vincial magistrate could be found so steeled against the
sensations of humanity and justice as wantonly to order troops to fire
on an unarmed populace, and more than repeat in Boston the tragic scene
exhibited in St. George's Fields." It was a wanton fire on an unarmed
populace that was protected against; and the protest was by men who
involuntarily shrank from mob-law as they would from the hell of
anarchy. They apprehended an impromptu collision between the people and
the troops; they knew that an illegal and wanton fire on the people
would produce such collision; the danger of this result formed,
undoubtedly, a large portion of the common talk; and the frequency and
manner in which the subject was discussed elicited from General Gage the
rather sweeping remark, that every citizen in Boston was a lawyer. Every
citizen was interested in the support of public liberty and public
order, and might well regard with deep concern the threats that were
continually made, which, if executed, would disturb both. Hutchinson, in
one of his letters, thus states the conclusions that were reached:--"Our
heroes for liberty say that no troops dare to fire on the people without
the order of the civil magistrate, and that no civil magistrate, would
dare to give such orders. In the first part of their opinion they may be
right; in the second they cannot be sure until they have made the
trial."

On Friday, the second of March, in the forenoon, as three soldiers were
at Gray's Ropewalks, near the head of India Wharf, they were asked by
one of the workmen to empty a vault. Sharp altercation followed this
insult, and the soldiers went off, but soon returned with a party of
their comrades, when there was a challenge to a boxing-match, and this
grew into a fight, the rope-makers using their "wouldring-sticks," and
the soldiers clubs and cutlasses. It proved to be the most serious
quarrel that had occurred. Lieutenant-Colonel Carr, commander of the
Twenty-Ninth, which, Hutchinson said, was composed of such bad fellows
that discipline could not restrain them, made a complaint to the
Lieutenant-Governor relative to the provoking conduct of the rope-maker
which brought on the affray; and thus this affair became the occasion of
political consultation, which tended to intensify the animosity between
the parties.

On Saturday, the report was circulated that the parties who were engaged
in this affray would renew the fight on Monday evening; on Sunday,