Alpha Book

] in 1664, and the settlement of Pennsylvania (1681) by William
Penn and his fellow Quakers [Footnote: The Swedish colony on the
Delaware was temporarily merged with Pennsylvania.] at last filled up
the gap between the North and the South.
Numerous causes had contributed to the growth of the British colonies
in America. Religious intolerance had driven Puritans to New England
and Roman Catholics to Maryland; the success of the Puritan Revolution
had sent Cavaliers to Virginia; thousands of others had come merely to
acquire wealth or to escape starvation. And America seemed a place
wherein to mend broken fortunes. Upon the estates (plantations) of
southern gentlemen negro slaves toiled without pay in the tobacco
fields. [Footnote: Subsequently, rice and cotton became important
products of Southern agriculture.] New England was less fertile, but
shrewd Yankees found wealth in fish, lumber, and trade. No wonder,
then, that the colonies grew in wealth and in population until in 1688
there were nearly three hundred thousand English subjects in the New
World.


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