We sincerely wish that all your Excellency's endeavours to promote peace and the general tranquillity of the Province may meet with success; and we promise to ourselves that the whole of your administration will be such as may claim the warmest testimonies of gratitude from the people, and the approbation of your Royal master."

Signed by one hundred and twenty-seven of the Inhabitants, including those who signed the Address to Governour Hutchinson.

Salem June 8, 1774.

HIS EXCELLENCY’S ANSWER.

GENTLEMEN: YOU will accept my thanks for your polite Address, and kind congratulations on my arrival in this Province; and be assured that I receive the greatest satisfaction that so respectable a body have testified an open disavowal of, the lawless violences that have been committed in the town of Boston.

I sincerely condole you on the distresses that many must feel on this occasion of shutting up the port, and shall rejoice in being afforded an early opportunity to make such representation as may tend to their relief; but you will believe that no discretionary power is lodged with me.

It is greatly to be wished for the good of the community in general, that those in whose hands power is vested, should use the most speedy method to fulfil the King's expectations, and fix the mode to indemnify the East India Company, and others who have suffered; which could not fail to extricate the citizens of Boston out of the difficulties in which they are involved, with as little delay as the nature of them will admit, and lay a foundation for that harmony between Great Britain and the Colony, which every considerate and good man must wish to see established; and nothing shall be wanting on my-part to accomplish an end so desirable.

Salem, June 8, 1774.

MASSACHUSETTS GENERAL ASSEMBLY.

The honourable House of Representatives, before they proceeded to business in Salem, on Wednesday, 8th June, 1774, came into the following Resolutions, and ordered the same to be entered on their Journals, viz:

Resolved, That by the Royal Charter of this Province, the power of convening, proroguing, and adjourning the Great and General Court of Assembly from time to time, is vested in the Governour, to be exercised as he shall judge necessary and for the good of the people. Therefore,

Resolved, That it is clearly the opinion of this House, that whensoever the Governour of this Province doth convene or hold the General Assembly at any time or place unnecessarily, or merely in obedience to an instruction, and without exercising that judgment and discretion of his own, with which by Charter he is specially vested for the good of the Province, it is manifestly inconsistent with the letter as well as the intention and spirit of the Charter.

Resolved, That the town of Boston hath, from the earliest lime's of this Province, been judged, and still is on various accounts, the most convenient place for holding the General Assembly; and accordingly, ample provision is there made for the accommodation of the said General Assembly, at a very great expense to the people of this Province.

Resolved, As the clear opinion of this House, that the General Assembly cannot be removed from its ancient seat, the Court House in Boston, and held in any other place, without great aud manifold inconveniences to the members thereof, and injury and damage of those who have necessary business to transact with the said General Assembly; many of which inconveniences have been clearly stated, and expressed by former Houses of Representatives, as appear by their Journal.

Resolved, That this House can see no necessity for the removal of the General Assembly from its ancient and only convenient place, the Court House in Boston, to the town of Salem; and the removal of the said Assembly from the Court HOUSE in Boston without necessity, is at all times considered to be a very great grievance.

On Thursday, June 9, 1774, a Committee of the House of Representatives waited on the Governour with the following Answer to his Speech at the opening of the Session.

"May it please your EXCELLENCY:

"Your Speech to both Houses of the General Assembly, at the opening of this Session, has been read and considered with all due attention in the House of Representatives.

"Your Excellency has therein signified to us, that his Majesty has been pleased, ‘to appoint you Governour and Captain General of his Province of Massachusetts Bay; and that your commission has been read and published.’ We congratulate your Excellency on your safe arrival, and honour you in the most exalted station in this Province; and confiding in your Excellency that you will make the known Constitution and Charter of the Province the rules of your administration, we beg leave to assure you that nothing on our part shall be wanting that may contribute to render the same easy and happy to yourself, and to aid your Excellency in promoting the prosperity of his Majesty's Government, and the welfare of our Constitution. And we thank your Excellency for the assurances you are pleased to give of your concurrence with us therein.

"It gives us pain to be informed by your Excellency, that you have the King's particular commands for holding the General Court at Salem, 'from the first day of this 'instant June, until his Majesty shall have signified his 'Royal will and pleasure for holding it again at Boston.' We are entirely at a loss for the cause of this command, as we cannot conceive any public utility arising from it, and both we and our constituents are now suffering the inconvenience of it.

"The removal of the Assembly from the Court House in Boston, its ancient and only convenient seat, has very lately given great discontent to the good people of this Province; and we cannot but think that misrepresentations from persons residing in this Province, have induced his Majesty's Ministers to advise his Majesty to lay your Excellency under an injunction whereby the people are in this instance deprived of the benefit of that discretionary power which is vested in the Governour by Charter, and has been exercised by former Governours, of determining in such cases for the good of the Province.

"We confide, however, in your Excellency's impartiality and justice, that the true state of this Province, and the character of his Majesty's subjects in it; their loyalty to their Sovereign; their affection for the parent country, as well as their invincible attachments to their just rights and liberties, will be laid before his Majesty; and we hope by these means your Excellency will be the happy instrument of removing the displeasure of his Majesty, and restoring harmony, which has too long been interrupted by the artifices of designing men.

"Your Excellency has laid no particular business before us, excepting the supply of the Treasury for the support of Government for the ensuing year, to which we shall give our immediate attention, as also to any other matters your Excellency may please to lay before us, and give that despatch to public business, which the manifold and great inconvenience of our present situation will admit."

In Council, June 9, 1774.

Ordered, That Jeremiah Powell, William Sever, and Jedediah Preble, Esquires, be a Committee to wait on his Excellency the Governour with the following Address, in answer to his Speech at the opening of the present General Court.

THOMAS FLUCKER, Secretary.

"To his Excellency THOMAS GAGE, Esq., Captain-General and Governour-in-chief of the Province of the MASSACHUSETTS BAY, &c. &c.

"The Address of the Council of the said Province:

"May it please your EXCELLENCY:

Your Speech to the two Houses at the opening of this Session has been duly considered by this Board,

"His Majesty having been pleased appoint you to the