VIRGINIA DARE:

A ROMANCE OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.

CHAPTER I.

“We’ve got a bright lookout, if this day is the foreteller of what our nation is to be in this new land;” and the speaker threw down his hunting-knife with a satirical laugh.

“Well, Jake, we cannot expect anything brighter if we’ve sense and courage enough to look before us. Ten days more and the ships will be gone; then what is there to prevent these savages from murdering us all? Our colony will have a short day, and may be wiped out before it is half over. This land belongs to the redskins; and when our men and the governors fly over the water, and won’t take us, it is simply saying, ‘Poor things, someone’s got to stay, or the London Company won’t like it: be brave, and die like Englishmen for us.’”

“What dost thou say, Hopeful Kent? Ah! thou talkest like a brave Englishman; surely, shouldst thou die as thou livest, thy countrymen would have naught to be proud of in thee.” Both men looked ashamed as the speaker advanced from the wood, and looked straight at them with his great searching eyes, from under a broad-brimmed flat hat, such as was worn by the clergy after the Reformation.

He looked almost sternly at the two men as he asked, “Dost thou try to better things by hard work? Dost thou try to help thy governor, whom thy Lord has put over thee? For shame, Jake Barnes! Didst thou work more, and growl less, thou would’st do better. Thou scarcely livest up to thy blessed calling in thy name, Hopeful Kent! How great is the mercy of thy God that he smiteth thee not!”

Jake Barnes shuffled away, muttering something to himself about “preaching parsons;” but the other man asked, “Don’t you think, Master Bradford, it is rather bad luck that the day the first white baby opens its eyes in this new land should be wild and rough? I always look, sir, on the bright side when my judgment lets me, but I think it’s a bad sign.”

“Dost thou? See, Hopeful,” cried the old man, “even now the sun has broken through. God be praised! Be there such things as thou speakest of,—chance, signs, and luck,—I wot not of them. But, even so, the day shall dawn dull and hard for us, as we have seen; but when the blessed evensong calleth, it shall be bright as yonder sky for our people, and the next day shall dawn and set with peace and plenty for them, through God’s great mercy.”

“A pity the first child was not a boy: we all think that, sir, don’t you?”

“Ah, Hopeful, the dear Lord knoweth best! This sweet lamb of his fold, born in this heathen land, mayhap she was sent a woman that her constancy may keep her faith bright, though her way be a hard one. God bless her!”

“Why should a woman be more constant than a man, sir? I think we men make the world what it is, and it seems to me rather bad that this child is a girl. We want fighting, not constancy, now. She’ll need as much care and food as if she were going to fell a dozen Indians when she’s grown. There’s been but little work done to-day, the men are all so excited, and all over a bit of a girl.”

“There’s not a man among us that knoweth the worth of a strong arm that the good Lord giveth unto his soldiers, better than I; but I have not the time to be talking to-day of the work of the blessed women in the world. It was the holy Father’s will; praised be his name! Let us bow down in thanksgiving that he hath sent unto us one of his little ones; for where they go they carry his blessing. As thou art pained by the slackness among the men about the work, I’ll keep thee no longer, thou may’st go to thy tasks; mayhap they will follow thy example.”

“Please, Master Bradford, Mistress Wilkins sends her regards, and would have me say that she would be wanting to speak with you.” The speaker was a child of ten or twelve, who courtesied as she gave her message. She was a strange-looking little figure, with her tightly plaited yellow hair drawn back from a very brown forehead. Her pale-blue eyes were a strange contrast to her skin, which was almost copper color from exposure. She wore a plain dark frock, with a kerchief neatly crossed on her breast.

The clergyman took the child’s hand, saying, “I will come at once, Patience, child; art thou going back to Mistress Wilkins now?”

“Please, I will be there almost with Master Bradford, if I may first gather some of those posies to put on the cradle. Mistress Wilkins says I may rock it,” said the child, looking up into the gray eyes that were smiling kindly down on her. They seemed to encourage her; for she added, clasping her hands, and fairly beaming with delight, “The baby is the most beautiful one, sir, you ever saw. I love it, oh, so much! They want to ask you about its name, and when it would please you to give it, sir.”

“Ah, yes, I suppose the governor wills it to be done before we sail; sure, it must be, but I had not thought of it. He is right: I am too old for this life here; my memory is failing me. I shall go back to England and thank the blessed Lord for letting so unworthy a servant do so great a work as to receive for him two precious souls belonging to so strange a time and people,—the red savage Manteo last week; and the wee baby, the first one in a new and heathen land, this week, no doubt.”

The old man had nodded his consent to the child, and walked on with bowed head, thinking aloud. The child sprang at once into a little thicket where wild vines and flowers grew in abundance, and gathered her arms full. She certainly made an odd picture; her droll little figure in that wild, unbroken country, as she stood on the branch of a fallen tree, one arm full of flowers and trailing vines, while she was trying with the other how far she could throw a flat stone and make it skip over the water. As it skipped once, twice, three times, then sank, making great circles on the smooth surface, she laughed merrily, and springing from branch to branch she ran on, jumping over every obstacle, at the same time chanting:—

It was Friday that Patience summoned Master Bradford to Mrs. Dare’s hut, where only a few hours before the baby had opened its blue eyes and caused excitement in the little colony. Even Master Bradford felt a strange thrill of pleasure as Mistress Wilkins put the tiny creature into his arms, saying, “Give the child your blessing, sir: I felt it were not safe to let her be longer without at least the blessing of a priest.”

As he took the little one, there was an uneasy look in his honest face. Master Bradford would not have suited some Churchmen of the present day; and yet we all look back with pride as well as pleasure to the fact that among the first colonists in this country there was a priest of our Church, and the first time that praise and worship sounded in our language from this great continent, it was in the words of our own beautiful liturgy; and thus, from Master Bradford’s service in the rude Roanoke chapel, to the days of Captain John Smith, when good Mr. Hunt and Mr. Whittaker fought the strengthening Puritan element, no service had ever been offered but that of our own dear Church.

He replied, “She is the first precious lamb the Lord has trusted to this fold. ’Tis true the blessing of any of God’s children is but a form of prayer to him and can do no harm.” He held many of the Puritan views that were then beginning to take root in England. It was only natural, then, that he should hesitate to comply with Mistress Wilkins’s request. But he took the child tenderly, as it was laid in his arms; and as he held it and looked into its little face, so fresh from heaven, all prejudice slipped away, and he satisfied even Mistress Wilkins.

The tall figure of Governor White, and his assistant Ananias Dare, entered the room as Master Bradford began, “May our ever-loving Shepherd watch over this little lamb in this wilderness, and lead her safely through it to the heavenly fold at last. And may the blessing of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit ever be with her.”

It was Sunday morning, the tenth after Trinity, in the year of our Lord 1587, the 18th of August, a typical day for that time of the year, sunny and warm, with a soft haze over everything, as if the world were resting, or rather, on this particular day, in this particular place, the world looked as if it had never waked up at all. One could not believe that those lovely flowers and ferns had ever been covered with ice and snow, or that those mighty forest trees had been shaken in fierce storms till their very roots trembled in the earth. That still peaceful sheet of water, sparkling in the morning sunlight, seemed unable to lash itself into great waves, or to dash great ships into fragments.

On this little island this quiet Sunday, there was a strange sight to be seen as the drum-beat called the people to service in the little log chapel; and an odd-looking lot they were. First came two Puritan maidens, walking demurely together; then an English gentleman, whose clothes looked shabby, as did he himself; then a little company from the shore, where some canoes showed that they had just landed. Among them was a tall figure with straight black hair hanging around his shoulders: he wore a topknot of feathers, a bright blanket, an English ruff about his neck, which had been given him while he was in England; for this was Manteo, the chief who had been made a Christian only the Sunday before in this same little chapel. He had a fine figure, tall and graceful. With him came a little group of his own braves: they went straight up the hill towards the low building. Then came some slouching sailors, who looked as if they did not often go to the chapel, and were a little uncomfortable now. Then there were some men in smock-frocks. Then behind a whole family, just as you might have seen at home in England, going to any church. They were evidently people of the middle class. The father had undoubtedly been a miller before he left home, if one might judge from his funny springing step and broad miller’s thumb. He looked very proud and happy as he walked along by his sturdy wife. Before them were their four children, a little rosy boy and a big girl, hand in hand, and the twins, yellow-haired English lassies. A strange mixture they all were; a little piece of civilization in the heart of a great wilderness; commonplace English people, living and worshipping in the primeval forest of the new land.