Page:Economic History of Virginia Vol 2.djvu/81

 that the Colony should not rest under the slightest suspicion that the Company was giving countenance to the piracy of Warwick and Argoll. That Yeardley understood the importance of keeping clear of the same imputation, is proved by the fact that he was so hostile to the vessel upon the strength of rumor alone that the master, in order to evade arrest, set sail instantly when he discovered that Argoll had taken flight. This did not prevent the vigilant Governor from dispatching a full account of all that could be learned about the Treasurer to the authorities of the Company in England. Entertaining this feeling towards the ship, and being fully aware of the extreme peril both to himself and to the safety of the Colony that would arise from showing consideration to a vessel which had excited the violent animosity of the Spanish Power, it seems wholly improbable that he would have entered into negotiations with Captain Elfrith for the purchase of the slaves contained in his ship. To have done so would have been to call down the wrath of the Spaniard upon Virginia at a time when it was the policy of the home as well as the colonial government to avert it. To give a cold reception to the Treasurer was the natural and prudent course to pursue, and that this was done, both Yeardley and Pory assert with equal clearness. If the negroes on board had been withdrawn from the ship by force, Warwick would have advanced the same claim to them which he afterwards advanced to the fourteen whom the Treasurer disembarked at the Bermudas subsequent to her departure from Virginia. No such claim was made. It is equally significant that in the census taken in 1624-25 but one negro is mentioned as having been imported into