By the second charter given for planting the "First colony of Virginia," as it was called, its breadth was cut down to four hundred miles along the seacoast. Virginia had formerly included all that the English claimed in America. Part of the four hundred miles was occupied by the Dutch in New Jersey and Delaware. And the territory of Virginia was, at length, further cut down by the taking of another part of it to form Maryland for Lord Baltimore.

George Calvert, afterward Lord Baltimore, was a Secretary of State to James I. In 1621 he planted a colony in Newfoundland, which he called Avalon. In 1627 he went to his colony in Newfoundland, but the climate was so cold that in 1629 he went to Virginia. Before going to Virginia, he wrote to the king, begging for territory to plant a colony there. Lord Baltimore had become a Catholic at a time when there were severe laws in England against Catholics. Even in the colonies Catholics were not allowed; and the Virginians took advantage of the orders given them from England, and insisted that he must take an oath declaring that the king was the head of the Church. As a Catholic, he could not do this, and the Virginians bade him leave the colony. Lord Baltimore returned to England, and got the king, Charles I, to give him a slice of Virginia north of the Potomac. This country King Charles named Maryland, in honor of the queen, his wife. For this, Baltimore was to pay to the king two American Indian arrows every year. But, before Lord Baltimore could send out a colony, he died.

The territory was then granted to Lord Baltimore's son, the second Lord Baltimore. He was given all the powers of a monarch. The first settlers were sent out in 1633, and reached Maryland in 1634. This company was composed of twenty gentlemen and three hundred laboring-men, and the first governor was Leonard Calvert, the second Lord Baltimore's brother. Roman Catholic priests were with them, and at their landing they set up a cross. But there were also a good many Protestants in the party, and Baltimore had resolved from the beginning that there should be no persecution of any Christians on account of religion in his new province. In almost every country in the world at that time the established religion, of whatever sort it might be, was enforced by law.

The colonists came in two ships called the Ark and the Dove; they settled first at a place which they called St. Mary's, on the St. Mary's River, not far from the Potomac. They bought from the American Indians living on the place their village and corn-ground, and for the rest of that season they lived in half of the village with the American Indians. The colony had many troubles and several little civil wars in its first years. These mostly grew out of the religious differences of the people. But after a while Maryland prospered and grew rich by raising tobacco.

After the settlement of New England by Puritans, and Maryland by Catholics, there was a period of about thirty years in which no new colonies were planted. In this period occurred the Great Rebellion in England, in which Charles I was beheaded, and his son Charles II was kept out of England by the Puritans under Oliver Cromwell. But, after Cromwell's death, Charles II was brought back to the throne of England. This is known as the Restoration. It took place in 1660.

After the Restoration there was a new interest in colonies. New York was taken from the Dutch, and new colonies were planned. King Charles II was a very thoughtless, self-indulgent monarch, who freely granted great tracts of land in America to several of his favorites. To some of his courtiers he gave, in 1663, a large territory cut off from Virginia on the south, which had been known before this time as Carolina, but was now called Carolina, from Carolus, the Latin form of King Charles's name. This territory included what we call North and South Carolina. Those to whom this territory was granted were called "The Lords Proprietors of Carolina." There were eight of them.

In the northeastern corner of this territory, on the Chowan River, a settlement had been made by people from Virginia, under the lead of a minister named Roger Green, in 1653. This was ten years before the country was granted to these lords proprietors, and the land belonged to Virginia when they settled there. A settlement was made at Port Royal, in South Carolina, in 1670, but the people afterward moved to where the city of Charleston now stands. The foundation of this city was laid in 1680. A large number of Huguenots, or French Protestants, settled in South Carolina about this time.

The lords-proprietors tried to force on the little settlements in the woods a constitution which they had prepared. This constitution provided for three orders of nobility, to be called palatines [pal-a-teens'], landgraves, and caciques [cas-seeks']. But this system of government worked so badly that it was, after a while, given up.

The Carolina colonies grew slowly. But after the introduction of rice-culture, in 1696, South Carolina became prosperous. The proprietors, living in England, conducted the government of the colonies in a selfish spirit, and the people disliked their management. In 1719 the South Carolina people rose in rebellion and threw off the yoke of the lords proprietors. In 1729 the king bought out the interest of the proprietors, and after that the governors were appointed by the king. They had already an Assembly elected by the people to pass laws.