under a restrictive tariff, but in that age representing an enormous volume of trade.[1]
Previous to the issue of patents to associations of private adventurers in 1616, the cost of the transportation of supplies to the settlers in Virginia was borne entirely by the London Company or its members, to whom fell whatever profit was to be acquired from the sale of the commodities of the Colony. In the beginning, the expense was met by the Company alone, and from the fund which had been subscribed by the different adventurers who had united themselves under the letters patent obtained by Gates and his associates in 1606. How large was this fund and how great were the individual subscriptions, there are now no means of ascertaining. That the general amount was of notable proportions is to be inferred from the size of the first expedition, and the number of supplies following previous to the grant of the second charter in 1609. The same rule was adopted in the case of the London Company, when it was formed, as in the case of other organizations of similar character; the adventurer wrote opposite to his name the figures of such a sum as he was prepared to risk, and his profits were to be in proportion to it. Under the regulations laid down for the government of the Colony, the trade during the first five years was to be confined to three stocks at the most.[2] All supplies purchased with the money contributed were transported thither as the property of the subscribers as a body. The commodities to be obtained from Virginia, whether in exchange with the Indians or as the product of the industry of the settlers, were to be returned to England
