The Plymouth Company in Parliament: Father Altham and Dove

The Ark steered for Bonavista, one of the Cape de Verd islands, but altered her course and entered a harbor of the island of Barbadoes, on the eastern verge of the Antilles, where her people, all regarded as Roman Catholics, were coldly received, and charged extravagant prices for the provisions which they were compelled to purchase. The voyagers there learned that they had escaped a Spanish fleet lying at Bonavista, and also another peril in the port at which they had arrived. The slaves on the island had conspired to murder their masters, seize the first ship that should appear, and put to sea. The conspiracy had just been discovered, and its cruel purposes arrested. Their eyes were now greeted by the arrival there of the pinnace Dove, after a separation of six weeks. In the terrible gale she had put back while her lantern was at the masthead, and took refuge in the Scilly Isles, whence she sailed with a fair wind in search of her consort. After perilous wanderings over the waters, the Dove returned to the Ark.

The emigrants left Barbadoes after a short sojourn there, passed several islands of the Antilles, near one of which they encountered canoes full of naked and painted cannibals, and late in February they sailed in between the Capes of Virginia. They touched at Point Comfort and then went up to Jamestown, where royal letters borne by Calvert secured for them a friendly reception from Governor Harvey. Nine days they tarried pleasantly there, and then sailed for the Chesapeake and entered the broad mouth of the Potomac River. They were delighted with the great stream and the scenery on its banks, and gave to it the name of St. Gregory, in honor of the canonized Pope of that name. "Never have I beheld a larger or more beautiful river," wrote Father White. "The Thames seems a mere rivulet in comparison with it; it is not disfigured by any swamps, but has firm land on each side. Fine groves of trees appear, not choked with briers or bushes or undergrowth, but growing at intervals as if planted by the hand of man, so that you can drive a four-horse carriage, wherever you choose, through the midst of the trees. Just at the mouth of the river we saw the natives in arms. That night fires blazed throughout the whole country, and since they had never seen so large a ship, messengers were sent in all directions, who reported that a canoe, like an island, had come with as many men as there were trees in the woods."

The colonists sailed up the Potomac to the Heron Islands, and on Black-stone (which they named St. Clements) they landed at a little past the middle of March. The air was balmy, and sweet with opening spring flowers, and birds were filling the groves with rich melody. The shy natives came to them one after another, and were disarmed of all hostility by the kindness of the Britons. There, on the feast of the Annunciation (March 25th), the priests, in full canonicals, performed religious services, and administered the Lord's Supper for the first time in all that savage region. Then the whole company followed Governor Calvert and the priests in procession, bearing a huge cross which they had fashioned from a tree, and planted the symbol of Christianity and civilization at a chosen spot. The Roman Catholics, on bended knees, recited the "Litanies of the Sacred Cross" according to the Italian ritual. On the verge of the forest shadows, as wondering spectators of the strange scene, stood groups of savage men, women and children, clad in scanty and picturesque garments, with their emperor and his queen. He was at the head of a tribe called the Piscataways, and ruled over several small principalities, as did Powhatan, in Virginia.

Calvert proceeded at once to pay a visit of ceremony to the emperor to make a treaty of friendship and secure his influence over the surrounding tribes in favor of the colonists. In the Dove and another pinnace which they had procured at Jamestown, the governor, with Father Altham and a part of the emigrants, sailed up the river, leaving the Ark at anchor. Indians appeared here and there along the shores for a few minutes, and then disappeared in the woods, fleeing in alarm. They finally reached the village of Potomac, near Mount Vernon, whose king was a youth, and the people were ruled by his uncle as regent. Their fears were soon overcome, and Father Altham, through an interpreter from Jamestown, explained that their object in coming was to teach the Indians to lead better lives, and to live with them as brothers. The old sachem welcomed them, saying: "We will use one tables-my people shall hunt for my pale-faced brother, and all things shall be in common between us."