modities were transported to Boston and there bartered for clothing, though a little direct trade was had with the West Indies, Madeira, and Fayal.' Rhode Island did a considerable export business, and in 1680 reported forty-nine vessels of all kinds. Massachusetts Bay was the leading commercial colony, and at this time Boston was the chief commercial city. Massachusetts was also the birthplace of American manufactures, which in the beginning, as in all the other colonies, took the form of homespun work for domestic purposes. Grist - mills, saw - mills, and tanneries were to be found everywhere; and salt works, brick-yards, glass works, pottery works, and cobblers' shops all existed, as auxiliaries to farming. Much the same conditions prevailed in Connecticut to the middle of the next century; but Massachusetts at a rather early date turned her hand to more elaborate manufacturing. Cotton from Barbadoes, wool from the backs of domestic sheep, as well as from Bilbao and Malaga, furnished the material. Iron works were started at Saugus and Weymouth in 1640, and a man named Jenks was granted a patent in 1646 for making scythes at Lynn. There is reason to believe that edged tools of other varieties also were made.2

1 Cal. of State Pap., Col., 1677-1680, §§ 522, 577.

? Mass. Col. Records, II., 105, III., 298; Cal. of State Pap., Col., 1661-1668, § 75; Weeden, Econ. and Social Hist. of New England, I., 183, 184.

Later these industries expanded until the greater part of the New England colonists were wearing articles of their own making, and were using in their daily work utensils hammered out at their own forges. Every New-Englander was a born mechanic and craftsman, and if unable to obtain supplies elsewhere, either because of distance or poverty, knew how to provide for himself. He was not manufacturing for export, he was only trying to live and to work. But the home government, urged on by the manufacturers in England, who desired a market for their products, viewed even the homespun industry with suspicion, fearful lest it might curtail the colonial demand for English goods. No restrictions were imposed during the period under discussion, but during the last decade of the seventeenth century, induced by the complaints of agents in America and urged on by interested parties at home, the English government began to adopt measures designed to prevent the increase of manufacturing in New England and New York.

Thus we see that from the point of view of industry and staple products the colonies fall into certain defined groups. South Carolina was an agricultural colony, carrying on a meagre commerce with the West Indies and closely allied to the West Indian group. Virginia and Maryland, absorbed in the production of tobacco, were wholly agricultural. The middle colonies, areas of agricult

ural activity, made up two groups with centres in Philadelphia and New York, to which they sent their surplus products for transmission to foreign countries, the West Indies, or neighboring colonies. Delaware, Pennsylvania (outside of Philadelphia), and New Jersey had no independent economic life, being self-sufficing agricultural regions, and reaching the outside world only through the adjacent commercial cities to which, economically, they were attached. Before 1689 no one of the southern or middle colonies had developed an independent manufacturing life or had carried domestic industry to such a point as to arouse the suspicions of the home government. In the south, manufacturing was subordinate to agriculture, and in Philadelphia to commerce. In New York, partly because of a growing mining industry in the hills across the Hudson, manufacturing tended to become a matter of importance; but even there it remained for the most part of little consequence in the seventeenth century.

In New England manufacturing in mills was carried on only in the tidewater regions, an area exceedingly small as compared with the agricultural district behind it, in which manufacturing was subordinate to agriculture, lumbering, and commerce. The instinct to manufacture was an ingrained characteristic of the New-Englander, and it is not surprising to find that manufacturing permeated the New England colonies as it did none of

the others. But at best it did not pass out of the domestic stage: people made their own clothes, hammered out their own nails, and provided a thousand and one other necessary conveniences for comfortable living.

At no time in their colonial history did English merchants have any special reason to fear colonial competitions, and though the restrictive policy of England may have succeeded in holding the colonies in check, it is an open question how far the colonists would have manufactured for export had they been let alone. England furnished New England and all the colonies with her own manufactures as well as with those of other countries; but she failed signally in making the colonies in all particulars a vent for her own commodities. All the colonies provided themselves to a certain extent with what they needed, and in New England two-thirds of the people dressed in cloths of their own making.

The mercantilist theory, like others of a similar character but of later date, took no account of the colonist as he actually was. Statesmen of the day created an ideal colonist, and from a vantage-point three thousand miles away endeavored to apply a system of colonial management which they believed to be best adapted to the interest of all. But the mercantilist as well as the Stuart had no comprehension of the difficulties of the problem.

CHAPTER XX

CRITICAL ESSAY ON AUTHORITIES

BIBLIOGRAPHICAL AIDS

'OR general reader and student alike the great biblio

Narrative and Critical History of America (8 vols., 1888-1889): the field of colonial affairs from 1650 to 1689 is covered by parts of vols. III., IV., and V.; the bibliographical chapters and notes are abundant but not very discriminating. Channing and Hart, Guide to the Study of American History (1896), contains lists of secondary authorities on state and local history (§ 23), and a list of colonial records classified by colonies and including local records (§ 29); §§ 98-108, 120-128, are topical lists in the field of this volume. The Guide now needs bringing up to date. J. N. Larned, Literature of American History, a Bibliographical Guide (1902), contains descriptive and critical notes on the principal authorities on colonial history.

GENERAL SECONDARY WORKS

The period from 1652 to 1689 has been liberally dealt with by writers on colonial history. George Bancroft, History of the United States (last revision, 6 vols., 18831885), has devoted three-quarters of a volume to the subject; but his version shows strong hostility to the policy of the English government and is marred by unnecessary digressions. Richard Hildreth, History of the United States (6 vols., 1849-1852), passes over many phases of the subject with little appreciation of the issues.