HISTORY STORIES
PIONEERS N LAND AND SEA
Mc MURK Y
9^
Pioneers on Land and Sea
PIONEER HISTORY STORIES
FIRST BOOK
Pioneers on Land and Sea
STORIES OF THE EASTERN STATES AND OF OCEAN EXPLORERS
BY £0^
CHARLES A. McMURRY, PH.D.
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
LONDON: MACMILLAN & CO., LTD. 1916
All rights reserved
M
(. 4,
COPYRIGHT, 1904, BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY.
Set up, electrotyped and published March, 1904. Reprinted September, 1904; January, July, November, 1905 ; January, 1908 ; March, 1909 ; January, August, 1911; September, 1912; March, 1913; January, 1915; February, September, 1916.
14 &
Bancroft
PREFACE
THIS is the first of three volumes of American History Stories for use in intermediate grades. It contains the accounts of the early explorers and frontiersmen along the Atlantic coast and of the voyages of the great ocean pioneers. They deal with great events and persons in the simple setting of pioneer life.
The importance of these stories to American children in the intermediate grades is now fully seen. In the simple and interesting form of personal biography they photograph the liveliest scenes of our early history. European teachers may well envy us this copious stream of pioneer story. No European country has anything that can be safely compared with it in richness and value.
The myths and early traditions of Europe we are making good use of in our schools, but in entering upon the field of real history, the pioneer and frontier life of America abounds in the striking scenes of simple folk- life in its rude beginnings. It is easy for children to lose themselves in this frontier scenery and to partake of its spirit.
VI PREFACE
These narratives are based on the most trustworthy historical documents, source materials which have been tested by our best historians, as Parkman, Fiske, Ban croft, Ha^t, and others. Some of the narratives are taken directly from undoubted source materials, the testimony of eye-witnesses and chief actors.
In connection with the story of Champlain the teacher should read Parkman's "Pioneers of France in the New World," from which some quotations are made.
In working, up the stories of Columbus, Magellan, and Cortes, John Fiske's two volumes on " The Discovery of America" have been freely consulted and occasionally quoted. Fiske's "Dutch and Quaker Settlements" and "Old Virginia and Her Neighbors" have also been used in the stories of Hudson and John Smith.
If the use of these stories in schools should lead teachers and children to a closer acquaintance with the full works of Parkman and Fiske it would be a very fortunate result.
Scudder's " Life of Washington," from which much of the story of Washington's early life is derived, is probably the best biography of him for grammar grades, and should become familiar to all the children in our schools ; likewise the Fiske-Irving "Life of Washington."
The chronology of history stories in the pioneer period is of little consequence to the children. A first-class
PREFACE Vii
story, full and rich in local color, personal and concrete in its whole setting, is desired. Two or three years later, in the grammar grades, these stories will find their proper place and connections in a chronological outline.
Maps are required at every step in these stories. They are necessary not only to a proper understanding of the stories, but they illuminate the whole early geography of North America and contribute much interest to the parallel lessons in American geography in these grades.
For children of the eastern states these stories, which are nearest home, are the best beginnings of history. The two following volumes, " Pioneers of the Mississippi Valley " and " Pioneers of the Rocky Mountains and the West" are the natural continuation of the series.
The " Special Method in History " in Chapter III dis cusses in full the value of these stories and the method of handling them in classes.
DE KALB, ILLINOIS, October 2, 1903.
CONTENTS
PAGE CHAPTER ..
I. CHAMPLAIN IN NEW FRANCE ......
II. HENRY HUDSON .........
III. WALTER RALEIGH .... .....
68
IV. JOHN SMITH .....
103 V. POPHAM'S SETTLEMENT
VI. JOHN SMITH'S DESCRIPTION OF NEW ENGLAND VII. CHRISTOPHER COLUMBU VIII. FERDINAND MAGELLAN ......
•f ort
IX. HERNANDO CORTES . .
. 222 X. PONCE DE LEON • • • • .
227 XI. GEORGE WASHINGTON .....
122 VII. CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS .
ILLUSTRATIONS
MUH
CHAMPLAIN AND THE INDIANS 17
CHAMPLAIN'S ATTACK ON AN IROQUOIS FORT 31
EARLY QUEBEC 33
THE PALISADES OF THE HUDSON 38
THE "HALF MOON" IN THE HIGHLANDS . . . . . .41
SIR WALTER RALEIGH 53
RETURN OF WHITE TO ROANOKE ISLAND 63
CAPTAIN JOHN SMITH ON THE BLOCK 80
CROWNING THE CHIEF OF THE POWHATANS 83
POCAHONTAS 96
A NEW ENGLAND BLOCK-HOUSE 105
CAPTAIN JOHN SMITH 108
INDIANS FISHING 120
COLUMBUS ' .123
THE DEPARTURE OF COLUMBUS 132
THE FLEET OF COLUMBUS 136
THE LANDING OF COLUMBUS 139
RECEPTION OF COLUMBUS ON HIS RETURN 147
MAGELLAN 161
CORTES 187
THE PUBLIC ENTRY OF CORTES INTO MEXICO 205
EARLY SPANISH SETTLEMENT IN FLORIDA 225
MONUMENT MARKING THE BIRTHPLACE OF GEORGE WASHINGTON . 227
AN OLD VIEW OF MOUNT VERNON 235
OPENING PAGE OF WASHINGTON'S JOURNAL 239
GEORGE WASHINGTON 251
xi
MAPS
THE WORLD Frontispiece
PAGE
THE MOUTH OF THE ST. LAWREXCE . . . . ... . 8
DISTRIBUTION OF INDIAN TRIBES 11
CAROLINA 57
VIRGINIA 74
SMITH'S MAP OF NEW ENGLAND ........ 110
THE WORLD AS KNOWN IN THE TIME OF COLUMBUS . . . 125
VOYAGES OF COLUMBUS AND OF OTHER DISCOVERERS . . . 134
ROUTE OF MAGELLAN AND OF HIS SHIP 171
ROUTE OF PONCE DE LEON . 223
xtt
Pioneers on Land and Sea
PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
CHAPTER I
CHAMPLAIN IN NEW FRANCE *
SAMUEL DE CHAMPLAIN, who has been called the Father of New France, was a French soldier of noble family. His first voyage to New France was made in 1603, when he explored the St. Lawrence River as far as the Rapids above Montreal. He tried to pass these, known as the Rapids of St. Louis, in a skiff, but was forced to return. On the deck of his vessel the Indians made rude plans or maps of the river above, with its chain of rapids, its lakes and cataracts. Champlain turned toward home but resolved to visit this country at some future time.
The next year he came again. This time, with the vessel in which the voyage from France was made, he explored the Bay of Fundy. After sailing around the head of the Bay of Fundy, he visited and named the St. John River and then went to Passamaquoddy Bay. Champlain made maps of all the coast and harbors. His
1 Authority : Parkman's " Pioneers of France in the New World." B 1
2 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
friend De Monts, to whom the king of France had given all the land from Montreal to the Delaware, wanted to make a settlement far' her south than the St. Lawrence, to avoid the extreme cold of the winters. At the mouth of the St. Croix River an island was selected as a site for the new colony. It commanded the river and was well fitted for defence, but the soil was poor, the place was not so far south as they thought, and not well located for the trade in furs which they expected to carry on.
Everybody went to work, and before winter began the cedars which covered the island were cut away and many houses were built. There were several dwellings, store houses, a magazine, workshops, and a barrack for the Swiss soldiers that had accompanied the expedition. The whole was enclosed with a palisade.
When the work of preparing for winter was done, part of the company returned to France. Seventy-nine men remained behind, among them Champlain, De Monts, and several other gentlemen of noble birth. The winter was a bitter one.
While De Monts was getting things settled upon the island, on the second of September he sent Champlain on an exploring trip along the coast of Norumbegue (Maine). With a bark of seventeen or eighteen tons, two Indian guides, and a dozen men, Champlain was in high spirits as he set out. They found the coast full of islands,
CHAMPLAIN IN NEW FRANCE 3
bold, rocky, and irregular, and coming in sight of a large island rising into barren summits, he called it Mount Desert. Its cool groves and fresh sea air have made it in recent years a great resort for summer tourists. Wind ing in and out among the islands, they entered the mouth of the Penobscot River. Up this stream they passed till they came to the fall just above the present city of Bangor, which stopped their further passage. The banks and hill sides were clothed with tall pines and stout oak trees. Along the river were a few deserted wigwams, but on the shores of Penobscot Bay there were many Indians, who proved friendly, entering into trade with beaver skins.
The weather now proved bad and as provisions were low, the party returned to the mouth of the St. Croix.
Great cakes of ice swept by their island with the ebb ing and flowing tide, often shutting off their supplies of wood and water. Icy winds swept through their rude houses and they shivered round their ill-kept fires, for wood from the mainland was very difficult to get. Soon scurvy broke out and before spring thirty-five died and many more were left weak and exhausted. Champlain did all he could to help and encourage the discontented survivors and was still unwilling to give up his plans for discovery and settlement.
After the severe winter was past and fresh supplies from France had arrived, Champlain and De Monts set
4 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
out for a still further examination of the coast of Maine and New England. With twenty sailors, two Indians, and some gentlemen, they started the 18th of June to search for a better location for a settlement. Passing by Mount Desert and the mouth of the Penobscot, they reached the entrance to the Kennebec. They sailed along both sides of the broad bay, meeting some Indians, but finding poor soil and no good point for a settle ment. They anchored in sight of Old Orchard Beach, now become famous as a watering-place. Crossing the bar with the rising tide, they anchored at Saco, near the mouth of the river, where the natives came down to see them with strong signs of rejoicing. Fields of waving corn, beans, pumpkins, and squashes in bloom, and heavily laden grapevines along the river, were seen. The Indians were graceful and agile, living mostly upon vegetables and corn, and upon fish which were caught by them in abundance at the mouth of the river.
After two days spent at Saco, they passed on and saw the islands at Cape Porpoise covered with wild currants upon which great flocks of wild pigeons were feasting. Many of these birds were taken, and these gave the Frenchmen a much-relished addition to their fare.
Casting anchor on the east side of Cape Ann, a few Indians were seen and Champlain went on shore. After winning the confidence of the natives by gifts, Cham-
CHAMPLAIN IN NEW FRANCE 5
plain took a piece of drawing-paper and crayon and out lined the coast as far as they could see and suggested to the Indians that they complete the sketch beyond. Seizing the crayon, one of the Indians continued to draw on the same paper the map of Massachusetts Bay. The Indians also indicated, by setting pebbles, that the bay was occupied by six tribes. This was probably the first drawing lesson that was ever given in an outdoor school in Massachusetts. July 16 the Frenchmen sailed into Boston harbor and were delighted with the scenery pre sented by the islands and shores, waving with corn-fields or shaded by tall forests. The clumsy log canoe of the Indians was here seen for the first time. The sail-boat of the explorers was perhaps the first that ever entered Massachusetts Bay. The shores were soon lined with many natives watching curiously this white-winged vessel, moving quietly along without oars. Jumping into their small canoes, they followed the departing Frenchmen a short distance.
Passing on down the shore, the explorers were at length driven into a small harbor to await a more favorable breeze. The French noticed that the Indians had just been fishing for cod, which they caught with hook and line much as in our day, a piece of barbed bone fastened to a stick serving as a hook, and the line being made of a grassy fibre growing in this region. Champlain went
6 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
on shore and made a sketch of the harbor, by which we are able to tell that it is the harbor of Plymouth, where the Pilgrims landed fifteen years later.
After spending a day at Plymouth the Frenchmen passed in a circle around the bay till they reached the white sands of Cape Cod, which they named Cape Blanc. But it had been visited before by Gosnold, who named it Cape Cod. Sailing down outside of Cape Cod, they reached and passed into Nauset harbor, where were many Indian huts. Entering this large bay July 22, they found many cone-shaped wigwams covered with thatch, with an opening for smoke. In the cultivated fields were beans, corn, pumpkins, radishes, and tobacco, and the woods contained hickory, oak, and cedar. The Indians were friendly. The weather was chilly and a cold east wind kept them four days in the harbor.
At this place they had the first hostile meeting with Indians. Some white men had gone ashore with brass kettles for fresh water. The Indians were very desirous of securing these. As one of the men stooped down to fill the kettle at a spring, an Indian seized it and started off. This led to a struggle and the Indian arrows flew thick, striking the white man and soon killing him. The Indians made off with the kettle into the woods.
Soon the other Indians came forward to explain that they had no share in this matter and Champlain had to
CHAMPLAIN IN NEW FRANCE 7
accept their statement rather than to run the risk of inflicting punishment upon the innocent.
The voyagers had been gone five weeks and it was time to turn back. On their return trip they stopped at Saco and at the mouth of the Kennebec. At the latter point they met an Indian sachem who told them that a vessel had stopped at this place and, while pre tending friendship, had seized five Indians and had killed or carried them off. From the description Cham- plain concluded that it was an English ship. From other sources we know that Captain George Weymouth, com manding an English vessel, explored this coast in June, 1605, and carried off five Indians as captives. He was seeking for a suitable location for a colony to be sent out by an English company. From this time on for many years the French and English were rivals in making settlements and gaining possession of the country along the shores of New England and Canada.
As the explorers had found no place to the south on this journey where they wished to make a settlement, De Monts decided to move to Port Royal — now Annapolis — where they had noted the beautiful inlet the year before. Every thing that could be moved was put on board the ves sels, carried across the Bay of Fundy, and landed at the chosen spot. Everybody was set to work and soon the buildings of the new colony took the place of the
8
PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
dense forest that had been cut down. When all was done, De Monts went to France, but Champlain decided
to spend another winter with the colony.
This winter was not so severe as the one at St. Croix but the colonists were glad to welcome the ship which brought more people and supplies late
followin Slimmer.
THE MOUTH OF THE ST. LAWRENCE JR
Soon after the return of this vessel to France, Champlain set out on another voyage of discovery. He went as far south as the southern coast of Massachusetts but then had to return, as the winter was close at hand.
During his absence the men at the fort had been busy with their crops, raising a good supply of maize, as well as some barley, wheat, and rye. These, with the supplies brought from France, provided a good store of food for the winter. Champlain devised a plan whereby their table might always be supplied. The chief men in the colony numbered fifteen. Champlain formed them into an order of Knighthood which he called the " Order of Good Times," and each member was to be, in turn, Grand Master for a day. The Grand Master was not only to see to the furnishing of food but was to super
CHAMPLAIN IN NEW FRANCE 9
intend the cooking and serving. Each wished to excel the others, so for several days before his turn each would spend his time hunting and fishing, or bartering with the Indians for food. The colonists had venison, bear and grouse, ducks, geese, and plover, as well as all kinds of fish, to eat with their bread and dried beans.
When the hour for dinner was struck — they dined at noon — " the Grand Master entered the hall, a napkin on his shoulder, his staff of office in his hand, and the collar of the Order about his neck." The brotherhood followed, each bearing a dish. The invited guests were Indian chiefs, seated at the table with the French, who enjoyed the companionship of the Indians. Those of hum bler degree — warriors, squaws, and children — sat on the floor, eagerly awaiting their share of biscuit or bread, a novel and much-coveted luxury. These Indians, always treated kindly, became very fond of the French, who often followed them on their great hunts.
In the evening, when the big fires roared and the sparks flew up the wide chimneys, the French and their Indian friends drew round the blaze and the Grand Master gave up his staff and collar to his successor. With such sports the French passed away the long winter. With good fare and entertainment there was but little sickness and only four deaths occurred.
In 1607 the French king took away De Monts' charter,
10 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
and the colony was deserted. The French settlers had been so kind to the Indians that, when the last boat load left Port Royal, the shore resounded with lamen tations and nothing could console the afflicted savages but promises of a speedy return.
In 1608 two ships, one commanded by Champlain, the other by Pontgrave, again crossed the ocean to New France. Pontgrave was to trade with the Indians and bring back the cargo of furs which, it was hoped, would meet the expenses of the voyage. Champlain left Pont grave at Port Royal to trade with the Indians and sailed up the St. Lawrence as far as Quebec. Here a small stream, the St. Charles, enters the St. Lawrence and in the angle between them rises a promontory, on two sides a natural fortress. In a few weeks a pile of wooden build ings rose on the brink of the St. Lawrence. " A strong wooden wall, surmounted by a gallery loop-holed for musketry, enclosed three buildings containing quarters for Champlain and his men, together with a courtyard, from one side of which rose a tall dove-cot, like a belfry. A moat surrounded the whole, and two or three small can non were planted on platforms toward the river."
After spending a winter in Quebec, Champlain decided to join a war party of Indians. A young Ottawa chief had begged him to join his tribe against the Iroquois. The Troquois lived in fortified villages in what is now the
1
,Vt:8L.-< ^^ft *
/-%* Ml A S K 0 K I
MAP SHOWING DISTRIBUTION OF INDIAN TRIBES
12 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
state of New York and were thought the most fierce of the Indian tribes of the East. The Algonquins, with allied tribes, lived along the St. Lawrence and in the country north of the river and the Great Lakes. Their allies, the Huron s, belonged to the Iroquois family but had refused to join the other tribes when the latter united against the Algonquins. As the French had shown great friendship for the Algonquins near their colonies, the Iro quois were naturally hostile toward the French. By join ing the Hurons and the Algonquins, Champlain thought he would be able to make discoveries without much danger to himself.
It was past the middle of June when the tribes from the north reached Quebec. Many of them had never seen a white man and they looked at the steel-clad strangers with speechless wonder. Eleven Frenchmen joined Cham- plain. They were armed with short guns called the arquebuse. They started up the river in a small sail-boat, " while around them the river was alive with canoes, and hundreds of naked arms plied the paddle with a steady measured sweep." They went up the river to the mouth of the Richelieu. Here they camped for two days, hunted, fished, and took their ease. The Indians quar relled and three-fourths of their number seceded and pad dled toward their homes. The rest of the party went on up the stream. Champlain soon outsailed the canoes and
CHAMPLAIN IN NEW FRANCE 13
thought he would push on without them, but was stopped by rapids in the river. The Indians had told him that his boat could sail the whole distance to the land they wished to reach but he found that he could not get the boat over the rapids, and sent it, with the greater part of the men, back to Quebec. Only two white men went on with him.
" The warriors lifted their canoes from the water, and in long procession through the forest, under the flickering sun and shade, bore them on their shoulders around the rapids to the smooth stream above. Here the chiefs made a muster of their forces, counting twenty-four canoes and sixty warriors. They advanced once more up the river, by marsh, meadow, forest, and scattered islands, then full of game, for it was an uninhabited land, the war-path and battle-ground of hostile tribes." Some were in front as a vanguard ; others formed the main body ; while an equal number were in the forests on the flanks and rear, hunting food for all. They carried with them parched maize ground into meal, but kept it for use while near the enemy, when hunting would become impossible.
" Late in the day they landed and drew up their canoes, ranging them closely side by side. Some stripped sheets of bark to cover their camp-sheds ; others gathered wood; others felled trees for a barricade. They seem to have had steel axes which they had gotten from the
14 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
French, for in less than two hours they had a strong defensive work, open on the river side, and large enough to enclose all their huts and sheds. Some of their number were sent forward as scouts, and returning, said they saw no signs of the enemy." At night they placed no guard but all lay down to sleep, the usual custom of the lazy warriors of the forest.
" The next morning the canoes again advanced, the river widening as they went. Great islands were seen, and soon Champlain entered the lake which now bears his name. Passing on, he saw on the left the forest ridges of the Green Mountains, and on the right rose the Adi- rondacks. These the Iroquois made their hunting- grounds ; and beyond, in the valleys of the Mohawk, the Onondaga, and the Genesee stretched the long line of their palisaded towns.
" They were so near the home of the enemy that they now moved only in the night. One morning in July, after paddling all night, they hid as usual in the forest. That night Champlain dreamed that he saw Iroquois drowning in the lake. Now he had been asked daily by his allies for his dreams, for the Indians had great faith in them, but to this moment his slumbers had been unbroken and he had had nothing to tell. This dream filled the crowd with joy, and at nightfall they went on their way, happy with thoughts of victory.
CHAMPLAIN IN NEW FRANCE 15
"It was ten o'clock in the evening when, near the present site of Ticonderoga, they saw dark objects in motion on the lake before them. These were the Iroquois canoes, heavier and slower than theirs, for they were made of oak bark. Each party saw the other, and the mingled war-cries pealed over the darkened water. The Iroquois landed and began to barricade themselves. Champlain could see them in the woods, working like beavers, hacking down trees with iron axes taken from Canadian tribes in war, and with stone hatchets of their own making. The allies remained on the lake, a bow shot from the hostile barricade, their canoes made fast together by poles lashed across. All night they danced with as much vigor as the frailty of their canoes would permit. It was agreed on both sides that the fight should not begin before daybreak, but meanwhile an ex change of abuse, threats, and boasting gave increasing exercise to the lungs and fancy of the combatants, — 6 much/ says Champlain, ' like the besiegers and besieged in a beleaguered town.' '
Early in the morning he and his two followers put on the light armor of the time. Champlain wore the doublet and long hose then in fashion. " Over the doublet he buckled on a breastplate and backpiece, while his thighs were covered by steel and his head by a plumed casque." Across his shoulder hung the strap of his ammunition
16 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
box ; at his side was his sword and in his hand his gun, which he had loaded with four balls. Each of the French men was in a separate canoe, and as it grew light, they kept themselves hidden, either by lying at the bottom of their boats, or by covering themselves with an Indian robe. The canoes came near the shore and all landed at some distance from the Iroquois, whom they could see filing out of their barricade, some two hundred in number of the boldest and fiercest warriors of North America. Some carried shields of wood and hide and were covered with a kind of armor made of tough twigs fastened together with a vegetable fibre supposed by Champlain to be cotton. The chiefs wore tall plumes on their heads. " The allies, growing anxious, called with loud cries for Champlain, and opened their ranks that he might pass to the front. He did so, and the Iroquois stood looking at him in silent amazement. But his gun was levelled, the report rang through the woods, a chief fell dead, and another by his side rolled among the bushes. Then there rose from the allies a yell which would have drowned a thunderclap, and the forest was full of whizzing arrows. For a moment the Iroquois stood firm and sent back their arrows lustily, but when another and another gunshot came from the thickets on their flank, they broke and fled in terror. Swifter than hounds, the allies tore through the bushes after them. Some of the Iroquois
18 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
were killed, more were taken. They left everything, — canoes, provisions, and weapons, — in their flight."
The victors returned to the mouth of the Richelieu, reaching it in three or four days. Then the Hurons and Algonquins went to their home on the Ottawa, while Champlain, with the rest of the Indians, descended the St. Lawrence to Quebec. At parting, the northern tribes invited Champlain to visit their towns and aid them again in their wars.
That winter, 1610, Champlain returned to France but came back in the spring to join the Indians against the common foe, the Iroquois. The tribes near Quebec prom ised to show him the way to Hudson Bay and the Hurons were to take him to the Great Lakes, where rich mines of copper were to be found. The tribes were to meet at the mouth of the Richelieu. There is an island in the St. Lawrence near the mouth of this river. Here Champlain with the warriors from the neighborhood of Quebec stopped to wait for the Algonquin warriors. The Indians were busy cutting down trees and clearing the ground for a dance and feast, as they were eager to wel come their allies with befitting honors. Some Indians came speeding down the river in a canoe. As they drew near they cried out that the Algonquins were in the forest fighting a hundred Iroquois warriors, who, out numbered, had betaken themselves to a barricade of trees.
CHAMPLAIN IN NEW FRANCE 19
The air was split with shrill outcries. " The Indians snatched their weapons, — shields, bows, arrows, war- clubs, sword-blades made fast to poles, — and pell-mell ran headlong to their canoes, screeching to Champlain to follow."
Champlain and four of his men were in the canoes. They shot across the water, arid, as their boats touched the shore, each warrior flung down his paddle, snatched his weapons, and ran like a greyhound into the woods. The five Frenchmen followed but could not keep up with the Indians, who were soon out of sight and hear ing. The day was warm and the forest air heavy and dense. The mosquitoes, says Champlain, were " so thick that we could scarcely draw breath, and it was wonder ful how cruelly they persecuted us." The ground was swampy and the Frenchmen could hardly get along with their heavy armor. At length they saw two Indians running in the distance and shouted to them that if they wished for their aid they must guide them to the enemy.
And now they could hear the shouts of the fighters and soon reached the battle-field. The barricade was made of trees piled into a circular breastwork, trunks, boughs, and matted leaves making a strong defence. The allies had attacked their enemy but had been driven back and were now waiting for the French. When the
20 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
Indians saw them, a yell arose from hundreds of throats. A fierce answer came from the band within and amid a storm of arrows from both sides the Frenchmen threw themselves into the fight. The Iroquois had not gotten over their first fear of the guns and when the French men ran up to the barricade, thrust their pieces through the crevices and shot death among the crowd within, they could not control their fright but with every re port threw themselves flat on the earth. The allies, covered by their large shields, began to drag out the trees from the barricade, while others, under Cham- plain's direction, gathered like a dark cloud at the edge of the forest, ready to close the affair with a final rush. Some French traders, hearing the noise, joined in the attack. Champlain gave the signal ; the crowd ran to the barricade, dragged down the boughs or climbed over them, and bore themselves "so well and manfully" that they soon forced an entrance. Some of the Iroquois were cut down as they stood ; some climbed the barri cade and were killed by the fierce crowd without ; some were drowned in the river ; while fifteen, the only ones left, were taken prisoners.
On the next day a large band of Hurons arrived, much vexed that they had come too late. Hundreds of warriors were now assembled and a heavy blow had been struck at the enemy, but none thought of follow-
CHAMPLAIN IN NEW FRANCE 21
ing up their success. Pleased with their unexpected good fortune, the}7 danced and sang ; then loaded up their canoes and started for their homes. Champlain had fought their battles and might now claim the escort they had promised to the Great Lakes and to the coun try to the north, but his colony needed supplies and he returned to France.
Early in the spring Champlain came again to Que bec but did not stay long, as he wanted to plant a colony at Montreal. This was the place that the Ind ians passed yearly as they came south for trade or war. Here he wanted to get the advantage of the fur trade. But other traders followed and soon Montreal, or Place Royal, as Champlain called it, became the centre of the fur trade.
"Down the surges of the St. Louis, where the mighty floods of the St. Lawrence, contracted to a narrow throat, roll in fury among the sunken rocks, — here, through foam and spray and the roar of the angry tor rent, a fleet of birch canoes came dancing like dry leaves on the froth of some riotous brook." They bore a band of Huron s, the first of the tribes at the usual meeting-place. As they drew near the landing, all the fur-traders' boats blazed forth a welcome which fright ened the Indians so much that they hardly dared to come ashore. More soon appeared and hundreds of
22 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
warriors were shortly encamped along the shore, all less and afraid. Late one night they awakened Cham- plain. On going with them to their camp, he found the chiefs and warriors sitting around the fire. " Though they were fearful of the others, their trust in him was boundless. ( Come to our country, buy our beaver, build a fort, teach us the true faith, do what you will, but do not bring this crowd with you/ ' They were afraid that this band of traders, all well armed, meant to at tack and plunder and kill them. Champlain told them not to be afraid, but the camp soon broke up and the uneasy warriors moved to a place above the rapids. " Here Champlain visited them, and hence these fearless canoe-men, kneeling in the birchen egg-shells, carried him homeward down the rapids, somewhat, as he ad- mite, to the discomposure of his nerves." The great gathering soon broke up ; the traders returned to the trading-post nearer the mouth of the St. Lawrence ; the Indians went, some to their homes, some to fight the Iroquois. Champlain could not go with them, as he had to return to France to get help for his colonies. The next year, 1612, Champlain was too busy in France to visit his colonies. This year a young man who had gone north with the Indians the year before and had spent the year with them, came to Paris with a tale of wonders. He said* that at the source of the
CHAMPLAIN IN NEW FRANCE 23
Ottawa River he had found a great lake; that he had crossed it and discovered a river flowing northward; that he had gone down this river and reached the shores of the sea; that here he had seen the wreck of an English ship, and that this sea was distant from Montreal but seventeen days by canoe. The story was told so clearly that Champlain believed it. His friends thought he ought to follow up this discovery, and he, thinking that at last the way to the Pacific and India had been found, was eager to go. Early in the spring of 1613 he again crossed the Atlantic and sailed up the St. Lawrence to Montreal. On Monday, the 27th of May, he started up the Ottawa with four Frenchmen, one of whom was the young man who had been north the year before, and one Indian, in two small canoes. They had to pass many rapids and the forest was so thick and tangled that they were forced to remain in the bed of the river, trailing their canoes along the bank with cords or pushing them by main force up the current. Champlain's foot slipped, he fell in the rapids, two rocks against which he braced himself saving him from being swept down, while the cord of the canoe, twisted around his hand, nearly cut it off. At length they reached smoother water, where they met some friendly Indians. Champlain left one of his Frenchmen with them and took one of their number in return.
24 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
After many days of hard travel the voyagers reached a lake where they saw a rough clearing. The trees had been partly burnt. Dead trunks, black with fire, stood grimly upright amid the stumps and fallen bodies of those half-burnt. In the spaces between, the soil had been scratched with hoes of wood or bone and a crop of maize was growing, now some four inches high. The houses, with frames of poles, covered with sheets of bark, were scattered here and there. The Indians ran to the shore to see the strangers. Warriors stood with their hands over their mouths, the Indian way of showing astonish ment ; squaws stared, both curious and afraid ; naked pappooses screamed and ran. The chief offered the calu met and then spoke to the crowd. " These white men must have fallen from the clouds. How else could they have reached us through the woods and rapids which even we find it hard to pass ? The French chief can do any thing. All that we have heard of him must be true."
Champlain asked to be guided to the settlements above and with a number of his new-found friends he advanced beyond the head of Lake Coulange, and landing, saw path ways through the forest. They led to the clearing and to the cabins of a chief named Tessouat, who gave the Frenchmen a friendly welcome and prepared to give a feast in Champlain's honor. " Runners were sent to invite the guests from neighboring villages, and on the morrow
CHAMPLAIN IN NEW FRANCE 25
Tessouat' s squaws swept his cabin for the festivity. Then Champlain and his Frenchmen were seated on skins in the place of honor and the naked guests appeared, each with his wooden dish and spoon and each giving his guttural salute as he stooped at the low door. The wisdom and prowess of the nation sat expectant on the bare earth. Each long, bare arm thrust forth its dish in turn as the host served out the banquet. First, a mess of pounded maize wherein were boiled, without salt, morsels of fish and dark' scraps of meat ; then fish and flesh broiled on the embers, with a kettle of cold water from the river." After the feast, pipes were smoked and Champlain asked the Indians to furnish him with four canoes and eight men to take him to the country north. Now Tessouat was not friendly toward the tribes to the north, and answered Champlain : " We always knew you for our best friend among the Frenchmen. We love you like our own children. But why did you break your word with us last year when we all went down to meet you at Montreal to give you presents and go with you to war ? You were not there, but other Frenchmen were there, who abused us. We will never go again. As for the four canoes, you shall have them if you insist upon it, but it grieves us to think of the hardships you must endure."
Champlain, fearing that he would not get his canoes, told Tessouat that the young man with him had been to
26 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
this country and did not find the road nor the people so bad as he had said. Tessouat asked the young man whether that were true. The impostor sat mute for a short time, then said, " Yes, I have been there." " You are a liar," returned the host. " You know very well that you slept here among my children every night and rose again every morning ; and if you ever went where you pretend to have gone, it must have been when you were asleep. How can you be so impudent as to lie to your chief, and so wicked as to risk his life among so many dangers?"
Champlain, greatly disturbed, led the young man from the cabin and begged him to tell the truth. At first he declared that all that he had said was true but finally broke down, owned his treachery, and begged for mercy. The Indians wanted Champlain to have him killed at once and offered to perform that office for him ; but Champlain, who had promised the young man his life if he would tell the truth, protected him.
As there was now no motive for further advance, the party set forth on their return, attended by a fleet of forty canoes bound to Montreal for trade. Champlain returned to France.
It was near the end of May in 1615 when Champlain again reached Quebec. With him came four Recollet friars to found missions in the New World. A convent was built for them near the fortified dwellings of Cham-
CHAMPLAIN IN NEW FRANCE 27
plain. One of the friars had gone at once to Montreal, where the Indians had come for their yearly trade. Champlain soon joined him. The Indians begged him to go with them against the Iroquois. He agreed to do so but first returned to Quebec. After a short delay he came back to Montreal, to find the place deserted. Impatient at his delay, the Indians had gone home, and with them went the friar and twelve well-armed Frenchmen.
Champlain, with two canoes, ten Indians, and two Frenchmen, followed up the stream. He passed the vil lage of Tessouat and two lakes in the river here. For twenty miles the Ottawa runs straight as the bee can fly deep, narrow, and black between its mountain shores. Then came a series of rapids and at last the party reached a small tributary of the Ottawa coining in from the west. This they ascended forty miles or more, then crossing a portage track, well trodden, stood on the shore of Lake Nipissing. Crossing the lake, they entered French River and floated westward to the great fresh-water sea of the Hurons. For more than a hundred miles they followed the eastern shore of this lake, and at last landed where an Indian trail led inland. To the eye of Champlain this land seemed one of beauty and abundance. There was a broad opening in the forest, there were fields of maize, pumpkins ripening in the sun, patches of sunflowers, from the seeds of which the Indians made hair-oil, and in tbe
28 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
midst lay the great town of the Hurons. It was sur rounded by a palisade of crossed tree trunks, and the long lodges were made of bark, each containing many households.
All were glad to see Champlain, as they thought him the champion who was to lead them to victory. There was bountiful feasting in his honor. But Champlain soon tired of the idleness of an Indian town and with some of his Frenchmen visited in three days five palisaded towns. " The country delighted them : its meadows, its deep woods, its pine and cedar thickets, full of hares and par tridges, its wild grapes and plums, cherries, crab-apples, nuts, and raspberries."
The warriors were beginning to gather. It was now the middle of August. " Feasts and the war-dance con sumed the days, till at last the tardy bands had all arrived. Shouldering their canoes and scanty baggage, the naked host set out." At the outlet of Lake Simcoe they all stopped to fish. It was the 8th of September when the Huron fleet crossed Lake Simcoe, went up the little river Talbot, across the portage to Balsam Lake, and down the chain of lakes which form the sources of the river Trent.
" They stopped and encamped for a deer-hunt. Five hundred men, in line, like the skirmishers of an army advancing to battle, drove the game to the end of a
CHAMPLAIN IN NEW FRANCE 29
woody point ; and the canoe-men killed them with spears and arrows as they took to the river.
"The canoes now left the mouth of the Trent, and cross ing Lake Ontario, landed within the borders of New York. After hiding their light craft in the woods, the warriors took up their swift and wary march, filing in silence be tween the woods and the lake for twelve miles along the pebbly strand. Then they struck inland, threaded the forest, crossed the river Onondaga, and after a march of four days, were deep within the western limits of the Iroquois." The hostile town was close at hand. The young Hurons in advance saw the Iroquois at work among the pumpkins and maize, gathering their harvest, for it was the 10th of October. Nothing could keep back the hare-brained crew. They screamed their war- cry and rushed in ; but the Iroquois defeated and pursued them until driven back by Champlain and his Frenchmen. Then the victors retired to their defences.
It was the town of the Senecas, the largest and one of the most warlike of the five Iroquois tribes, and its site was on or near one of the lakes in central New York. Champlain says its defensive works were stronger than those of the Huron villages. They had four rows of palisades, formed of trunks and trees, thirty feet high, set aslant in the earth and crossing one another near the top, where they supported a kind of gallery, well defended
30 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
by shot-proof timber and furnished with wooden gutters for quenching fire. A pond or lake, which washed one side of the palisade and was led by sluices into the town, gave a good supply of water.
Champlain was much vexed with his allies for their useless attack and tried to show them how to take the fort. A wooden tower was made, high enough to over look the palisade and large enough to shelter four or five marksmen. Several movable shields were also made. In four hours all was ready and the attack began. " Two hundred of the strongest warriors dragged the tower close to the palisade, and three of -the Frenchmen mounted it and opened a raking fire along the galleries, now thronged with wild and naked defenders. But the Hu- rons could not be kept back. They left their movable shields, and, deaf to every command, swarmed out like bees upon the open field, leaped, shouted, shrieked their war-cries, and shot off their arrows, while the Iroquois sent back a shower of stones and arrows in reply. A Huron, bolder than the rest, ran forward with firebrands to burn the palisade, and others followed with wood to feed the flames. But it was stupidly kindled on the leeward side, without the shields intended to cover it, and torrents of water, poured down from the gutters above, soon put it out. Champlain tried in vain to restore order. Each warrior was yelling at the top of
CHAMPLAIN IN NEW FRANCE
31
his throat, and his voice was drowned in the dreadful din. Thinking, as he says, that his head would split with shouting, he gave over the attempt and busied hiin-
CHAMPLAIN'S ATTACK ON AN IROQDOIS FORT
self and his men with picking off the Iroquois along the ramparts."
The attack lasted three hours, when the Hurons fell back to their camp with seventeen warriors wounded. Champlain, too, was hurt and for a time disabled. He
32 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
wanted, however, to renew the attack, but the Hurons refused, unless the five hundred allies they expected should appear. They waited five days in vain and then began to retreat. Their wounded, Champlain among the rest, had been packed in baskets so that they might be carried, each on the back of a strong warrior, " bundled in a heap," says Champlain, " doubled and strapped to gether after such a fashion that one could no more move than an infant in swaddling clothes — I lost all patience, and as soon as I could bear my weight I got out of this prison."
At length the dismal march was ended. They reached the spot where their canoes were hidden, found them untouched, embarked and crossed to the northern shore of Lake Ontario. The Hurons had promised Champlain an escort to Quebec but each warrior found good reasons for refusing to go or lend his canoe. The help of " the man with an iron breast " no longer meant victory and they were careless of his friendship. A chief offered him the shelter of his lodge and he spent an unpleasant winter with the Hurons. In the spring, when Champlain returned to Quebec, his Indian host went with him and was delighted with all that he saw. The fort, the ship, the armor, the plumes, the cannon, the houses and bar racks, the splendors of the chapel, and above all the good cheer, pleased him wonderfully and he paddled back to
CHAMPLAIN IN NEW FRANCE
33
his lodge in the woods bewildered with admiring aston ishment.
EARLY QUEBEC (from an old print)
Champlain made no more excursions to the wilder ness but devoted himself to his colonies. Quarrels among those in authority in France and among the traders
34 riONKKltS ON LAND AND SEA
themselves kept the colony from prospering. The colo nists did not raise enough to support themselves and supplies from France did not come often. In 1629 a squadron of English ships appeared before Quebec and demanded its surrender. Champlain's company was too weak to defend the fort and surrendered on condition that the men would .be returned to France. Three years later England gave up her claim to New France and Champlain returned to Quebec, where he remained until his death in 1635.
CHAPTER II
HENRY HUDSON i
OF Henry Hudson's boyhood, history tells us nothing. It is supposed that he belonged to a Hudson family that lived in England, some of whose members were friends of Sir Humphrey Gilbert, Sir Walter Raleigh, and others much interested in seafaring and discovery. We know, however, that he was a citizen of London and that on the first day of May, 1607, he sailed for Greenland in command of an arctic expedition. He tried to sail between Green land and Spitzbergen, in the hope of passing over the North Pole and finding an open sea over which he could sail to the eastern ports of Asia. In 1608 he tried to pass between Spitzbergen and Nova Zembla, which lie to the north of Russia. " In this high latitude he tells us that on the morning of the 15th of June two of his sail ors saw a mermaid, who came close to the ship's side and gazed earnestly at them. Her face and breasts were those of a woman, but below she was a fish as big as a halibut, and in color like a speckled mackerel." It is
1 Authority : Fiske's " Dutch and Quaker Colonies in America." 2Fiske's " Dutch and Quaker Colonies in America."
35
36 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
supposed that this creature was a seal, an animal which at that time was little known by English sailors.
When Hudson returnel tox England after these voyages, he found himself famous. He had been nearer the pole than anyone else and had proved himself a very fine sea man. The Dutch East India Company was anxious to secure his services and persuaded him to make a voyage for them. On the 4th of April, 1609, Henry Hudson set sail on the Zuyder Zee. He commanded a little yacht of eighty tons burden and had a crew of sixteen or eigh teen sailors. About half of the crew were English but the mate was a Netherlander. His ship was named the Half Moon. On the fifth day of May he sailed around North Cape and headed for Nova Zernbla. But the sea was so full of ice that passage was very difficult and the crew became mutinous. Hudson decided that he would try another way of reaching Asia. On the maps of the early voyagers to the New World a great sea was pictured behind Virginia, divided from the Atlantic by a narrow isthmus near the 40th parallel and called the sea of Yer- razano. It might be possible to find a strait near here that would lead into this sea. Captain John Smith, who had explored along the coast the preceding summer, thought it possible and had written to Hudson about it ; so Hudson turned his ship and started for the New World.
On the 13th of May the little Half Moon stopped
HENRY HUDSON 37
at the Faroe Islands and the casks were filled with fresh water. On the 3d of June the sailors were surprised at the force of the ocean current which we now call the Gulf Stream. On the 18th of July they arrived in Penobscot Bay, with the foremast gone and the sails much the worse for wear. Here they stopped for a week to mend their sails and make a new mast. They enjoyed good living while here, for they caught fifty cod, a hun dred lobsters, and one great halibut. They were visited by two French shallops full of Indians. The mate of the Half Moon, who kept a journal, says : " Wee espied two French shallops full of the country people come into the harbor, but they offered us no wrong, seeing we stood upon our guard. They brought many beaver skinnes and other fine furres, which they would have changed for redde gowns. For the French trade with them for red cassockes, knives, hatchets, copper, kettles, . . . beades and other trifles. . . . We kept good watch for fear of being betrayed by the people, and perceived where the}7 layd their shallops."1
Nine days after leaving Penobscot Bay the Half Moon reached the neighborhood of Cape Cod. On the 18th of August she was as far south as Accomac penin sula, where Hudson saw an opening which he thought was the James River, for he says, " This is the entrance
1 Hart's " American History told by Contemporaries."
38
PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
into the King's River in' Virginia, where our Englishmen are." Presently turning north again, he entered Dela ware Bay on the 28th day of August and began to take soundings. The water was shallow in many places and the swift current made him sure that he was at the
THE PALISADES OF THE HUDSON
mouth of a large river. So he sailed farther north and, on the 3d of September, stopped somewhere between Sandy Hook and Staten Island.
They entered the bay and says the mate's journal: " This day the people of the country came aboord of us, seeming very glad of our coming, and brought greene
HENRY HUDSON
tobacco, and gave us of it for knives and beads. They goe in deere skins loose, well dressed. They have yellow copper. They desire cloathes, and are very civ ill. They have great store of maize or wheate, whereof they make good bread. The country is full of great and tall oakes.
" The fifth, in the morning, as soon as the day was light, the wind ceased and the flood came. So we heaved off our ship againe into five fathoms of water, and sent our boate to sound the bay, and we found that there was three fathoms hard by the souther shoare. Our men went on land there, and saw great store of men, women, and children who gave them tobacco at their coming on land. So they went up into the woods, and saw great store of very goodly oakes and some currants. For one of them came aboord and brought some dryed, and gave me some, which were sweet and good. This day many of the peo ple came aboord, some in mantles of feathers, and some in skinnes of divers sorts of good furres. Some women also came to us with hempe. They had red copper tobacco pipes, and other things of copper they did wear about their necks. At night they went on land againe, so we rode very quiet, but durst not trust them."
Their fears were well founded, for the next day "in the morning was fair weather, and our master sent John Colin an, with foure other men in our boate, over to the north-side to sound the other river, being four leagues
40 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
from us. They found by the way shoald water, two fathoms : but at the north of the river eighteen, and twenty fathoms, and very good riding for ships; and a narrow river to the westward, between two ilands. The lands, they told us, were as pleasant with grasse and flowers and goodly trees as ever they had seene, and very sweet smells came from them. So they went in two leagues and saw an open sea, and returned ; and as they came backe, they were set upon by two canoes, the one having twelve, the other fourteene men. The night came on, and it began to rayne, so that their match went out ; and they had one man slaine in the fight, which was an Englishman, named John Col man, with an arrow shot into his throat, and two more hurt. It grew so darke that they could not find the ship that night, but labored too and fro with their oares. They had so great a streame, that their grapnell would not hold them.
" The eleventh was faire and very hot weather . . . wee anchored, and saw that it was a very good harbour for all windes, and rode all night. The people of the country came aboord of us, making show of love, and gave us tabacco and Indian wheat, and departed for that night ; but we durst not trust them."
As the Half Moon passed up the river, she was often greeted with flights of arrows and sometimes answered the salute with musket shots. On the 14th of Sep-
42 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
tember the ship passed between Stony and Verplanck's points. The journal says : The " fourteenth, in the morning, being very faire weather, the wind south-east, we sayled up the river twelve leagues. . . . The river is a mile broad : there is high land on both sides. The land grew very high and mountainous.
" The fifteenth, in the morning, was misty, untill the sun arose : then it cleared. So we weighed with the wind at south, and ran up into the river twentie leagues, passing by high mountains. Wee had a very good depth, as sixe, seven, eight, nine, ten, twelve, and thirteene fathoms, and great store of salmons in the river. This morning our two savages got out of a port and swam away. After wee were under sayle, they called to us in scorne. At night we came to other mountains which lie from the rivers side. There we found very loving people, and caught great store of very good fish. " *
On the 22d, after passing as far north as Troy, the water became so shallow that the voyagers could go no farther. This was plainly not the passage to the western ocean. They now started on their return voyage down the river. Their adventures are told in the mate's journal. "The people of the mountaynes came aboord us, wondering at our ships and weapons. We bought some small skinnes of them for trifles. This afternoone,
1 Hart's " American History told by Contemporaries."
HENRY HUDSON 43
one canoe kept hanging under our sterne with one man in it, which we could not keepe from thence, who got up by our rudder to the cabin window, and stole out my pillow, and two shirts and two bandeleeres. Our master's mate shot at him and killed him. Whereupon all the rest fled away, some in their canoes, and some leapt out of them into the water. We manned our boat and got our things againe. Then one of them that swamme got hold of our boat thinking to overthrow it. But our cooke took a sword and cut off one of his hands and he was drowned. By this time the ebbe was come and we weighed and got down two leagues." l
At one time the Indians came in hundreds in their bark canoes, shooting their arrows at the boat with little effect, but the ship's cannon sank their boats and the muskets did deadly work. Sometimes the meetings with the natives were friendly. Hudson tells of an experience near the site of Catskill. "I sailed to the shore in one of their canoes, with an old man, who was the chief of a tribe consisting of forty men and seventeen women ; these 1 saw in a house well constructed of oak bark, and circular in shape, so that it had the appearance of being well built, with an arched roof. It contained a great quantity of maize . . . and beans of last years growth, and there lay near the house for the purpose of drying, enough to load
1 Fiske's " Dutch and Quaker Colonies in America."
44 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
three ships, besides what was growing in the fields. On our coming into the house, two mats were spread out to sit upon, and immediately some food was served in well- made wooden bowls; two men were also despatched at once with bows and arrows in quest of game, who soon after brought in a pair of pigeons which they had shot. They likewise killed a fat dog and skinned it with great haste, with shells which they got out of the water. They supposed that I would remain with them for the night, but I returned after a short time on board the ship. The land is the finest for cultivation that I ever in my life set foot upon, and it also abounds in trees of every description." *
On the 4th of October Hudson left behind him the shore which was called by the natives Manna-hatta and set sail for Europe. On the 7th of November he reached Dartmouth and the English members of his crew made him stop there. He sent a report of his voyage to Amsterdam and asked for more money and some men to take the place of the discontented English sailors. He intended to start in March on a fresh search for the Northwest Passage. The directors of the Dutch East India Company asked him to come first to Holland. King James refused to let him go and the Half Moon was sent to Amsterdam without him. A new ship was fitted
1 Fiske's " Dutch and Quaker Colonies in America."
HENRY HUDSON 45
out in England and in April the new voyage was begun. The English wanted the glory of the discoveries the famous sailor expected to make.
In time the ship entered the great inland sea known as Hudson Bay. Trien winter came on and from Novem ber, 1610, to the following June, the ship was locked in ice at the southern end of James Bay. As soon as the ice broke up, the crew insisted upon going home but Hudson decided to go westward. The crew mutinied and, three days after leaving winter quarters, Henry Hudson with his son John Hudson and seven sick men were set adrift in an open boat and the ship started for England. The leaders of the mutiny were killed by Indians before reaching the ocean. As soon as the ship came to England, the crew was thrown into jail and a ship was sent in search of the great sailor, but the search was unsuccessful.
Of the results of these voyages, John Fiske says : " In all that he attempted he failed, and yet he achieved great results that were not contemplated in his schemes. He started two immense industries, the Spitzbergen whale fisheries and the Hudson Bay fur trade, and he brought the Dutch to Manhattan Island. No realization of his dreams could have approached the astonishing reality which would have greeted him could he have looked through the coming centuries and caught a glimpse
46 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SKA
of what the voyager now beholds in sailing up the .bay of New York. But what perhaps would have surprised him most of all would have been to become a part of the folklore of the beautiful river to which it is attached, that he was to figure as a Dutchman in spite of himself, in legend and on the stage, that when it is thunder weather on the Catskills the children should say it is Hendrik Hudson playing at skittles with his goblin
crew."
CHAPTER III
WALTER RALEIGH i
v.
ABOUT the middle of the sixteenth century, 1552, a boy named Walter Raleigh was living with his father and mother in a small farmhouse vnear the Otter River in the south of England. His father, though not rich, belonged to a family which had long been rich and powerful in England. The mother also belonged to a noble family, being a descendant of the Courtenays, the famous English emperors of Constantinople. The father and mother were very proud of their son, who was noted in the neighbor hood for his beauty. His features were regular, his com plexion rosy, his eyes large, bright, and brown, and his mind quick and active. He received his early education at home from his mother. He was fond of outdoor sports and as soon as he was old enough was the com panion of his father as he galloped over the hills, his pack of hounds yelping at his sides, chasing the fleet-footed deer.
About thirty miles from the farmhouse in the midst of a forest stood an old castle, whose lofty towers rose
1 Authorities : Bancroft's " History of the United States," Higginson's " American Explorers."
47
48 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
high above the surrounding trees. Here lived Waltei Raleigh's half-brothers, Humphrey and Adrian Gilbert ; for his mother, when a girl, had wedded a brave knight. Sir Otho Gilbert, who died when his sons were yet young. After her husband's death she married the quiet country gentleman who became Walter Raleigh's father. These half-brothers had been much abroad in the world and had met with many stirring adventures in war and on the sea. They were very fond of their young half-brother, who delighted in visiting them and was never tired of sitting with them by the big fireplace on a winter night, hearing them tell of their adventures, and he was never so happy as when following them to the hunt.
As his house was near the ocean, he often went to the cottages of the sailors along the southern coast. These men came home to rest after long and exciting voyages and were very fond of telling of adventures at sea. Walter Raleigh was equally fond of listening to their stories of battle, shipwreck, and discovery. He read of the discoveries of Columbus, Magellan, Pizarro, and Cor tes with great interest and thought he would like to be the hero of such adventures.
When about fifteen he left his quiet home for Oxford. He entered into his college work with as much zest as he had shown in pursuit of amusement before. He was well liked by the young men he met and became friendly-
WALTER RALEIGH 49
with many noted men. One of his friends, Francis Bacon, tells an anecdote of Walter Raleigh which shows something of his spirit at that time. " Whilst Raleigh was a scholar at Oxford there was a cowardly fellow, who happened to be a very good archer; but having been grossly abused by another, he bemoaned himself to Raleigh, and asked his advice what he should do to repair the wrong that had been offered to him. < Why,' promptly answered Raleigh, ' challenge him to a match of shooting.' '
When Raleigh had been at Oxford almost three years, he was offered a chance to try some of the adventures he had so long thought and dreamed about. A conflict was going on in France between the Huguenots, or Protestants, and the Catholic king, Charles IX. Eliza beth, who was queen of England at this time, sympa thized with the Protestants and encouraged adventurous noblemen to help them, though she offered no direct aid herself. A young cavalier, Henry Champenon, a cousin of Walter Raleigh, was going to France with a company of one hundred young men to take part in the war and win what glory they could. This cousin asked Walter Raleigh to join him and the temptation was too great to be resisted. A fleet of four vessels took the little company to France, where they joined the army of Coligny, the great leader. What their exploits were
.~>U I'lONEKKS ON LAND AND SKA
history fails to tell, but no doubt they performed many brave deeds, and Walter Raleigh received a training in warfare which was of great use to him in after life. He remained six years in France. He continued his studies when he was not fighting and always took careful note of all that he heard and saw.
When, at last, Walter Raleigh returned to England, he was no longer a boy but a tall, broad-shouldered man of twenty-four. He was thought to be very handsome and was noted for his refined and graceful manner. He attracted the attention of the queen and many nobles at court. Soon after his return war broke out in Holland. An expedition was sent from England to help the Dutch against the Spaniards and Raleigh was given command of a company. The expedition was a successful one ; the Spaniards were defeated and Raleigh returned with new laurels.
In the meantime, Raleigh's half-brother, Sir Humphrey Gilbert, whose ambition had long been excited by voyages of discovery, had made up his mind to start out upon a voyage himself. He wanted to explore the still mysteri ous continent of America. He fitted up a squadron of vessels which he himself was to command. Walter Raleigh reached London just in time to join him. When the squadron dropped down the English Channel and put to sea, Raleigh was on the flagship with Sir
WALTER RALEIGH 51
Humphrey. It was his first experience of life on the ocean and he watched everything with keen interest. He learned the methods of finding the latitude and longitude of the ship's position, the arrangement and management of the sails, and the discipline which was imposed upon the crew. As he had little to do himself, he spent much of his time on board in study. Mean while he shared the rough life of the sailors, enduring many of the hardships to which they were subjected.
The expedition was not a successful one. One of the ships mutinied and sailed away. The rest were beset by Spanish cruisers and escaped only by flight. Sir Humphrey returned to Portsmouth with his ships badly damaged and the expedition was given up.
Raleigh was next sent to put down a rebellion in Ire land. Although he was eager for adventure, he did not like this work of fighting people who were struggling for liberty. " I disdain this charge," he said to the Earl of Leicester, " as much as to keep sheep." But he could not let a chance go by to add to his fame and accepted a captainship in spite of his scruples. He fought bravely and did so much toward putting down the rebellion that his praises were sounded in England and reached the ears of Queen Elizabeth.
At the age of thirty Raleigh returned to England. Soon after his return a happy adventure had much to do
62 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
with his future fortune. Queen Elizabeth was stopping at the castle and a crowd of gayly dressed courtiers were awaiting her appearance. " Grave statesmen, all beruffed, their white beards carefully trimmed and daintily pointed; fine young cavaliers, sparkling with gems, attired in rich velvets and long plumes, and armed with gold-hilted swords ; stately dames and beautiful young girls, were gathered on the thick green lawn beneath the palace portals; while the trumpets gave forth inspiriting sounds, and lines of soldiers were drawn up along the bank." Soon the queen appeared, and, surrounded by a gay group of ladies and courtiers, set out for a walk in the park. It had rained during the day and small pools of water still stood in places along the walk. The queen paused before a muddy place in her path, disliking to soil her dainty boots. At the instant, Walter Raleigh stepped forward and threw his handsome velvet cloak over the mud. The queen smiled at him and went on with her walk. But she kept Raleigh at her side and seemed very friendly toward him. She gave him, soon afterward, great estates in both England and Ireland.
In the meantime Sir Humphrey Gilbert was busy with plans for discoveries and settlement in the New World. Walter Raleigh joined eagerly in these plans. They wished to make a settlement in Newfoundland. The
WALTER RALEIGH
53
expedition set out in 1583, commanded by Sir Humphrey, Raleigh remaining at home. Sir Humphrey reached the coast of Newfoundland but his men became unruly and
SIR WALTER RALEIGH
demanded that they be taken home again. They started for England, but during a storm the Squirrel, Sir Humphrey's ship, was sunk, and all on board were lost
54 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SKA
Raleigh was much grieved but not discouraged by the sad death of his brother. As soon as possible he fitted out another fleet to colonize the New World. This time he thought he would make a settlement farther south and from Queen Elizabeth obtained the right to plant colonies in any region not already occupied and to have, himself, the government of such colonies as he might plant. In 1584 he sent out two vessels, commanded by Philip Amadas and Arthur Barlow, to explore the coast of the Carolinas. The ocean was quiet and they reached the shores of North Carolina after a pleasant voyage. As they drew near land, the fragrance was " as if they had been in the midst of some delicate garden, abounding with all kinds of odoriferous flowers." They sailed along the coast for 120 miles in search of a good harbor, and, landing on an island near the mainland, took possession of the country for the queen of England. They were delighted with all they saw. The natives who came to the shore were friendly and they were entertained on the island of Roanoke by the king's mother. " The people were most gentle, loving, and faithful, void of all guile and treason, and such as lived after the manner of the golden age."
The adventurers were pleased with the New World, and, without taking time to explore much, returned to England.
WALTER RALEIGH 50
In 1585 Raleigh sent out another company which sailed in a fleet of seven vessels and had as commander Sir Richard Grenville, a friend of Raleigh. These ships carried 108 colonists. Ralph Lane was made governor. The fleet crossed the ocean in safety but came near being wrecked upon the cape which was then for the first time called Cape Fear. They made their way to Roanoke. After spending eight days in exploring the coast, Grenville returned to England.
Lane and his colonists explored the country. Lane wrote at the time : " It is the goodliest soil under the cope of heaven ; the most pleasing territory of the world ; the continent is of a huge and unknown greatness, and very well peopled and towned, though savagely. The climate is so wholesome that we have not been sick since we touched the land. If Virginia had but horses and kine and were inhabited with English, no realm of Chris tendom were comparable to it."
Hariot, the historian of the company, examined the productions of the country. He observed the culture of tobacco, used it, and believed in its healing power. Maize and the tuberous roots of the potato were tried and found to be very good food. The natives are de scribed as " too feeble to inspire terror ; clothed in man tles and aprons of deer-skins ; having no weapons but wooden $words, and bows of witch-hazel with arrows of
56 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
reeds ; no armors but targets of bark and sticks wickered together with thread. Their towns were small, the largest containing but thirty dwellings. The walls of the houses were made of bark fastened to stakes, and sometimes consisted of poles fixed upright, one by another, and at the top bent over and fastened as arbors are some times made in gardens." The tribes warred against one another but seldom in open battle. They lay in wait to surprise an enemy at some unexpected place. They thought the white men came from heaven, and the guns, clocks, burning glass, and books the English had with them, the works of gods. They feared the English and wished to get rid of them. Finding they were eager for gold, some of the savages told them that the Roanoke River gushed from a rock so near the Pacific Ocean that the surge of the sea sometimes dashed into its fountains. Its banks were inhabited by a nation skilled in the art of refining the rich ore in which the country abounded. The walls of the city, they said, glittered from the abundance of pearls.
Lane and some of his followers tried to reach the source of the Roanoke but their provisions gave out and they returned after a short time. While they were gone the Indians had planned to get rid of the English by attacking them while the two parties were apart, but Lane's sudden return put an end to this plot. The
WALTER RALEIGH
Indians feared that the English would take their land and plotted several times to destroy them, but were unsuccessful. The English heard of some of these plots and decided to put an end to them. They asked that they might visit one of the most powerful of the Indian chiefs. The Indians, fearing nothing, received them kindly. At a signal the Eng lish fell upon them and murdered the chief and his followers.
Lane had made some ex plorations both north and south of the Roanoke. Better harbors were found farther north and better places for colonization.
The colonists at Roanoke began to grow impatient as none of the promised stores came from England. One day they were delighted to see the sails of twenty-three vessels on the ocean. In three days Sir Francis Drake, who was returning from the sacking of St. Domingo, Cartagena, and St. Augustine, anchored his fleet " in the wild road of their bad harbor. He conferred with them of their state and welfare, and how things
MAP OF CAROLINA
58 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
had passed with them. They answered him that they lived all, but hitherto in some scarcity, and as yet could hear of no supply out of England; therefore they re quested him that he would leave with them two or three ships, that, if in some reasonable time they heard not out of England they might then return themselves. Which he agreed to. Whilst some were then writing their letters to send into England, and some others mak ing reports of the accidents of their travels each to other, — some on land, some on board, — a great storm arose and drove most of their fleet from their anchor to sea ; in which ships at that instant were the chiefest of the English colony. The rest on land, perceiving this, hastened to those three sails which were appointed to be left there ; and for fear they should be left behind, they left all things confusedly, as if they had been chased from thence by a mighty army. And no doubt so they were, for the hand of God came upon them for the cruelty and outrages committed by some of them against the native inhabitants of that country."
Soon after the departure of the colonists " out of this paradise of the world " a ship which had been sent out by Raleigh well laden with supplies reached the island, but finding no one there, returned to England. About fourteen or fifteen days later Richard Grenville, with three well-furnished ships, appeared off the coast
WALTER RALEIGH , 59
and looked in vain for the colony. Unwilling that the English should lose possession of the country, he left fifteen men on the island of Roanoke to be the guard ians of English rights.
Sir Walter Raleigh persevered in his attempts to colonize Virginia and in 1587 sent out a new colony of 150 men. John White was made governor and had under him twelve assistants. A city was to be built in Virginia and it was to be called the City of Raleigh. It was intended that the city should be built farther north than the island of Roanoke but the men landed at Roanoke to search for the fifteen men left by Grenville. No sooner were they landed than the commander of the fleet, who was to take the ships back to England, refused to go farther. It was late in July when they reached America and he claimed that the summer was too far spent for explorations. " Unto this were all the sailors both in the pinnace and ship persuaded by the master ; wherefore it booted not the governor to contend with them, but (we) passed to Roanoke ; and the same night at sunset went a-land on the island, in the place where our fifteen men were left ; but we found none of them, nor any sign that they had been there, saving only we found the bones of one of those fifteen which the savages had slain long before.
" The three and twentieth of July, the governor, with
60 . PIONEERS OK LAND AND SEA
divers of his company, walked to the north end of the island, where Master Ralph Lane had his fort with sundry necessary and decent dwelling-houses, made by his men about it the year before, where we hoped to find some signs or certain knowledge of our fifteen men. When we came thither, we found the fort razed down, but all the houses standing unhurt, saving that the nether rooms of them, and also of the fort, were overgrown with melons of divers sorts, and deer within them feeding on those melons ; so we returned to our company, without hope of ever seeing any of the fifteen men living.
"The same day, order was again given that every man should be employed for the repairing of those houses which we found standing, and also to make other new cottages for such as should need."
From Manteo, a friendly Indian of Croatan, the colo nists learned that the fifteen men had been killed by Indians.
On the 18th of August " Eleanor, daughter to the governor, and wife of Ananias Dare, one of the assist ants, was delivered of a daughter in Roanoke, and the same was christened there the Sunday following; and because this child was the first Christian born in Vir ginia, she was named Virginia. By this time, our ships had unladen the goods and victuals of the planters and begun to take wood and fresh water, and to new calk
WALTER RALEIGH 61
and trim them for England ; the planters, also, prepared their letters and tokens to send back to England."
The colonists united in asking Governor White to return to England to hasten the supplies so much needed. At first he refused but finally consented as the ships were ready to sail. He expected to return as soon as possible.
But when White reached England he found every body fearing a Spanish invasion. Grenville, Raleigh, Drake, Frobisher, and all to whom he could look for assistance were busy planning resistance. Yet Raleigh, after a time, found means to send White with two vessels of supplies. But desiring to make the voyage a gainful one, the ships ran after Spanish cruisers, and instead of gaining a prize, were forced to return to England in a disabled condition. The delay was fatal, for the Invincible Armada must be defeated before further thought could be given to the colonists. Raleigh had spent so much money in his attempts to colonize America and in the wars, that his fortune was almost gone. He tried, however, to organize a company of mer chants to go to his colony in Virginia but more tha-n another year elapsed before White could return to search for his colony and his daughter. Upon reaching Roa- noke he found the settlers gone.
Of the search for this lost colony, Governor White says :
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"As we entered up the sandy bank, upon a tree, in the very brow thereof, were curiously carved these fair Roman letters, CRO : which letters presently we knew to signify the place where I should find the planters seated, accord ing to a secret token agreed upon between them and me at my last departure from them. Which was, that in any ways they should not fail to write or carve upon the trees or posts of the doors the name of the place where they should be seated ; for at my coming away they were pre pared to remove from Roanoke fifty miles into the main. Therefore at my departure from them in 1587, I willed them, that if they should happen to be distressed in any of those places, then they should carve over the letters or name a cross . . . but we found no such sign of distress. And having well considered of this, we passed toward the place where they were left in sundry houses; but we found the houses taken down, and the place very strongly enclosed with a high palisado of great trees, with curtains and flankers, very fort-like. And one of the chief trees or posts at the right side of the entrance had the bark taken off ; and five feet from the ground, in fair capital letters, was graven CROATAN, without any cross, or sign of distress. This done we entered the palisado, where we found many bars of iron, two pigs of lead . . . and such like heavy things, thrown here and there, almost overgrown with grasses and weeds.
WALTER RALEIGH
*' From thence we went along by the water-side, toward the point of the creek, to see if we could find any of theii boats or pinnace ; but we could perceive no sign of them.
RETURN OF WHITE TO ROANOKE ISLAND
. . . At our return from the creek, some of the sailors, meeting us, told us they had found where divers chests had been hidden, and long since digged up again, and
64 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
broken up, and much of the goods in them spoiled and scattered about, but nothing left, of such things as the savages knew any use of, undefaced. Presently Captain Cooke and I went to the place, which was in the end of an old trench, made two years past by Captain Amadas, where we found five chests that had been carefully hidden of the planters, and of the same chests three were my own ; and about the place many of my things spoiled and broken, and my books torn from the covers, the frames of some of my pictures and maps rotten, and spoiled with rain, and my armor almost eaten through with rust. This could be no other but the deed of the savages, our ene mies, . . . who had watched the departure of our men to Croatan, and, as soon as they were departed, digged up every place where they suspected anything to be buried. But although it much grieved me to see such spoil of my goods, yet on the other side I greatly joyed that I had found a certain token of their safe being at Croatan, which is the place where Manteo was born, and the sav ages of the island our friends." 1 Unfortunately, weather, which "grew to be fouler and fouler," and some broken cables, as well as a scarcity of victuals and water, made it necessary for the vessel to "go for St. John, or some other island to the southward," and no trace of the lost colony has ever been discovered.
1 Higginson's " Young Folks' Book of American Explorers."
WALTER RALEIGH 65
About this time Raleigh married secretly a young girl who was Elizabeth's maid of honor. When Elizabeth heard of this marriage, she was very angry and had Raleigh sent to the Tower to punish him. He had been a prisoner here some time when some of his ships which had been out to look for Spanish prizes brought in a Spanish vessel loaded with valuable goods. As Raleigh was chief owner of the fleet which had captured the prize he was set free so that he might help divide the booty. Elizabeth was much pleased with her share and upon Raleigh's return to prison sent word that he might be liberated. He lived quietly in one of his castles with his beautiful wife for a while, but hearing of the wonders of Guiana in South America, he resolved to visit that coun try and to add it and its wealth to his beloved England.
According to Spanish accounts this Guiana on the north coast of South America was in truth the land of gold. Stories were told of a great city which stood on the heights in the interior of the country, "where the very troughs at the corners of the streets at which the horses were watered were made of solid blocks of gold and silver ; and where billets of gold lay about in heaps as if they were logs of wood marked out to be burned." It was also said that Montezuma had sent his great treas ures to this city when he was captured by Cortes, and that the boundless wealth of the Inca of Peru had been sent
66 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
to the same place when he was conquered by Pizarro. Raleigh disliked the Spaniards very much and to prevent their getting this land of gold he determined to go him self to take possession of it in the name of his queen, Elizabeth. He had given up his attempts to colonize Virginia after so many failures but this seemed a new and more promising field for colonization. In 1594 five stout ships provided with crews and arms and provisions, and with Sir Walter Raleigh himself as commander, left the harbor of Plymouth. The fleet reached Guiana in safety. Raleigh ascended the Orinoco some distance and brought away some stones containing gold. He returned to England to get more men, as he feared the Spaniards would try to keep from him the great wealth he expected to bring to England. When he reached England he was needed in an attack against Spain and could riot return to America.
Soon after this Elizabeth died and King James of Scot land became king of England. Now James did not like Raleigh and took from him his offices and estates. This made Raleigh angry and he said many bitter things of the king. Some of his enemies claimed that he was guilty of treason and he was tried and convicted, though there was really no proof that he was guilty. He was imprisoned in the Tower where he remained thirteen years. While in prison he wrote a history of the world. At last he was
WALTER KALEIGH 67
released from prison that he might go again to Guiana to find the gold mines of which he had heard.
This expedition was not successful and upon his return Raleigh was again thrown into prison. The old charge of treason was revived and Raleigh was taken from prison and beheaded. His efforts to found colonies" in America had not been successful, but he had kept up the interest of Englishmen in America and soon afterward colonies were successfully planted.
CHAPTER IV
JOHN SMITH i
THE adventures of John Smith began when he was very young. Before reaching his twentieth year he had fought for a while in the French army and had served three years in the Netherlands. In the year 1600 he returned to his home in England, u where," he says in the history of his life, " within a short time, being glutted with too much company wherein he took small delight, he retired himself into a little woody pasture a good way from any town, environed with many hundred acres of woods. Here by a fair brook he built a pavilion of boughs where only in his clothes he lay." Here he read books upon the art of war and studied the wise sayings of Marcus Aurelius. He also took exercise with " a good horse, with lance and ring ; his food was thought to be more of venison thac anything else." But he soon grew tired of this quiet life. " He was desirous to see more of the world and try his fortune against the Turks ; both lamenting and repenting to have seen so many Christians slaughtering one another."
1 Authority : Fiske's " Old Virginia and Her Neighbors " and other sources.
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JOHN SMITH 69
After an adventure in France with robbers, in which he lost everything he had with him, he reached Marseilles. Here he embarked for Turkey with a band of pilgrims. A storm arose " which they said was all because of their having this heretic on board, and so, like Jonah, the young adventurer was thrown into the sea. He was a good swimmer, however, and ' God brought him,' he says, Ho a little island with no inhabitants but a few kine and goats.' ' Next morning he was picked up by a Breton vessel whose captain knew some of Smith's friends in France and treated him with much kindness. The vessel was bound for Egypt and Cyprus. On the return voyage they were fired upon by a Venetian argosy and a hot fight took place until the Venetian struck her colors. After taking from her a rich treasure of silks and velvet and Turkish coins in gold and silver, the Bretons let her go on her way. When the spoil was divided, Smith received £225 in coin and a box of goods worth nearly as much more. His friend, the captain, landed him in Piedmont, and he journeyed to Naples, enjoying himself i: sight see ing." He visited Rome, Florence, and Bologna, and finally made his way to Venice. From here he went to Styria and entered the service of the Emperor Rudolph II. He was soon given command of a company of 250 cavalry, with the rank of captain. " On one occasion he made himself useful by devising a system of signals, and on
70 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
another occasion by inventing a kind of rude missiles which he called * fiery dragons/ which sorely annoyed the Turks by setting fire to their camp."
During the years 1601 and 1602 Smith saw much rough fighting. The troop to which his company be longed passed into the service of Prince Sigismund of Transylvania. " The Transylvanians were besieging Re gal, one of their towns which the Turks had occupied, and the siege made but little progress, so that the barbarians from the top of the wall hurled down sarcasms upon their assailants and complained of growing fat for lack of exer cise. One day a Turkish captain sent a challenge, declar ing that ( in order to delight the ladies, who did long to see some court-like pastime, he did defy any captain that had the command of a company, who durst combat with him for his head.' The challenge was accepted by the Christian army, it was decided to select the champion by lot, and the lot fell upon Smith. A truce was proclaimed for the single combat, the besieging army was drawn up in battle array, the town walls were crowded with veiled dames and turbaned warriors, the combatants on their horses politely exchanged salutes, and then rushed at each other with levelled lances. At the first thrust Smith killed the Turk, and dismounting, unfastened his helmet, cut off his head and carried it to the commanding general who accepted it graciously. The Turks were so chagrined
JOHN SMITH 71
that one of their captains sent a personal challenge to Smith, and next day the scene was repeated." This time both lances were shivered and pistols were used. The Turk received a ball which threw him to the ground and then Smith beheaded him. " Some time afterward our victorious champion sent a message into the town ' that the ladies might know he was not so much enamoured of their servants' heads, but if any Turk of their rank would come to the place of combat to redeem them, he should have his also upon the like conditions, if he could win it.' The defiance was accepted. This time the Turk, having the choice of weapons, chose battle-axes, and pressed Smith so hard that his axe flew from his hand, whereat loud cheers arose from the ramparts ; but with a quick movement of his horse he dodged his enemy's next blow, and drawing his sword gave him a fearless thrust in the side which settled the affair; in another moment Smith had his head. At a later time, after Prince Sigisrnund had heard of these exploits, he granted to Smith a coat-of-arms with three Turk's heads in a shield." 1
At a battle fought in 1602 Smith was taken prisoner by the Turks and sold into slavery. After enduring many hardships he escaped by killing his master and made his way to Russia. From there he went to Leipsic,
1 See Fiske's " Old Virginia and Her Neighbors," pp. 86-88.
72 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
where he found Prince Sigismund. After travelling for some time on the continent he returned to England.
At the time of Smith's return to London, the Lon don Company had just fitted out an expedition to plant a colony in Virginia. There were three ships, with Captain Christopher Newport in command. Smith had talked with Newport, Gosnold, and other captains who had visited America, and his love of adventure and strong geographical curiosity urged him to join this company. The three ships sailed on New Year's Day with 105 colonists on board. The names of the per sons appointed by the London Company to the colonial council were carried in a sealed box, not to be opened until the little squadron reached the end of its journey. The voyage was a long one, as they first went down to the Canary Islands and followed Columbus' s route across to the West Indies. In the year 1602 Gosnold, who was second in command, had crossed directly from the English Channel to Cape Cod and it seems strange that this shorter route was not tried again. The stock of provisions was sadly diminished before the journey was ended.
Some trouble arose between Smith and Wingfield, one of the colonists. Smith was accused of plotting mutiny and was kept in irons more than a month until the ships reached Virginia. After leaving the West Indies
JOHN SMITH 73
they lost their reckoning, but on the 26th of April they reached the cape which they named Henry, after the Prince of Wales, as the cape opposite was after ward named for his younger brother, Charles. A few of the company went on shore, " where they were at once attacked by Indians, and two were badly injured by arrows. That evening the sealed box was 'opened, and it was found that Bartholomew Gosnold, Edward Wingfield, John Smith, John Ratcliffe, John Martin, and George Kendall were appointed members of the council, — six in all, of whom the president was to have two votes." *
As the ships sailed into the quiet waters of Hamp ton Roads, leaving the stormy weather they had en countered, they named the promontory at the entrance, Point Comfort. Then they entered the broad river which they named James, in honor of their king. They sailed along the banks until they found a spot which seemed suited for a settlement and there they landed on the 13th of May. As soon as the company had landed, all the members of the council, except Smith, were sworn into office and then they chose Wingfield president for one year. On the next day the men went to work building their fort. They called it Fort James, but soon the settlement came to be
1 Fiske's " Old Virginia and Her Neighbors."
74
PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
known as Jamestown. There was some dispute about the site and the one selected was just what they had been told to avoid. In their letter of instructions they were warned not to select a place that was low and damp, as it was likely to prove unhealthful. At high tide the waters half covered the little peninsula upon
which the fort was built, but the narrow neck was easy to guard and that, perhaps, decided the choice of the place.
Smith was no longer a prisoner but his enemies would not admit him to the council. Newport was to explore the river and Smith, with four other gentlemen, four skilled mariners, and fourteen common sailors, went with him. They sailed up about as far as the present site of Richmond, fre quently meeting parties of Indians on the banks and passing Indian villages. Newport was always kind and wise in his deal ings with the Indians, and they seemed quite friendly. These Indians were Algonquins, of the tribe called Pow- hatans. After a few days the exploring party reached a village called Powhatan, consisting of about a dozen houses
MAP OF VIRGINIA
JOHN SMITH 75
"pleasantly seated on a hill." These were large clan houses with framework of beams and covering of bark, much like the long houses of the Iroquois. The Pow- hatans seemed to be the leading tribe of the neighbor hood. Their principal village was oil the York River about fifteen miles from Jamestown and the chief who lived there was called the Powhatan.
When Newport and Smith returned to Jamestown, they found that it had been attacked by a force of two hundred Indians. They had been driven off but one English man had been killed and eleven wounded. In the course of the next two weeks these enemies were very annoying. They would hide in the grass about the fort and try to pick off men with their barbed, stone-tipped arrows. Some of their new acquaintances from the Powhatan tribe came to visit them and told Newport that the Indians who- had attacked Jamestown belonged to a hostile tribe against which they would willingly form an alliance. They ad vised the English to cut the grass around the fort, which seems to prove that they were sincere in what they said.
Smith now demanded a trial. Though Wingfield ob jected, a jury was granted and he was acquitted of all the charges against him. Then he was allowed to take his place in the council. Newport soon after sailed for England with a cargo of sassafras, and fine wood for wainscoting. He promised to be back in Virginia within twenty weeks.
76 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
but all the food he could leave in the fort was reckoned to be scarcely enough for fifteen weeks, so that the company were put upon short rations. One hundred and five people were left in Jamestown. A record given at the tinnj sa^s that besides the six councillors, the clergyman, and the sur geon, there were twenty-nine gentlemen, six carpenters, one mason, two bricklayers, one blacksmith, one sailor, one drummer, one tailor, one barber, twelve laborers, and four boys " with 38 whom he neither names nor classifies but simply mentions as ' divers others.' ' The food left for this company was not appetizing. After the ship was gone, says one of the number, " there remained neither tavern, beer-house, nor place of relief but the com mon kettle ; . . . and that was half a pint of wheat and as much barley, boiled with water, for a man a day; and this, having fried some 26 weeks in the ships hold, contained as many worms as grains. . . . Our (only) drink was water. . . . Had we been as free from all sins as gluttony and drunkenness, we might have been canon ized for saints." It seems they found but little game, though some caught crabs and sturgeon in the river. The poor diet, the great heat of an American summer, and the unaccustomed work, soon added sickness to their suffer ings. Before the end of September more than fifty of the company were dead. One of the survivors of this dread ful time writes : " There were neuer Englishmen left in a
JOHN SMITH 77
forreigne Countrey in such, miserie as wee were in this new discouered Virginia. Wee watched euery three nights, lying on the bare . . . ground, what weather so- euer came ; (and) warded all the next day ; which brought our men to bee most feeble wretches. Our food was but a small Can of Barlie sodden in water to fiue men a day. Our drink cold water taken out of the River ; which was at a floud verie salt : at a low tide full of slime and filth; which was the destruction of many of ovr men. Thus we lived for the space of fiue months in this miserable dis- tresse, not hauing fiue able men to man our Bulwarkes upon any occasion. If it had not pleased God to haue put a terrour in the Sauages hearts, we had all perished by those wild and cruell Pagans, being in that weake estate as we were ; our men night and day groaning in every corner of the Fort most pittiful to heai^e. If there were any conscience in men, it would make their harts to bleed to heare the pitifull murmurings and outcries of our sick men without reliefe, euery night and day for the space of sixe weekes : some departing out of the World, many times three or foure in a night; in the morning their bodies be ing trailed out of their Cabines like Dogges, to be buried. In this sort did I see the mortalitie of diuers of our people." x
Captain Gosnold died of the fever. After his death
1 Fiske's "Old Virginia and Her Neighbors.'
78 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
the quarrel between Smith and Wingfield was renewed. " To control the rations of so many hungry men was no easy matter. It was charged against Wingfield that he kept back sundry dainties, and especially some wine and spirits for himself and a few favored friends; but his quite plausible defence is that he reserved two gallons of sack for the communion table and a few bottles of brandy for extreme emergencies, but the other members of the council, whose flasks were all empt}^ did long for to sup up that little remnant." It was also said that he intended to take one of the small vessels remaining in the river and abandon the colony. He was later required to pay Smith heavy damages for defaming his character. He was finally deposed and John Ratclift'e was elected in his place.
During these troubled times Smith's activity in trading with the Indians for corn helped the colony greatly. In the autumn so many wild-fowl were shot that the diet was greatly improved. In December Smith started on a trip for exploration up the Chickahominy River. He went as far as his shallop would go, then leaving it with seven men to guard it he went on in a canoe with only two white men and two Indian guides. After going some distance this little party was attacked by two hundred Indians, led by a brother of Powhatan. Smith's two com rades were killed and he was captured, but not until he
JOHN SMITH 79
had slain two Indians with his pistol. " It was quite like the quick-witted man to take out his ivory pocket com pass, and to entertain the childish minds of the barbarians with its quivering needle which they could plainly see through the glass, but, strange to say, could not feel when they tried to touch it. Very like him it was to improve the occasion with a brief discourse on star craft, eked out no doubt with abundant gesticulation, which may have led his hearers to regard him as a wizard." They did not seem to agree as to what they should do with him. He was tied to a tree and a cruel death seemed to await him, when the chief held up the compass. Then the captive was untied and the Indians marched away through the forest, taking him with them.
After some time spent in wandering from place to place, he was brought before the Powhatan, who received him in his long wigwam. " The elderly chieftain sat before the fireplace, on a kind of bench, and was covered with a robe of raccoon skins, all with the tails on and hanging like ornamental tassels. Beside him sat his young squaws, a row of women with their faces and bare shoulders painted bright red and chains of white shell beads about their necks stood around by the walls, and in front of them stood the grim warriors." Smith, in his account of what followed, says the Indians departed together and presently two big stones were placed before
80
PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
the chief and Smith was dragged hither and his head laid upon them ; but even while warriors were standing.
Kiny Powhatan cemandr C.'Smitfi to b is life hi and htnv he Subiecltd fyefthtir fen#
This picture was drawn by an artist from Captain Smith's own description.
with clubs in hand, to beat his brains out, the chief's young daughter, Pocahontas, rushed up and embraced
JOHN SMITH 81
him and laid her head upon his to shield him, whereupon her father spared his life.1 "Two days afterward the Powhatan ' having disguised him self e in the most fearfullest manner he could/ caused Captain Smith to be brought forth to a great house in the woods, and there upon a mat by the fire be left alone. Not long after from behind a mat that divided the house was made 6 the most dolefullest noyse he ever heard.' Then the old chieftain, looking more like the devil than a man, came to Smith and told him that now they were friends and he might go back to Jamestown ; then if he would send to the Powhatan a couple of cannon and a grindstone, he should have in exchange a piece of land in the neighborhood, and that chief would evermore esteem him as his own son." The next time Smith visited the Powhatan he was called by this chief a " werowance," or chief of the tribe. The Powhatan also ordered "that all his subjects should so esteem us, and no man account us strangers . . . but Powhatans, and that the corn, women, and country should be to us as to his own people."
On the very day that Smith returned to Jamestown, Captain Newport arrived with 120 colonists. There were only 38 men who had survived the hardships at James town. The supply of food brought by the ships was not enough for so many people, so Smith took his " Father
1 See Fiske's " Old Virginia and Her Neighbors," pp. 102-111.
82 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
Newport " to visit the Powhatan. With blue glass beads they bought a large quantity of corn. In the spring Newport sailed for England again and Wingfield went with him. In the summer of 1608 Smith made two voyages of exploration up the Chesapeake Bay and into the Potomac, Patapsco, and Susquehanna rivers. He met some Iroquois warriors and found them carrying a few French hatchets which had evidently come from Canada. Daring his absence there was trouble at James town and Ratcliffe was deposed. On Smith's return, in September, he was at once chosen president. Only 28 were lost this year, and when Newport arrived in Sep tember with 70 more persons, the colony numbered 200. There were two women in this company.
The London Company was getting impatient with the great expense and small return from the colony, and had told Newport " that he must find either the way to the South Sea, or a lump of gold, or one of White's lost colonists, or else he need not come back and show his face in England." When Smith heard these instructions he "bluntly declared that the London Company were fools, which seems to have shocked the decorous mariner/' Newport was also ordered to crown their "new ally, the mighty Emperor Powhatan. Newport and Smith did it, and much mirth it must have afforded them. The chief refused to come to Jamestown, so Mahomet had to
JOHN SMITH
83
go to the mountain. Up in the long wigwam the two Englishmen divested the old fellow of his raccoon skin garment and put on him a scarlet robe which greatly pleased him. Then they tried to force him down upon
CROWNING THE CHIEF OF THE POWHATANS
his knees — which he did not like at all — while they put the crown on his head. When the operation was safely snded, the forest-monarch grunted acquiescence, and handed to Newport his old raccoon skin cloak as a present For his royal brother in England."
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Newport was not able to find a nugget of gold or an 31 traces of Eleanor Dare and her friends. The Indians told him that there were mountains westward and that it would be useless to look for a salt sea there. New port tried, however, and came back tired out before he reached the Blue Ridge. Of these adventures one of the colonists says : " Now was there no way to make us miserable but to neglect that time to make our provision whilst it was to be had ; the which was done to perfourme this strange discovery, but more strange coronation. To lose that time, spend that victuall we had, tire and strane our men, having no means to carry victuall, mu nition, the hurt or si eke, but their own backes : how or by whom they were invented I know not ... as for the coronation of Powhatan and his presents of bason, ewer, bed, clothes, and such costly nouelties ; they had bin much better well spared than so ill spent; for we had his favour much better onlie for a poore peece of copper, till this stately kinde of soliciting made him so much overvalue himselfe, that he respected us as much as nothing at all."
Newport returned to England and took with him Ratcliffe, the deposed president, thus ridding the colony of a man of doubtful character. It is said his real name was Sickelmore and that he had taken the other name to conceal his past. With Newport, Smith sent
JOHN SMITH 85
his new map of Virginia, showing the country he had discovered and explored. This was "a map of remark able accuracy and witness to an amount of original labor that is marvellous to think of. ... None but a man of heroic mould could have done the geographical work involved in making it.
"With the map Smith sent what he naively calls his ' Rude Answer ' to the London Company, a paper bristling with common sense and not timid when it comes to calling a spade a spade."
It was thought in England that Virginia would bring much wealth to the mother country. In a play per formed on the stage in 1605 one of the characters asks of Virginia, " But is there much treasure there, Cap tain, as I have heard ? " and the answer is : "I tell thee, gold is more plentiful there than copper is with us; and for as much red copper as I can bring I'll have thrice the weight in gold. Why, man, all their dripping-pans are pure gold, and all the chains with which they chain up their streets are massy gold, all the prisoners they take are fettered in gold ; and for rubies and diamonds they go forth on holidays and gather 'em by the seashore to hang on their children's coats, and stick in their children's caps."
It was in search of gold that so many gentlemen came to this new country. Then to care for it there
86 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
were two goldsmiths, two refiners, and one jeweller brought over with the first supply. At this time some one discovered a bank of bright yellow dirt which was thought to contain gold. Then "there was no thought, no discourse, no hope, and no work but to dig gold, wash gold, refine gold, and load gold." On his return "Newport carried a shipload of the yellow stuff to London, and found, to his chagrin, that all is not gold that glitters. On that same voyage he carried home a coop of plump turkeys, the first that ever graced an English bill of fare."
Smith soon gave up the search for gold and turned his thoughts to other industries. Valuable timber was cut and the making of tar and soap was tried ; also the manufacture of glass. These efforts were not very successful. The London Company was not satisfied with a few shiploads of rough boards and sassafras where they had expected gold and jewels. Then Wingfield and other enemies of Smith had criticised his manage ment of the colony before the London Company. When the instructions brought by Newport with the second supply were read, something said therein made Smith angry and provoked the "Rude Answer" with which he tries to defend himself. Of the quarrels among the colonists he says : " For our factions, unless you would have me run away and leave the country, I cannot pre-
JOHN SMITH 87
vent them. ... I do make many stay that would els fly any whither." Of the tasks asked of Captain Newport he says : " Expressly to follow your directions by Cap tain Newport, though they be performed, I was directly against it ; but according to our Commission, I was content to be ruled by the major part of the council > I fear to the hazard of us all ; which is now generally- confessed when it is too late. . . . For him (Newport) at that time to find the South Sea, a mine of gold, or any of them sent by Sir Walter Raleigh, I told them was as likely as the rest. But during this great voyage of discovery of thirty miles (which might as well have been done by one man, and much more, for the value of a pound of copper at a seasonable time) they had the pinnace and all the boats with them (save) one that re mained with me to serve the fort.
"In their absence I followed the new begun works of pitch and tar, glass, soap ashes and clapboard; whereof some small quantities we have sent you.
"For the coronation of Powhatan, by whose advice you sent him such presents I know not; but this, give me leave to tell you, I fear will be the confusion of us all ere we hear from you again. At your ship's arrival the salvage's harvest was newly gathered and we going to buy it ; our own not being half sufficient for so great a number. As for the two (ship-loads) of corn New-
88 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
port promised to provide us from Powhatan, he brought us but 14 bushels. From your ship we had not provi sion or victuals worth £20, and we are more than 200 to live upon this ; the one half sick, the other little better. Oar diet is a little meal and water, and not sufficient of that. Though there be fish in the sea, fowls in the air, and beasts in the woods, their bounds are so large, they so wild, and we so weak and ignorant that we cannot much trouble them.
" When you send again, I entreat you send but 30 carpenters, husbandmen, gardeners, fishermen, black smiths, masons, and diggers up of trees' roots, well pro vided (rather) than 1000 of such as we have ; for except we be able both to lodge them and feed them, the most will consume with want of necessaries before they can be made good for anything."
That Smith had labored with some of the gentlemen with some success is shown by the testimony of Amos Todkill, one of the first company of settlers. He tells how Smith conducted a party of thirty of them five miles from the fort "to learn to ... cut down trees and make clapboard." Two lately arrived gallants were among the number, "both proper gentlemen. Strange were these pleasures to their conditions; yet lodging, eating and drinking, working or playing, they (were) but doing as the President did himselfe. All these
JOHN SMITH 89
things were carried on so pleasantly as within a week they became masters ; making it their delight to heare the trees thunder as they fell ; but the axes so oft blis tered their tender fingers that many times every third blow had a loud othe to drowne the eccho; for remedie of which sinne, the President devised how to have every man's othes numbred, and at night for every othe to have a cann of water powred downe his sleeue, with which every offender was so washed (himself e and all) that a man should scarce hear an othe in a weeke.
' For he who scorns and makes but jests of cursings and his othe He doth contemne, not man but God, nor man, but both/
" By this let no man thinke that the President and these gentlemen spent their time as common wood hackers at felling of trees, or such other like labours; or that they were pressed to it as hirelings or common slaves; for what they did, after they were but once inured, it seemed and some conceited it only as a pleasure and recreation : ... 30 or 40 of such voluntary gentlemen would doe more in a day than 100 of the rest that must be prest to it by compulsion." Then he adds, "twenty good workmen had been better than them all."
After Newport was gone, the thing that Captain Smith had feared came to pass. The Indians refused to furnish them with corn. During the past winter Pocahontas
yU PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
had often visited the colony, bringing presents of corn and game, and had thus helped to keep off famine. But the Indians were growing jealous of the increasing num bers of the settlers and wished to get rid of them. When Smith first visited the Powhatan, he had been asked why the English had come to this part of the world. Smith did not think it safe to say that they had come to stay, so he invented a story of their being defeated by the Spaniards and driven ashore. As their boat was leaky, Father Newport had left them while he went away to get it mended. Now Father Newport had come twice and had brought many more children than he had taken away. There were now two hundred men at Jamestown. " Every painted and feathered warrior knew that these pale children were not good farmers, and that their lives depended upon a supply of corn. By withholding this necessary of life, how easy it might be to rid the land of their presence." 1
As winter came on and the Indians refused to sell their corn, the condition of the colonists became serious. Smith decided that if the Indians would not trade of their own free will, they must be made to trade. The Pow- hatan had asked for help on a house he was building and Smith sent him fourteen men. He soon followed with twenty-seven men in the pinnace and barge. When
1 Fiske's " Old Virginia and Her Neighbors."
JOHN SMITH 91
they stopped the first night, a chieftain told them to be ware of the treachery of the Powhatan, who intended to kill them. " Captain Smith thanked the red-skin for his good counsel, assured him of his undying affec tion, and went on down the river to Hampton." Here he was kindly welcomed by a small tribe of Indians numbering about twenty warriors. A storm of snow and sleet lasting about a week, from December 30, 1608, to January 6, 1609, made the party stay in the well- warmed wigwams of their friends. They were well fed with oysters, fish, venison, and wild-fowl. When they continued their journey and came near the York River, the Indians seemed less friendly. When they reached the village of the Powhatan, "the river was frozen for nearly half a mile from shore, but Smith rammed and broke the ice with his barge until he had pushed up to a place where it was thick enough to walk safely." The barge was sent back to the pinnace to bring the rest of the party. When all were landed, they took possession of the first house they came to and sent to the Powhatan for food. He sent them venison, turkeys, and corn bread.
The next day the chief visited them and asked them how long they meant to stay. He said he had not asked the English to come to see him and he had no corn for them. He knew, however, where he could get forty
92 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SKA
baskets of it, if they would give a sword for each basket. Smith pointed to the new house already begun and to the men he had sent to build it. " Powhatan," he said, " I am surprised to hear you say that you have not invited us hither; you must have a short memory." This answer made the old chieftain laugh, but he in sisted that he would sell his corn for swords and guns, but not for copper. He could eat corn but not copper. Then Captain Smith said : " Powhatan, to testify my love I sent you my men for your building, neglecting mine own. Now you think by consuming the time we shall consume for want, not having wherewith to fulfil your strange demands. As for swords and guns, I told you long ago I had none to spare. You must know that the weapons I have can keep me from want, yet steal or wrong you I will not, nor dissolve that friendship we have mutually promised, except you constrain me by bad usage."
The Powhatan, understanding the threat, quickly said that he would soon let the English have all the corn he could spare. Then he said, " I have some doubt, Cap tain Smith, about your coining hither, which makes me not so kindly seek to relieve you as I would. For many do inform me that your coming hither is not for trade but to invade my people and possess my country. They dare not come to bring you corn, seeing you thus armed
JOHN SMITH 93
with your men. To free us of this fear, leave your weapons aboard the ship, for here they are needless, we being all friends, and forever Powhatans."
" With many such discourses," says the chronicle, " did they spend the day ; and on the morrow the parley was renewed." Again and again the old chief insisted that be fore the corn could be brought, the visitors must leave their arms on shipboard ; but Smith was not so blind as to walk into such a trap. He said, " Powhatan, the vow I made you of my love, both myself and my men have kept. As for your promise, I find it every day violated by some of your subjects ; yet for your sake only we have curbed our thirsting desire for revenge ; else had they known as well the cruelty we use to our enemies as our true love and courtesy to our friends. And I think your judgment sufficient to conceive — as well by the adven tures we have undertaken as by the advantage we have in our arms over yours — that had we intended you any hurt, we could long ere this have effected it. Your peo ple coming to Jamestown are entertained with their bows and arrows, without any exceptions; we esteeming it with you as it is with us, to wear our arms as our apparel. As for your hiding your provisions ... we shall not so unadvisedly starve as you conclude ; your friendly care in that behalf is needless, for we have ways of finding food that are quite beyond your knowledge."
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The hint that the white men could get along without his corn had its effect upon the Powhatan. Baskets filled with corn were brought, but before they were given to Smith the chief said : " Captain Smith, I never used any chief so kindly as yourself, yet from you I receive the least kindness of any. Captain Newport gave me swords, copper, clothes, a bed, towels, or whatever I desired ; ever taking what I offered him, and would send away his guns when I entreated him. None doth refuse to do what I desire but only you; of whom I can have nothing but what you regard not, and yet you will have whatsoever you demand. You call me father, but I see you will do what you list. But if you intend so friendly as you say, send hence your arms that I may believe you."
Smith felt sure that this whimpering speech was merely the cover for a meditated attack. Of his thirty-eight Englishmen but eighteen were with him at the moment. He sent a messenger to his vessels, ordering all save a guard of three or four men to come ashore, and he set some Indians to work breaking the ice, so that the barge could be forced up near to the bank. For a little while Captain Smith and John Russell were left alone in a house with the Powhatan and a few squaws, when all at once the old chief slipped out and disappeared from view. While -Smith was talking with the women a crowd of armed warriors surrounded the house, but instantly Smith
JOHN SMITH 95
and Russell sprang forth and with drawn swords charged upon them so furiously that they all turned and fled, tumbling over one another in their headlong terror.
Now the English felt sure of a plot against them, but the Indians " to the uttermost of their skill sought ex cuses to dissemble the matter ; and Powhatan, to excuse his flight and the sudden coming of this multitude, sent our Captain a great bracelet and a chain of pearl, by an ancient orator that bespoke us to this purpose ; perceiving even then from our pinnace, a barge and men departing and coming unto us : Captain Smith, our chief is fled ; fearing your guns, and knowing when the ice was broken there would come more men, sent these numbers but to guard his corn from stealing, which might happen with out your knowledge. Now, though some be hurt by your misprision, yet the Powhatan is your friend, and so will ever continue. Now since the ice is open he would have you send away your corn, and if you would have his com pany send away also your guns." Captain Smith did not send away his guns, and "never set eyes on his Father Powhatan again. With faces frowning, guns were loaded and cocked, the Englishmen stood by while a file of Indians with baskets on their backs carried down the corn and loaded it into the barge." l
The Englishmen would have departed at once, but the
1 Fiske's " Old Virginia and Her Neighbors."
96
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tide had left their boat stranded and they must wait foi high water. They decided to pass the night in the house where they were already quartered as it was some dis tance from the village, and they sent word to the Powha- tan to send them some supper. Here Pocahontas, that
"dearest jewel, in that dark night came through the irk some woods, and told our Captain great cheer should be sent us by and by, but Powhatan and all the power he could make would after come kill us all, if indeed they that brought it did not kill us when we were at supper. Therefore, if we would live she wished us presently to be gone. Such things as she delighted in we would have given her ; but with the tears running down her cheeks she said she durst not be seen to have any, for if Powhatan should know it she were but dead ; and so she ran away by herself as she came." 1
Soon eight or ten Indians came with venison and other dainties " and begged the English to put out the matches
1 Fiske's " Old Virginia and Her Neighbors."
POCAHONTAS
JOHN SMITH 97
of their matchlocks, for the smell of the smoke made them sick." Smith sent them back to the Powhatan with the message, " If he is coming to visit me to-night let him make haste, for I am ready to receive him." The Powhatan did not come. A few scouts prowled about, but the English kept guard till high tide and then sailed away.
The courage and tact of Smith had preserved peace between the Powhatan and the English, and his fear lessness and quick action helped them in another ad venture on the way home. When they arrived at his village, the brother of the Powhatan, chief of the Pamunkeys, received them pleasantly, but soon they were surrounded by a great crowd of armed warriors. It did not seem best to fire upon the crowd, as Smith was anxious to avoid bloodshed. Smith, with three men, rushed into the chieftain's house, " seized him by the long scalp-lock, dragged him before the astonished multitude, and held a pistol to his breast." This so frightened the Indians that they hurriedly brought out their corn, and the vessels made their way back to Jamestown " loaded with some 300 bushels of it, besides a couple of hundred-weight of venison and deer suet. In itself it was but a trifle of a. pound of meat and a bushel and a half of grain for each person in the col ony But the chief result was the profound impression
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made upon the Indians/' It seems that they decided that such brave men were better as friends than as enemies.
Now that the fear of the Indians was past, Captain Smith had time to look after affairs at Jamestown. Things there were in a bad state. The chief difficulty lay in the fact that the colony had been begun on a communistic plan, that is, everything was owned in common. Each man worked not for himself and family but for the whole community. Whatever he got in hunting or fishing, or trading with the Indians,. was for all and not for himself. The idle and lazy fared as well as the hardest worker, and so easy was it to live without work that the time came when some thirty or forty people were supporting the whole colony of two hundred. Then Smith " applied the strong hand." He called them together one day and told them that as their lawfully chosen ruler he had a right to punish those that would not obey his laws, and they must all understand that hereafter he that will not work shall not eat. The rule was enforced and for a while the colony prospered. " By the end of April twenty houses had been built, a well of pure sweet water had been dug in the fort, thirty acres or more of ground had been broken up and planted, and nets and weirs ar ranged for fishing. A few hogs and fowl had been left
JOHN SMITH 99
by Newport, and now could be heard the squeals of sixty pigs and the peeping of five hundred spring chickens. The manufacture of tar and soap-ashes went on, and a new fortress was begun in an easily defensi ble position, upon a commanding hill."
But a new trouble arose. Rats, brought over from time to time by the ships, had increased rapidly and made such havoc in the granaries that little corn was left. It was not a long time before harvest and work were stopped while everybody searched for food. The Ind ians were friendly and traded what they could spare, but that was not much. By midsummer the settlers were scattered, some among the Indians, some were picking berries in the woods, and others down at Point Comfort fishing. It was the fishermen " that were the first to hail the bark of young Samuel Argall, who was coming for sturgeon and whatever else he could find, and had steered a straighter course from London than any mariner before him." Argall brought letters from the company complaining that the goods sent home in the ships were not of greater value, and saying that Smith had been accused of dealing harshly with the Indians. He also brought news that a great expedi tion, commanded by Lord Delaware, was about to sail for Virginia.
Part of the new expedition reached Virginia in
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/
August, and unfortunately the mischief-maker, Ratcliffe, was with them. He instantly called upon Smith to abdicate and some of the newcomers supported him. But the old settlers were loyal to Smith, and there was much confusion until the latter arrested Ratcliffe as a disturber of the peace. The newcomers were, as Smith says, " unruly gallants, packed thither by their friends to escape ill destinies." They were sure to make trouble but for a while Smith held them in check. He decided to find a better site for a colony than the low marshy Jamestown. In September he sailed up to the Indian village of Powhatan and bought of the natives a tract of land near the present site of Richmond. This was a range of hills that could be easily defended, with so fair a landscape that Smith called the place Nonesuch. On his way back to James town a bag of gunpowder in his boat exploded and wounded him so badly that he was obliged to go to England in the ship that sailed in October, for surgical aid.
The winter after Smith left the colony was one of great suffering to the settlers and is known as "the starving time." Of the 490 persons in the colony in October, only 60 lived through the winter. One of these survivors wrote of Smith : " What shall I say ? but thus we lost him that in all his proceedings made
JOHN SMITH 101
justice his first guide and experience his second; ever hating baseness, sloth, pride, and indignity more than any dangers; that never allowed more for himself than his soldiers with him ; that upon no danger would send them where he would not lead himself; that would never see us want what he either had, or could by any means get us ; that loved actions more than words, and hated falsehood and covetousness worse than death; whose adventures were our lives, and whose loss our deaths."
In 1614 Smith again visited America, being sent out by the Plymouth Company to explore the coast given to it. He sailed from Penobscot Bay to Cape Cod and made an excellent map of the coast. He called the country New England, the name by which it has been known ever since. The next year Smith started on another expedition but was captured by a French squadron and taken to France. He was again in Eng land when Pocahontas, who had married an English man named John Rolfe, made her visit at court. She was received as a princess, for the English in London still thought of her father as a mighty sovereign. Smith was making preparations for another voyage to New England when he heard of Pocahontas's arrival and called on her. When he called her Lady Rebekah. as all did in England, "she seemed hurt and turned
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away, covering her face with her hands. She insisted upon calling him Father and having him call her his child, as formerly in the wilderness. Then she added, 6 They did always tell us you were dead, and I knew not otherwise till I came to Plymouth."
The remaining sixteen years of Smith's life were spent in England writing books, publishing maps, and encour aging emigration to the New World. He was only thirty- seven when his adventures ended with his capture by the French while on his way to start a colony in New Eng land, but he lived until 1631, — long enough to know that a successful settlement had been made in New England and that Virginia was prospering.
CHAPTER V
POPHAM'S SETTLEMENT
IN 1605 an English noble became so much interested in the reports of the fine country about Cape Cod which Gosnold had before visited, that he fitted out a ship with Captain Weymouth to visit and examine the country still further. Captain Weymouth came in sight of Cape Cod and was driven by the winds northward, where he entered the broad mouth of a noble river, the Kennebec. He and his companions were delighted with the forest- covered hills and wide river mouths, where hundreds of great ships might safely anchor. They found the coast waters swarming with excellent fish, of which they caught cod four and five feet long. Noble forests clothed the hillsides, from which lumber for building and for ships could be had. Game on land was plentiful; the springs and brooks coining from the valleys were delightful.
They made special efforts to win the friendship of the Indians and to excite their wonder and respect for white men. Weymouth had been authorized to capture and bring back with him to England some of these natives,
103
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But they were so timid and suspicious that at first he could not entice them into his ship. But he finally suc ceeded in kidnapping five of the Indians and, getting them on board, sailed for home.
On his return to England with his captive Indians, Captain Weymouth gave a glowing description of the Kennebec as a place for planting a colony. The broad mouth of the river leading up into a well-wooded country, where beaver skins and other furs could be purchased of the Indians for trifles, seemed to offer a great tempta tion to settlers. The abundance and variety of fishing along the coast, the good harbors, and the prospect for raising plenty of vegetables and maize also gave much encouragement. In the summer-time, especially, the coun try was beautiful, and with the boundless resources of land and sea, and with friendly natives, the success of a settlement seemed certain.
At any rate Weymouth' s reports awakened much interest in England, and the next year the Plymouth Company, under the leadership of Sir John Popham, who was chief justice of England, sent out a colony of 120 persons to settle at the mouth of the Kennebec. On the last of July they got sight of the coast of Maine, and the two ships, the Mary and John and the Gift of Gfod, sailed along the coast till they reached the mouth of the Kennebec. The Indians became friendly when they saw
POPHAM S SETTLEMENT
105
with the whites one of the Indians whom Weymouth had carried off.
On Sunday the colonists landed upon an island at the mouth of the Kennebec and held a religious service, the first upon the shores of New England.
After exploring the coast until the middle of August, they returned to the mouth of the Kennebe^ and landed
A NEW ENGLAND BLOCK HOUSE
at a place near the island of Sequin. Here the designs of the Company were explained to the settlers and soon all were actively at work carrying out these plans. Among the first buildings constructed were a fort and a storehouse. Trees were cut down, a clearing was made ; the carpenters began to trim the logs and frame them into buildings. The surrounding forests furnished abun dant building materials and a large number of log cabins
106 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SKA
were built. Before the winter set in the colonists were so industrious that they had completed the fort and mounted twelve cannon upon its walls, built a storehouse and church, and finished about fifty cabins.
During the same time the ship-builders had put to gether a pinnace, or small sailing vessel supplied with oars, with which they could explore the coasts, inlets, and rivers. In the meantime Captain Gilbert was explor ing the neighboring coasts and getting acquainted with the surrounding country.
The Indians scarcely knew what to make of these white people. They were suspicious of them, yet very curious to watch and discover their plans. While they were in clined to be hostile, they had great respect for the guns and other weapons of the white men. The natives had only bows, arrows, and spears, to match the armor and guns of the whites. The latter were afraid to trust the Indians, and therefore had to carry about their heavy guns, and were burdened also with steel armor, sword, and head-dress. It was difficult, therefore, to move about quickly. Once in going up the river in a boat, Gilbert had a narrow escape from battling with the Indians. They suddenly threw his firebrand for lighting the guns into the river, threatened the whites with their arrows, and seized the ropes to draw the boat ashore. But the whites frightened the Indians by pointing their
POPHAM'S SETTLEMENT 107
guns at them as if to shoot and they ran off to the woods.
As the winter came on, it proved much more severe than they expected. Instead of the green foliage of summer, the bleak hills were covered with snow and in spite of their preparations they suffered many hardships. Some of the men fell sick. George Popham, the president, and others also of the colony died. The winter lasted longer than usual and before the warm days of spring returned many had grown homesick. This new land had not come up to their expectations.
In the spring a ship came laden with full supplies of food, arms, and tools, and all things needful for the colony. But it also brought the report that Lord Popham, the brother of George Popham and the chief supporter of the enterprise, was dead. Captain Gilbert, who since the death of George Popham had been leader of the colonists, heard that his own brother, whose estates he inherited, was dead and he was anxious to get back to England. There was no one left to lead a colony to success, and it was decided to abandon the attempt to found one and to return to England.
Upon their return home the colonists spread the report that the coasts of New England were too cold and severe for permanent settlement, and no attempt was made for several years to repeat the experiment.
CHAPTER VI
JOHN SMITH'S DESCRIPTION OF NEW ENGLAND*
IN the month of April, 1614, with two ships from London, of a few merchants, I chanced to arrive in New
England, a part of America, at the isle of Mohegan in 43 J° of northerly latitude. Our plan was there to take whales and make trial of a mine of gold and copper. If those failed, fish and furs were then our refuge. We found the whaling a costly affair. We saw many and spent much time chasing them, but could not kill any, besides they were not the kind that yield fins and oil. As for the gold mine, it was rather a device to get a voyage
1 Condensed and slightly modified from Captain Smith's own account.
108
JOHN SMITH'S DESCRIPTION OF NEW ENGLAND 109
started than any knowledge of such a mine. By our late arrival and long time spent after whales, we lost the best time for fishing and furs. Yet in July some fish were taken but not enough to pay our expenses.
While the sailors fished, myself, with eight or nine others of them that might best be spared, ranged the coast in a small boat. We got for trifles near eleven hun dred beaver skins, one hundred marten skins, and near as many others, and the most of them within the distance of twenty leagues.
We ranged the coast both east and west much farther, but eastward our goods were not much esteemed, they were so near the French, who offered them better; and right over against us on the mainland was a ship of Sir Francis Popham's that had much acquaintance there, having used only that port many years, and further west were two other French ships that had made there a great voyage for trade.
With these furs, oil, and fish, I returned to England in the Bark, where within six months after our departure we safe arrived back.
New England is that part of America in the Ocean Sea opposite to New Albion (California), discovered by the most memorable Sir Francis Drake in his voyage about the world. Now because I have been so oft asked such strange questions of the goodness and greatness of these
110
PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
spacious tracts of land, how they can be thus long im known or not possessed by the Spaniards, I entreat your pardons if I chance to be too plain or tedious in relating my knowledge for plain men's satisfaction. . . .
[J f\ ;:- cs_^sSc^f JBW
* A it »tL.? '^- Al.or.len
^', ^ \^
DunftfcgS
Schooler* hill Sandwichfe? Dartmouth^.
4
"
SMIXH'S MAP OF NEW ENGLAND
I have drawn a map (of the New England coast) from point to point, isle to isle, and harbor to harbor, with the
JOHN SMITH'S DESCRIPTION OF NEW ENGLAND 111
soundings, sands, rocks, and landmarks, as I passed close along the shore in a little boat, although there be many things to be observed which the haste of other affairs did cause me to omit. For being sent to get present prod ucts rather than knowledge by discoveries for any future good, I had not power to search as I would.
Thus you may see that of this two thousand -miles of coast (east coast of North America) more than half is yet unknown to any purpose ; no, not so much as the borders of the sea are yet certainly discovered. As for the good ness and true substance of the land, we are for the most part ignorant of them.
That part we call New England is betwixt the degrees 41 and 45, but that part here spoken of stretcheth from Penobscot to Cape Cod, 75 leagues by a right line from each other; within which bounds I have seen at least forty several habitations upon the sea coast, and sounded about 25 excellent good harbors, in many whereof there is anchorage for 500 sail of ships of any burden; in some of them, for 5000, and more than 200 isles over grown with good timber of divers sorts of wood.
For their fur trade and merchandize : to each of their habitations they have different towns and peoples belong ing, and by their relations and descriptions, more than twenty several habitations and rivers that stretch them selves far up into the country, even to the borders of
112 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
divers great lakes, where they kill and take most of their beavers and otters.
From Penobscot to Sagadahock this coast is all moun tains and isles of huge rocks, but overgrown with all sorts of excellent good woods for building houses, boats, barks, or ships ; with an incredible abundance of most sorts of fish, much fowl, and sundry sorts of good fruits for man's use.
Betwixt Sagadahock and Sawocatuck there are but two or three sandy bays but betwixt that and Cape Cod very many. Especially the coast of Massachusetts is so indif ferently mixed with high clayey or sandy cliffs in one place, and then tracts of large long ledges of divers sorts and quarries of stones, in other places so strongly divided with tinctured veins of divers colors : as free stone for building, slate for tiling, smooth stone to make furnaces and forges for glass or iron, and iron ore, sufficient con veniently to melt them. All which are so near adjoining to those other advantages I observed in these parts, that if the ore prove as good iron and steel in those parts as I know there is within the bounds of the country, I dare engage my head (having men skillful to work the sim ples there growing) to have all things belonging to the building and rigging of ships of any size and good mer chandize for freight, within a square of ten or fourteen leagues.
And surely by reason of those sandy cliffs and cliffs of
JOHN SMITH'S DESCRIPTION OP NEW ENGLAND 113
rocks, both which we saw so planted with gardens and corn fields, and so well inhabited with a goodly, strong, and well-proportioned people, besides the greatness of the timber growing on them, the greatness of the fish and the moderate temper of the air, who can but approve this a most excellent place both for health and fertility ? And of all the four parts of the world that I have yet seen not inhabited, could I have but means to transport a colony, I would rather live here than anywhere; and if it did not maintain itself, were we once indifferently well fitted out, let us starve.
The main staple from hence to be expected for the present^ to produce the rest, is fish, which however may seem a mean and base commodity ; yet whoever will take the pains and consider the sequel, I think will allow it well worth the labor.
Here is ground also as good as any that lyeth in the height of forty one, forty two, forty three degrees, etc., where is as fruitful land as between any parallels in the world.
Therefore, I conclude if the heart and entrails of those regions were sought, if their land were cultured, planted, and manured by men of industry, judgment, and experi ence, what hope is there or what need they doubt, having those advantages of the sea, that it might equal any of those famous kingdoms (in Europe) in all commodities,
114 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
pleasures, and conditions; seeing that even the very edges do afford us such plenty, that no ship need return away empty. If they will but use the season of the sea, fish will return an honest gain besides all other advan tages, her treasures having never yet been opened, nor her originals wasted, consumed, nor abused.
The ground is so fertile that questionless, it is capable of producing any grain, fruits, or seed you will sow or plant, but it may be not every kind to that perfection of delicacy, or some tender plants may miscarry, because the summer is not so hot, and the winter is more cold in those parts we have tried near the sea side, than we find in the same latitude in Europe and Asia. Yet I made a garden on the top of a rocky isle in 43±°, four leagues from the maine, in May, that grew so well as it served us for salads in June and July.
All sorts of cattle may here be bred and fed in the isles or peninsulas, securely for nothing. In the interim, till they increase, observing the seasons, I undertake to -have corn enough from the savages.
In March, April, May, and half of June here is cod in abundance, in May, June, July, and August, mullet and sturgeon, and surely there is an incredible abundance upon this coast. The mullets here are in that abundance you may take them with nets, sometimes by the hundreds. Much salmon some have found up the rivers as they have
JOHN SMITH'S DESCRIPTION OF NEW ENGLAND 115
passed and here the air is so temperate as all these at any time may well be preserved. Now young boys and girls, savages or any other, be they never such idlers, may turn, carry, and return fish, without either shame or any great pain. He is very idle that is past twelve years of age and cannot do so much and she is very old that cannot spin a thread to make nets to catch them.
Salt upon salt may assuredly be made. Then the ships may transport kine, horses, goats, coarse cloth and other goods as we want, against whose arrival may be made that provision of fish to freight the ships that they stay not.
Of the muskrat may be well raised gains well worth their labor that will endeavor to make trial of their goodness. Of beavers, otters, martens, black foxes and furs of price, may yearly be six or seven thousand and, if the trade of the French were prevented, many more.
Twenty five thousand this year (1614) were brought from those northern parts into France, of which trade we may have as good part as the French, if we take good courses.
Of mines of gold, silver, copper, and probabilities of lead, crystal and alum, I could say much if reports were good assurances. But I am no alchemist nor will promise more than I know.
But to return a little more to the particulars of this country — the most northern part I was at was the Bay
116 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
of Periobscot which is east and west, north and south, more than ten leagues. I found that this river ran far up into the land and was well inhabited with many people, but they were away from their habitations, either fishing among the isles or hunting the lakes and woods for deer and beavers. The bay is full of great islands of one, two, six, eight or ten miles in length, which divide it into many fair and excellent good harbors.
On the east of it are the Tarran tines, mortal enemies of those at Penobscot ; where inhabit the French, as they report, that live with those people as one nation or family, and northwest of Penobscot is Mecaddacut at the foot of a high mountain (a kind of fortress against the Tarrantines) adjoining to the high mountains of Penobscot, against whose feet doth beat the sea; but over all the lands, isles or other impediments you may well see them sixteen or eighteen leagues from their situation.
Up this river (at Sagadahock) where was the western plantation, are Anmuckcaugen, Kennebeck and divers others, where there are planted some corn-fields. Along this river forty or fifty miles I saw nothing but great high cliffs of barren rocks, overgrown with wood ; but where the savages dwelt, there the ground is exceeding fat and fertile.
Westward of this river is the country Ancosisco, in the
JOHN SMITH'S DESCRIPTION OF NEW ENGLAND 117
bottom of a large deep bay, full of many great isles which divide it into many good harbors.
But all this coast to Penobscot and as far as I could see eastward of it, is nothing but such high craggy, cliffy rocks and stony isles, that I wondered such great trees could grow upon so hard foundations. It is a country rather to affright than to delight one. And how to describe a more plain spectacle of desolation, or more barren, I know not. Yet the sea there is the strangest fish pond I ever saw ; and those barren isles, so furnished with good woods, springs, fruits, fish, arid fowl, that it makes me think, though the coast be rocky and affright- able, the valleys, plains, and interior parts may well be very fertile. But there is no kingdom so fertile that hath not some barren part ; and New England is great enough to make many kingdoms and countries were it all inhabited.
As you pass the coast still westward, Accominticus and Passataquach are two convenient harbors for small barks, and a good country within their craggy cliffs. Angoam is the next. This place might content a right curious judg ment ; but there are many sands at the entrance of the harbor and the worst is it is embayed too far from the deep sea. Here are many rising hills and on their tops and descents many corn-fields and delightful groves.
From thence (Naimkech) doth stretch into the sea the
118 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
fair headland of Tragabigzanda fronted with three isles called the Three Turks' Heads. To the north of this doth enter a great bay, where were found some habitations and corn-fields. They report a great river and at least thirty habitations. But because the French had got their trade, I had no leisure to discover it.
The isles of Mattahunts are on the west side of this bay, where are many isles and questionless good harbors, and then the country of the Massachusetts, which is the paradise of all those parts. For here are many isles all planted with corn, groves, mulberries, savages' gardens, and good harbors; the coast is for the most part high, clayey, sandy cliffs. The sea-coast as you pass shows you all along corn-fields and great troops of well-propor tioned people. But the French, having remained here near six weeks, left us no occasion to examine the number of people, the rivers, and other things.
We found the people in those parts very kind but in their fury no less valiant. For upon a quarrel we had with one of them, he, only with three others, crossed the harbor of Quanahassit to certain rocks whereby we must pass, and there let fly their arrows for our shot till we were out of danger.
Then came we to Acconmac, an excellent good harbor, good land, and no want of anything but industrious peo ple. After much kindness, upon a small occasion, we
JOHN SMITH'S DESCRIPTION OF NEW ENGLAND 119
fought also with forty or fifty of those ; though some were hurt and some slain, yet within an hour after they became friends.
Cape Cod is the next that presents itself, which is only a headland of high hills of sand, overgrown with shrubby pines, hurts, and such trash, but an excellent harbor for all weathers. This cape is made by the main sea on one side and a great bay on the other in the form of a sickle. On it doth inhabit the people of Paumet and in the bot tom of the bay the people of Chawum.
Toward the south and west of this cape is found a long and dangerous shoal of sands and rocks. But so far as I encircled it, I found thirty fathoms of water aboard the shore and a strong current, which makes me think there is a channel about this shoal ; where is the best and great est fish to be had winter and summer in all that country.
The herbs and fruits (of New England) are of many sorts : currants, mulberries, vines, plums, walnuts, chest nuts, small nuts, etc., pumpkins, gourds, strawberries, beans, peas, and maize ; a kind or two of flax wherewith they make nets, lines, and ropes.
There are eagles, many kinds of hawks, cranes, geese, brants, cormorants, ducks, sheldrakes, teals, gulls, turkeys, dive-droppers, and many other sorts whose names I know not; whales, grampus, porpoises, turbot, sturgeon, cod, hake, haddock, cole, shark, mackerel, eels, crabs, lobsters.
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mussels, oysters, and many others ; moose, a beast bigger than a stag, deer, red and fallow, beavers, wolves, foxes, wildcats, bears, otters, martens, and divers sorts of ver min whose names I know not.
All these and divers other good things do here for want of use increase and decrease. They grow to that abun dance that you shall scarce find any bay, shallow shore, or cove of sand, where you may not take many clams and lobsters, and in many places load your boat if you
—^
=m^ please; nor isles where you find not fruits, birds, or crabs, or mussels, or all of them, for the taking at low water. And in the harbors we frequented, a little boy might take, of cunners and pinacks and such delicate fish, at the ship's stern, more fish than six or ten men can eat in a day; but with the casting net thousands when we
INDIANS WISHING
JOHN SMITH'S DESCRIPTION OF NEW ENGLAND 121
pleased. And scarce any place but cod, cuske, halibut, mackerel, skate, or such like, a man may take with a hook or line what he will. And in divers sandy bays a man may draw with a net great store of mullets, bass, and other sorts of such excellent fish, as many as his net can draw on shore.
There is no river where there is not plenty of sturgeon, or salmon, or both, all of which are to be had in abun dance, observing but their seasons. But if a man will go at Christmas to gather cherries in Kent, he may be deceived, though there be plenty in summer. So here these plenties have each their seasons, as I have expressed.
CHAPTER VII
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS*
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS was born at Genoa about 1436. The family had been weavers. Columbus was probably sent to school till he was about fourteen, when he turned to the sea, and for many years made voyages in the Medi terranean, and later beyond that to England, and also south along the coast of Africa.
He became in time an expert geographer and map- maker, and, being also an experienced seaman, he made charts for sea-captains and merchants.
His native place, Genoa, in northwestern Italy, was an important port and shipping centre for Mediterranean countries, and Columbus often returned here between his voyages and probably employed his time, while at home, in map-making. A number of interesting stories are told of his adventures and shipwreck in these early voyages, but little is definitely known except that he became a thoroughly seasoned and expert sailor and sea-captain.
About the year 1470 he made his way to Lisbon, where his younger brother, Bartholomew, had gone before, as it
1 Authorities : Fiske's "Discovery of America" and Irving's "Life oi Columbus."
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CHBISTOtHEK COLUMBUS
128
had become a famous centre for navigators and sea-faring men. Under the guidance of Prince Henry of Portugal, the Portuguese had become greatly interested in explora tions along the west coast of Africa. It is probable that Columbus sailed as far as the equator on some of these voy ages, and he himself tells of one of his voy ages to England and beyond as far as Iceland.
At Lisbon, in 1473, Columbus married a beau-
tiful Portuguese COLUMBUS
lady, Philippa, whose father had been governor of Porto Santo, one of the Madeira Islands. Soon afterward Columbus and his wife went to live for a few years on this island. Philippa's father had left property there, including valuable charts, and it is believed that, while
124 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
dwelling upon this island, three hundred miles west of the coast of Africa, Columbus first formed the idea of sailing westward to the coast of India.
On account of their rich products the lands along the southern coast of Asia, known as India, were regarded by the people of Europe as the richest of all lands. It was supposed that any one who could find an easy way to India would gain boundless wealth. Before the time of Columbus the trade with India was carried on by ships to the Black Sea, where caravans carried goods from Bagdad and the Persian Gulf along the Tigris to Trebizond. Another caravan route was from the Tigris to Damascus and then to the Mediterranean at Tyre and Sidon. A third route was by way of Alexandria in Egypt, up the Nile and across to the Red Sea. By these 'different routes, there were brought from India, partly by water, partly by caravan, oil, fruits, gold and precious stones, beautiful silks and embroidered robes, spices and fine weapons. The trade in these valuable products centred in Venice and made that city very rich. But the cities along the overland route to northern Europe, like those of the Rhine and Danube, were made prosperous by this trade with the East. From Europe, cotton and woollen goods, toys, and other products were sent to India. When Columbus was a boy, the Turks conquered Constantinople and closed up the trade routes
2
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by way of the Black Sea and the Persian Gulf, and later they took possession of Egypt also and thus almost closed up thi§ way of reaching India.
Columbus believed that by sailing westward from Spain he would come to the islands of India. If such a route to the rich lands and cities of India could be found, it would be much shorter and easier than by way of the Mediterranean and by caravans across the deserts to India.
Columbus had many good reasons for thinking that the earth is spherical like a ball, so that India could be reached by going westward as well, and perhaps better than by going eastward. He had learned some things from his own observations as a sailor during thirty years and more. By watching ships disappear on the sea he had one proof. He had been almost to the equator on the south, and to Iceland in the north, and he had observed that the North Star and other stars toward the north appear higher in the heavens than farther south. Besides this, Columbus had read much in books of geography and astronomy and had found that many of the wisest writers believed the world to be shaped like a ball. In order to be still more surely convinced, he wrote a letter to Toscanelli, a famous astronomer of Florence, explaining his belief that he should find India by sailing west. Toscanelli, who
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS 127
was an old man of seventy-seven years, was much pleased with the letter and plans of a voyage, and not only en couraged Columbus to sail westward but drew a map of Spain, Africa, and the Atlantic Ocean, marking down the islands and showing how far he thought Columbus would need to sail before reaching India. This map Columbus kept and used on the voyage.
Columbus became thus firmly convinced that he could reach India by sailing westward across the Atlantic.
V
But he had no money with which to build ships and hire sailors for so dangerous a voyage. For some years he had been at Lisbon from time to time and had succeeded in getting an audience with King John II, in which he urged his plan upon the king. The king did not feel like deciding so difficult a question and called a council of geographers and learned men. They condemned Columbus's plan, thinking it a wild dream. Still the king was interested in the matter and called another council of the most learned men in the king dom. Some of the council approved of his plan, but others thought it too expensive or dangerous or im possible. King John allowed himself to treat Columbus very meanly. Having secured Columbus's charts and plans of the voyage, he secretly sent out a ship with a captain and crew to see whether they could not find the way to India and thus outwit Columbus. The expedi-
128 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
tion proceeded to the Cape Verde Islands and thence sailed westward. The captain and sailors had not gone far be fore they became frightened at the great waste of ocean around them, so they turned back and on their return to Lisbon ridiculed Columbus's plan. When this meanness and dishonesty came to the ears of Columbus, he was very indignant at the king. He left Portugal at once and set out for Spain, where he hoped for better treat ment from the king and queen.
In the autumn of 1484 Columbus was in Spain with his little son, Diego, whom he left with an aunt, his mother's sister, at Huelva, near Palos, on the south west coast of Spain. At this time Ferdinand and Isabella, king and queen of Spain, were carrying on a great war with the Moors, who were not Christians, trying to capture the old castle and city of Granada arid drive the Moors out of Spain into Africa. Then Ferdi nand and Isabella would rule over the whole of Spain and be free from the Mohammedan Moors.
The king and queen were so busy raising money and armies to carry on this war that Columbus, for some time, was unable to get a hearing. But the Spanish treasurer became interested in his ideas and in the fall of 1486 a council of learned men was called at the University of Salamanca, where much opposition to Columbus was shown. His idea that the earth is spheri-
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS 129
cal was ridiculed. Texts of scripture were brought up against him and some passages of ancient books were quoted to prove him in the wrong. Some of the priests and scholars, indeed, were strongly in favor of Columbus and adopted his views. But nothing was done to help him in his undertaking.
In the fall of 1488 Columbus made another visit to Lisbon to see his brother, Bartholomew, who had just returned from a great voyage with Diaz, in which they had explored southward along the coast of Africa till they came to the Cape of Good Hope and thus opened up the way to India by passing round Africa. Columbus now sent bis brother to England with maps and plans to secure the aid of King Henry. He was received and well treated by the king but was not given money or ships. Bartholo mew, therefore, set out for France to make another effort.
Columbus returned to Spain and joined the Spanish army fighting against the Moors, where he showed great valor as a soldier. Not receiving help from the king, he applied to one of the great nobles, the Duke of Medina- Sidonia, who refused to aid him. Then the Duke of Medina-Celi proved a strong friend, kept Columbus at his palace for two years, and proposed to fit out some vessels with which he could make his voyage. The queen refused to grant the duke the privilege but she herself failed to take up the matter, and Columbus, disgusted with long
130 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
waiting, resolved to shake off the dust of Spain from his feet and to go to France or England. He deserted the Spanish court, set out for Huelva to get his little son, Diego, who should go with him. As he and the boy were walking one afternoon along the road in sight of the ocean, a few miles from Palos, they stopped at a little monastery, La Rabida, to get food and drink. At this time Columbus was very much discouraged ; for many years he had labored with the kings of Portugal and Spain to secure help for his great plan, but now, after so many years of fruitless toil, he was about to leave Spain and start out for new and strange lands and kings to seek help. Little did he dream that in this little home of monks, a mile or two from Palos, he was to meet the man who would greatly aid him in his plan.
The prior, or head of the monastery, was Juan Perez, who saw Columbus and talked with him as he entered the gate. He had never before met the navigator; but he was a wise man, and as they talked together he became interested in Columbus's plan of a great voyage and asked many questions. He persuaded Columbus to stay over night and sent for a young physician of Palos, Garcia, and Martin Pinzon, a sea-captain, who talked over Colum bus's plan with enthusiasm. A few years before, Juan Perez had been confessor to Isabella at the court, and he now offered to go to court and persuade Isabella to under-
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS 131
take the expense of the voyage. He sent a letter to the queen and was at once summoned to appear at court. After a few weeks he returned from Granada with a sum equivalent to $1180 to pay Columbus's expenses for ap pearing again at court. Columbus bought a court suit, a mule, and other things and set out again to visit the queen. His little son, Diego, he left with one of the priests. As soon as Columbus reached Granada he was well received and his plan was again discussed by a council of learned men. But, although some opposed him, many of the leading men were strong supporters of his plan, and the queen promised to undertake it as soon as Gra nada was captured and the war against the Moors ended. This happened very soon, in the spring of 1492, but then a difficulty arose that threatened to put an end to the whole plan. Columbus was unwilling to undertake the voyage unless the queen promised to make him admiral of the ocean and governor of all the lands he should discover, and allow him to receive one-eighth of all the profits coming from those lands. The queen felt that these demands were too large and the agreement was broken off. Columbus refused to undertake the voyage on any less favorable terms, so he mounted his mule and started to leave the court a ' second time. Some of the chief advisers of the queen went to her and urged that she was losing a great chance.
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PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
She was persuaded to think the matter over and a swift horseman was sent to overtake Columbus, who was found jogging along on his mule about six miles from Granada. He was persuaded to return and soon an agreement was made that was satisfactory to both parties.
THE DEPARTURE OF COLUMBUS
Now, in a second meeting with the queen, it was agreed that Columbus should be admiral in all the islands and countries he might discover, that he should be gov ernor of these new lands, that he should iiave for himself
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS 133
one-tenth of all the precious stones, pearls, gold, silver, spices, and merchandise obtained in those regions, that he should be judge of all disputes arising as to trade in those countries. Columbus was to meet one-eighth of all the expenses of the fitting out of vessels for the journey. Some of Columbus's friends furnished him the money for this purpose. The queen herself and her treasurer, Santangel, undertook the work, and Ferdinand, the king, was not directly concerned in it.
At the port of Palos, on the southeast coast of Spain, Columbus was to prepare his men and fleet. The little town itself was required to raise a tax upon its citizens to help pay the expense and this they grumbled at. When Columbus went down to Palos to begin work, the town was in an uproar, the sailors and people were frightened by such a voyage out on the great unknown sea. Colum bus was cursed on account of the forced tax but the Pin- zon brothers (sea-captains) were his strong friends and supported the undertaking.
Three ships (caravels) were secured, the Santa Maria, the admiral's flag-ship, the Pinta, a smaller but swifter vessel, and the Nina. The two smaller vessels were not decked amidships. Columbus had more trouble in secur ing men than ships. Those going on this rash journey scarcely expected to see their homes again. To persuade men to join the crews debts were forgiven and some pris-
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS 135
oners were released from jail on the promise of going with Columbus. Ninety persons were at length secured to man the three vessels. August 3, 1492, before sunrise, they set sail from Palos in the midst of sorrow and weep ing. They stood southward to the Canaries. Before they reached the islands there were bad signs of trouble. The Pinta broke her rudder and Columbus suspected that its owners, who were on board, had purposely disabled it so that their vessel might be left behind. At the Cana ries, Columbus stopped to repair the Pinta. These were Spanish islands and a safe place for Spanish ships to stop. But even here two things threatened danger. First, it was reported that some Portuguese ships were near to prevent Columbus sailing. A volcano on one of the islands had an eruption and caused a second terror to the supersti tious sailors. But in spite of all these fears, on Septem ber 6, they set sail from the Canaries on the first great voyage out into the Atlantic. As they sailed westward they saw the lighted mountain behind them sending out fire and smoke. A short distance from the coast they were becalmed and made only thirty miles in two days. Then the breeze freshened and the islands passed out of sight. Many of the sailors cried and sobbed like children.
The weather was fine and but for the fears of the sailors this might have been a pleasant voyage. Many things happened to excite their anxious fears. Septem-
136
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ber 13 the ship crossed the line where the needle pointed straight north, and Columbus was astonished to see that the compass needle began to sway from the right to the left of the Pole Star. When the pilots found the compass acting so queerly, they thought it bewitched and playing a foul trick as a punishment
THE FLEET OF COLUMBUS
for their boldness. Columbus himself, though puzzled, soothed their fears with a shrewd explanation.
On September 16 the vessels entered a vast tract of floating seaweed and grasses, where many timny fish and crabs were seen. " They had entered the wonder ful Sargasso Sea, where vast tangles of vegetation cover
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the surface of water more than two thousand fathoms deep." At first the ships went through this tangle with considerable ease, but, the wind becoming light, they found progress difficult. Then the crews became fright ened and thought of stories they had heard of "myste rious impassable seas and of overbold sailors whose ships stuck fast in them." Some were afraid they might be stranded on shoals, but sounding they were aston ished to find their longest line failed to reach the bot tom. After a few days stronger winds blew and on September 22 the ships had passed the sea of grass.
Now a new fear was aroused in the sailors by the trade winds which blew steadily westward. Perhaps they would never be able to return in the face of these winds. After a while the wind changed to the south west and their fears were quieted.
The crews were now impatient at not finding land. Columbus, fearing this, had kept two logs, one for him self and one for the crew. In the log for the crew he never told the full number of miles sailed each day and they did not know how far they really were from the Canaries. Lately many signs of land had appeared. Strange birds were seen flying through the air. A mirage showed what appeared to be a coast-line but the next morning it was gone, and then the men were sure they had reached an enchanted place. Some one
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suggested pushing Columbus overboard in such manner that it would seem he had fallen while looking at the stars. The fear that the fleet might not be able to return to Spain without him probably saved his life.
On October 4 there were signs of mutiny and Colum bus, to please his pilots, changed his course to the south west. They were now 2724 miles from the Canaries, though the log for the crew showed only 2200 miles. This change to the southwest, although they did not know it, shortened the distance to land about two hun dred miles, as the coast of Florida directly west of them was farther than the island they finally reached. On October 11 signs of land became unmistakable and all were much excited. A reward was promised to the one that first saw the land and all watched eagerly. About ten o'clock the admiral, standing on the high poop of his vessel, saw a moving light as if some one were run ning along the shore with a torch. A few hours later a sailor on the Pinta saw land and soon all could see the low coast some five miles away. This was at two o'clock in the morning of Friday, October 12th — just ten weeks since they had sailed from Palos and thirty- three days since they lost sight of Ferro. The sails were now taken in, and the ships lay to, waiting for dawn.
At daybreak Columbus, with most of his men, went
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ashore. Beautiful trees and shrubs were upon every side. All was strange and new and beautiful. The sailors were wild with delight. They had at last reached Cipango (Japan) and her great wealth was theirs. The officers embraced Columbus or kissed his hands, while the sailors threw themselves at his feet and begged his pardon.
The people of the island gathered around, watching the strangers with amazement. The natives were un like any people the Spaniards had ever seen. All were naked and most of them were greased and painted. They thought the ships were sea-monsters and the white men strange creatures from the sky. At first they ran away as the strangers came ashore, but finding they were not hurt they came slowly back, stopping every few paces to throw themselves down to show their respect. The Spaniards received them with nods and smiles and they soon came close to the visitors and touched them, as if to make sure that they were real, and not a mere vision. The Spaniards offered them presents of glass beads and hawks' bells and received in return cotton yarn, tame parrots, and small gold ornaments. Columbus tried to ask them, with signs, where they got their gold and they pointed to the south. Then Columbus decided that he was a little north of the rich Cipango. This, he soon discovered
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was a small island and he understood the name to be Guanahani. He took formal possession of it for Cas tile and gave it a Christian name, San Salvador. The island discovered was one of the Bahamas. The name San Salvador is still given to one of this group, though perhaps not the one first seen by Columbus.
For ten days the ships sailed among the Bahamas and visited four of the islands. Columbus was satis fied that he was in the ocean east of Cathay, for Marco Polo had said it was studded with thousands of spice- bearing islands, and some of them were inhabited by naked savages. Although he had found no spices, there were many strange trees and shrubs; and the air was full of fragrance and this might mean anything. When the natives were asked where they found their gold, they always pointed southward and there must lie the island he was seeking.
He sailed to the south, intending to stay a short time at Ciparigo and then sail on to China.
Soon he reached Cuba and was charmed with the beauty of its scenery. Pearl oysters were found along the shore. He was sure he had reached Cipango, though no large cities could be seen. He tried to talk with the natives, and understood them to say that Cuba was a part of the Asiatic continent and that there was a king in th', neighborhood that was at war with the Great Khan. So
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he sent two messengers, one of them a converted Jew who spoke Arabic, a language heard in parts of Asia, to find the two kings. These messengers found pleasant villages, with large houses surrounded by fields of to bacco and of such unknown vegetables as maize and pota toes. Columbus says in his diary, " The two Christians met on the road a great many people going to their vil lages, men and women with brands in their hands, made of herbs for taking their customary smoke." The Span iards little dreamed that the tobacco fields would some day bring greater wealth than the spices they were seeking. They passed acres of growing cotton and saw in the houses piles of yarn that was to be woven into rough cloth or twisted into nets for hammocks. They found neither cities nor kings, neither gold nor spices, and soon returned to the coast.
Columbus was puzzled. If this was the continent of Asia, where was Cipango ? He thought the natives said there was a great island to the southwest where much gold was found, so he sailed in that direction. On the 20th of November, Martin Pinzon, whose ship could outsail the others, deserted him. Pinzon seemed to think that he might get credit for the discovery of the islands if he first carried home the news.
For two weeks after Pinzon's desertion, Columbus sailed slowly eastward along the coast of Cuba. He found
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pearls and mastic and aloes and it seemed to him there were signs of gold. Passing the island, he reached, on the 6th of December, the island of Hayti, which he called Hispaniola, or "Spanish land." Here again he thought the natives spoke of gold inland and, as they called the island Cibano, he was sure they meant Cipango and that he had at last reached the place he sought. The scenery was beautiful. Columbus says : " The land is elevated with many mountains and peaks . . . most beautiful, of a thousand varied forms, accessible, and full of trees of endless varieties, so tall that they almost touch the sky ; and I have been told that they never lose their foliage. The nightingale and other small birds .of a thousand kinds were singing in November (December) when I was there." l Before he had done much exploring an accident made him change his plans. On Christmas morning, through carelessness of the helmsman, the flag ship struck upon a sand-bank, where the waves soon dashed her to pieces.
After the desertion of the Pinta and of her crew and captain, the loss of the flag-ship Santa Maria caused Columbus to fear that he would not be able to get back to Spain. The only ship left, the Nina, was small, and might never be able to cross the ocean back to Spain. Columbus therefore prepared to return. After the loss of
1 Fiske's " Discovery of America."
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the flag-ship, more men were left than could well return on the little Nina, and some of them desired to be left on the island to await Columbus's return on a second voy age. The climate was so delightful and the Indians so friendly that the men were eager to stay. Forty of them remained on the island. From the wrecked timbers of the ship a fort was built and the guns of the lost vessel Dlaced upon it, and when the preparations were made, Columbus with one ship set sail on his return.
Two days later, while sailing along the northern coast of Hispaniola, the Nina -came in -sight of the Pinta. The commander pretended to be glad to see Columbus and tried to explain that he had been separated from Columbus by bad weather. Columbus was glad to see the other ship again and to have her company on the return voyage, though he believed that the captain had tried to desert him.
As soon as the ships got out into the ocean they met the westward blowing trade-winds which made sailing eastward slow and difficult. In order to avoid these trade- winds Columbus sailed to the northeast till he reached the 37th parallel, which is outside of the limit of trade- winds. Then he sailed directly toward Spain. They had started back across the ocean on January 4. On Febru ary 12 a storm overtook the two small vessels and tossed them with great violence for four days. It was so severe
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS 145
and long continued that Columbus almost despaired of holding out. Fearing that his ships would both go down, he wrote out on parchment two accounts of his voyage and discoveries, addressed to Ferdinand and Isabella, wrapped them in cloth and then surrounded them with a cake of wax. Each of these was securely fastened in a tight barrel. One of the barrels was cast overboard. The two vessels were separated during the storm and did not meet again upon the sea. Before the tempest ceased the Nina came in sight of land, which proved to be one of the Azores Islands. These belonged to Portugal and when a company of Columbus's sailors landed and went to one of the churches to offer thanks for their deliverance from the storm, they were arrested and cast into prison, where they were left five days. Columbus threatened the governor with the punishment of Spain unless the men were given up and at length they were sent back to the ship.
As Columbus with his single ship now sailed eastward toward Cape St. Vincent, they met another fierce storm and were carried to the north, and at length found refuge in the harbor of Lisbon at the mouth of the Tagus. But here also danger threatened the little crew of the Nina. Some of King John's councillors desired him to have Columbus arrested or put to death. But King John was too wise for this- He invited Columbus to his court and
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treated him honorably and on March 13 allowed him to set sail for Palos. Two days later the little ship sailed back into the harbor of Palos and was at once recognized by the people, who were greatly excited and rejoiced. They had scarcely expected to see again the friends who had sailed away the year before out into the unknown ocean. That evening, while the bells were ringing and everybody was rejoicing, the Pinta sailed into the harbor. Captain Pinzon of the Pinta, hoping that Columbus had gone down in the storm, had written a letter to the king and queen, claiming the credit of the discovery for him self. His vessel had been driven northward in the storm to France but he returned to Palos on the same day as Columbus. He was greatly disappointed in finding Columbus already in port. Discouraged and worn out and knowing how unjustly he had acted, he died a few days later.
Columbus sent a message to the king and queen of his safe arrival but the news had spread to them before the letter reached them. He was summoned to appear before them at Barcelona and to give an account of his dis coveries. His reception by the king and queen was a grand scene. He was bidden to sit down in the presence of the monarchs, an honor usually granted only to mem bers of the royal family. The curious products of the newly discovered islands — parrots, plants, pearls, and
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gold — were displayed, and even six savages brought from Hispaniola were presented as interesting curiosities.
RECEPTION OP COLUMBUS ON HIS RETURN
The islands discovered by Columbus were supposed to be a part of the eastern coast of Asia, especially Japan. The whole coast of eastern Asia, called India, was but very imperfectly known to Europeans and these natives were therefore called Indians. In fact, it was many years
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after this before people found out that the islands dis covered by Columbus are separated from India and China by a great continent and by thousands of miles of ocean.
The discovery of these islands and of this supposed western route to India was a cause of great pride and pleasure to Ferdinand and Isabella. The rich countries of India would thus fall into the hands of Spain and great wealth was expected.
King John of Portugal, who had refused to help Columbus, felt bitterly disappointed that he had let slip this great chance of adding to his kingdom and he was very envious of the Spaniards.
The king and queen were now anxious to send out a strong fleet of ships, with soldiers, sailors, and settlers, to take possession of the new lands and still further to explore this beautiful and boundless region of wealth. The war which Ferdinand and Isabella had waged against the Moors in southern Spain had ended in the capture of the chief Moorish city, Granada, and the expulsion of the Moors, and now many soldiers, and even young Spanish nobles, were ready to seek adventure and wealth in the newly discovered lands of India.
Columbus, of course, must be the commander of this expedition and by the agreement made with Isabella and Ferdinand before the first voyage, he was governor- general
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and admiral over all these new countries, with a right to keep for himself and his children these honors and with them one-tenth of all the wealth obtained. In a word, Columbus had become a great Spanish noble and men flocked to his ships.
In September, 1493, he had command of seventeen vessels and fifteen hundred men, soldiers, sailors, and other adventurers, who were full of joyful enthusiasm for discovery and conquest.
On this voyage Columbus, passing farther south, first touched the Caribbean Islands, and, after stopping at Porto Rico, passed on to Hispaniola and La Navidad. Much to his sorrow he found only the charred ruins of the fort in which he had left forty men upon his first voyage. The boxes of provisions and chests of tools had been broken open and carried away, and the bodies of eleven white men were found near the fort. Later, Columbus learned from the Indians that the white men had quarrelled among themselves and had treated the natives so badly that the red men had gathered in large numbers, and had attacked and destroyed the fort and all the white men.
Columbus now laid out a town at a good harbor on the north coast of Hispaniola, and named it Isabella, where he built houses, a market, and a church, and surrounded the whole with a stone wall. This place was left under
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the command of his brother, Diego, while Columbus, after sending twelve vessels back to Spain for supplies, took three ships for a voyage of further exploration. He passed along the southern coast of Cuba and the islands about a thousand miles, then returned along the coast of Jamaica, and finally passed eastward around the southern coast of Hispaniola, everywhere searching for rich cities which he did not find.
Just before reaching Isabella, he was taken very sick and was for several weeks unconscious. As he recovered from this illness at Isabella, he found the affairs of his colony in very bad shape. The Spanish soldiers and nobles had been quarrelsome and disobedient to the gov ernor and wandered about the island, committing wrongs against the natives instead of working and strengthening the colony. Two of the leading Spaniards, with their friends, seized a vessel and sailed back to Spain and made bitter complaints against Columbus and his brother to Ferdinand and Isabella.
A strong native chief now formed a plot to destroy all the white men but it was discovered and the chief cap tured. In spite of his capture, an Indian war broke out and Columbus spent a year in subduing the savages^ and in bringing the troublesome and disorderly Spaniards under control. In the meantime four vessels had arrived with much-needed supplies, but they also had on board
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an agent sent out by the king and queen to examine into the condition of the colony and its government. This man, Aguado, was shrewdly won over by the enemies of Columbus, so that Columbus thought it best to go back to Spain with him and defend his own conduct at court.
A short time before starting, rich gold mines were discovered near the south coast and with this good news Columbus set sail. His brother, Bartholomew, was left in command and the next summer, 1496, transferred the headquarters of the colony to the south coast, where he founded the city of San Domingo.
The two ships were overloaded with two hundred passengers and on the return trip got out of food and almost starved, the men even threatening to eat their Indian captives. Yet Columbus was able to hinder this and the starved company at length reached Cadiz.
Columbus was received kindly at the court, and, after much delay and vexation caused by his enemies, in the spring of 1498 he had six ships ready for his third voyage. Sailing farther south on this cruise so as to reach the supposed Spice Islands and gold regions, he came into the region of cairns just north of the equator. Irving says : " The wind suddenly fell and a dead sultry calm commenced, which lasted for eight days. The air was like a furnace ; the tar melted, the seams of the ship yawned; the salt meat became putrid; the wheat was
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parched as if with fire ; the hoops shrank from the wine and water casks, some of which leaked and others burst, while the heat in the holds of the vessels was so suffocating that no one could remain below a sufficient time to prevent the damage that was taking place. The mariners lost all strength and spirit and sank under the oppressive heat. It seemed as if the old fable of the torrid zone was about to be realized ; and that they were approaching a fiery region, where it would be impossible to exist." (Quoted by Fiske.)
But, while there was no breath of wind, the strong equatorial current carried the ships steadily toward the northwest, so that after eight days they arrived again in the region of westward trades, and with ten days of good sailing came in sight of an island with three mountain peaks, which Columbus called Trinidad. In passing around the southern side of this island the ships were caught in a mighty current of fresh water which swept through the channel. This passage he called the Serpent's Mouth, as it almost swallowed up his ships, and led him to guess that it must be the mouth of some great river draining an unheard-of con tinent to the south. Sailing westward along the coast, he made a collection of fine pearls. Here, again, ex hausted with his anxieties and exertions, he became
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS 153
feverish, his eyes failed, and he was forced to turn northward to San Domingo.
His brother, Bartholomew, had been in charge of the colony during his .absence and had found no end of trouble with the rebellious Spaniards and with the Indians who were furious against the white man. A Spanish scoundrel named Roldan had raised a rebellion against Bartholomew and had joined his men with the Indians in the western part of the island. Columbus and his brother managed to put down these rebels, hanged some of the worst leaders, and threw others into prison. Reports of these troubles reached Spain from time to time, and the powerful enemies of Columbus at the court filled the ears of the Spanish rulers with complaints and false charges of his cruelty and wrong doing against the Spaniards and Indians.
At length, by order of Ferdinand and Isabella, a Spanish knight, Bobadilla, was sent out with full au thority to inquire into the condition of the colony, arrest and punish wrong-doers, and, if necessary, to take the government into his own hands.
When Bobadilla arrived at San Domingo, instead of making careful inquiries into the conduct of Columbus and his brother, he at once liberated the rebels from prison, joined with the enemies of Columbus, and with out notice or trial threw him and his brothers into
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prison and loaded them with chains. He then collected from the rebels all manner of complaints against Colum bus and forwarded them, with him as a prisoner, to Spain. The sea-captain, on whose vessel Columbus was put, was shocked to see the stately form of the old man in irons and offered to release him, but Columbus replied that he would wear the fetters till removed by the order of his sovereigns, as full proof of the foul treatment he had received. His son, Ferdinand, wrote that he had afterward often seen these fetters hanging in his father's room. A letter written on shipboard by Columbus to one of the ladies at the court, and de scribing the manner in which he had been treated, came into the hands of the queen and she was so much shocked that she sent a swift messenger to Cadiz, ordering that he and his brothers be released, that Columbus be invited at once to the court, after receiving a purse of money for his expenses.
When Columbus arrived at the palace of the Alham- bra in Granada, he was received with tears by the queen and was so much overcome that, as Fiske says, "this much-enduring old man, whose proud and mas terful spirit had so long been proof against all wrongs and insults, broke down. He threw himself at the feet of the sovereigns in an agony of tears and sobs." He was promised payment for all his losses. But it was
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difficult for Isabella to fulfil her promises to him. The Spaniards hated him as a foreigner, and it was extremely difficult, even for a native Spaniard, to rule successfully his cruel and plotting countrymen. Espe cially was this true upon far-away islands, where they had but little fear of the government of Spain, and where they were all the while, by mean and bloody deeds, stirring up the Indians to war. Columbus was, therefore, fed on promises, while others were allowed to rule and enrich themselves in the lands which he had discovered.
In 1502, with four small and leaky vessels, he was allowed to make a fourth voyage of exploration, hoping at last to find some rich empire that would reward him for all his labors and pay Spain the heavy costs of his voyages and colonies. He finally reached the shores of Yucatan and sailed southward many hundreds of miles along the coasts of Central America, finding, indeed, races of men who dressed in cotton and built large stone or adobe houses. The natives wore also gold ornaments and this seemed to point to rich gold-producing countries to the west. Passing southward in hopes of finding a passage to China, which he thought was close at hand, he began to suffer great hardships. His ships became worm-eaten, the food gave out, many of his men were killed in Indian troubles, and he was com-
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pelled to sail back to San Domingo. On the south coast of Cuba his leaky vessels were met by a storm and were driven at last upon the coast of Jamaica, where they were too full of water to sail farther. They were hauled up on the beach and two men were sent in a canoe across to San Domingo to ask help. But the governor, Ovando, made no effort at first to rescue them and Columbus and his party spent a mis erable year upon this wild coast.
A mutiny among his men led to a pitched battle, in which Bartholomew was victor and killed or captured the rebels. Finally Ovando sent two vessels to bring back the suffering company of Columbus and pretended to treat him and his brothers with courtesy. But Co lumbus was glad to get away from so treacherous a friend and sailed for Spain, where he arrived a few days before the death of Isabella. After her death he had no strong friend at court and could do little to secure his rights. The last year and a half of his life was spent in sickness and poverty, and, worn out with disappointment and sorrow, he died May 20, 1506.
But Columbus had accomplished more than even he had ever dreamed. He did not know that he had touched upon the shores of two vast continents, far more important to Europe than India and China. The rich empires of Mexico and Peru were close at hand,
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which would soon put vast quantities of gold into the hands of the conquering Spaniards. If he could have opened his eyes to the real importance of his dis coveries, if he could have seen the great map of North and South America, as we know it, unrolled, he would have been filled with wonder.
Columbus, in his explorations and settlements in the West Indies, bad two very difficult classes of people to deal with, — the Spaniards and the Indians.
In exploring the islands, the Spaniards had to support themselves from the country and they often plundered and maltreated the Indians. The Indians in turn would plot the destruction of the white men, and bloody war followed.
In order to establish some sort of peace and understand ing between the Indians and the whites, Columbus levied a small tribute, or tax, upon all the Indians, which would bring a sufficient sum to meet the needs of the Spaniards. Those who had not paid this tribute were required to work for their Spanish masters. This soon led to a form of slavery, as whole villages of Indians were required to till the soil for a single Spaniard who ruled the district as if it were his plantation. This system grew worse and worse and the Spanish masters practised the most inhuman cruelties upon their Indian subjects or slaves. Columbus did not intend to establish a system
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of slavery ; but soon after he left Hispaniola the system he had started developed into the most cruel form of bondage. Many of the Indians were required to labor in the mines of San Domingo and were worked so hard and treated so cruelly tha.t they died in great numbers.
The Indians of the Caribbees were warlike cannibals, who tortured and roasted the victims whom they cap tured along the coast of Hispaniola. Columbus, in order to stop their raids, and at the same time to win the favor of the Indians in San Domingo, sent expeditions against the Caribbee Indians, captured many of them and sent them to Europe as slaves, hoping thus to make Christians out of them, who might then come back to civilize their people.
Columbus was especially unfortunate in dealing with the Spaniards who accompanied him on his voyages. They were treacherous and mutinous and were con stantly arousing the bitter hatred of the Indians by their cruelty and selfish love of gold. He was hated by the Spaniards as a foreigner and they placed so many difficulties in his way that he was soon deprived of his government and his rights were never restored, though his son, Diego, did become governor of Hispaniola a few years after his father's death.
Columbus's original purpose was to find a way to the Indies by the route westward. While the Spaniards
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under the leadership of Columbus were exploring among the islands, the Portuguese had passed round the Cape of. Good Hope and even pushed across the Indian Ocean to India. In 1497 Vasco da Gama sailed around southern Africa, crossed the Indian Ocean to India, and brought home a rich cargo of spices, silks, ivory, robes, and pre cious stones. He had seen great cities and opened up for Portugal the splendid commerce of the East. Columbus had not discovered any cities or powerful kingdoms and his voyages and discoveries had 'been very expensive, without bringing in much return. It seemed as if the Portuguese under Da Gama and others had really won the rich prize, while Columbus had found only a few islands inhabited by savages. By a decree of the Pope at Rome, all the newly discovered lands along the coast of Africa and eastward to India were to belong to Portugal, while those discovered to the west, by Columbus and others, were to be the possession of Spain. This line of division was drawn at first on a meridian three hundred leagues west of the Cape Verde and Canary Islands.
Columbus fondly hoped that, by pushing a little farther west among the islands, he would come to those rich countries of India (the Spice Islands, Japan, and China) which the Portuguese had already reached by sailing round Africa and across the Indian Ocean. He never even dreamed that the Spaniards, soon after his death,
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would discover and conquer rich kingdoms in Mexico and Peru, more than ten thousand miles from the Indies ; so ignorant was he of the real geography of the world and of that vast ocean which lay westward from his newly discovered islands, and from the continents which he had touched without knowing what they were.
CHAPTER VIII
FERDINAND MAGELLAN
FERDINAND MAGELLAN was born about 1480, in a rugged mountain district in Portugal. He belonged to a noble family and as a youth was early sent to the court of Portugal, where he was brought up in the royal household. As a boy he must have seen the ships coming into Lisbon from exploring voyages. When about twenty-five years old he sailed with Almeida, the Portuguese governor of India, around the coasts of Africa and spent the next seven years in service as a soldier and sailor in conquering the East Indies for Portugal. This was hard service, as he was engaged in many fierce fights with the Arabs and native tribes along the coasts of Asia and the East Indies.
M 161
MAGELLAN
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In 1509 he was with the first European ships which sailed along the coast of Malacca under the command of Sequeira. While the Portuguese were loading the four vessels with ginger and pepper, the native Malays were allowed to throng upon the ships. The Portuguese had taken all the boats but one ashore to bring the cargo and many of the white men were scattered along the beach loading the boats. The shrewd Malay king planned to attack the Portuguese suddenly and murder them all. The signal was to be a puff of smoke from a tall square tower in the town which lay on the hillside. Sequeira, all unconscious of danger, was playing a game of chess on the deck of his flag-ship. While the Malays were standing about, apparently friendly, awaiting the signal, Magellan heard a rumor of the plot from a friendly native woman and taking the only remaining boat and riding to the flag-ship, shouted " treason " just in time to save Sequeira. The men on board the ships began to drive off the natives. At the signal from the tower, the Malays attacked and massacred most of the Portuguese at work along the shore, but Serrano, the captain, and a few of his men jumped into their boats and pushed off. They were swiftly surrounded by a great number of Malay boats and overwhelmed by numbers. Just at this moment Magellan rowed up with his men and attacked the Malay boats with such fury that they were driven off and
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Serrano and his men were saved. The Malays then swarmed about the ships in their boats but the European guns soon did such havoc among them that they withdrew.
From this time Serrano and Magellan became the closest friends. Serrano pushed still farther eastward and became settled in the Molucca or Spice Islands. Magellan returned to Lisbon in 1514 and letters from his friend Serrano awakened in him the desire to sail to those islands himself. He had become very much interested in the study of geography and navigation, and, by long experience and study, was an expert sea man and pilot. In the meantime, Amerigo Vespucius and his associates had sailed along the coast of South America to 20° below the equator, and it was believed that there was a passage farther south to the seas be yond and thus to the Indies. Magellan formed the daring plan of sailing through this strait and beyond and then of continuing his course around the world. In this way he would go to meet his friend, Serrano, in the Moluccas, from the East. But Magellan had no notion of the vast breadth of the ocean west of South America. In fact, he knew very little about South America itself. About this time he spent a year with the Portuguese, fighting against the Moors in Morocco, and received a wound in the knee which lamed
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him for life. He was not in great favor with King Emanuel of Portugal and when he presented his plan before the king, it was not well, received.
Magellan therefore decided to offer his services to the king of Spain in order to carry out his great idea of circumnavigating the earth. In 1517 he settled at Seville, in Spain, and soon married the daughter of his friend and host, Barbosa, a Portuguese in Spanish ser vice. At the Spanish court Magellan was well received by Charles V, the young king, the grandson of Ferdi nand and Isabella. It was agreed that a fleet of ships should be fitted out for this undertaking, but so slow was +he work that it was more than a year before all the necessarj preparations had been made.
The king of Portugal, on hearing that Magellan was fitting out such an expedition, put many obstacles in his way. Ruffians were hired to waylay him in the streets, orders were sent to the East Indies commanding the Portuguese officer in charge to arrest Magellan should he come into those regions, and, worse still, the crews which were to sail with Magellan were corrupted and three out of four of his captains afterward proved traitors. The Spaniards at court were naturally jealous of a foreigner who was sent upon so important an expedi tion, and even the common people were stirred up against him. But Magellan had the firm support of King Charles,
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and continued his preparations. He was to have impor tant rights and privileges in the newly discovered lands, besides the honor, if successful, of being the first to sail round the world.
The five ships, Trinidad, San Antonio, Conception, Victoria, and Santiago, were ready in September, 1519, and were manned by 280 sailors and adventurers, 37 of whom were Portuguese who had followed Magellan. The son of his old friend, Serrano, was captain of the Santiago, and the only one of the four captains faithful to Magellan. On the 20th of September the little fleet escaped from the mouth of the river and set sail. The boats were old and somewhat weather-beaten, the largest 120 tons burden, the smallest 75 tons; not a very promising outfit for so long a voyage in un known seas. A few days later a small vessel overtook the flag-ship, with an anxious message from Magellan's father-in-law, Barbosa, that the captains had sworn to their friends to kill Magellan if they got into trouble with him. Magellan sent back the reply to his friends to be of good cheer, as he would carry out his plan in spite of the traitors. Pigafetta, a passenger on board the fleet, kept a journal of this famous voyage, from which our knowledge is obtained.
After stopping at the Canaries for water and wood, the squadron sailed to the southwest and was be-
166 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
calmed for three weeks. On account of bad weather and scarcity of food and water, mutiny began to show itself. Carthagena, the captain of the San Antonio, the largest ship, came on board the flag-ship and openly accused Magellan. Magellan seized him with his own hands and put him in irons, thus checking the mutiny for the time. But the captains waited only for a better opportunity.
The five ships arrived at Rio Janeiro Bay, Decem ber 13, after a trip of nearly three months. Boats were quickly lowered and the men were soon on land. The natives treated the Spaniards very kindly, building a long hut for them to live in and bringing them some pigs. These the Spaniards roasted and greatly enjoyed after months of diet on salt meat and hardtack. They also tasted the pineapple for the first time and found the sweet potato, which was described as having the form of the turnip and a taste resembling the chestnut. The natives had no metal tools. Their large canoes, capable of holding thirty or forty men, were dug out of the trunks of trees with knives of stone.
Magellan was in search of a passage to the western sea and coming to the mouth of the La Plata in Janu ary, he spent three weeks examining the broad bay and river. Finding only a river's mouth, he sailed south along the coast of Patagonia. He and his companions
FERDINAND MAGELLAN lf>7
were here overtaken by violent storms during February and March and barely saved their ships from wreck. The southern winter was setting in. " The cold be came so intense that, finding a sheltered harbor, with plenty of fish, at Port St. Julian, they chose it for win ter quarters, and anchored there the last day of March." { Magellan proposed now to spend five months of an antarctic winter in this bay, and, when spring opened again, to proceed southward till a strait was reached or the end of this unexplored continent. . It seemed that dangers and hardships had no power to weaken the determination of this man, yet he also showed himself kindly disposed, promised his men great rewards, and appealed to their pride as Spaniards not to give up the expedition. But the mutinous captains thought they had suffered enough of storm and hardship. Food was scarce and the ships were well battered. Per haps Magellan was only trying to lead a Spanish squadron to destruction. To spend five months of an icy winter idly upon their ships was too much.
The traitors, Mendoza and Quesada, had already per suaded the crews of their ships to join in the mutiny. On Sunday night of Easter day, Quesada, with Carthagena and thirty men, boarded the third ship, San Antonio, seized the captain, a cousin of Magellan, and put him in irons.
1 Fiske's " Discovery of America."
168 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
They took possession of the ship, disarmed the loyal men, and persuaded the others to join the mutineers, giving out extra portions of bread and wine. The rebels were now in full command of three of the large ships and felt safe in defying Magellan. On Monday morning he knew nothing of what had happened till he despatched a boat to one of the ships, which was sent back to him with the insolent reply that he no longer commanded that ship. By sending the boat round to all the fleet, Magellan found that only the smallest ship, the Santiago, with Serrano, was faithful. Quesada requested a conference with Ma gellan, who consented by asking the rebellious captains on board the flag-ship. This invitation they refused.
Fiske says of Magellan at this juncture: "Little did they realize with what a man they were dealing. Magel lan knew how to make them come to him. He had reason to believe that the crew of the Victoria was less disloyal than the others, and selected that ship for his first coup de main. While he kept a boat in readiness with a score of trusty men, armed to the teeth, and led by his wife's brother, Barbosa, he sent another boat ahead to the Victo ria with his alguazil or constable, Espinoza, and five other men. Luis de Mendoza, captain of the Victoria, suffered this small party to come on board. Espinoza then served on Mendoza a formal summons to come to the flag-ship, and upon his refusal, quick as lightning sprang upon him and
FERDINAND MAGELLAN 169
plunged a dagger into his throat. As the corpse of the rebellious captain dropped upon the deck, Barbosa's party rushed over the ship's side with drawn cutlasses, the dazed crew at once surrendered, and Barbosa took com mand."
Magellan now had command of three ships and in the evening his men boarded the San Antonio on two sides and captured her, and soon after the other ship surren dered. Thus in less than a day Magellan brought this dangerous mutiny to a close and established his authority more firmly than before. Quesada was beheaded and Carthagena and a guilty priest were set on shore the fol lowing spring to shift for themselves.
The smallest ship, while out exploring, was wrecked during the winter and after extreme hardships the crew was rescued. While at Port St. Julian, the voyagers saw much of the native Patagonians, who were almost giants in stature. They were friendly till some of their men were invited on board the fleet and kept as prisoners. During the winter the ships had been repaired and all preparation made for the voyage southward with the earliest spring.
On the 24th of August the explorers set sail again but the weather was very stormy and they were nearly two months sailing along a rocky coast.
As the squadron moved southward it was overtaken by a fierce storm, which for several days threatened either to
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overwhelm the ships or to dash them against the rocky shore. One of the vessels sprang a leak and another barely escaped the rocks. At last they rode safely at anchor in a small bay where the sailors demanded the return of the expedition to Spain. They had suffered danger enough, they said. But Magellan stoutly refused, and, after refitting 'the ships and repairing the damage of the storm, he again set sail southward, seeking a passage to the western ocean.
On the morning of October 21, 1520, Magellan was celebrating the day sacred to the eleven thousand virgins, when, as the ceremony ended, one of the sailors espied a cape or headland, beyond which nothing could be seen, and, as they rounded the point, " Magellan's heart leaped within him to perceive that there was a broad inlet run ning in a southwesterly direction, and that while the land was plainly visible on its southern side, its limit inland could not be seen. Naming the point the Cape of the Virgins, he gave orders that the fleet should boldly enter the inlet and endeavor to find out whither it led." l
The shores were rugged and steep, with occasional for ests. The main channel was divided into many inlets and bays and in places was almost closed up by rocky islands. The jutting reefs and breakers were to be avoided and it was necessary to survey the channel closely as they
i Towle's « Life of Magellan."
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advanced. Pigafetta, as quoted by Fiske, says: "The straight now cauled the straight of Magellanus, beinge in sum place. C. x. leaques in length : and in breadth sum- where very large and in other places lyttle more than halfe a leaque in bredth. On both the sydes of this strayght are great and hygh mountaynes couered with snowe, beyonde the whiche is the enteraunce into the sea of Sur. . . . Here one of the shyppes stole away priuile and returned into Spayne."
More than five weeks were spent in working their way through these winding channels. At length, in a shel tered bay, the fleet cast anchor. Two ships were sent ahead to explore the channel while the others waited. While attempting to return, the two vessels were over taken by a furious storm and driven forward, and, after passing through several straits and bays, they reached a channel from which they could see the boundless ocean beyond.
At last Magellan "was relieved by seeing them speeding rapidly toward the bay, with flags and streamers flying gayly at their mastheads. They were soon alongside the flag-ship, and Mesquito, hastening on board, eagerly advanced to Magellan and fell at his feet. < Praise be to God, Admiral/ cried he, when he could recover his breath so as to speak, ' we have found the outlet.' Magellan, with flushed face, his whole body trembling with excitement,
FERDINAND MAGELLAN 173
raised the faithful captain from the deck, and clasping him about the neck, burst into tears of joy. ' Is it indeed true ? ' he said, with faltering voice. ' And have you seen the other ocean, the western ocean beyond ? ' ' We have indeed seen it with these very eyes,' replied Mesquito. ' We came near perishing in the storm, but we kept on and have succeeded/ Having embraced the other officers, Magellan said, 'My Comrades, we have at last triumphed. Our perils have been great, our trials and hardships sore and many. But the reward of all has come. The passage that leads from the Atlantic to the further Ocean, and opens the" nearest way from Spain to the rich Molucca islands is found. It is just before us. We shall pass through it into the ocean beyond, if God still pro tect us. We shall make other discoveries, find wealth and fame for ourselves and new lands for our king. Let the captains return to their ships, and assemble their crews to tell the good tidings ; let your cannon speak to awake echoes among the crags ; float the royal flag from your mastheads, array the decks with streamers and ribbons, let meat and drink be set forth in plenty, and render thanks to God for leading us to this great discovery.' " l
The four ships were anchored alongside and the day was given up to feasting and celebiation. When the
1 Towle's " Life of Magellan/'
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feast was done, altars were erected on the deck and the priests chanted the song of triumph.
The fleet now set sail and advanced through the chan nel in a series of bays and narrow straits. Following the course of the first two ships they came at last to a narrow strait and a cape that jutted into it, from which they could dimly see the distant ocean. This place Magellan named Cape Forward.
But at this point the channel divides into two parts, both extending far away, and he was at a loss to know which to follow. Before sending forward the ships to explore these channels, he called together his principal men and asked their opinions about his future course. Should they return now to Spain and make known this discovery or proceed on the long voyage across the new ocean to the Moluccas ? In spite of hardship, riches and honor could be had by sailing on to the Moluccas. Some were eager to go on but the chief pilot, Gomez, objected and urged Magellan to return to Spain for provisions and better ships. Magellan at once replied, " We will go on even if we have to eat the leather from the ship's yards."
The Conception and the San Antonio were now sent out to explore the two channels. After waiting impa tiently for several days, Magellan set out along the southern channel. Advancing, they came to a wide cur rent in which many small fishes were found. Magellan
FERDINAND MAGELLAN 175
named it the Kiver of Sardines. Suddenly the Concep tion appeared, to the great delight of Magellan, but the other ship, the San Antonio, was not seen again by him. The pilot, Gomez, had persuaded the crew to seize the captain, Mesquito, and then they deserted Magellan and started back through the strait and across the Atlantic to Spain, and after six months reported that Magellan and all the other ships were lost.
Magellan sent out men in two long boats to explore the River of Sardines to its mouth. After three days they returned and said that it flowed into the ocean, the shores of which they had reached. The three ships pro ceeded to the outlet of the river and anchored in a good harbor near a hilly cape at the entrance to the ocean, which Magellan called Cape Desire, because he had long desired to see it. As he looked upon the rocky cliffs reaching northward, and the boundless ocean to the west, his heart was filled with thanks for the great discovery.
At this place they spent several days, exploring the neighboring hills, mountains, and forests. The crews went on shore and refreshed themselves among the forests and in visits with the native Indians of large size whom they found here. The Indians brought pro visions to the ships and were greatly delighted with the beads, buttons, and little bells with which Magellan rewarded them. The ships were now repaired, the crews
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rested, and a fresh supply of water, wood, and provisions was taken on board. They were making ready for the unknown voyage northward to the equator and westward to India. They were trying to reach the Moluccas by a route over which no traveller had ever gone before.
As the ships ploughed the waters westward the sailors were surprised at the calm of the ocean. The weather was warm and sunny and the sea steadily quiet. Magel lan studied his charts and attempted to reckon the dis tance to the Indies. What if he should reach India and sail homeward by way of the Cape of Good Hope ! No navigator had ever dared^ such a thing ! After they had sailed many days through a quiet sea, Magellan called his captains together and said that the great ocean through which they were now the first to sail should be called the Pacific, because of its peaceful waters. The first part of this long journey was like a pleasure trip, but in passing over so vast an untravelled waste it was hard to tell what troubles might lie before them. As the voyagers approached nearer the equator they turned more to the west. The region of calms was at length reached and for days together the ships lay idly floating on the water. The winds sprang up again and they sped westward. But the calms returned, till the crews grew impatient. Their supply of food and water was running short. Passing the Tropic of Capricorn, they came upon
FERDINAND MAGELLAN 177
very hot weather. The rosin oozed from the pine boards on deck. An island hove in sight but it was barren and lifeless. Another appeared but brought no relief. The fleet had already sailed nearly twice as far as Co lumbus in his first voyage across the Atlantic from the Canaries to Guanahani, and there were still five thousand miles of ocean before the men would again see land. Their sufferings may be best understood from the old English narrative of Eden, quoted by Fiske : —
" And hauynge in this tyme consumed all theyr bysket and other vyttayles, they fell into such necessitie that they were inforced to eate the pouder that remayned thereof beinge now full of woormes. . . . Theyre freshe water was also putrifyed and become yelow. They dyd eate skynnes and pieces of lether which were foulded abowt certeyne great ropes of the shyps. (Thus did the captain-general's words come true.) But these skynnes being made verye harde by reason of the soonne, rayne, and wynde, they hunge them by a corde in the sea for the space of foure or fiue dayse to mollifie them, and sodde them, and eate them. By reason of this famen and vnclene feedynge, sumrne of theyr gummes grewe so ouer theyr teethe (a symptom of scurvy), that they dyed miserably for hunger. And by this occasion dyed, xix. men, and . . . besyde these that dyed, xxv. or. xxx. were so sicke that they were not able to doo any seruice
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with theyr handes or arms for feeblenesse : So that was in maner none without sum disease. In three monethes and. XK- dayes, they say led foure thousande leaques in one goulfe by the sayde sea cauled Pacificum (that is) peaceable, whiche may well bee so cauled forasmuch as in all this tyme hauying no syght of any lande, they had no misfortune of wynde or any other tempest. ... So that in fine, if god of his mercy had not gyuen them good wether, it was necessary that in this soo greate a sea they shuld all haue dyed for hunger. Whiche neuer- theless they escaped soo hardely, that it may bee doubted whether euer the like viage may be attempted with so goode successe."
At last the end of this terrible suffering was reached. Islands, green and wooded, appeared in the edge of the sky. As the ships approached, boat loads of natives came out to meet them, bringing clusters of bananas, cocoanuts, and other fruits. These the sailors were soon eagerly devouring. Later, on account of the disposi tion of the people to steal everything they could lay their hands upon, Magellan called these the Ladrones, or islands of robbers.
Ten days later, on the 16th of March, the voyagers came to the islands that are now called the Philippines. They first landed on an uninhabited Island, where there was good water. Two large tents were put up and the sick
FERDINAND MAGELLAN 179
men carefully tended. The friendly natives from the neighboring islands came in long boats bringing fish and oranges. These they laid at the feet of Magellan. He brought out from the tents and distributed among them little bells, red caps, looking-glasses, and brass and silver ornaments. These things delighted the natives and they brought figs and cocoanuts and other food with which he stocked his vessels. At last the chief of the island, with his leading men, visited Ma gellan. He was a pleasant-mannered old man and brought two loads of oranges and palm wine, and also some chickens. Magellan spent a week with these people and through them learned much about the sur rounding islands. The crews of the vessels were also greatly refreshed with good food and life upon land.
Later he visited the island of Sebu and was received in friendly spirit by the Malay chief, who not only con cluded a treaty of peace with the Spaniards, promising to trade only with them, but accepted Christianity. A great bonfire was made of their idols and the tribe be came Christians; a cross was set up and the people of the island were baptized.
Magellan learned by conversing with these tribes that they were visited by Asiatic traders and that the Molucca Islands lay to the south. He knew also by his own reckoning that he had already passed the longi-
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tude of the Moluccas. In short, he had at last com pleted the journey over the unknown parts of the ocean and could now sail through the East Indies and the Indian Ocean back to Spain.
Just as he was prepared to leave Sebu and continue his voyage south and west, he learned that the chief with whom he had concluded a treaty of friendship and commerce and who had become a Christian, needed his aid in subduing the king of a neighboring island. Ma gellan was nob a man to desert his new friend and besides he thought it a part of his work to subdue this heathen king and make him accept Christianity. With three boats and sixty men Magellan crossed over to the neighboring island. Wading ashore with forty-nine men, he attacked the savages, who swarmed about the Spaniards in great numbers. After a furious battle the Spaniards were compelled to retreat to their boats. Magellan was among the last to retreat, shielding and protecting his men. His helmet was knocked off and his right arm disabled by a spear. u The Indians threw themselves upon him with iron-pointed bamboo spears and scimitars and every weapon they had, and ran him through, — our mirror, our light, our comforter, — until they killed him." (Pigafetta, quoted by Fiske.) A tew of his men fell bravely fighting by his side ; the rest reached the boats and returned to the ships.
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The king of Sebu, finding that Magellan and his men were not so powerful as he had supposed, decided that he had made a mistake in accepting the God of the Christians. He therefore invited thirty of the leading Spaniards, including the brave captains, Barbosa and Serrano, to a feast, and then massacred all of them. The cross was chopped down and the heathen religion restored.
The crews of the ships were now in a desperate situation. They left the islands in haste. Stopping at a favorable harbor they consulted upon their future plans. Only 115 men remained of the 280 who started. The Conception was leaky and unseaworthy and was now burned to the water's edge; the crews were divided between the other two ships. Having chosen new cap tains, they visited the island of Borneo, where they were kindly received and spent several days. The men at last reached the Moluccas, which Magellan had long desired to see. They were well treated by the natives, and, after trading for a while, they prepared to sail homeward. It was found, however, that the Trinidad was leaking badly. After consulting, the voyagers de cided that the Victoria should start upon the voyage homeward at once, so as to take advantage of the ea>i monsoon, while the Trinidad, after being thoroughly repaired, should sail back across the Pacific to tlu
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Spanish settlements at Panama. Fifty-four men re mained on board the Trinidad, forty-seven on the Vic toria. Espinosa had command of the Trinidad and Elcano of the Victoria.
In the spring of 1522 the Trinidad sailed east upon the Pacific, but encountered unfavorable winds and was finally driven back to the Moluccas. The crew had suffered much from scurvy and privation. Only nineteen men were left and these were seized by the Portuguese and treated with great cruelty. Four years afterwards four only of these men, including the captain, Espinosa, were sent back to Spain.
The Victoria sailed man}' miles south of Ceylon, mak ing a straight course for the Cape of Good Hope, which she reached " on the 16th of May, with starvation and scurvy already thinning their ranks, with foretop- mast gone by the board and foreyard badly sprung." It had been very stormy before reaching the cape and the men begged their commander to allow them to stop at Mozambique, a Portuguese settlement, but he knew that they would be taken captive by the Portuguese who were on the lookout for Magellan's ships. They pushed on. The good ship became leaky and the men had to work constantly at the pumps. In the two months of the voyage along the western shore of Africa to the Cape Verdes twenty-one men died. The Cape
FERDINAND MAGELLAN 183
Verde Islands were also possessions of the Portuguese. Being in sore need, the men were compelled to stop at these islands; they deceived the Portuguese by saying they came from America and were driven out of their course by a storm. The sick were taken on shore and cared for and a boat load of rice was sent to" the ship. But the secret got out and thirteen men in one of the boats were seized by the Portuguese, and the ships in the harbor were armed for the purpose of capturing the Victoria. The commander of the Victoria, seeing this, stretched all his sail and made his escape, though followed some distance by the Portuguese.
It took the Victoria eight weeks longer to make the coast of Spain. On the 6th of September she came in sight of land, with nineteen men on board, — all that were left of the 280 who had sailed with Magellan nearly three years before. They sailed into the mouth of the Guadalquivir, greatly rejoiced. Entering the harbor of St. Lucas, they were greeted by the vessels there. When the Spaniards learned that this little vessel, the Victoria, of eighty-five tons, had sailed round the world, they were filled with astonishment. The ship sailed up the river to Seville, where her arrival filled the old city with excitement. A public reception was given to the brave men who had survived so many dangers. King
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Charles V entertained the officers at his palace and bestowed pensions upon them.
The little son of Magellan had died the year before and his wife also, soon after hearing of the death of her husband and brother in the Philippines, had died, so there was no one left to receive the reward of Magellan's expedition. Fiske says : —
" The voyage thus ended was doubtless the greatest feat of navigation that has ever been performed, and nothing can be imagined that would surpass it except a journey to some other planet. It has not the unique historic position of the first voyage of Columbus, which brought together two streams of human life that had been disjoined since the Glacial Period. But as an achievement in ocean navi gation, that voyage of Columbus sinks into insignificance by the side of it, and when the earth was a second time encompassed by the greatest English sailor of his age, the advance in knowledge, as well as the different route chosen, had much reduced the difficulty of the performance. When we consider the frailness of the ships, the immeasurable extent of the unknown, the mutinies that were prevented or quelled, and the hardships that were endured, we can have no hesitation in speaking of Magellan as the prince of navigators. Nor can we ever fail to admire the sim plicity and purity of that devoted life in which there is nothing that seeks to be hidden or explained away."
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Magellan had formerly spent several years in the East Indies, so that in making his way across the Pacific to the Philippines he had really completed the circumnavigation of the world and had settled forever the great question as to the size and shape of the earth.
The next great navigator to complete the journey round the world was Sir Francis Drake, fifty years later. Drake met with difficulties and hardships very similar in some respects to those of Magellan.
One result of Magellan's voyage was to bring the Philippine Islands under the control of Spain. Portugal tried to claim them as a part of the East Indies but they were taken and held by the Spaniards till 1898, when, after the victory of Admiral Dewey in Manila Bay, they became a possession of the United States.
CHAPTER IX
HERNANDO CORTES *
STILL believing that the new country discovered by Columbus was near Cipango and Cathay, the Spaniards dreamed of finding great cities and untold wealth. Many searched for these marvels and at last one man found something more wonderful, perhaps, than these dreams.
In the year 1504 a young man named Hernando Cortes, a native of Spain, came to the Indies in search of adventure. He fought bravely under Velasquez in the conquest of Cuba in 1511. Later he was made chief judge of the newly founded town of Santiago. In the year 1518, hearing of the wonderful cities seen by Cor dova on the peninsula of Yucatan, he persuaded Velasquez to give him command of a fleet fitted up for further ex ploration and conquest. These cities of which he had heard had strange-looking towers or pyramids, and the people were dressed in garments of cotton and wrore gold ornaments, cloaks of feathers, and plumes. Then a nephew of Velasquez, sailing along the coast, met a native who told him wonderful stories of his chief, Montezuma,
1 Authorities : Fiske and Prescott. 186
HERN AN DO CORTES
187
who lived far up iii the country and ruled over many cities and had no end of gold. This doubtless was the Great Khan and wealth and fame would belong to the brave men who should conquer him.
Before Cortes was well started upon his adventures, Velasquez began to fear that he would prove too inde pendent in case he found a treasure and sent two messages to call him back. Cortes paid no attention to the messengers but calmly went on his way. Early in March, 1519, he landed at
Tabasco on the coast of Yucatan. Finding the natives unfriendly, he attacked and defeated them. Seizing a supply of provisions, he went to San Juan de Ulloa, where he sent gifts to Montezuma in the name of his sovereign, Charles V.
>* Montezuma was the chief of the Aztecs, who had built their chief city, or pueblo, in a well-protected place in the
CORTES
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marshes by Lake Tezcuco. This pueblo was begun in the year 1325 and was called Tenochtitlan, which means "place of the cactus rock." An old legend says that the Aztecs, fleeing from their foes, took refuge in these marshes. Here they found a stone upon which, some years before, one of their chiefs had sacrificed a captive chief. From a crevice in this stone, where a little earth was embedded, there grew a cactus, upon which sat an eagle holding in its beak a serpent. Their priest said this meant long and continued victory. Diving into the lake he talked with the god of waters, who told him that upon this spot the people were to build their town. The name under which it was best known later was taken from Mexitl, one of the names of their war god.1
This pueblo was surrounded by marshes, which, by means of dikes and causeways, the Aztecs gradually made into a large artificial lake. In this stronghold, the Aztecs grew stronger than any of the neighboring tribes. With some of these tribes they formed an alli ance, while they subdued others and demanded tribute from them. They had elected "a chief of men" who was war chief of the allied tribes. Montezuma, the present chief, was about fifty years old at the time the Spaniards reached Mexico and was a man of much in fluence among his people. He had heard of the won-
1 Fiske's " Discovery of America."
HERNANDO CORTES 189
derful towers with wings, moving lightly on the sea, and of the men with white faces and shining raiment, and thought they might be gods, perhaps the emissaries of the sun god, for whom they had waited so long. \yThe Aztecs worshipped a god of good and one of evil. To the evil one they offered human sacrifices to keep him good-natured. Between Quetzalcoatl, the good god, and Tezcatlipoca, the evil god, there was endless warfare. "The latter deity had once been the sun, but Quetzalcoatl had knocked him out of the sky with a big club, and jumping into his place had become the sun instead of him. Tezcatlipoca, after tumbling into the sea, rose again in the night sky as the Great Bear, anc? so things went on for a while, until suddenly the Kvii One changed himself into a tiger, and with a blow of his paw struck Quetzalcoatl from the sky." r Long was the struggle between these two gods, say the old legends, but finally Quetzalcoatl was outwitted and obliged to forsake the land. With a few young friends he had gone to the eastern shore. Here he bade them good-by, saying that he must go farther, but would return some day from the east, with men as fair skinned as himself, and would take possession of the country. His coming would, of course, do away with the sacrifice of human beings, as he believed that the perfume of flowers
1 Fiske's " Discovery of America."
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and incense, offered to the gods, was enough without the shedding of blood. He also did not believe in war. These newcomers had appeared at almost the spot where Quetzalcoatl had disappeared and it was natural for the worshippers to think that their god had returned as he had promised.
Cortes did not, at the time, understand all these things that aided him in his invasion of these new countries, but he saw that some of the pueblos paid their tribute to Montezuma unwillingly and this feeling he encouraged whenever possible. At one large town, he persuaded the chief to arrest Montezuma's tax-gatherers, and then he quietly released them and sent them to their great chief with many kind words.
"<x" The messengers sent to Montezuma returned, in a short time, with rich gifts of gold and jewels and were accompanied by an embassy from Montezuma. The ambassadors entered Cortes' pavilion with great pomp, their attendants carrying censers which sent up clouds of incense. After saluting Cortes and his officers with much respect, touching the ground with their hands and then carrying them to their heads, they ordered their slaves to open the mats in which the presents were wrapped. There were shields, helmets, cuirasses em bossed with plates and ornaments of pure gold; collars and bracelets of gold, sandals, fans, head ornaments of
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different colored feathers intermingled with gold and silver threads, and sprinkled with pearls and precious stones, imitations of birds and animals in wrought and cast gold and silver of finest workmanship ; curtains, coverlets, and robes of cotton, fine as silk, of many colors, and interwoven with feather work. There were more than thirty loads of cotton cloth and a Spanish helmet that the messengers had carried to the capital was returned filled with grains of gold. But the things that most pleased the Spaniards were two circular plates of gold and silver as large as carriage wheels.1
Cortes and his followers were delighted with these presents but much disappointed with the message which Montezuma sent. He refused to see them and hoped that they would soon return to their own land. ^Cortes decided to found a colony. As the country around San Juan de Ulloa was low and marshy, he sent an exploring party to find a better location. A place was selected a little north of the present site of Vera Cruz. The foundations were laid and a govern ment was formed. The new city was called Villa Rica de Vera Cruz — "The Rich Town of the True Cross."
Now Cortes resigned his commission from Velasquez and was at once elected governor of his colony. He was to have for his own one-fifth of the gold and
1 Prescott's " Conquest of Mexico."
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silver which might thereafter be obtained from the natives by commerce or conquest. He sent his flag-ship to Spain with some of his friends to ask the favor of the king. ^ Fearing from the conduct of some of his followers that they might mutiny and return to Spain, he hit upon a bold plan to prevent such a calamity. One after another he had his ships scuttled and sunk, until but one was left. It was supposed, at first, that the storms had injured them and the worms had so eaten into the sides and bottoms that they were un- seaworthy ; but some of the discontented ones in camp found out that the ships had been purposely sunken and complained to Cortes. He asked them for whom but cowards was retreat necessary. "As for me, I have chosen my part. I will remain here while there is one to bear me company. If there be any so craven as to shrink from sharing the dangers of our glorious enter prise, let them go home, in God's name. There is still one vessel left. Let them take that and return to Cuba. They can tell there how they deserted their commander and their comrades, and patiently wait till we return loaded with the spoils of the Aztecs." 1 They all decided to stay with him. Then he suggested that, as this was the last ship, it might as well be destroyed ; all agreed and the vessel was destroyed at once. Then,
1 Prescott's " Conquest of Mexico."
HEKNANDO COKTES 193
with 450 men, many of them clad in mail, half a dozen small cannon, and fifteen horses, Cortes pushed on toward Tenochtitlan. Several hundred Indians, from the towns along the way, went with them.
Their progress was a peaceful one. "It was not enough that the Spanish soldier of that day was a bull dog for strength and courage, or that his armor was proof against stone and arrows, or that he wielded a Toledo blade that could cut through silken cushions, or that his arquebus and cannon were not only death-dealing weapons but objects of superstitious awe." l None of these things frightened the Indians so much as those unknown crea tures, those frightful monsters, the horses. Before them, men, women, and children fled in horror.^/ Their fear of the supernatural overcame their bravery. The horses be longed to the god, Quetzalcoatl, who had come back- to win his kingdom from the evil one. When Cortes threw down the idols from the temple and set free the victims held for sacrifice, the action seemed a natural one to the Indians, for Quetzalcoatl did not believe in human sacri fice. Then the cross which Cortes set up in place of the idols happened to be one of their god's emblems.
The Spaniards passed through many cities where they were treated with kindness. In one large city fifty men were sacrificed to them as deities and cakes dipped in the
1 Fiske's " Discovery of America."
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blood of the victims were offered them to eat. As the invaders went on, they climbed gradually to a great pla teau, the climate growing colder and the vegetation chang ing from tropical to that of the temperate zone. They finally reached Tlascala, one of the important towns upon the plateau of Anahuac, more than seven thousand feet above the level of the sea.
The Tlascalans were a powerful tribe and were enemies of Montezuma. Their stronghold was well fortified and the Aztecs had been unable to subdue them. When they heard of the approach of the strangers one chieftain ad vised his people to admit them, as they were doubtless gods and it would do no good to resist them. Another chief thought, however, so long as there was any doubt about the matter, it was worth while to fight. The num ber of the strangers was small and the men of Tlascala could not be defeated. This advice was taken and the warriors, some five thousand strong, went out to fight. The chief warriors wore quilted cotton doublets which protected the body, and some of the wealthier chiefs wore over this a sort of armor of thin gold or silver plate. Cloaks made of bright-colored feathers were often thrown over the armor, and a headpiece of wood or leather to represent the head of some wild animal protected the head and gave a fierce appearance to the wearer. The shields of the natives were frameworks of reeds or
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bamboo, covered with leather or quilted cotton and gayly decorated with feathers. They fought with slings, bows and arrows tipped with obsidian, lances with copper points, and wooden swords with sharp blades of obsidian inserted on both sides, making a dangerous weapon. The common people wore no armor and their bodies were painted with the colors of the chieftains that they followed.
For two days fierce fighting was carried on and many Indians were slain. One or two Spaniards were killed and several wounded. The deaths were carefully con cealed from the enemy. A horse that was killed was taken by the Tlascalans as a trophy. Cortes was afraid this would destroy the fear and awe the natives felt for the horses and had two others that were killed secretly buried. The Indian allies the Spaniards had gathered on their journey were of great service to them.
The Tlascalans now decided that the strangers were more than mortal but the chief who had advised war, after counsel with the soothsayers, suggested that as sun- gods, they might lose their strength at night and be more easily conquered. A night attack was planned but Cortes was not surprised. In the moonlight one of the sentinels saw the Indians stealthily creeping toward the camp. In a few moments the Spaniards were in arms. The battle-cry was sounded as they quickly ran down the
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hill to meet their foes. The Indians were so astounded that they fled, after one feeble volley of arrows, to their stronghold.
The next day a party of Tlascalans came to the Span ish camp with presents from their chief, who, they said, was tired of war and wished the friendship of the Span iards. Cortes received them kindly but their behavior made him suspicious and he finally arrested them as spies. They were sure that only gods could read men's thoughts and made a full confession. They were to watch things carefully and bring back a report. Some were to stay in camp and at a given signal set fire to it. Cortes waited until nightfall, then cut off the thumbs of the spies and sent them back to tell their chief that they would find the white man as strong by night as by day.
It was clear that it was useless to oppose these chil dren of the sun. The soothsayers who advised the night attack were sacrificed and the tribal council decided to make an alliance with these " wielders of thunder and lightning " against their old enemy, the Aztecs. The Aztecs were greatly alarmed by this alliance and were convinced that beings who could ^o easily defeat the Tlascalans must be more than human.
From Tlascala, Cortes went on to Cholula, a strong pueblo belonging to the Aztecs. Here they were re ceived with much friendliness and invited into the town.
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But secretly, and with the approval of Montezuma's emissaries, a plan was made for trapping the Spaniards. But with Cortes was a young Indian woman called Marina, from Tabasco, who not only understood the native languages but soon learned to speak Spanish. She was very fond of Cortes and aided him in every possible way. She had become the friend of one of the Cholulan women and this woman, wishing to save her new-found friend, hinted that danger was near. Marina told Cortes what she feared and together they discovered the whole plot. Cortes called the principal chiefs of Cholula together and told them that he intended to start next day for Tenochtitlan, and would like to have them furnish him a supply of food and a force of Cholulans to go with him. The chiefs were delighted with his plan, for they expected to surprise the Spaniards with a great force of men as they left the city and so destroy them. A large army of Mexicans was quartered a short distance from the city to assist the chiefs, and all sorts of obstruc tions had been placed in the streets to confuse the depart ing Spaniards. The natives thought the white men for once did not see everything.
Several three-year-old babes were sacrificed that day by the Cholulans and the signs were favorable for success. The chiefs spent the night in arranging their plans for getting rid of the strangers, while Cortes saw that his
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cannon were placed in a suitable position for raking the streets. In the morning the warriors crowded the square where the Spaniards were quartered, and the chiefs felt so safe that thirty or more accepted an invitation to meet Cortes in private and receive his parting blessing. When they were gathered together Cortes told them that he knew of their plot. He also knew that all had not favored it and these he would spare. He had heard that Montezuma approved of it, but he would not believe so wise a chief could be guilty of such a thing, and he would spare his emissaries. Then the noise of artillery, never before heard in Cholula, startled the waiting crowd. The warriors in the courtyard were mowed down like grain before the sickle. Those who attempted to escape by scaling the walls afforded a still better mark for the musket. The cannon cleared the streets of all who attempted to assist their friends, and the Tlascalan war riors who were camped outside the city rushed in to help in the slaughter. Hundreds were slain, including the head war chief. Some of the captured chiefs were burnt at the stake. Cortes found many victims caged for sacrifice. These he released and resumed his march.
As the army went on its way toward Tenochtitlan, they were met by the chiefs of some of the towns they passed, asking for help against the tyranny of the Aztecs. One of the towns, Cuitlahuac, was built upon the cause-
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way leading across the Lake of Chalco and reminded them of Venice. " It was built over the water, with canals for streets. Its floating gardens and its houses glistening in their stucco of white gypsum delighted the eye of the Spaniards." Crossing the causeway they reached, on the 7th of November, 1519, a point from which they could see Tenochtitlan. Diaz, a Spaniard with the party, says : " And when we beheld so many cities and towns rising up from the water, and other populous places situated on terra firma, and that cause way, straight as a level, which went into Mexico, we remained astonished, and said to one another that it appeared like the enchanted castles which they tell of in the book of Amadis, by reason of the great towers, temples, and edifices which there were in the water, and all of them work of masonry. Some of our soldiers asked if this that they saw was not a thing in a dream." ^ "The City of Mexico stood in a salt lake, and was approached by three causeways of solid masonry, each as the Spanish soldiers said, two lances in breadth, which might mean from twenty to thirty feet. Being from four to five miles in length, and assailable on both sides by the canoes of the city's defenders, they were very dangerous avenues for an enemy, whether advancing or retreating. Near the city these causeways were inter rupted by wooden drawbridges. Then they were con-
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tinned into the city as main thoroughfares, and met in the great square where the temple stood. The city was also connected with the mainland by an aqueduct in solid masonry leading down from Chapultepec. The streets might have reminded one of Venice, in so far as some were canals alive with canoes, while others were dry footpaths paved with hard cement, and the footways often crossed the canals on bridges."
The houses were built of stone, usually covered with a shining white stucco. They were large enough to afford living room for some two hundred families and were built about great courtyards. They were never more than two stories high and often only one. The flat roofs were sometimes covered with flower-gardens and were protected by parapets of stone, so that each house was a fortress. " The windows were mere loop-holes, and they as well as the doorways were open. The entrance to the house could be barricaded, but doors had not been invented. It was customary to carve upon the jambs, on either side of the doorway, enormous serpents with gaping mouths." 1
The partitions and ceilings of the houses were made of cedar and other fine woods. The rooms were decorated with tapestries made of the bright feathers of the many birds which were kept in an immense aviary for that pur-
1 Fiske's " Discovery of America."
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pose. Cardinal birds, parrots, humming-birds, and others of brilliant plumage were carefully looked after, and during the moulting season the feathers were collected for this gorgeous feather- work.
" Except a few small tables and stools, there was not much furniture. Palm-leaf mats piled on the hard cemented floor served as beds, and sometimes there were coverlets of cotton or feather-work. Resinous torches were used for lights. The principal meal of the day was served on low tables, the people sitting on mats or cushions in long rows around the sides of the room, with their backs against the wall. A lighted brazier stood in the middle, and before tasting the food each person threw a morsel into the brazier as an offering to the fire god. The commonest meat was the turkey." l
Loaves of bread were made of Indian corn and eggs, also little cakes baked on heated stones. The Aztecs had plenty of fresh fish and game. The meats were highly seasoned with tabasco and chile sauce. One Spaniard counted thirty dishes upon Montezuma's table made of stewed meats thus seasoned. " One favorite mess was frog spawn and stewed ants peppered with chile; another was human flesh cooked in like manner. . . . These viands were kept hot by means of chafing dishes and were served on earthenware bowls or plates, . , . chocolate,
1 Fiske's " Discovery of America."
202 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
flavored with vanilla, was the ordinary beverage. Food was handled with the fingers, but bowls of water and towels were brought in at the end of the meal." *
The people were dressed in garments of fine cotton. The men had long cloaks and ample sashes often em broidered with rich figures and edged with fringe. The women wore skirts with gay borders of embroidery and over them robes, reaching to the ankles. In cold weather robes of fur or of feather-work were worn. The faces were sometimes painted, and the teeth stained with cochineal. The hair was usually worn long. Bracelets and anklets were made of gold and silver, as well as rings for fingers, ears, and nose. These were worn by both men and women.
There were no shops in this pueblo, but two great market-places, where all the trading was carried on. Every fifth day there was a fair and the city was crowded with people who came not only from the neighborhood but from leagues around. Here could be seen, displayed for trade, foods, cloths, and jewels ; tools, weapons, and building materials; mats and stools, dye-stuffs and pottery, drugs, and razors made of obsidian. People from the country around brought their product in canoes or upon litters, — the only kind of wagon used. The ex changes were made partly by barter and partly with the
1 Fiske's " Discovery of America."
HERNANDO CORTES 20$
•>
currency of the country. This was bits of tin or copper shaped like the letter T, or little bags of cocoa seed, or quills filled with gold-dust.
V Near the principal market and in the centre of the pueblo was the great enclosure of the temple. Within a stone wall eight feet in height and entered by four gateways, were not fewer than twenty teocallis or pyramids, the largest of which was that of the war god. This pyramid was about 100 feet high and was built in five stories. The top of it was reached by stone stairs on the outside. The Spaniards counted 114 steps. The first flight went up to a terrace or platform at the base of the second story. Then it was necessary to walk around the platform to the other side to reach the second flight, which led to the third story. This construction was continued so that one had to pass around the building four times to reach the top. When the religious processions with their many priests and musicians marched round and round to the summit, the sight was an imposing one.
On the top was a broad platform paved with flat stones, and here was the large block of jasper where the human victim was laid for sacrifice. Here also were two towers in which the images of the gods were kept. Before each sanctuary stood an altar upon which burned an undying fire ; for if this fire should go out, great trouble would come to the Aztecs. " On these altars smoked fresh human
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hearts, of which the gods were fond, while other parts oi the body were prepared for the communal houses below. . . . The walls and floor of the great temple were clotted with blood and shreds of human flesh, and the snieli was like that of a slaughter house."
Early in November the white visitors entered this strange city and were politely received by Montezuma, not because he was glad to see them but because he could do nothing else. A great house near the temple was given them for their lodging. This house was large enough to hold the 450 Spaniards and 1000 or more of their Tlascalan allies. Cortes at once placed sentinels along the parapet and pat his cannon where they would be most effective.
When Cortes had been in the city for nearly a week, studying it and its people, he began to feel very uneasy about his position. How long he would enjoy the friend liness of Montezuma and his followers was uncertain. He finally decided to bring Montezuma to the Spanish quar ters and keep him where he could control his actions. As long as Montezuma was with the Spaniards, his people would hardly dare to attack them. As in other places Cortes had entered, there were here two parties, one bitterly opposed to the strangers. The priests of the evil god (Tezcatlipoca) hated these friends of the good god (Quet
1 Fiske's " Discovery of America."
206 PIONEEKS ON LAND AND SEA
zalcoatl) and would do all they could to destroy them. Cortes had noticed that in other towns the capture of a few chiefs seemed to paralyze the people. This was doubt less due to the fact that some religious rites were thought necessary that could not be performed without the help of the chief. With Montezuma in his charge he felt that the Spaniards would be reasonably safe from the dangers that surrounded them.
Cortes now looked for an excuse for carrying out his plan. This was soon found. A few Spaniards had been left at Yera Cruz. In a quarrel with an Aztec chief sev eral white men were killed, though the Spaniards were victorious. This was most unfortunate, as it was now known that the strangers were mortal. Cortes decided that this affair gave an excellent excuse for taking posses sion of Montezuma' s person. With five of his bravest men, all clad in armor, and Marina, his interpreter, he visited Montezuma. Some thirty of the soldiers were to follow in groups of three or four, that they might not attract attention. The party was received with kindness by Montezuma. As soon as the soldiers were assembled, Cortes stated the object of his visit. Of course, he said, he did not think Montezuma was guilty of the murder of the men at Vera Cruz, but until the matter was settled, he would like to have him transfer his residence to the house occupied by the Spaniards. Montezuma protested but
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was forced to return with his visitors. He was paid every mark of respect and the tribal council was allowed to meet with him to do public business. Sometimes he was allowed to visit the temple but on such occasions a large body of armed Spaniards went with him. Cortes was now acting governor of Tenochtitlan and its allied towns, with Montezuma as his mouthpiece.
When the offending chief was brought up from the coast by Montezuma' s order, Cortes had him, with several of his friends, burned in the public square before the Span iards' house. A plan for the release of Montezuma was made by his brother (Cuitlazhuatzin) and the tribal chiefs of Tezcuco and Tlacopan, but Cortes discovered it and soon had the chiefs in prison.
The custom of offering human sacrifices to their gods greatly shocked Cortes, " as men are wont to be shocked by any kind of wickedness with which they are unfamiliar." He took possession of one of the great pyramids, threw down the idols, cleansed the bloody altar, sprinkled it with holy water, then set up a crucifix and an image of the virgin. As the natives were still uncertain that this was not the desire of their sun god, they did not resent this action but watched with doubtful faces the service that followed.
The long winter passed quietly and it was April when picture-writing sent up from the coast gave alarming
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news. Narvaez, with 18 ships, and not fewer than 1200 soldiers, had been sent from Cuba by Velasquez, with orders to arrest Cortes.
Cortes wasted no time. He left Pedro de Alvarado with 150 men to take charge of Montezuma and Mexico. With the remaining 300 men he hurried to the coast, sur prised, defeated, and captured Narvaez, then persuaded the men to join his own army. With his increased force he marched back to Mexico. On his way he met messen gers from Alvarado with bad news. In May the Aztecs celebrated a great festival in honor of their war god. They assembled in the court of the temple, near the Spanish quarters, in gala dress, to the number of 600. Alvarado, fearing they were planning an attack, surprised them in the midst of their dance and killed them all. Among them were many chiefs and the warriors belonged to families of note. The Aztecs were at once aroused and attacked the Spaniards with fury. Montezuma was com pelled to go out upon the roof and quiet the outbreak. The Spaniards were besieged in their fortress and the brigantines built by Cortes to use in time of danger were Burned on the lake.
When Cortes entered the city on the 24th of June, he found the streets deserted, the markets closed, and many of the drawbridges raised. But few Indians were to be seen. When he met Alvarado, Cortes told him that his
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conduct was that of a madman ; but it was now the turn of Cortes to make a mistake. Montezuma's brother, who stood next in line of succession, was the prisoner of Cortes, who did not understand the danger of letting him out. There was not food enough in the fortress for the larger army and Cortes sent this brother to order the mar kets opened. Some say that Montezuma suggested this plan. This at once brought matters to a crisis. The brother called together the tribal council, which instantly deposed Montezuma and elected him in his place.
Early next morning came the outbreak. From the parapet surrounding the enclosure, the Spaniards could see every avenue leading toward them black with the masses of warriors, while every pyramid and flat house top was swarming with the enemy. They attacked with arrows, slings, and javelins, and many Spaniards were killed or wounded. The Spanish cannon swept the streets with terrible effect but the Indians pressed on under the very muzzles of the guns. They shot burning arrows into the fort and some of the woodwork caught fire. The besieged had but little water with which to put out the flames and part of the wall was torn down to check the fire. The breach was protected by heavy guns and a constant fire was kept up through the open ing. At Cortes' direction Montezuma appeared upon the parapet and tried to quiet the people but he found his
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power was ended. Stones and darts were hurled at him ; he was struck down by a heavy stone and died a few days afterward.
Before Montezuma's death and after several days' fighting, Cortes, with three hundred chosen men, made a sortie and after a terrific fight drove the enemy from the temple that overlooked the Spaniards' quarters. From this temple the enemy had sent such a volley of stones and arrows that the Spaniards could not for a moment leave their defences. Reaching the summit of the temple, the Spaniards hurled the idols among the people and burned the bloody shrines.
It was the last day of June that Montezurna died and on the evening of the next day, fearing lest his army should be blockaded and starved, Cortes left the city. The Aztecs did not fight at night and the Spaniards hoped that the causeway might be crossed before their plan was discovered. All the treasure that had been collected was brought out and the soldiers were allowed to help themselves, after the share belonging to the crown had been placed in charge of careful officers.
The night was cloudy and a drizzling rain was falling. The troops marched through quiet and deserted streets till they reached the great causeway leading to Tlacopan. Its three drawbridges had all been destroyed but the Spaniards had made a portable bridge which was placed
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across the breach. The Spaniards started across. Before they had all crossed this narrow passage the splashing of many oars was heard through the darkness. Then came a few stones and arrows, striking at random among the hurrying troops. They fell every moment faster and more furious and the lake seemed to be swarming with warriors. The Spaniards pushed on as rapidly as possible anxious to make their escape. When the natives climbed up the sides of the causeway and broke into their ranks, the horsemen shook them off and rode over them, while the men on foot with their swords or the butts of their pieces drove them headlong into the water. When the head of the long column reached the second opening in the causeway, the rear had not yet crossed the first. Here a pause was necessary and the suffering from arrows of the enemy was intense. Repeated messages were sent to the rear for the portable bridge. When, finally, all had crossed, an attempt was made to lift the bridge to send it to the front, but it stuck fast to the sides of the dike and could not be raised. As this news was passed from man to man and its meaning understood, a cry of despair arose, which for a moment drowned all noise of the con flict. All means of retreat were cut off. Order was at an end. Each thought only of his own life. Some suc ceeded in swimming their horses across. Others failed and rolled headlong with their steeds into the lake. The
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infantry followed pell-mell, falling one upon the other, and frequently pierced by the shafts, or struck down by the war clubs of the Aztecs. The struggle was long and deadly. The warriors, running their canoes alongside, leaped upon the land and grappled the enemy until both rolled down the side of the causeway together.
In time the opening in the causeway was filled with the wreckage of the ammunition wagons, heavy guns, bales of rich stuffs, chests of gold, and bodies of men and horses. Over this dismal ruin a passage was formed and those in the rear passed over to the other side. Then all pressed forward to the last opening. It was wide and deep but not so thickly beset by the enemy. Cortes, who it is said had reached the place through the water, tried to encourage his men to pass. The cavaliers again set the example by plunging into the water. Horse and foot followed as they could, some swimming, others clinging to the manes and tails of the struggling animals. Cortes, with a few of his faithful friends, still kept in advance. As morning dawned the remnant of the army reached land. This terrible night has ever since been known in history as la noche triste, or the melancholy night. Cortes had started the evening before with 1250 Spaniards, 6000 Tlascalans, and 80 horses. Next morning, after reaching land, he had 500 Spaniards, 2000 Tlascalans, and 20 horses. All
HERNANDO CORTES 213
his cannon were sunk in the lake. Then Cortes sat down upon a rock and wept.
But Cortes did not give up his purpose of taking Mexico. In a few days the Indians from that and neigh boring pueblos attacked him, hoping to destroy his army, but he won a decided victory. This was fortunate, for the Tlascalans, almost persuaded by Aztec envoys, were talking of deserting Cortes. After this victory they de cided to keep up their alliance with him. During the autumn Cortes had many encounters with the smaller pueblos, defeating those that resisted him and making alliances with the enemies of Tenochtitlan. " Cortes now found ships useful. Taking some of those that had come with Narvaez, he sent them to Hispaniola for horses, cannon, and soldiers. By Christmas eve he found himself at the head of a thoroughly equipped army of TOO infantry armed with pikes and crossbows, 118 arquebusiers, 86 cavalry, a dozen cannon, and several thousand Indian allies." l
Starting at Christmas on his final march against the mighty pueblo, Cortes first went to Tezcuco. There had been quarrels among chiefs of the Aztec confederacy and the new war chief of Tezcuco, being offended with the pueblo across the lake, admitted Cortes into his town and entertained him hospitably. This move placed all the
1 Fiske's " Discovery of America."
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warriors of Tezcuco at the command of Cortes and made it possible for him to build a new fleet of brigantines on the lake. Meanwhile, smallpox had carried off Cuitlaz- huatzin and his nephew was now " chief of men." He was a brave warrior and made a gallant defence of his city. " For ferocious courage the Aztecs were not sur passed by any other Indians on the continent, and when Cortes at length began the siege of Mexico, April 28, 1521, the fighting that ensued was incessant and terrible. The fresh-water supply was soon cut off, and then slowly but surely the besiegers upon the three causeways and in the brigantines closed in upon their prey. Points of advan tage were sometimes lost by the Aztecs through their excessive anxiety to capture Spaniards alive. Occasion ally they succeeded, and then from the top of the great pyramid would resound the awful tones of the sacrificial drum made of serpent skins, a sound that could be heard in every quarter of this horrible city ; and the souls of the soldiers sickened as they saw their wretched comrades dragged up the long staircase, to be offered as sacrifices to Satan. ... At last resistance came to an end. Canals and footways were choked with corpses, and a great part of the city lay in ruins." 1
When the conquerors entered the city, their first work was to cleanse and rebuild. Mexico soon looked like a
1 Fiske's " Discovery of America."
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Spanish town. Where the heathen temple had stood, a Gothic church was built. This was replaced in 1573 by the cathedral which still stands there. The palace of Cortes was built of hewn stone, and seven thousand cedar beams are said to have been used for the interior.
Cortes also had a strong fortress built. When it was finished, he found himself in need of artillery and ammu nition. His enemies in Spain prevented the sending of supplies, so he had cannon cast in his own foundries, made of the copper which was common in Mexico and of tin which came from more distant mines. With these and a few brought from the ships, he soon had the walls mounted with seventy pieces of ordnance. Stone balls were used for the cannon. Nitre for making powder was easily found and sulphur was brought from the crater of a volcano.
To bring inhabitants to the city, Cortes made liberal grants of land and houses to the Spaniards. About two thousand Spanish families settled in the City of Mexico, besides three thousand native families. The natives were allowed to live under their own chiefs and given many privileges. Markets were established, displaying all the different products and manufactures of the surrounding country. Colonies were made in different parts of the country. A system of slavery was thought necessary to secure workmen. The Tlascalans, in gratitude for their
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services, were not enslaved. In order to encourage agri culture Cortes asked that all vessels coming over from Spain should bring seeds and plants. Under the sun of the tropics, the peach, the almond, the orange, the vine, and the olive, before unknown there, flourished in the gardens of the table-land.
Cortes did not give up the idea of further discovery and conquest. It was very desirable that a strait should be found connecting the two oceans. He was fitting out a fleet on the Pacific coast to explore the shore of that great sea, but, when nearly completed, it was burned in the dockyards. Cortez at once began to repair the loss. He writes to the emperor that another squadron will soon be got ready at the same port, and "he doubts not will put his Majesty in possession of more lands and kingdoms than the nation has ever heard of." Cortes wrote further to Charles V, "Your Majesty may be assured, that, as I know how much you have at heart the discovery of this great secret of a strait, I shall postpone all interests and projects of rny own, some of them of the highest moment, for the fulfilment of this great object."
For this purpose a fleet was sent along the eastern coast under the command of Olid, one of Cortes' brave officers. He was to plant a colony on the northern coast of Hon duras and explore the coast farther south. Hearing that Olid was acting too independently, Cortes sent a trusty
HERNANDO CORTES 217
Kinsman to arrest him. Not getting any news for a long time, Cortes left the City of Mexico in the hands of men chosen by him, marched south, and for nearly two years wandered through mountains and swamps, building bridges and suffering extreme hardships, till he reached the settlement and took charge of it.
When Cortes left the City of Mexico, he had placed the management of his colonies in the hands of several men. Soon after his departure quarrels arose among those left in charge. Tidings were received that Cortes and his men had perished in the -swamps. This news was readily believed and after proclaiming his death and performing funeral ceremonies in his honor, the members of the gov ernment took possession of his property and that of others engaged in the expedition.
On arriving at the southern settlement, Cortes gave up all thought of further conquest and .soon embarked for home. He was delayed by storms and sickness and it was not until the 16th of May, 1526, that he reached San Juan de Ulloa. He hurried on to the capital ; his prog ress was a triumphal procession amid public rejoicing. His entrance to the city was made in great state. It was nearly two years since Cortes had left Mexico and he was welcomed back as one who had risen from the dead.
His triumph did not last long. In July he heard that his enemies had been busy at court and that he was to be
218 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
removed from his office while an examination was made of his conduct of affairs. The bishop, Fonseca, who had been Columbus's enemy, had listened to the complaints of Velasquez and others who were envious of Cortes' success, and was doing all he could to disgrace him. Cortes was accused of secreting the treasures of Montezuma and of using for himself gold which belonged to the crown. The Mexicans, during the siege, had destroyed, buried, or thrown into the lake, everything possible, and the Span iards were greatly disappointed upon entering the city to find so little of value left. Even then the discontented had hinted that Cortes had more than his share and their complaints soon reached his enemies at court. He was accused also of making false reports of the provinces he had conquered, so that he might defraud the government of its lawful revenues. He had given offices to his fa vorites and had fortified the capital and his own palace so that he might at any time throw off his allegiance to Spain and declare himself an independent sovereign in New Spain.
Before receiving a summons from the king requiring him to return, Cortes had decided to go to Spain to ask justice of the king. After a brief and prosperous voy age he entered the little port of Valos in May, 1528. His return seemed to remove the prejudices against him and he was shown great honors.
HERNANDO CORTES 219
With him Cortes had brought several Aztec and Tlasca- ]an chiefs, among them a son of Montezuma. He had also a large collection of plants and minerals, as specimens of the natural resources of the country, several wild ani mals and birds of gaudy plumage, various fabrics of deli cate workmanship, especially the gorgeous feather-work, and lastly a rich treasure of jewels, gold, and silver. After some delay he reached Toledo, where he was ad mitted to an audience by the emperor. The emperor re ceived him kindly and asked him many questions about the country he had conquered. He seemed pleased with the answers and consulted Cortes on the best mode of governing the new colonies. Several important changes were made according to Cortes' advice.
In July, 1529, the emperor made Cortes Marquis of the Valley of Oaxaca and granted him a vast tract of land in the province, together with large estates in the City of Mexico. This grant was made because of his services to the crown and because it is " the duty of princes to honor and reward those who serve them well and loyally, in order that the memory of their great deeds should be per petuated, and others be incited by their example to the performance of the like illustrious exploits." Though willing to show Cortes these honors the emperor refused to reinstate him as governor. He did, however, make him Captain General of New Spain and the South Sea,
220 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
He encouraged him to make further discoveries and prom ised him that he should be governor of any new countries that he might find. In the spring of 1530 Cortes em barked for New Spain. With him he took his bride, the young and beautiful daughter of one of the nobles who had been his friend at court. To her he gave a beautiful jewel of five emeralds, of wonderful size and brilliancy, doubtless a part of the treasure of Montezuma that had escaped the wreck of "the melancholy night." For a while after reaching his estates he devoted himself to their cul tivation, but this did not long content his restless and adventurous spirit. In the years 1532 and 1533 Cortes fitted out two squadrons that were sent on a voyage of discovery to the northwest. The peninsula of California was reached by one of these squadrons and a landing made on its southern point. In 1539 another expedition sent out by him went to the head of the Gulf of California, then doubling the peninsula, followed the coast as far north as the twenty-eighth or twenty-ninth degree of latitude.
Cortes now decided to fit out another expedition for the purpose of seeking a country in the north, where it was said great gold-fields existed. But Mendoza, who at this time controlled affairs in New Spain, wanted the glory of this discovery for himself and objected to Cortes' plan. Cortes decided to go again to Spain for justice. In 1540, with his eight-year-old son and heir, Don Martin, he
HERNANDO CORTES 221
sailed for his native land. Keaching the capital, he found the emperor absent from the country. Although he was kindly received, nothing was done to right his wrongs. After waiting a year Cortes joined an expedition against Algiers. To his disgust nothing was accomplished in this attack upon the Corsairs. During a storm the ves sel in which he and his son had embarked was wrecked and their lives were saved by swimming. At this time the valuable jewels he carried with him were lost, — "a loss," says an old writer, " that made the expedition fall more heavily on the Marquis of the Valley than on any other man in the kingdom except the emperor."
After the expedition returned to Castile, Cortes lost no time in laying his case before the emperor. But the em peror received him coldly. Cortes was growing old and was not likely to be of future service to the country. His undertakings, since his former visit, had been singularly unfortunate. Then Peru was returning so much more wealth from her gold mines than had as yet come from the mines of Mexico that his former successes did not seem so wonderful. In vain Cortes wrote to the emperor asking for attention to bis suit. After three years of weary waiting he decided to return to Mexico. With his son he had gone as far as Seville when he fell ill of indigestion, caused, probably, by mental trouble. He sank rapidly, and on the 2d of December, 1547, he died.
CHAPTER X
PONCE DE LEON
PONCE DE LEON came with Columbus on the latter's second voyage to America. He served as a soldier in Cuba and other parts of the West Indies and was deemed worthy to be put in charge of the conquest of Porto Rico. He had been many years among the beautiful islands of the West and was growing old. Rumors came to him of a marvellous land of wealth lying to the north, where gold and treasures were in plenty, — a land of lakes and rivers, among whose glades was a spring fabled to possess the power of making an old man young again.
In the year 1512 the king of Spain gave to Ponce de Leon the right " to proceed to discover and settle the Island of Bimini." This was a name given by the Ind ians to a large tract of land which they said lay to the north of them, upon which the fountain of youth was to be found. Some trouble with the Indians in Porto Rico delayed Ponce de Leon for a time, and it was not until March, 1513, that he sailed from Porto Rico with three vessels in search of this land of promise. He first sailed among the groups of the Bahama Islands, searching for
222
PONCE DE LEON
223
the Island of Bimini ; but not finding an island that ful filled his hopes, he turned toward the northwest across the narrow seas separating him from a larger land. " One Sunday, the 27th of March, 1513, he sighted an unknown, low-lying coast. It was covered with a heavy growth of rich foliage, and flowering vines, even at this early season, spread themselves over and among the trees, and the whole land was full of beauty and fra grance. He happened to sight the land on Easter Sun day, called in Spanish Pascua Florida, and named it Florida.
Sailing slowly up the coast, on the 2d of April he landed (in latitude 30° 8',ja little above St. Augustine. As usual, he planted a cross and went through the ceremony of claiming all the land for his king, spreading the Spanish flag to the breeze and promising obedience.
After this ceremony the vessels sailed south ward. They followed ROUTE OF PONCE DE LEON
the coast until the 20th of April, then landed. When the vessels tried to sail away again, they met with so strong a current that they could not go on and
224 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
were forced to anchor. One of the vessels was driven out of sight. Landing as soon as possible, the Spaniards found the natives so unfriendly that they had to drive them away. Finally getting away from this point, they sailed around the southern part of Florida and along the western coast as far north as Tampa Bay and possibly farther.
During this time Ponce de Leon made several trips inland. But on account of its flat and swampy char acter the country was not easily surveyed. The thickets of woods and vines and the oozy marshlands made it hard to get about and there was no sign of cities or of a wealthy kingdom. The fabled spring did not appear at all. The people dwelling in this new country showed themselves fierce and unfriendly. In fact they were quite dangerous and the Spaniards had constantly to be on guard against them.
It was September when Ponce de Leon again reached Porto Rico. It is said that while among the Bahamas he sent a ship under one of his captains and his pilot, who as a boy had sailed with Columbus, to look still further for Bimini; and these people when they came back thought they had found the island but they did not find the fountain of youth.
Ponce de Leon was so well pleased with his discovery that he soon after went to Spain to tell the king of the
PONCE DE LEON
225
beautiful country he had found, and to get permission to conquer and settle it. His request was granted and he was appointed governor of the new colonies. After he had subdued the Caribs who were making trouble at that time, he was to take the vessels and men used in that service to help in the conquest and settlement of " the Island of Bimini and the Island of Florida." But the Carib war lasted much longer than was ex pected and Ponce de Leon was kept busy for a number
EARLY SPANISH SETTLEMENT IN FLORIDA
of years before he could prepare for his second visit to Florida. In the meantime several exploring trips had been made by various Spaniards along both the east and west coasts of Florida, and it had been found that Florida is not an island, but a large region of country which might contain in the interior the rich kingdoms of
226 PIONKKKS ON LAM) AND SEA
which the Spaniards had heard. Cortes had lately dis covered a rich empire in Mexico and Ponce De Leon, though getting quite old, thought he might still conquer such a kingdom and leave a great name.
It was in February, 1521, that Ponce de Leon at last set out for his province. "He went prepared to settle, carrying clergymen for the colonists, friars to found Indian missions, and horses, cattle, sheep, and swine." After enduring severe storms, he landed again on the east coast and had himself proclaimed its master. But the fierce tribes had no disposition to acknowledge his authority. They attacked his company with such bold ness and success that they killed many Spaniards and even wounded the governor himself. Discouraged by this hostility of the natives and suffering severely with his wound, the old man decided to abandon the attempt. He sailed back to Cuba where, sick and heartbroken, he soon afterward died. His son inherited his rights but made no attempt to take possession of them by conquer ing Florida.
1 Winsor's '< Narrative and Critical History of America," Vol. II, p. 236.
CHAPTER XI
-
GEORGE WASHINGTON*
George Washington was born, in the year 1732, ms father, Augustine Washington, was living on a plantation near the Poto mac River. Soon after this time the house in which the father lived was burnt and he moved with his family to another planta tion, on the Rappahannock River, and here George Washington lived until he was eleven years old.
In those days there were no large towns in Virginia. The people lived on great
MONUMENT AT WAKKFIELD MARKING
plantations along the rivers THE BIRTHPLACE OF GEORGE
where boats could easily WASHINGTON
reach them, for travelling through the new country was
very difficult except by water. The owners of these
1 Authorities : Scudder's "George Washington;" living's "Life of Washington."
227
228 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
plantations grew tobacco, which was in great demand in England. The country was covered with trees which had to be cut down to make room for the tobacco fields. A traveller could tell when he was approaching a planta tion by these clearings, or by the dead trees which had been girdled so that they might be cut away to clear ground for new fields. The fields were surrounded by tall rail fences which could be easily moved when the field was made larger.
The house of the planter was usually a long two-story building with a broad veranda in front and a huge chimney built upon the outside at each end. The halls and rooms were large and were simply furnished. To keep the house cool in the summer the kitchen was built at some distance from it. The owner of the plantation was usually an Englishman who kept up in America as nearly as possible the customs of an English country house.
Not far from the house one could see what looked like a small village. A great many people were needed to work the tobacco fields. The plants while growing had to be pruned once a week and a worm which ate the plant had to be picked from it. The planter found it very convenient to keep negro slaves to do the work of the plantation, and these slaves lived in the small huts near the master's house.
GEORGE WASHINGTON 229
As there were no markets where the planter could buy the things necessary to farm with and to provide for so large a household, each plantation furnished its own supplies. There were workshops where the negro carpenters, smiths, shoemakers, and tailors worked ; smoke-houses where meat was smoked and hams cured. Down by a brook would be found a spring-house where milk and butter and eggs were kept cool in buckets standing in running water. There were also large wooden buildings where the tobacco was hung upon poles to dry in the sun and air ; and there were mills for grinding wheat and Indian corn, of which large fields were cultivated for the use of the family and the negro slaves. The good furniture, silver, china, wines, and clothing were brought over from England in the ships that carried back the tobacco in exchange.
Although the owner of the plantation kept- an over seer to look after the negroes and the work planned for them, he was by no means an idle man. He spent much of his time riding about his plantation seeing that the work was well done and what improvements could be made. Then his accounts must be looked after and that meant no light task in so large a household. His stock took much care, for he always had many fine horses in his stables and each planter was anxious to have the best. Good dogs were kept for the hunt,
230 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
which not only was a favorite amusement, but added much to the household stores, for the woods abounded with deer and other game.
Amid such surroundings George Washington lived much of his life. As a child he went to school to a man named Hobby, who was sexton of the parish church. Here he learned to read, write, and cipher. Among his playmates was a boy named Richard Henry Lee, who wrote to him when the boys were about nine years old:
" Richard Henry Lee to George Washington: " Pa brought me two pretty books full of pictures he got them in Alexandria they have pictures of dogs and cats and tigers and elefants and ever so many pretty things cousin bids me send you one of them it has a picture of an elefent and a little Indian boy on his back like uncle jo's sam pa says if I learn my tasks good he will let uncle jo bring me to see you will you ask your ma to let you come to see me.
" RICHARD HENRY LEE."
" George Washington to Richard Henry Lee : " Dear Dickey, I thank you very much for the pretty picture-book you gave me. Sam asked me to show him the pictures and I showed him all the pictures in it; and I read to him how the tame elephant took care of the master's little boy, and put him on his back and
GEORGE WASHINGTON 231
would not let anybody touch his master's little son. T can read three or four pages sometimes without missing a word. Ma says I may go to see you, and stay all day with you next week if it be not rainy. She says I may ride my pony Hero if Uncle Ben will go with me and lead Hero. I have a little piece of poetry about the picture book you gave me, but I mustn't tell you who wrote the poetry.
" G. W.'s compliments to E. H. L., And he likes his book full well, Henceforth will count him his friend, And hopes many happy days he may spend.
" Your good friend,
" GEORGE WASHINGTON.
" I am going to get a whip top soon, and you may see it and whip it."
" Kichard Henry Lee's letter was probably sent just as it was written, but George Washington's letter looks as if it had been corrected by a careful mother or teacher, and copied before it -was sent."1
When George Washington was eleven years old his father died and he was left to his mother's care. She was a woman well able to care for herself and her chil dren. Her son was like her in many ways. From her
1 Scudder's " George Washington."
232 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
he got his high temper and from her he learned to con trol it. She taught him many useful things and gave him many excellent rules to guide him ; but she herself, honest, high-spirited, and truthful, helped the boy more than the rules she gave him.
There is a story told of George Washington's boy hood that shows the character of both mother and son. The father had kept many fine horses. The mother was anxious to keep the stock pure and took much in terest in their care. Among them were several colts that were not yet broken. - One of them, a " sorrel," was thought to be very vicious. One morning George Washington, with several other boys, went out to the pasture to see these colts. Washington told the boys that he would ride the sorrel if they would help him to catch it. They soon surrounded the colt and suc ceeded in getting the bit into its mouth. Washington mounted and away the angry animal went. It made every possible effort to throw its burden but the rider kept his seat, never once losing his control of the ani mal nor of himself. Suddenly, as if determined to rid itself of its rider, the colt sprang into the air with a great bound. The effort broke a blood-vessel and it dropped dead.
The boys were frightened and when at breakfast the mother, knowing that they had been in the field, began
GEORGE WASHINGTON 233
to ask after her stock, no one liked to speak. She repeated her question. "Have you seen my blooded colts in your rambles ? I hope they are well taken care of. My favorite, I am told, is as large as his sire."
"The sorrel is dead, madam," said her son. "I killed him." Then he told all that had happened that morning. The mother, upon hearing the adventure, flushed with anger, but controlling herself, said quietly, " It is well ; but while I regret the loss of my favorite, I rejoice in my son who always speaks the truth." l
George Washington was a strong, active boy, fond of outdoor sports. He took an active part in the games that were common then, — he pitched heavy bars, tossed quoits, ran, leaped, and wrestled. His playmates used to show- the place by the Rappahannock, near Fred- ericksburg, where he stood and threw a stone to the opposite bank. At the Natural Bridge in Virginia, they always tell that George Washington threw a stone to the top of the arch, which is two hundred feet high. One of the favorite games was war, for the boys heard much of the wars with France and of the fights with the Indians. As George Washington was a generous, fair- minded boy, he was often chosen leader in the sports. He formed a military company, which he drilled with care. From his brother, Lawrence, who had joined the
1 Scudder's " George Washington.1'
234 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
British army in the West Indies for a time, he learned much of military tactics and used his knowledge in training his comrades at school.
This brother, Lawrence, had been sent to England to school when George was very young. When he came back George was seven or eight years old and learned many things from the big brother who had been to England.
Soon after the father's death the elder brothers, Law rence and Augustine, married. Lawrence took the estate upon the Potomac, left him by his father, and named it Mount Yernon for the Admiral Yernon under whom he had served in the wars in the West Indies. Augustine took the estate at Bridges Creek and here Washington spent some time in school, as the teacher was better than the one at home. His education was plain and practical. His manuscript school-books still exist and are models of neatness and accuracy. Before he was thirteen years of age, he had copied into a volume forms of all kinds of mercantile and legal papers, bills of ex change, notes of hand, deeds, bonds, and the like.
At Mount Yernon George Washington was always a welcome visitor. He admired his brother Lawrence and, doubtless, tried to imitate him in many ways. Here he heard much about the wars, for Lawrence Washing ton had many of his soldier friends for guests, after he
GEOKGE
left the army. George decided that he would be a soldier. As he was too young for the army, being only fifteen, his brother got him a place in the navy as midshipman. When his luggage was packed and he was ready to board a man-of-war anchored in the Potomac, his mother decided that she could not let her boy go to sea. So the plan was given up and George
AN OLD VIEW OF MOUNT VERNON
went back to school for another year. He spent much of this year studying surveying. In a new country where the land is to be divided among the settlers, sur veying is an important occupation. It requires exact ness, a love of order, and much outdoor work, and George Washington found it very attractive. As it would be six years before he could come into the prop erty left him by his father and managed by his mother,
236 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
he was glad to have something to do that would bring him in money. So he studied geometry and trigonome try; he made calculations and he surveyed all the fields about the schoolhouse, plotting them and setting down everything with great exactness.
Near Mount Vernon lived William Fairfax, the father of Anne, the wife of Lawrence Washington. He was a man of education and wealth and fond of society. His house was more richly furnished than those of most of the Virginia planters. The floors were cov ered with carpets and the rooms were lighted with wax candles. Servants in livery moved about to wait on the guests and Virginia ladies were fond of visiting there.
George Washington, coming to visit his brother Law rence, was often a guest there. He was fifteen years old when first thrown into this gay society. He was a reserved, shy, awkward schoolboy, but was so tall, large-limbed, and serious that he seemed much older than he really was. He took his place among the men in sports and hunting. The ladies all liked the tall, thoughtful boy. It may be that for guidance in this society Washington wrote out the " Rules of Civility and Decent Behavior in Company and Conversation," found in one of his manuscript books. There are in all 110 rules. A few will show what was expected of boys in those days.
GEORGE WASHINGTON 237
" Every action in company ought to be with some sign of respect to those present. When you meet with one of greater quality than yourself, stop and retire, especially if it be at a door or any strait place, to give room to him to pass."
u Think before you speak ; pronounce not imperfectly nor bring out your words too hastily, but orderly and distinctly."
"Speak not evil of the absent, for it is unjust."
" Make no show of taking great delight in your vict uals, feed not with greediness, cut your bread with ?, knife; lean not on the table; neither find fault with what you eat."
"Let your recreations be manful, not sinful."
Here in Virginia George Washington met Lord Fairfax, who was sixty years old, and who had come out to rest in the wilderness after he had grown tired of the gay life in England. He liked the free out-of-door life and the excitement of the hunt. Between him and the tall, grave lad who rode and hunted so well, grew up a strong friendship.
Neither Lord Fairfax* nor his cousin William knew the extent of the land each owned beyond the Blue Ridge. They decided to have it surveyed and gave the task to their young friend, George Washington. George Fairfax, the son of William Fairfax, was at the head
238 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
of the expedition sent out. He was six years older than Washington but the two were warm friends.
Just a month after George Washington's sixteenth birthday, in March, 1748, the two young men set out on their errand. On horseback they crossed the Blue Ridge by Ashby's Gap and entered the Shenandoah Valley. They followed the Shenandoah to its junction with the Potomac and then ascended that river and went some seventy miles up the South Branch, return ing over the mountains. They had plenty of adventure. They camped out in the wildest storms, swam their horses over swollen streams, and shot deer and wild tur keys which they cooked upon forked sticks held over the fire. Chips of wood were used for dishes. At one time their tent was blown down ; at another they were driven out of it by smoke. One night the straw upon which Washington was sleeping caught fire and he was awakened by a companion just in time to escape a scorching. At one place the travellers saw a party of thirty Indians, who had been on the war-path, come in. "We had some liquor with us," Washington says, "of which we gave them a part. This elevating their spirits, put them in the humor of dancing." So they had a grand war-dance. Their music consisted of two pieces, — a pot half full of water, over which a deerskin was stretched, and a gourd with some shot in it used as a rattle.
'/ut<C <rf* ?n-*"t«
OPENING PAGE OF WASHINGTON'S JOURNAL OF HIS JOURNEY OVER THB
MOUNTAINS
240 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
The work lasted more than a month. It was cold and stormy much of the time and the young Virginian felt many discomforts. But he was glad to earn his own living. He was paid according to the amount of work he did and sometimes earned as much as $20 a day. His work was so well done that soon after his return the governor of Virginia made him public surveyor. This meant that his surveys were to be recorded and to stand as authority when lands were bought and sold. It was necessary that the work should be carefully done. People soon found that the young surveyor made no mistakes, and he had all the work he could do.
For three years he carried on this work, spending much of his time in the wilderness where he became well acquainted with the rough life of the backwoods men, and learned much of the habits of the Indians. During the winter months, when it was too cold to work out of doors, he visited his mother and friends or read the books of his friend, Lord Fairfax.
While most of the English lived east of the Alle- ghany Mountains, a few had explored the land west of the mountains, had hunted and traded with the Indians along the valley of the Ohio River, and de cided that it would be well for the English to possess the land and the friendship of the Indians. The
GEORGE WASHINGTON 241
French who lived along the St. Lawrence had made friends of the northern tribes and of those along the Mississippi, and had tried to gain the good-will of those tribes who lived along the Ohio. They claimed this country because they had explored the Mississippi and they said that all the land along this river and its tributaries belonged to them. The English said all the country between the Mississippi River and the Atlantic Ocean was theirs because they had conquered the Ind ians that owned it, and these Indians had granted them the land upon the payment of ,£400. A number of men, among them Washington's two brothers, got a grant from the king, giving them the country along the Ohio and its tributaries for settlement and to carry on trade with the Indians.
The French paid no attention to the claims of the British and took possession of the country in the name of their king. The English soon saw that they would have to settle the dispute by war and began to form companies and train men for service. Lawrence Wash ington was not well enough to take an active part in the preparation for war, but through his influence his brother George was made military commander of one of the districts into which the colony was divided. His duty was to bring the men together and train them for service. He himself took lessons in the art
242 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
of war from an old friend of his brother. He read books upon military tactics and took lessons in fencing from another friend, a Dutchman named Von Braam.
The French, with their Indian allies, still claimed the valley of the Ohio and built a chain of forts from the Mississippi to Lake Erie. The governor of Vir ginia decided to send a message to the commander of a French fort on Lake Erie, stating the English claim and asking the French to leave the country belonging to the English. The way to Lake Erie was a long and dangerous one and it was important that the man sent on this mission should be strong, brave, and skilled in woodcraft. It was decided that George Washington, though he was only twenty-one years old, was the most suitable person to send and the commission was given to him.
Washington left Williamsburg on the thirteenth, day of October. He stopped at Fredericksburg for his friend, Von Braam, who was to act as his interpreter. Wash ington knew no French, while his old master of fencing claimed to know it well, and it was not until later that Washington found that he knew neither French nor English very well. At Alexandria Washington laid in the necessary supplies for such a journey ; and at Winchester, on the frontier, he provided himself with horses and tents. At Wills Creek, now Cumberland, in
GEORGE WASHINGTON 24o
Maryland, he was joined by Christopher Gist, an ex perienced woodsman, an Indian interpreter, and four frontiersmen. On the 15th of November the party started for Logstown, an Indian village not far from the present site of Pittsburg. Here they met several Indian chiefs, who promised their friendship and gave an escort to the French fort. The weather was bad and they suffered many delays but finally reached the fort. Here Washington was politely received, and after some delay an answer was given him to return to the governor of Virginia, and his party started home.
The horses had grown so weak with the hard journey and lack of food that they carried only the necessary sup plies while Washington and his men walked. So slowly did they travel that Washington and Gist decided to go on alone across the country the shortest way to Virginia. An Indian guide who started with them fired upon them soon after they left the path. They pretended to think the firing was an accident but sent the Indian home that night. Fearing that he would rally his friends and pursue them, they walked all night and the next day, reaching the Ohio River at dark. Here they rested over night.
They had expected to find the river frozen over but it was frozen only near the shore, while the centre was full of great blocks of floating ice. " There was no way of
244 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
getting over," says Washington in his journal, " but on a raft, which we set about, with but one poor hatchet, and finished just after sun-setting. This was a whole day's work ; we next got it launched, then went on board of it, and set off; but before we were halfway over, we were jammed in the ice in such a manner that we expected every moment our raft to sink and ourselves to perish. I put out my setting-pole to try to stop the raft, that the ice might pass by, when the rapidity of the stream threw it with so much violence against the pole that it jerked me out into ten feet of water ; but I fortunately saved my self by catching hold of one of the raft-logs. Notwith standing all our efforts, we could not get to either shore, but were obliged, as we were near an island, to quit our raft and to make it. The cold was so extremely severe that Mr. Gist had all his fingers and some of his toes frozen, and the water was shut up so hard that we found no difficulty in getting off the island on the ice in the morning." 1
After crossing the river they were able to get horses and in due time reached Williamsburg. Washington's report of all that he had seen and done upon this diffi cult journey pleased the governor and his friends. They felt that they had found a young man who was brave and who could be trusted.
1 Sc udder's "George Washington."
GEORGE WASHINGTON 245
While on this journey Washington noticed that the best point for a fort was at the junction of the Monongahela River with the Ohio, and advised the governor to build it in order to hold the land against the French. The Ohio Company began a fort there, when the French came down the river with a force of about a thousand men, took possession, and, finishing it, called it Fort Duquesne. The force of the English, some three hundred men under Colonel Fry, with Washington as second in command, was, after many delays, started for the Ohio. Wash ington, with a small body of men, went ahead to break the path. After crossing the mountains, he discovered a small body of the French. Fearing an ambuscade, he surprised them at a place called Great Meadows, and attacked them, killing the commander at the first fire. Ten of the French were killed, one wounded, and twenty- one captured. In a letter to his brother, Washington wrote, "I heard the bullets whistle, and, believe me, there is something charming in the sound." When asked many years after if he had really said this, he replied, " If I said so, it was when I was young."
Before advancing farther Washington built a palisaded fortress, called Fort Necessity, to make safe his retreat in case of defeat. By the death of Colonel Fry, Washington became commander of the whole force. He had been reenforced by a small company of artillery with nine
246 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
swivels, which had been dragged with great difficulty over the rough roads, He advanced about thirteen miles from the fort, but hearing that a large French force was coming out to meet him, he retreated to Fort Necessity. Here he was attacked by the French and lost twelve men, while forty-one were wounded. The French loss was greater, but as their force was much larger, about four to one, and as the little garrison was almost without food, Washington was obliged to surrender. His troops were allowed to march out with the honors of war. They took with them everything but their artillery and made their way, in safety, home. Fort Necessity surrendered on the 4th of July, 1754.
After Washington's return to Virginia he gave up his commission and went to Mount Vernon, intending to put in his time looking after his plantation. His brother, Lawrence, meantime had died and had left him this estate. But the next year General Braddock was sent over from England with a large army to drive the French out of the Ohio Valley.
The preparations for war were carried on actively in the neighborhood of Mount Vernon. Washington could 3ee the ships and transports, carrying men and arms, going up and down the Potomac, and often rode over to Alexandria, where General Braddock had his head quarters. Governor Dinwiddie told the general of
GEOKGE WASHINGTON 247
Washington, of his good service, and his knowledge of the country, and Washington was invited to join the army as aide-de-camp. He accepted at once, as he was anxious to have the training in war under so experienced a commander. He was kindly received by General Braddock. He was surprised at the preparations that were being made to carry supplies through the moun tains, and remembering the difficulties he met with his scanty stores and nine swivels, he said to General Brad- dock, "If our march is to be regulated by the slow movements of the train, it will be tedious, very tedious indeed." 1 But Braddock smiled at him, thinking the young provincial officer knew but little of the march of great armies.
There were many delays before the army finally started. It was almost impossible to find wagons to carry the stores and the supplies promised by the governors of the colony were slow in coming in, so that Braddock complained bitterly of the provincials. Benjamin Franklin came from Philadelphia to see what ne could do to help and offered to get horses and wagons from the German farmers of Pennsylvania. He was asked to contract for 150 wagons, with four horses to each wagon, and 1500 saddle or pack horses for the service of his Majesty's forces.
1 Sounder's " George Washington."
248 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
Benjamin Franklin writes of General Braddock : " In conversation with him one day he was giving me some account of his intended progress. ' After taking Fort Duquesne I am to proceed to Niagara ; and having taken that, to Frontenac, if the season will allow time ; and I suppose it will, for Duquesne can hardly detain me above three or four days, and then I can see nothing that can obstruct my march to Niagara.'
"Having before resolved in my mind," continues Franklin, " the long line his army must make in their march by a very narrow road to be cut for them through the woods and bushes, and also what I had heard of a former defeat of fifteen hundred French who invaded the Illinois country, I had conceived some doubts and some fears of the event of the campaign; but I ven tured only to say : < To be sure, sir, if you arrive well before Duquesne with these fine troops, so well provided with artillery, the fort, though completely fortified, and assisted with a very strong garrison, can probably make but a short resistance. The only danger I apprehend of obstruction to your march is from the ambuscades of the Indians, who, by constant practice, are dexterous in laying and executing them; and the slender line, nearly four miles long, which your army must make, may expose it to be attacked by surprise on its flanks, and to be cut like thread into several pieces, which, from
GEORGE WASHINGTON 249
the distance, cannot come up in time to support one another/
" He smiled at my ignorance, and replied, * These savages may indeed be a formidable enemy to raw American militia, but upon the king's regular and disciplined troops, sir, it is impossible they should make an impression.' '
On the 19th of May the forces reached Fort Cumber land. The two regiments of one thousand men from England had been increased by four hundred men from Maryland and Virginia, the troops of Virginia light- horse commanded by Captain Stewart, two companies of carpenters, thirty men each, with subalterns and cap tains, a company of guides, a detachment of thirty sailors with their officers, and the remnants of two independent companies from New York, commanded by Captain Gates. The Indians who were to help them did not come.
During the halt at Fort Cumberland, Washington was sent to Williamsburg to bring on £4000 for the mili tary chest. After an absence of two weeks he returned, escorted from Winchester by eight men, "which eight men," he writes, " were two days assembling, but I be lieve would not have been more than as many seconds dispersing, if I had been attacked."
Braddock was disgusted with the provinces of Penn sylvania and Virginia because they failed to furnish
250 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
promptly the supplies, build the roads through the mountains, and furnish the horses, wagons, and baggage trains needed for his army. Several hundred Indians had also been promised as allies by Governor Dinwiddie, only about fifty of whom ever arrived. These finally deserted the camp because they were not consulted and employed in military affairs. Brad dock tried to give the Virginia militia a strict military drill, but they were so slouchy-looking a set and so careless in manner that he had a poor opinion of them as soldiers.
While the army was waiting for supplies and horses at Fort Cumberland, Washington had an opportunity to see strict military discipline practised. Each day the roll of the company was called, at morning, noon, and night, their arms inspected, and the drills executed. The morals of the camp were strictly upheld, drunken ness and theft severely punished, and the chaplain led religious services every Sunday morning at the head of each regiment.
Washington was chagrined at the stubbornness of Braddock and the inability of the general and his officers to adapt themselves to the hardships and necessities of a campaign in the wilderness. Braddock had travelled in a chariot as far as Fort Cumberland, attended by his staff and a body-guard of light-horse. Many of the best horses were employed by the officers as pack
GEORGE WASHINGTON (after a portrait by C. W. Peale — the earliest known portrait of Washington)
252 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
animals for their luxuries. Washington advised Brad- dock to leave all but the most necessary things and push forward rapidly. After leaving Fort Cumberland the army struggled along over rough mountain roads, dragging the heavy wagons arid cannon, till Braddock himself began to see the value of Washington's advice and consulted him as to the future march.
Washington advised that the army be divided into two parts; the choicest troops, equipped as lightly as possible, should move forward rapidly and capture Fort Duquesne before the French should receive reenforce- ments. The rest of the army, with the baggage train, could come up more slowly by easy marches. This was then decided upon. But the officers kept two hundred horses for their private baggage, while Washington, fol lowing his own advice, " retained no more clothing and effects with him than would about half fill a portmanteau, and gave up his best steed as a packhorse, which he nevsr heard of afterward."
About this time the famous Indian fighter, Captain Jack, with his band of forest rangers, came into camp, 66 equipped with rifle, knife, hunting-shirts, leggings and moccasins, and looking almost like a band of Indians.
" The captain asked an interview with the general, by whom it would seem he was not expected. Braddock received him in his tent in his usual stiff and stately
GEORGE WASHINGTON 253
manner. The ' black rifle ' spoke of himself and his followers as men inured to hardships, and accustomed to deal with Indians, who preferred stealth and stratagem to open warfare. He requested that his company should be employed as a reconnoitring party to beat up the Indians in their lurking-places and ambuscades.
"Braddock, who had a sovereign contempt for the chivalry of the woods and despised their boasted strategy, replied to the hero of the Pennsylvania settlements in a manner to which he had not been accustomed. ' There was time enough,' he said, ' for making arrangements ; and he had experienced troops on whom he could completely rely for all purposes.'
"Captain Jack withdrew, indignant at so haughty a reception, and informed his leathern-clad followers of his rebuff. They forthwith shouldered their rifles, turned their backs upon the camp, and, headed by the captain, departed in Indian file through the woods for the usual scene of their exploits where men knew their value." l
The first division of the army now pushed forward but while Braddock had adopted Washington's advice, he did not follow it vigorously. Washington said, " I found that, instead of pushing on with vigor, without regarding a little rough road, they were halting to level every mole-
1 Washington Irving's " Life of Washington."
254 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
hill and to erect bridges over every brook, by which means we were four days in getting twelve miles."
About this time Washington was overtaken by a severe fever and headache and he became so ill that he had to be borne in a covered wagon. At last, on account of his serious condition, General Braddock required him to remain at one of the camping-places in the charge of a physician and with a sufficient guard. Permission was granted, however, that he should overtake the army before the attack on Fort Duquesne.
With great toil and effort the army kept on the march over the mountain roads. Several stragglers and scouts were killed by the Indians. Deserted campfires of the French and Indians were passed. "In fact, it was the Indian boast that throughout this march of Braddock they saw him every day from the mountains and expected to be able to shoot down his soldiers like pigeons."
For about ten days Washington remained in camp with his physician, when he was rejoiced by the arrival of a troop of a hundred men bringing provisions to Braddock' s advance army. Washington now felt strong enough to go with them, though he had still to be borne in a covered wagon. The party overtook Braddock on the 8th of July, about fifteen miles from Fort Duquesne.
Braddock had planned to reach and attack the fort the next day. The line of march made it necessary to cross
GEORGE WASHINGTON 255
the Monongahela River twice at fords about five miles apart. Washington, though still weak from illness, mounted his horse and joined the general's staff. " As it was supposed the enemy would be on the watch for the crossing of the troops, it had been agreed that they should do it in the greatest order, with bayonets fixed, colors flying, and drums and fifes beating and playing. They accordingly made a gallant appearance as they forded the Monongahela, and wound along its banks and through the open forests, gleaming and glittering in morning sunshine, and stepping buoyantly to the ' Grenadiers'
March.' a«aoftLibiw»
"Washington, with his keen and youthful relish for military affairs, was delighted with their perfect order and equipment, so different from the rough bush-fighters to which he had been accustomed. Roused to new life, he forgot his recent ailments, and broke forth in expressions of enjoyment and admiration, as he rode in company with his fellow aides-de-camp, Orme and Morris. Often, in after life, he used to speak of the effect upon him of the first sight of a well-disciplined European army, march ing in high confidence and bright array, on the eve of a battle."
After making the second crossing the army was ar ranged in line of march. Washington had suggested the day before that the Virginia rangers should be sent out
256 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
to scour the country in advance ; but General Braddock had rejected the sensible advice. The road, about twelve feet wide, led over a level ground skirted by high grass and bushes, while scattering forest trees stood on both sides. A half mile from the river a wooded slope rose to a range of hills.
The vanguard were pushing along this road and reached the slope of the hill, when they were suddenly attacked by the French and Indians in ambuscade. Irving says : " The van of the advance had indeed been taken by surprise. It was composed of two companies of carpenters or pioneers to cut the road, and two flank companies of grenadiers to protect them. Suddenly the engineer who preceded them to mark out the road gave the alarm, ' French and Indians ! ' A body of them was approaching rapidly, cheered on by a Frenchman in gayly fringed hunting-shirt, whose gorget showed him to be an officer. There was sharp firing on both sides at first. Several of the enemy fell, among them their leader ; but a murderous fire broke out among trees and a ravine on the right, and the woods resounded with unearthly whoops and yellings. The Indian rifle was at work, levelled by unseen hands. Most of the grenadiers and many of the pioneers were shot down. The survivors were driven in on the advance."
Colonel Gage ordered his men to advanced with fixed
GEORGE WASHINGTON 257
bayonets up the hillside but the regulars refused to obey. They were frightened by the confusion and by the fearful yells of the savages. The soldiers fired at random wherever they saw a smoke, as they could not see the enemy.
As soon as Braddock heard the firing in front he ordered Colonel Benton forward with the main body, eight hundred strong. As they were forming to face the ris ing ground, the advance guard fell back upon them in disorder and spread confusion among them. Braddock came up and attempted to rally his men and get them into order ; the other officers also attempted to form the lines but the men could not be prevailed upon to obey orders. They fired at random, killing some of their own men in advance.
The Virginia troops took to the woods in Indian fashion and did much to protect the regular troops. Washington urged Braddock to follow the same tactics and distribute his men in the woods; but Braddock re fused and stormed at his men as cowards for deserting the ranks and taking to the trees. The men were hud dled together and offered so much better target for the enemy. The officers conducted themselves with great bravery. Washington was surprised to see them expose themselves to the utmost dangers in trying to rally the men or in dashing forward to the attack. Great num bers of the officers were slain.
258 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
Washington was kept very busy. Early in the battle the other aides, Orme and Morris, were wounded and dis abled, so that Washington had to move all about the battle-ground carrying the general's orders. Two horses were killed under him and four bullets passed through his coat. The Indians were constantly directing their aim against officers and men on horseback. Washing ton, as he rode about the field, was a striking figure, and it is remarkable that he was not struck by the bullets of these sharpshooters. "At one time he was sent to the main body to bring the artillery into action. All there was likewise in confusion; for the Indians had extended themselves along the ravine so as to flank the reserve and carry slaughter into the ranks. Sir Peter Halket had been shot down at the head of his regiment. The men who should have served the guns were paralyzed. Had they raked the ravines with grapeshot the day might have been saved. In his ardor Washington sprang from his horse, wheeled and pointed a brass field piece with his own hand, and directed an effective discharge into the woods ; but neither his efforts nor example were of avail. The men could not be kept to the guns.
66 Braddock still remained in the centre of the field, in the desperate hope of retrieving the fortunes of the day. The Virginia rangers, who had been most efficient
GEORGE WASHINGTON 259
in covering his position, were nearly all killed or wounded. His secretary, Shirley, had fallen by his side. Many of his officers had been slain within his sight and many of his guard of Virginia light-horse. Five horses had been killed under him; still he kept his ground, vainly en deavoring to check the flight of his men, or, at least, to effect their retreat in good order. At length a bullet passed through his right arm and lodged itself in his lungs. He fell from his horse but was caught by Cap tain Stewart, of the Virginia guards, who, with the assistance of another American and a servant, placed him in a tumbrel. It was with much difficulty they got him out of the field — in his despair he desired to be left there.
"The rout now became complete. Baggage, stores, artillery, everything, was abandoned. The wagoners took each a horse out of his team and fled. The offi cers were swept off with the men in this headlong flight. It was rendered more precipitate by the shouts and yells of the savages, numbers of whom rushed forth from their coverts and pursued the fugitives to the riverside, kill ing several as they dashed across in tumultuous confu sion. Fortunately for the latter, the victors gave up the pursuit in their eagerness to collect the spoil."
What was -left of the army retreated across the river but even there no effective force could be collected.
260 PIONEERS ON LAND AND SEA
More than seven hundred men had been killed or wounded. Out of eighty-six officers twenty-six had been killed and thirty-six wounded. The Virginia troops had suffered most in the number lost.
Washington was sent back to Dunbar's division, forty miles, to bring up provisions, hospital stores, and wagons, with two companies for guard. On July 13 Braddock and his wounded officers reached Great Meadows. That night Braddock died and was buried quietly, Washing ton reading the funeral service over his grave.
On the 17th Washington arrived with his wounded companions at Fort Cumberland. Fearing that his family might be in great anxiety about him, he wrote to his brother from Fort Cumberland. "As I have heard, since my arrival at this place, a circumstantial account of my death and dying speech, I take this early opportunity of contradicting the first, and of as suring you that I have not composed the latter. But, by the all-powerful dispensations of Providence, I have been protected beyond all human probability or expecta tion ; for I had four bullets through my coat and two horses shot under me, yet escaped unhurt, though death was levelling my companions on every side of me !
" We have been most scandalously beaten by a trifling body of men, but fatigue and want of time prevent me from giving you any of the details until I have the
GEOKGE WASHINGTON 2(Jl
happiness of seeing you at Mount Vernon, which I now most earnestly wish for, since we are driven in thus far. A feeble state of health obliges me to halt here for two or three days to recover a little strength, that I may thereby be enabled to proceed homeward with
more ease."
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