When the Europeans first planted themselves at Jamestown, according to Captain Smith’s account, the country, from the sea-coast to the mountains, was inhabited by forty-three different tribes. Thirty of these spread over the tract of country south of the Potomac, within a space of about 8,000 square miles. Within sixty miles of Jamestown, it is said, there were 5,000 of these natives. There were several confederacies among them, the chief of which were the Powhatan confederacy, the confederacy of the Mannahoacks, and that of the Monacans. These last two were united in a grand alliance against the Powhatan league. Long and bloody wars were maintained between these rival sovereignties. The Mannahoack confederacy embraced thirteen tribes, eight of whom were under the Mannahoacks, and five under the Monacans. Besides these, there were also the independent tribes of the Nottoways, Meherriks, Tuteloes, and various others. These tribes, especially the Powhatan confederacy, were not disposed to allow the English to settle down among them unmolested. Though at times preserving a show of peace, feelings of hostility rankled in their hearts, and the colonists were obliged to be always on their guard. Nor can we blame the Indians that they felt inimical to the settlers. Hitherto, they had remained sole lords and proprietors of the vast territory over which they roamed, undisturbed except by the wars which they carried on with each other. To break in upon this supremacy, and to appropriate their lands, the white man came and planted himself down, not only assuming a superiority of intelligence and power, but of right. The means of communication with distant tribes were evidently greater than has sometimes been imagined, and doubtless the story of Cortés, De Soto, and other invaders, had reached the ears of these savages. We shall not be surprised, therefore, to find that Powhatan, the chief of the tribe of that name, soon began to grow hostile to his new neighbours at Jamestown, after their settlement in 1607. The enemy he had to oppose, however, was the undaunted and chivalrous Captain Smith, whose earlier history seems almost like a romance, appropriately followed out by the strange incidents of his residence in the colony.[7] The Indians, in the course of numerous attacks and skirmishes, learned to regard Smith as a foe by no means to be despised; and when, in one of his expeditions, he was taken captive, their joy knew no bounds. After being led from one chief to another, Captain Smith was finally presented to Powhatan himself. Opechancanough, who was his successor, seems to have cherished strong feelings of dislike to Smith, and had Powhatan felt disposed to spare him, he would have found himself opposed by his chief warriors. Finally, when he had been seen by all the Indians, and experiments had been tried on his courage, it was determined, in a council of chiefs, that he should have his brains beaten out with a club.