Morocco, when 150 sovereigns paid tribute to Lisbon.'

Spain received the West as the portion of the patrimony given her by the Roman Pontiff, who assumed the power to divide the earth between his two faithful children. Such a field for colonization as the two continents of the New World presented had never before been found. Spain, like Portugal, tried to transplant herself, State and Church, in her dependencies. Her hierarchy, her cloisters, and her inquisition, were incorporated with the civil power, and all dependent on the king. Thus a colonial policy, clearly defined and intimately interwoven with the parent State, had been established early in the sixteenth century. The colonial empire of Spain embraced most of South and Central America, Mexico, the West Indies, and Florida, and continued for 200 years. Now all that remains of these once vast foreign dominions are Cuba and Porto Rico, in the West Indies; the Philippines (which Spain, obedient to the injunctions of the Holy See, reached by going west); and a few unimportant settlements in Africa.

After the decline of Portugal and Spain from the high position of powerful maritime nations, Holland succeeded them as the chief carrier of the commerce of the world, and before the close of the seventeenth

century numbered amongst her colonies Ceylon, the Cape of Good Hope, Guiana, several islands of the Antilles, five distinct governments under a trading company in the Indian Archipelago, and factories on the Coromandel and Malabar coasts, and in China and Japan. The Dutch Republic, at first the advocate of maritime freedom, followed the policy of the age, and centred in herself the trade and government of her colonies.

Surinam, Curacoa, St. Eustatius and settlements in Sumatra, Java and Molucca, are now all that remain of this once extended colonial empire.

The colonies of France embraced, a century ago, half the continent of North America; and in the East, Mauritius, Bourbon, and portions of the coast of India. Now she holds no part of North America, only Guiana and Cayenne in South America, Martinique and Guadaloupe, and some of the smaller of the Antilles in the West Indies, Bourbon and a fortress in Hindostan, and a depôt in Madagascar in the East, the Society Islands and New Caledonia in the Pacific, and Algiers-the last two named recent acquisitions.

The first representative legislature established in America, as stated above, was in Virginia. Sir George Yeardley had been appointed governor by the Company in 1619, and he promptly signified his

intention of convoking a provincial assembly, framed with all possible analogy to the Parliament of the parent State. The first assembly consisted of the governor, the council, and a number of burgesses, who met in Jamestown, and discussed all matters that concerned the general welfare with good sense, moderation, and harmony.' But Maryland,' says Chalmers, has always enjoyed the unrivalled honour of being the first colony which was erected into a province of the English empire, governed regularly by laws enacted in a provincial legislature; nor were its laws made subject to the supremacy and control of the Crown.' In 1650 the burgesses were formed into a Lower House, and those called to the assembly by the special writ of the proprietary into the Upper House, thus establishing a miniature parliament. This charter, granted in 1632, empowered the proprietary to confer titles of dignity, to create manors and court barons, and the right of advowsons according to the Church of England.

.

While poor the colonists were left in the enjoyment of liberties conferred or assumed, with more or less tormenting from Crown and Parliament. Their disputes with the proprietaries or Crown led to the charters of the leading colonies being cancelled, and in passing from under the direct authority of the Crown to the Parliament they lost

much of that freedom of action which had made them virtually independent commonwealths.

The new charter given to Massachusetts in 1691 by William and Mary was much less liberal in its provisions than that of Charles I. in 1628, and differed widely from the spirit even of those granted to the southern provinces. Under the first charter Massachusetts elected annually her governor and other officers; under the second, the appointment of all these functionaries was reserved to the Crown; to the governor was given a negative on the Acts of the assembly and council; all such Acts, too, were required to be sent to England for the royal approbation, and if disallowed within three years were to become void. Virginia was the centre and parent of the Southern as Massachusetts was of the Northern States. The first of her three charters was granted in 1606 to the London Company; in the second, in 1609, the local council was abolished, and the company dissolved in 1624. But the provincial assembly remained; yet the most extraordinary powers were conferred on the governors appointed by the Crown. He was,' says Bancroft (vol. iii. p. 20), at once lieutenant-general and admiral, lord treasurer and chancellor, the chief judge of all the courts, president of the council, and bishop or ordinary; so that the armed force, the revenue,

D

the interpretation of the law, the administration of justice, the church,-all were under his control.'

In 1754 Parliament claimed the right to tax the colonies. The Navigation Act had been passed in 1651, but was a dead letter until 1763, when Grenville obtained a new one, and enforced it on all the American sea-board with more than Spanish rigour. The Act gave authority to employ the ships, seamen and officers of the navy as custom-house officers and informers.' The Stamp Act was also proposed in this year (1763) by the Secretary of the Treasury, and passed in 1765.

6

When Dr. Franklin was examined before the House of Commons in January 1766, to the question, 'What was the temper of America before 1763 ?' he replied, 'The best in the world. They were led by a thread. They had not only a respect, but an affection for Great Britain, for its people, its laws, its customs, and manners; and even a fondness for its fashions that greatly increased the commerce.' And what is their temper now?' (1766) 'Oh, very much changed. They considered Parliament the great bulwark and security of their liberties, and always spoke of it with the utmost respect and veneration.' 'And have they not the same respect for Parliament now?'-'No; it is greatly lessened.' 'To what cause is this owing?'-To restraints lately laid on their trade; the prohibition of making paper money

-