Page:Economic History of Virginia Vol 1.djvu/479

 of it escaped the regular charges. Women and children came on board in a quiet way, bought the tobacco in bundles, and secretly bore it off to the shore.

Grave as was the loss to the royal revenue from the volume of leaf in bulk escaping the officers of the customs, the loss to the treasury of the colonial government was still, more serious, the income of the latter being curtailed, because tobacco in this shape was exported in only too many instances without the owners having paid the usual charges to the collectors, the packages or bundles being smuggled on board as the vessels passed from plantation to plantation. An amount which would require a dozen ships to convey it, if exported in hogsheads, needed only ten when it was in bulk, and the result of this was that the Colony was deprived of port dues upon one vessel in every six. The number of crews to be supplied with