Page:Economic History of Virginia Vol 1.djvu/599

 slaves. In the course of the last twenty years of the century the demand for slaves increased, and they rapidly advanced in importance from a numerical point of view, and continued to do so until the termination of the colonial era. Until the middle of the seventeenth century, however, they played but a small part in the economic life of the community in comparison with the white servant. The latter was the main pillar of the industrial fabric of the Colony, and performed the most honorable work in establishing and sustaining the earliest and, in some respects, the greatest of the English settlements in America.

The term &#8220;servant&#8221; has been misinterpreted in modern times in the light of the menial signification which the expression has gradually acquired. The members of this class in Virginia in the seventeenth century included all who had bound themselves under the provisions of an agreement, embodied in a formal legal document, or, in the absence of an indenture, according to the universal custom of the country, which had the force and sanctity of law, to continue for a prescribed time in another&#8217;s employment. The term was applied not only to those who had contracted to work as agricultural laborers, or as artisans and mechanics, but also to those who were seeking to obtain, under articles of apprenticeship, a knowledge of one of