overlooked. Martial law brought order and uniformity
in operations and compelled the people to work regularly, the hours
being six to ten in the morning, two to four in the afternoon. Dale saw
to it that corn was planted and harvested, that houses and boats were
built, and that the new laws were strictly observed. He pressed one and
all into service, even the women, some of whom "were appointed to make
shirtes for the Colony servants" using carefully rationed needle and
thread. Dale was credited, by a contemporary, as building on the
foundations laid by Gates in a manner that dealt effectively with the
two greatest "enemies and disturbers of our proceedings": "enmity with
the naturalls, and ... famine." Among the important achievements was the
careful husbanding of livestock to the end that a "great stock of kine,
goates, and other cattle" was built up for the company "for the service
of the publique."

Both Gates and Dale proceeded with a stern attitude toward the Indians.
In the end it was possible to arrive at a peaceful state by force and
negotiation. Dale recognized, too, that the Pocahontas-John Rolfe
marriage, in 1614, was "an other knot to binde this peace the stronger."
This helped to strengthen the treaties worked out with old Powhatan and
with the closer Chickahominies.

So effective were all of these measures that John Rolfe, in 1616, wrote
"whereupon a peace was concluded, which still continues so firme, that
our people yearlely plant and reape quietly, and travell in the woods a
fowling and a hunting as freely and securely from danger or treacherie
as in England. The great blessings of God have followed this peace, and
it, next under him, hath bredd our plentie...."

All this was accomplished when the fortunes of the Virginia Company were
at a low point and little support was being sent to the Colony. John
Rolfe then went on to predict that Dale's "worth and name ... will out
last the standing of this plantation...."

Martial law, strictly administered at first, was gradually relaxed in
application as conditions stabilized. Prior to 1614 Dale took the
momentous step of allotting "to every man in the Colony [excepting the
Bermuda Hundred people], three English acres of cleere corne ground,
which every man is to manure and tend, being in the nature of farmers."
Along with the three acres went exemption from much Company service and
such as was required was not to be in "seede time, or in harvest." There