For the settlers it meant wealth and prosperity, for the natives it meant staying alive. Some ran their own fishing operations, catching mullet, shad, herring, and other fish that they sold in local markets, either with or without consent of their masters.
The Indians lived very close to nature. As the years passed, however, fear and mistrust replaced friendliness. Though the French and Spanish were powerful players in the Indian trade, the transformation of southern agriculture was largely an English enterprise.
The settlers also knew that because they were so few in number, a battle with the Indians would result in their own quick defeat. On several occasions, different groups of fishermen tried to establish a permanent settlement on the coast.
Timothy H. Most of its people lived in small, peaceful villages along stream and riverbanks and survived by fishing for salmon and trout, hunting and gathering wild berries, roots and nuts.
Ruling Classes Upon arrival to the New World, the European Americans adhered to a governmental monarchy, yet the Native Americans held to a tribal form of government. The two groups would meet as friends.
It was also more diverse: Its estimated different tribes and groups spoke more spoke more than dialects. Curtin, Grace Brush, and George Fischer, eds. European and Native American cultures vary greatly in their views of women in the home, in societal structure, and in mythology.
Because many of the slaves imported to work on tobacco and rice plantations came from West Africa where malaria was common, they brought with them both acquired and genetic protection against some of the more virulent strains of malarial parasites, another trait that, in the eyes of English planters, made Africans better suited to work in tobacco and rice fields.