The Pensacola journal. (Pensacola, Fla.) 1898-1985, 1915-07-02

/, All Europe feared England's power
while Cromwell ruled. No doubt
Cromwell would have made a greater
empire for England in America had
his hands been free at home; but
death overlook him ere his plans had
widened to that great work e Sep
TENDER, 1889
Massachusetts used the time while
the Commonwealth stood not only to
settle a little more carefully the
forms of her own government, but
also to extend her jurisdiction over
the new settlements which were
springing up about her to the north
ward, and to set up mint Of her own
to coin shillings, sixpences, and
threepences to take the place of the
money so fast drawn off into England
to pay for the goods brought thence.
And, since her people were nearly all
of one mind and creed in matters of
religion, she took occasion to regulate
her church affairs even more strin-
gently than the Puritans at home
yentured to regulate the faith and
worship of England.
Virginia, meanwhile, underwent a
veritable Transformation. When the
Parliamentary commissioners came to
jamestown in 1862, in their frigate,
to summon the colony to make her
submission to the Commonwealth,
they had had to deal, as they knew,
with no special class iof Englishmen
like the Puritans in New England,
but with average Englishmen, mixed
of gentle and common, too far away
from England to be very hot party
men upon either side in respect of
the sad quarrel between the king and
the Puritans.
The Burgesses were the real gov
errors of the colony all the while
and the house of Burgesses was made
up of men of all opinions. 1t cost a
good deal Of watchfulness and steadi-
ness in governing to keep such men
quiet even under their own assembly
and the Burgesses themselves has
tened to call Sir William Berkeley
back to the governorship again when
they learned that Richard Cromwell
had declined to maintain his fathers
place in the government at home
England had not yet enthroned
Charles II; things hung for many
months in a doubtful balance; and
! the Burgesses conducted Virginia's
| government the while in their own
name. Sir William Berkeley was
only their servant as yet, and they
chose Captain Bennett also to be OF
| the governors council; but Sir Viii
liam was more to their mind, after
/ all, than commonwealth men, ant
they very promptly acknowledged
him the kings governor again wher
they knew that Charles had been re
ceived and restored in England, re
turning with certain sense of relief
to their old allegiance and their Ions
accustomed ways of government.
| The steady tide of immigration dit
not stop even at the fall of the Com
monwealth and the restoration O
Charles, the king. In 1913 there hat
been but fifteen thousand English
people in Virginia; in 1870 there wer,
thirty-eight thousand, and nine new
counties sent Burgesses to her as
sembly. This great immigration
though it brought to Virginia mel
who were all of one tradition an,
way of life, did not mean the intro
duction of a new class of gentle-folk
: There had been men of Ike extrac
tion,. manners, and principles in tn
colony from the frst-not grea
many, perhaps, but quite enough t
keep all men IN remembrance of tn
gentle middle and upper classes a
home; gentlemen as. well as. Doors
noted blood and obscure, good man
ners and bad. There now came me-
great many like Colonel Richar
Lee, of the ancient family of Coto
Hall in Shropshire, honored since tn
thirteenth century with places o
| trust and distinction in the publ
service; like Mr.. John Washington
grandson of Lawrence Washington
of Sulgrave and Brington, an
cousin of that gallant Colonel Henri
Washington who upon a famous da
, had stormed Bristol with Rupert