawk," he answered,--"yea, and by the guns
you have given the red men. To-morrow's sun, and the next, and the
next--three suns--and the tribes will fall upon the English. At the same
hour, when the men are in the fields and the women and children are in
the houses, they will strike--all the tribes, as one man; and from where
the Powhatan falls over the rocks to the salt water beyond Accomac,
there will not be one white man left alive. "

He ceased to speak, and for a minute the fire made the only sound in the
hut. Then I asked, "All die?
There are three thousand Englishmen in
Virginia. "

"They are scattered and unwarned. The fighting men of the villages of
the Powhatan and the Pamunkey and the great bay are many, and they have
sharpened their hatchets and filled their quivers with arrows. "

"Scattered! " I cried. "Strewn broadcast up and down the river--here a
lonely house, there a cluster of two or three--the men in the fields or
at the wharves, the women and children busy within doors, all unwarned! "

I leaned against the side of the hut, for my heart beat like a
frightened woman's. "Three days! " I exclaimed. "If we go with all our
speed, we shall be in time. When did you learn this thing? "

"While you watched the dance," the Indian answered, "Opechancanough and
I sat within his lodge in the darkness. His heart was moved, and he
talked to me of his own youth in a strange country, south of the sunset.
Also he spoke to me of Powhatan, my father--of how wise he was and how
great a chief before the English came, and how he hated them. And
then--then I heard what I have told you! "

"How long has this been planned? "

"For many moons. I have been a child, fooled and turned aside from the
trail; not wise enough to see it beneath the flowers, through the smoke
of the peace pipes. "

"Why does Opechancanough send us back to the settlements? " I demanded.

"It is his fancy. Every hunter and trader and learner of our tongues,
living in the villages or straying in the woods, has been sent back to
Jamestown or his home with presents and fair words. You will lull the
English in Jamestown into a faith in the smiling sky just before the
storm bursts on them in fullest fury. "

There was a pause.

"Nantaquas," I said, "you are not the first child of Powhatan who has
loved and shielded the white men. "

"Pocahontas was a woman, a child," he answered. "Out of pity she saved
your lives, not knowing that it was to the hurt of her people. Then you
were few and weak and could not take your revenge. Now, if you die not,
you will drink deep of vengeance--so deep that your lips may never leave
the cup. More ships will come, and more; you will grow ever stronger.
There may come a moon when the deep forests and the shining rivers will
know us, to whom [v]Kiwassa gave them, no more. "

"You will be with your people in the war? " I asked.

"I am an Indian," was his simple reply.

"Come against us if you will," I returned. "Nobly warned, fair upon our
guard, we will meet you as knightly foe should be met. "

Very slowly he raised his arm from his side and held out his hand. His
eyes met mine in somber inquiry, half eager, half proudly doubtful. I
went to him at once and took his hand in mine. No word was spoken.
Presently he withdrew his hand from my clasp, and, putting his finger to
his lips, whistled low to the Indian girl. She drew aside the mats, and
we passed out, Diccon and I, leaving him standing as we had found him,
upright against the post, in the red firelight.

Should we ever go through the woods, pass through that gathering storm,
reach Jamestown, warn them there of the death that was rushing upon
them? Should we ever leave that hated village? Would the morning ever
come? It was an alarm that was sounding, and there were only two to
hear; miles away beneath the mute stars English men and women lay
asleep, with the hour thundering at their gates, and there was none to
cry, "Awake! " I could have cried out in that agony of waiting, with the
leagues on leagues to be traveled and the time so short! I saw, in my
mind's eye, the dark warriors gathering, tribe on tribe, war party on
war party, thick crowding shadows of death, slipping through the silent
forest . . . and in the clearings the women and children!

It came to an end, as all things earthly will. When the ruffled pools
amid the marshes were rosy red beneath the sunrise, the women brought us
food, and the warriors and old men gathered about us. I offered them
bread and meat and told them that they must come to Jamestown to taste
the white man's cookery.

Scarcely was the meal over when Opechancanough issued from his lodge,
and, coming slowly up to us, took his seat upon the white mat that was
spread for him. Through his scalp lock was stuck an eagle's feather;
across his face, from temple to chin, was a bar of red paint; the eyes
above were very bright and watchful.

One of his young men brought a great pipe, carved and painted, stem and
bowl; it was filled with tobacco, lit, and borne to the emperor. He put
it to his lips and smoked in silence, while the sun climbed higher and
higher and the golden minutes that were more precious than heart's blood
went by swiftly.

At last, his part in the solemn mockery played, he held out the pipe to
me.

"The sky will fall, and the rivers will run dry, and the birds cease to
sing," he said, "before the smoke of this peace-pipe fades from the
land. "

I took the symbol of peace and smoked it as silently and soberly as he
had done before me, then laid it leisurely aside and held out my hand.

"Come to Jamestown," I said, "to smoke of the Englishman's pipe and
receive rich presents--a red robe like your brother Powhatan, and a cup
from which you shall drink, you and all your people. "

But the cup I meant was that of punishment.

The savage laid his dark fingers in mine for an instant, withdrew them,
and, rising to his feet, motioned to three Indians who stood out from
the throng of warriors.

"These are Captain Percy's guides and friends," he announced. "The sun
is high; it is time that he was gone. Here are presents for him and my
brother the governor. " As he spoke, he took from his neck the rope of
pearls and from his arm a copper bracelet, and laid both upon my palm.

"Thank you, Opechancanough," I said briefly. "When we meet again I will
not greet you with empty thanks. "

We bade farewell to the noisy throng and went down to the river, where
we found a canoe and rowers, crossed the stream, and entered the forest,
which stretched black and forbidding before us--the blacker that we now
knew the dreadful secret it guarded.


II

After leaving the Indian village, Captain Percy and Diccon found
that their guides purposely delayed the march, so that they would
not reach Jamestown until just before the beginning of the attack,
when it would be too late for them to warn the English, if they
suspected anything. Percy and Diccon, in this dilemma, surprised
the Indian guides and killed them, then hurried on with all
possible speed toward Jamestown. As they hastened through the
forest, Diccon was shot by an Indian and mortally wounded; Captain
Percy remained with him until his death, and again took up the
journey, now alone and greatly fearing that he would arrive too
late.

The dusk had quite fallen when I reached the neck of land. Arriving at
the palisade that protected Jamestown, I beat upon the gate and called
to the warden to open. He did so with starting eyes. Giving him a few
words and cautioning him to raise no alarm in the town, I hurried by him
into the street and down it toward the house that was set aside for the
governor of Virginia, Sir Francis Wyatt.

The governor's door was open, and in the hall servingmen were moving to
and fro. When I came in upon them, they cried out as if it had been a
ghost, and one fellow let a silver dish fall to the floor with a
clatter. They shook with fright and stood back as I passed them without
a word and went on to the governor's great room. The door was ajar, and
I pushed it open and stood for a minute on the threshold. They were all
there--the principal men of the colony, the governor, the [v]treasurer,
[v]West, [v]John Rolfe.

At sight of me the governor sprang to his feet; through the treasurer's
lips came a long, sighing breath; West's dark face was ashen. I came
forward to the table, and leaned my weight upon it; for all the waves of
the sea were roaring in my ears and the lights were going up and down.

"Are you man or spirit! " cried Rolfe through white lips. "Are you Ralph
Percy? "

"Yes," I said, "I am Percy. "

With an effort I drew myself erect, and standing so, told my tidings,
quietly and with circumstance, so as to leave no room for doubt as to
their verity, or as to the sanity of him who brought them. They listened
with shaking limbs and gasping breath; for it was the fall and wiping
out of a people of which I brought warning.

When all was told I thought to ask a question myself; but before my
tongue could frame it, the roaring of the sea became so loud that I
could hear naught else, and the lights all ran together into a wheel of
fire. Then in a moment all sounds ceased and to the lights succeeded the
blackness of outer darkness.

When I awoke from the sleep into which I must have passed from that
swoon, it was to find myself lying in a room flooded with sunshine. For
a moment I lay still, wondering where I was and how I came there. A drum
beat, a dog barked, and a man's quick voice gave a command. The sounds
stung me into remembrance.

There were many people in the street. Women hurried by to the fort with
white, scared faces, their arms filled with household gear; children ran
beside them; men went to and fro, the most grimly silent, but a few
talking loudly.

I could not see the palisade across the neck, but I knew that it was
there that the fight--if fight there were--would be made. Should the
Indians take the palisade, there would yet be the houses of the town,
and, last of all, the fort in which to make a stand. I believed not that
they would take it, for Indian warfare ran more to ambuscade and
surprise than to assault in the open field.

The drum beat again, and a messenger from the palisade came down the
street at a run.

"They're in the woods over against us, thicker than ants! " he cried to
West, who was coming along the way. "A boat has just drifted ashore,
with two men in it, dead and scalped! "

I looked again at the neck of land and the forest beyond, and now, as if
by magic, from the forest and up and down the river as far as the eye
could reach, rose here and there thin columns of smoke. Suddenly, as I
stared, three or four white smoke puffs, like giant flowers, started out
of the shadowy woods across the neck. Following the crack of the
muskets--fired out of pure bravado by the Indians--came the yelling of
the savages. The sound was prolonged and deep, as though issuing from
many throats.

The street, when I went out into it, was very quiet. All windows and
doors were closed and barred. The yelling from the forest had ceased for
the moment, but I knew well that it would soon begin with doubled noise.
I hurried along the street to the palisade, where all the men of
Jamestown were gathered, armed and helmeted and breast-plated, waiting
for the foe in grim silence.

Through a loophole in the gate of the palisade I looked and saw the
sandy neck joining the town to the mainland, and the deep and dark woods
beyond, the fairy mantle giving invisibility to the foe. I drew back
from my loophole and held out my hand to a woman for a loaded musket. A
quick murmur like the drawing of a breath came from our line. The
governor, standing near me, cast an anxious glance along the stretch of
wooden stakes that were neither so high nor so thick as they should have
been.

"I am new to this warfare, Captain Percy," he said. "Do they think to
use those logs they carry as battering rams? "

"As scaling ladders, your honor," I replied. "It is possible that we may
have some sword play after all. "

"We'll take your advice the next time we build a palisade, Ralph Percy,"
muttered West on my other side. Mounting the breastwork that we had
thrown up to shelter the women who were to load the muskets, he coolly
looked over the pales at the oncoming savages.

"Wait until they pass the blasted pine, men! " he cried. "Then give them
a hail of lead that will beat them back to the Pamunkey. "

An arrow whistled by his ear; a second struck him on the shoulder but
pierced not his coat of mail. He came down from his dangerous post with
a laugh.

"If the leader could be picked off"--I said. "It's a long shot, but
there's no harm in trying. "

As I spoke I raised my gun to my shoulder, but West leaned across Rolfe,
who stood between us, and plucked me by the sleeve.

"You've not looked at him closely," he said. "Look again. "

I did as he told me, and lowered my musket. It was not for me to send
that Indian leader to his account. Rolfe's lips tightened and a sudden
pallor overspread his face. "Nantaquas? " he muttered in my ear, and I
nodded yes.

The volley that we fired full into the ranks of our foe was deadly, and
we looked to see them turn and flee, as they had fled so often before at
a hot volley. But this time they were led by one who had been trained in
English steadfastness. Broken for the moment by our fire, they rallied
and came on yelling, bearing logs, thick branches of trees, oars tied
together--anything by whose help they could hope to surmount the
palisade. We fired again, but they had planted their ladders. Before we
could snatch the loaded muskets from the women a dozen painted figures
appeared above the sharpened stakes. A moment, and they and a score
behind them had leaped down upon us.

It was no time now to skulk behind a palisade. At all hazards, that tide
from the forest must be stemmed. Those that were among us we might kill,
but more were swarming after them, and from the neck came the exultant
yelling of madly hurrying reinforcements.

We flung open the gates. I drove my sword through the heart of an Indian
who would have opposed me, and, calling for my men to follow, sprang
forward. Perhaps thirty came at my call; together we made for the
opening. A party of the savages in our midst interposed. We set upon
them with sword and musket butt, and though they fought like very devils
drove them before us through the gateway. Behind us were wild clamor,
the shrieking of women, the stern shouts of the English, the whooping of
the savages; before us a rush that must be met and turned.

It was done. A moment's fierce fighting, then the Indians wavered,
broke, and fled. Like sheep we drove them before us, across the neck, to
the edge of the forest, into which they plunged. Into that ambush we
cared not to follow, but fell back to the palisade and the town,
believing, and with reason, that the lesson had been taught. The strip
of sand was strewn with the dead and the dying, but they belonged not to
us. Our dead numbered but three, and we bore their bodies with us.

Within the palisade we found the English in sufficiently good case. Of
the score or more Indians cut off by us from their mates and penned
within that death trap, half at least were already dead, run through
with sword and pike, shot down with the muskets that there was now time
to load. The remainder, hemmed about, pressed against the wall, were
fast meeting with a like fate. They stood no chance against us; we cared
not to make prisoners of them; it was a slaughter, but they had taken
the [v]initiative. They fought with the courage of despair, striving to
spring in upon us, and striking when they could with hatchet and knife.
They were brave men that we slew that day.

At last there was left but the leader--unharmed, unwounded, though time
and again he had striven to close with some one of us, to strike and to
die striking with his fellows. Behind him was the wall; of the half
circle which he faced, well-nigh all were old soldiers and servants of
the colony. We were swordsmen all. When in his desperation he would have
thrown himself upon us, we contented ourselves with keeping him at
sword's length, and at last West sent the knife in the dark hand
whirling over the palisade. Some one had shouted to the musketeers to
spare him.

When he saw that he stood alone, he stepped back against the wall, drew
himself up to his full height, and folded his arms. Perhaps he thought
that we would shoot him down then and there; perhaps he saw himself a
captive amongst us, a show for the idle and for the strangers that the
ships brought in.

The din had ceased, and we the living, the victors, stood and looked at
the vanquished dead at our feet, and at the dead beyond the gates, and
at the neck upon which was no living foe, and at the blue sky bending
over all. Our hearts told us, and truly, that the lesson had been
taught, and that no more forever need we at Jamestown fear an Indian
attack. And then we looked at him whose life we had spared.

He opposed our gaze with his folded arms and his head held high and his
back against the wall. Slowly, as one man and with no spoken word, we
fell back, the half circle straightening into a line, and leaving a
clear pathway to the open gates. The wind had ceased to blow, and a
sunny stillness lay upon the sand and the rough-hewn wooden stakes and a
little patch of tender grass. The church bell began to ring.

The Indian out of whose path to life and freedom we had stepped glanced
from the line of lowered steel to the open gates and the forest beyond,
and understood. For a full minute he waited, not moving a muscle, still
and stately as some noble masterpiece in bronze. Then he stepped from
the shadow of the wall and moved past us, with his eyes fixed on the
forest; there was no change in the superb calm of his face. He went by
the huddled dead and the long line of the living that spoke no word, and
out of the gates and across the neck, walking slowly, that we might yet
shoot him down if we saw fit to repent ourselves. He reached the shadow
of the trees: a moment, and the forest had back her own.

We sheathed our swords and listened to the governor's few earnest words
of thankfulness and recognition; and then we set to work to search for
ways to reach and aid those who might be yet alive in the plantations
above and below us.

Presently there came a great noise from the watchers on the river-bank,
and a cry that boats were coming down the stream. It was so, and there
were in them white men, nearly all of whom had wounds to show, and
cowering women and children--all that were left of the people for miles
along the James.

Then began that strange procession that lasted throughout the afternoon
and night and into the next day, when a sloop dropped down from
[v]Henricus with the news that the English were in force there to stand
their ground, although their loss had been heavy. Hour after hour they
came as fast as sail and oar could bring them, the panic-stricken folk,
whose homes were burned, whose kindred were slain, who had themselves
escaped as by a miracle. Each boatload had the same tale to tell of
treachery, surprise, and fiendish butchery.

Before the dawning we had heard from all save the remoter settlements.
The blow had been struck and the hurt was deep. But it was not beyond
remedy, thank God! We took stern measures for our protection, and the
wound to the colony was soon healed; vengeance was meted out to those
who had set upon us in the dark and had failed to reach the heart. The
colony of Virginia had passed through its greatest trial and had
survived--for what greater ends, under Providence, I knew not.

MARY JOHNSTON.


=HELPS TO STUDY=

I. Describe the situation in which Percy and Diccon found
themselves. What preparations did the Indians make for the death of
the two men? How were they interrupted?