There was, indeed, a prohibition against all concerns in trade to the whole Council, and against all taking of presents by any in authority.  A right of prosecution in the King’s Bench was also established; but it was a right the exercise of which is difficult, and in many, and those the most weighty cases, impracticable.  No considerable facilities were given to prosecution in Parliament; nothing was done to prevent complaint from being far more dangerous to the sufferer than injustice to the oppressor.  No overt acts were fixed, upon which corruption should be presumed in transactions of which secrecy and collusion formed the very basis; no rules of evidence nor authentic mode of transmission were settled in conformity to the unalterable circumstances of the country and the people.

[Sidenote:  Removal of servants.]

One provision, indeed, was made for restraining the servants, in itself very wise and substantial:  a delinquent once dismissed, could not be restored, but by the votes of three fourths of the Directors and three fourths of the proprietors:  this was well aimed.  But no method was settled for bringing delinquents to the question of removal:  and if they should be brought to it, a door lay wide open for evasion of the law, and for a return into the service, in defiance of its plain intention,—­that is, by resigning to avoid removal; by which measure this provision of the act has proved as unoperative as all the rest.  By this management a mere majority may bring in the greater delinquent, whilst the person removed for offences comparatively trivial may remain excluded forever.

[Sidenote:  Council-General]

The new Council nominated in the act was composed of two totally discordant elements, which soon distinguished themselves into permanent parties.  One of the principal instructions which the three members of the Council sent immediately from England, namely, General Clavering, Colonel Monson, and Mr. Francis, carried out with them was, to “cause the strictest inquiry to be made into all oppressions and abuses,” among which the practice of receiving presents from the natives, at that time generally charged upon men in power, was principally aimed at.

Presents to any considerable value were justly reputed by the legislature, not as marks of attention and respect, but as bribes or extortions, for which either the beneficial and gratuitous duties of government were sold, or they were the price paid for acts of partiality, or, finally, they were sums of money extorted from the givers by the terrors of power.  Against the system of presents, therefore, the new commission was in general opinion particularly pointed.  In the commencement of reformation, at a period when a rapacious conquest had overpowered and succeeded to a corrupt government, an act of indemnity might have been thought advisable; perhaps a new account ought to have been opened; all retrospect ought to