the smoke
of the peace pipes."

"Why does Opechancanough send us back to the settlements?" I demanded.
"Their faith in him needs no strengthening."

"It is his fancy. Every hunter and trader and learner of our tongues,
living in the villages or straying in the woods, has been sent back
to Jamestown or to his hundred with presents and with words that are
sweeter than honey. He has told the three who go with you the hour in
which you are to reach Jamestown; he would have you as singing birds,
telling lying tales to the Governor, with scarce the smoking of a pipe
between those words of peace and the war whoop. But if those who go with
you see reason to misdoubt you, they will kill you in the forest."

His voice fell, and he stood in silence, straight as an arrow, against
the post, the firelight playing over his dark limbs and sternly quiet
face. Outside, the night wind, rising, began to howl through the naked
branches, and a louder burst of yells came to us from the roisterers in
the distance. The mat before the doorway shook, and a slim brown hand,
slipped between the wood and the woven grass, beckoned to us.

"Why did you come?" demanded the Indian. "Long ago, when there were
none but dark men from the Chesapeake to the hunting grounds beneath the
sunset, we were happy. Why did you leave your own land, in the strange
black ships with sails like the piled-up clouds of summer? Was it not a
good land? Were not your forests broad and green, your fields fruitful,
your rivers deep and filled with fish? And the towns I have heard
of--were they not fair? You are brave men: had you no enemies there,
and no warpaths? It was your home: a man should love the good earth over
which he hunts, upon which stands his village. This is the red man's
land. He wishes his hunting grounds, his maize fields, and his rivers
for himself, his women and children. He has no ships in which to go to
another country. When you first came we thought you were gods; but you
have not done like the great white God who, you say, loves you so. You
are wiser and stronger than we, but your strength and wisdom help us
not: they press us down from men to children; they are weights upon the
head and shoulders of a babe to keep him under stature. Ill gifts have
you brought us, evil have you wrought us"--

"Not to you, Nantauquas!" I cried, stung into speech.

He turned his eyes upon me. "Nantauquas is the war chief of his tribe.
Opechancanough is his king, and