gentlemen, merchants, and others.

The King's charter created a great Council of Virginia, sitting in London,
governing from overhead. In the new land itself there should exist a second
and lesser council. The two councils had authority within the range of
Virginian matters, but the Crown retained the power of veto. The Council in
Virginia might coin money for trade with the Indians, expel invaders,
import settlers, punish illdoers, levy and collect taxes--should have, in
short, dignity and power enough for any colony. Likewise, acting for the
whole, it might give and take orders "to dig, mine and search for all
manner of mines of gold, silver and copper . . . to have and enjoy . . .
yielding to us, our heirs and successors, the fifth part only of all the
same gold and silver, and the fifteenth part of all the same copper."

Now are we ready--it being Christmas-tide of the year 1606--to go to
Virginia. Riding on the Thames, before Blackwall, are three ships, small
enough in all conscience' sake, the Susan Constant, the Goodspeed, and the
Discovery. The Admiral of this fleet is Christopher Newport, an old seaman
of Raleigh's. Bartholomew Gosnold captains the Goodspeed, and John
Ratcliffe the Discovery. The three ships have aboard their crews and one
hundred and twenty colonists, all men. The Council in Virginia is on board,
but it does not yet know itself as such, for the names of its members have
been deposited by the superior home council in a sealed box, to be opened
only on Virginia soil.

The colonists have their paper of instructions. They shall find out a safe
port in the entrance of a navigable river. They shall be prepared against
surprise and attack. They shall observe "whether the river on which you
plant doth spring out of mountains or out of lakes. If it be out of any
lake the passage to the other sea will be the more easy, and like enough .