Hariot, in a treatise which must have produced a distinct impression in England in regard to the advisability of establishing colonies in America, gave a detailed statement as to the merchantable commodities the newly explored country afforded. These commodities were silk grass, resembling the kind imported in a manufactured form into Europe from Persia; worm silk, as excellent in texture as the silk of the same origin which the English purchased from the Italians, Spaniards, Persians, and Turks; nitre, alum, and copperas, terra sigillata, pitch, tar, rosin, and turpentine; sassafras, which had been found to be a specific for many diseases; oaks, firs, maples, hollies, and elms; cedars, which were specially adapted to the manufacture of bedsteads, tables, desks, lutes, and virginals; wines, oil of walnuts and acorns; otter and deer skins in vast quantities; iron, that could be made at the most profitable rates on account of the abundance of wood and the cheapness of labor; copper, silver, pearl; sweet gums and dyes of different kinds. And lastly, the soil and climate seemed to be favorable to the growth of sugar canes, oranges, quinces, lemons, and other tropical fruits, if the seeds were planted and properly attended to.[1]
The persons who participated in the voyages to America subsequent to the failure of the Roanoke Colony, but previous to the grant of the letters patent to the London Company, were equally impressed with the ability of the
- ↑ Discourse of Thomas Harlot, Hakluyt’s Voyages, vol. III, p. 326.
the same effect with equal enthusiasm. “So rare, so singular the commodities of this her majesty’s new kingdom of Virginia,” he exclaimed, “as all the kingdoms and states of Christendom, their commodities joined together, do not yield either more good or more plentiful whatsoever, for public use is needful or pleasing for delight.” British State Papers, Colonial, vol. I, No. 3; Sainsbury Abstracts for 1585, p. 73, Va. State Library.
