ad been no
lack of harbors, fertile soil, timber, minerals and other resources.
From the earliest days the colonists experienced a labor shortage.

The labor situation was trebly difficult. First, there was no native
labor; second, passage from Europe was so long and so hazardous that
only the bold and venturesome were willing to attempt it, and third,
when these adventurers did reach the new world, they had a choice
between taking up free land and working it for themselves and taking
service with a master. Men possessing sufficient initiative to leave an
old home and make a journey across the sea were not the men to submit
themselves to unnecessary authority when they might, at will, become
masters of their own fortunes. The appeal of a new life was its own
argument, and the newcomers struck out for themselves.

Throughout the colonies, and particularly in the South where the
plantation culture of rice and tobacco, and later of cotton, called for
large numbers of unskilled workers, the labor problem was acute. The
abundance of raw materials and fertile land; the speedy growth of
industry in the North and of agriculture in the South; the generous
profits and expanding markets created a labor demand which far
outstripped the meager supply,--a demand that was met by the importation
of black slaves from Africa.

2. _The Slave Coast_

The "Slave Coast" from which most of the Negroes came was discovered by
Portuguese navigators, who were the first Europeans to venture down the
West coast of Africa, and, rounding the "lobe" of the continent, to sail
East along the "Gold Coast." The trade in gold and ivory which sprang up
as a result of these early explorations led other nations of Europe to
begin an eager competition which eventually brought French, Dutch,
German, Danish and English commercial interests into sharp conflict with
the Portuguese.

Ships sailing from the Gold Coast for home ports made a practice of
picking up such slaves as they could easily secure. By 1450 the number
reaching Portugal each year was placed at 600 or 700.[12] From this
small and quite incidental beginning there developed a trade which
eventually supplied Europe, the West Indies, North America and South
America with black slaves.

Along the "Slave Coast," which extended from Cape Verde on the North to
Cape St. Martha on the South, and in the hinterland there lived Negroes
of varying temperaments and of varying standards of culture. Some of