MARYLAND 341
In addition, he received the patronage of all churches built,
and was enabled to exercise an all-too-rare liberality towards
different religions.
The first expedition started in 1633 and is said to have con-
sisted of about twenty gentlemen and three hundred labourers.1
Among the former were Leonard Calvert, the proprietor's
brother, and governor of the new province, and other catholics,
together with two Jesuits. The new settlers finally arrived in
the Potomac and founded the city of St. Mary's in March 1634.
They were fortunate in escaping many of the trials and tribula-
tions that befell most other colonies, such as disease, scurvy,
famine, and Indian attacks. In fact they prospered so well
that their first crop of Indian corn allowed a surplus for export
to New England, where it was exchanged for salt fish. Also
they were fortunate in that they could profit by the experience
of the Virginians and plant tobacco, which became their staple
product as well as their currency. They developed a rural or
agricultural society, with scattered plantations instead of the
urban civilization of New England. Some of their estates were
large, were known as manors, and even had the courts baron
and courts leet of English feudalism. However, these manors
gradually lost their early characteristics and became plantations
worked by slaves.
During the civil wars, the colonies sided with the king or
remained neutral, and even New England, though sympathetic
with the puritan cause, stood aloof. When the second civil
war was over and the republic was established, the Long
Parliament was not able to give immediate attention to the
colonies, where Virginia and Barbados had recognized Charles II
as rightful king. It was not until 1651 that Sir George Ayscue
was sent with a fleet to the West Indies, where its mere presence
sufficed to induce the Barbadians to expel Lord Willoughby,
the royalist leader, and to acknowledge the commonwealth.
Similarly, without recourse to arms, parliamentary commis-
sioners persuaded Virginia to disavow its royalist governor,
Sir William Berkeley, and they also received the submission
of Maryland. During the Dutch war the council of state in
London hoped that the colonies would attack the Dutch settle-
ments in New Netherland, but very little was attempted until
1 So Baltimore told Wentworth. (Strqfforde's Letters > i. 178-9.) The number of
emigrants looks large in view of the tonnage of the two vessels chartered.