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 54 INTRODUCTION. chap, ii. When afterwards, in 1620, they were com- 1612. plained of by the commons in parliament, and therefore discontinued by proclamation, they were declared to have " supplied the real food by which Virginia had been nourished." About this time an event took place which was followed by important consequences to the colony. Provisions in Jamestown continuing to be scarce, and supplies from the neighbour- ing Indians, with whom the English were often at war, and seldom on terms of real cordiality, being necessarily uncertain, captain Argal, who arrived in the beginning of the year from England, with two vessels, was sent round to the Potowmac, for a cargo of corn. While employed in obtaining the cargo, he understood that Pocahontas, who had saved the life of captain Smith, and had been ever stedfast in her attachment to the English, had, for some un- known cause, absented herself from the house of her father, and lay concealed in the neigh- bourhood. By bribing some of those in whom /Seizes sne confided, captain Argal prevailed on her Pocahontas. tQ come on board his vessel, where she was detained respectfully, and brought to James- town. His motive for taking this step was a hope, that the possession of Pocahontas would give the English an ascendency over her father Powhatan, who was known to doat on her. In p Robertson.. ,.Chalmer....Stith.... Beverly.