Page:Economic History of Virginia Vol 2.djvu/468

 of his own estate all the supplies needed in carrying it on, whether springing directly from the soil and used in their natural state or after undergoing the process of manufacture. Among the numerous artificers who were found in the list of his servants and slaves, were spinners of the flax which he had produced in the cultivation of his own land. There were probably other planters, contemporaries of Captain Mathews, who made a similar use of the same plant obtained in it like manner, and this continued through the interval preceding 1681. In that year, we find Colonel Fitzhugh writing to Thomas Mathew and congratulating him on his progress in manufacturing linen, and expressing the hope that it would be profitable, and at the same time, commending his example to all the landowners of the Colony.

In 1682, at the instance of Lord Culpeper, a law for the encouragement of linen and woollen manufactures was passed, on the ground advanced by the Governor, that &#8220;it might be of some use,&#8221; which reveals that previous observation had not led him to be very sanguine as to any important development of these industries. The provisions as to the manufacture of linen were very complete in detail, but they show that there was no general effort on the part of the planters to convert their fiax into this material. To every person who brought flax or hemp to the court of the county in which he resided, in a condition to be placed on the spindle, two pounds of tobacco were given for every pound of flax or hemp so presented, but it must have been the product of his own land. The