A Delightful Country The attractive as a home for settlers. There was no need of a scramble. "The morasses were alive with water-fowl, the creeks abounded with oysters heaped together in inexhaustible beds; the rivers were crowded with fish; the forests were alive with game, the wind rustled with covies of quails and wild turkeys, and hogs ran at large in troops. It was the best poor man's country in the world." The stream of emigration to this delightful place was steady, and by 1675 the population of the Old Dominion was nearly fifty thousand. NEIGHBORS OF THE OLD DOMINION By this time a sister-colony of the Old Dominion had been planted at the north and had attained a high degree of pros perity. The founder of Maryland was George Calvert, first Lord Baltimore, who in 1629 visited Jamestown, taking with him his family and some followers. But Calvert was an unwelcome visitor because he was a Roman Catholic. He was commanded to take the oath upholding the Church of England, and when he refused to However, being in do this he was ordered out of the colony. 1 When Pennsylvania was granted to Penn a dispute arose between Lord Baltimore and Penn as to the boundary between their grants. The matter was settled did estate Baltimore was made absolute owner and lord proprietor. George Calvert died before the deed was fully executed, but the grant was transferred to his son, Cecilius Calvert. Under this charter the proprietor was vested with almost unlimited political power. He could declare war, make peace, appoint all colonial officers, pardon criminals, and confer titles. He could also make laws for the government of his colony, but all such laws had to receive the approval of the freemen. They did not, however, have to receive the approval of the king. Maryland was thus almost entirely independent of the Crown in matters of government. The Founding Mary land The actual settlement of Maryland began in 1634, when Leonard Calvert, a brother of Cecilius and the first governor of of the province, founded the town of St. Marys near the mouth of the Potomac River. With him came over about two hundred colonists. Since Englishmen had by this time learned the art of colonization, the settlement of Maryland was easily accomplished. Tobacco at an early date began to be raised and was soon the staple product, just as it was in Virginia. There was some trouble in regard to government, but before many years had passed Maryland had a representative assembly and the settlers were managing their own affairs. Tolera Act Almost from the very beginning the people of Maryland enjoyed religious freedom. "Toleration in the province grew The up silently as the custom of the land." In 1649 the Maryland on Assembly, in which Catholics had the majority of votes, passed an act providing that "no person professing to believe in Jesus Christ shall from henceforth be anywise troubled, molested, or discountenanced, for or in respect of his or her religion, nor in the free exercise thereof, within this province." Thus there was established in Maryland that religious liberty for which Roger Williams about the same time (p. 41) was pleading so strongly. But the plans of Williams were broader than those of Lord Baltimore, for in Maryland only Christians were welcome, while in Rhode Island men of any faith and men of in 1767, when the Mason and Dixon's Line was established. This line separated Maryland from Delaware and Pennsylvania. The boundary between Maryland and West Virg.nia was not definitely settled until 1912. The North no faith were welcome. Still, the Toleration Act passed by the little Maryland assembly deserves the praise that Bancroft gives it when he calls it the "morning star" of religious freedom. During the long conflict between the king and Parliament, Lord Baltimore "trimmed his sails with masterly art," now inclining to one party, now to the other. When Charles II came to the throne he upheld the authority of the proprietor. The colony remained under the rule of the proprietor until 1692, when it was brought under the control of the king. In 1715, however, Maryland was again restored to the Baltimore family. About the time Charles I granted Maryland to George Calvert he likewise granted (1629) Carolina to Sir Robert Heath. No settlement, however, was made under the Heath grant, and all rights under it fell into disuse. In 1663 Charles II made a second grant of Carolina, giving it to eight proprietors, of whom the Earl of Clarendon was the leading man. As described by the charter, Carolina lay between the thirty-first and thirty-sixth parallels and extended from the Atlantic to the Pacific. The settlement of Carolina really began some years before the grant to the proprietors was made. About 1650, frontiersmen began to leave Virginia and settle along Albemarle Sound, where the farming lands were good and where the freedom of pioneer life could be fully enjoyed. It was in the Albemarle region that the proprietors of Carolina developed their grant. In 1665 there was held in the Albemarle colony a general as sembly composed of a governor, a council, and twelve delegates. The assembling of this legislature marks the beginning of the political history of North Carolina. For although Carolina was granted to a single group of proprietors and was regarded as a single province, the territory was divided into two clearly defined jurisdictions, one of which was called North Carolina and the other South Carolina. Carolina South Carolina had its beginning in 1670, when about one south hundred and fifty colonists settled at the mouth of the Ashley River and built a cluster of cabins that they called Charlestown, in honor of the king. Old Charlestown, as this first settlement was called, was gradually abandoned, and by 1680 a new Charlestown (now called Charleston), with a population of 1000 inhabitants, had arisen in the peninsula between the Ashley and the Cooper Rivers. In South Carolina, as in North Carolina, there was established a government of the usual colonial type-a representative assembly, a council, and a governor. The Develop of the Carolinas The proprietors were diligent in their efforts to secure settlers and they drew alluring pictures of the resources and advantages ment of their great estate. As a result of their advertising a tide of emigration to the Carolinas set.in. From Holland came some Dutch settlers, bringing with them their money and their industrious habits. From Scotland came a large body of Covenanters, fearing the establishment of the Catholic power at home. In South Carolina the Huguenots (p. 16) found refuge from religious persecution. In 1598 the French king, Henry of Navarre, issued the Edict of Nantes, under which Huguenots were allowed to live in peace; but in 1685 the edict was revoked and a persecution of Huguenots followed. Thousands of the persecuted sect fled from France and sought refuge in foreign lands. Many of them came to the English colonies and settled in New York, in Maryland, in Virginia, in the Carolinas. Some of them went to Charleston where they rendered noble service in the upbuilding of South Carolina. In North Carolina the population was scattered, and it was fifty years before the colony could boast of a village with a dozen houses. In New Amsterdam The Swedes in Delaware South Carolina everything centered around Charleston, which as early as 1685 had a population of several thousand and contained "buildings of great ornament and beauty." The Carolinas in their early days had a stormy and troublous existence. For one thing they were greatly annoyed by the pirates who infested the coast. Then, they were troubled by the Spaniards who lived at St. Augustine and who more than once appeared in force along the coast, destroying life and property. But the most disquieting element in the early history of the Carolinas was the dissension that arose among the colonists themselves. The relations between the proprietors and the people were never satisfactory, and there was ceaseless bickering and strife. Once the regular proprietary government was overthrown by rebellious colonists. The proprietors, having reaped but little gain from their Carolina possessions, at last decided to get rid of them entirely. In 1729 they sold North Carolina and South Carolina to the king of England, each proprietor receiving five thousand pounds sterling for his share. THE MIDDLE COLONIES We saw (p. 40) that the territory between Connecticut at the North and Maryland at the south was settled by the Dutch and claimed by them as their rightful possession. The growth of New Netherlands was slow, because the Dutch, neglecting agriculture, directed their energies principally to the fur-trade. Life in their colony centered at New Amsterdam, which, in 1653, was incorporated as a city. The population of the future metropolis of the western hemisphere consisted of fur-traders, sailors, wharf-keepers, and longshoremen. From the outset the little city showed its cosmopolitan character, for besides Dutchmen it contained Englishmen, Scotchmen, Jews, Walloons, and men of other nationalities. The laws had to be published in several different languages, and on Broadway more than a dozen tongues were spoken. In the settlement of New Netherlands the Dutch were troubled by the encroachments of the Swedes. In 1638 a colony from Sweden settled at Christiana, in Delaware, near the spot. |