It may now be thought a matter of surprise by some men, especially by such as know the advantages of agriculture, that the Proprietors of Carolina, who were men of knowledge, and zealous for the interest and improvement of the colony, paid so little regard to the only thing upon which the subsistence of the inhabitants and the success of the settlement depended. Instead of framing codes of laws, and modelling the government of the country on principles of speculation, in which men are always in danger of error, especially when living in a different climate, far remote from the country they mean to govern; had they established a plantation in it for the particular purpose of making experiments, to find out what productions were most suitable to the soil and climate; this would have been of more real use than all the visionary laws they ever framed. The first planters were men of little knowledge or substance, many of them utter strangers to the arts of agriculture; and those who had been accustomed to husbandry in Europe, followed the same rules, and planted the same grain in Carolina, as they had formerly done in England; which were by no means adapted to the climate. They moved on in the old line, exhausted their strength in fruitless efforts, without presuming to imagine, that different articles of produce, and a deviation from the eastern modes of cultivation, could be beneficial. Hence the planters, though they had lands on the easiest terms, remained poor; and the fault was occasioned more by their ignorance and inexperience than by the climate or soil. It was the business of the Proprietors to have directed their views to such productions as were best suited to the nature of their lands, and most likely to reward their toil; and not to have left a matter of such importance to chance, or the ingenuity of poor labourers. Agriculture was certainly an object of the highest consequence to the settlers, and of course also to the Proprietors of the country. [Sidenote] Archdale returns to England, and leaves Joseph Blake governor.