1587.]

White's Colony in Roanoke.

237

That day never came. No sooner were the colonists landed than they began to quarrel with one another and show signs of mutiny. It was necessary that two able messengers should accompany the ships to England, to acquaint Sir Walter Raleigh as to the proceedings of the party, and to arrange with him for the proper sending of such fresh supplies as were required; and Captain White was forced to be one of these. Sorely against his will,—for he honestly desired to bring the plantation of Virginia to a successful issue, and he was bound to it by strong personal ties as well as by feelings of honour and duty, his daughter, Eleanor Dare, being one of the colonists, and her infant child, christened Virginia because she was the first native of the colony and of English America, having been born on the 18th of the month,-he yielded to their imperative request, and left Roanoke on the 27th of August.

His homeward voyage was altogether disastrous. On the day of starting, the little vessel in which he went was nearly disabled and many of its crew were lost. Ferdinando, in charge of the Admiral, being instructed to do what he could towards reimbursing Sir Walter Raleigh for the expenses of the expedition, by trade or piracy among the Spaniards of the West Indies, refused to take his general by a direct route to England. Therefore White resolved to make the best of his way home by himself in the little broken-down vessel. Gentle winds helped him onwards during twenty days, by which time nearly all his fresh water was exhausted and the provisions were brought very low. Then, as

he says in his doleful narrative, "there arose a storm which for six days ceased not to blow so exceedingly that we were driven further in those six days than we could recover in thirteen days. In which time others of our sailors began to fall very sick and two of them died. The weather also continued so close that our master, sometimes in four days together, could see neither sun nor star, and all the beverage we could make, with stinking water, dregs of beer, and lees of wine which remained, was but three gallons, and therefore now we expected nothing but famine and to perish at sea." By good fortune, however, they kept afloat and alive for a few days longer, and at the end of that time they drifted up to the south-western corner of Ireland. There they were picked up by a Southampton pinnace and taken by it into port. After being more than ten weeks at sea, White reached Southampton on the 8th of November, and learnt that the Admiral, “ in such weakness by sickness and death of their chiefest men, that they might all have perished if a small bark by great hap had not come to them to help them," had arrived at Portsmouth, without a shilling's worth of booty, some three weeks before.

England was too full of excitement about the public and private war then being waged with Spain, and of preparations for the expected coming of the Great Armada, for the poor Virginian colonists to be much thought of, or for Captain White's entreaties on their behalf to receive serious attention. Sir Walter Raleigh, indeed, seems to have grown weary of his North

1587-1589.]

White's Return to England.

239

American possessions. Already his adventurous spirit had been attracted by the fables of El Dorado, and he was resolved, as soon as more pressing occupations allowed him time and opportunity, to apply himself to the work of discovery and conquest in South America. Accordingly, after doing no more than listen to John White's petitions during a year and a half, he formally abandoned the colony out of which, five years before, he had hoped to construct an empire which was to prove as helpful to his own fortunes as it could be to the welfare of England. On the 7th of March, 1589, he transferred his Virginian patent to a company of merchants and others, himself tendering a subscription of 1007., "in especial regard and zeal of planting the Christian religion in those barbarous countries, and for the advancement and preferment of the same, and the common utility and profit of the inhabitants."* White eagerly became a member of this company; and he seems to have been its only active member.

After a year of further effort on behalf of the unfortunate colonists who had been waiting for assistance from home since the summer of 1587, he managed, with Raleigh's assistance, to persuade the owners of three ships intended for piracy in the West Indies to take him back to Virginia and do something on behalf of his neglected friends. It was at first intended that several other Englishmen and abundant stores of necessary articles should go with him; but this arrangement

*SOUTHEY, The British Admirals, vol. iv., p. 238.

was overruled, and he was allowed to take nothing but his own personal property.

The three vessels, the Hopewell, the John Evangelist, and the Little John, with two shallops, left Plymouth on the 20th of March, 1590. "Both governors, masters, and sailors," says White, "regarding very smally the good of their countrymen in Virginia, determined nothing less than to touch at those places, but wholly disposed themselves to seek after purchase and spoils, spending so much time therein that summer was spent before we arrived at Virginia; and, when we were come thither, the season was so unfit and the weather so foul, that we were constrained of force to forsake that coast, having not seen any of our planters."

Some search, however, was made for the planters. On the 1st of August, after much hunting and some spoiling of Spaniards, the mainland of the Virginian district was sighted. The ships were kept at sea, by bad weather, for a fortnight, and on the 15th they anchored off the southern edge of Roanoke. "At our first coming to anchor on this shore," says White, "we saw a great smoke in the isle, near the place where I left our colony in the year 1587; which smoke put us in good hope that some of the colony were there expecting my return out of England." That hope was soon dispelled. On the morning of the 16th, two boats were sent to examine the part from which the smoke had been seen to rise; but no men and no signs of white men's residence were found. Next day a more careful search was begun in two boats with crews of

1590.]

White's Search for his Colonists.

241

nineteen persons. Let the story be told in Captain White's own words. "Before we could get to the place where our planters were left, it was so exceeding dark that we overshot the place a quarter of a mile. There we espied, towards the north end of the island, the light of a great fire through the woods, to which we presently rowed. When we came right over against it, we let fall our grapnel near the shore, and sounded with a trumpet a call, and after many familiar English tunes of songs, and called to them friendly. But we had no answer. We therefore landed at daybreak, and

coming to the fire, we found the grass and sundry rotten trees burning about the place. From hence we went through the woods to that part of the island over against the mainland, and from thence we returned to the water-side, round about the north point of the island, until we came to the place where I left our colony in the year 1587. In all this way we saw in the sand the print of the savages' feet of two or three sorts trodden the night before; and, as we entered up the sandy bank, upon a tree, in the very brow thereof, were curiously carved the fair Roman letters CR O. Which letters presently we knew to signify the place where I should find the planters seated, according to a secret token agreed upon between them and me at my last departure from them. I willed them that if they should happen to be distressed in any of those places, they should carve over the letters or name a cross. And having well considered of this, we passed towards the place where they were left in sundry

VOL. I.

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