Page:Economic History of Virginia Vol 1.djvu/304

 and that they should contribute to the royal treasury a round sum of ten thousand pounds sterling to be obtained from the sale of one-fourth part of the tobacco brought in, the proceeds from the sale of the remaining portion to be expended in defraying the charges that would arise in enforcing the terms of the agreement. The Old Company declared that they were ready to become the purchasers of the annual crop of the Colony. They proposed that upon its arrival in England it should be received by officers of the Company. In the hands of that body they recommended should rest the sole management of the contract. It alone should decide as to the volume of the leaf to be imported into the kingdom each year, and it should also have the power to assign to the King all debts created in its favor while the arrangement lasted. No licenses should be granted to the retailers of tobacco.

The commissioners do not appear to have restricted their inquiries to the members of the Old Company. A contract much inure detailed than the one just described was propounded by Mr. Ditchfield and his associates. This contract required that the tobacco to be delivered should be made up in rolls, and when presented in this shape, the contractors were to bind themselves to purchase during the first two years two hundred thousand pounds of it, at the rate of two shillings and four pence for the higher grades, and one shilling and four pence for the lower, to be paid for in part in six months, and in part in twelve. The King was to receive during the same period the annual sum of ten thousand pounds. The contractors agreed to buy in the course of the following five years two hundred and fifty thousand pounds of the leaf at the