one tolerably well to keep her clear from
destruction, will not be able to conduct her with common
safety any longer."[231]

The earliest organization of the House was, on the part of the friends
of Patrick Henry, made the occasion for a momentary flash of
resentment against Edmund Pendleton, as the man who was believed by
them to have been the guiding mind of the Committee of Safety in its
long series of restraints upon the military activity of their chief.
At the opening of the convention Pendleton was nominated for its
president,--a most suitable nomination, and one which under ordinary
circumstances would have been carried by acclamation. Thomas Johnson,
however, a stanch follower of Patrick Henry, at once presented an
opposing candidate; and although Pendleton was elected, he was not
elected without a contest, or without this significant hint that the
fires of indignation against him were still burning in the hearts of a
strong party in that house and throughout the colony.

The convention lasted just two months lacking a day; and in all the
detail and drudgery of its business, as the journal indicates, Patrick
Henry bore a very large part. In the course of the session, he seems
to have served on perhaps a majority of all its committees. On the 6th
of May, he was made a member of the committee of privileges and
elections; on the 7th, of a committee "to bring in an ordinance to
encourage the making of salt, saltpetre, and gunpowder;" on the 8th,
of the committee on "propositions and grievances;" on the 21st, of a
committee "to inquire for a proper hospital for the reception and
accommodation of the sick and wounded soldiers;" on the 22d, of a
committee to inquire into the truth of a complaint made by the Indians
respecting encroachments on their lands; on the 23d, of a committee to
bring in an ordinance for augmenting the ninth regiment, for enlisting
four troops of horse, and for raising men for the defence of the
frontier counties; on the 4th of June, of a committee to inquire into
the causes for the depreciation of paper money in the colony, and into
the rates at which goods are sold at the public store; on the 14th of
June, of a committee to prepare an address to be sent by Virginia to
the Shawanese Indians; on the 15th of June, of a committee to bring in
amendments to the ordinance for prescribing a mode of punishment for
the enemies of America in this colony; and on the 22d of June, of a
committee