by James Otis
CAPTAIN SMITH'S SPEECH
Jamestown was a scene of turmoil and confusion when Captain Smith cameback from his journey having on board only two baskets of corn forseed. After understanding what had been done by the idle ones during hisabsence, he called all the people together and said unto them, speakingearnestly, as if pleading for his very life:
"Never did I believe white men who were come together in a new world,and should stand shoulder to shoulder against all the enemies thatsurround them, could be so reckless and malicious. It is vain to hopefor more help from Powhatan, and the time has come when I will no longerbear with you in your idleness; but punish severely if you do not setabout the work which must be done, without further plotting. You cannotdeny but that I have risked my life many a time in order to saveyours, when, if you had been allowed to go your own way, all wouldhave starved. Now I swear solemnly that you shall not only gather foryourselves the fruits which the earth doth yield, but for those who aresick. Every one that gathers not each day as much as I do, shall on thenext day be set beyond the river, forever banished from the fort, tolive or starve as God wills."
This caused the lazy ones to bestir themselves for the time, and perhapsall might have gone well with us had not the London Company sent outnine more vessels, in which were five hundred persons, to join us peoplein Jamestown. One of the ships, as we afterward learned, was wrecked ina hurricane; seven arrived safely, and the ninth vessel we had not heardfrom.
All these people had expected to find food in plenty, servants to waitupon them, and everything furnished to hand without being obliged toraise a finger in their own behalf. What was yet worse, they hadamong them many men who believed they were to be made officers of thegovernment.
THE NEW LAWS
Now you must understand that with the coming of this fleet we ofJamestown were told that the London Company had changed all the laws forus in Virginia, and that Lord De la Warr, who sailed on the ship fromwhich nothing had been heard, was to be our governor.
From that hour did it seem as if all the men in Jamestown, save onlyhalf a dozen, among whom were Captain Smith, Master Hunt and MasterPercy, strove their best to wreck the settlement.
Because Lord De la Warr, the new governor, had not arrived, many of thenew comers refused to obey my master, and they were so strong in numbersthat it was not possible for him to force them to his will.
Each man strove for himself, regardless of the sick, or of the womenand children. Some banded themselves together in companies, falling uponsuch Indian villages as they could easily overcome, and murdered androbbed until all the brown men of Virginia stood ready to shed the bloodof every white man who crossed their path.
Then came that which plunged Nathaniel and me into deepest grief.
THE ACCIDENT
Captain Smith had gone up the bay in the hope of soothing the troubleamong the savages, and, failing in this effort, was returning, havinggot within four and twenty hours' journey of Jamestown, when the pinnacewas anchored for the night.
The boat's company lay down to sleep, and then came that accident, ifaccident it may be called, the cause of which no man has ever been ableto explain to the satisfaction of Master Hunt or myself.
Captain Smith was asleep, with his powder bag by his side, when in somemanner it was set on fire, and the powder, exploding, tore the fleshfrom his body and thighs for the space of nine or ten inches square,even down to the bones.
In his agony, and being thus horribly aroused from sleep, hardly knowingwhat he did, he plunged overboard as the quickest way to soothe thepain. There he was like to have drowned but for Samuel White, who camenear to losing his own life in saving him.
He was brought back to the town on the day before the ships of thefleet, which had brought so many quarrelsome people, were to sail forEngland. With no surgeon to dress his wounds, what could he do butdepart in one of these ships with the poor hope of living in agony untilhe arrived on the other side of the ocean.
Nathaniel and I would have gone with him, willing, because of hisfriendship for us, to have served him so long as we lived. He refused tolisten to our prayers, insisting that we were lads well fitted to livein a new land like Virginia, and that if we would but remain with MasterHunt, working out our time of apprenticeship, which would be but fiveyears longer, then might we find ourselves men of importance in thecolony. He doubted not, so he said, but that we would continue, after hehad gone, as we had while he was with us.
What could we lads do other than obey, when his commands were laid uponus, even though our hearts were so sore that it seemed as if it would nolonger be possible to live when he had departed?
Even amid his suffering, when one might well have believed that he couldgive no heed to anything save his own plight, he spoke to us of what weshould do for the bettering of our own condition. He promised that assoon as he was come to London, and able to walk around, if so be Godpermitted him to live, he would seek out Nathaniel's parents to tellthem that the lad who had run away from his home was rapidly making aman of himself in Virginia, and would one day come back to gladden theirhearts.
CAPTAIN SMITH'S DEPARTURE
It is not well for me to dwell upon our parting with the master whom wehad served more than two years, and who had ever been the most friendlyfriend and the most manly man one could ask to meet.
Our hearts were sore, when, after having done what little we mighttoward carrying him on board the ship, we came back to his house, whichhe had said in the presence of witnesses should be ours, and there tookup our lives with Master Hunt.
But for that good man's prayers, on this first night we would haveabandoned ourselves entirely to grief; but he devoted his time tosoothing us, showing why we had no right to do other than continue inthe course on which we had been started by the man who was gone from us,until it was, to my mind at least, as if I should be doing some grievouswrong to my master, if I failed to carry on the work while he was away,as it would have been done had I known we were to see him again withinthe week.
With Captain Smith gone, perhaps to his death; with half a dozen men whoclaimed the right to stand at the head of the government until Lord Dela Warr should come; and with the savages menacing us on every hand,sore indeed was our plight.
With so many in the town, for there were now four hundred and ninetypersons, and while the savages, because of having been so sorelywronged, were in arms against us, it was no longer possible to go abroadfor food, and as the winter came on we were put to it even in that landof plenty, for enough to keep ourselves alive.
THE "STARVING TIME"
We came to know what starvation meant during that winter, and were I toset down here all of the suffering, of the hunger weakness, and of theselfishness we saw during the six months after Captain Smith sailed forhome, there would not be days enough left in my life to complete thetale.
As I look back on it now, it seems more like some wonderful dream thana reality, wherein men strove with women and children for food to keeplife in their own worthless bodies.
It is enough if I say that of the four hundred and ninety persons whomCaptain Smith left behind him, there were, in the month of May of theyear 1610, but fifty-eight left alive. That God should have sparedamong those, Nathaniel Peacock and myself, is something which passethunderstanding, for verily there were scores of better than we whoselives would have advantaged Jamestown more than ours ever can, who diedand were buried as best they could be by the few who had sufficientstrength remaining to dig the graves.
I set it down in all truth that, through God's mercy, our lives weresaved by Master Hunt, for he counseled us wisely as to the care weshould take of our bodies when our stomachs were crying out for food,and it was he who showed us how we might prepare this herb or the barkfrom that tree for the sustaining of life, when we had nothing else toput into our mouths.
We had forgotten that Lord De la Warr was the new governor; we had heardnothing of the ship in which it was said Sir Thomas Gates and Sir GeorgeSomers ha
d sailed. We were come to that pass where we cared neither forgovernor nor nobleman. We strove only to keep within our bodies the lifewhich had become painful.
Then it was, when the few of us who yet lived, feared each moment lestthe savages would put an end to us, that we saw sailing up into the baytwo small ships, and I doubt if there was any among us who did not fallupon his knees and give thanks aloud to God for the help which had comeat the very moment when it had seemed that we were past all aid.
OUR COURAGE GIVES OUT
But our time of rejoicing was short. Although these two ships werebrought by Sir Thomas Gates and Sir George Somers, having in them notless than one hundred and fifty men, they did not have among them foodsufficient to provide for the wants of our company until another harvestshould come.
The vessel in which these new comers had sailed was, as I have said,wrecked in a hurricane near the Bermuda Isles, where, after much labor,they had contrived to build these two small ships.
It needed not that we, who of all our people in Jamestown remainedalive, should tell the story of what we had suffered, for that could beread on our faces.
Neither was it required that these new comers should study long in orderto decide upon the course to be pursued, for the answer to all theirspeculations could be found in the empty storehouse, and in thenumberless graves 'twixt there and the river bank.
Of provisions, they had so much as might serve for a voyage to England,if peradventure the winds were favorable; and ere the ships had beenat anchor four and twenty hours, it was resolved that we should abandonthis town of James, which we had hoped might one day grow into a cityfair to look upon.
An attempt to build up a nation in this new land of Virginia, of whichours was the third, had cost of money and of blood more than man couldwell set down, and now, after all this brave effort on the part of suchmen as Captain Smith, Master Hunt and Master Percy, it was to go fornaught.
Once more were the savages to hold undisputed possession of the landwhich they claimed as their own.
ABANDONING JAMESTOWN
Now even though Nathaniel Peacock and I had known more of sufferingand of sorrow, than of pleasure, in Jamestown, our hearts were sore atleaving it.
It seemed to me as if we were running contrary to that which my masterwould have commanded, and there were tears in my eyes, of which I wasnot ashamed, when Nathaniel and I, hand in hand, followed Master Huntout of the house we had helped to build.
Those who had come from the shipwreck amid the Bermudas, were rejoicingbecause they had failed to arrive in time to share with us thestarvation and the sickness, therefore to them this turning back uponthe enterprise was but a piece of good fortune. Yet were they silent andsad, understanding our sorrow.
It was the eighth day of June, in the year 1610, when we set sail fromJamestown, believing we were done with the new world forever, and yetwithin less than three hours was all our grief changed to rejoicing, allour sorrow to thankfulness.
LORD DE LA WARR'S ARRIVAL
At the mouth of the river, sailing toward us bravely as if having comefrom some glorious victory, were three ships laden with men, and, as weafterward came to know, an ample store of provisions.
It was Lord De la Warr who had come to take up his governorship, andverily he was arrived in the very point of time, for had he been delayedfour and twenty hours, we would have been on the ocean, where was littlelikelihood of seeing him.
It needs not I should say that our ships were turned back, and beforenightfall Master Hunt was sitting in Captain Smith's house, withNathaniel Peacock and me cooking for him such a dinner as we three hadnot known these six months past.
I have finished my story of Jamestown, having set myself to tell only ofwhat was done there while we were with Captain John Smith.
And it is well I should bring this story to an end here, for if I makeany attempt at telling what came to Nathaniel Peacock and myself afterthat, then am I like to keep on until he who has begun to read will laydown the story because of weariness.
For the satisfaction of myself, and the better pleasing of NathanielPeacock, however, I will add, concerning our two selves, that weremained in the land of Virginia until our time of apprenticeship wasended, and then it was, that Master Hunt did for us as Captain Smith hadpromised to do.
THE YOUNG PLANTERS
We found ourselves, in the year 1614, the owners of an hundred acres ofland which Nathaniel and I had chosen some distance back from the river,so that we might stand in no danger of the shaking sickness, and builtourselves a house like unto the one we had helped make for CaptainSmith.
With the coming of Lord De la Warr all things were changed. Thegoverning of the people was done as my old master, who never sawVirginia again, I grieve to say, would have had it. We became a lawabiding people, save when a few hotheads stirred up trouble and got theworst of it.
When Nathaniel Peacock and I settled down as planters on our ownaccount, there were eleven villages in the land of Virginia, and, livingin them, more than four thousand men, women, and children.
It was no longer a country over which the savages ruled without check,though sad to relate, the brown men of the land shed the blood of whitemen like water, ere they were driven out from among us.