of James CHAP. XI. plant all the American coast between 34° and 41° north latitude; the second, called The Plymouth Adventurers, to whom was assigned the territory north of the above, as far as the 45th degree. In the same year, the London company sent out Foundation Captain Newport, with 105 men, who founded James Town. Town, on the river Powhatan, which they called James River. The settlers soon became involved in dissensions with one another, and with the natives, and they were so exposed to disease and famine, that, had it not been for the able conduct of Captain Smith, the colony would undoubtedly have perished. As it was, the numbers were soon reduced to forty. The men who had come out with him and Newport were chiefly gentlemen, and others unaccustomed to work; he, therefore, wrote to the company at home to send out workmen and agricultural labourers, and, in the meantime, he taught the gentlemen how to use the axe and the spade. In 1609, a fresh body of emigrants came out, and Smith, disabled by an accident, returned to England. In the following year, Lord Delaware, appointed governor of Virginia by James, arrived with a fresh body; and he was followed, in 1611, by a third band of settlers, under Sir Thomas Gates. A distribution of land to each emigrant, as his private property, gave a new stimulus to industry; the colony prospered; the Indian tribes in the immediate neighbourhood submitted, through the Pocahontas, influence of Pocahontas, the daughter of Powhatan, the maiden. chief sachem of those parts; a maiden who appears to have cherished a love for the strange Palefaces, as she had formerly saved Smith from torture, when he had been captured by the Indians, and who now married an Englishman in the colony, came to England and was baptised, but died on her voyage home. She left a son, however, from whom are sprung some of the leading families in Virginia. After this, the colony went on increasing; and though they had many disappointments, and, on one occasion, the inhabitants of most of the settlements were massacred by the Indians, the adventurers found the speculation profitable, and they had enough to do to keep out enemies and rivals. Their territory was invaded by the French, who, in 1608, had settled in Canada, and colonies in now crossed the St. Lawrence, and planted colonies in Acadia (Nova Scotia), and the country now called New England; and by the Dutch, who had built the town of New Amsterdam (New York), and the port of Orange (Albany), in what they called the country of New Netherlands. But both were the Indian French and Dutch America. 1603-60 dislodged in 1618, though the Dutch returned, and eventually made good their position. The chief production of the colony of Virginia was tobacco, the cultivation of which was introduced from the West Indies in 1616; and soon afterwards slave labour was introduced. At first, the colony was entirely under the control of the company in London, subject, however to the crown; but, in 1621, James granted them a representative constitution. Charles made several alterations in their charter; he also granted them many new privileges, which caused the colony to remain faithful to the royal cause throughout the civil war. of North found New The northern colony of Virginia, to which Prince Charles gave the name of New England, in 1614, when Captain Smith The colony showed him a map of the country and gave him very Virginia. glowing accounts of its scenery and riches, did not make much progress, until the Brownists, or Independents, began to go out in search of a land where they might enjoy liberty of conscience, and be free from the persecution of the great and the ridicule of the licentious. The first band went out in 1620, in two vessels, called the Speedwell and the Mayflower, and consisted of about one hundred and twenty persons, who set sail from The Pilgrim Delft-Haven, on the 22nd of July, after having received Fathers the benedictions and prayers of their pastor, John Plymouth, Robinson. After a long and stormy voyage, they reached Massachussets Bay in November, and, out of respect to the company in whose territory they landed, they named their settlement New Plymouth. They were not incorporated by royal charter, and, being a feeble community, they found it advisable to join themselves to the colony of Massachussets, which and Massaother members of their persuasion established under a royal charter, in 1629. The intolerant policy of Laud continually added to their numbers; and, in addition to the town of Salem, which was founded in the above year, the foundations of Boston, Charlestown, Dorchester, Roxborough, and other towns, were laid. In each of these places a church, after the model of these Puritan fathers, was established; none but members of the church were admitted as freemen, and a representative government was established, in which all freemen had the right of election. John Winthrop was the first governor, and after him the most distinguished was Sir Harry Vane (1636) in whose time a fierce religious controversy broke out, which led to the establishment of other colonies by those whom the church expelled. Thus arose Providence, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New Hampshire, Maine, and other settle chussets. CHAP. XI. ments; the founding of which led to murderous wars with the natives, and to disputes with the Dutch, at Manhattan, or New Amsterdam. But the strong, earnest spirit of the colonists overcame all obstacles; about 1640, they began to export corn to the West Indies, to extend the fisheries, and to open an active commerce with England, which the Long Parliament greatly encouraged, by exempting them from the payment of customs upon imports and exports to the mother country. Besides these colonies, there were established, during the same West Indian period, settlements in the West Indies and other islands: settleraents. in Barbadoes (1623); Jamaica (1625); and the Bermudas (1612). Colonies were also founded in South Virginia, as the two Carolinas, planted by Lord Arundel and others, in 1629; and Maryland, planted by Lord Baltimore, in 1632. These latter colonists were Roman Catholics, and the settlements, like those in New England, became the refuge of men who were driven from England by religious persecution.* 5. Manufactures. Many improvements were made, during this period, in the art of dyeing wool, in consequence of the establishThe woollen ment of Dutch and Flemish workmen in London, manufacture. Norfolk, and other places; and the weaving trade made great advances, so that after the Restoration, English cloths were equal to the finest broadcloths of the continent. Cotton In the early part of the period, the cotton manufacture was planted in the kingdom, cotton wool being imported from the Levant, and used at Manchester, in the production of manufacture. mixed goods, i.e., fabrics of which the warp was composed of linen, and the weft of cotton. The cottons and cotton velvets mentioned before this date were really composed of sheep's wool. Manchester was the chief seat of this new manufacture. The silk trade. The silk manufacture attracted great attention; and active exertions were made for establishing it firmly in England. In 1608, James I. gave an impetus to it by encouraging the growth of mulberry trees, 10,000 plants being sent to each county. Most of the old mulberry trees now, or till lately, standing in England, including Shakspere's famous mulberry, in his garden at Stratford, are supposed to have been planted at this time. But the breeding of worms did not succeed; the manufacture, however, made great progress, and in 1661, the company of silk throwsters in the metropolis employed about 40,000 workpeople. * Heeren's States-System, 111-117; Robertson's America, II., 304-305; Bancroft's History of the United States, I., 313 et seq. 1603-60 works. The iron manufacture was much improved during this period, in consequence of the application of coal to the process of Iron smelting the invention of many machines for pumping water out of mines making that fuel cheaper. It was also used for other manufacturing purposes; and, as the trade in it thus increased, a company was formed in 1637, to whom Charles I. gave the monopoly of buying all coal exported from Newcastle and the adjoining districts. Of other arts, we may mention that alum was first made about 1603, and watches for the pocket in 1658. England became famous for its ordnance, which were chiefly manufactured in Dean Forest; glassmaking became naturalised, and shipbuilding was greatly improved, in consequence of the long voyages made by the East India Company, requiring larger and more stronglybuilt vessels.* of hackney 6. Travelling and means of communication. The progress of the nation in prosperity and national industry is further indicated by various improvements which were introduced in the means of transit and communication. In 1625, hackney-coaches Introduction made their first appearance in London, and became so coaches, fashionable, that, ten years afterwards, the government took alarm at their general use, and endeavoured to diminish their number, on the ground that they were a nuisance to the nobility. In 1634, sedan chairs were introduced, and were patronised and sedan by royal patent, because they protected the subject from chairs. the danger to which he was exposed by the crowded state of the streets, and the multitude of hackney-coaches! postage But a more important novelty, as regards the progress of the nation, was the establishment of a regular system of internal posts, in 1635. James I. had established the first post-office, origin of for the accommodation of English merchants, in their post transactions with the continental marts; but it was not system. till 1635 that the home post-office was established. Its first object was to maintain a communication between London and Edinburgh, the journey between the two cities occupying three days, and the post running night and day. Letters were delivered at the intermediate towns by the way; then by-posts were established, branching off from the main line, and running, at first, to Lincoln, Hull, Chester and Holyhead, Exeter and Plymouth, and gradually extending to the whole realm. Pict. Hist., II., 559. Dress of SECTION II. GENERAL LIFE AND MANNERS. CHAP. XI. 7. Costumes. The style of dress during this period was very changeable. In the reign of James I. gentlemen still wore the steeple-crowned hat, richly adorned with feathers, or a gentlemen, jewelled hat-band; the ruff was changed for a neck-band of satin, called a piccadil; the jackets, or doublets, were short, stiff, and profusely ornamented with slashings and embroidery; and they had false hanging sleeves, like those of a modern hussar. The hose were of an immense width, and, in shape, like balloons; silk and thread stockings were generally worn by the gentry. The extravagance and costliness which had marked the attire of the courtiers during the reign of Elizabeth, were largely increased by her successor; and Taylor, the water poet, tells us that the nobleman wore a farm in shoe-strings edged with gold, Prized at the church's tithe—the poor man's bread. In the reign of Charles I., the ugly costumes of his father's court were altogether set aside, and a style of dress was adopted, which was exceedingly graceful. This fashion has been called after Vandyke, whose numerous paintings have made it familiar; its chief features were, a low-crowned Flemish hat, a peaked beard and moustache, and love-locks, wide trunks and hose, wider boots, a gorgeous sash, a sword and belt, and a splendid doublet, with a collar of fine lace turned over the shoulders. The Puritan, with the exception that he wore the sugar-loaf hat, adopted the same general form of dress, but wore materials of a sombre colour and coarse texture, and his collar was of plain linen. and of ladies. The ladies of James I.'s court continued to wear the enormous fardingale, the standing collar and buckram bodices of the previous reign. The ruffs, however, were discontinued after Mrs. Turner, a milliner, appeared in them on the scaffold, when she was hanged for poisoning Sir Thomas Overbury. The hair was frizzed and crisped until 1640, when it was allowed to fall gracefully over the shoulders; under Charles I., also, the fardingale ceased to be worn, and female dress, like that of the gentlemen, was very graceful. Puritan ladies discarded the ringlets, gay embroidery, and rich ornaments of the Royalist * Piccadils, or peccadiloes, meant also the edges or hem of a garment; they were sold. at a well known shop in London, from which the street so called received its name |