Page:Economic History of Virginia Vol 1.djvu/77

 It is plain that Smith approved of the sentiment which Bacon expressed in his Essay on Plantations, &#8220;that a plantation is like the planting of woods, for you must make account to lose almost twenty years&#8217; profit and expect your recompense in the end.&#8221; With a sufficient period allowed for the growth of its interests, he perhaps believed with Daniel Price, that Virginia &#8220;was not unlikely to be equal to Tyrus for colors, Basan for woods, Persia for oils, Arabia for spices, Spain for silks, Narsis for shipping, Netherlands for fish, Bonoma for fruit, and by tillage, Babylon for corn.&#8221; Before these fortunate conditions could be brought about, it was found that the soil was adapted to tobacco as a staple crop. The attention of the settlers was soon diverted to this plant, to the practical exclusion of all other products except sassafras, and even sassafras soon ceased to be thought of. The Company, finding that the colony expanded and prospered, did not attempt for any great length of time to subordinate tobacco to those various commodities with which the new country had in the beginning been expected to furnish the English people, although, as will be seen, it took the most careful steps to establish vineyards and foster silk-worms, with a view of filling the place of Spain and France in supplying the wine and silk needed in England. It was the opinion of Bacon that tobacco culture had turned the thoughts and energies of the English inhabitants of Virginia away from the real objects sought in the erection of the Colony. It will be discovered again and again hereafter that this opinion was entertained by James I and Charles I, and the committee in charge of the affairs of the plantations. &#8220;The carefull and dilligent prosecucon of Staples Comodities wch we