Children's Stories in American HistoryWright, Henrietta Christian
History
Children's Stories in American History
Wright, Henrietta Christian
America -- Discovery and exploration -- Juvenile literature; United States -- History -- Juvenile literature
But Raleigh was not discouraged; he sent out another company, two years
afterwards (1587), under John White. This company also settled on
Roanoke Island and laid the foundations of the "City of Raleigh." And
here, on this wild American island, where a few years before many brave
Englishmen had been killed by the savage Indians, where there were only
rough log-houses to live in, and where fierce wild animals roamed
through the gloomy forests, was born one day a little baby girl. She was
the granddaughter of Captain John White, the governor of the colony.
This little girl was the first child born in America of English parents,
and she was named "Virginia Dare." Some time after White had to go back
to England for provisions; he was away three years, and when he returned
to Roanoke every trace of the colony had disappeared. And to this day no
one knows what ever became of the colonists, and of little Virginia
Dare. It is supposed that they might have been carried away by the
Indians and spent their lives as captives, but no one knows whether
Virginia Dare grew up as an Indian maiden, far away from her friends and
not knowing that she was the child of white parents, or whether, with
all the rest of the colony, she perished by the hands of the Indians.
All we know is that, more than three hundred years ago this little
English maiden came to live a while on the Island of Roanoke, and that
then she vanished as utterly as do the rain drops that fall into the
sea, and only her name is remembered.
CHAPTER XVIII.
THE STORY OF POCAHONTAS, THE INDIAN PRINCESS.
Pocahontas was a very beautiful child, and was so good and sweet that
she was loved by all the tribe over which her father ruled. Her home was
in Virginia, and a very happy life she led there, in the sunny woods,
with the birds and squirrels for her companions; and in after years,
when she went to live far away across the sea, the memory of her
childhood home seemed the sweetest thing in the world to her, for it
brought to her mind the songs of the birds, the beautiful flowers, the
waving trees, the bright rivers, and the fair skies that she was so
familiar with when she was a little happy child.
To have had a happy childhood is a very beautiful thing, it makes all
after-life sweeter, it is like the first spring flowers which we gather
in the meadow, and although by and by the snow will come and cover the
place where they bloomed, it cannot take away the memory of their
sweetness and loveliness, for that is in our hearts and will stay there
forever.
So Pocahontas grew up in this pleasant home, and learned to embroider
her dresses with shells, and to weave mats, and to cook, and to do all
those things which Indian maidens were accustomed to.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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