Letter of Transmittal. xi

announcing the appointment of the former as governor. This was followed by
a speech by the Governor himself congratulating the members of the Assembly
upon the arrival at age of Frederick, expressing confidence that as Governor
he would have the co-operation of that body, and announcing as an evidence of
the young Proprietary's zeal for the welfare of the Province that there had
already been received a promise from him for the replacement of the arms
which had been supplied from the Provincial armory for the late expedition
to Canada.

After new members, elected to fill vacancies caused by death or resignation,
were sworn in, the Lower House presented an address to the Governor ex-
pressing its great satisfaction at his selection, thanking him for the part he had
taken in securing the replacement of the Provincial arms, and promising to
cooperate with him in advancing the welfare of the Province; to which the
Governor replied in an appropriate speech.

Ever suspicious and resentful of the fees collected by the various Provincial
officers of the Proprietary government, a committee of the Lower House
of which Dr. Charles Carroll (father of Charles Carroll, the Barrister) and
an aggressive member of the County party, was Chairman, filed a lengthy
report showing how great was the aggregate amount of the fees collected during
the preceding eight years and paid into the Provincial Court, the Land Office,
the Chancery Court, and the Court of Probate. Two other instances are to be
noted at this session when the Lower House took a stand against the payment
of fines or fees to the Proprietary or his officers, one of which had rather far
reaching repercussions. The act to license hawkers, pedlars, and petty chapmen,
which had failed of passage at the former session, after the interchange of
fruitless messages between the two houses, failed again because the Upper
House insisted that the fines should go to the Lord Proprietary " for the sup-
port of Government," and the Lower House that they should be used for the
support of the county schools. The Lower House, in an address dated No-
vember 17th, declared that as a matter of fact, the fines collected in the Province,
except a small amount paid by the Proprietary as a salary to the governor,
did not really go to the support of the government at all but into the pocket
of the Proprietary for his own purposes. After coming up again the next
year successively at the February, May and July sessions, and engendering
increasingly strained relations, a compromise was finally effected by which the
fines from this source were to be used for " his Majesty's service," in aiding
Virginia to defend the frontier against the French and Indians. The Lower
House also refused to allow fees voted by the Upper House to the late governor
for issuing proclamations in the several counties announcing his assent to the