od fortune and the subsequent prosperous life on the island and
final deliverance was due to the noble Somers, or Sommers, after whom
the Bermudas were long called "Sommers Isles," which was gradually
corrupted into "The Summer Isles." These islands of Bermuda had ever
been accounted an enchanted pile of rocks and a desert inhabitation for
devils, which the navigator and mariner avoided as Scylla and Charybdis,
or the devil himself. But this shipwrecked company found it the most
delightful country in the world, the climate was enchanting, delicious
fruits abounded, the waters swarmed with fish, some of them big enough
to nearly drag the fishers into the sea, while whales could be heard
spouting and nosing about the rocks at night; birds fat and tame and
willing to be eaten covered all the bushes, and such droves of wild hogs
covered the island that the slaughter of them for months seemed not to
diminish their number. The friendly disposition of the birds seemed
most to impress the writer of the "True Declaration of Virginia." He
remembers how the ravens fed Elias in the brook Cedron; "so God provided
for our disconsolate people in the midst of the sea by foules; but with
an admirable difference; unto Elias the ravens brought meat, unto our
men the foules brought (themselves) for meate: for when they whistled,
or made any strange noyse, the foules would come and sit on their
shoulders, they would suffer themselves to be taken and weighed by our
men, who would make choice of the fairest and fattest and let flie the
leane and lightest, an accident [the chronicler exclaims], I take it
[and everybody will take it], that cannot be paralleled by any Historie,
except when God sent abundance of Quayles to feed his Israel in the
barren wilderness."

The rescued voyagers built themselves comfortable houses on the island,
and dwelt there nine months in good health and plentifully fed. Sunday
was carefully observed, with sermons by Mr. Buck, the chaplain, an
Oxford man, who was assisted in the services by Stephen Hopkins, one of
the Puritans who were in the company. A marriage was celebrated between
Thomas Powell, the cook of Sir George Somers, and Elizabeth Persons,
the servant of Mrs. Horlow. Two children were also born, a boy who was
christened Bermudas and a girl Bermuda. The girl was the child of Mr.
John Rolfe and wife, the Rolfe who was shortly afterward to become
famous by another marriage. In order that nothing should be wan