acco, increased rapidly in this
section, and the best that England and France could offer was not too
expensive for the luxurious homes of not only Virginia but Maryland and
South Carolina. The higher Dutch families of New York also began to show
considerable vigor socially; Philadelphia forgot the staid dignity of
its founder; and even New England, especially Boston, began to use
accumulated wealth in ways of levity that would have shocked the Puritan
fathers.

In the eighteenth-century South we find accounts of a carefree,
pleasure-loving, joyous mode of life that read almost like stories of
some fairy world. The traditions of the people, among whom was an
element of Cavalier blood, the genial climate, the use of slave labor,
the great demand for tobacco, all united to develop a social life much
more unbounded and hospitable than that found in the northern colonies.
But this constant raising of tobacco soon exhausted the soil; and the
planters, instead of attempting to enrich their lands, found it more
profitable constantly to advance into the forest wilderness to the west,
where the process of gaining wealth at the expense of the soil might be
repeated. This was well for American civilization, but not immediately
beneficial to the intellectual growth of the people. The mansions were
naturally far apart; towns were few in number; schools were almost
impossible; and successful newspapers were for many years simply out of
the question. Washington's estate at Mt. Vernon contained over four
thousand acres; many other farms were far larger; each planter lived in
comparative isolation. Those peculiar advantages arising from living
near a city were totally absent. As late as 1740 Eliza Pinckney wrote a
friend in England: "We are 17 miles by land and 6 by water from Charles
Town."

Thus, each large owner had a tendency to become a petty feudal lord,
controlling large numbers of slaves and unlimited resources of soil and
labor within an arbitrary grasp. As there were numerous navigable
streams, many of the planters possessed private wharfs where tobacco
could be loaded for shipment and goods from abroad delivered within a
short distance of the mansion. Such an economic scheme made trading
centers almost unnecessary and tended to keep the population scattered.
"In striking contrast to New England was the absence of towns, due
mainly to two reasons--first, the wealth of the water courses, which
enabled every planter of means t