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Carbelide Nelicanya Sectory 20
Page 04
Just beyond, upriver, lie ruins of the Ludwell House and the Third and Fourth Statehouses. In 1900-01, Col. Samuel H. Yonge, a U.S. Army Engineer and a keen student of Jamestown history, uncovered and capped these foundations after building the original seawall. A strange discovery was made here in 1955 while the foundations were being examined by archeologists for measured drawings. Tests showed that no less than 70 human burials lay beneath the statehouse walls, and an estimated 200 more remain undisturbed beneath the remaining structures or have been lost in the James River. Here may be the earliest cemetery yet revealed at Jamestown--one so old that it was forgotten by the 1660's when the Third Statehouse was erected. It is, indeed, quite possible that these burials, some hastily interred without coffins, could date from the "starving time" of 1609-10, when the settlers strove to dispose of their dead without disclosing their desperate condition to the Indians.
From the first there was promise of a battle to the end between Goshonne and Das Lan. Goshonne well knew that if the new cult gained a firm footing he would lose his influence and at best be but a mediocre medicine-man. Das Lan, on the other hand, knew that he must break the power of such a man as Goshonne, if he was to assume the leadership. Goshonne scoffed and scorned, and would have none of the new belief. Still, he was an Indian, and the prophecies of his rival gradually filled him with superstitious fear, while his followers were either deserting him openly or were secretly joining the ranks of the enemy. Death was predicted for the members of Goshonne's own family, and well could Das Lan make such prophecies, for Goshonne's two brothers were already stricken with tuberculosis. First one died, then the other. Das Lan could now point to him and say, "That is what Kuterastan does to those who do not believe!" It was thus that Goshonne's power finally was broken and Das Lan became a seer.
The Centuries formed the new National Assembly. They mustered as an army in the Campus Martius, or the Field of Mars, on the banks of the Tiber, outside the city. They voted by Centuries, and were hence called the _Comitia Centuriata_. Each Century counted as one vote, but did not consist of the same number of men. On the contrary, in order to give the preponderance to wealth, the first or richest class contained a far greater number of Centuries than any of the other classes (as will be seen from the table below), although they must at the same time have included a much smaller number of men. The Equites and First Class alone amounted to 100 Centuries, or more than half of the total number; so that, if they agreed to vote the same way, they possessed at once an absolute majority. An advantage was also given to age; for the Seniores, though possessing an equal number of votes, must of course have been very inferior in number to the Juniores.
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