xiv Introduction.

were not enough members present to make an house: in this case, there were
enough, thirty-two of the fifty-eight, and the session got under way in the
regular way, and quickly. Only Anne Arundel, Cecil and Talbot Counties and
the city of Annapolis had their full complement present. St. Mary's, Calvert,
Prince George's, Worcester and Frederick had three of their four, and Balti-
more and Somerset had none at all. Stragglers came in (pp. 21, 24, 25, 27, 28,
30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 83, 85, 86 and so on) until the total rose to fifty-four.
House rules declared that when a member absented himself without leave, the
Speaker might fine him up to five shillings, and more than once letters went
out to absent members to say that the House required their immediate atten-
dance. The speaker chosen in June, Matthew Tilghman of Talbot, and the
clerks and minor officials continued to serve. The same rules, the same hours
for sitting were adopted, the same committees were set up. And the same
instructions were given to the Committee of Aggrievances, that it should
attend also to the courts of justice and to the commissions of the judges.

Both houses replied in a pleasant way to the pleasant opening speech of the
Governor. Both agreed that the October date was the best possible season for
their private affairs and the Lower House went so far as to take out of the
first draft of their reply a somewhat ill-natured reference to the Governor's
action in proroguing the Assembly to get William Steuart out of the jail into
which the Lower House had thrown him (Archives, LXII, pp. xxvii-xxix,
421-425).

In his opening address, the Governor urged the houses to consider the
Light house proposed fdr Cape Henry, the establishment of a seminary or
college, the correction of compass variations because of the harmful effect
thereof on land boundaries, the bad condition of the public roads, and the
often-repeated matter of the extent of English statutes to Maryland. In its
reply the Lower House admitted the importance of these topics, but it added
that there were matters more immediately affecting the welfare of the Province,
to which they must first attend. A committee was set up to draft a law for
the regulation of the staple of tobacco, certainly a matter of the utmost urgency
in a province where tobacco was currency. Another committee was ordered
to prepare a bill for the regulation of officers fees. The matter of those fees
and of the right of the Governor to establish them by proclamation had created
much angry controversey in earlier sessions (Archives, LXIII, xxiv, 109-111,
359-361). In these sessions also there was much debate and much heat, but
no settlement (pp. 35, 116, 285, 317, 323-324).

Then, the opening formalities over, the Lower House got down to business.
It took up the confused case of Mr. Jonathan Hagar as reported by the Com-
mittee of Elections and Privileges of the last session. With Hagar present,
it ordered read to it seven English or Provincial statutes bearing on the right
of a naturalized citizen to sit in its midst. After Hagar had withdrawn, it
declared his seat vacant, and ordered that a new writ of election be obtained
to fill it (pp. 21-23). This Lower House action against Hagar was one of the
things that so horrified the Governor at the time the House adjourned itself
without notice to anyone (pp. 434-435, 436).