Some Three Hundred Years Ago | Page 3

rail.
Just then there came a lull in the tales and the old fellow, to urge on the
flagging spirits, brandished his dirk and pledged it to "The best fellow
yet!"
Fierce and impossible yarns followed until Jacques, as if to work off
his excitement, jumped into the circle with the swing and the stamp of
his newly-learned hornpipe. He danced it well and responded
repeatedly to the sailors' applause. It pleased them better than any tale
told, and they voted Jacques, "The best fellow yet!" True to his pledge,

the old salt presented the knife with a sweeping bow. Jacques,
overjoyed, at once cut his mark on the handle, and he dreamed that
night of his attack on the New World. He awoke to make plans for the
Indian scalps he should take to Raoul, for Indians seemed only as
beasts to be slaughtered.
Days and nights of sailing passed, as well as storms and fogs. When the
sun at last brought clear horizons, the shout of "Land head!" thrilled
captain, mates, and crew. No one knew just where they were, but
shining peaks could be seen in the distance. At last they came to anchor,
and small boats carried the men ashore. Jacques, too, was allowed to go.
He clutched his knife, expecting to plunge it into the head of the first
red-skin.
A group of Indians stood on the rocks. Monsieur Champlain, the first to
step ashore, greeted them with friendly signs. Jacques caught sight of
an Indian boy of his own size, lurking behind. He held a bow in his
hand, and a quiver of arrows was slung across his back. It was Nonowit,
for they had landed on the Piscataqua shores.
The Indian boy gathered wood for the fire, and Jacques eagerly joined
in the search. Soon the older folk sat about the blaze. The white men
tried to ask where they had landed and what was the nature of the coast.
Jacques, in his desire to learn, drew in the sand for Nonowit the picture
of the ship, the point of rocks, and the coast. The Indian boy understood
and added the river to the map. That aroused Monsieur Champlain,
who sent an order to the ship and soon received brilliant beads and
various knives from the stores on board. These he laid at the feet of the
Indians and pointed to the boy's map on the sand. The red men pulled
charred sticks from the fire and drew on the paper offered the full coast
line, so far as they knew, even to the Merrimac River with its impeding
sandbars, then not even heard of by white men.
By the time the French had started for their vessel Jacques had become
sure that the many stories he had heard of the fierceness of the Indians
were not entirely true, for already he had found an Indian boy a good
companion. Instead of thrusting his knife into his scalp, he followed the
example of his leaders and laid it at Nonowit's feet. The little red-skin,

pleased with his gift, instinctively offered to Jacques his bow and
arrows. These the French lad safely tucked away for Raoul, now
thinking it a much finer gift than many scalps.
Monsieur Champlain was even more pleased than Jacques to carry to
his countrymen so true a map of the coast of the New World, though at
that time he did not know it was to be the map of New England, nor
that he had landed on the New Hampshire shore.

VISITORS FROM ENGLAND.
Eleven years passed and Nonowit was a grown Indian who knew the
forest lands along the Piscataqua and the rocky turns of the coast. But
in all this time he had not forgotten the two strange experiences of his
boyhood: a sailing vessel, seen in the river, and later the meeting of
white men face to face. Never did his eye run along the ocean horizon
without thought of those white-winged sails.
One morning in May, 1614, Nonowit paddled miles from the shore and
pulled his canoe upon the rocks of a small island, the largest of a group
that could be seen from the coast. Leaving his bark in safety, he crossed
to the opposite shore of the island, where he first laid sticks for a fire
and then threw out his line for a fish. A full catch held his attention
until the tide had risen to an unusual height. Suddenly he thought of his
canoe. He hastened over the rocks to find it far afloat. There he was left
alone on the island with only the fish of the ocean for food and the sky
to cover his head. That day and the next he watched for a stray canoe.
On the