Part 4 (1/2)

[Sidenote: Prosperity.]

34. Tobacco-growing and Prosperity.--European people were now beginning to use tobacco. Most of it came from the Spanish colonies.

Tobacco grew wild in Virginia. But the colonists at first did not know how to dry it and make it fit for smoking. After a few years they found out how to prepare it. They now worked with great eagerness and planted tobacco on every spot of cleared land. Men with money came over from England. They brought many workingmen with them and planted large pieces of ground. Soon tobacco became the money of the colony, and the whole life of Virginia turned on its cultivation. But it was difficult to find enough laborers to do the necessary work.

[Sidenote: White servants.]

[Sidenote: Criminals.]

[Sidenote: Negro slaves, 1619.]

35. Servants and Slaves.--Most of the laborers were white men and women who were bound to service for terms of years. These were called servants. Some of them were poor persons who sold their labor to pay for their pa.s.sage to Virginia. Others were unfortunate men and women and even children who were stolen from their families and sold to the colonists. Still others were criminals whom King James sent over to the colony because that was the cheapest thing to do with them. In 1619 the first negro slaves were brought to Virginia by a Dutch vessel. The Virginians bought them all--only twenty in number. But the planters preferred white laborers. It was not until more that twenty-five years had pa.s.sed away that the slaves really became numerous enough to make much difference in the life of the colony.

[Sidenote: Sir Edwin Sandys.]

[Sidenote: The first American legislature, 1619.]

36. The first American Legislature, 1619.--The men who first formed the Virginia Company had long since lost interest in it. Other men had taken their places. These latter were mostly Puritans (p. 29) or were the friends and workers with the Puritans. The best known of them was Sir Edwin Sandys, the playmate of William Brewster--one of the Pilgrim Fathers (p. 29). Sandys and his friends sent Sir George Yeardley to Virginia as governor. They ordered him to summon an a.s.sembly to be made up of representatives chosen by the freemen of the colony. These representatives soon did away with Dale's ferocious regulations, and made other and much milder laws.

[Sidenote: End of the Virginia Company, 1624.]

[Sidenote: Virginia a royal province.]

37. Virginia becomes a Royal Province, 1624.--The Virginians thought this was a very good way to be governed. But King James thought that the new rulers of the Virginia Company were much too liberal, and he determined to destroy the company. The judges in those days dared not displease the king for he could turn them out of office at any time. So when he told them to destroy the Virginia charter they took the very first opportunity to declare it to be of no force. In this way the Virginia Company came to an end, and Virginia became a royal province with a governor appointed by the king.

[Sidenote: Intolerance in Virginia.]

[Sidenote: Persecution of the Puritans.]

38. Religious Intolerance.--In 1625 King James died, and his son Charles became king. He left the Virginians to themselves for the most part. They liked this. But they did not like his giving the northern part of Virginia to a Roman Catholic favorite, Lord Baltimore, with the name of Maryland. Many Roman Catholics soon settled in Lord Baltimore's colony. The Virginians feared lest they might come to Virginia and made severe laws against them. Puritan missionaries also came from New England and began to convert the Virginians to Puritanism. Governor Berkeley and the leading Virginians were Episcopalians. They did not like the Puritans any better than they liked the Roman Catholics. They made harsh laws against them and drove them out of Virginia into Maryland.

[Sidenote: Maryland given to Baltimore, 1632.]

[Sidenote: Settlement of Maryland. _Higginson_, 121-123; _Eggleston_, 50-53; _Source-book_, 48-51.]

39. Settlement of Maryland.--Maryland included the most valuable portion of Virginia north of the Potomac. Beside being the owner of all this land, Lord Baltimore was also the ruler of the colony. He invited people to go over and settle in Maryland and offered to give them large tracts of land on the payment of a small sum every year forever. Each man's payment was small. But all the payments taken together, made quite a large amount which went on growing larger and larger as Maryland was settled. The Baltimores were broad-minded men. They gave their colonists a large share in the government of the colony and did what they could to bring about religious toleration in Maryland.

[Sidenote: Roman Catholics in England.]

[Sidenote: Roman Catholics and Puritans in Maryland.]

[Sidenote: The Toleration Act, 1649.]

40. The Maryland Toleration Act, 1649.--The English Roman Catholics were cruelly oppressed. No priest of that faith was allowed to live in England. And Roman Catholics who were not priests had to pay heavy fines simply because they were Roman Catholics. Lord Baltimore hoped that his fellow Catholics might find a place of shelter in Maryland, and many of the leading colonists were Roman Catholics. But most of the laborers were Protestants. Soon came the Puritans from Virginia. They were kindly received and given land. But it was evident that it would be difficult for Roman Catholics, Episcopalians, and Puritans to live together without some kind of law to go by. So a law was made that any Christian might wors.h.i.+p as he saw fit. This was the first toleration act in the history of America. It was the first toleration act in the history of modern times. But the Puritan, Roger Williams, had already established religious freedom in Rhode Island (p. 33).

[Sidenote: Tobacco and grain.]

[Sidenote: Commerce.]