Page:History of the United States of America, Spencer, v1.djvu/64

 which though I would have excused, I durst not allow of that title, because she was a king's daughter; with a well-set countenance, she said, 'Were you not afraid to come into my father's countrie, and caused feare in him and all his people but mee, and feare you here I should call you father? I tell you, then, I will, and you shall call mee child, and so I will bee for ever and ever your countrieman. They did tell us alwais you were dead, and I knew 110 other till I came to Plimoth; yet Powhatan did command Uttamatomakkin to seeke you and know the truth, because your countriemen will lie much.'

"The treasurer, councell, and companie having well furnished Captaine Samuel Argall, the Lady Pocahontas, alias Rebecca, with her husband and others, in the good ship called the George, it pleased God, at Gravesend, to take this young lady to his mercie, where shee made not more sorrow for her unexpected death, than joy to the beholders to hear and see her make so religious and godly an end." This sad event occurred in 1617, when Pocahontas was about twenty-two years of age. She left an infant son, who was educated in England, and through whom several families in Virginia claim direct descent from the daughter of Powhatan.

The stability of the colony was much promoted by the establishment of a right of private property, and the addition of a number of respectable young women from England. Sir Thomas Dale, though empowered to exercise martial law, was yet so discreet and just withal, that no oppression was felt during the five years that remained in the colony from—1611 to 1616. Argall, in 1613, fell upon a colony which the French were just planting on the Penobscot, and completely destroyed it: subsequently he sailed north again, on a sort of piratical expedition, and threw down the fortifications of De Monts on the isle of St. Croix, and set fire to the deserted settlement of Port Royal. On his return, in November, it is said that he entered the mouth of the Hudson and compelled the Dutch traders on the island of Manhattan to make an acknowledgment of the authority and claims of England. But the statement is unsupported, and probably fictitious.

Gates returned to England in 1614, and Dale two years later, leaving George Yeardley as deputy-governor. Through the efforts of a faction he was displaced, and Argall, an active, but coarse and tyrannical man, was appointed deputy-governor, and also admiral of the country and the neighboring seas. His rapacity and tyranny soon occasioned loud complaints, and the Company solicited Lord Delaware to resume his former office: he left England, but died on the passage off the entrance of the bay which bears his name. After a struggle, Yeardley, the former deputy, was appointed governor, and the honor of knighthood was conferred upon him.