LAND, HO! OUR COUNTRY'S BIRTHPLACE
When we hoisted our anchor next day, it came up reluctantly; and we
sailed away with faces often turned backward toward the little harbour
of Chuckatuck, with its blue of wave and sky, its white of cloud and
beach, its green of circling hills, and the picturesque life on its
waters.
Out again in the James (still some four miles wide), we felt that
Nature had almost overdone the matter of supplying us with a waterway
for our voyage. We should willingly have dispensed with a mile or so on
either side of our houseboat. There was a wind that kept steadily
freshening, so that after rounding Day's Point we noticed that the
river was getting rather rough; and we soon found that Gadabout was
equally observing. She rolled and pitched; but with both engines and
the tide to help her along she made good enough headway.
And in navigating the broad stream what advantages we had over those
early mariners upon the Sarah Constant, the Goodspeed, and the
Discovery!
Their passage up this river was upon unknown waters through an unknown
land. We knew just where we were, and where we were going. They even
fancied that they might be upon an arm of the ocean that would lead
through the new-found world and open a direct route to the South Sea
and to the Indies. Our maps showed us that even this wide waterway was
but a river; and that while it flowed some four hundred miles from its
source beyond the Blue Ridge Mountains, yet we could ascend it only
about one hundred miles, as we should then come upon a line of falls
and rapids that would prevent farther navigation.
In the case of those early voyagers, savages lurked along the wooded
shores and greater dangers lay in the unknown, treacherous currents and
hidden bars of the stream itself. We should have to imagine all our
savages; and there, on the table in Gadabout's little cockpit, close to
the man (or, quite as likely, the woman) at the wheel, lay charts that
told the hidden features of the river highway.
Quaint old-time Sarah and her sister ships could not have sailed up
this waterway very far before finding navigation difficult. Even small
as they were, they must often have found scant water if the James of
that time, like the James of to-day, had its top and bottom so close
together every here and there. A majestic river several miles wide,
often fifty to seventy-five feet deep, yet barred by such tangles of
shoals as one would not expect to find in a respectable creek. And
shoals too that the colour of the water hides from the keenest eyes.
To be sure, for us it was all plain sailing. The charts told where the
shoals were and how to avoid them. Our chief danger lay in presuming
too much upon our light draft and in venturing too far from the
indicated channels. But how about those deeper-draft, chartless sailing
craft? Well, they managed to get along anyway, and our houseboat must
on after them.
One more straight reach of the river, one more great sweeping bend, and
we should come upon the site of that old village of James Towne. Still
the tawny Powhatan, like many another proud savage, showed small sign
of succumbing to civilization. There seemed scarce any mark of human
habitation. The life of the people, where there were people, must have
been back from the banks. The river itself was empty. Nowhere was there
wreath of smoke or shimmer of sail. Just the wild beauty of the shores,
the noble expanse of the stream, the cloudless blue of the summer sky,
and Gadabout.
Yet, we were not seeing quite the James that those first English eyes
beheld. For them the slopes and headlands were covered with far nobler
forests and Nature wore her May-time gown. Life and colour were
everywhere. In the clear atmosphere of the Virginia spring, the
woodland was a wealth of living green radiantly starred with flowers.
What a Canaan those weary, storm-tossed colonists must have thought it
all!
We can well imagine the little family groups gathered on the decks,
eagerly planning for their new life. We can see the brightening in the
tired eyes of women and of children as the ships tack near to the
flowery shore; as schools of fish break the river into patches of
flashing silver; as strange, brilliant birds go flaming in the
sunlight; as beauty is added to beauty in this wondrous new home-land.
No! We blunder in our history. There were no women and children on the
Sarah Constant, nor on the Goodspeed, nor on the Discovery. The story
of these ships is not like that later one of the Mayflower. The colour
dies out of the picture; and there remains only the worn, motley band
of men--men who have taken possession of the country by the sign of the
cross, fit omen of the fate awaiting them.
[Illustration: "JUST THE WILD BEAUTY OF THE SHORES, THE NOBLE EXPANSE
OF THE STREAM ... AND GADABOUT."]
At last our houseboat came about the bend in the river and before us
along the northern shore lay Jamestown Island, the site of old James
Towne. We could make out little yet but the low wooded shore and the
wide opening that we knew was the mouth of Back River, the waterway
that cuts off from the mainland that storied piece of soil. Now
Gadabout's steering-wheel was counting spokes to starboard; she headed
diagonally up the river toward the northern shore, and we were soon
nearing the historic island.
So, here was where those three little ships, that we had been following
at the respectful distance of three centuries, terminated their voyage;
here was where that handful of colonists founded the first permanent
English settlement in the New World; here was the cradle of our
country.
However, the place in those old days was not exactly an island,
although even the early colonists often called it so. There was a low
isthmus (that has since been washed away) connecting with the mainland;
so that the site of the settlement was in reality a peninsula. It was a
low and marshy peninsula, an unhealthful place for the site of a
colony. The settlers had a hard time from the beginning. They would
have had a harder time but for the presence of a remarkable man among
them. He was one of the best of men, or he was one of the
worst--dependent upon which history you happen to pick up. At all
events, he was the man for the hour. But for him the colony would have
perished at the outset. This man of course was the schoolboy's hero,
Captain John Smith.
The chief hardships of the colonists at first were scarcity of food and
frequent Indian attacks. To these were soon added a malarial epidemic
caused by the unhealthful surroundings. As if there were yet not
suffering enough, the "Supplies" (the ships that came over with
reinforcements and food) brought bubonic plague and cholera from
English ports. Often, if they had touched at the West Indies, they
brought yellow fever too. The sufferings in that little pioneer
settlement of our country have scarcely been equalled in modern
colonization.
Time went on; and the population waxed and waned as reinforcements
built it up and as the terrible mortality cut it down again. All the
while there seemed no outcome to the struggle. James Towne had in it
not even the promise of a successful colony. The settlers did not find
the gold and precious stones that were expected, nor did they find or
produce in quantities any valuable commodities. They were not even
self-supporting. The colony held on because constantly fed with men and
provisions by the "Supplies." There was dissatisfaction in London; in
James Towne misery and often despair. The climax of disappointment and
suffering was reached in the spring of 1610, ever since known as the
"Starving Time." In that season of horror, the settlement almost passed
out of existence.
After that matters improved, and chiefly because of a single
development: James Towne learned to grow tobacco; Europe learned to use
it. From that time the place took on new life and made great strides
toward becoming self-supporting. More and better settlers arrived, and
the colony even put out offshoots, so that soon there were several
settlements up and down the river and upon other rivers. And of all,
James Towne was the seat of government, the proud little capital of the
Colony of Virginia.
But trouble was still in store for this pioneer village, and this time
final disaster. The very cause of prosperity became the chief cause of
downfall. Tobacco and towns could not long flourish together. The
famous weed rapidly exhausted the soil, and there was constant need for
new lands to clear and cultivate. The leading Virginians turned their
backs upon James Towne and upon the other struggling settlements too,
and established vast individual estates along the river to which they
drew the body of the people.
To be sure there still had to be some place as the seat of government;
and in that capacity the village hung on a good while longer, though
with few inhabitants aside from colonial officials and some
tavern-keepers. It was not to be allowed to keep even these. Despite
every effort to force the growth of the town, it dwindled; and in 1699
it received its deathblow upon the removal of the seat of government to
Williamsburg.
The rest is a matter of a few words. The pioneer village was gradually
abandoned and fell to ruins. As though natural decay could not tear
down and bury fast enough, the greedy river came to its aid. Besides
eating away the ancient isthmus, the James attacked the upper end of
the island, devouring part of the site of the old-time settlement.
Between decay and the river, James Towne, the birthplace of our
country, vanished from the face of the earth.