Page:Economic History of Virginia Vol 2.djvu/62

 the rate of five pounds sixteen shillings and six pence a month. The average wages by the year appear to have been at the close of the century six pounds sterling, or if paid in tobacco, fourteen hundred pounds of this commodity, with one pair of shoes and one pair of stockings. The rate by the day was twelve pence.

If these wages were carefully husbanded, they could be invested in ways that were certain to bring handsome returns. Bullock has left an interesting opinion as to the disposition which a hired laborer at this time should make of his earnings. A part of the sum received should go to the purchase of a heifer, and the remainder be spent in buying three or four flitches of bacon for exportation to England, where they could be easily sold for two pounds three shillings and four pence sterling. This amount was to be expended in combs, laces, and pins, which commanded in Virginia double the price current in the mother country, ensuring the owner upon his original outlay in bacon not less than five pounds sterling. In the interval, the cow which he had purchased had probably given birth to a calf, and the wages of the second year had been received. At the end of four years, Bullock estimated