xxxvi Introduction.

provision for winter quarters for the King's regular troops, the house had at
the beginning of the session made " an Attempt upon the Rights and Prin-
ciples incident to the Station I have the Honour to hold among you ", in enter-
ing his house and attempting to arrest his Secretary. He declared that the
refusal of the house to recognize Ridout as his Secretary and " constitution-
ally under my Protection ", and its attempt to treat him as a non-privileged
individual for an alleged contempt was an attack upon the constitutional rights
of a coordinate branch of the government, and that so far from apologizing
for its unwarranted actions in encroaching upon these rights " You only con-
fine the Indelicacy offered to me to the Time of my being at Dinner ". The
Governor declared that when the servant of one branch of the government
offends the servant of another, redress must be sought from the branch of the
government itself and not from the individual. Therefore instead of sending
for the sheriff, as he might have done, to arrest the Sergeant-at-arms he had
made direct application to the house itself, and expected from it the " same
Decency ". He concluded by advising the house to turn its attention to matters
which imperatively demanded its immediate attention (pp. 227-231).

But the dispute did not end here. The Lower House took another tack and
ordered a special committee consisting of Philip Hammond, William Murdock,

and Edward Dorsey, all leaders of the county or anti-Proprietary party, to

report to it whether there was a record in the Provincial Office of any com-
mission appointing Mr. John Ridout Secretary to the Governor, and whether
he had taken the oaths required to qualify on such commission, and also
to examine the records to see whether there could be found a commission by a
previous governor appointing any person to be his secretary (p. 231). Some
seven weeks elapsed before the Lower House on December 11 sent a lengthy
message drawn up by these three members and addressed to the Governor,
covering some eight printed pages of this volume (pp. 291-297), which was fol-
lowed by an even more lengthy rejoinder to the house by the Governor

(PP- 36I-375)-

As to the origin of " this unlucky affair of Mr. Ridout's ", it need only
be said that when Ridout was asked the first time to appear before the Lower
House he did so informally and explained his part in the removal of the Cresap
memoranda for correction, but when later he was further questioned upon
matters of other import, he very properly declined to answer, and referred
the members of the Lower House who had questioned him to the Governor
for the information which they sought.

The last two exchanges of artillery between the Governor and the Lower
House revealed the true animus of the house in making an issue of the
" affair ". The Lower House, always opposed to any expenditure of Pro-
vincial money on the distant outskirts of the frontier, and especially upon
Fort Cumberland, which it felt should be defended by British forces and
money, examined with overcritical eye every item of expense incurred in main-
taining Provincial soldiers as a garrison there. When the original accounts
were removed by Ridout, under orders from the Governor for correction by