The Adventures of Captain John Smith (Longmans and Co., 5s.)
is an old story excellently retold by M. E. P. Roberts. Born of a fighting family, John Smith went early to the wars; and few men, even in his age of enterprise, saw more of the world or drew the sword oftener than he. He had his first taste of fighting in Holland, where, as he says, he learned " to ride a horse and to use his arms and the rudiments of war." But though he was a soldier, he did not neglect humane letters ; and we are told that his favourite books were Machiavelli's "Art of War" and Marcus Aurelius. So after much service and many travels he was taken prisoner at the battle of Rothenthurm by the Tartars, and sent to Constanti- nople as a present to the Lady Charatza Tragabizanda. This was the first romance of John Smith's life, for the lady, thinking to serve him, gave him to her brother, a rich Timor of Tartary; but the Timor proving a hard master, John Smith killed him with a threshing-bat and escaped. On his return to England, he joined a company of adventurers, who obtained a charter from James I. to colonise Virginia. The charter was not granted with- out difficulty, for the Spaniolised Englishmen, as Smith called the Court party, took little interest in the • expansion of the Empire, and feared Spain more than they loved their own country. However, the charter was granted at last, and in 1606 the ` Susan Constant ' and the ` Godspeed' with a pinnace of twenty tons set sail for Virginia. There the real work of John Smith's life began, and thence, ten years later, he brought back to England his Indian bride, the famous Pocahontas. His ad- ventures were written admirably by himself, and breathe the true spirit of Elizabethan England. For those who shirk the archaism of Smith's own style Mr. Roberts has composed an excellent version and we have seen of late few better books for boys than this. John Smith, indeed, may be regarded, so to say, as England's eponymous hero, and there is a perfect propriety in his simple name.
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