[Footnote 306: Captain Smith says of Virginia, "that the number of felons and vagabonds did bring such evil character on the place, that some did choose to be hanged rather than go there, and _were_."--Graham's _Rise and Progress of the United States_, vol. i., p. 71 "England adopted in the seventeenth century the system of transportation to her North American plantations, and the example was propagated by Cromwell, who introduced the practice of selling his political captives as slaves to the West Indians. But the number of regular convicts was too small, and that of free laborers too large, in the old provinces of North America, to have allowed this infusion of a convict population to produce much effect on the development of those communities, either in respect of their morals or their health.[307] Our own times are the first which have witnessed the phenomena of communities, in which the bulk of the working people consists of felons serving out the period of their punishment."--Merrivale, vol. ii., p. 3.] [Footnote 307: It must be remembered that the crimes of the convicts were chiefly political. The number transported to Virginia for social crimes was never considerable--scarcely enough to sustain the sentiment of pride in its scorn of the laboring population--certainly not enough to affect its character.--Bancroft, vol. ii., p. 191.] [Footnote 308: Stith's _Hist. of Virginia_, p. 167, 168; Chalmers's _Annals of the United Colonies_, p. 69.] [Footnote 309: Stith's _Hist. of Virginia_, p. 307.] [Footnote 310: It is asserted by Camden that tobacco was first brought into England by Mr. Ralph Lane, who went out as chief governor of Virginia in the first expedition commanded by Sir Richard Greenville. There can be little doubt that Lane was desired to import it by his master, Sir Walter Raleigh, who had seen it used in France during his residence there.--Camden, in Kennet, vol. ii., p. 509. "There is a well-known tradition that Sir Walter first began to smoke it privately in his study, and the servant coming in with his tankard of ale and nutmeg, as he was intent upon his book, seeing the smoke issuing from his mouth, threw all the liquor in his face by way of extinguishing the fire, and, running down stairs, alarmed the family with piercing cries that his master, before they could get up, would be burned to ashes."--Oldy's _Life of Raleigh_, p. 74.