Introduction. xxix

payment of the remainder of the large public debt, amounting to 5,623,499
pounds of tobacco and 11,904 pounds sterling. After compromising on various
minor items in dispute, the Journal of Accounts, in which the various debts
were listed in detail, was agreed upon, the money for this purpose to be raised
by an issue of dollar bills of credit, amounting to 173,733 dollars, a "dollar"
being valued at four shillings, six pence in London bills of exchange, these
bills of credit to be secured by Bank of England stock held in London in
the hands of trustees. This matter is discussed at greater length later in this
Introduction (pp. lxiii, c-cii).

The exchange of messages and addresses between the Upper and Lower
House on the one hand, and between Governor Sharpe and the two houses
on the other, were at this session much fewer, shorter, and in better temper
than had been the case for many years. The dispute with the mother country,
aroused by the Stamp Act, for the present occupied the public mind more
than did the various controversies between the people and the Proprietary.
Although resolves were passed, and a few addresses were sent by the Lower
House bearing upon these controversies with the Proprietary, they were
largely for the purpose of keeping the record alive against "Proprietary pre-
tensions." An exception was the still insistent demand of the Lower House
that it be represented in England by a Provincial Agent, who could voice there
before the Crown as arbitrator the disputes between the people and the Pro-
prietary. Another method of keeping the record straight with the public took
the form of the passage by the Lower House at this, as it had at successive
previous sessions, of bills aimed at curbing "Proprietary pretensions", bills
which it knew well would certainly be rejected by the Upper House. There
were seventeen bills of such a kind passed by the Lower House at this session.

Acting upon a suggestion made to Sharpe by Hugh Hamersley, the Pro-
prietary's Secretary for Maryland, that the Assembly express its gratitude
to the King for the repeal of the Stamp Act, both houses adopted and sent
separate addresses to King. The Upper House sent its address to the Lord Pro-
prietary, requesting him to present this to the King (pp. lvii-lviii, 134-135,
176-177, 206). The Lower House address was transmitted to the Crown
through Charles Garth, agent in London of the Lower House in Stamp Act
affairs. These addresses to the King are discussed more fully later (p. Ivii).
The Lower House also adopted a resolution, followed by the passage of a
bill, expressing its gratitude to Pitt, Camden, and Charles Garth, as well as
to several other prominent men in both houses of Parliament, who had op-
posed the passage of the Stamp Act and had been active in securing its repeal.
Known as the "Act of Gratitude", after extolling these leaders for their
patriotism and expressing the profound gratitude of the people of Maryland,
the bill provided for the purchase of a statute of Pitt and of a portrait of
Camden, and recorded formal expressions of appreciation to various other
"distinguishing worthies in the House of Peers and the House of Commons"
who had opposed the Stamp Act (pp. 188-189). The Act of Gratitude to
Pitt, Camden and others passed the Lower House unanimously, but was
promptly rejected by the Upper House on the ostensible ground that under