Impressed with the idea of Columbus, and other early navigators, that the West India Islands were not far from the Indian continent, he concluded that, if he steered in a more northerly direction, he should reach India by a shorter course than that pursued by the great discoverer. Accordingly, sailing in that course, he discovered Newfoundland and Prince Edwards', and, soon after, the coast of North America, along which he sailed, from Labrador to Virginia. But, disappointed in not finding a westerly passage to India, he returned to England, without attempting, either by settlement or conquest, to gain a footing on the great continent which the English were the second to visit, of all the European nations.
England was prevented, by various circumstances, from deriving immediate advantage from the discovery. The unsettled state of the country; the distractions arising from the civil wars, and afterwards from the Reformation; the poverty of the people, and the sordid nature of the king,—were unfavorable to settlements which promised no immediate advantage; and it was not until the reign of Elizabeth that any deliberate plans were made for the colonization of North America. The voyages of Frobisher and Drake had aroused a spirit of adventure, if they had not gratified the thirst for gold.
Among those who felt an intense interest in the new world, was Sir Humphrey Gilbert, a man of enlarged views and intrepid boldness. He secured from Elizabeth (1578) a liberal patent, and sailed, with a considerable body of adventurers, for the new world. But he took a too northerly direction, and his largest vessel was shipwrecked on the coast of Cape Breton. The enterprise from various causes, completely failed, and the intrepid navigator lost his life.
The spirit of the times raised up, however, a greater genius, and a more accomplished adventurer, and no less a personage than Sir Walter Raleigh. Sir Walter Raleigh,—the favorite of the queen; one of the greatest scholars and the most elegant courtier of the age; a soldier, a philosopher, and a statesman. He obtained a patent, substantially the same as that which had been bestowed on Gilbert. In 1584, Raleigh despatched two small exploring vessels, under the command of Amidas and Barlow, which seasonably arrived off the coast of North Carolina. From the favorable report of the country and the people, a larger fleet, of seven ships, was despatched to America, commanded by Sir Richard Grenville. But he was diverted from his course by the prevailing passion for predatory enterprise, and hence only landed one hundred and eight men at Roanoke, (1585.) The government of this feeble band was intrusted to Captain Lane. But the passion for gold led to a misunderstanding with the natives. The colony became enfeebled and reduced, and the adventurers returned to England, (1586,) bringing with them some knowledge of the country, and also that singular weed, which rapidly enslaved the courtiers of Queen Elizabeth, and which soon became one of the great staple commodities in the trade of the civilized world. Modern science has proved it to be a poison, and modern philanthropy has lifted up its warning voice against the use of it. But when have men, in their degeneracy, been governed by their reason? What logic can break the power of habit, or counteract the seductive influences of those excitements which fill the mind with visionary hopes, and lull a tumultuous spirit into the repose of pleasant dreams and oblivious joys? Sir Walter Raleigh, to his shame or his misfortune, was among the first to patronize a custom which has proved more injurious to civilized nations than even the use of opium itself, because it is more universal and more insidious.
But smoking was simply an amusement with him. He soon turned his thoughts to the reëstablishment of his colony. Even before the return of the company under Lane, Sir Richard Grenville had visited the Roanoke, with the necessary stores. But he arrived too late; the colony was abandoned.
But nothing could abate the zeal of the most enterprising genius of the age. In 1587, he despatched three more ships, under the command of Captain White, who founded the city of Raleigh. But no better success attended the new band of colonists. White sailed for England, to secure new supplies; and, when he returned, he found no traces of the colony he had planted; and no subsequent ingenuity or labor has been able to discover the slightest vestige.
The patience of Raleigh was not wasted; but new objects occupied his mind, and he parted with his patent, which made him the proprietary of a great part of the Southern States. Nor were there any new attempts at colonization until 1606, in the reign of James.
Through the influence of Sir Ferdinand Gorges, a man of great wealth; Sir John Popham, lord chief justice of England; Richard Hakluyt, the historian; Bartholomew Gosnold, the navigator, and John Smith, the enthusiastic adventurer,—King James I. granted a royal charter to two rival companies, for the colonization of America. The London Company Incorporated. first was composed of noblemen, gentlemen, and merchants, in and about London, who had an exclusive right to occupy regions from thirty-four to thirty-eight degrees of north latitude. The other company, composed of gentlemen and merchants in the west of England, had assigned to them the territory between forty-one and forty-five degrees. But only the first company succeeded.
The territory, appropriated to the London or southern colony, preserved the name which had been bestowed upon it during the reign of Elizabeth,—Virginia. The colonists were authorized to transport, free of the custom-house, for the term of seven years, what arms and provisions they required; and their children were permitted to enjoy the same privileges and liberties, in the American settlements, that Englishmen had at home. They had the right to search for mines, to coin money, and, for twenty-one years, to impose duties, on vessels trading to their harbors, for the benefit of the colony. But, after this period, the duty was to be taken for the king, who also preserved a control over both the councils established for the government of the colony,—the one in England itself, and the other in Virginia; a control inconsistent with those liberties which the colonists subsequently asserted and secured.
The London Company promptly applied themselves to the settlement of their territories; and, on the 19th of December, 1606, a squadron of three small vessels set sail for the new world; and, on May 13, 1607, a company of one hundred and five men, without families, disembarked at Hardships of the Virginia Colony. Jamestown. This was the first permanent settlement in America by the English. But great misfortunes afflicted them. Before September, one half of the colonists had perished, and the other half were suffering from famine, dissension, and fear. The president, Wingfield, attempted to embezzle the public stores, and escape to the West Indies. He was supplanted in his command by Ratcliffe, a man without capacity. But a deliverer was raised up in the person of Captain John Smith, who extricated the suffering and discontented band from the evils which impended. He had been a traveller and a warrior; had visited France, Italy, and Egypt; fought in Holland and Hungary; was taken a prisoner of war in Wallachia, and sent as a slave to Constantinople. Removed to a fortress in the Crimea, and subjected to the hardest tasks, he yet contrived to escape, and, after many perils, reached his native country. But greater hardships and dangers awaited him in the new world, to which he was impelled by his adventurous curiosity. He was surprised and taken by a party of hostile Indians, when on a tour of exploration, and would have been murdered, had it not been for his remarkable presence of mind and singular sagacity, united with the intercession of the famous Pocahontas, daughter of a great Indian chief, from whom some of the best families in Virginia are descended. It would be pleasant to detail the romantic incidents of this brief captivity; but our limits forbid. Smith, when he returned to Jamestown, found his company reduced to forty men, and they were discouraged and disheartened. Moreover, they were a different class of men from those who colonized New England. They were gentlemen adventurers connected with aristocratic families, were greedy for gold, and had neither the fortitude nor the habits requisite for success. They were not accustomed to labor, at least with the axe and plough. Smith earnestly wrote to the council of the company in England, to send carpenters, husbandmen, gardeners, fishermen, and blacksmiths, instead of "vagabond gentlemen and goldsmiths." But he had to organize a colony with such materials as avarice or adventurous curiosity had sent to America. And, in spite of dissensions and natural indolence, he succeeded in placing it on a firm foundation; surveyed the Chesapeake Bay to the Susquehannah, and explored the inlets of the majestic Potomac. But he was not permitted to complete the work which he had so beneficently begun. His administration was unacceptable to the company in England, who cared very little for the welfare of the infant colony, and only sought a profitable investment of their capital. They were disappointed that mines of gold and silver had not been discovered, and that they themselves had not become enriched. Even the substantial welfare of the colony displeased them; for this diverted attention from the pursuit of mineral wealth.