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Lib. M.
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Subjects to a Contempt and Disrespect of the Authority of
the honourable high Court of Chancery of Great Britain, and
more especially to an Abuse of that August Name of Majesty,
that it became a Duty highly incumbent on the Government
of this Province to pursue all legal Methods for the discoura-
ging the like for the future, and bringing to condign Punishmt
every such bold and insolent Offender; And for these pur-
poses so necessary for the Preservation of Peace and Order,
the high Sheriff of Baltimore County was authorized and im-
powered according to Law to arrest the Bodies of Every such
turbulent Transgressor of the Laws of this Province and to
exact the Payment of the Dues and Taxes which those who
had in so extraordinary manner presumed to disown the
Authority and Protection of this Government were obliged by
the Laws thereof to pay to the same: But as it was with
much Probability apprehended (as it happen'd) that those who
had once dared either to Enter into or promote by the afore-
mentioned Means such seditious and illegal Confederacies and
Associations might by the same dangerous Principles be pre-
vailed upon to resist with force that lawful Authority of this
Government which was so intended to be executed over them,
It was thought absolutely necessary to support the said Sheriff
in the Execution of his Duty with such Assistance as might
be sufficient to repell any Resistance or Violence that should
be opposed or offered against such Sheriff, which prudent and
justifiable Caution has been so much mistaken as to be inter-
preted a Levying of War against his Majestys Subjects of the
Province of Pensilvania, upon this weak Pretence that those
Parts of Baltimore County where the said Sheriff went to
discharge his Duty aforesaid lye upwards of twenty Miles to
the Northward of an East and West Line which was, by a sol-
emn Agreement entered into by the Lord Proprietary of
Maryland and the Proprietaries of Pensilvania, now subsisting
and under the Cognizance of his Majestys high Court of
Chancery, fixed and established as the Boundary of their
respective Provinces; Whereas It is a truth too well known to
be denyed or the contrary to be believed, that this solemn
Agreement can never have any Effect to fix and establish the
Boundaries of the Provinces, unless the Proprietaries of Pensil-
vania should be able by the Justice of their Case to obtain a De-
cree in his Majestys high Court of Chancery for that Purpose
in their favour, in which Court that Cause is still depending
and under the Cognizance thereof, so that before the Point
whether the Lord Proprietary shall be obliged in Con-
science and Equity to perform that Agreement, be determined
in his Majesty's high Court of Chancery, no justifiable Claim
can be asserted by Virtue of any of the Boundaries expressed
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