ABSTRACT
The persistency with which the same reasons are put forward in the various pamphlets and letters of the time attest the strength of the forces at work. The first and the strongest motive at work was the thirst for gold. The treasures obtained by Spain had dazzled the popular imagination, and every man seemed to hold El Dorado within his grasp. A second motive and one coupled by Lane, with the discovery of a gold mine, as the sole possible means of making the country in request in England, as a desirable place for settlement, was the discovery of the North-west passage. The raison d'etre of the subsequent Navigation Acts was recognised in the original foundation of Virginia. The Virginia Company experienced the truth that, in the absence of finds of gold or of trading monopolies, companies formed merely to develop new territories do not pay. The Virginia Company did not surrender without a struggle.
