dicted the sports of the forest, and inflicted the penalty of slavery upon all who refused to attend church on Sundays, or holy-days. The colonists laid their grievances before the Company in England, who appointed Sir George Yeardley to examine into the wrongs of which they complained. Mr. Yeardley arrived again in the colony, in pursuance of his commission, in the year 1619. He called a general assembly of the colonists, but as their settlements had become widely extended, and it was inconvenient for the people generally to assemble, the convention was formed by delegates from the several plantations in the colony, who were permitted to assume the high and proud prerogatives of legislators. Eleven towns or boroughs were represented in this convention, and the representatives were called Burgesses. The ordinances passed by this assembly were not numerous or of particular importance, except an act dissolving martial law which had been established by Argal. The principal object of the President, or, as he was now denominated, the Governor, in calling this convention seems to have been to soothe the spirit and feelings of the people, who rejoiced to find themselves exercising the privileges and functions of English freemen. This was the first representative assembly ever held in America, and forms an interesting and important æra in the governmental history of the colonists. It gave them a taste for legislative liberty which could never thereafter be offended with impunity. Hitherto they had had no voice in the administration of affairs, but the powers of legislation had been exercised either by the Company in England, or by a council or officers of their appointment in the colony.

The progress of their settlements, the expansion of

their resources, and their generally increasing prosperity, now relieved the people from the perplexities and embarrasments which had attended their earlier history, and they found leisure to devote themselves more carefully to the general interests and concerns of the colony. Turning their attention to the charter regulations of the Company, they began to discover the impropriety of many of its provisions, and gradually to emerge from that quiet and easy spirit of acquiescence in which they had so long reposed. In their assemblies there appeared many popular orators, who exposed the injustice of the policy pursued by the crown and council in England, and whose denunciations of the same were bold, manly, and energetic. The conditions and limitations to which they had submitted in their infancy, were felt as restraints beyond the measure of which the spirit of liberty soon swelled itself, until the cry went forth, loud and incessant, that to them should be extended all and unqualified the privileges of free natives and denizens of the mother country. They succeeded at length in procuring the publication of a new charter, which was issued in the year 1621, erecting the government of the colony in a more constitutional and enduring form. It was composed of a Council of State who were appointed and removable by the Company in England, and with a Governor, formed the executive branch. The legislative powers were vested in the Governor, Council, and Burgesses or delegates from the several towns, who were chosen by the people of the boroughs or towns which they represented. This assembly was authorised to enact all laws, and pass ordinances, necessary for the regulation and protection of the interests and relations of the colony. Their deliberations were controlled by a ma

jority of the members, while a negative on their enactments resided in the Governor. Their ordinances were subject to the revision of the General Court of the Company, in England, and were to be ratified under its seal; while on the other hand no order of the General Court, was binding upon the colonists unless the same was assented to by the General Assembly. It was further provided that the General Assembly of the colony should imitate and follow the policy of government, laws, customs, and manner of trial, and other administration of justice used in the realm of England as near as may be."

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Under this organization the Governor was supposed to represent the King, the council to answer to the Peerage, and the delegates to the house of commons; such at least is the analogy to the constitution of England which is fondly traced by her historians. But in attentively perusing the history of her colonies in America, we discover far more interesting and important developements of free republican principles, and a more noble and generous regard for the rights of man, in their departures from, than in their assimilations to, the constitution and laws of the mother country. Under a policy and frame of goverment so much more favourable to the interests and liberties of the colonists, though in many of its features still objectionable, the prosperity of the colony was greatly promoted. Constant accessions were made to its numbers by the arrival of new adventurers, additional towns were erected, and the number composing the representative assembly was increased. This increase of their settlements, and wide dispersion of the population, was found to render the existing administration of justice inconvenient and almost impracticable, inasmuch as the judicial powers

were vested exclusively in the Governor and Council, who held their courts at Jamestown. To obviate these evils inferior courts were established whose jurisdiction embraced a certain district composed of a convenient number of towns associated together, which were called counties. These courts were called county courts, the first of which was held in the year 1622. Appeals lay from these inferior courts to the superiour tribunal of justice.

CHAPTER XI.

THE rapid growth, and more frequent deliberations of the assembly of the colony, led to a still further exposition of the objectionable features inherent in the policy of their charter governments, and emboldened them more freely to assert, as well as to oppose, any infringement of their rights or liberties. James and his ministers looked with jealousy and apprehension on these symptoms of increasing strength and seeming independence. Attempts were accordingly made to check the freedom of their debates, and to bring them back again to their original state of quiescence and subjection. But these attempts rather than proving effectual had the effect to link the colonists more firmly to each other. Finding the measures resorted to unavailing, the King at length had recourse to his prerogative. In its unjust and arbitrary exercise he issued a commission appointing commissioners to enquire into all the transactions of The South Virginia Company from its first organization. The result of this investigation,

agreeably with the design with which it was directed, was made the pretext for depriving the Company of its charter. The consequence of this was a dissolution of its incorporation, and an escheat of all the privileges, powers, and immunities which its charter had conferred.*

Although the existence of this company in England had not been in itself directly favorable to the rapid advancement of the colony in America; although its government over the settlers had been, in its spirit and provisions, rigorous and arbitrary, and had tended rather to their oppression, still its dissolution was regretted. It was more easy of resistance, and, as we have seen, had been practically deprived of much of its authority, or awed from the exercise of its most odious powers, by the ready and indignant resistance. of the colonists to any unwarrantable infringement of their liberties. But the entire prostration of the company, and the assumption of direct and absolute control over them by the crown, seemed a death-blow to many of the institutions of government and association which had grown up among them. It is interesting to observe how in the natural course of things the principles of civil liberty were here developed and grew. While but a handful of needy adventurers, they readily yielded to the control of a company on whose supplies and protection their very existence depended. But as they grew in numbers, in strength, and in the resources of self-dependence, they overawed that company and disregarded its ordinances. At this crisis the crown steps in to claim its prerogatives of sovereignty over them. But they had developed principles, and founded institutions of government among themselves which were hostile to those prerogatives, and against which it was

* 1623.