8. Sir Walter Raleigh

One morning, Elizabeth, Queen of England, was taking her daily walk with her maids after a rain-storm that had made the streets of London very muddy. A young man named Walter Raleigh, who was dressed in a new, rich scarlet plush cloak thrown over his shoulders, saw the Queen and her maids stop at a muddy place, wondering how they could cross. Quickly this young man, Walter, forgot all about himself and thought only of the Queen, and how he could help her. He took off his coat, spread it across the muddy place, and with a graceful bow, politely begged the Queen to do him the honor of walking on it as upon a carpet. She crossed without soiling her shoes, and then turned to thank the generous and polite young man. As she walked on, she said to her maids, “Who is he?” “His name is Walter Raleigh,” they replied. Not long after the Queen invited this polite young man to her palace, where she said to him: “Walter Raleigh, I wish to reward you for your generous gallantry. You are Sir Walter Raleigh.” That made him a knight. He became the Queen’s favorite at the court, and a great man in the nation. He tried to get English people to settle in America, and he introduced two things into England, from the Indians, which the people then knew very little about—potatoes and tobacco. There is a story that one day a servant, seeing the smoke curling over his master’s head and thinking he was on fire, ran for a pail of water, which he threw into Sir Walter’s face. This put the fire out quickly, but it did not stop people smoking tobacco. Would it not have been better if Sir Walter Raleigh had left the tobacco with the Indians?