Representatives shall think of a more eligible method, we
shall be heartily glad of it. But whether you can justly
take away or free a negro from his master, who fairly
purchased him, and (although illegally; for such is the
purchase of any person against their consent unless it be
for a capital offence) which the custom of this country has
justified him in, we shall not determine; but hope that
unerring Wisdom will direct you in this and all your other
important undertakings."[388]

Medford instructed the representative to "use his utmost influence to
have a final period put to that most cruel, inhuman and unchristian
practice, the slave-trade." At a town meeting the people of Sandwich
voted, on the 18th of May, 1773, "that our representative is
instructed to endeavor to have an Act passed by the Court, to prevent
the importation of _slaves_ into this country, and that all children
that shall be born of such Africans as are now slaves among us, shall,
after such Act, be free at 21 yrs. of age."[389]

This completes the list of towns that gave instructions to their
representatives, as far as the record goes. But there doubtless were
others; as the towns were close together, and as the "spirit of
liberty was rife in the land."

The Negroes did not endure the yoke without complaint. Having waited
long and patiently for the dawn of freedom in the colony in vain, a
spirit of unrest seized them. They grew sullen and desperate. The
local government started, like a sick man, at every imaginary sound,
and charged all disorders to the Negroes. If a fire broke out, the
"Negroes did it,"--in fact, the Negroes, who were not one-sixth of the
population, were continually committing depreciations against the
whites! On the 13th of April, 1723, Lieut.-Gov. Dummer issued a
proclamation against the Negroes, which contained the following
preamble:--

"Whereas, within some short time past, many fires have broke
out within the town of Boston, and divers buildings have
thereby been consumed: which fires have been designedly and
industriously kindled by some villanous and desperate
negroes, or other dissolute people, as appears by the
confession of some of them (who have been examined by the
authority), and many concurring circumstances; and it being
vehemently suspected that they have entered into a
combination to burn and destroy the town, I have the