Then the thoughts of Pocahontas found themselves at Jamestown, whither they now often wandered. She smiled as she remembered her own amazement at the sight of the two Englishwomen who had lately arrived there: Mistress Forrest and her maid, Anne Burroughs. With what curiosity the white women and the Indian girl had measured each other, their hair, their eyes, their curious garments! Then she beheld in her fancy her friend, her "brother," so earnest, so brave, who out of opposition always captured victory. She had witnessed how he forced the colonists to labor, had seen the punishment he meted out to those who disobeyed his commands against swearing--that strange offence she could not comprehend--the pouring of cold water in the sleeve of those who uttered oaths, amid the jeers and laughter of their companions. Her lips continued to smile while she thought of Smith, of the gentle words he had ever ready for her, of the interest he ever manifested at all she had to tell him. He had talked to her as she knew he talked to few, of his hopes for this little handful of men who must live and grow, and how, if they two, he and his "little Sister," could bring it about, the English and the Powhatans should forget any grievances against one another and be friends as long as the sky and earth should last. Perhaps, he had said one day, marriages between the English and the Indians might cement this friendship. "Perhaps thou thyself, Matoaka," he had begun, and then had ceased. Now she wondered again, as she had wondered then, if he had perhaps meant himself. Such a possibility was an exciting one, and she would have been glad to let her mind explore it fully; but her eyes were heavy and the pine needles soft and fragrant, and soon the beaver, who from a hollow beneath the exposed roots of the oak over the stream had been watching her bright eyes, seeing them closed, slipped forth to begin again his work on the dam her feet had flattened out. Though Nautauquas, returning an hour later from a peaceful mission to a confederated tribe, made scarcely more noise than the beaver, Pocahontas awoke and raised her head and loosening the needles from her hair, sprang up. "Greetings, Matoaka!" called out her brother. "Thou wert as snugly hidden here as a deer." "What news, my Brother?" she asked as he sat down and, taking off his moccasins, let his heated feet hang into the stream. "Evil news it is," he answered gravely, "for the friends of the great Captain." "What hath befallen my white Brother?" she cried out; "tell me speedily." "He was sleeping in his boat, I heard, far off from their island. A big bag of the powder they put into their guns lay in the bottom of his canoe, and when by chance a spark from his pipe fell upon it it grew angry and began to spit and burned his flesh till it waked him, and in his agony, he sprang into the river to quench the blaze." Pocahontas, who had not winced at the thought of the brained Dutchmen, shivered.