Page:Economic History of Virginia Vol 2.djvu/70

 by the slaves imported from the coast of Africa or sprung from parents of African nativity. The climate of Virginia, it is true, was less oppressive to the European laborer than the climate of the West Indies, but the economic reasons which made the negro a more useful and profitable hand in the cultivation of a great staple like tobacco, were just as applicable to him in the valleys of the James and York as in the islands of Cuba and San Domingo.

One of the most serious drawbacks to the employment of indented laborers was the inevitable frequency of change attending this form of service. In a few years, as soon as the time for which the servant had been bound under the articles of his contract or by the custom of the country had come to an end, his place had to be supplied by another person of the same class. Whenever a planter brought in a laborer at his own expense, or purchased his term from the local or foreign merchant who had transported him to the Colony, the planter was compelled to bear in mind the day when he would no longer have a right to claim the benefit of his servant&#8217;s energies because his control over him had expired by limitation. He might introduce a hundred willing laborers, who might prove invaluable to him during the time covered by their covenants, but in a few years, when experience had made them efficient, and their bodies had become thoroughly enured to the change of climate, they recovered their freedom, and, if they felt the inclination to do so, as the great majority naturally did, were at liberty to abandon his estate and begin the cultivation of tobacco on their own account, or follow the trades in which they had been educated. Unless the planter had been careful to make provision against their departure by the importation of other laborers, he was left in a helpless position without men to