Armes offensive they haue sufficient. - defensive not halfe ynough. MUNITION.

They are in greate want of powder, but lead to make smale shott they have ynough for the pres

ance of treaty obligations and orders from the Court of Madrid, he was committing upon the commerce of Venice, caused them to be detained. Captain Harvey repaired at once to the Hague, assured Sir Dudley Carleton, then ambassador there, that the destination of his ship was for Guiana, and besought his official interference. At the request of the Dutch authorities, the investigation of the case of all the suspected vessels was referred to the Privy Council; and they, finding the suspicions of the Venetian resident to be groundless, ordered the vessels to be released; the owners - among whom the principal was Maurice Abbott, brother of the Archbishop of Canterbury, and one of King James's four nominees for the vacancy of Sir Edwin Sandys, in 1620 (Stith, p. 179)—giving satisfactory security to the States-General, and being required by a royal command, upon their allegiance," not to serve the king of Spain, or any of his Lieutenants." (Carleton, Letters, pp. 214, 221, 223, 226, 227.)

Chamberlain, about three weeks after the arrest of Harvey's ship, wrote to his friend, Sir Dudley, expressing his gratification at the favor he had shown to Rowland Lytton and Captain Harvey. He thinks "Harvey, with whom he had some little acquaintance, to be a proper man, though perhaps somewhat choleric and impatient." He says, "Sure their meaning is for Guiana, or some part of the West Indies." From his language, it would appear that Lytton and Harvey were saved from ruin by Sir Dudley; or, in his own words, "would have been quite undone, if they had been hindered." (I. Birch, James, p. 456.) Harvey's intimacy with the Lyttons appears to have continued. In November, 1620, he bought of William Lytton, whom Chamberlain calls Sir Dudley's cousin, three shares or three hundred acres of land in the colony; and, in the same year, with others, procured from the Treasurer and Council a patent for a plantation there. (Virg. Comp. Declaration, 1620; I. Birch, James, p. 262.)

Two years later, in 1622, he lost his intimate friend, Nicholas Hare, with whom he had travelled over Italy, and had finally been domesticated at Padua. The administration of Mr. Hare's large estate was left to him as sole executor. Chamberlain supposed it would yield him £3,000 or £4,000. (II. Birch, James, p. 286.)

Sir Dudley Carleton having a portrait of Mr. Hare, and Harvey being anxious to obtain a copy of it to be made by Michael Jansen, or some other good artist, Chamberlain communicated Harvey's wish to Sir Dudley, who readily gave permission that a copy might be taken at his country seat at Ickworth, by any one whom Harvey chose. This permission was accompanied with the remark that "it was a happiness to that unfortunate gentleman [Hare] to have so honest a friend as Captain Harvey about him; otherwise, his hypochondriacal humors might have carried him some such way as the Lord Berkshire has gone." (II. Birch, James, p. 291.)

In August, 1623, Harvey was appointed a commissioner with Pory, as stated in the beginning of this note.

In August, 1624, shortly after his return from Virginia, he was appointed one of the council in the colony, under the administration of Sir Francis Wyatt, and afterwards on the 14th March, 1626, one of Sir George Yeardley's council; and, in case of Sir George's death during his official term, as his successor in office. Yeardley died in the autumn of 1627; and the Colonial Council informed the Privy Council, in their letter of the 20th of December, that, in accordance with the tenor of his commission, they had chosen Captain Francis West governor. It appears that Harvey had remained in England ever since 1624. (Chalmers's MSS. Eng. St. Papers, T. A.; I. Hazard, pp. 189, 230.)

By a royal commission issued on the 26th of March, 1628, Harvey, who was knighted on this occasion, was appointed governor; but he did not proceed to the colony till late in the

ent. But since my Cominge home I am certainlie informed his Majesties Commissioners for Virginia haue sent a good supply of powder.

following year. In his letter of the 29th of May, 1630, to the Privy Council, he says, that, on account of his long voyage and sickness, he had been unable to apply to the affairs of the colony till the week before Easter, against which time (24th March) he had called a new assembly. (I. Hazard, p. 234; Chalmers's MSS. St. Papers, ut supra.)

Some further account of Harvey will be found in the notes to Secretary Kemp's letter, inserted hereafter.

The purpose of the commission under which Harvey's Declaration, or report, was made was to ascertain the actual state and condition of the colony, and to make, if possible, the recall of the charter and the king's assumption of the government acceptable to the colonists. This act of despotic power was predetermined. The dissensions of the Company, the insinuations and intrigues of Gondomar, the Spanish Ambassador, and the profusion and avarice` of James, all contributed to its final accomplishment. The king, coveting an increased revenue from tobacco, had already, not only violated the charter, but also, subsequently, abjured and annulled a solemn contract with the Company, which conferred, to a certain extent, the monopoly of the English market for that article. He had also required, that all Virginia commodities should be first brought to English ports, and pay English duties on exportation to any foreign country.

Next, on the 9th of May, 1623, a commission under the great seal had been issued to Sir William Jones, a justice of the Common Pleas, and other knights, to investigate the affairs of the colony. In the hope of obtaining proof of misconduct on the part of the Company, their books and records were seized, the Deputy-Treasurer Farrar was arrested and confined; and all letters from Virginia were intercepted. The deputy, however, was soon after released, and the books were restored on the Company's petition, to enable them to carry on their business before the commissioners and elsewhere.

The king also, on the last day of the following July, obtained from the Attorney-General, Coventry, and the Solicitor-General, Heath, an opinion, that for original defects in the patent, and for abuses and miscarriages in the plantation and its government, the king might resume the government, with a reservation of the rights of individuals; and, to save time, it would be best not to wait for a judicial decision, but to proceed at once by royal proclamation. This was purely an obsequious opinion. According to an old marginal note on the Privy Council records," the real fanlt in the Patents was, that the King would have them." (Chalmers's MSS. Notes, Eng. St. Papers, T. A.; Peckard's Life of Farrar, pp. 89, 109, 113, 115, 126, 144, 145; Stith, p. 298.)

Armed with this opinion, the king, after several vexatious assaults on the Company's vested rights, on the 8th of the following October, by order in council, declared to the Company his fixed intention to substitute a new charter for that of 1609, and required a court to be assembled immediately, to determine whether they would, or would not, assent to the proposed abrogation of their charter; and, if they refused, he would proceed to effect his purpose in such way as to him should seem just and meet. (Stith, pp. 303, 304.)

On the 20th of October, the Company, by a large majority, resolved to defend their charter. The king, to give his arbitrary conduct the semblance of justice, so far departed from the course recommended by his legal advisers, as to seek the attainment of his purpose by a longer but equally sure method, the formality of a legal process. (Stith, pp. 296–298, signature X.)

To procure such proofs in aid of his design as he had failed to discover in the books and records of the Company, and in the letters intercepted, the commission to which Harvey and Pory were attached was now formed. Alderman Johnson's petition to the king, and his subsequent "Declaration " in praise of Sir Thomas Smith's administration, and the random calumnies of Captain Butler, in his "Virginia Unmasked," led to the persuasion that the evidence desired might easily be found in the colony..

FORTIFICATIONS. - Fortifications they haue none sufficient against a stronger enemy then the Salvages, and against the Savages only houses impaled.

Harvey, with his colleague Pory, arrived at Jamestown in the beginning of the year 1624, where they were joined by their colonial colleagues, Matthews and Persey. Three orders in Council of the 8th, 17th, and 20th of October, were intrusted to Pory to be published, at his discretion, in Virginia. They all related to the proposed resumption of the charter. The first announced the king's intentions; the second reproved the Company's delay, and required an immediate decision as to the voluntary surrender of the charter; and the third was explanatory of the king's intention to respect the private interest and property of every These were all published, soon after, by the Assembly. By a letter from the Privy Council to the Governor and Council, the latter were required to "yield their best aid and assistance upon all occasions, and in all things which the commissioners might find cause to use, in the prosecution of their inquiries concerning the state of the colony." (Stith, pp. 297814.)

man.

The commissioners were apparently well received by the local authorities, and, as usual on similar occasions, mutual assurances of a desire that their dealings with each other should be marked with the utmost frankness and amicable feeling were, no doubt, exchanged. But Stith (p. 315) says, that the commissioners "at first promised to communicate all their representations and papers to the Governor and Assembly, expecting the like favor from them, but afterwards stood off, and, indeed, absolutely refused to let them know any thing they were doing, under the pretence that the Lords of the Privy Council ought to have the first view of what they intended to present." Now, it surely is not credible, that men, of such intelligence and experience as Harvey and Pory certainly were, could be so forgetful of the nature of their position as to "promise to communicate all their representations and papers," in any such sense as to include their official reports to the Privy Council. In all assurances exchanged as above, on the threshold of any negotiation or mission, there is an implied and well understood reserve, that confines their meaning within the pale of official duty. Accordingly, when asked if they would give the Virginia rulers a first sight of any report they might make before it should be despatched to the Privy Council, the commissioners answered, as might be expected, and perhaps, too, as was hoped and desired, that "the Lords of the Council ought to have the first view of what they intended to present."

Stith adduces this reply, as proof of a breach of promise, and of a refusal, on the part of the commissioners, to let the Virginia rulers "know any thing of what they were doing." It proves neither. The question which produced the reply was made early, and was entirely prospective. It pointed to future reports, and, as well as the reply, had not the slightest reference to what the commissioners were doing, or had done; which, of course, at any time before the session of the Assembly, could only have been collecting information, the materials for a report. This was unavoidably a work to be carried on so much in public, that it did not admit of concealment, in fact, no report whatever was made for sixteen days after the Assembly met.

Warrants were issued on the 26th of January, -a few days after the two commissioners from England landed, for the meeting of the Assembly on the 14th of February. On that day, the Assembly met, and went immediately into secret session, with the avowed design of concealing all their proceedings from the commissioners. The first business of the Assembly was to draw up answers to the unfavorable accounts of the colony, given by Alderman Johnson and Captain Butler, in order to remove, if possible, the king's prejudices, and avert the danger impending over the charter. A desire to conceal, for a time, the fact that copies of Johnson and Butler's accounts had been mysteriously procured from the archives of the Privy Council, to anticipate any contradictory report, and to secure themselves from all interference and external influence that might be apprehended from the commissioners, was probably the leading motive for thus closing their doors against them, although Stith represents it as caused by the fault, breach of promise, &c., which he endeavors to fasten on the commissioners.

HOUSES. Houses they haue sufficient for the people that are nowe there, the fabricke whereof they haue much amended within these last two yeares.

In legal strictness, this proceeding, on the part of the Assembly, was a violation of duty, and an insult to their sovereign, in the person of his commissioners; for, in spite of his demerits, he, as legal visitor of all corporations, had the indefeasible right of free access, in some form or other, to all information concerning their acts and proceedings; and the letter of the Privy Council, mentioned above, had also enjoined the local government to aid the commissioners "in all things which they should find cause to use," in the execution of their commission.

Authentic information of the secret proceedings of the Assembly, at this critical period, must have been to the king an object of great interest and importance. By the conduct of the Assembly in withholding it, his commissioners were driven to get what they were entitled to by some such indirect expedient as they adopted in procuring it from Sharples, the Clerk, for a pecuniary consideration. In their capacity, they were constrained, by duty to their sovereign, to give him complete and ample information of every thing within the scope of their commission; and, according to English law, which, by charter, was paramount in the colony, any oath that Sharples, as Clerk of the Assembly, had taken to deliver no papers without the Governor's consent, was, as against the king's commands, a mere nullity. The king could not be divested of his paramount rights by the act of any subordinate assembly of a chartered company. Even the irregular delivery, by Sharples, of the papers to the commissioners, might be legally deemed a delivery to the king, and in obedience to a command emanating from him, which either virtually overruled and superseded the necessity of any such sanction from the Governor, or other functionary, as might have been prescribed by local law; or, at least, so far changed the complexion of the offence of Sharples as to take it out of the class of crimes for which mutilation, or other corporal and disgraceful punishment, was then inflicted. The Governor and Council themselves were subsequently disinclined to subject Sharples to the whole punishment prescribed in the sentence. They were called to account for the affair, and, on the 13th of July, 1625, wrote in excuse to the Lords of the Privy Council, that he was "only just set on the pillory, and lost a piece of one of his ears."

If, according to Stith, and writers who have copied him, Pory is to be condemned for his share in this transaction, on what principle are we to acquit Franklin, or his coadjutor, Whately, or Williamson, for obtaining, surreptitiously, the letters of Hutchinson and others; Madison, for purchasing the Henry papers; or Washington and all his Presidential successors, for approving and using appropriations for secret services? Least of all, was the Council of the Virginia Company entitled to sit in judgment upon him, before they had accounted for their mysterious possession of authentic copies of the Privy Council documents Johnson's petition, and Butler's information - more satisfactorily than by the loose and evasive statement, that "they were sent to the Company by some person." (Stith, p. 291.)

On the 24th of February, the commissioners communicated to the Assembly the three orders in council mentioned above, together with a paper containing four queries, or propositions, as they were termed, respecting the colony, and explained their commission and instructions, so far as concerned the subjects to be inquired into. A week later, they addressed a letter to the Assembly, enclosing, for consideration a form of assent to the king's proposed change of government, and expressing a hope that they would consider it "very fit to be subscribed by the whole Assembly, it being what they themselves would most readily and most humbly set their hands unto." But that body, equally unwilling to offend the king, or to adopt the suicidal measure proposed, instead of giving any positive answer, inquired by what authority the commissioners made such a proposal, as they could not see that it had any ground in the instructions which they had seen; and therefore, before they returned an answer, they desired to learn from the commissioners the extent of their authority, or definitely that they had no further instructions or commission which might concern them.

VICTUALS.Corne for themselves they haue noe more then sufficient to bringe the yeare about and at my Comminge away they were goeinge to trade for Corne with the Savages in the baye.

The commissioners, in their rejoinder, reminded the Assembly of the declaration they made at the delivery of their papers, that they had neither commission nor instruction to move the Assembly to subscribe the form of assent, nor were they needed for propounding the performance of so eminent a duty. They had been guided, they said, by their own discretion, with a view to the benefit of the colony; and, as freemen and planters, it was lawful for them to offer to the Assembly any reasonable suggestion, even of less consequence. They added, that they had further commissions, which concerned the colonists in their "houses, persons, servants, corn, cattle, arms, &c.," but that it need not be suspected, "that they would attempt any thing to any man's wrong, or which they could not very well answer."

The Assembly, having thus obtained a written disavowal of official authority for this attempt to induce the Assembly to disregard the policy and sentiments of their immediate governors, the Company in England, and give a subservient support and adherence to the measures of the king, replied, that, when their assent should be required by authority, it would be most proper to give a reply. They repeated their conviction, that the king's intentions had been founded on wrong information, and would, they hoped, be altered by their own more faithful accounts. All four of the commissioners signed the report to the Privy Council of this transaction, which was unnecessary, if they acted only in the private capacity, as they pretended, of "freemen and planters, and not as commissioners." (Stith, pp. 316, 318; Chalmers's MSS. Extracts, T. A.'s Va. Papers, vol. i. fol. 37, 38.)

Stith mentions, in general terms, the four propositions, or queries, which the commissioners, at this period, laid before the Assembly. As neither he nor later writers give the propositions in full, nor the answers at all, we will now give them, somewhat more at large. The four propositions were as follows:

First. What places in the country are best or most proper to be fortified or maintained, either against Indians or other enemies that may come by sea?

Second. How the colony stands in respect of the savages?

Third. What hopes may truly and really be conceived of this plantation.

Fourth. What means are the most direct to attain these hopes?

The Assembly answered each query in order:

Firstly. Point Comfort is of most use, but of great charge and difficulty. Warriscoyake, where the fortification was intended, (is) more effectual to secure the places above it; from Wyanoake Marsh upwards, there are divers places which may peremptorily command shipping or boats. The best against the Indians, and most of use for the future increase of plenty, is the winning of the forest, by running a pale from Martin's Hundred to Chiskiack, which is not above six miles, and planting upon both rivers, the river of Pamunkey being also more defensible against a foreign enemy.

Secondly. The terms between them (Indians) and us are irreconcilable. The charge of driving them away, which would reduce us to a better state than we were before the massacre, so great as it is, (is) too weighty for us to support; though hitherto we have done whatsoever it was possible for our means and numbers to effect against an enemy from whom there is no spoil to be expected. The advantages of the woods and the nimbleness of their heels prevent execution; the harms they do us is by ambushes and sudden incursions, where they see their advantages, we never, since the massacre, having lost one man in any expedition against them. The inconveniences that we receive from them are of far greater consequence: we have not the safe range of the country for the increase of cattle, swine, &c., nor the game and fowl, which the country affords in great plenty; besides, our duties to watch and ward, to secure ourselves and labors, are as hard and chargeable as if the enemy were at all times present.