Now suddenly the path turned and before them shone the silver mirror of
the sea.

"Behold!" cried Pocahontas, and then Red Wing, her nearest companion,
fell flat upon the ground, burying her face in the sand. The others
stood and stared at the new watery world in front of them, hushed in an
awed silence. Gradually their curiosity got the better of their fear and
they began to question:

"How many leagues does it stretch, Pocahontas?"--"Can war canoes find
their way on it?"--"Come the good oysters from its depths?" asked
Deer-Eye, whose appetite was always made fun of.

Pocahontas answered as well as she was able, but to her who had seen
several times before the great water, it was almost as much of a mystery
as to her comrades. But to-day she greeted it as an old friend. She
could scarcely wait to throw herself into the little rippling waves at
her feet.

"Come on," she cried, "let us hasten. How wonderful to our heated bodies
will its freshness be." And as she ran towards it she threw off her
skirt, her moccasins and her necklace and dashed into the sea.

Though her companions were used to swimming from the day their mothers
had thrown them as babies into the river to harden them, they had never
been where there were not protecting banks on each side of them, and
they were afraid to follow Pocahontas into this unknown. But gradually
her evident safety and delight were too much for their caution, and they
were soon at home in the gentle waves.