of to-day as somewhat comic, was entered into by Sandys and his associates in the most earnest spirit. In their regulations for the government of the colony, the Company made strong distinctions in favor of married

men.

To prevent all objection, the purity of the feminine supply was jealously guarded, and two of the number who transgressed were sent back to England. Every safeguard was thrown around them to make them happy in their new homes. It was ordered: "In case they cannot be presently married, we desire that they may be put with several householders that have wives until they can be supplied with husbands. . . . We desire that the marriage be free, according to nature, and we would not have these maids deceived and married to servants, but only such freemen or tenants as have means to maintain them, .. not enforcing them to marry against their wills."

These orders went in the ship with the maids, and seem to have been strictly obeyed. The scheme succeeded to a marvel: there was no difficulty at all in the way of being "presently married." On the arrival of the ship the settlers flocked to Jamestown, and the curious spectacle was presented of suitors going about in the crowd of maids, and selecting or being selected by their future wives. The arrangement seems to have caused no embarrassment, and the odd wooing was soon ended. Offers were made and matches agreed to without loss of time. The men paid for their partners, and were married to them at once; and the happiest results followed. "These new companions were received with such fondness" that they wrote to England, and induced sixty other maids, "young, handsome and chaste," to come out to Virginia for the same purpose.

Soon the wise device of Sir Edwin Sandys bore its fruit. The careless adventurers became " " provident fathers of families, solicitous about the prosperity of a country which they now considered as their own." The colony, under the effect of these virtuous home ties, grew to be a settled and well-ordered society; immigration increased; new land patents were constantly applied for; and in three years no less than three thousand five hundred persons went from England to cast their lot in Virginia.

And now, at the very time when Sir Edwin was executing his original project of infusing fresh and lusty blood into the depleted colony, blood of another sort was coming, and coming to stay. Up to this period the only servitude known in Virginia was that of "indented servants." This servitude was temporary and conditional, even in the case of felons like those sent to Virginia by James I. Sometimes the servant entered into the arrangement himself. He was not a slave, but a debtor bound to serve for a term of years, to repay the cost of bringing him to Virginia. But a class of persons in England, nicknamed "spirits," beat up recruits, sold them off to the colonies, and they were transferred there to new masters at a large advance. This was protested against, but the system went on. Prisoners taken at the battles of Dunbar and Worcester were also sent as servants to New England and Virginia, and as late as 1685 men condemned as adherents of Monmouth were disposed of in the same manner. The system was soon regulated by law. The labor of the indented servant was due to his master for the term of the indenture; if cruelly treated he had his recourse to the "Commissioner," or Justice of the

Peace. He could not marry without his master's permission on penalty of a year's additional service. Harboring runaways was a misdemeanor, and the runaway was to serve double the time lost. If he offended a second time he "passed under the statute of incorrigible rogues," and was branded. This brand was the letter R, signifying Runaway, burned into his cheek. If he went to the Indians with fire-arms, and left them, he was to suffer death.

This is sufficient to define the social status of the indented servants. They were similar to the "redemptioners" of the banks of the Hudson in the next generation persons "brought over free, not being able to pay their passage money, and sold to the landed proprietors for a certain number of years." At the end of their terms of service, both the indented servants of the Virginia planter and the redemptioners of the New York patroon became free citizens.

Now (August, 1619), a portentous personage appeared on the soil of North America- the African slave.1 A Dutch ship sailed up James River, and offered for sale to the planters twenty negroes as slaves. There was to be no trouble about an indenture, or any limitation of the term of service. The negroes were captives, and their owners sold them to repay themselves for their trouble and expense. There seems to have been no difference of opinion as to their right to do so. The negroes were probably regarded as substantially the

1 The year of the arrival of the first slaves is sometimes stated to have been 1620. The correct date is here given. Rolfe, then at Jamestown, says: "To begin with, this year, 1619, about the last of August, came in a Dutch man-of-war that sold us twenty negars." The first Assembly had met in July. Thus free government and African slavery were introduced into America nearly at the same moment.

same as indented servants, with the important exception that the servitude was to last during their lives. The planters readily purchased them to cultivate tobacco; they were scattered among the plantations; and from this small nucleus widened, year by year, the great African shadow, out of which were to issue the lightning and thunder of the future.

XXI.

THE MASSACRE.

66

WITH the opening of the year 1622 Virginia seemed to be on the highroad to prosperity. There were more than four thousand people in it. The old huddle of huts at Jamestown had streamed away into new settlements everywhere. Along the banks of James River, from a point just below the falls down to Chesapeake Bay, were numerous 'plantations," the residences of little groups of settlers, varying from a few families to a hundred persons; and adventurous people had penetrated the country and established "forts" toward the Potomac. The fields smiled with plenty; there was no trace now of the old starving era. Tobacco had suddenly become a great source of revenue, and was assiduously cultivated. Glass and other works were in process of erection. An Indian college had been founded at the City of Henricus. Virginia had representative government, and law and order reigned. To human eyes the foundation of a thriving state had been firmly laid.

Suddenly the one leader among the Indians who seemed to have inherited the brains and courage of

Powhatan struck a heavy blow at all this prosperity. And it was struck at a moment when there was a feeling of profound security everywhere. The Indians were no longer feared, and a lasting peace between the two races seemed to have followed the old turmoil. The red men went in and out of the houses. The whites visited them at their scattered villages, and traded with them for the proceeds of their hunting. They were supplied with fire-arms, and had become excellent shots; Sir George Yeardley had an Indian servant to shoot game for him. In the eyes of the Virginians, these red people were a conquered race inferior people, who had at last accepted their fate with resignation, and from whom nothing more was to be feared, since events had decided to whom Virginia belonged.

an

From this dream they now had a rude waking. Powhatan had died in 1618, and had been succeeded by his brother, Opitchapan, an old and inert man, who was quickly deposed by Opechancanough. The Indian tradition in the time of Beverley was that Opechancanough was not Powhatan's brother, nor a Virginian at all, but a mysterious stranger from Mexico or some southwestern country. But he became the Virginia ruler, and, as soon as he found himself in authority, formed a plot for the extermination of the English. It was laid with great secrecy and skill. The essential point was to wait, and lull the colonists to a sense of security; and this was thoroughly effected. For four years Opechancanough was maturing his scheme, and bringing tribe. after tribe into it; and during this time no one of the many Indians acquainted with it betrayed him. He himself acted his part of friend of the English with the