And it was all about tea, a word which, since ’67, had been steadily becoming the most vexed in the language.  The East India Company had put forth a complaint.  They had Heaven knows how many tons getting stale in London warehouses, all by reason of our stubbornness, and so it was enacted that all tea paying the small American tax should have a rebate of the English duties.  That was truly a master-stroke, for Parliament to give it us cheaper than it could be had at home!  To cause his Majesty’s government to lose revenues for the sake of being able to say they had caught and taxed us at last!  The happy result is now history, my dears.  And this is not a history, tho’ I wish it were.  What occurred at Boston, at Philadelphia, and Charleston, has since caused Englishmen, as well as Americans, to feel proud.  The chief incident in Annapolis I shall mention in another chapter.

When it became known with us that several cargoes were on their way to the colonies, excitement and indignation gained a pitch not reached since the Stamp Act.  Business came to a standstill, plantations lay idle, and gentry and farmers flocked to Annapolis, and held meetings and made resolutions anew.  On my way of a morning from Mr. Swain’s house to his chambers in the Circle I would meet as many as a dozen knots of people.  Mr. Claude was one of the few patriots who reaped reward out of the disturbance, for his inn was crowded.  The Assembly met, appointed committees to correspond with the other colonies, and was prorogued once and again.  Many a night I sat up until the small hours copying out letters to the committees of Virginia, and Pennsylvania, and Massachusetts.  The gentlemen were wont to dine at the Coffee House, and I would sit near the foot of the table, taking notes of their plans.  ’Twas so I met many men of distinction from the other colonies.  Colonel Washington came once.  He was grown a greater man than ever, and I thought him graver than when I had last seen him.  I believe a trait of this gentleman was never to forget a face.

“How do you, Richard?” said he.  How I reddened when he called me so before all the committee.  “I have heard your story, and it does you vast credit.  And the gentlemen tell me you are earning laurels, sir.”

That first winter of the tea troubles was cold and wet with us, and the sun, as if in sympathy with the times, rarely showed his face.  Early in February our apprehensions concerning Mr. Swain’s health were realized.  One day, without a word to any one, he went to his bed, where Patty found him.  And I ran all the way to Dr. Leiden’s.  The doctor looked at him, felt his pulse and his chest, and said nothing.  But he did not rest that night, nor did Patty or I.

Thus I came to have to do with the good barrister’s private affairs.  I knew that he was a rich man, as riches went in our province, but I had never tried to guess at his estate.  I confess the sums he had paid out in Tom’s behalf frightened me.  With the advice of Mr. Bordley and Mr. Lloyd I managed his money as best I could, but by reason of the non-importation resolutions there was little chance for good investments, —­no cargoes coming and few going.  I saw, indeed, that buying the Talbot estate had been a fortunate step, since the quantities of wheat we grew there might be disposed of in America.