have been more costly, because it would have been necessary to proceed more rapidly to secure new fields. If Virginia had been found by the first settlers to be a country as devoid of trees as a Western prairie, which was rendered impossible by the extreme humidity of the climate, the expense of producing wheat would have been smaller provided an adequate number of ploughs were available, but even under these circumstances, it is doubtful whether the landowners of the Colony would have been in a position to compete with the English farmer in supplying the English market, on account of the heavy charge for ocean transportation.[1] Admitting that he could have done so successfully, the English Government would have anticipated by many years the imposition of the tax which, in 1651, was placed upon all grain imported into England, as a means of protecting domestic agriculture. Holland at this time was the greatest storehouse of food products in the world, being a purchaser from all civilized countries, and in a period of dearth supplying them from her own granaries with the very corn she had previously procured from them at much lower prices.
- ↑ So far as I have been able to discover, there is hardly an instance of the exportation of grain from Virginia to England during the existence of the Company. It is recorded that “Sir George (Yeardley) with his Company went to Accomack (1622) to his new plantation, where he staied neere six weekes, some come he brought home, but as he adventured for himselfe he accordingly enjoyed the benefit.” Works of Capt. John Smith, p. 595. The expression “home,” which was the term usually applied to England by the colonists, was evidently intended here to mean Jamestown. The East India Company may have exported a small quantity. See opposite page.
