town-meeting and an oration by some Boston patriot. By such meetings and addresses the people kept alive the memory of a wrong, and encouraged one another to resist tyranny.

8. Samuel Adams, a patriot who had great influence, especially among the plain working-men of Boston, headed the citizens

in a demand for the removal of the troops. The governor, Thomas Hutchinson, seeing the entire community aroused, was wise enough to order the troops to be removed to the fort in the harbor, called the Castle. But the people were fast coming to look upon the English government as hostile.

9. England now

Samuel Adams.

committed a blunder which brought affairs to a crisis. The colonies, by their firmness, had compelled parliament to remove one tax after another; that on tea alone remained. The people accordingly refused to buy tea, although formerly they had bought large quantities. The East India Company found itself with seventeen million pounds of tea in its English warehouses, which it could not sell.

10. The failure of the company would greatly im

poverish the king, who owned shares in it. It became necessary to do something to relieve the company. Accordingly Lord North, the king's chief adviser, persuaded parliament to pass an act taking off the tax of sixpence a pound which the tea paid in England.

11. It was supposed this would so reduce the price of tea that the Americans would not mind the tax of threepence per pound which was still to be paid in America, and would buy largely. The company was shrewder than Lord North, and asked to be allowed to pay the English tax, but to land the tea, free of duty, in America. "No," said the king, "there must be one tax, to keep up the right."

12. As soon as the colonies learned of the act of parliament, there was great indignation. It was not cheap tea that they wanted, but untaxed tea. They saw the English government taking off the tax in England, but keeping it on in America. They knew that this was intended by the king as a declaration of his right to tax the colonies. When the vessels bringing the tea reached America, the citizens in many of the ports compelled the captains to sail back with their cargoes to England. 13. In Boston the royalist governor attempted to enforce the landing of the tea.

The citizens, under the lead of Sam Adams, as he was popularly called, 1773. would not permit it. For twenty days the committee of the people strove to compel the governor to send back the vessels. Faneuil Hall, where the town-meetings were held, was crowded day after day with people who met to consult.

14. At last, in the twilight of a December day, when the people were gathered in the Old South Church, because Faneuil Hall was not large enough, a messenger

1773.

came from the governor with his final refusal. Sam Adams stood up and declared, "This meeting Dec. 16, can do nothing more to save the country." A voice in the gallery called out, "Hurrah for Griffin's Wharf!"

15. It was at Griffin's Wharf that the tea-ships lay. Immediately the people poured out of the church and hurried after a party of young men disguised as Indians, who set up a war-whoop. These men took possession of the vessels, seized the tea-chests, broke them open, and poured the contents into the harbor.

16. As soon as the news reached England, Lord North brought into parliament a bill, which was passed, ordering that after the 1st of June no person should load or unload any ship in the port of Boston until the town apologized, and paid for the tea which had been destroyed. The Boston Port Bill, as it was called, was the punishment which the British government inflicted on the rebellious town.

1774.

17. To close the port of Boston was to strike a severe blow at the prosperity of the town and of the entire colony. When the act went into operation, the bells were tolled and the people hung out mourning. June 1, Throughout the country there was the greatest sympathy shown for Massachusetts. The other colonies urged the Bostonians to remain steadfast, and showed their sympathy by gifts of money and provisions.

1. WHEN the port of Boston was closed, a British fleet lay at the entrance, and regiments of British soldiers occupied the town. A still severer blow was struck at the liberties of the people. Parliament had passed two acts for the regulation of the government of the Province of Massachusetts Bay.

2. By these acts nearly all the power was lodged in the hands of the governor and of officers appointed by the king or governor. The people could hold townmeetings only once a year. The courts had power to send prisoners to England or to other colonies for trial, instead of being required to try them before juries of their neighbors.

They

3. The people now knew that they had something more to struggle for than freedom from taxation. were to contend for rights dear to every free Englishman, and they proceeded at once to take measures to assert those rights. Since parliament chose to take from them their customary government, they would make a new government.

4. The people in Massachusetts, as in the other colonies, had been used to acting according to law. So now, when they rebelled against the government, they went about the business, not as if they were breaking laws, but as if they were keeping them. They were

forbidden to have more than one town-meeting a year. In Boston, accordingly, they had only one, but by adjourning from time to time they made it last all the

year.

5. The colonies all had committees of correspondence, and kept one another informed by letter of what was going on. Massachusetts now invited the other colonies to send delegates to a congress at Philadelphia. This is known as the First Continental Con

gress. All the colonies were represented ex

Sept.

1774.

cept Georgia. They drew up an address to the king, setting forth their griev

ances, and formed an

agreement to refuse to

carry on any trade with Great Britain until

their wrongs should be righted.

in

6. Meanwhile, Massachusetts, General Gage, the governor, refused to recognize the legislature chosen by the people. There

upon the legislature formed itself into the Provincial Congress of Massachusetts, and withdrew from Boston to Concord. This Congress was regarded by the people of the colony as the real government. Oct. 1774. It appointed a Committee of Safety, who met frequently and had power to act in any emergency.

7. The towns had always had their militia companies. Now these were newly organized, under patriotic cap