various regulations were established for making them soberly industrious on
a small-farming basis. The land could not be alienated, and neither slaves
nor rum could be imported. Persons immigrating at their own expense might
procure larger land grants, but no one could own more than five hundred
acres; and all settlers must plant specified numbers of grape vines and
mulberry trees with a view to establishing wine and silk as the staples of
the colony.

In the first few years, while Oglethorpe was in personal charge at Savannah
and supplies from England were abundant, there was an appearance of
success, which soon proved illusory. Not only were the conditions unfit
for silk and wine, but the fertile tracts were malarial and the healthy
districts barren, and every industry suited to the climate had to meet the
competition of the South Carolinians with their slave labor and plantation
system. The ne'er-do-weels from England proved ne'er-do-weels again. They
complained of the soil, the climate, and the paternalistic regulations
under which they lived. They protested against the requirements of silk and
wine culture; they begged for the removal of all peculiar restrictions and
for the institution of self-government They bombarded the trustees with
petitions saying "rum punch is very wholesome in this climate," asking
fee-simple title to their lands, and demanding most vigorously the right of
importing slaves. But the trustees were deaf to complaints. They maintained
that the one thing lacking for prosperity from silk and wine was
perseverance, that the restriction on land tenure was necessary on the one
hand to keep an arms-bearing population in the colony and on the other
hand to prevent the settlers from contracting debts by mortgage, that the
prohibitions of rum and slaves were essential safeguards of sobriety and
industry, and that discontent under the benevolent care of the trustees
evidenced a perversity on the part of the complainants which would
disqualify them for self-government. Affairs thus reached an impasse.