on with this
voyage and captivity, whether the manuscript was not cut by those who
published it. The reason given for excision is that the promoters of
the Virginia scheme were anxious that nothing should appear to
discourage capitalists, or to deter emigrants, and that this story of
the hostility and cruelty of Powhatan, only averted by the tender
mercy of his daughter, would have an unfortunate effect. The answer
to this is that the hostility was exhibited by the captivity and the
intimation that Smith was being fatted to be eaten, and this was
permitted to stand. It is wholly improbable that an incident so
romantic, so appealing to the imagination, in an age when
wonder-tales were eagerly welcomed, and which exhibited such tender
pity in the breast of a savage maiden, and such paternal clemency in a
savage chief, would have been omitted. It was calculated to lend a
lively interest to the narration, and would be invaluable as an
advertisement of the adventure.

[For a full bibliographical discussion of this point the reader is
referred to the reprint of "The True Relation," by Charles Deane,
Esq., Boston, 1864, the preface and notes to which are a masterpiece
of critical analysis.]

That some portions of "The True Relation" were omitted is possible.
There is internal evidence of this in the abrupt manner in which it
opens, and in the absence of allusions to the discords during the
voyage and on the arrival. Captain Smith was not the man to pass
over such questions in silence, as his subsequent caustic letter sent
home to the Governor and Council of Virginia shows. And it is
probable enough that the London promoters would cut out from the
"Relation" complaints and evidence of the seditions and helpless
state of the colony. The narration of the captivity is consistent as
it stands, and wholly inconsistent with the Pocahontas episode.

We extract from the narrative after Smith's departure from Apocant,
the highest town inhabited, between thirty and forty miles up the
river, and below Orapaks, one of Powhatan's seats, which also appears
on his map. He writes:

"Ten miles higher I discovered with the barge; in the midway a great
tree hindered my passage, which I cut in two: heere the river became
narrower, 8, 9 or 10 foote at a high water, and 6 or 7 at a lowe: the
stream exceeding swift, and the bottom hard channell, the ground most
part a low plaine, sandy soyle, this occasioned me to suppose it
might issue fro