ars, and many a strong heart was bowed in prayer, as
the stout old colonists stood around, and saw the baptismal rite which
sealed the profession and the faith of the brave, the beautiful, the
generous Pocahontas.

But while this old ruin thus suggests many an association with the olden
time, there is nothing left to tell the antiquary of the condition and
appearance of Jamestown, the first capital of Virginia. The island, as
the narrow neck of land on which the town was built is still erroneously
called, may yet be seen; but not a vestige of the simple splendour, with
which colonial pride delighted to adorn it, remains to tell the story of
its glory or destruction. And yet, to the eye and the heart of the
colonist, this little town was a delight: for here were assembled the
Governor and his council, who, with mimic pride, emulated the grandeur
and the pageant of Whitehall. Here, too, were the burgesses congregated
at the call of the Governor, who, with their stately wives and blooming
daughters, contributed to the delight of the metropolitan society. Here,
too, was the principal mart, where the planters shipped their tobacco
for the English market, and received from home those articles of
manufacture and those rarer delicacies which the colony was as yet
unable to supply. And here, too, they received news from Europe, which
served the old planters and prurient young statesmen with topics of
conversation until the next arrival; while the young folks gazed with
wonder and delight at the ship, its crew and passengers, who had
actually been in that great old England of which they had heard their
fathers talk so much.

The town, like an old-fashioned sermon, was naturally divided into two
parts. The first, which lay along the river, was chiefly devoted to
commercial purposes--the principal resort of drunken seamen, and those
land harpies who prey upon them for their own subsistence. Here were
located those miserable tippling-houses, which the Assembly had so long
and so vainly attempted to suppress. Here were the busy forwarding
houses, with their dark counting-rooms, their sallow clerks, and their
bills of lading. Here the shrewd merchant and the bluff sea-captain
talked loudly and learnedly of the laws of trade, the restrictive policy
of the navigation laws, and the growing importance of the commercial
interests of the colony. And here was the immense warehouse, under the
especial control of the government, with its hund