"Having re-accomodated themselves, they solemnly invited Smith to their lodging; but no sooner was hee within the house, but all these nimphes more tormented him than ever with crowding and pressing and hanging upon him, most tediously crying '_Love you not mee? Love you not mee?_' "This salutation ended the feast was set consisting of fruit in baskets, fish and flesh in wooden platters: beans and pease there wanted not (for twenty hogges), nor any Salvage daintie their invention could devise; some attending, others singing and dancing about them. This mirth and banquet being ended, with fire-brands (instead of torches), they conducted him to his lodging."[46] The next day Powhatan arrived. There were no more "antics," no more mirth. Diplomacy and cunning ruled the hour. As to the "maskarado," the less we say perhaps the better, seeing it was meant in kindness. It could hardly have been an improvised entertainment! Pocahontas had possibly been drawn to the fort by news of the arrival of the two ships, and had learned of Smith's proposed visit. It is stated by one of the chroniclers that _she_ was the leader. We will give her the benefit of a doubt. Perhaps she had already met Madame Forrest and Ann Burras, and been given some Christian garments; and having ordered the dramatic performance, was seated in grave dignity among the spectators. We think this is possible. There is no reason, because she wheeled on hands and feet the last summer, she should go this length in the autumn. I can hardly imagine a more brilliant _mise en scène_; the forest in its gorgeous autumnal splendour, the brightly painted, party-coloured young girls with deer's antlers on their dusky brows, the fitful footlights of a blazing fire, the shimmering curtain of smoke! The audience seated in picturesque groups on the mats of reeds fill in the picture. Smith was coldly received by the emperor, nor was the latter softened by the promise of presents, the invitation to Jamestown, and the return of Namontack. He curtly replied: "If your King have sent me presents, I also am a King, and this is my land. 8 days will I stay to receive them. Your father is to come to me, not I to him; nor yet to your fort: neither will I bite at such a bate. As for the Monacans, I can revenge my owne injuries; as for the place where you say your brother was slain, it is a contrary way from those parts you suppose it. As to any salt water beyond the mountains, the relations you have from my people are false."[47] This was decisive and squarely to the point; so Newport sent the presents by water, and he, with fifty of the best shot, went himself by land and awaited the arrival of the barge. [Illustration: "The newly crowned potentate started with terror."]