persons connected with English families ennobled or otherwise eminent for public service."[31] Beyond doubt the most numerous section of the Virginia aristocracy was derived from the English merchant class.[32] It was the opportunity of amassing wealth by the cultivation of tobacco that caused great numbers of these men to settle in the Old Dominion. Many had been dealers in the plant in England, receiving it in their warehouses and disposing of it to retailers. They kept up a constant and intimate correspondence with the planter, acting for him as purchasing agent, supplying him with clothes, with household goods, with the thousand and one articles essential to the conducting of the plantation, and thus were in a position to judge of the advantages he enjoyed. They kept him in touch with the political situation in England and in return received from him the latest tidings of what was going on in Virginia. In fact for one hundred and fifty years after the founding of Jamestown the colony was in closer touch with London, Bristol, Plymouth and other English seaports than with its nearest neighbors in America.[33] The life of the Virginia planters offered an inviting spectacle to the English merchant. He could but look with envious eyes upon the large profits which for so many years the cultivation of tobacco afforded. He held, in common with all Englishmen, the passion for land, and in Virginia land could be had almost for the asking. He understood fully that could he resolve to leave his native country a position of political power and social supremacy awaited him in the colony. The civil wars in England greatly accelerated the emigration of merchants to Virginia. Business men are usually averse to war, for nothing can derange the delicate fibers of commerce more quickly than battles and sieges. And this is especially true of civil wars, for then it is the very heart of the country that suffers. Many prominent merchants of the English cities, fearing that their interests would be ruined by the ravages of the contending armies or the general business depression, withdrew to the colony, which was pursuing its usual quiet life but slightly affected by the convulsions of the mother country. William Hallam, a salter, wrote, "I fear if these times hold amongst us, we must all be faine to come to Virginia." William Mason wrote in 1648, "I will assure you that we have had several great losses that have befallen us and our charge is greater by reason of ye differences that are in our kingdom, trading is dead."[34]