Of Plantations
When Francis Bacon speaks of plantations, he means colonies. This essay was published in 1625, so he would have known much about the early colonization efforts of Sir Walter Raleigh and the Virginia Company. The first disastrous settlement at Jamestown was planted in 1607. He would have heard about the massacre of 1622, in which the Powhatan Confederacy tried to get rid of the troublesome interlopers once and for all. Bacon would have heard stories about the starvation, disease, Indian attacks, and bitter fighting among the colonists, but this essay shows no sign of any of that. He chose instead to provide his considered opinion about how colonization ought to be done.
Plantation, not extirpation
“I like a plantation in pure soil; that is, where people are not displanted, to the end, to plant in others. For else it is rather an extirpation, than a plantation.” Could there be a milder response to the violent conflicts between English and Indian?
Toward the end, he adds, “If you plant where savages are, do not only entertain them, with trifles and gingles, but use them justly and graciously, with sufficient guard nevertheless; and do not win their favor, by helping them to invade their enemies, but for their defense, it is not amiss; and send oft of them, over to the country that plants, that they may see a better condition than their own, and commend it when they return.”
He was convinced, as all Europeans were, of the vast superiority of their own cultures and practices. It’s the way of all people, I suppose. Justice and courtesy would have gone a long way in making English colonization more successful in the long run. There was a lot of room. We would have overwhelmed the aboriginal inhabitants eventually since agriculture supports larger populations, but it could have happened more gradually, with less bigotry and violence. My $0.02, at Jacobean rates. Of Plantations read more…
Don’t be greedy
“Planting of countries is like the planting of woods; for you must make an account to leese almost twenty years’ profit, and expect your recompense in the end. For the principal thing, that hath been the destruction of most plantations, hath been the base and hasty drawing of profit, in the first years.”
Bacon’s readers would understand the analogy of an investment in woods perfectly. You have to wait for the trees to grow, after all. Until then, it’s just a patch of ground. You can hunt in it, but not much else.
Choose your settlers wisely
“It is a shameful and unblessed thing, to take the scum of people, and wicked condemned men, to be the people with whom you plant; and not only so, but it spoileth the plantation; for they will ever live like rogues, and not fall to work, but be lazy, and do mischief, and spend victuals, and be quickly weary, and then certify over to their country, to the discredit of the plantation. The people wherewith you plant ought to be gardeners, plowmen, laborers, smiths, carpenters, joiners, fishermen, fowlers, with a few apothecaries, surgeons, cooks, and bakers.”
He might have added, don’t bring a shipload of gentlemen adventurers either. They won’t know how to work, even if they could be goaded into the manual labor required to build a town.
Later he adds, “Cram not in people, by sending too fast company after company; but rather harken how they waste and send supplies proportionably; but so, as the number may live well in the plantation, and not by surcharge be in penury.” Harken how they waste; there’s a delicate phrasing. Of Plantations read more…
Consider the victuals
Finicky Francis — advice about provender is the largest component of this essay.
“In a country of a plantation, first look about, what kind of victual the country yields of itself to hand; as chestnuts, walnuts, pineapples, olives, dates, plums, cherries, wild honey, and the like; and make use of them.” We’re still looking for a country that has olives, cherries, and pineapples, though I suppose he knew perfectly well those fruits didn’t grow in the same sorts of places.
“Then consider what victual or esculent things there are, which grow speedily, and within the year; as parsnips, carrots, turnips, onions, radish, artichokes of Hierusalem, maize, and the like.”
Woohoo! A new word, ‘esculent.’ Here’s OED: “Suitable for food, eatable.” First citation? Francis Bacon. He probably made it up.
“For wheat, barley, and oats, they ask too much labor; but with peace and beans you may begin, both because they ask less labor, and because they serve for meat, as well as for bread. And of rice, likewise, cometh a great increase, and it is a kind of meat. Above all, there ought to be brought store of biscuit, oatmeal, flour, meal, and the like, in the beginning, till bread may be had. For beasts or birds, take chiefly such as are least subject to diseases, and multiply fastest; as swine, goats, cocks, hens, turkeys, geese, house-doves, and the like.”
He advocates a sort of communalism, all farming the community plots and sharing rationed portions of the produce. Of Plantations read more…
Keep an eye out for a profit
Don’t rush into the commercial aspects of your venture, but do keep your eyes out for ways to pay back your investors as soon as may be. You might try planting tobacco. There seems to be plenty of wood in most cases, so watch out for iron. “If there be iron ore, and streams whereupon to set the mills, iron is a brave commodity where wood aboundeth.” Takes a lot of fuel — and water, which he doesn’t worry about — to process ore.
Other options are harvesting bay salt, pitch, and tar, or growing silk. That last seems highly unlikely, although the Spanish successfully planted both silk-growers and mulberry trees in Oaxaca. Bacon probably read those accounts as well, at least the ones translated into English.
“But moil not too much underground; for the hope of mines is very uncertain, and useth to make the planters lazy, in other things.” If all you have to do is scoop up a pan-full of gold every month or two, why bother to grow crops? Of Plantations read more…
Limit the government, but not too much
“For government, let it be in the hands of one, assisted with some counsel; and let them have the commission to exercise martial laws, with some limitation.” Remember that God is always with you.
“Let not the government of the plantation, depend upon too many counselors, and undertakers, in the country that planteth, but upon a temperate number; and let those be rather noblemen and gentlemen than merchants; for they [the merchants] look ever to the present gain.” It is also the function of noblemen and gentlemen to govern, though he doesn’t say this.
Location, location
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“It hath been a great endangering to the health of some plantations, that they have built along the sea and rivers, in marish and unwholesome grounds. Therefore, though you begin there, to avoid carriage and like discommodities, yet build still rather upwards from the streams, than along.”
I’m reading Libbie Hawker’s excellent novel Tidewater, about the Jamestown settlers and the Powhatan Confederacy. She says the settlers suffered from a lack of freshwater seasonally, as the tide flowed higher, making the river water briny. The semi-starved men were forced to haul water from fresh springs at a considerable distance. Of Plantations read more…
Bring in the women and leave no man behind
“When the plantation grows to strength, then it is time to plant with women, as well as with men; that the plantation may spread into generations, and not be ever pieced from without. It is the most sinful thing in the world, to forsake or destitute a plantation once in forwardness; for besides the dishonor, it is the guiltiness of blood of many commiserable persons.”
