Introduction. xli

but, as just stated, it did not meet again. Following various prorogations in
1767, on April 2, June 13, August 22, September 11, October 10, and Novem-
ber 3, the Governor, after finally fixing upon December 7th as the date of
meeting, decided to dissolve it, and on November 3, 1767, ordered that writs,
dated December 13, 1767, be issued for new elections for delegates to the Lower
House (Arch. Md. XXXII, 188, 208, 213, 214, 218). The election results, as
elections leisurely progressed in the various counties during December, 1767,
and January, 1768, appeared in issues of the Maryland Gazette for these
months.

Governor Sharpe, on December 4, 1767, called the newly elected Assembly
to meet on the first Monday in February, but on January 4th prorogued the
proposed meeting until the third Monday (16th) of May (Arch Md. XXXII.
218, 219, 220); and again until May 24th, when the session began with thirty-
four of the fifty-eight members present (pp. 325, 326). Seventeen months
had elapsed since the last Assembly had adjourned on December 6, 1765, but
there does not seem to have been any public demand for an earlier meeting.
Provincial politics following the repeal of the Stamp Act had been quiescent
during this relatively long period.

The members of the Upper House who were present at various times during
this 1768 session were, in addition to Governor Sharpe, Benjamin Tasker the
President, Benedict Calvert, Daniel Dulany, Charles Hammond, Samuel Cham-
berlaine and John Ridout, and the two new members, Walter Dulany and
John Beale Bordley. Dulany, who filled the vacancy caused by the death of
Charles Goldsborough (Arch. Md. XIV, 411), had been sworn in as a mem-
ber of the Council and Upper House on February 11, 1767, and Bordley, who
took the place of Colonel Henry Hooper, who had recently died (Arch. Md.
XIV, 350), had not been sworn in until May 24th, the opening day of this
session (Arch. Md. XIV, 350; XXXII, 179, 232).

Neither Edward Lloyd nor Richard Lee was present at any time during
this session. Since the November-December, 1766, session two members of
the Upper House had died: Colonel Henry Hooper of Dorchester, who died
April 20, 1767, and Charles Goldsborough, also of Dorchester, who died
July 16, 1767. Although at this period the membership of the Council and
the Upper House was fixed at twelve, there were at the opening of this
session two other vacancies not yet filled, which were increased to three by
the death of Benjamin Tasker just before the close of the session. At only
one meeting were there as many as eight members present (p. 301). Sharpe,
writing to Hamersley, the Proprietary's Secretary for Maryland affairs in
England, on June 22nd, the closing day of this session, urged that the Pro-
prietary make new appointments to fill these three vacancies, and quite graphi-
cally described how old age, illness, and dissatisfaction had cut down the
number in attendance (Arch. Md. XIV, 509). Benjamin Tasker, for forty-
six years a member of the Upper House and for twenty-seven years its Presi-
dent, had died on June 19, a few days before the session closed, after an illness
of only a fortnight. Tasker, wrote Sharpe, had "to the last given punctual
Attendance; his mild Temper and Behavior to every Body made him much
esteemed." Colonel Charles Hammond, he writes, "who is now the Senior