How my father and Scrope Bernard's other children had learned that tradition I am unable to say; probably from the gossip of friends and servants. They-notably my father and his younger sister1-appeared by no means certain of its authenticity. This, of course, they could have ascertained from their father, their uncle Thomas, and aunt Julia, all of whom lived till they were of an age to inquire; but apparently the possibility did not strike them in time, or they did not venture on any startling questions, which in those days could not be lightly asked by young people of their elders.

I have been informed that a book exists which would throw much light on the life of the Governor's wife, if the work of a person in a position to know the facts and anxious to report them accurately. As I have not seen the book myself, I cannot speak positively about any of its contents; but, from the report made to me, it would seem to have been written by an American loyalist, in the assumed character of a sister of Lady Bernard, and to have contained an account of her sorrows and sufferings during the troubles at Boston. A copy was lent some years ago by the owner to an aunt and a cousin of mine, but they did not retain a very clear recollection of the contents. On a subsequent occasion, when a loan of it was asked for by other cousins, the owner was unable to find the volume. Had this book contained any mention of the outrage, it would at least have established the fact that this story was current in Massachusetts; but, on inquiry, it did not appear that my relatives distinctly remembered any such mention.

Silence, in a case of this description, if never broken, would of course tell strongly against the authenticity of the rumour accepted in Buckinghamshire as unquestioned truth; but, even at present, the greatest uncertainty characterises this hitherto unpublished Legend of the Province House.'

1 Then Mrs. Glanville. It was to her, and Miss Spencer, her daughter by her first marriage, that the book mentioned below was lent by its owner, Mrs. Johnstone.

POLITICAL RANCOUR

89

CHAPTER XX

INTRODUCTION OF THE NEW TAX

Shuffling Policy of the Earl of Shelburne The Situation in Massachusetts— Governor Bernard's Bill of Indemnity for the Rioters disallowed in England-The Popular Party prepares for a Campaign against the New TaxThe Question of Paper-money-Josiah Quincy-Resistance to the Importation of British Goods-Attitude of the Patriots' to Governor BernardThe Earl of Hillsborough appointed Secretary of State for the American Department-Samuel Adams's Efforts to keep up Popular ExcitementGovernor Bernard urges the Policy of allowing American Representation— Joseph Warren's Libel-'The Sons of Liberty.'

THE approach of another annual election in May 1767 was the signal for renewed and increased activity on the part of the Opposition. Rumours of various kinds were rife; some of them, it would seem, put in circulation with a very definite purpose. Among other reports, it was 'insinuated that the Governor had been censured for the use of his negative '-censured, that is, by the British Governmentand that he would not venture to exercise it again. That assertion was not founded on fact; neither censure nor approbation had been obtained, although Mr. Bernard had earnestly requested directions on that matter and other doubtful points, offering to attend in England, if it should be considered desirable, and explain the state of affairs to the Ministry. At this moment Mr. Bernard was suffering from a recent bereavement, his son Shute having died on April 5; but it does not appear that this sorrow had any effect in softening the rancour of political enmity. It is probable that he wrote to his old friend, Sir Eardley Wilmot,1 then Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, with the hope of gaining information as to the legal aspect of his position,

See vol. i. ch. viii. of this work.

and that the following passage, given by his son, was a portion of the answer :

'The great variety of business in which your Excellency has been engaged, and so ably acquitted yourself, must have appropriated all your time, and deprived your friends of the pleasure which will ever accompany a correspondence with you. I hope you will do me the honour of ranking me in that number, and that this mutual exchange of letters will operate as a remitter to the friendship of our younger years, which was laid in the durable materials of congenial sentiments, unadulterated by those motives which form connections in this factious and licentious age.'

'1

The rest of the letter is not quoted; no doubt because it was a private communication. But such kindly words. were the more valuable that the Earl of Shelburne, Secretary of State, from whom Mr. Bernard then had to receive orders, instructions, and advice, was peculiarly unsympathetic and oracular. Shortly before the elections, the Governor wrote to this nobleman :

I have but one part to act, which is to keep to my purpose of defending the Government by the only means I have left; the use of my negative in the new election of counsellors. This is a disagreeable, difficult, and dangerous task; but I have no choice; to decline it is now to give up all. And though I have not had the satisfaction of receiving any testimonial of my former conduct in this respect being approved, yet I have no reason to think it has been condemned: and therefore I must act upon this as I did on the former occasion, according to what I truly think will be the best for his Majesty's service, without regard to myself; an alternative seemingly hard, but what I have been used to for above a year and a half past. Indeed, I have very little choice; where I have, if I know what conduct will be agreeable to your Lordship and his Majesty's Ministers, I will pursue it; where I do not know, I must do the best I can.2

A note to Hutchinson's History gives some idea of the shuffling policy of the new Secretary of State:

Life of Sir Francis Bernard. 'Letter from Chief Justice Wilmot to Governor Bernard, dated 27th March, 1767.'

2 Ibid. Extract from a Letter to the Earl of Shelburne, dated 4th of May, 1767.'

HUTCHINSON AND THE COUNCIL

91

The Governor was fully persuaded that both LieutenantGovernor and Secretary were designed by the charter to be of the Council, and that Mr. Mather, the agent, who was consulted in framing the charter; had fixed upon the number 28' in imitation of Lycurgus's senators, who were of a like number, and, being added to the two Kings, who only retained a voice with the other senators, made up thirty. He sent a representation of the affair to the Earl of Shelburne, then Secretary of State. His Lordship expressed his concern at the warmth discovered by the House of Representatives, his sense of the utility and propriety of admitting the Lieutenant-Governor to be present at the deliberations of the Council, his favourable opinion of the person at that time Lieutenant-Governor; but, after all, supposed the Council to have the best right to determine whom they would admit to be present at their deliberations. This was a sudden opinion. If the charter gave a right, the Council could not have a right to determine against it.1

It appears from Mr. Hutchinson's narrative 2 that the Governor went so far as to propose to the House of Representatives a compromise of their differences in the matter of elections. This was rejected; the Crown officials were excluded from the Council as before, and Mr. Bernard consequently vetoed five out of the six obnoxious members of the previous House. The sixth had been so moderate in his conduct during the period of exclusion that an exception was made in his favour.

The House then proceeded to challenge the LieutenantGovernor's right to sit in the Council-room without being a member of the Board.

His assumption of his seat at the opening of this session [writes Thomas Bernard] was declared by the House of Representatives to be repugnant to the Constitution, and was adopted by the popular party as a cause of attack on the Government, and of censure on Mr. Hutchinson, for a new and additional instance of ambition and lust of power.' The Governor answered the message by directing the Secretary to search for precedents; who made his report, from whence it appeared that though there was no express authority in the charter, yet there were several precedents in justification of the Lieutenant-Governor's claim,

'Hutchinson, Hist. Mass., note to ch. ii.

2 Ibid. ii.

and one contemporary with the charter itself. The House of Representatives, on receipt of a copy of his report, resolved, but not with any marked attention to the privileges of the Upper House, that 'The Lieutenant-Governor had no right to be present in the Council.'1

Such, however, was the esteem in which the excluded functionary was held, notwithstanding all differences, such, perhaps, also the influence still exerted by the Tories, that, a few days after accusing him of ambition and lust of power,

the same house of representatives, in conjunction with the Council, added another, though temporary, yet very important post, by electing him the first of three Commissioners empowered to adjust and settle a controversy long subsisting between the two Provinces of Massachusetts Bay and New York, respecting their boundary lines. This was the more observable, because it had long been the practice, with scarcely an instance to the contrary, to confer such places on such only as were members of one or other of the Houses of Assembly.2

Most persons were, indeed, thoroughly convinced of Mr. Hutchinson's ability and integrity, so that even agitators thought it well to employ him when he did not stand in the way of their schemes. Of the situation at this time the Lieutenant-Governor himself writes:

In Massachusetts Bay all parties continued to profess their obligations to adhere to the Constitution according to the charter. The popular branch of the Legislature had, however, acquired a much greater proportion of power than it ever possessed before. The House of Representatives had been continually increasing in number, every new town adding two members, if it thought fit to choose them. The civil officers, besides the councillors, were annually elected by the joint vote of Council and House. As the number of members in the House increased, its weight increased in proportion, the number of the Council continuing always the same.3

Apparently the numbers of the Council must have positively diminished in 1766, for a time at least, because the