Reconciled now to the dominant creed, with a Maryland where Catholics were
heavily penalized, Baltimore resumed the government under favor of the
Crown. But it was a government with a difference. In Maryland, as
everywhere, the people were beginning to hold the reins. Not again the old
lord and the old underling! For years to come the lords would say that
they governed, but strong life arose beneath, around, and above their
governing.
Maryland had by 1715 within her bounds more than forty thousand white men
and nearly ten thousand black men. She still planted and shipped tobacco,
but presently found how well she might raise wheat, and that it, too, was
valuable to send away in exchange for all kinds of manufactured things.
Thus Maryland began to be a land of wheat still more than a land of tobacco.
For the rest, conditions of life in Maryland paralleled pretty closely
those in Virginia. Maryland was almost wholly rural; her plantations and
farms were reached with difficulty by roads hardly more than bridle-paths,
or with ease by sailboat and rowboat along the innumerable waterways.
Though here and there manors -- large, easygoing, patriarchal places, with
vague, feudal ways and customs -- were to be found, the moderate sized
plantation was the rule. Here stood, in sight usually of blue water, the
planter's dwelling of brick or wood. Around it grew up the typical
outhouses, household offices, and storerooms; farther away yet clustered
the cabin quarters alike of slaves and indentured labor.
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