with a view to fitting out a new expedition. In 1617, aided perhaps by the
interest which Pocahontas had aroused in London, he was promised a fleet
of twenty vessels, and the title of Admiral of New England was bestowed
upon him. Admiral he remained till his death; but the fleet he was to
command never put forth to sea. A ship more famous than any he had
captained was to sail for New England in 1620, and land the Pilgrims on
Plymouth. Rock. Smith's active career was over, though he was but
eight-and-thirty years of age, and had fifteen years of life still before
him. He had drunk too deeply of the intoxicating cup of adventure and
achievement ever to be content with a duller draught; and from year to
year he continued to use his arguments and representations upon all who
would listen. But he no longer had money of his own, and he was
forestalled by other men. He was to have no share in the development of
the country which he had charted and named. At the time of his death in
London in 1632, poor and disappointed, Plymouth, Salem and Boston had been
founded, Virginia had entered upon a new career, and Maryland had been
settled by the Catholics under Lord Baltimore. The Dutch had created New
Amsterdam on Manhattan Island in 1623; and the new nation in the new
continent was fairly under way.

Jamestown, as has been said, narrowly escaped extinction in the winter of
1609. The colonists found none among their number to fill Smith's place,
and soon relapsed into the idleness and improvidence which he had so
resolutely counteracted. They ate all the food which he had laid up for
them, and when it was gone the Indians would sell them no more. Squads of
hungry men began to wander about the country, and many of them were
murdered by the savages. The mortality within the settlement was terrible,
and everything that could be used as food was eaten; at length cannibalism
was begun; the body of an Indian, and then the starved corpses of the
settlers themselves were devoured. Many crawled away to perish in the