Hakluyt's 63. Fiske, Old Virginia Neighbors, A Discourse CHAPTER II THE BUSINESS ASPECTS OF COLONIZATION Contemporary Estimates of the possibilities of the British possessions in America were colored, naturally enough, by Spanish experience. The first explorers sent home exaggerated reports of what they saw and heard. Verrazano asserted that gold, silver, and copper abounded on the Carolina coast. Jacques Cartier gave a no less hopeful account of the St. Lawrence country. Jean Ribault, commandant of the Huguenot colony at Fort Royal, observed that the natives wore ornaments made of the precious metals and argued that the mines could not be far away. John Sparke, the chronicler of Hawkins's second voyage, shrewdly suspected that the Indians had filched their gold and silver from the wreck of Spanish treasure ships cast upon this stormy coast. Nevertheless, he believed that back in the interior "where are high hills, may be gold and silver as well as in Mexico because it is all one main." As the country became better known, soberer opinions prevailed. Men began to realize that the great advantage of the New World possessions lay in the fact that America was a virgin continent where land was to be had in limitless tracts, and where there was no immediate fear of a diminishing return from the soil. In Western Planting, a shrewd estimate of the possibilities of America written by Hakluyt, we find set forth the economic advantage that would accrue to Great Britain from the planting of colonies across the Such enterprises would serve to drain off the surplus population of the mother country. Thousands of able-bodied men, yeomen and artisans, for whom there was no employ sea. 22 VIII, III. ment at home, might find in America opportunity to earn an honest living. Such colonies would, also, furnish a new market for English manufactures, which were languishing for lack of purchasers. It was hoped that even the Hakluyt's savages would develop a taste for clothes and would thus Voyages, increase the demand for woolen cloth such as English looms produced in plenty. In exchange for her surplus manufactures, the colonists would send back to England commodities of which the government stood greatly in need for the maintenance of the navy, such as masts and spars, tar and pitch, cordage and iron. Timber and pitch had hitherto been imported from Russia and Poland. The iron had come from Spain, the copper from Sweden. These articles could be had from America at half the price because the supply was limitless, and because in trade with English. colonies there could be none of the troublesome exactions suffered in the dominions of the Czar, none of the risks encountered by British traders in hostile Spanish ports. This colonial traffic would give profitable employment to English merchant vessels, forced to lie idle since the Dutch commercial ascendency, and to English seamen who were hiring themselves to foreigners since they could not find service under the British flag. Whatever revenue was to be derived from tariffs and tonnage duties would, moreover, accrue to his Majesty's treasury. The Financing of the Colonies Genesis of The Chartered Companies. So evident were these ad- Brown, vantages that Parliament was urged to appropriate money for equipping a colonial venture on the ground that it was more honorable that the state should back such an enterprise than surrender it to private monopoly. No state fund was voted, however, and at the request of certain firm and hearty lovers of colonization," Hakluyt among the number, the king intrusted the undertaking (1606) to two joint stock companies chartered for that purpose. These were the London Company, to which was consigned that Fiske, Old Virginia and Her Neighbors, I, 64–72. part of the coast lying between the thirty-fourth and thirtyfifth parallels, and the Plymouth Company, which received I, Pt. I, Ch. I, title to all lands from the forty-first parallel north to the Osgood, II. Lucas, forty-fifth. Later charters (1609 and 1612) vested in the incorporators the government of such colonies as they should establish and the monopoly of trade between the colonists lish Colonies, and the mother country. The money necessary to fit out a Charters of the Old Eng 9-28. Brown, Genesis of the United States, I, 71, 280, 306, 309, 391, 465, 469; II, 555, 558, 581, 685, 688. colonial expedition to transport colonists and provide The sending of colonists to America was undertaken on a purely business basis. The initial expenses were great, but it was hoped that the ultimate profit, to the "adventurers in the way of dividends, and to the country as a whole by the beneficial effects of colonial trade, would bring full compensation. The capital accumulated by the corporation was invested in supplies agricultural implements, cattle, sheep, and horses, and food to last the colonists until the first harvest. For a term of from five to seven years the supplies were treated as a common store from which the needs of the planters " 66 men, women, and children were supplied. Each able-bodied man worked according to his capacity at the task assigned him, whether hunting, fishing, plowing, or at carpentering or smith's work. The products of their labor were turned into the common stock. The first houses put up were used by all in common, and the first boats built belonged to the community. Each colony was expected to send some marketable product to the representatives of the company in England. Fiske, and Her Osgood, I, Pt. I, Ch. III. Genesis of the United States, I, 71, 402–413. Works of Capt. John At Jamestown, the first enterprise of the London Company, for example, a magazine was erected for housing the common stores and a cape merchant" was appointed to receive and distribute them. The plan was far from successful, because it did not offer sufficient incentive to labor. Few men will put forth their best endeavors when their needs are met out of a public fund and they realize no advantage from individual effort. The Jamestown colo- Brown, nists shirked their tasks, and, the supplies being soon exhausted, Captain Smith was forced to announce that every man must perform his share of the work or be excluded from the colony. "Every one that gathereth not every day as much as I do, the next day, shall be set beyond the river and forever be banished from the fort, and live there or starve." When this energetic taskmaster returned to 543. England (1609), the fields were neglected and the cattle killed for eating, and the "starving time came upon the infant colony. But for the timely arrival of Lord Delaware with fresh supplies and adequate authority, the Jamestown settlement would have met the fate of Roanoke. Sir Thomas Dale, who was sent out by the Company in 1611, put matters on a better footing by assigning to each man a piece of garden land for his own use. Thereafter there was no difficulty in inducing the settlers to till the soil on their own account, but the requirement that they should labor one month out of every year for the Company was grudgingly obeyed. So eager were the directors for a money return on their venture that they ordered Captain Newport, when he sailed for Virginia in 1608, to bring back a cargo of products worth £2000 (the cost of this second supply) and intimated that, if profits were not soon realized, the colony would be abandoned, since the discouraged stock Smith, 89-174, 497 Winsor, Narr. and III, 175-177. Osgood, holders were withdrawing their pledges. Newport carried with him eight skilled artisans, and these men got together some tar, pitch, glass, and iron ore. These commodities together with clapboards cut by the colonists "for their exercise at leisure times" made up the first return cargo from Virginia. The colony sent to Sagadahoc on the Kennebec River by the Plymouth Company, in 1606, set out under brilliant auspices. It was planned by Lord John Popham, Chief Justice of England, and officered by his brother, George Popham, and his nephew, Ralegh Gilbert. The rank and file of the settlers, however, were rough, wild fellows picked up in the seaports. They had little ability and less inclination for hard work. The summer season was wasted in exploring expeditions. The friendship of the Indians was forfeited through wanton cruelty. Winter found the colonists unprepared, and they could get neither corn nor furs from the outraged natives. Popham died, and the colony was so reduced by disease and starvation that, when the supply ship arrived in the spring, the men would hear of nothing but immediate return to England. They carried home an evil report of the land where they had suffered so much hardship. The Plymouth Company, disheartened by this costly experiment, planted no more colonies at its own expense. These failures on the part of the chartered companies are not to be regretted. The English settlements might have been mere trading posts dependent on the good will of a merchant company like the Dutch colonies on the Hudson, but for the fortunate circumstance that the first ventures were unsuccessful and returned no profit on the investment. The stockholders became discouraged, the managers got into trouble with the government, and the charters were withdrawn, that of the London Company in 1624, that of the Council for New England eleven years after. Associations of Adventurers. Later colonies were 1, Pt. I, Ch. V. financed by private associations, each of which secured a charter giving title to a definite strip of territory and more |