During the early years of the Jamestown settlement the Virginia Company of London encouraged many agricultural pursuits, including the planting and cultivation of grape vines and the making of wine. The reasons seemed to have been twofold: first, to make money for the Virginia Company, whose stock-holders had invested much capital in the new colony; and secondly, to insure the mother country a steady flow of inexpensive wine—which was impossible as long as continental merchants charged exorbitant prices for wines sent to England. Then, too, if wine could be made successfully in Virginia, the people living in the new settlement would profit accordingly.