sh, and came orderly to church every day
to prayers". He gave Strachey the names of Powhattan's wives, and told
him, truly or not, that Pocahontas was married, about 1610, to an Indian
named Kocoum.(5) I offer the guess that Kemps and Machumps, who came
and went from Pocahontas, and recited an Indian prayer which Strachey
neglected to copy out, may have been among Strachey's authorities. I
shall, of course, be told that Kemps picked up Ahone at church. This did
not strike Strachey as being the fact; he had no opinion of the creed in
which Ahone was a factor, "the misery and thraldome under which Sathan
has bound these wretched miscreants". According to Strachey, the
priests, far from borrowing any part of our faith, "feare and tremble
lest the knowledge of God, and of our Saviour Jesus Christ be taught in
these parts".

(1) Arber, cxvii. Strachey mentions that (before his arrival in
Virginia) Pocahontas turned cart-wheels, naked, in Jamestown, being then
under twelve, and not yet wearing the apron. Smith says she was ten
in 1608, but does not mention the cart-wheels. Later, he found it
convenient to put her age at twelve or thirteen in 1608. Most American
scholars, such as Mr. Adams, entirely distrust the romantic later
narratives of Smith.

(2) The Proeeedings, etc., by W. S. Arber, p. 151.

(3) Ibid., p. 155.

(4) Ibid., p. 157.

(5) Strachey, pp. 54, 55.

Strachey is therefore for putting down the priests, and, like Smith
(indeed here borrowing from Smith), accuses them of sacrificing
children. To Smith's statement that such a rite was worked at
Quiyough-cohanock, Strachey adds that Sir George Percy (who was with
Smith) "was at, and observed" a similar mystery at Kecoughtan. It is
plain that the rite was not a sacrifice, but a Bora, or initiation, and
the parallel of the Spartan flogging of boys, with the retreat of the
boys and their instructors, is very close, and, of course, unnoted by
classical scholars except Mr. Frazer. Strachey ends with the critical
remark that we shall not know all the certainty of the religion and
mysteries till we can capture some of the priests, or Quiyough-quisocks.

Students who have access to a good library of Americana may do more
to elucidate Ahone. I regard him as in a line with Kiehtan and the God
spoken of by Heriot, and do not believe (1) that Strachey lied; (2) that
natives deceived Strachey; (3) that Ahone was borrowed from "the God of
Captain Smith".

MYTH