THE STORY OF POCAHONTAS, THE INDIAN PRINCESS.
Pocahontas was a very beautiful child, and was so good and sweet that
she was loved by all the tribe over which her father ruled. Her home was
in Virginia, and a very happy life she led there, in the sunny woods,
with the birds and squirrels for her companions; and in after years,
when she went to live far away across the sea, the memory of her
childhood home seemed the sweetest thing in the world to her, for it
brought to her mind the songs of the birds, the beautiful flowers, the
waving trees, the bright rivers, and the fair skies that she was so
familiar with when she was a little happy child.
To have had a happy childhood is a very beautiful thing, it makes all
after-life sweeter, it is like the first spring flowers which we gather
in the meadow, and although by and by the snow will come and cover the
place where they bloomed, it cannot take away the memory of their
sweetness and loveliness, for that is in our hearts and will stay there
forever.
So Pocahontas grew up in this pleasant home, and learned to embroider
her dresses with shells, and to weave mats, and to cook, and to do all
those things which Indian maidens were accustomed to.
One day, when she was about twelve years old, an Indian came into the
village and told the people a story about a wonderful white man that had
been captured some time before. It was said that he could talk to his
friends many miles away by putting down words on a piece of paper, and
he had a queer little instrument by which he talked with the stars, and
he had told them that the earth was round, and that the sun "chased the
night around it continually." They had never heard of such curious
things before, and they decided that this strange being was something
more than a mere man, and that perhaps it was in his power to bring good
or evil upon them as he wished. So all the Indian priests and magicians
met together and for three days practised all sorts of magic to find out
from the invisible world what they had better do with their prisoner;
and finally they decided to take him to the great chief Powhatan, father
of Pocahontas, and let him decide for them.
Powhatan received the captive with great courtesy. He asked him about
his life, and found that he was one of a company of men who had sailed
from England to found a settlement in Virginia.
[Illustration: SMITH SAVED BY POCAHONTAS.]
This man was Captain John Smith, a great soldier, who had already won
much fame in fighting against the Turks.
He and his companions founded Jamestown, in Virginia, the first English
colony which succeeded in America. While exploring the country he had
been captured by the Indians. His companions were put to death
immediately, but he saved his life by his presence of mind. When the
Indians captured him he did not show any sign of fear, but began talking
to them about his friends in Jamestown, and wrote a letter which he
asked them to send there. Then he took out a pocket-compass and showed
them how to use it, and also talked to them about the shape of the
earth, and its motion around the sun.
All this surprised the Indians very much. They had never seen a written
letter before, and they imagined it could only be done by magic, and
they thought that if Smith were guided through the forest by means of
the compass it was because he could talk to the stars and the sun. And
then, had they not always been taught that the sun came up from the east
in the morning, and went down in the west at night, never to return, but
that a new sun came each day to light the world? So they listened to all
these wonderful things with great awe and fear, and Powhatan and his
council decided that it was not safe to let such a man live, as he might
do them great harm, being so powerful and wise, and knowing so much
about the unseen world. When Pocahontas was told that Smith must die,
she felt very sad indeed. During the time that he had been a prisoner in
the village she had grown very fond of him, as he also had of her, and
it seemed a dreadful thing that such a brave and good man should die.
Many a story had he told her of the lands beyond the sea, where lived
the little English boys and girls whom he had left behind him, and
Pocahontas was never tired of listening to the tales of that fair
England that Smith loved so well. How different it was from her own
home, and how she would like to see those blue-eyed, fair-haired
children, whose lives were so unlike her own. Ah, it was such a cruel
thing to think that this good man must die. If she could only save him
in some way, how glad she would be. And he was so brave too, he did not
flinch when he was told that he must die--not even when he was told that
he was to be put to death in the most cruel way that the Indians could
think of. And so the Indian maiden grieved and grieved and tried to
think of some way in which she might save her friend's life, but she
could not.
At length the time came for his execution. He was brought out in the
village square, and after his hands and feet were bound he was
stretched on the ground with his head resting upon a great stone. Beside
him stood an Indian with a great club in his hand with which he was to
dash out the Englishman's brains. The club was lifted in the air and in
another moment would have fallen upon Smith's head, had not Pocahontas,
who at the last moment resolved to save his life at the risk of her own,
rushed up to the spot and, clasping the captive's head in her arms,
begged her father with tears in her eyes to spare his life.
Powhatan was touched by his daughter's sorrow and listened to her
request; he ordered Smith's bonds to be taken off, and said that he
would spare his life.
So Smith rose from the ground a free man, and with an escort of twelve
men was sent back to Jamestown.
You can well imagine that he would never forget this brave, beautiful
Indian maid who had saved his life. And many times after that he had
reason to be grateful to Pocahontas. At that time the Jamestown
settlement was in constant fear of attacks from the Indians, and more
than once Pocahontas came through the forest at night to warn the
English of danger, and Captain Smith said that, had it not been for her
help, the Jamestown colony would have died of starvation. The Indians
were very unfriendly and very unwilling to supply the English with food,
and if Pocahontas and her father had not brought them corn they could
not have gotten it anywhere else. Jamestown soon became as familiar to
Pocahontas as her own father's home. She often went there to offer help
and counsel to the colonists, and always showed the same fondness for
Smith that she had shown in early childhood. Smith was obliged to go
back to England after a while, to be treated for a wound, and after he
went away Pocahontas did not visit Jamestown any more. The English told
her that he was dead, and she could not bear to go there without seeing
him. But he was not dead, and the two friends were to meet once
more--not in Jamestown, it is true, but in England, where Pocahontas
went as the bride of the young Englishman John Rolfe.
Rolfe loved the young Indian maiden dearly, but he could not marry her,
as it was then considered very wrong for an Englishman to marry a
heathen; but after a time Pocahontas became a Christian and was baptized
under the name of Rebecca, and soon after she was married.
Powhatan and his chiefs were very glad of this marriage, as were also
the colonists, and for many years after the Indians were more friendly.
Pocahontas was taken by her husband to England, where she was received
with great delight by the English court. The king and queen grew very
fond of her and showed her every kindness that they could, and all the
great English lords and ladies wished to see the Indian girl who had
been so kind to their countrymen in Jamestown. As she was a princess she
was called Lady Pocahontas, and every one was surprised that a girl who
had been brought up in the society of cruel savages, should have such
beautiful and gentle manners. They said that she acted more like one of
their own English ladies than the daughter of an Indian chief, but
Pocahontas was gentle-mannered because her heart was kind and good; not
gentle birth but kind hearts make the truest ladies and gentlemen, and
no lady of the English court could say that she had saved another's life
at the risk of her own as could the Indian maid from across the sea.
Pocahontas was much surprised to find Captain Smith alive and in
England; she wept on seeing him, and begged him to let her call him
father.
Smith told her that, as she was a king's daughter, this would not be
allowed at the court; but she said that she must call him father and he
must call her child, and that she would be his countrywoman forever.
Smith wrote a letter to the king and queen asking them to receive
Pocahontas kindly, and it was through him that she was so much noticed
by the English nobility.
Her beauty and sweetness would have won their hearts, but it was the
memory of what she had done for the English in Jamestown that made them
so eager to be kind to her in return. Pocahontas did not stay very long
in England, although she grew to love it dearly, and did not want to go
away from the land where she had only known happiness and kindness. But
her husband decided to return to Jamestown, and Pocahontas prepared to
leave England with a heavy heart. She thought that they could be much
happier there than in America, and she wanted to bring up her little son
as an English boy, and did not want him to see all the cruelty and
wickedness which she knew he would find in the wild life in Jamestown.
So all things were made ready, and they left London and went to
Gravesend, where they were to take ship for America. But, just as they
were about to sail Pocahontas was taken ill and died; the English
climate had been too severe for one born in the South, and so Rolfe and
his little son went back to America alone, and the beautiful princess
was buried in England, far from her own land; and her English friends
mourned for the sweet Indian girl whom they all loved; and for years and
years her story was listened to with admiration by the boys and girls in
the homes of England, for it was the story of a brave and true heart,
and such we must always honor.