ment. The new law did not invest the suitor with an unlimited privilege of appeal, which was what the English Ministry wanted. It "declared void, and of none effect, the section or paragraph of the said Act providing for liberty of appeal unto his Majesty in Council," thus withdrawing the question of appeal under whatsoever conditions, and leaving the General Court unsustained indeed by the crown in the qualification which it had sought to obtain, but, on the other hand, uncommitted by any action on its own part to an abatement of its claim to complete exemption.

The General Court tried again. They passed an "Act for Establishing of Courts," which 1697. went more into details, but was substan- June 19. tially the same as that of five years before. It renewed the provision restricting appeals to England to cases of pecuniary importance. It was hoped, perhaps, that the Privy Council would rather on reflection have an express grant of appeals, though a limited one, than have the whole question remain open; and the lieutenant-governor and Council sent to the King a "Representation and Address relating to appeals, and 1698. praying to be continued in the enjoyment of all those privileges granted in the royal charter." This Act too was, however, disallowed in England, for the alleged reason that, inasmuch as it granted the right of trial by jury in all cases, it took away the option given

May.

Nov. 24.

by English law to custom-house officers, respecting trial by an Admiralty Court which has no jury, and so interfered with a vigorous enforcement of the Navigation Laws. The Superior 1699. Court, which was engaged in a trial when April 26. intelligence to this effect was received, immediately dissolved itself. It is likely that this movement hastened Lord Bellomont's journey to Massachusetts, and that an anticipation of it was the cause of the General Court's urgency when

so soon as

1698. they sent to New York an Address prayNov. 22. ing that he would "be pleased to favor the province with his presence the season of the year might comfortably admit his undertaking so long and difficult a journey.” He came accordingly in the following spring,

1699.

and in his first speech to the General Court June 2. advised a re-enactment of the law for constituting courts, with an omission of the obnoxious provision; and that step was immediately June 26. taken, so far as that all reference to appeals was avoided, and that question was relegated to future consideration. Certain chancery powers were at the same time given to that court and to the Court of Common Pleas, and it was now declared that the Superior Court was to have jurisdiction "as fully and amply, to all intents and purposes whatsoever, as the Courts of King's Bench, Common Pleas, and Exchequer, within his Majesty's kingdom of England, have or ought to have." Admiralty powers, which, under the

1694.

colonial charter, were exercised by the Assistants, had, under King William's charter, been reserved to the crown, which, through the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty, proceeded to constitute a Court of Vice-Admiralty for New England and New York, with a King's Advocate, a Registrar, and a Marshal. The common-law courts claimed a right as recognized by the charter, and confirmed by the law, to revise the decisions of the Admiralty Court, which had the important function of trying offences against the Laws of Trade; and this conflict of jurisdiction finally led to important complications.

June.

Affairs in Massachusetts were in competent hands, and could proceed satisfactorily without the governor's personal attention. New York was torn by factions, and never free from danger from the excitable Indians on the western frontier. Lord Bellomont remained in Massachu- 1700. setts only fourteen months. He was esteemed to be good-natured, and not ungenerously disposed towards the people whom he came to rule. For his short service the General Court made him grants amounting to nearly two thousand pounds sterling; a greater liberality than was ever shown to a governor of Massachusetts, before or since his time. They overrated the extent of his friendship for them. They might have been less liberal had they known of his writing home that in his government he wanted persons, employed in the King's service in all

ranks, from high to low, to be "not men of the 1701. country, but Englishmen." He died in

March 5. New York before the end of the year after his return thither; happy, perhaps, to escape the unjust reception which was awaiting him in England, on account of his connection with Lord Somers. He was honorable, frank, and sensitive, perhaps overconfident, perhaps not without arrogance. The sight of knavery in others enraged him, and he could not endure to be himself suspected of any indirection.

While he was in Massachusetts, Lord Bellomont used laudable diligence in preparing himself to make reports to his superiors on the condition of his province; but, as was to have been expected from his own want of acquaintance with the country and the little time he had for 1699. inquiries, the information which he comAug. 28. municated was by no means exact. He informed the Lords of Trade that the Eastern tribes had not above "three hundred fighting men," yet that they had broken up a thousand families of English settlers. He represented that "the province of Maine, a noble country, had been destroyed in the late war," and that there were "no thoughts of repeopling it; the people were not public-spirited enough." He distinguished a portion of the Council as "the sour part." He reported them as saying that "they were too much cramped in their liberties already," and he complained that a Bill relating to piracy,

especially a clause punishing it with death, "would not go down with them by any means.” He had had a sharp dispute with the Council about their alleged right to a share in the appointment of certain officers. Sir William Phipps had been weak enough, he said, to yield that point to them; and Stoughton had done the same, though not without a protest. A present of a thousand pounds of the provincial currency, made to him by the General Court, he said, was equivalent to no more than seven hundred pounds sterling, whereas, before leaving England, he had been led to expect a regular salary of twelve hundred pounds. "I never did," he writes, “nor ever will ask them anything, and it troubles me that I am on so precarious a foot for a salary for this government." This complaint being communicated by the Lords of Trade to the agent of Massachusetts, Sir Henry "said he believed the Council and the Assembly would not consent to settle a 1700. salary upon all governors for the future; but that if his Majesty should be pleased to write to them, or if this Board should do it, he doubted not but that they might be persuaded to settle a suitable salary upon the Earl of Bellomont during his government."

Aug. 28.

Jan. 31.

The reader remembers that one consideration which had had weight in the selection of Lord Bellomont for the chief administration in America related to the piracies believed to have been com