the indomitable spirit from which victory is born, and made the southern wilderness a scene of memorable deeds. That part of the continent was to witness the first westward march of a white population through the forest; the first organized display of the new travel impulse that afterward continued without interruption by flatboat, steamboat, canal-boat, stage-coach, prairie schooner and railway until there was no more land to cross, and the Pacific Ocean halted the long migration.

Among all phases of the varied history that deals with the occupation and economic conquest of the continent by the white race, that which relates to the South from the time of its first settlements until the War for Independence is perhaps least known. We possess the dates and stories of certain important events, and a few human figures stand out with the prominence of silhouettes against a background of mystery, legend and conjecture. But mere dates are no longer esteemed the chief elements of history. They are not even the skeleton of it, for chronological records alone do not enable us to reconstruct the whole symmetrical substance of a period. They do not portray its features, analyze its qualities of strength and weakness or transform its vanished people and activities into a living drama that can be exhibited like moving pictures thrown upon a screen. The southern generations of that early time lived afar off. They had a hard time of it at first even harder in many ways than those to the north of them. They tried to be sufficient unto themselves as far as possible; were very busy in the struggle to establish themselves securely in a new country, and — doubtless because of their surroundings, isolation and labors developed less of the recording instinct than appeared among other white pioneers of the country.

During the early years of the white invasion of Virginia and the shores of Chesapeake Bay practically all travel was carried on between the various little settlements and plantations by means of big log canoes and heavy, broad-beamed sailing boats. And because of their fear of the Indians it was the habit of the people to build shields along the sides of the craft as a protection against arrows, and to fasten small poles in the boats, with hats on top of them just high enough to be seen above the shields, in order to make the natives think the moving parties were stronger than they really were. No effort was made for a long time to extend white activity more than a few miles back from the coast, and from the very first the character of development in the South showed a marked divergence from the tendency that manifested itself in the northern colonies. In the North the people at once began to gather into compact little communities which speedily became towns and served as central points from which radiated the white influence. In the South this was not so. The main impulse that directed the method and progress of southern settlement in its earliest days lay in the control of men who, before coming to the new continent, had been accustomed to traditions and methods of life handed down from the feudal period of large landed estates which produced all that was needful for owner and retainer alike. Hence the establishment of the plantation system of the South, and the creation of conditions that profoundly affected its future history not only with regard to travel movement, but in respect of all those other social and economic conditions that are always based on the accessibility of population units to one another. It must not be understood there were no towns whatever in the South during its first century and a half, for there were such

communities, but they were very few in number, very small, and exerted practically no influence in the life of the inhabitants.

By the year 1689 Virginia had some 50,000 or 60,000 people scattered in obedience to the plantation system, but keeping close to water. The few points where population was at all concentrated were little settlements called

Henrico, Bermuda and West Shirley. Rude paths through the forest were increasing, and a few rough roads were in existence, but no travel by vehicle was yet possible. All land journeys of consequence were made on horseback, and three years before the date named the Burgesses had recognized the importance of quicker travel by passing a law for improving the breed of horses in the colony. The landed proprietors met this appeal of the government with enthusiasm and the result was the evolution of a splendid type of animal that, together with an equally famous breed developed about the same time in Rhode Island,' served through all the English colonies, for a long time, as the best means of getting from place to place.

The early conditions in Maryland were similar to those in Virginia. Plantations were established all along the bays and rivers, each with a water frontage, and boats were the standard vehicle for such little travel as took place. Until the time of the Revolution the colony - aside from plantation clearings on the waterwayswas one unbroken forest. The old Baltimore was a trivial settlement that appeared on Bush River about 1683, but the new and present city was established on the Patapsco in 1730. Even as late as the year 1752 the town had but twenty-five houses. Twenty years after the founding of

The Rhode Island horses were called the Narragansett breed. It is believed to have died out soon after 1800. Horses were expensive, and good animals for horseback riding were worth from £25 to £40.

the colony there were only about eight thousand people within its limits, and by 1689 the population had only grown to some thirty thousand. After that time the increase was more noticeable and by 1751 Maryland had 145,000 people. Road building was advancing in a few

25.-Method by which coach or carriage travellers were conveyed across a stream in the days when journeys in wheeled vehicles were first becoming possible. If the ferry boat was a small one, the horses were compelled to swim.

localities and the first wheeled vehicles and sedan chairs had appeared.

The early population of these two colonies differed from that which established itself in the North in as striking a degree as did the economic conditions of the two regions. From the first there existed in the South a sharper social cleavage in the population than was to be found in New England and the intermediate settlements. It practically divided the people of the South into two classes, one of which had brought to America and transplanted here all those qualities and customs that had

long distinguished the man of culture and landed proprietor of England. The other class, numerically the greater but of infinitely less consequence in directing the political and social affairs of the people during the first century, was made up of small independent husbandmen from abroad or from the northern settlements, and of agricultural employees and retainers of the rich. The language of Lord Calvert in cataloguing his first party of settlers as "twenty gentlemen and three hundred laborers" gives a fairly good idea of the distinction that long existed between the two sorts of inhabitants. The body of the population performed the labor necessary in transforming a vast primeval forest into a civilization. Its members felled and burned the huge trees, made potash from their ashes, planted the soil, built the log cabins and propelled the boats when journeys were made. Their lives were dedicated to severe and unceasing toil, to eating, sleeping and fighting. There is little need for wonder that they left practically no annals of the years they lived in. They spent their days in doing things; not in telling about them. And in the performance of the tremendous task that had fallen to their lot they were sustained by a strength not appreciated by themselves. They and their ancestors had never been on speaking terms with luxury and they were not able, through personal knowledge and understanding, to compare their situation with a less stern necessity. It was well for America that this was so.

The other class organized and directed the activities of the time, valiantly led their fellow men in battle when need arose and sought, in the utmost degree permitted by their surroundings, to perpetuate on the edge of an immense wilderness all those refinements and light diversions of society without which their situation must have