54 Singing Valleys 



common kettle . . . and that was half a pint of wheat and as much 

 barley boiled with water, for a man a day; and this having fried 

 some 26 weeks in the ship's hold contained as many worms as 

 grains, so that we might truly call it rather so much bran as corn 

 . . . those that escaped lived upon sturgeon and sea crabs. Fifty 

 in this time we buried. . . . 



Smith, meanwhile, had led a party to explore the shores of 

 the Sound and to buy grain from the natives. They found many 

 Indian villages, each surrounded by green maize fields, from 

 twenty to one hundred acres in extent and cleanly cultivated 

 between the hills. Strachey says that at the time the English 

 arrived there were three thousand acres of cleared and planted 

 land within the boundaries of the present state of Virginia. 

 By the accounts, the palm went to the natives of Kecoughtan, 

 the peninsula whose sea tip the English named Point Com- 

 fort, and who were "better husbands than in any parte else 

 that we have observed." 



Entries in John Smith's Journal record the corn purchases 

 made that summer: 



At the mouth of the River 16 bushels 



On the South side of the River 30 bushels 



From Pashpahegh (that churlish nation) . .10-12 bushels 



As Smith explored the bays and wide river mouths of Tide- 

 water Virginia in the pinnace which was an important part of 

 the colony's equipment, he became more and more impressed 

 by the cultivation of the corn lands. The rows were four feet 

 apart, and the soil between them was kept clear of weeds by 

 the women of the village who used their wooden hoes indus- 

 triously. This method of tillage was new to the English. In 

 Britain, at that time, most seeds were sown broadcast. Hariot 

 had commented on the good results of the Indians' method. 

 Squashes and "pompions" grew between the hills. The stalks, 

 according to Smith, usually bore two ears. Occasionally there 

 were three, rarely four, to a plant. The ears were well filled out 



