king up the
grains that fly here and there as if possessed of an evil spirit.
Newsamp is the name which the savages give to this cooking of wheat.

I have an idea that when we get a mill for grinding, it will be possible
to break the kernels easily and quickly between the millstones, without
crushing a goodly portion of them to meal.

When the Indian corn is young, that is to say, before it has grown hard,
the ears as plucked from the stalks may be roasted before the coals
with great profit, and when we would give our master something unusually
pleasing, Nathaniel and I go abroad in search of the gardens made by the
savages, where we may get, by bargaining, a supply of roasting ears.

With a trencher of porridge, and a dozen roasting ears, together with
a half score of the bread balls such as I have already written about,
Captain Smith can satisfy his hunger with great pleasure, and then it
is that he declares he has the most comfortable home in all Virginia,
thanks to his "houseboys," as he is pleased to call us.

THE SWEET POTATO ROOT

The Indians have roots, which some of our gentlemen call sweet potatoes,
which are by no means unpleasant to the taste, the only difficulty being
that we cannot get any great quantity of them. Our master declares that
when we make a garden, this root shall be the first thing planted, and
after it has ripened, we will have some cooked every day.

Nathaniel and I have no trouble in preparing the root, for it may be
roasted in the ashes, boiled into a pudding which should be well salted,
or mixed with the meal of Indian corn and made into a kind of sweet
cake.

However, we lads have not had good success in baking this last dish,
because of the ashes which fly out of the fire when the wind blows ever
so slightly. Captain Smith declares that he would rather have the ashes
without the meal and sweet potato, if indeed he must eat any, but of
course when he speaks thus, it is only in the way of making sport.

Captain Kendall, who, because he has made two voyages to the Indies,
believes himself a wondrously wise man, says that he who eats sweet
potatoes at least once each day will not live above seven years, and
he who eats them twice every day will become blind, after which all his
teeth will drop out.

Because of this prediction, many of our gentlemen are not willing even
so much as to taste of the root, but Captain Smith says that wise men
may grow fat where fools starve, th