The month of December found the colonists anxiously apprehensive of starvation during the ensuing winter, a winter which was long remembered in Europe as one of unprecedented severity. Newport had been for many weeks overdue. The weather was already bitterly cold. A great central camp-fire was kept burning, day and night, which they fed from the limbs of the trees they had felled in building their fortifications, church, and humble cabins. Over this fire hung the "common kettle," lately redolent with savoury odours of venison and wild fowl, but now relegated to its original uses,--the boiling of barley in the grain. Of this only a small portion remained. Captain Smith had carefully laid up some of the autumn's plenty, and "the idlers had as carelessly wasted it." Finding upon measurement that only "fourteen daies victualls were left," he sallied forth to tempt the Tappahannocks[29] to trade, sending Captain Martin to the nation of the Paspaheghs on a similar errand. They found the Indians of those tribes sulky and reluctant, at that scarce season, to part with their provisions, but they managed to secure from kindlier sources seven hogsheads of corn. The "idlers" now began to murmur because no effort had been made to explore the country; and complained that the royal order to go in search of the "South Sea"--that sea which was to open to them the riches of the East--had not been obeyed. The great sea perhaps lay not far distant. Communication with it would be found, they had heard, through some river running from the northwest. There was the Chickahominy flowing in that direction,--why was this river not explored? Their number had now been so much reduced that they hesitated to send any of their strong men far away from the fort. They remembered the fate of the Roanoke colony. Perhaps, after all, they had better keep together, antagonistic as was their attitude towards each other. Plans were made and abandoned: to return to England or send thither for supplies; to send to Newfoundland, or to the southern islands. Finally they resolved to wait as long as possible, and hope for Newport's return. Anxious eyes scanned the horizon from the moment the sun streamed up from the sea in the east until he sank behind the mysterious hills in the west. No sail appeared upon the silent waters. Perhaps they had been abandoned! Perhaps Newport would never come! But the frost and snow had already come. The birds had long ago sought a warmer climate, and the fish would soon be locked in the ice-bound streams. They durst not wander far enough away from the fort to track the deer or capture the wild-fowl that abound in winter upon the Virginia marshes. More than one of their number had ventured only a short distance away, and been shot full of arrows. Wherever there was a tangle of grass, or of thick-growing reeds, there would some savage lie in hiding with his evil eye upon the hated white man.