[1] Read Fiske's _Old Virginia and her Neighbours_, Vol. I, pp. 96-98. [2] Captain John Smith was born in England in 1580. At an early age he was a soldier in France and in the Netherlands; then after a short stay in England he set off to fight the Turks. In France he was robbed and left for dead, but reached Marseilles and joined a party of pilgrims bound to the Levant. During a violent storm the pilgrims, believing he had caused it, threw him into the sea. But he swam to an island, and after many adventures was made a captain in the Venetian army. The Turks captured him and sold him into slavery, but he killed his master, escaped to a Russian fortress, made his way through Germany, France, Spain, and Morocco, and reached England in time to go out with the London Company's colony. His career in Virginia was as adventurous as in the Old World. While exploring the Chickahominy River he and his companions were taken by the Indians. Lest they should kill him at once Smith showed them a pocket compass with its quivering needle always pointing north. They could see, but could not touch it because of the glass. Supposing him a wizard, they took him to the Powhatan. According to Smith's account two stones were brought and Smith's head laid upon them, while warriors, club in hand, stood near by to beat out his brains. But suddenly the chief's little daughter, Pocahontas, rushed in and laid her head on Smith's to shield him. He was given his life and sent back to Jamestown. [3] Smith and Newport visited the old chief at his village of Werowocomoco, took off the Powhatan's raccoon-skin coat, and put on the crimson robe. When they told him to kneel, he refused. Two men thereupon seized him by the shoulders and forced him to bend his knees, and the crown was clapped on his head. The Powhatan then took off his old moccasins and sent them, with his raccoon-skin coat, to his royal brother in London. [4] They were part of a body of some five hundred in nine ships which left England in June. On the way over a storm scattered the fleet; one ship was lost, and another bearing the leaders of the expedition was wrecked on the Bermudas. The shipwrecked colonists spent ten months building two little vessels, in which they reached Jamestown in May, 1610. [5] Read Fiske's _Old Virginia and her Neighbours_, Vol. I, pp. 152-155. [6] The governor, the council, and the House of Burgesses constituted the General Assembly. Any act of the Assembly might be vetoed by the governor, and no law was valid till approved by the "general court" of the company at London. Neither was any law made by the company for the colony valid till approved by the Assembly. After 1660 the House of Burgesses consisted of two delegates from each county, with one from Jamestown.