222 SPOFFORD 



greatly condensed, may serve to give a fairly truthful picture of 

 the life of the white man in Maryland and Virginia, at the time 

 when our national capital was carved out of the territories of 

 those contiguous states. 



First, however, I must briefly establish the chronology of the 

 earlier coming of the white man. Passing by the Norse and 

 the Spanish discoveries of the New World as foreign to our 

 theme, let us note the first English settlements on American soil. 

 Sir Walter Raleigh and Sir Humphrey Gilbert divide between 

 them the honor of having been the father of British American 

 colonization. Gilbert, in 1578, obtained from Queen Elizabeth 

 a patent for planting an English colony in America. Raleigh, 

 half-brother to Gilbert, was interested in the scheme, and sailed 

 with him in 1578 for America. Gilbert was forced to return, 

 but Raleigh made an attack on Spanish vessels near the Cape 

 Verde Islands, and then sailed for England in 1579. In 1583, 

 Sir Humphrey Gilbert sailed on his second voyage, took pos- 

 session of Newfoundland, and sailed to the coast of New Eng- 

 land, but was lost at sea in 1584. That year, Raleigh secured 

 a charter for planting the new lands in America, and sent out 

 an expedition which left a colony on Roanoke Island, in North 

 Carolina, in 1585. Queen Elizabeth named the whole region 

 Virginia, and appointed Sir Walter Governor of Virginia. The 

 Roanoke colony did not prosper, and was soon abandoned. 



VIRGINIA. 



In 1606, the first Virginia Company was formed in London, 

 with larger means, and a distinct purpose of permanent settle- 

 ment in America. The Company consisted of noblemen, gen- 

 tlemen, and merchants of London ; was known as ' the London 

 Company for Virginia,' and sometimes called ' the Adventurers 

 for Virginia.' The manuscript Records of their careful and 

 systematic government of Virginia now form one of the most 

 precious possessions of the Library of Congress. The Com- 

 pany was granted a royal charter, with exclusive right to 

 occupy the regions between 34° and 38°, or from Cape Fear 

 to southern Maryland. The Virginia Company, like the East 



