Englishmen in Virginia bought without qualm, as Englishmen in England
bought without qualm. The cargo of the Dutch ship was a commonplace. The
only novelty was that it was the first shipload of Africans brought to
English-America. Here, by the same waters, were the beginnings of popular
government and the young upas-tree of slavery. A contradiction in terms
was set to resolve itself, a riddle for unborn generations of Americans.
Presently there happened another importation. Virginia, under the new
management, had strongly revived. Ships bringing colonists were coming in;
hamlets were building; fields were being planted; up and down were to be
found churches; a college at Henricus was projected so that Indian children
might be taught and converted from "heathennesse." Yet was the population
almost wholly a doublet - and - breeches - wearing population. The children for
whom the school was building were Indian children. The men sailing to
Virginia dreamed of a few years there and gathered wealth, and then return
to England.
Apparently it was the new Treasurer, Sir Edwyn Sandys, who first grasped
the essential principle of successful colonization: Virginia must be HOME
to those we send! Wife and children made home. Sandys gathered ninety
women, poor maidens and widows, "young, handsome, and chaste," who were
willing to emigrate and in Virginia become wives of settlers. They sailed;
their passage money was paid by the men of their choice; they married--and
home life began in Virginia.
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