Parker's Second Reader Part 22

This charming Indian girl did not meet with all the grat.i.tude she deserved.

11. Before 1612, Captain Smith received a wound, which made it necessary for him to go to England, for surgical aid; and after his departure a copper kettle was offered to any Indian who would bring Pocahontas to the English settlement.

12. She was, accordingly, stolen from her father, and carried prisoner to Jamestown. Powhatan offered five hundred bushels of corn as a ransom for his darling child.

13. Before the negotiation was finished, an Englishman of good character, by the name of Thomas Rolfe, became attached to Pocahontas, and they were soon after married, with the king's consent.

14. This event secured peace to the English for many years. The Indian bride became a Christian, and was baptized.

LESSON LII.

_The same subject, concluded._

1. In 1616, Pocahontas went to England with her husband,--was introduced at court, and received great attention.

2. King James is said to have been very indignant that any of his subjects should have dared to marry a princess; but Captain Smith has been accused, perhaps falsely, of being sufficiently cold and selfish to blush for his acquaintance with the generous North American savage.

3. Pocahontas never returned to her native country. She died at Gravesend, in 1617, just as she was about to embark for America.

4. She left one son, Thomas Rolfe; and from his daughter are descended several people of high rank in Virginia, among whom was the celebrated John Randolph of Roanoke.

5. Smith had many adventures, after his wound obliged him to leave Jamestown. He visited this country again; made a voyage to the Summer Isles; fought with pirates; joined the French against the Spaniards; and was adrift, in a little boat, alone, on the stormy sea, during a night so tempestuous that thirteen French ships were wrecked, near the Isle of Re; yet he was saved.

6. He died in London, in 1631, in the fifty-second year of his age, after having published his singular adventures in Europe, Asia, Africa, and America.

LESSON LIII.

_John Ledyard._--JUVENILE MISCELLANY.

1. Few men have done so much, in a short life, as John Ledyard. When he was a mere boy, he built a canoe with his own hands, and descended Connecticut river alone and una.s.sisted.

2. He enlisted as a soldier, at Gibraltar; and afterwards, in the humble character of corporal of the marines, he sailed round the world with the celebrated Captain Cook.

3. After his return to England, he formed the bold design of traversing the northern parts of Europe and Asia, crossing Behring's Straits, and examining the whole of North America, from east to west.

4. Sir Joseph Banks, famous for his generosity to men of enterprise, furnished him with money for the undertaking. He expended nearly all of it in purchasing sea stores; and these, most unluckily, were all seized by a custom-house officer, on account of some articles which the English law forbade to be exported.

5. Poor Ledyard was now left in utter poverty; but he was a resolute man, and he would not be discouraged. With only ten guineas in his purse, he attempted to _walk_ over the greater part of three continents.

6. He walked through Denmark and Sweden, and attempted to cross the great Gulf of Bothnia, on his way to Siberia; but when he reached the middle of that inland sea, he found the water was not frozen, and he was obliged to foot it back to Stockholm.

7. He then traveled round the head of the gulf, and descended to St.

Petersburg. Here he was soon discovered to be a man of talents and activity; and though he was without money, and absolutely dest.i.tute of stockings and shoes, he was treated with great attention.

8. The Portuguese amba.s.sador invited him to dine, and was so much pleased with him, that he used his influence to obtain for him a free pa.s.sage in the government wagons, then going to Irkutsk, in Siberia, at the command of the Empress Katharine.

9. He went from this place to Yakutz, and there awaited the opening of the spring, full of the animating hope of soon completing his wearisome journey. But misfortune seemed to follow him wherever he went.

10. The empress could not believe that any man in his senses was traveling through the ice and snows of uncivilized Siberia, merely for the sake of seeing the country and the people.

11. She imagined that he was an English spy, sent there merely for the purpose of prying into the state of her empire and her government. She therefore employed two Russian soldiers to seize him, and convey him out of her dominions.

12. Taken, he knew not why, and obliged to go off without his clothes, his money, or his papers, he was seated in one of the strange-looking sledges used in those northern deserts, and carried through Tartary and White Russia, to the frontiers of Poland.

13. Covered with dirty rags, worn out with hardships, sick almost unto death, without friends and without money, he begged his way to Konigsberg, in Prussia.

LESSON LIV.

_The same subject, concluded._

1. In this hour of deep distress, he found a person willing to take his draft for five guineas on the Royal Society of England. With this a.s.sistance, he arrived in the land of our forefathers.

2. He immediately applied to his ever-ready friend, Sir Joseph Banks, for employment. Sir Joseph, knowing that nothing suited him better than perilous adventures, told him that a company had just been formed, for the purpose of penetrating into the interior of Africa, and discovering the source of the river Niger.

3. Burning sands, savage negroes, venomous serpents, all the frightful animals of the torrid zone, could not alarm the intrepid soul of Ledyard. He immediately expressed his desire to go.

4. When the map was spread before him, and his dangerous journey pointed out, he promptly exclaimed, "I will go to-morrow morning."

5. The gentleman smiled at his eagerness, and gladly intrusted him with an expedition in which suffering and peril were certain, and success extremely doubtful. He left London on the 30th of June, 1788, and arrived in Grand Cairo on the 19th of August.

6. There he spent his time to great advantage, in searching for and deciphering the various wonders of that ancient and once learned land.

7. His letters from Egypt were delightful. They showed much enthusiasm, united with the most patient and laborious exertion. The company formed great hopes concerning his discoveries in Senaar, and awaited letters from that country with much anxiety.

8. But, alas! he never reached there. He was seized with a violent illness at Cairo; died, and was decently buried beside the English who had ended their days in that celebrated city.

9. We should never read accounts of great or good men without learning some profitable lesson. If we cannot, like Ledyard, defend Gibraltar, sail round the world with Captain Cook, project trading voyages to the north-west coast, study Egyptian hieroglyph'ics, and traverse the dreary northern zone on foot,--we can, at least, learn from him the important lesson of _perseverance_.

10. The boy who perseveringly pores over a hard lesson, and who will not give up an intricate problem until he has studied it out, forms a habit, which, in after life, will make him a great man; and he who resolutely struggles against his own indolence, violent temper, or any other bad propensity, will most a.s.suredly be a good one.

LESSON LV.

_Learning to Work._--ORIGINAL.