io_, by the constable, and by
warrant from a magistrate or commissioner shall be committed to the
House of Correction, and there have the discipline of the house applied
to him, and be kept to work, with bread and water, for three days, and
then released, or else shall pay five pounds in money as a fine to the
country for such offence; and all constables neglecting their duty in
not faithfully executing this order, shall incur the penalty of five
pounds upon conviction, one-third thereof to the informer."[176]

They likewise instructed their agents in England to give assurance "That
the Acts of Trade, so far as they concerned the colony, should be
strictly observed, and that all due encouragement and assistance should
be given to his Majesty's officers and informers that might prosecute
the breaches of said Acts of Trade and Navigation."[177] But while as a
Court they professed this in their records and through their agents in
England, officers were elected in the colony who would not execute the
law, and so not a farthing of duties was collected under it at
Massachusetts Bay.

Thus for twenty years the rulers of Massachusetts Bay resisted and
evaded the six conditions on which King Charles the Second, after his
restoration, proposed to overlook and pardon their past offences and
perpetuate the Charter given to them by his Royal father; for twenty
years the King, without committing a single unconstitutional or
oppressive act against them, or without demanding anything which Queen
Victoria does not receive, this day, from every colony of the British
Empire, endured their evasions and denials of his authority and insults
of his Commissioners and officers. In all the despatches of the King's
Government to the rulers of Massachusetts Bay, during these twenty
years, as the reader of the preceding pages will have seen, the spirit
of kindness, and a full recognition of their rights in connection with
those of the Crown, were predominant.

This they repeatedly acknowledged in their addresses to the King. They
pretended the Royal Charter gave them absolute independence; and on that
absurd interpretation and lawless assumption they maintained a
continuous contest with the mother country for more than fifty years.
Every party in England, and the Commonwealth as well as Royalty,
maintained the right of King and Parliament to be the supreme tribunal
of appeal and control in America as well as in England; while the rulers
of Massa