CHAPTER IX.

NOTICE OF THE BERMUDAS, AND CONTINUATION OF

THE HISTORY OF VIRGINIA, DURING JAMES THE
FIRST'S REIGN.

A. D. 1609-1616.

The Bermudas-Gates and Somers wrecked there-The duties of the Church sustained by Mr. Bucke, the Chaplain, during their detention in the islands-Two vessels built, in which they sailed to Virginia, May 10, 1610—Arrive at James Town-Its miserable condition-Divine Service in the Church-Resolution to abandon the Colony-Changed by Lord De la Warr's arrival-His personal piety -Appointment of 'true preachers' for the due celebration of Divine Worship Order and industrious habits restored in the ColonySomers returns to the Bermudas, and dies there-Gates sent to England to report progress-Lotteries-Lord De la Warr compelled to return to England by sickness in 1611-Sir Thomas Dale sent out to Virginia, accompanied by Rev. Alexander WhitakerDeclaration of the Virginia Council-Gates returns to Virginia, accompanied by Rev. Mr. Glover-Henrico and New Bermudas built-Upon the return of Gates to England in 1614, Dale is entrusted with the sole command of the Colony-His character— The power of exercising martial law committed to him—Its tyrannical enactments-Dale abstains from enforcing it in all its extentWhitaker a most valuable labourer with Dale-His characterHis Sermon-Pocahuntas taken prisoner by the English, in 1612— Baptized by the name of Rebecca-Married to John Rolfe, in 1613 -Proceeds in 1616 to England with her husband and Sir Thomas Dale, who leaves the government in charge of Yeardley-Her recep tion by Captain Smith-And by King James and his Queen-Her death-Proceedings of the English, during Dale's government, towards the French and Dutch settlements in North America.

IX.

In the midst of the Atlantic Ocean, at a distance of CHAP. about six hundred miles from the American continent, lies a cluster of islands, which extend in a

The Bermudas.

IX.

CHAP. crescent-like shape, from east to west, in length about twenty miles, and in breadth two miles and a half. Their very existence was unknown for thirty years after the first discovery made by Columbus of the Western world; and, when tidings of the fact at length reached Europe, it was but to announce the wreck of a Spanish vessel upon the rocks with which these islands are surrounded. The name of the vessel, or of its captain, was Bermudaz; and the same was given in consequence to the islands themselves'. The English mariners, therefore, who ventured to sail in that direction, sought rather to avoid than to visit the dangerous spot. Strange and portentous rumours, also, were spread abroad, which ignorance and love of the marvellous were not slow to exaggerate; and which reported, that these islands were the habitation of furies and monsters, whose enchantments evoked fierce hurricanes, and rolling thunders, and visions of most hideous aspect. Shakspeare, accordingly, did but avail himself of the prevalent belief in these wild stories, and make this department, as indeed every other, of the world of fiction or of reality, tributary to his own genius, when, in his play of the Tempest, he introduces Ariel, as able

To fly,

To swim, to dive into the fire, to ride
On the curl'd clouds ;'

By some the name of the ves-
sel is said to have been Gorza,
which was also applied to the
islands. See extract from Oviedo's
History, in Strachy's Narrative,
Purchas, iv. 1738. The Spanish
vessel in question is said to have

had on board some hogs which she was carrying to the West Indies, and these having swum ashore, had increased in vast numbers when the English became possessors of the island. Stith's History of Virginia, p. 114.

IX.

and makes her answer the question of Prospero by CHAP. saying,

'Safely in harbour

Is the king's ship; in the deep nook where once

Thou call'dst me up at midnight to fetch dew
From the still vex'd Bermoothes, there she's hid 2.'

Somers

there.

Upon the still vex'd' shore of these very islands, Gates and was wrecked the vessel, spoken of in the last chapter, wrecked which contained Sir Thomas Gates, and Sir George Somers, and Newport, vice-admiral of the squadron. They, and the whole of the ship's company, amounting to an hundred and fifty souls, succeeded in landing in safety; and soon found, to their joy, that the spot, which had been so long associated in their minds with images of confusion and terror, was fair and beautiful. So inviting a prospect of safe and commodious habitation did it hold out to them, that designs were quickly formed by some of their party of relinquishing altogether the Virginian scheme, and of remaining there. To quell the conspiracies and mutinies which arose out of these designs, and to punish the ringleaders of them, formed not the least arduous part of the difficulties which Gates had first to encounter. He kept constantly and faithfully in view the object for the attainment of which he had received his commission. Soon after the landing of his party, he had fitted out the long boat, with such supplies as could be obtained from the wreck; and dispatched her, with six sailors under the command of the master's mate, to Virginia, with

2 Shakspeare's Tempest, Act i. Scene ii.

IX.

CHAP. letters for the Colony. Of this small vessel and her crew, no tidings were ever heard. Instructions had been given to the mate, in case of his safe arrival, that he should return the next new moone;' and, for this purpose, it is stated, in the simple and touching narrative from which our information is derived, that the Ilands were appointed carefully to be watched, and fiers prepared as beacons to haue directed and wafted him in, but two moones were wasted vpon the promontory, and [we] gaue many a long and wished looke round about the horizon from the north-east to the south-west, but in vaine, discouering nothing all the while, which way soeuer we turned our eye, but ayre and sea".

The failure of their hopes from this quarter did but stimulate them to fresh efforts; and, whilst Somers was employed in making a survey of the islands, Gates, at his suggestion, urged onward the building of a vessel about eighty tons' burden, large enough to transport the whole party to Virginia. It was constructed, in part, of the oak-beams and planks belonging to the vessel in which they had been wrecked, and the rest of it of cedar, a tree which grows in rich luxuriance upon the islands. the islands. After the labour of a few months, this vessel and another of smaller size were brought to a state of great forwardness; and, the mutinous and discontented members of their company,-some of whom had fled away into the woods, having been, with the exception of

3 Strachy's Narrative, Purchas, iv. 1742.

IX.

two persons, brought back to a state of order and CHAP. obedience, and the differences which had sprung up, for a brief season, even between the leaders themselves, having been reconciled, preparations were made for their departure.

the Church

Mr. Bucke,

This band of Englishmen had not been without The duties of the guidance and consolations of religion, during sustained by the period in which they remained thus cut off from the Chaplain, all intercourse with the rest of the world. Mr. detention in Bucke has been already mentioned in the last chap

during their

the islands.