Page:The Homes of the New World- Vol. III.djvu/346

Rh and pure splendour. The race who produced such a daughter deserved a better treatment from the people whom she protected than it received.

The portrait of Pocahontas, which I have copied, represents her in the costume which was worn by the higher class of English in the time of Elizabeth; but the stiff Indian plaits of hair which hang down her cheeks from beneath her hat betray her descent. The countenance has an affecting expression of child-like goodness and innocence; the eyes have a melancholy charm, and the form of the countenance reminds me of the Feather-cloud woman in Minnesota. The portrait was taken in 1616, when she was twenty-one years old, and bears the inscription, ''Matoaka als. Rebecca'' ''Filia potentiss. Princ. Powhatan Imp. Virginiæ''.

Smith's portrait, which I have also drawn, shows a resolute, but not handsome, and very bearded warrior. His history, also in Virginia, is a chain of contentions, of bold actions, and misfortunes, by which he was finally subdued, without having left, of all his unquiet, combative life, any more beautiful memory than that which belongs to him from the child-like tenderness and attachment of the Indian girl. That which the strong arm of this ambitious man was not able to obtain, was obtained for him by two tender, childish arms which were wound round his neck.

My forenoons, as usual, I keep for myself, my afternoons are devoted to company, walking, &c. I have visited a few of the small farms in the neighbourhood, which are cultivated by free negroes, and have found them to be as neat and comfortable as those which belong to the white farmer. I have also been with my charming hostess to see her parents, a planter's family, not far from here; a family of good slave-holders, not rich enough to emancipate their slaves, but too good not to take care of and to make them happy. They belong