Daily public ledger. [volume] (Maysville, Ky.) 1892-191?, 1896-04-11
iN wAsHlNoroN.s pAY.
A Picture Of Colonial virginia Her Vast
Landed Estates.

A Picture Of Colonial virgInia-Her Vast
Landed Estates.
Virginia, the oldest of the colonies,
was least to be distinguished by any pri
vatc character of her own from the rural
communities of England herself. Her
population has come 10 her almost with
out selection throughout every stage ce
quick change and troubled fortune tat
England had seen during the fatefIti days
since James Stuart became king; and
Englishmen in Virginia were in no way
radically distinguishablc from English
men in England, except that they were
provincials and frontiersmen. They had
their own tasks and ways of life, in
deed, living, as they did, within the old
forests of u virgin continent, upon the
confines of the world. But their tastes
and spite of change and Sc
clusion, they had in common with Eng.
lishmen at home. They gave leave to
their opinions, too, with a like down.
right confidence and hardihood of be-
lief, never doubling they knew how
far practical matters should go. They
had even kept the English character as
they had received it, against the touch OF
time and social revolution, until Virgin
ians seemed like elder Englishmen.
England changed. but Virginia did not.
There landed estates spread themselves
with an ample acreage along the mar
gins of the streams that everywhere
threaded the virgin woodland; and the
planter drew about him a body of de-
pendants who knew no other master;
to whom came, in their seclusion. none
of that quick air of change that had so
stirred in England throughout all her
century of revolution. Some were his
slaves, bound to him in perpetual sub
lection. Others were his tenants, and
looked upon him as n sort of patron. In
Maryland, where similar broad estates
lay upon every shore, the law dubbed
great property here and there
manor" and suffered it to boast it's
separate court baron and private iuris-
diction. Nirglnian gentlemen enjoyed
independence and authority without
need of formal title.
There was but one center of social life
in Virginia. at Williamsburg, the vii
lage capital, where the governor had his
palace" where stood the colonial col
lege, where there were taverns and the
town houses of sundry planters of vicin-
age, and where there was much CAV
company and not little ceremonial in
the season. For the rest, the Old Do
minion made shift to do without towns.
There was no great mart to which all
the trade of the colony drawn. Ships
came and went upon each broad river
rs upon highway, taking and dis
charging freight at the private wharves
of the several plantations. For every
planter was his own merchant. shipping
his tobacco to England, and importing
thence in return his clothes, his tools,
his household fittings, his knowledge of
the London fashions and of the game of
politics at home. His mechanics he
found amongst his own slaves and de-
pendents. Their Quarters and the Of
ices of his simple establishment showed
almost like a village of themselves
where hey stood in irregular groops
about his own square. broad gabled
house, with It's airy hall and homelil<a
living rooms. He might have good plates
upon his sideboard and on his table,
ralatable old wine in his cellar, and on
the walls about him portraits of the
stately mon and DANES from whom he
took his blood and breeding. But there
was little luxury in his life. Plain
comfort and n homcly abundance suf-
feed him. He was gentleman. owned
all he saw around him, exercised au.
thority, and enjoyed consideration
throughout the colony: but he was no
prince. He lived always in the style Of
provincial and gentlemanly COM
moner, as his ucighbors and friends
did.-Woodrow Wilson, in uarper's
Magazine.