Page:Economic History of Virginia Vol 2.djvu/544

 Among the rules adopted in 1623 for the improvement of affairs in Virginia, was one requiring that all towns to be erected in future in the Colony should be built in the neighborhood of each other, this provision being suggested by the massacre of the previous year, which had been rendered more deadly in consequence of the fact that the different settlements were situated far apart, and so, in that terrible emergency, unable to afford any assistance to each other. The towns referred to were to be collections of farm-houses rather than towns in the ordinary sense of the word. The great mortality prevailing in Virginia in 1623 perhaps occasioned the further provision, that in choosing sites for towns and dwelling-houses only spots remarkable for their healthfulness should be chosen. The same year was rendered still more notable as the date of the earliest of the orders passed to compel every ship arriving in Virginian waters to proceed to Jamestown without breaking the bulk of its cargo before reaching that place. The Governors of the Colony after the revocation of the charter of the Company were for many years successively instructed to enforce this regulation. The effect anticipated was not only that an end would be put to the habit of forestalling imported supplies, but also that the population of that place would be increased owing to the extension of the opportunities for employment.

The practical operation of these laws in time excited great discontent, and the committee in England in charge of the affairs of the Plantations was in 1638 earnestly petitioned to express disapproval of them. One of the principal grounds upon which they were opposed was that there were no houses at Jamestown in which either tobacco or goods could be stored. The subcommittee, in