IRGINIA IN 1606--FROM CAPTAIN JOHN SMITH'S MAP]

"The sailors of Captain Newport," he explained, "are staying here too
long and are devouring much of the supplies designed for us. A strange
mania hath overtaken them, little Sister; they are mad for gold. They
believe that the streams about here are full of the dust they and our
men of Jamestown value more than life itself. It is more to them than
thy precious pocone, and as thou seest, they desert their ship and spend
their days sifting sand. If they are not soon gone there will be nothing
left for the mouths of any of us."

"Thou shalt not want, Brother," promised Pocahontas, and the next day
came the Indians with large stores of provisions. These Smith now bought
from them with beads and utensils and colored cloths. But the President
and the Council, jealous of the growing importance of Smith's relations
with the savages, sought to increase their own by paying four times the
amount Smith had agreed upon.

Discouragement met Smith with each morning's sun and kept him awake at
night. The colony seemed to take no root in this virgin soil; men who
would not work in the fields to raise grain toiled feverishly in search
of gold, forgetting that a full harvest would mean more for their
welfare than bags of money. Then, to add to the troubles, a fire started
one winter night at Jamestown and spread rapidly over most of the town,
burning down the warehouse in which the precious grain was stored. From
cold and starvation "more than halfe of us dyed," wrote Smith later in
his history.

Both with his own strength and by his example John Smith strove to his
utmost to rebuild Jamestown and to encourage the downhearted and to make
friends for himself among those who had listened to suspicions of his
purposes.

For a long time Powhatan had desired to secure weapons such as the white
men used, but the colonists had so far refused the Indians' request to
barter them. Now he determined to try other methods. He sent twenty fat
turkeys--each a heavy burden for the man who bore it across his
shoulders--to Captain Newport, asking that in return the Englishman
would send him twenty swords. Newport, whose orders from the authorities
in London had been not to offend the natives in any manner, had not
refused and had sent the swords in return. Then Powhatan, still eager to
secure a further store of weapons, had twenty more fine turkeys carried
to Smith, asking for twenty swords more. But S