ever go through the woods, pass through that gathering storm,
reach Jamestown, warn them there of the death that was rushing upon
them? Should we ever leave that hated village? Would the morning ever
come? When we reached our hut, unseen, and sat down just within the
doorway to watch for the dawn, it seemed as though the stars would never
pale. Again and again the leaping Indians between us and the fire fed
the tall flame; if one figure fell in the wild dancing, another took its
place; the yelling never ceased, nor the beating of the drums.

It was an alarum that was sounding, and there were only two to hear;
miles away beneath the mute stars English men and women lay asleep, with
the hour thundering at their gates, and there was none to cry, "Awake!"
When would the dawn come, when should we be gone? I could have cried out
in that agony of waiting, with the leagues on leagues to be traveled,
and the time so short! If we never reached those sleepers--I saw the
dark warriors gathering, tribe on tribe, war party on war party, thick
crowding shadows of death, slipping though the silent forest... and
the clearings we had made and the houses we had built... the goodly
Englishmen, Kent and Thorpe and Yeardley, Maddison, Wynne, Hamor, the
men who had striven to win and hold this land so fatal and so fair, West
and Rolfe and Jeremy Sparrow... the children about the doorsteps, the
women... one woman...

It came to an end, as all things earthly will. The flames of the great
bonfire sank lower and lower, and as they sank the gray light faltered
into being, grew, and strengthened. At last the dancers were still, the
women scattered, the priests with their hideous Okee gone. The wailing
of the pipes died away, the drums ceased to beat, and the village lay in
the keen wind and the pale light, inert and quiet with the stillness of
exhaustion.

The pause and hush did not last. When the ruffled pools amid the marshes
were rosy beneath the sunrise, the women brought us food, and the
warriors and old men gathered about us. They sat upon mats or billets of
wood, and I offered them bread and meat, and told them they must come to
Jamestown to taste of the white man's cookery.

Scarcely was the meal over when Opechancanough issued from his lodge,
with his picked men behind him, and, coming slowly up to us, took his
seat upon the white mat that was spread for him. For a few minutes he
sat in a silence that neither we nor his people cared to