Virginia. There was no thought as yet of the mountains and beyond, little even of the colonies growing up to the south. In 1705 Virginia slew her first and last witch, but to redeem that she then codified her laws, and in Beverly found a native and worthy chronicler of her history. Proud of the title of the Old Dominion, derived from her loyalty under the Commonwealth and from the motto on her seal, En dat Virginia quintum, ranking her as an equal part of the United Kingdom, Virginia continued on in her own life, not selfish, but self-reliant.

CHAPTER VII

CAROLINA UNDER THE PROPRIETORS

ONE becomes so accustomed from his early lessons in geography to naming the Atlantic States from top to bottom of the map, that he instinctively thinks of North before South Carolina. And yet historically they for a long time constituted but the one colony of Carolina, governed from the one city of Charleston, about which was the fuller development. Although later settled than the other principal colonies, South Carolina has always preserved so marked an individuality as to be a study not less interesting than any of them. The courage, the high spirit, the independence, and the love of home which have made this little State remarkable have given it a fame far out of proportion to its present limits. Its beginnings, therefore, deserve special attention, for they throw light on what has distinguished the country from its settlement until the present.

Somewhat as Mr. Green correctly begins the study of English history on the shores of Frisia, whence the AngloSaxons came, for the beginnings of Carolina we must not turn to England as in the case of Virginia and Massachusetts, but to another quarter of the globe. The spirit of exploration and colonization of the days of Elizabeth and James led to the acquisition by England of islands and countries in many parts of the world. Thus came several places in the West Indies and the Caribbean Islands, and not the least famous of these was Barbadoes. This little island,

containing hardly one hundred and sixty-six square miles, was known to the English from 1605, but it was not settled until 1625 under a patent of James I. creating Lord Leigh, afterward Earl of Marlborough, its proprietor. The year before, King James had granted to the Earl of Carlisle the twenty-two Caribbean Islands, including Barbadoes, although the patent did not pass the seal for three years. The conflict between these two grants continued a long time, and yet, nevertheless, the island became well peopled and prosperous. It was the first English colony to plant the sugar cane, cultivated by negroes brought from Africa, and the distance from England enabled its people to develop institutions of their own, built upon slavery, sugar cane, and a military system, all tending to create a spirit of independence. It had an Assembly, among whose early enactments was a slave code of severe but wholesome nature, and the Church of England and the parish system were fully adopted. During the civil disturbances it was neutral, and under the Commonwealth royalist. The Navigation Ordinance and later Act were mainly directed against this little community, which finally accepted the Commonwealth, but with practical independence. The Restoration brought no advantages to the faithful colony, for, in fact, the Navigation Act, forbidding foreign ships to trade with the colonies, was made more stringent. It is true that the dispute as to the two patents was quieted, but it was by imposing a tax of four and one-half per cent upon all produce to provide a fund to buy out the contestants, and with a proviso that after this was effected the proceeds of the tax should go to the royal treasury. There was some danger of overpopulation also, for about this time the island, hardly larger than the Isle of Wight, contained one hundred and thirty thousand people, of whom fifty thousand were whites. To its political difficulties were added disastrous hurricanes, and the result of it all was that not a few Barbadians were inclined to look for other homes, and some turned their eyes toward the continent of North America.

There, ever since the unfortunate fate of the French under Ribault and others, the territory between Virginia and St. Augustine had been a debatable land. The Spaniards extended their occupancy of the islands toward the north, kept in touch with the Indians of the mainland, and from time to time explored the coasts, with the primary object now of keeping off English intruders, for Spain's days of active advance were over, although she did not know it. In 1630 Charles had seen fit to make grants of all the region between thirty-one and thirty-six degrees, from the Atlantic westward to the South Sea, to Sir Robert Heath, the attorney-general, under the name of Carolana. This patent was not to be the one under which settlement was actually made, but, as a return to an earlier plan of colonization, and a precedent for one actually carried out, this instance of the proprietary charter deserves study. The Heath patent preceded that of Maryland to Lord Baltimore in 1632 and of Maine to Gorges in 1639, and so is really the first of those upon the mainland after Raleigh's.

America was not only a field of colonization of different races, but for different kinds of colonization by the same race. We have seen how the English founded Virginia by a patent to men prominent in the time of Queen Elizabeth and King James, and how this proved inadequate to the ends in view. It was found that a commercial company, where many stockholders risked comparatively little each, succeeded best; but this plan was not to prevail in the settling of all the great English colonies in America. In some cases the crown reverted to the old plan of a personal patent because of special conditions. It was really a reversion to a remote feudal past. Just as in earlier times an outpost had been established on the Rhine by the Carlovingians to protect their domains from the heathen Saxons and called the "Palatinate" because ruled by an officer of their palace; just as the Mark of Brandenburg was an outlying province designed to defend the march, or border, of Germany from the northeastern savages,-so, later, the Norman

kings of England established the principalities or counties palatine of Chester, Lancaster, and Durham on the borders of Wales and Scotland to protect the boundaries. No more interesting spot of land exists than Durham, at once a palatinate and the seat of a bishop. The plan of such a grant was to clothe one man with great privileges, both governmental and territorial, giving him almost royal rights, so that he would be the better able to perform his duties as a watchman on the frontier. He coined money, he appointed his own officials, he held his own courts, and originally the writs and officials of the central government had no effect within his domain. But that was long ago, and in the time of Charles I. only Durham remained a palatine. No such privileges as the grant of Maryland had been conferred on any English subject since the Wars of the Roses. And yet, it seemed appropriate in colonization, and in particular presented advantages for any colony which might be placed between the well-established province of Virginia and her foes, whether of Indian or European origin. Only experience was to tell whether people emigrating so far from England and needing so much selfreliance to make a living and build up a country would be satisfied to take their law from a fellow subject and be cut off from the constitutional and commercial growth which might be attained by their kindred at home. One would hardly think that the matter of popular rights and the possibility of popular liberty were subjects which concerned the Stuarts, and yet the glorious, if unsuccessful, struggle of the Virginia Company had not been in vain. When Charles I. granted his charter of Carolana to Sir Robert Heath, there was an important limitation of the absolute powers conferred by the charters of Queen Elizabeth upon Raleigh and others; for it was provided that Heath should enact laws with the counsel, assent, and approbation of the major part of the freeholders of the province, whom as often as need require he should call together. It is true that this innovation was qualified by a right in the proprietor to make