The West India Company and the Walloons. 



G5 



it, the Virginia Company made reply that they did not conceive any 

 inconvenience at present to suffer sixty families of "Walloons and 

 Frenchmen to go and inhabit Virginia, providing they took an oath 

 to be his majesty's faithful subjects, and provided they made profession 

 to agree in points of faith, and to be conformable to the form of govern- 

 ment established in the Church of England. But they esteemed it so 

 royal a favor in his majesty and so singular a benefit to the Walloons 

 and Frenchmen to be admitted to live in that fruitful land under the 

 protection and government of so mighty and pious a monarch as his 

 majesty is, that they ought not to expect of his majesty any aid of 

 shipping or other chargeable favor, and as for the company itself their 

 stock is so utterly exhausted, that they cannot give them any help, 

 and can only advise and counsel them as to the cheapest transportation 

 of themselves and goods, and as to the most frugal and profitable 

 management of their affairs. And further, that they do not consider 

 it expedient that all the families should settle as an entire body in any 

 one place, but that they should be located in different cities and vil- 

 lages as they might choose, -which they consider, judging from their 

 experience, would prove to be better and more comfortable to them 

 than the way they proposed. This reply, while not refusing the per- 

 mission to emigrate, was not very assuring, and it cannot be supposed 

 that the felicity of living in so pious a monarch's dominions, or even 

 the good advice that the Virginia Company would give them, could be 

 considered a full compensation for the denial of the ship they asked 

 for and the means of protection they required. Their demands do 

 not seem to have been extravagant; and as they were not granted in 

 the most important particulars, the negotiations with the Virginia 

 Company came to an end. 



But while Jesse De Forest was negotiating with the Virginia Com- 

 pany, the States General of Holland were in session and were preparing 

 the patent conferring the extraordinary powers I have mentioned upon 

 the West India Company. The government had kept themselves well 

 informed of the intention of the Walloons to emigrate, and had rightly 

 considered them a most desirable people with whom to form a new 

 colony. Before the West India Company had actually commenced 

 operations, this active leader of the Walloons had laid before the States 

 of Holland and Westfriesland his plan of emigration, and had received 

 from the directors of the new company to whom it had been referred 

 by those provincial States, a most favorable report, to the effect that 

 such a plan would be advantageous to the company, and that an effort 

 ought to be made to promote it, and with a promise that they should 



