Page:History of the United States of America, Spencer, v1.djvu/214

 his new government, and, during the six years he was in office, he was particularly serviceable to the colony in collecting, arranging, and taking measures to preserve the public records. Early in 1693, Thomas Neale obtained a patent for establishing a post in the colonies at rates proportioned to those of the English post-office. An act was also passed, in 1696, fixing the salaries of the ministers at sixteen thousand pounds of tobacco, together with a glebe, and a dwelling house to be provided by the parish.

Nicholson, in 1698, was reappointed to Virginia, and, with his usual activity, undertook various measures for the benefit of the colony. An act was passed in December of this year for the building of a new city, which was to be hereafter the capital of the province in place of Jamestown. The college had already been erected at Middle Plantation, and the region having proved salubrious, the site of the new city was fixed upon in the vicinity of the college on two pleasant creeks that run out of James and York Rivers. As showing their loyal devotion the streets of the new city, named Williamsburg, were laid out in the form of a cypher made from the letters W and M. In order to defray the expense of building a Capitol or State House, the tax on liquors was continued, and a new tax on servants not born in England or Wales, and on slaves imported into the colony. During the same session, provision was made for thoroughly revising the colonial statutes, and also, in obedience to orders received from England, the benefits of the English toleration acts were extended to the dissenters.

Although this last was a step in the right direction, yet but little, if any, aid was to be expected from the royal governors towards attaining enlarged political freedom. "The powers of the governor," says Mr. Bancroft, "were exorbitant; he was at once lieutenant general and admiral, lord treasurer and chancellor, the chief judge in all courts, president of the council, and bishop or ordinary, so that the armed force, the revenue, the interpretation of law, the administration of justice, the church,—all were under his control or guardianship." Checks on this power, it is true, did exist, in the instructions from the mother country, the Council, and the General Assembly; but, as the instructions were kept secret, the members were in a great measure dependent on the governor for their seats, and as the Assembly was under pretty strict surveillance and occupied somewhat of a subordinate position, the governor, if so disposed, was at liberty to exercise tyrannical sway over the people.

The Virginians, however, nursed the spirit of independence in various ways. They knew well the importance of the colony to England; they were jealous of their rights; they would not vote money unless they could have some oversight of its distribution; and by their aristocratic tendencies they both acquired and retained extensive power in the management of public affairs. When Nicholson favored the project of