The Upper House. 275

the Lower House Importing that the Indians of the Eastern
Shore having made frequent Complaints of Injurys done
them either by Purchases made of their Lands when in Drink
or of Incroachments made by the English in their bounds
and of such persons also who having Entred upon their Lands
by Consent and upon Condition of paying rent therefore have
not Comply'd therewith so that the Indians on the one hand
are cheated of their rents And on the other hand with the loss
of their Lands The first gives a great deal of Unnecessary
trouble to the Government as the other will lay us under A
Necessity of purchasing more Lands for them to make Corn
upon. We also observe that the Necessity which the two
houses of Assembly found themselves to lay under of reliev-

U. H. J.

ing the Indians ag^t English fraudulent purchases to be the
Sole Motives and Inducements of the Act of Assembly Com-
plained of by said Nichplls whose wilful and Contemptious
proceedings in relation to his purchase and Small Improve-
ments made thereon deserved the Censure rather than Com-
passion of the Legislature who treated him with a great deal
of tenderness by restoreing the purchase money with a
small Defalcation by his Indian friends and Adviseing him
to relinquish his Claim
We of this Comittee Do likewise find the case of M^r
Isaac Nichols to be attended with sundry Aggravating Cir-
cumstances: first that the Indians as they Informed the
Governour and Upper house of Assembly were made Drunk
by him in which Condition with Allurement of the Money a
bargain was brought about for the Land in Question.
Secondly that the said Land was purchased by him at an
under rate the Consideration being Expressed in the Deed to
be twenty seven pounds ten Shillings Current money whereas
the publick paid Major Sewell the Year following for A
tract of Land called [Indian Neck] of which tract Isaac
Nicholls had purchased the better part. Thirdly that the
purchase and Improvements made by Isaac Nicholls af^d tend
Evidently to the defeating the good endeavours of the Legis-
lature in making the Indians the primitive Inhabitants of this
Country Easy under their present Circumstances and loss
of their Country by Securing Convenient and Suitable Lands
for them and their posterity to Subsist upon, for Nicholls
knew before the time of his purchase that Major Sewell
Claimed the Land and had Petitioned the Assembly for Satis-
faction therefore.
It Appears likewise to this Committee that the Attested
Certificate of Sales can be of no Avail to said Nichols in the
present Case where his purchase differs so very widely from

p. 108