POCAHONTAS
Princess
by Marcel Schwob
Pocahontas was the daughter of King Powhatan who ruled from a couch-like throne draped in coon-skin robes with all the tails hanging down. She was raised in a house made of plaited reeds, among priests and women whose faces and shoulders were painted vivid red, and who amused her with leather toys and snake rattles. Namontak, a faithful old servant, watched over the princess while she played; sometimes they took her into the woods beside the wide Rappahannock River where thirty young girls would dance for her. They would he tinted bright colors and girdled with green leaves, having goats’ horns on their heads and otter skins in their belts as they shook their clubs, leaping around a crackling fire. The dance they would stamp out the fire and over, return with the princess in the glowing light of smoldering embers.
During the year 1607 the land of Pocahontas was troubled by Europeans. Ruined gentlemen, criminals and gold seekers came down the Potomac and built log cabins. To this scattered group of huts they gave the name Jamestown and they called their col¬ ony Virginia. In those first years Virginia was no more than a small impoverished fort on Chesapeake Bay, surrounded by the domains of the great King Powhatan. For their leader the colonists chose Captain John Smith, who earlier had sought adventure in the East among the Turks. Under his command they wandered along the rocks, living on shellfish together with what little grain they were able to secure through traffic with the Indians.
At first they were received with great ceremony. A native priest came to them playing a reed flute, his braided locks crowned by a diadem of elk hair tinted red and arranged in rosettes. His body was painted crimson, his face blue, and he glittered from head to foot with ornaments of native silver. Straight and grim, he squat¬ ted on a carpet of mats, smoking a pipe filled with tobacco. Then others came, forming a solid square around the white men. Some were painted black, others red or white or in variegated colors. They sang and danced before their idol, which they called Okian image made of snake skins stuffed with mosses and hung with copper chains. In spite of this show of friendliness, Captain Smith was assailed a few days later while exploring the river, and was taken and bound. Amid wild warcries he was carried away to a long-hut to be left there under a guard of forty savages. Priests with eyes made red and black faces crossed by broad white bands circled around the fire sprinkling grains of wheat on the ground. Then John Smith was conducted to the house of the King. Powhatan sat cloaked in his fur robes; near him were other chieftains, their locks filled with feathers. A woman brought water for John Smith to bathe his hands, and another dried them on a tuft of down. Meanwhile two red giants placed flat stones at Powhatan’s feet, and the King raised his hand in a sign for John Smith to kneel there and be beheaded. Advancing timidly through the circle of painted chiefs, Pocahontas threw herself before the Captain, her head against his cheek.
She was only twelve years old. John Smith was twenty-nine. On his aquiline face he wore big straight mustaches and a fan¬ shaped beard. Pocahontas, they told him, was the name of the princess who had saved his life. But that was not her real name. Powhatan made peace with John Smith and set him free.
A year later Captain Smith camped with his men in a dense woodland one night when a penetrating rain deadened all sound. Suddenly Pocahontas touched his shoulder. Alone she had come through the dark to warn him how her father planned an attack, intending to kill the English while they sat at supper. She begged him to go at once if he wished to live. Captain Smith offered her beads and ribbons but she only cried, telling him she did not want them. Then she went away alone into the forest.
The following year found Smith in disgrace among the colonists and in 1609 he embarked for England. There he wrote books about Virginia, explained the colonial situation, recounted his adventures. About 1612 a certain Captain Argali, having gone to trade among the Potomacs (Powhatan’s tribe), took Pocahontas away as hostage. Her father was furious but she was not given back. She remained a prisoner until a gentleman of the court, one John Rolfe, became fascinated with her and married her. They say Pocahontas confessed her love for John Smith to a priest who visited her in her prison. In June, 1616, she reached London where her advent aroused much curiosity at court. Good Queen Anne received her kindly, ordering her portrait en¬ graved by a great artist.
About to return to Virginia, Captain John Smith called to pay his respects before embarking. He had not seen Pocahontas since 1608; she was now twenty two. When he entered she turned her face away, re¬ plying neither to the words of her husband nor her friends, remaining alone and silent for several hours. Then she called for Smith, and raising her eyes she said to him:
“You promised Powhatan whatever be¬ longed to you was his and he promised you the same. A stranger in his country, you called him father—I am a stranger in your country and I shall call you that.”
Captain Smith excused himself from the familiarity, for, he explained, she was the daughter of a king.
She replied:
“You were not afraid to come to my father’s country, and he dreaded you, he and all his people . . . excepting me. Here, do you think I shall not call you my father? I will say ‘my father’ and you shall say ‘my child’ and I will belong to your people al¬ ways. . . . They told me over there that you were dead.”
Her name, she confided secretly to John Smith, was Matoaka. Fearing witchcraft, the Indians had falsely reported it to be Pocahontas. John Smith sailed for Virginia. He never saw Matoaka again. When she sickened at Gravesend shortly after the beginning of the following year, she soon grew pale and died. She was not quite twenty-three.
Her portrait carries this inscription: “Matoaka alias Rebecca filia potentissimi principis Powhatani imperatoris Virgince ” It shows poor Matoaka in a high felt hat with two garlands of pearls, a ruffed collarette of lace and a plumed fan. Her face appears wan, her cheekbones are high and her large eyes are soft.
Marcel Schwob
Imaginary Lives
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