The Upper House. 75

him when, and not before you were acquainted with the
Address
We heartily Wish We were as good masters of Policy &
prudence of Government as you think your selves to be We
shou'd not then have called that part of the Oath An Inno-
vation that was enacted in the Reign of Edward the third
nor have waited long for the opinion of the best Lawyers in
England concerning what was most Agreable to the Con-
stitution and Publick Weal of Maryland as you proposed in
your former Message tho you deviate in your Present Mes-
sage in this particular as well as forgetting that your Objec-
tions to the Oath was in Points more material than what you
now mention and not in the Points you do now mention and
since the Oath you do now Propose is exactly the same Words
that M^r Attorney General proposed saving that you transpose
the Word Reasonable viz. (according to the reasonable Laws
Statutes and Customs of England and) instead of According
to the Laws Statutes and Reasonable Customs of England
&c^a which as you form it will leave room for the Judges to be
Arbitrary what Statutes were reasonable the thing you at
first Inveighed against and as M^r Attorney propos'd it, it
evidently provides against that mischief and we hope your
Honours will so far fall in with your own Measures against
Arbitrary Judges as to Oblige us with placing the Word
reasonable where it may be more Agreable to the resolves of
our House and our Constitution than as above Proposed.

U. H. J.

We are sorry your Honours take that to your selves which
was said of the Enemies of our Protestant Constitution but
We cannot help your doing so, so we can only say we meant
you not nor will our Words bear such Construction if made
by any that are not jealous of our censures
We most earnestly desire you will perfect what you profess
towards the dispatch of the business now before you that we
may no longer wait at so Vast an Expence for the one single
Bill relating to Officers fees which must drop in December if
not concurr'd with
Sign'd p Order M. Jenifer Cl. Lo. Ho.

The Message being read the following Answer ¹ was pre-
pared Viz.

By the Upper House of Assembly November 3^d 1724.
Gentlemen.

We find by several of your Messages and especially by that
of this day by Col^o Mackall and three others In Answer to

¹For the text of the message which was sent in reply to this answer, and
which is lacking from this record, see Lower House Journal, p. 176, infra.

p. 159