bruary, was pleased to tell us, "That, if the house should be of opinion that there will be a necessity to strike a farther sum in bills of credit, to defray the charges of raising supplies for his majesty's service in this time of imminent danger, and would create a proper fund or funds, for sinking the same in a few years, he would concur with us in passing a law for that purpose, thinking himself sufficiently warranted so to do in cases of real emergency."

'On this assurance the house have prepared a bill, and presented it to the governor, to strike the sum of ten thousand pounds, to give the same to the king's use, and to sink it by an extension of the excise act for a farther term of ten years. The governor will be pleased to consider, that his predecessor, to whom the mentioned instruction was given, did afterwards pass an act of the same kind, extending the excise act ten years (now near expired) for a grant of five thousand pounds only; and we never heard that he incurred the royal displeasure for so doing. As the sum we grant is double, we had no expectation that our proposing the same term would have been deemed extravagant. The governor thinks four years sufficient; but, as the representatives are best acquainted with the circumstances of the people, and must themselves, as a part of the people, bear a share of all burthens laid upon them, it seems not reasonable to suppose they will lay such burthens unnecessarily. They now offer ten thousand pounds to the crown, and propose a manner of raising it, that they judge most easy and convenient for the people they represent: and, if the governor thinks fit to refuse it, merely from an opinion that a shorter term for sinking the bills would be more easy for the people, we cannot but suppose, that, since the messages in which he so warmly recommended this affair to us, he has, on farther advices, or better consideration, changed his sentiments of the importance of the present occasion for supplies, and doth not now think the danger so imminent, or the emergency so great or so real, as he then apprehended it to be.'

They also intimated at the same time, that, it being an inconvenient season for the members to be absent from their

respective homes, they desired the governor to let them know his result as soon as possible.

And upon the next day but one this result came, and proved to be of a nature altogether extraordinary. Having charged the assembly with laying down a position in their last message, derogatory to the rights of government; in maintaining, that the representatives of the people have an undoubted right to judge and determine, not only of the sum to be raised for the use of the crown but of the manner of raising of it, he first acknowledges that right, and then whittles it away, by arguing, it was not an exclusive right; one half of the legislative powers being vested in the governor. After which he goes on to say, that he had neither objected to the sum, though he wished it had been larger and more seasonably granted, nor to the manner of raising it, though he could have also wished it had not been by compelling him to depart from the letter of his majesty's instruction, but only to the extension of the fund, whereby the money is proposed to be repaid, to an unnecessary length, by which a tax was to be laid and continued upon the people without the least apparent necessity: and that he was sorry to find, they were not satisfied with a fund by which the ten thousand pounds granted to his majesty would be repaid in the easiest manner in six years, and leave a surplus of several thousand pounds in their hands to be disposed of as they thought fit; and that, for the said ten thousand pounds so granted, they were desirous of obtaining more than three times the sum for themselves: that the example of any former governor was not to be a rule for him: but that, however, if they would inlarge the sum given for his majesty's use, he would extend the time for repaying it in the same proportion already allowed in his amendment, which he should not otherwise recede from; that it was possible more might be concealed under this solicitude for so long an extension of the excise than they were willing should be discovered:-and here a paragraph occurs, which does indeed make a discovery, and which will be of singular use to the intelligent reader through the whole course of the controversy, viz. 'It is well known,

that by the laws now in force, the public money is solely in the disposal of the assembly, without the participation of the governor; nevertheless, while these acts, by which money was raised, were of short duration, the governor had now and then an opportunity of obliging the assembly in a very essential manner by a renewal of those acts, and thereby of making himself acceptable to them; but to extend them to such an unreasonable length of time as you now desire, might be to render him in a great measure unnecessary to them during the continuance of those acts, but upon terms very disagreeable to himself, as well as injurious to his constituents: to this condition therefore I will not be the means of reducing any successor of mine; and this circumstance is of no small additional weight with me to adhere to my amendment.' He then desires them to observe, that the question between them, is not, which is best acquainted with the circumstances of the people? but whether it was reasonable to burden them with an unnecessary tax: assures them, they are exceedingly mistaken if they really supposed he had either changed his sentiments with respect to the importance of the present occasion for supplies, or that he was less apprehensive of the dangers the province was then exposed to from the invasion of a foreign power than before; makes a merit of having gone farther in his condescensions to please them, than he was warranted to do, by the king's instruction, unless they made an addition to the supply, by extending their currency a year longer than the utmost term allowed to the eastern governments by the late act of parliament; adds, that he well knew the state of their funds, and that the loan-office itself, were the money duly collected, was able to furnish a much larger sum than the sum granted upon this important occasion, independent of the interest hereafter to accrue, &c. That such being the favourable state of their finances, in declining to do what his majesty so justly expected from them, merely because he, the governor, would not wholly depart from his instruction, they became more justly chargeable with a wanton disregard of his majesty's commands, than he could possibly be with the lukewarmness imputed to him,

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which he had the greatest detestation of: and with a mixture of persuasion and menace, he came to a conclusion as follows, 'let me therefore, gentlemen, recommend to your serious attention, a review of your conduct upon the present occasion, and if you shall find that you have been too precipitate in the resolution contained in your message, let me intreat you to rectify it before it be too late; for, as I must be obliged soon to lay this whole transaction before his majesty, it would give me the greatest pleasure that both you and I might receive his gracious approbation of our services. But if, contrary to my hopes, you should still persist in refusing to accept of my amendment, and the bill should by that means be lost, I cannot but apprehend some unhappy consequences to the province from your extraordinary behaviour.'

There is, one would think, a magical power in government capable not only of altering, but even reversing the forms, colours, and essences of things; to common sense it seems evident, that the people give, and the governor refuses to accept; and that the said governor by avowing proprietary and deputy-government-reasons for such his refusal, avows, that the king's service and the people's safety are but subordinate considerations.......but our own eyes are not to be trusted it seems.......none of this is so.......if the people do not do all that is required of them, and in the manner required, they do nothing; and all the mischiefs that ensue are to be laid at their door.

The assembly were not, however, to be amused by the waving of a government-wand; but on the contrary having bestowed as much time upon the affair as was necessary for a thorough discussion of it, came to a course of spirited resolutions; of which the most material and perspicuous are those which follow, viz.

"That the raising of money for support of government and other public uses, by an excise on spirituous liquors, hath been practised in this province, with very little intermission, for more than thirty years past, and hath not been found,

communibus annis, to produce more money than was necessary for those uses.

"That the raising money by such excise, has by experience been found less burthensome to the people, than the method of poll and pound rates; and hence the load of public expence hath been more cheerfully borne, government more liberally supported, those who serve the public better and more punctually paid, and greater sums given from time to time to the king's use, than could otherwise have well been raised.

6 That if the excise act be extended but four years, and the sum of ten thousand pounds is to be sunk thereby in that term, yearly provincial taxes by poll and pound rates (always more grievous to the people) must probably in a short time become necessary, to defray the usual and contingent expences of the government.

'That if there really were, which is very uncertain, so great a sum outstanding due to the public, as if collected, would be in the disposition of the house, and sufficient to answer the present emergency; yet, to inforce the collection suddenly, by seizing and seiling the estates of the delinquent borrowers, in this time of scarcity of money, when so many plantations being offered at once to sale, could not probably find a sufficient number of good purchasers, and must consequently sell for much less than their real value, would be cruel, oppressive, and ruinous to the people.

"That the right of judging and determining, not only of the sum necessary to be raised for any public service, but of the time and manner of raising it, and term for paying it, is solely in the representatives of the people; and that the governors of this province have not, nor ever had, nor can have, any right to interfere therein, under pretence of rectifying mistakes, easing the people, or any other pretence what

ever.

'That a just, upright and prudent administration of government, will always be the best and most effectual means of obtaining and securing the affections of the people; and

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