of
the 64th and 65th British regiments, under Colonels MacKay and Pomeroy;
the object of which was to protect the revenue officers in the
collection of duties."[308]

Such was the state of things in Massachusetts and in other colonies at
the close of the year 1768.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 301: The following are the concluding paragraphs of this
petition to the King, dated 20th January, 1768:

"With great sincerity permit us to assure your Majesty, that your
subjects of this province ever have and will continue to acknowledge
your Majesty's High Court of Parliament as the supreme legislative power
of the whole empire, the superintending authority of which is clearly
admitted in all cases that can consist with the fundamental rights of
nature and the constitution, to which your Majesty's happy subjects in
all parts of your empire conceive they have a just and equitable claim.

"It is with the deepest concern that your humble suppliants would
represent to your Majesty, that your Parliament, the rectitude of whose
intentions is never to be questioned, has thought proper to pass divers
Acts imposing taxes on your Majesty's subjects in America, with the sole
and express purpose of raising a revenue. If your Majesty's subjects
here shall be deprived of the honour and privilege of voluntarily
contributing their aid to your Majesty in supporting your government and
authority in the province, and defending and securing your rights and
territories in America, which they have always hitherto done with the
utmost cheerfulness: if these Acts of Parliament shall remain in force,
and your Majesty's Commons in Great Britain shall continue to exercise
the power of granting the property of their fellow-subjects in this
province, your people must then regret their unhappy fate in having only
the name left of free subjects.

"With all humility we conceive that a representation of your Majesty's
subjects of this province in the Parliament, considering their local
circumstances, is utterly impracticable. Your Majesty has heretofore
been graciously pleased to order your requisitions to be laid before the
representatives of your people in the General Assembly, who have never
failed to afford the necessary aid to the extent of their ability, and
sometimes beyond it; and it would be ever grievous to your Majesty's
faithful subjects to be called upon in a way that should appear to them
to imply a distrust of their most ready and willing co