not easy to repeat that crime on the banks of the Powhatan, as the settlers there belonged to a Protestant nation, whose people as a mass would have retaliated upon the Spaniards if they had ventured to murder the English in Virginia, or to carry them off as prisoners of war. The pusillanimous monarch who then occupied the throne of England could not have restrained the spirit of vengeance that would have arisen in his subjects. The awe with which the Spanish Power had for so many years been regarded by the English people had steadily weakened, until at the time of the foundation of the Jamestown Colony, the fangs of the lion had in the opinion of most of the leading men in the kingdom been hopelessly impaired if not drawn altogether. Zuniga, writing to Philip III from London in April, 1609, reported that it was thought in England that Spain had even then sunk into such impoverishment that it would be unable to prevent the erection of fortifications in Virginia.[1] The author of Nova Britannia proudly declared that “with a mere handful of people we invaded their best and strongest fortified places, because for want of men they were so poorly defended that we could easily have overrun the whole country and reduced them to very narrow limits a long time ago if we had followed up our good success. But now that we have passed on without driving them from their settlements, and God in his mercy has given us another country so remote from their habitation, what reason is there that any one should be offended by our great success or feel envious, or if they are envious, why should we attach any weight to it, or why fear to enlarge ourselves? Where is our ancient might and power? Where is that great reputation sleep-
- ↑ Spanish Archives, Brown’s Genesis of the United States, pp. 258-259.
