Biographical Memorials of James Oglethorpe by Thaddeus Mason Harris
page 53 of 356 (14%)
page 53 of 356 (14%)
![]() | ![]() |
|
either be burdensome to their relations, or betake themselves to
little shifts for sustenance, which, it is ten to one do not answer their purposes, and to which a well-educated person descends with the utmost constraint. What various misfortunes may reduce the rich, the industrious, to danger of a prison,--to a moral certainty of starving!--These are the persons that may relieve themselves, and strengthen Georgia by resorting thither, and Great Britain by their departure. "With a view to the relief of people in the condition I have described, his Majesty has, this present year, incorporated a considerable number of persons of quality and distinction, and invested a large tract of South Carolina in them, by the name of Georgia, in trust, to be distributed among the necessitous. Those Trustees not only give land to the unhappy, who go thither, but are also empowered to receive the voluntary contributions of charitable persons to enable them to furnish the poor adventurers with all necessaries for the expense of the voyage, occupying the land, and supporting them, until they find themselves settled. So that now the unfortunate will not be obliged to bind themselves to a long service to pay for their passage, for they may be carried _gratis_ into a land of liberty and plenty, where they will immediately find themselves in possession of a competent estate, in a happier climate than they knew before,--and they are unfortunate indeed if they cannot forget their sorrows."[1] [Footnote 1: _New and Accurate Account of the Provinces of South Carolina and Georgia_. London. 1733. p. 30--33.] When the Trustees had got a list of a sufficient number of persons |
|