appreciated and held in respect, the mysterious element of public opinion.  He felt that it was rising as a power.  He saw this power already intrenched in the impregnable lines of free institutions.  Seeking to know its springs, he was a close and at times a shrewd observer, as well from a habit of research, in tracing the currents of the past, as from occupying a position which made it a duty to watch the growth of what influenced the present.  His letters, very voluminous, deal with causes as well as with facts, and are often fine tributes to the life-giving power of vital political ideas, from the pen of a subtle and determined enemy.

When the executive functions devolved on Hutchinson, it had been semi-officially announced that the Ministry, wholly out of commercial considerations, intended to propose, at the next session of Parliament, a repeal of a portion of the revenue acts; and the Patriots were pressing, with more zeal than ever, the non-importation agreement, in the hope of obtaining, as matter of constitutional right, a total repeal.  To enforce this agreement, the merchants had held a public meeting in Faneuil Hall, adopted a series of spirited resolves, and adjourned to a future day; and Hutchinson’s first important gubernatorial decision had reference to this meeting.  He had urged the necessity of troops to sustain the authority of the Government.  He had awarded to them the credit of preventing a great catastrophe.  He had written that they would make the Boston saints as tame as lambs.  It was his settled conviction that the Americans never would set armies in the field against Great Britain, and if they did, that “a few troops would be sufficient to quell them.”  He was now importuned to use the troops at his command to disperse the merchants’ meeting at its adjournment.  He held that this meeting was contrary to law.  He characterized its resolves as contemptuous and insolent, and derogatory to the authority of Parliament.  He never grew weary of holding up to reprobation the objects which the merchants had in view.  And his political friends now asked him to make good his professions by acts.  But he declined to interfere with this meeting.  The merchants proceeded to a close with their business.  Hutchinson’s explanation of his course to the Ministry, on this occasion, applies to the popular demonstrations which took place, at intervals, down to the military crisis.  “I am very sensible,” are his words, “that the whole proceeding is unwarrantable; but it is so generally countenanced in this and in several of the Colonies, and the authority of Government is so feeble, that an attempt to put a stop to it would have no other effect than still further to inflame the minds of the people.  I can do no more than represent to your Lordship, and wait for such instructions as may be thought proper.”  And he continued to present these combinations of the merchants as “a most certain evidence of the lost authority of Government,” and as exhibiting