We mention these particulars for the sake of introducing Menatenon, the king of the tribe last named. His province is described as the largest on the whole length of the river; and the town of Chowanock, it is said, could bring seven hundred bowmen into the field. Menatenon was lame--owing probably to a wound in battle--but writes an old chronicler "he had more understanding than all the rest." He amused the colonists, and especially their governor, Mr. Lane, with a story about a copper mine and a pearl fishery, somewhere along the coast. He also gave a strange account of the head of the river Moratuc, (now called the Roanoke,) where lived a king (he affirmed,) whose country bordered on the sea, and who took such an abundance of pearls from it, that not only his skins and his noblemen's, but his beds and his houses were garnished with that ornament. Mr. Lane expressed a wish to see a specimen of them; but Menatenon readily replied, that the king of that rich country _reserved them expressly for trading with white men._ [FN] * * * * * [FN] "This King was at Chowanock two yeares agoe to trade with _blacke pearle,_ his worst sort whereof I had a rope, _but they were naught;_ but that king he, [Menatenon] sayth hath store of _white,_ and had traffcke with white men, for whom he reserved them." The source of the Moratuc was described as springing out of a vast rock, standing so near the sea, that in storms the surges beat over it. As for the copper, _that_ he said was generally collected in great bowls, covered with skin, at a place particularly described, and yielded two parts of metal for three of ore. There might be a shadow of foundation for some of these relations; but the chief object of Menatenon--who was a captive among the colonists at the time of his making them--must have been to render himself an important man in their eyes, and perhaps to lead them into some hazardous enterprise. Hearing them talk much about mines and pearls, and the South Sea--which were all hobbies with the credulous adventurers of that period--he adapted his discourse accordingly, and his eager hearers were simple enough to believe every thing he asserted. [FN] * * * * * [FN] The Mangoaks haue such plentie of it, they beautifie their houses with great plates thereof; this the salvages report; and young Shiko, the _King Chawonocks sonne my prisoner,_ that had been prisoner among the Mangoaks, &c. . . . _Menatenon also confirmed all this, and promised me guides to this mettall country, &c._