constitution of their
country.

The reader of history need not be reminded that the expedition of Bland
and Carver, designed to surprise Sir William Berkeley in his new
retreat, was completely frustrated by the treachery of Larimore, and its
unfortunate projectors met, at the hands of the stern old Governor, a
traitor's doom. Thus the drooping hopes of the loyalists were again
revived, and taking advantage of this happy change in the condition of
affairs, Berkeley with his little band of faithful adherents returned by
sea to Jamestown, and fortified the place to the best of their ability
against the attacks of the rebels.

Nor were the insurgents unwilling to furnish them an opportunity for a
contest. The battle of Bloody Run is memorable in the annals of the
colony as having forever annihilated the Indian power in Eastern
Virginia. Like the characters in Bunyan's sublime vision, this unhappy
race, so long a thorn in the side of the colonists, had passed away, and
"they saw their faces no more." But his very triumph over the savage
enemies of his country, well nigh proved the ruin of the young
insurgent. Many of his followers, who had joined him with a bona fide
design of extirpating the Indian power, now laid down their arms, and
retired quietly to their several homes. Bacon was thus left with only
about two hundred adherents, to prosecute the civil war which the harsh
and dissembling policy of Berkeley had invoked; while the Governor was
surrounded by more than three times that number, with the entire navy of
Virginia at his command, and, moreover, secure behind the fortifications
of Jamestown. Yet did not the brave young hero shrink from the contest.
Though reduced in numbers, those that remained were in themselves a
host. They were all men of more expanded views, and more exalted
conceptions of liberty, than many of the medley crew who had before
attended him. They fought in a holier cause than when arrayed against
the despised force of their savage foes, and, moreover, they fought in
self-defence. For, too proud and generous to desert their leader in his
hour of peril, each of his adherents lay under the proscriptive ban of
the revengeful Governor, as a rebel and a traitor. No sooner, therefore,
did Bacon hear of the return of Berkeley to Jamestown, than, with hasty
marches, he proceeded to invest the place. It is here, then, that we
resume the thread of our broken narrative.

CHAPTER XXXIII.