To-day we will consider the various colonial charters, comparing them with each other and with that of Maryland. This will show out various fundamental characteristics of the times when these were given, and will also indicate a certain progress in thought and in the apprehension of civil and religious liberty; for the period from the first Virginia charter to that for Georgia extends over a good deal more than a hundred years, during which great questions were agitated, and the human mind was advancing towards a clearer sense of what constituted human rights and liberty.

These, as we have seen, were by royal grant, and all ran in the name of the king, on the ground that all such territories as were held by right of discovery, belonged to the king. Those to wholn the charters were granted, however, were compelled to be at their own charges in securing their settlements, and as in the beginning the majority of those who were willing to leave their homes and the security of English life for the insecurity and exposure of the wilderness, as well as for the long and doubtful sea voyage, as it was then, were poor men, the expense to those sending them out was necessarily very great. For besides the charges of the outward voyage, cost of vessels, etc., provision had necessarily to be made for the support Of the colony until crops could be planted and matured, as well as for all the other incidental costs of building, clearing up lands, placating the natives. The expenses were very great, and the failure to meet them, and to make provision for the many necessary demands that must arise, was the cause of various failures among the early adventurers.

Lord Baltimore, who had learned experience by his father's attempts in Newfoundland, and by his association with the Virginia Company, spent, we are told, forty thousand pounds sterling in getting his colony firmly and definitely started; a venture that very few would have felt themselves justified in making even if they had the ability. Colonization by the English was a new thing, and for its success required boldness as well as large resources. Besides, Lord Baltimore, being the sole grantee of the charter, was not hampered by a multitude of counsellors, among whom there will always be some doubtful and timid spirits, and some who, if not doubtful and timid, can always find some reason for questioning every proposition. Doubless one great cause why Maryland and Pennsylvania succeeded so well, was that in each case one man was at the head of affairs, and so all rivalry and jealousy in the source of administration, were avoided.

Again the charters differed very greatly one from the other, not only in respect of whether they were granted to one person or many, but also radically as to character, and as to the perogatives, greater or less, which were bestowed by them. There were charters creating royal colonies, for instance, in which the great power of oversight, for instance, in which the great power of oversight was retained by the king. And ever here, also, there was great difference; for while in some instances, as later in Virginia, and when Maryland was for a while withdrawn from the jurisdiction of the Lords Baltimore, the governor was appointed by the king and held only of the king; in other cases, as in the first charters of Virginia, the council (to which the regulation of affairs in the colony was entrt'sted, and which could itself be appointed and removed by the king) had the power of appointing the governor and other officers. Of these councils for Virginia there were two,-one in England and the other in the colony; and according to the charter, "the laws, ordinances aud instructions" that were to guide them, were to be such as shall in that behalf be given and signed by the king's hand and sign-manual, and pass under the privy seal of the realm of England.

Again, also, in a royal colony all laws passed by the colonial assembly (for such a body came soon to be recognized as essential in every colony) were transmitted to the king for his approval; while in other cases, as in the proprietary government of Maryland, the king was not known, but the right to confirm or veto was in the proprietor. In the year 1620 a new charter was granted for New England, as it came now to be called, which was conferred upon "the council established at Plymouth for the planting, ruling, ordering, and governing of New England; according to whlch the council was to make and revoke governors, officers and ministers, also to make, ordain, establish all manner of orders, laws, directions, instructions, forms, ceremonies of government of said colony, only that the same be not contrary to the laws and statutes of this our realm of England." The governor was also empowered to exercise martial law upon emergency.

When, however, the Brownists, coming from Holland, settled at New Plymouth in 1620, they did so without a charter,-squatters, as they would be defined in these days,-and consequently were able to enjoy in a very high degree self-government, electing their officers, passing their own laws, regulating their own affairs. Later on, when they had grown to power, and were often disposed to show towards the government at home the independence that made up so large a part of their character, their power was restricted, governors were sent from England, and they were watched with a jealous eye. Such royal control was also exercised over the other New England colonies. This was, however, only in the reigns of Charles the Second and James the Second; for during the civil war and the commonwealth, which covered so large a part of the earlier period of the colonies, the New England colonies were too much in sympathy with the parliamentary cause to apprehend any restriction of privileges.

The proprietary colonies differed from the royal in this, that the whole territory was passed over by the king to one or more individuals, the only recognition of the royal right reserved being a nominal rent; as, for instance, in the case of Avalon, a white horse, whenever the king should demand it in person within the province; which was in every sense nominal,--a king of England visiting the cold shores of Newfoundland being hardly conveivable as a possibility. In the charter of Maryland the recognition of the king's right was the presentation of two arrow-heads, to be delivered at Windsor annually. In the beginning, at any rate, Lord Baltimore was careful to make this delivery, as the receipts among his papers show. A notable case of this kind of colony was that of the Carolinas, given by Charles the Second in the year 1663 to various courtiers This territory was made a province by the fifth clause of the charter, and the consideration was the more sub- stantial but insignificant payment of twenty marks lawful money. In Georgia, however, whose charter was bestowed in 1732, the king required that four shillings be paid him and his successors for every hundred acres settled, the payment to commence ten years after the establishment of the colony. According to all the charters, however, the king reserved to himself a certain portion, one-fourth or one-fifth, of the gold and silver ore found in the colony, This was also the case, as you will recollect, in the Spanish colonies; for the planting of colonies always filled the mind of the royal giver with expectations of filling his empty coffers, for kingly coffers were as apt to get empty as those of other people. In the case of the Spaniards, as we know, that hope was attained in a marvelous degree. The same cannot be said of the English colonies, though they did something infinitely better: they developed, both in themselves and in England, a commercial activity and enterprise that stimulated the best energies of human nature, by which they became able to reap rich harvests of gold from all the earth.

These proprietary charters were very much alike, though when the time came to make some of the later ones the grants were not so generous as they had been before their vallie was fully understood. When we reach Lord Baltimore's charter we can analyze, and in that way understand more fully, the meaning of the name given them. All that need be dwelt upon at this point is the distinction between the royal and proprietary colonies; in the former, as we have seen, the king retaining within his prerogative a large amount of direction and jurisdiction, while in the latter the proprietary is the highest officer. King James, for instance, when he granted the charter to the two Virginia companies, himself prepared a whole body of laws and transmitted them, while the proprietaries could either submit laws to the Assembly of the people for their approval, or could establish a law when it had passed the Assembly. In the case of Pennsylvania, in 1681, this proprietary prerogative was farther limited by the requirement that all laws should be submitted within four years to the English Privy Council.

The charters also provided for emergencies by giving to the proprietaries, by themselves or their executive officers, from time to time to make and ordain fit and wholesome orders and ordinances, which ordinances "we do by these presents straightly charge and command to be inviolably observ'ed within the province, under the penalties therein expressed, so that such ordinances be reasonable and not repugnant to the laws and statutes of the Kingdom of England." It is to be observed here that the writ of Habeas Corpus, by which personal safety is secured to every one against arbitrary arrest, was not extended to the colonies till the reign of Queen Anne. Possibly the constitutional principle had been recognized all the way along, as it had been in England since the day of Magna Charta. The act, however, of th thirty-first year of Charles the Second, which gave the principle definite form and substance, was not extended to the colonies till the time given. No better protection has ever been devised for the citizen than the law extending this right of investigation; for under it any one could demand to know the reasons of his arrest, with such an amount of preliminary investigation as to show reasonable ground for suspicion and indictment. The reason why Charles the Second, in granting the charter to William Penn, limited his prerogative by reserving to the Privy Council the right of reviewing all laws passed in the colony, was that after his restoration in 1660 New England had indicated an independent spirit, and the claim of a right to control her own affairs, which could not but gall one who felt that all the domain of America belonged to him, and was held only by his grace and that of his fathers. In fact, there was always present in the colonies a certain conflict between two great and powerful principles, the one being the absolute power of the king, the other the freedom of the subject. This was a conflict that had begun definitely in England during the reign of Elizabeth, or rather was definitely renewed in her day. For it had begun and been to some degree settled in the fourteenth century; only the long and terrible wars between the houses of York and Lancaster, that desolated the land aitd reduced the strength of the nobles and the people, had prepared the way for the absolute power that was exercised during the reigns of Henry the Seventh and his immediate successors.

By the days of Elizabeth, however, the people had recovered some of their old prosperity, and, with it, their spirit; not the nobility, but the people, for feudalism was practically dead, and power had passed into the hands of the people. These principles were in conflict all along through the colonial period, and as they had brought about the Great Rebellion in England, so there was a constant protest in the colonies, a protest that grew more and more pronounced, until the long struggle ended in, as it had trained the colonies for, national independence. Even in the charter of New York, granted to the Duke of York. afterwards James the Second, by his brother Charles, we find the jealousy of colonial independence manifested, for in some respects the duke's privileges were inferior even to those granted to other proprietaries.

There are certain things common to many of the charters which it would be well for us to remember, among them the privilege of removal granted to those who desired to go into the colonies. We are so accustomed to the right of changing our abode, going to any foreign land, or to any part of our own land, that we cannot understand readily the denial or limitation of this right as it existed in the days when charters were given. For among the privi~leges granted by these is this, that persons so desiring should be free to go over to the colonies to make their homes there. And this was because of an old law of the reign of Elizabeth, according to which "if any subject or denizen shall depart the realm without license under the great seal, he shall forfeit his life." The liberty granted, therefore, was very necessary, being only a relaxation of the law in behalf of the colonies. Even within the kingdm itself free passage was not allowed from the place to place, but license had to be obtained. Though all of this survives in some parts of Europe to-day, most notably in Russia, where every one belongs to some commune, to which he may he returned wherever he may be found within any part of the great empire.

This restriction of personal freedom was seen in a most oppressive form in the charter of Virginia in the year 1612, one clause of which was that certain persons having returned from Virginia and given an evil report of the condition of things there, the king granted power to the home council "to apprehend and bind over with good sureties, or else to remand and send back the said offenders to the said colony of Virginia, there to be proceeded against and punished as governor, deputy, or council there, for the time being, shall think meet." We should think it a strange thing if any one coming back from our western country, or from Alaska, and bringing a report of disappointment and distress, should be arrested and bound over to keep silent, or else be sent back again, to be dealt with by those who had every private and selfish reason for making the world believe that all was encouraging. But private rights, as we know them, were not known in 1612.

Another privilege granted, which is also common to the charters, is that of transmitting goods into the colonies and of shipping from the colonies any productions. But this latter was subject to conditions. For it was a universal law that the home country possessed the monopoly of the trade of the colonies, and no ships of other nations were allowed to trade directly with them. And nothing was watched more jealously than this. Goods from the colonies did reach other countries, but they had first to be shipped to England, Scotland or Ireland, and then afterwards to be reshipped to any other port. By this means the English agents of the colonists reaped a heavy commission, and the necessity arose that all goods from whatever country should first pass through the hands of British or Irish merchants. It will he remembered how Massachusetts repudiated tbl5 right of English interference with her trade, and by all possible and sometimes absurd excuses, sought to extenuate her notorious violations of the law. For Massachusetts was always at the forefront of protest against British pretensions.

In the matter of the legislative power of the people, and their right to determine what laws should bind them, we find a good deal of interest, from the fact that the Stuart kings by no means looked upon the exercise of this right by the people with pleasure, and called their representatives together in parliament as seldom as their own needs would allow. For at that day it was different from what it is now, for the people did not govern the realm, but only came together to assist the king to do it, whenever he called them, and this was only so often as he needed money, which he could not get without them. It will be remembered that it was King Charles' effort to get money without the people's consent that aroused Hampden, and with Hampden the whole English world, and precipitated the civil war, and overthrew the monarchy, and compassed the death of the king.

But in the colonial charters provision soon came to be made for the assembling of the people or their representatives, and the requirement that no law should be of force without their consent. In the first grant to the Virginia Company no such provision was made. The king made the laws and the council provided for the government under them. In 1621, however, two houses of assembly were created in Virginia,-one appointed by the treasurer and council of the Company, the other Icomposed of the' governor, local council and two burgesses to be chosen by the inhabitants of any town, hundred or settlement. The governor was to have a veto of the laws passed; while also, accepted by him, they had to be further approved and confirmed by the general court in England. Again, however, it was provided that no order of the general court could bind the colony till it was assented to by the colonial assembly.

Provision for such assembly by the charters became the rule from that time out. The charter for Avalon, for instance, granted to Lord Baltimore in 1623, before he changed his religion and ceased to be Secretary of State, provided that the freeholders were to be assembled for the making of laws for the province, the condition given being that the laws should not be repugnant or contrary, but as near as conveniently may be, agreeable to the laws and statutes of England. Lord Baltimore, who was one of the most astute and observant men of his day, saw the necessity, and had the provision incorporated. And again, when his second charter was given, that for Maryland, the same clause was inserted. How far it was only policy and how far it was the fruit of a broad and liberal spirit, we do not know. We only know that when the colony had been planted, and its administration became a practical problem, his son, on whom the world has been delighted to lavish its praise, attempted so far as to limit the privilege of the assembly as to claim the sole initiative in the making of laws. This the people rejected, however, and proceeded to consider the laws as of their own suggestion, a claim and prerogative which his lordship was aftenvards constrained to allow. The right of initiative was recognized as belonging to both parties equally. Before a law could become finally and completely part of the code of the province it had not only to pass the assembly in both its houses, hut also to receive the approval of the governor in the colony and afterwards of the proprietary. It went into effect, however, upon its approval by the governor, so that sometimes the anomaly was seen that a law was in force and business carried on in the colony under it, when in fact it was no law and was finally rejected by the proprietor. There was of necessity a good deal of de facto and not de jure government under such circumstances.

Another notable peculiarity to be observed, is the reference made to extending the Christian religion, as being one of the purposes of sending out the colony, "Enlarging the extent of the Christian world," as the charter of Avalon has it. Also the charter of Massachusetts Bay of 1629 declares that converting the natives is the principal end. of the royal intention and of the adventurers free profession in the establishment of the plantation. The charter for Maryland also contained the same. How far such clauses are to be pushed, is questionable, though we do know that whatever may have been the intention either of the grantor or of the grantee under the charter, efforts were made by godly, earnest men to carry the word of God to the inhabitants of the wilderness. The bitter spirit that was excited in the Indians soon hindered in many places the zeal of the missionaries, a bitterness created by the injustice and brutality with which they were treated; yet to the very utmost of their power, often preceding the trader and the explorer, devoted men pursued their purpose even to remote districts. This was the case not only in the English colonies, but also in Canada, the account of their efforts often reading more like a romance than like sober and sometimes painful reality. The account we have from Father Andrew White of his own work and that of his colleagues in Maryland, cannot but fill us with admiration for the single mindedness and purity of intention of his earnest soul.

Another point of interest is the taxafion of the people. The colonies were subjected to various custom charges, dues, etc., from which there was no appeal. In the case of the Carolina charter of 1663 free trade was allowed with England, Scotland and Ireland for seven years, after which customs and dues were to be paid; but in the earlier charters there were no charges for shipments to England, but only when the same goods were reshipped to some foreign port, when they had to pay the same durites as were paid upon any other goods. A singular exemption was allowed by the charter for Avalon, as the products of the colony were to be relieved even of the burden for a period of ten years; but upon peron, goods, chattels, tenements, lands, no taxes could be levied save by and with the consent of the represenatives of the people. The king relinquished any right he thought himself possessed of, and he provided by the charters that the proprietaries should not exercise any such right. It certainly promoted the peace of the colonies that that was fixed and dertermined, for there was none of the proprietaries that was not soon made to feel that the people knew and were determined to exercise, all the rights and privileges of English citizens and subjects.

The question of religion, also, as it is suggested by the various charters, may very well he touched upon here. I have spoken of the claim that the grantees were influenced by a desire to extend the blessings of the Christian religion to the Indians. But I refer in this place to the regulations concerning religion that were contained in the charters, the assurance and limitation of privileges, as hearing upon the residents of the province. This was a matter of the first concern, for one of the most powerful causes for impelling men to leave their homes and seek a retreat in the colonies was the desire to enjoy freedom of conscience and of worship.

The Virginia colony was from the beginning under Church of England influences, and we have seen how, with a high hand, the deputy governor, in 1618, issued his injunctions that every one should go to church on Sundays and holy days, and that the penalty of refusing to do so was Compulsory labor. The church was part and parcel of the very existence of things, church and state being so close together that no defining line could be drawn between them. In the charter granted to Sir Geo. Calvert for Avalon, which was before he changed his religion, there was given him the advowson of all churches to be erected in the province; that is, the right to appoint ministers, it being of the very sentiment of England that churches should be built, and that the patronage or right of appointment should be vested in some individual.

In England various persons have this right; sometimes official as where the Lord Chancellor has many churches in his gift; or the faculty of the learned colleges; or some of the church dignitaries, as the Bishops; or private individuals, as when a church has been built upon a private estate. And so when a title to the province was given to Calvert, both as proprietor of the soil and as possessing civil jurisdiction, this privilege was granted.

And so again in the charter for Maryland in 1632 we find the same. At this time Calvert had become Baron of Baltimore, and had avowed his conversion to the Roman religion. The fourth clause confers upon him the patronage and advowson of all the churches, together with license and faculty to build churches and to cause them to be dedicated and consecrated according to the clesiastical laws of the kingdom of England. Though Lord Baltimore had declared himself a Roman Catholic, the charter refused to recognize the fact, and treated him and insisted on his acting as a member of the established Church of England. It is true he never built churches or chapels, and none therefore were consecrated, and the function of patronage was never exerised. It was only about the only one of the privileges of his charter that he did not exercise. It brought him no emolument, it might have been an expense to him, and it may have been against his conscience. Certain it is that the failure to make such provision for the great Protestant majority of his people, proved to him a great misfortune, as it was one of the chief causes of his loss of the administration of the province in the Protestant revolution, and with it a large part of his revenue that arose from the civil administration. Accepting the charter with the fourth clause, he was bound not to neglect the spiritual needs of the people and not to apprdpriate all the revenues to his private use. Here let me observe that in speaking of Lord Baltimore I proceed upon the principle that "The king is dead, long live the king." When it is necessary to distinguish between the different individuals that bore the title I shall do so.

The charter of the Carolinas, granted in 1663, contained the same clause providing for the patronage of the churches and their dedication. In the charter for Pennsylvania, however, we find a difference; for in that there is a recognition that the grantee, Penn, was not of the faith of the Church of England; for the right was secured to any persons to the number of twenty, to petition the Bishop of London to send a minister to them, and he was to be such a one as the Bishop would approve, the king evidently fearing that Penn was not of a sufficiently tolerant spirit to induce him to extend the liberty of worship to all. The right of petition was to be exercised irrespective of the will or pleasure of Penn.

A strong contrast is presented between the religious spirit of New England and that of Georgia, suggesting the progress,that had been made between the year 1620 and l732 for while in New England the spirit of the time showed itself in repressing, as far as possible, religious liberty, and in the endeavor to hold state and church within the bonds of a narrow denominationalism--the spirit of the times, I say, because then a persecuting spirit was abroad in almost the whole world,- - in Georgia there was, from it foundation, a spirit of broader liberty, freedom of conscience to all, and the right of public worship to all except the Roman Catholics; who were dreaded and repressed more for what were regarded as their dangerous political heresies than their erroneous religious creed. It took many years for Protestant England to become so conscious of her own power that she could despise and ignore those heresies.

Modern nations, like ancient ones, cultivate as far as possible the memory of their founders and of those who in the earlier days of their existence, glorified the state either by their virtue, their wisdom or their deeds. The ancient nations, it is true, losing the due balance between God and man, worshiped often these ancient heroes, exalting them to a second place among the divinities and paying them all reverence. And the great deeds and wise words of those who lived in the historical period were likewise handed on, by poet as well as historian, a halo gathered about them, glorifying what, may be, thousands of men in their own time would have said or done. Modern nations, it is true, do not so glorify their founders, there is no hero-worship; still every nation is proud of being able to point out illustrious men among the fathers of the state, or those who by wisdom and devotion, have promoted its welfare and honor. England has her Alfred of earlier days, her Henry the Fifth, her William Pitt; France has her Charlemagne, her Louis the Pious, her First Napoleon. America has not only her Washington, but the whole galaxy of wisdom and devotion that vindicate the manhood of the nation by the Declaration of Indepdence. Many of the separate States have their champions, men that guided the course of events in earlier days, or in the periods nearer our own.

And well it is for nations that it should be so, for such commemoration of the illustrious departed keeps alive the national love of the institutions of the State, makes men jealous of everything that can tarnish the honor or destroy the integrity of the State. Patriotism is something that has to be fostered. It may spring up spontaneously in the human heart, but unless it is cultivated, by keeping alive the memory of the honorable if not heroic past, it will die, choked out by the weeds of selfishness and self4ndulgence, greed and ambition. There may be, even without patriotism, enough of courage preserved to call forth the efforts for the defense of the country; but patriotism,-the love of country, that fosters some of the highest virtues of the human heart, and without which a nation is on the decline of the plane that leads to hopeless disaster,-patriotism can only be kept alive by a recollection of the country's heroic antecedents, and of those who in the country's behalf pledged their lives and their sacred honor in its cause.

Now among the separate States of the Union that have glory in a notable past, is Maryland. Somehow she never made as much of her inheritance as some other have, though in recent years she has become zealous in searching into her records and presenting them to the world. I presume that one cause of her apathy in other days was that hers was a mixed community; that being a Border State, a very large portion of her people were not native, but came here chiefly for the sake of the many advantages which the State offered in it soil and location, for commercial and manufacturing enterprises. When the second volume of a most excellent history never saw the light, because the first, on which the author had bestowed so much and such conscientious care and labor, the most worthy monument yet erected of the period it covered, was received with so little interest,-I speak of McMahon's history of Maryland,-when such was the fact, it shows at how low an ebb was the sentiment in Maryland in behalf of the honor of Maryland. There is a different state of things now, I grant, but it is altogether questionable how far the sentiment extends. It is one purpose of these lectures to endeavor to develop in the young men of Maryland a pride and love of the honorable old State.

Upon going back to the first days of the colony we find two men standing out in strong prominence, father and son, George and Cecilius Calvert, first and second Lords Baltimore. The common name, Lord Baltimore, seems to have caused a good deal of confusion, for Lord Baltimore has often been referred to as if the whole early history of the colony had been controlled and directed by one man; whereas, as regards the offices of father and son, they are as different as the lives and times of two men could possibly make them.

Of the first of these, the father, George Calvert, first Lord Baltimore, there is very little that can be said, and that little is neither good nor bad. For we do not know enough of the man, his thoughts, feelings, purposes, to give any very distinct portratiure of him. He was a loving husband and an enterprising man, and as a politician, he was fairly consistent in his principles. But such things can probably be said of the largest part of the human family. Born about 1580, he in early manhood entered political life, filling various offices, including that of principal Secretary of State and membership of the Privy Council. James the First honored him with many proofs of his confidence, which he attempted to justify, not only by a faithful performance of his various duties, but by standing forth as the advocate of the king's claims when questioned by parliament or people. George Calvert was a courtier in the strictest sense of the word, and was always as near the king as the king's favor could bring him. And doubtless he was fitted to be there, as a gentleman of education and excellent intelligence.

At the same time he was always providing for himself, but in an honorable way. Had there been any means of imputing evil conduct to him, doubtless it would have been done. For he was not a favorite with the weak king's favorite, and could he have been deprived of the king's favor, to get him out of the way, doubtless it wottld have been done.

But such qualities never make a hero, and George Baltimore was not a hero. He had alvays an eye to business, so that there was hardly a foreign enterprise prosecuted in which he had not an interest, colonization being a specialty with him. He was one of the original associaates of the Virginia Company, and continued so till 1620. In 1609 and 1614 he put money in the East India Company. In 1622 he was a member of the New England Company. In 1620 he bought an extensive plantation in Newfoundland, and in 1623 he secured a charter for this, creating it a province, and giving him almost royal honors and prerogatives. Avalon, however, failing him in his expectations, he secured from King Charles the gift of a section of Virginia, extending also into North Carolina, and called Carolana; but finding he wouki have trouble in securing the actual possession he relinquished it. And then in the year 1632 we find him obtaining the province of Maryland, though dying before the gift was finally completed. Also in the year 1621 the king granted him twenty-three hundred acres of land in Ireland, which he endeavored to colonize.

All these transactions indicate that he was a man of great enterprise and business intelligence, and judging from the amounts he and his son claimed to have spent upon Avalon and Maryland, about forty-six thousand pounds sterling, he must have been very successful in the various enterprises in which he was interested.

But all these things do not make a hero. Sometimes it is claimed he sought to establish a colony in Maryland as a refuge for the members of his church and religious faith who were denied freedom of religious worship in their own country; that that was the purpose he had in view. And the attempt has been made on .this account to glorify him and to lift him up above the narrow views and unworthy contentions that belittled the whole religious mind of that day. But for over twenty years right along, from the foundation of the second Virginia Company in 1609, he had been engaged in this very business of colonization. Also in 1620 he bought estates, as we have seen, for which he secured a patent in 1623, a year and more before he avowed any change in religion, and yet the charters of both are nearly identical, evidently drawn by the same hand, and that probably his own. He was a great speculator on a large sclae; Virginia, New England, India, Newfoundland, Carolana, and Maryland, as well as Ireland, being the fields of his operations. But he was wiser or more fortunate than some speculators, because, though he did not live to reap the fruits of his ventures, his children and his heirs did; for their patrimony in Maryland proved a splendid source of revenue. George Calvert was not of the stuff out of which heroes are made.

As to his change of religious views, we are sometimes told that he made it at a great sacrifice. But I do not suppose that any one would be more disposed to smile at such an assertion than Calvert himself. No one questions his sincerity, for it required great sincerity to avow a change of religion from that of the established to that of the Roman faith, which was then so severely under the popular ban. Politics ran high, and religion was part of the national sentiment. Politics and religion were inseparably united, not only because religion was tablished, but because of the claims which on both royal and Roman Catholic sides, the rulers put forth. The kings of England, for instance, claimed supremacy in religious matters, and in the king and parliament was the power of passing laws for the government of the church. The great digiutaries of the church also were appointed by the king, while in the House of Lords, at that time far more influential than now as a constituent body of the realm, the Bishops had their place. It is well know how the royal and state authority in religion passed down all the way through all the ranks of the people.

On the other hand, we know what were the claims of the Pope--to unmake kings, to absolve their people from their allegiance, to possess supreme jurisdiction everywhere. And these contrary claims caused in England tbe most violent contentions, so that the minority were placed severely under the ban, and every one professing the unpopular religion, was declared incapable of holding any office. The oaths of office were so searching that no Roman Catholic could, without deliberate perjury, take them.

When, therefore, George Lord Baltimore avowed in 1624 his change of faith from that of the established church, he proved his sincerity. When he changed his creed he ran great risk of personal loss. How long before his avowal he had changed we do not know. We only know lie chose a very opportune time for the avowal; for his popularity with the king had for some time been very much diminished, because the Duke of Buckingham had found Lord Baltimore standing in the way of his political schemes, chiefly the proposed French marriage for the Prince of Wales; and what the duke abhorred the king rejected. Now, however, both the duke and the king had turned a favoring look upon him, and at that moment, while the skies were propitious, the avowal was made, with the result that, unlike his predecessor in the same office, he was allowed to sell out his secretaryship for six thousand pounds sterling, he had the lordship conferred upon him, becoming Baron of Baltimore in Ireland, his fine estate in Ireland of twenty- three hundred acres was renewed to him, the oath of supremacy being waived, and he continued in possession of Avalon. His change of religion therefore cost him nothing, but was probably one of the most successful ventures he ever made; for beside the immediate emolument it brought him, it set him free to pursue those plans of empire beyond the sea on which his mind had for years been set, and from which he hoped and his heirs derived, such large reward.

When, however, we turn to Cecilius Calvert we find one whose wisdom was shown to be great by his founding and administration of, the province of Maryland. The foundation of Maryland was made in troublous times, when both the religious and political currents were running wildly through all English life, and not only in England, but on the Continent as well. You will recollect that at this time the Thirty Years' War was going on, having begun in 1618, a war that involved all Europe, and in which not only religious antagonisms existed, but political ambition as well. For while the war began as a reaction from the Reformation of the century before, yet soon the questions of territory, the seizing upon the spoils of war; entered in, and in the course of it all Europe was devastated. The connection between tbe kingdoms on the Continent and England was not as immediate and as sensitive then as now, yet not only for political and religious reasons was the feeling of the English people aroused, but also for family reasons, the daughter of James the First being the wife of Elector Palatine, the elected king of Bohemia, who was one of the chief victims and sufferers of the war.

The times were troubled also in England, for it was during this period that the people of England began to assert strongly the rights of English freemen as against the claims of royal perogative and arbitrary government. The contest began back in Queen Elizabeth's day, the Commons from time to time indicating their will in such a way that the queen saw it was wisdom to acquiesce. But in the days of James for whom as a Scotchman and a foreigner the people had no hereditary love, and who had no shining qualities to constrain their admiration or forbearance, the voice of the people became more distinct and emphatic. And when Charles the First came to the throne in 1625 the position was as advanced as the voice was pronounced and clear. As I am not writing English history, however, I must not go into detail. Only you will recoflect that, after contentions in parliament and then a long cessation of parliament, the king attempting to rule without it, and the attempt also by the king to provide for the public necessities by the seizure of private property without the sanction of law, and then the calling of the Long Parliament which would not be dissolved,-you will recollect, I say, that after all this came the civil war, and the beheading of the king in the beginning of the year 1649. The times were troubled.

Along with the religious agitation of the time there was the religious as well, for religion and politics were strongiy blended. Through generations there had been scarcely a distinction between them. The king had been at the head of the church in temporal things, and the rninisters of the church, especially the Bishops, had filled many offices in the temporal administration of the kingdom. And this was the case, not only in England, but everywhere. Beside this, religious malignity was shown, owing to certain claims to political and temporal power which were put forth in the name of religion; so that the agitation went on everywhere and involved the strongest emotions.

Now it was in the midst of such commotions as these that Cecilius, the second Lord Baltimore, began and prosecuted his enterprise. His father had died in 1632, having before his death secured the promise of the grant of Maryland. The report is the king only hesitated to grant it from a desire to retain Lord Baltimore near himself, having need of the services of a tried and experienced statesman and diplomatist. To prosecute the enterprise required all the wisdom of which a man might seem capable. He was of the unpopular side in religion, around every member of which there existed the suspicion that he was a traitor and capable of betraying the state. His father had been a convert, and probably he also, for we do not know enough concerning the inner life of the family to know when or why they changed their faith. There is contemporary evidence to show that there was a good deal of apparent vacillation in the father before his convictions became established. As early as 1620 he was suspected to be "popishly affected," and by others it was supposed he had always been inclinded that way. One contemporary writer states that he had three different times avowed his change of faith. Probably, however, it was only his association with the proposed Spanish match, which he earnestly championed, that caused such imputations. But converts, we know, excite more suspicion and enmity than those born to the faith. The father and consequently the whole family, were associated with the court, and so had become indentified in the minds of the people with the extreme, arbitrary views of the king and court, indentification justified by the whole course of the father while he was in office.

And yet though these were his circumstances and he but twenty-six years old when the inheritance fell to him we find Cecilius conducting his affairs with a good judgment and wise policy that brought him through every trouble and enabled him to hold his own, or if for a while deprived of it by the temporary success of his enemies, to recover it again and band it on to his successor, a strong, vigorous, growing, wealthy colony. Such skill and such success demonstrate the man. When also we remember that it was not only troubles without, but troubles within, that he had a mixed multitude to govern as well as to conciliate, a multitude composed of all classes and conditions of life, in part the high-toned and spirited, jealous of individual rights and dignity, and in part the very refuse of England, with those of every intervening condition; when we remember also that he had the members of his own church to restrain, lest they should succeed in their claims, which would have crushed down his own rights, as well as excited tumult among the colonists; when we remember the bigotry of the same class of refugees who had set England on fire, and who now settled in Maryland, having been expelled from Virginia, and who had to inflame them the sense that they were martyrs for their faith, that they held the truth and no one else did, and that the Lord had blessed their cause in England by the overthrow of all their enemies, when we remember all this, and yet see bow successfully he conducted his whole administration through forty-three years, we cannot but be struck with the widom of the man.

All the glory belongs to him and not to his father. He was a man of eminent policy if not of widom. Though never a friend of the poeple of England, but only a useful member of the court, he pursued his way so cleverly that when the evil day came and the favor of the court was so far withdrawn that he had no reason to foster further hopes, he was able to retire well laden with both the honors and the substantial rewards of service, a very wealthy man. To Cecilius' belongs all the honor of the successful administration of Maryland. What may have been his motives is one thing, and we may not judge of other men's motives, but of his actions we may judge. His administration may have been one of policy and a shrewd recognition of the necessities of his position, or it may have been the genius of the high-toned statesman. Either thing could have determined his course in the way he took. The probabilities, however, are in his favor, for mere skill of policy is never consistent, and in time is almost certain to overreach itself to the ruin of all its schemes. As we have seen from first to last, Cecilius Lord Baltimore met with no ch fate, but under king, under parliament, under comwealth, and under restored kingdom, maintained or a recovered his own.

The next thing that ought to occupy our attention, to proceed logically, is the charter under which the colony was sent to Maryland. As we have seen, George Calvert, the first Lord Baltimore, had been for many years connected with efforts at colonization, and as a practical man he had seen the difficulties and the failures that had attended them. He was, therefore, prepared, when he sought the charter for Avalon, to avoid those causes which had produced failure; and the charter for Maryland, which he secured nine years after, only proves how convinced he was that he had discovered the right means of success; for the charter for Maryland is almost indentically the same as that for Avalon, the differences being in minor features.

The great distinctive feature of both charters was that the whole gift was to one, and the whole administration placed in the hands of one. Tbe earlier gifts by the crown had proven failures, because the intention of the grantees had not been to establish a colony, an empire, for the sake of the empire, in wbich tbe good of tbe people was to be looked to, and in which all laws and regulations should be such as would promote the permanent welfare of the people; but tbeir intention had been to secure to themselves certain commercial advantages through trade with the natives; and wben this was not achieved, or the expense was found too great, the charter was allowed to fall. Besides, instead of having one man at the head of affairs, and so a consistent administration, there was a council in England, and a council in the colony, each composed of many members, which must of necessity produce, either apathy from divided counsels, or else antagonism and jealousy.

Lord Baltimore avoided all this in both his charters. They were each given at a time when the heart of the king was warm to him; and to the king's mind such a territory even as Maryland was to be lightly esteemed, a wilderness inhabited only by savages, if inhabited at all. The king also, either James or Charles, would have had no objection such a charter, conveying such powers, for it was exactly the form of government that they thought was the best, and the form they would have secured for themselves at home had it been possible. For, first of all, there was the inherent and essential right of the absolute lord, which was the title granted by the charter, and the title which the Lords Baltimore claimed and used all the way down. Their right was absolute, something which the people had not given and which they could not take away. Now-a-days for the king to attempt to confer such high-sounding phrase would be deemed absurd, but not so then; for, as we have seen, the king claimed the right, and it was allowed, of absolute control over all foreign territories gotten by discovery, or, as they said, by right of conquest. The king ruled by right divine, and not by act of Parliament. The kingdom belonged to him, and while it came to be that he could not exercise absolute power, though Henry the Seventh and his immediate successors did, over their home country, the rights of the people to the foreign dominions had not yet been perceived. To-day they are so well perceived, that if Queen Victoria were to attempt to bestow a hundred-acre farm in Africa or Australia by patent in virtue of any absolute right in British possessions there, the world would look on in-amused astonishment.

But if he was made absolute lord, powers were given to make that title real. All the gifts under the charter were to run from father to son forever, not only title to the soil, but the powers of government. It was intended to be an hereditary monarchy, as much so as England itself, and, as will be remembered, it continued to be so till the family became extinct. There were intervals when they were deprived of the administration, but in each case restoration took place after a while.

Another feature in keeping with the royal mind of that day, was the privilege granted by the fourteenth section, of conferring favors, rewards, honors, and to adorn with titles and dignities. Lord Baltimore had gotten his two titles of Knight and Baron from King James. It was a royal privilege. And so, when Charles would bestow his gift, he granted to the absolute lord he made the same privilege, only limiting that the titles and dignities conferred should not be the same with those of England. This same privilege was granted in other charters, and though there were some absurd titles proposed in North Carolina, yet it is astonishing that through the colonial period, with the fond infatuation that many have for that kind of honor, so very few, if any, such titles were conferred. Your Excellency, as associated with office; your Honor, as associated with the bench, with colonels, generals, doctors, scattered with no parsimonious hand, are about all the American mind has ever cared for.

The creating of manors also, with manorial rights, was provided for, the right cognate with the royal one of creating a province; with the right of the holder of the manor to set up court leet and court baron to regulate justice within his territory, to raise the hue and cry, that is, to summon the whole body of the people for the apprehension of an accused person. This was a feudal right, and to a small extent it was exercised. It was not, however, harmonious with the spirit of the colony and soon fell into disuse.

Another royal right conferred was that of proposing laws, the sixth clause of the charter running in this way: We grant to the same Baron, etc.: to ordain, make and enact laws, of what kind soever, of and with the advice, assent, and approbation of the free men of the same province, or of the greater part of them. Here the intention evidently was that the laws should proceed from the proprietary, who had the power to ordain, make and enact, while the function and privilege granted to the free men were to assent to them. The people could originate nothing. They could refuse to accept, that was all. We can at once see what a vast attribute of tyranny was here claimed. The thousand things that in a body politic would have to be provided for, must be negiected until the lord proprietary should suggest a law covering them, and then the law would have to be such as suited him, and not such as the people might think best fitted for the need. In other words, he was the law-making power, and the people only had the veto, as if to-day the President of the United States, or the Governor of this State, should have the exclusive power to propose the laws, which the people must accept or else go without; an entire reversal of all our notions of the relative duties of ruler and people.

Lord Baltimore tried to carry out the terms of this clause when the people came together to legislate for the welfare of the colony, but he soon found that his scheme would not work; for the people refused to recognize his laws as proposed, and then proceeded to consider them as if originating with themselves. In this they established a precedent which Lord Baltimore saw it best to accept in his future administration. The power to propose laws became the equal power of both. The disastrous consequences of the attempted method would have been the greater because Cecilius Lord Baltimore was never in the colony, and his laws were sent over from England. One condition, however, was associated with the law-making power bestowed, "that the laws should be consonant to reason, and not repugnant or contrary, but so far as conveniently may be, agreeable to the laws, statutes, customs and rights of our kingdom of England." The police power of providing for emergencies was also granted by the charter, even to the liberty of proclaiming martial law in the time of insurrection or rebellion.

One thing, however, was strongly insisted on all the time, that all the citizens of the colony were always to be regarded as being liege subjects of the king of England. The allegiance of the lord of the province might be indicated by a very simple and easy service, the presentation of two arrow-heads once a year, but with it went the duties as well as the rights and privileges of all the people as English subjects. What a battle was fought out on that line in the after-days of the colony! It was a most excellent principle on which to hang a claim; and that is what the people did, and contended for it till they had secured a victory. We shall see this further on.

Abundant provision was made for the emoluments of the proprietary. He claims to have spent forty thousand pounds sterling in establishing his province, and there is no reason to doubt that he did. How it could have been spent in or on the colony it would defy any attempt now to explain. For the whole outfit was insignificant, and the colony was composed of men who were capable of paying their own charges, for themselves and their servants, whose renumeration was received not in money, but in land. Probably far the greater part of this sum went into the pockets of courtiers who would use their influence in Lord Baltimore's behalf; for everything was bought and sold in that day, and courtiers were always needy; though possibly a very large sum may have gone into the coffers of the king himself, who was the most needy of them all. We know that when Charles the Second bestowed the charter of Pennsylvania upon William Penn, it was in liquidation of certain claims against the state which Penn had inherited from his father. Charles the First, who held back from n'o means by which he could obtain money, would not have failed to avail himself of such an opportunity as the alienation of an extensive province. In all transfers there is very apt to be a consideration, even if it is not avowed. In this way we can see how the forty thousand pounds might have been spent in the founding of Maryland.

But Lord Baltimore's emoluments were abundant, and in time proved an excellent interest on his money. For by the charter the revenues of the province were to be his. Whatever export or import duties were levied were to be his; also all fines and forfeitures; also the proceeds of the quit-rents, or the yearly charges upon the land; for the lands bestowed by him upon immigrants were always subject to a yearly charge, made known in the conditions of plantation. These last amounted in the year 1770 to seven thousand five hundred pounds sterling, net, and with the revenue from other sources gave him a total sum of abeut twelve thousand potmds. In the earlier years of the colony, of course, the amount received was insignificant alongside of this, but then the people sometimes supplemented the small revenues by free gifts.

By the twentieth section the king went even farther than this. He pledged and bound himself and his heirs and sucessors, that at no time would they "impose or cause to be imposed, any impositions, customs, or other taxations, quotas or contributions whatsoever upon the residents or inhabitants of the province aforesaid, for their goods, lands, tenements, within the said province." All revenues from taxes, which were to be imposed by the proprietary and people, were to be for the use of the proprietary and the good government of the colony. This, some of yo~u will recollect gave Maryland a fair ground, above all the other colonies, for protesting against any kind of imposition of taxes by the English government; for the exemption by the charter even went so far as to cover "goods and merchandise to be laden or unladen in any of the ports or harbors of the province." It is true, Parliament did not recognize or allow this right of the king to exempt any colony, but it belonged to the charter rights of Maryland, which had been acquiesced in by Pariiament for over a hundred years. Maryland's position, therefore, when she refused the stamped paper, or when she destroyed the cargo of tea in Annapolis harbor, was a stronger one that that of any of the other colonies. In the colony of Georgia, when her charter was given, in 1732, the right of Parliament to levy taxes upon the people was distinctly asserted.

The charter was wonderfully drawn up. It created an empire within the empire. It gave most extensive functions to the head of.the government It made Maryland practically free of Great Britain from the beginning. It did not attempt to enjoy its full freedom, for often the people found it very convenient to limit the extensive prerogatives of the proprietary by claiming the rights and privileges of liege subjects of England. Still, the freedom was there, to be pleaded against England to restrain her presumptions when injustice or tyranny was attempted; and the spirit was fostered by it to restrain her own governors and officers, when under the charter their claims or exactations were in danger of becoming extravagent.

"Maryland has always enjoyed the unrivaled honor of being the first colony which was erected into a province of the English empire and governed regularly by laws enacted in a provincial assembly." These are the words of Chalmers, whose work on the American Colonies stands at the head, both as to time and value, of the standard authorities in the matter of the English settlements on the Atlantic coast. "The unrivaled honor of being the first colony erected into a province"; for a colony differs from a province, in that "colony" is a less exact term, indicating nothing more definite than a settlement, while a province implies a definite government, a fixed orden It is a section of the empire, and a part of it, while it possesses, subordinate to the empire, a certain independence of jurisdiction. We recollect the provinces of the Roman empire, over which there were placcd consuls or other great officers of state, who, while the emperor could appoint them or remove them, could at the same time exercise the highest functions of government, military and civil, subject in certain cases to appeal. The province was part of the empire. The Greek colonies, however, were often merely the overflow of the parent state, saihng away, whether to Asia or to Italy, and becoming themselves. a new state.

Of this class of colonies was Massachusetts, or to speak more correctly, the settlement at Plymouth, whose members landed in America in 1620. They had formerly been a colony in Holland, but deprived in that gracious land of that stimulus that could alone excite their enthusiasm and devotion, persecution at the hands of those who did not hold with them, they came to America and settled, making their own laws, choosing their own officers, executing the functions of state as best pleased them. They would have been a colony in that sense if they had gone to the Pacific coast or found their home in the South seas. But Maryland was a province, a definite part of the empire. Other such provinces were afterwards created, but Maryland was the first.

This function of a province is expressed in the second clause of the quotation: "governed regularly by laws enacted in a provincial assembly." The earlier charters, as we have seen, did not provide for such assemblies, but a council, appointed by the king, made laws, or the people were governed by proclamation. The charter of Avalon did provide for the assembly of the freemen, but that was an abortive attempt and soon came to nothing. From the beginning, however, Maryland had her assemblies, who determined for themselves what laws should govern them, refusing to accept any that they did not approve, and intimating distinctly what they wished to have. It was this freedom of~ making laws for their own government, which came afterwards to be possessed and exercised by all the colonies, that fostered the spirit of freedom that at last demanded independence. Self-government went on, becoming more and more definite year after year, so that finally, in response to an attempt to exercise humiliating and undue control, the colonies, one and all, said. We will be entirely free. And Maryland first possessed this honor.

Let us now look at the province of Maryland as under the charter it was first intended to be. It was the first of all the colonies to have its boundaries definitely determined, and according to them it ought to be a great deal larger than it is now. For on the north it was to run with the fortieth degree of north latitude, and yet, if you will examine the map, you will find that that line will carry the state beyond Philadelphia. Again, on the west it was to be bounded by a north and south line to the farthest source of the Potomac; yet, if you will look, to-day you will see that a large section of the territory that is included within that line, belongs to West Virginia. Again following the farthest bank of the Potomac to the mouth of the river, the line was to pass across the bay and the eastern peninsula to the Atlantic ocean; but instead, the present line of division is to the north of that. Then the line was to run with the Atlantic and the Delaware bay and river back to the fortieth degree of north latitude; but within that region lies the State of Delaware. You see, therefore, how large a part of Maryland has been lost to it.

Why? Because other parties possessed greater skill and greater influence than Lord Baltimore did. As regards the large section of Pennsylvania that of right belonged to Maryland, it is to be said that neither Lord Baltimore nor William Penn knew about the boundaries of their two territories where the fortieth degree would run; and that afterwards, when it was discovered that Lord Baltimore's right, in virtue of prior grant, covered the territory above where Penn had fixed his city of brotherly love, it became an earnest and shrewd effort on Penn's part, by every conceivable subtlety of misrepresentation, to claim the region as far south as the present boundary. Penn wanted for his colony the commercial advantages which would be furnished by the Delaware bay and river, and he and his sons, being of superior skill to Lord Baltimore and his son, got at last what they desired, though the long contention was not finally settled till the year 1760.

Penn's ambition, however, did not stop with desiring this large section on the north of Maryland. He soon came to yearn for Delaware as well. This was, as we have seen, a part of Maryland beyond all question; but it was lost to her through two pleas. The first of these was, that when Lord Baltimore got his charter it was expressly stipulated that the territory given should be found uncultivated, whereas it was said that Delaware was already occupied along its shores by the Dutch and Swedes, and that this invalidated his title. The other plea was, that the Dutch and Swedes having been perruitted to continue and retain their settlements, without having been compelled to acknowledge Lord Baltimore as proprietor, it was a tacit acquiescence in their right, and that when they, along with New York, were reduced by the English, their settlement, as a dependency of the Dutch colony, passed to the Duke of York when that territory was bestowed upon him.

William Penn, in his desire for commercial advantages for his province, of course yearned for Delaware also, a yearning that James satisfied by passing it to him. Contentions arose, Lord Baltimore struggling to retain his own. In 1685, however, James being now king, the decision was given against Baltimore's right, and the present division of the peninsula between Delaware and Maryland took place. As to the claim that the Dutch and Swedes occupied the territory, the fact that the English did not recognize their right but regarded them as interlopers, ought to have been a sufficient answer in law. The whole, however, was rather a question of influence and of private favor, than of law.

As to the loss of territory on the western part of the province, the question was in the beginning, which was the farthest source of the Potomac; for the geography of Maryland was then wholly undetermined. There was no distinct purpose of fraud, as in the other case, no evident intention to seize, through influence in high quarters, upon what belonged to another. According to the conditions of the charter, however, the south branch of the Potomac is the true line of division. The same also is true of the small bit of territory along the southern line, on the Eastern Shore.

The first body of immigrants that came to Maryland brought with it every assurance of success that the enterprise admitted of Lord Baltimore himself did not come over, seeing it to be his interest to remain in England to guard his rights, which were sure to be assailed. But the men that did come possessed, as a body, every qualification that promised success. For, first of al, the company consisted in part of twenty "gentlemen," which meant men well born, of fair intelligence and some education. They were such men as in England would have exercised influcence in their own communities. There may have been exceptions among them as regards some of these particulars, but that probably was the character of the principal body. Again, they were certainly men of enterprise; for everything indicates that they did not come out to America "to play the gentleman," or to discover gold and silver mines, or to trade in a lucrative way with the Indians and to get rich suddenly; but they came over to take up land and work, and make Maryland their home. All their interests were to be in the colony. They were also men of some property, not merely bankrupts that came over to improve their fortunes. This is seen in the fact that they brought with them servants, for whose expenses of all kinds they had to provide, not only in the coming over, but also for the whole time that was to elapse till the first harvests could be gotten in. For it was not for Lord Baltimore to provide for the colony in these things. They were to he at their own expense and charges, and were to receive in compensation certain quantities of land, according to the number of servants introduced. This number in the first company that came was from six to ten to each "gentleman."

Observe, the servants here spoken of were not negroes, but white men, men that, wanting to come into the colony, and not having the means to pay their expenses, sold themselves for a term of years. There were negro slaves here from the foundation of the colony, but they were at first few in number, and these white men were doubtless often men of enterprise, and sometimes of as good birth and training as their masters. Only they were anxious to come to, the province and had not the means necessary. For after they had worked out their time, they became freemen and were entitled for themselves and for their wives and children, to a certain portion of land, and so to become freeholders and exercise all the rights and privileges of the rest of the citizens.

Every quality, therefore, was found in the early colonists, intelligence, property, character, industry. These qualities were demonstrated when the citizens were called together to pass upon the condition of the colony and to provide laws for its government. There was another class of immigrants that came in afterwards, who were far from being so desirable, criminals of various classes and degrees, whom England shipped from her own shores to plague her colonies. They either died out or reformed, and it is possible that some of the best blood of Maryland had its origin in that source; though it is none the worse for that. Possibly, also, through the influence of what scientific men call heredity, some of our great scamps and rascals are direct descendants of these same unwelcome importations. Certainly, there are found, sometimes in good society, families that have a taint of the blood, so that for generations past it has been true that no one of the name or connection has commanded public confidence. Later in the provincial history immigrants came into Maryland from many quarters, attracted by the liberal local institutions of the province, as well as by its generous naturalization laws and conditions of plantation.

Now, though Maryland had such a good start, and such a good proprietary and such a good local governor; for Lord Baltimore showed his sincere faith in the enterprise by sending his brother with the colony as governor; yet Maryland was not blessed for many years with peace, but contention followed contention right along for a long while. I do not speak of discussions and disputations, such as took place in the House of Assembly over the rights and privileges of the people. For such things were right and according to a law of nature. Public claims have come on as such as surging tide and beat down barriers. It is the only way in which such can be beaten down. Tempests in houses of Parliament and in Congress, whether American, or English, or Continental, may frighten timid souls, but they are, by the law of nature, grand manifestations of the human spirit. A mighty, boiling, foaming human sea they may seem to be, but that is the way the ocean of human life is kept pure. And those who attempt to build barriers against such tempests prove their folly by the ruin that overtakes their works. So Charles the First demonstrated his folly, so George the Third demonstrated his, and so Louis the Sixteenth his. The great power in this world's affairs is not the right divine of kings, but the divine right of God's voice speaking by the people.

That is, therefore, not the kind of contentions I mean. Maryland had them all the way along, too, and our fathers of the state demonstrated their manhood in that way. But the contentions I mean were those great commotions in which the power and authority of the proprietary and his government were overthrown, and other power and authority set up in their stead. When Lord Baltimore's colony came into Maryland they had the misfortune to find that Kent Island, lying along the eastern shore of the bay, was already occupied by a number of persons-how many it is not known-who had settled there for; convenience of trading with the Indians, with whom they were frequent intercourse. This little community had come out from Virginia and held themsleves to be of that colony. At the head of them was William Claiborne, a man of enterprise, intelligence and great pertinacity of character, who, deeming that his right had been invaded by the Maryland charter, and that Kent Island belonged to Virginia, of which he was a councillor refused in every way to acknowledge the jurisdiction of Lord Baltimore. This was the beginning of a strife that lasted for twenty years.

First of all, there was some reason for believing that he had tampered with the Indians, because instead of continuing in their former friendly mind, they held aloof, refused to bring in provisions, and in other ways acted so suspiciously that the people stood in dread and felt com- pelled, for the sake of security, to build a block-house. Next, in the year 1635, matters came to an open rupture, and a naval battle was fought in the Pocomoke river, in which the small vessel belonging to Claiborne and manned with thirty men, which was out on a pirating expedition, was taken. A little while later another conflict took place, in which again Claiborne's force met with disaster. In the year 1644, however, he was more successful; for, having allied himself with Richard Ingle, who had formerly given some trouble in the province, he had the ability to drive Governor Calvert to take refuge in Virginia, and to hold the province for two years. This time he claimed to have the king's commission for his acts, but later, in 1652, when the royal power in England had been entirely overthrown, he received a commission from Parliament, under which he was able to reduce Maryland and deprive the proprietary of all control. These troubles, gratifying the spirit of revenge which he so strongly fostered, lasted still for several years, after whcih Claiborne disappeared from view.

It was during these troubles that the battle of the Severn was fought, in the year 1655. The occasion of the battle was this: When the parlimentary commissioners had reduced the colony to obedience, they retained the then governor, Stone, he promising to conform, in his administration, to the new order of things. When, however, Lord Baltimore rebuked him for betraying the trust committed to him, and stimulated him to reassurne authority in his name, Stone was moved to attempt it, and, gathering a force in that part of the colony that had always been loyal to Lord Baltimore, St. Mary's County, he led them up along the bay to the Severn, where a few years before a settlement of Puritans from Virginia had been made. The force was divided, some passing by land and some by water, the vessels keeping near enough to the shore to assist the land forces, when needful, in crossing the creeks and rivers. These Puritans, in the present troubles, had of course resisted the authority of the proprietary, because they were in sympathy with the parliamentary cause, and because for religion's sake they objected to being under the jurisdiction of Lord Baltimore, who was of the faith which they abhorred. They also objected to the powers and title which he held, as being absolute lord, to whom the oath of allegiance and obedience was to be taken.

When Stone reached the Severn, whatever may have been his expectations, he found himself face to face with a force, partly military and partly naval, which soon, in the encounter which ensued, put his whole army to rout and took him and many others prisoners. Under what plea, it is not said, but in spite of the promise of quarter, when the surrender was made, some of the soldiers were put to death by court-martial, and Stone himself was only saved by the appeal of the Puritan soldiers themselves and some of the women of the place. The battle was fought about where Annapolis now stands. These Puritans had sought refuge in Maryland, having been compelled by Governor Berkeley to leave Virginia on account of their religion. They had, also, been induced by Governor Stone to choose Maryland as their place of refuge, under the promise of indulgence for their religious views and methods. It is not clear why, when they had the opportunity, they should have indulged such malignant feelings toward him.

After this episode the proprietary jurisdiction lapsed, and continued so till Cromwell ordered its restitution; and even then it was not finally secured to him; for the governor of his own choice and appointment, Fendall, again surrendered it into the hands of the malcontents. By 1659, however, all was finally adjusted, to remain so, as it proved, only till 1689, when, upon the Revolution having taken place in England, by which James the Second was dethroned and William and Mary advanced to power, the people of Maryland overtumed the government of Lord Baltimore and asked to be taken under the royal jurisdicition. The reason for such a course was that they were in sympathy with parlianientary ideas as opposed to royal absolutism, and had also grown to feel great dissatisfaction with the proprietary administration, under which the rests of the province; moral, educational and religious had been neglected.

From this time on till 1715, about twenty-six years, the Baltimore family was stripped of all civil power and authority, though not of their private right in the soil. They were allowed to draw revenue from their whole landed interest in Maryland, the same as any other proprietor. In 1715, however, authority and jurisdiction were restored, and continued to be exercised till the people assumed jurisdiction, in the times preceding the American Revolution.

Now, why was it that Lord Baltimore had so much trouble through all this period, four insurrections in the course of the first fifty-five years-1644, 1652, 1659, 1689? Evidence is abundant and satisfactory that Cecilius Lord Baltimore was a man of eminent wisdom, and one in the very slightest degree willing to offend his people. Also it is in evidence that during his long life, dying as he did in 1675, he had the confidence of the people. He was a just, honorable, upright ruler. The same also may be said of his son and successor, who was so many years resident in the province. Why then, it may well be asked, was he so unfortunate as to have the colony so frequently disturbed and the people so suspicious as to be ever ready for rebellion?

The probable answer is not far to seek. In one great and cardinal matter Lord Baltimore was not in sympathy with his people, namely, the all important matter of religion; in that day more important than in this, because religion entered so much more into the civil administration. In these days we should put under the ban any man that would. refuse to vote for another on the ground simply that he differed from him in religion. It is true it is often done, but not avowedly because of the man's religious profession, but rather because of some qualities in his own character, as that he would use his official position to promote either the advantage of his own church or the interests of the memers of his church. But in the days of Cecilius Calvert it was not so. For then religious antagonisms were as strong and as violently expressed as feelings or opinions are not concerning tariff issues or questions involving the right of the general government to interfere with the rights of the separate States. The feeling about religion was deep and often malignant. Even Charles the First, though he was the donor to the Lords Baltimore of the handsome. property and prerogatives bestowed, was in his heart strongly antagonistic to their faith, and if he, how much more the people not only of England but of the colony also; for from the beginning the great body of the people abhorred Lord Baltimore's creed, and as time went on the preponderance of this sentiment increased.

This question of religion entered into everything. Take the oath of allegiance, for instance. One would suppose that it would be sufficient for that simply to embody the promise to uphold the powers that be, and to maintain the laws. But it went much farther than that and decried the right and pretensions of the Roman pontiff to excommunicate kings and thereby depose them. And the oath of supremacy went farther than this, in that it declared the king to be the only supreme governor in his 'realm and dominions in all spiritual and ecclesiastical things and causes. The question of religion was the burning question of that day. It entered into everything. It excited passion, created suspicion, separated men from men, justified the most hideous and exhausting wars. It was not, however, because it was religion, but rather because there were associated with religion the most unwarrantable and extensive claims, to depose monarchs, relieve the people of the duty and obligation of obedience. And these claims had sometimes taken the most substantial and terrible form; nations being hurled into the vortex of civil war, and the land ruined, according as men would recoguize the validity of these claims or would maintain the rights of their civil rulers.

This great, wide-spread principle was at the bottom of the disaffection of the people for Cecilius Lord Baltimore and his son. Whatever may have been their wisdom and uprightness, yet their church and religious connections they feared; as was evidenced by the fact that as long as these two held the government, that is, till the Protestant Revolution in 1689, fault was found and apprehension expressed. No man, probably, ever did less to deserve the apprehension, yet the sensitiveness of the people kept them always on the alert. Probably it was never so much what they did as what they left undone, the want of sympathy and interest in the people in matters of the highest concern, religion and education, which in that day was always connected with religion. The colony was assailed even before it was out of English waters, and brought back and made to take the oath of allegiance, containing, as we have seen, a clause denying the Pope's right to temporal power as it was then understood. This was the power to depose the English monarch, a clause inserted in the oath against the adherents of the Roman church, because such a power was claimed and had before been exercised in England itself; it had been claimed, though it could not: be exercised, as late as the days of Queen Elizabeth. When the first Lord Baltimore visited Virginia, in 1629, he was approached with the demand to take these oaths of alleigance and supremacy.

The first proprietary knew of this feeling among the people and recognized it from the first, knew that he was not in harmony with the people. This is strongly indicated in the "Instructions" given November, 1633, when the colony was about to sail, the first of which was "that the governor and commissioners be very careful that they suffer no scandal nor offense to be given to any of the Protestants, whereby any just complaint may hereafter be made by them in Virginia or in England, and that for that end they cause all acts of the Roman Catholic religion to be done as privately as may be, and that they instruct all the Roman Catholics to be silent upon all occasions of discourse concerning matters of religion, and that the said governor and commissioners treat the Protestants with as much mildness and favor as justice will permit."

In the fourth "Instruction" we read that by the first opportunity after their arrival in Maryland they cause a messenger to be dispatched away to Jamestown, "such a one as is conformable to the Church of England." In the fifth we again read that a messenger was to be sent to Captain Claiborne, "one likewise conformable to the Church of England." Evidently, among the "gentlemen" of his first colony there were some Protestants to perform these offices.

These "Instructions" show his recognition of the difficulties of his situation. He knew he did not have the confidence of the people, that they were keenly anxious concerning the whole matter of his faith, and therefore he was watchful not to give offense. The same policy was exhibited when it came to the administration of the settlement, for when on one occasion a Protestant chapel was violated, and when, on another, abusive language was indulged in against some that were reading a Protestant book, the offense was instantly rebuked and punished.

It was this question that gave Lord Baltimore his hands full of trouble and vexation from the start. His own church and the religious order that he had for some reason sent over, who were not then known as they came afterwards to be known, and to be reprobated both by popes and kings,-the Jesuits, harassed him by their assumptions in a matter of the highest moment; for they assumed, by an old ecclesiastical pretension, which had excited the antagonism of the crown and people of England in early days,-the right to acquire lands for themselves irrespective of the civil power altogether. In England, at one time, of course, such lands might be received by gift, devise or purchase, and being received were held forever. To prevent this the statute of mortmain was passed, which prevented the conveyance of landed property to the church, lest the church should, in the course of ages, swallow up the whole kingdom. The Jesuits in Maryland attempted to ignore this entirely, and though, under the charter, all of the territory of Maryland belonged to the proprietor, they attempted to override his right by acquiring land directly from the Indians, and to hold it independently of him and without his consent.

He fought them diligently on this question, though in doing so he excited doubts in the minds of the Jesuit fathers whethers he was a true "Catholic"; while his secretary, Lewger, was vilified as if the leaven of his old Protestantism still pervaded his whole spirit. On the other hand Lord Baltimore could use severe language, and he exercised his capacity for epithets entirely without stint. Thought the influence of the provincal of the order, however, he was able at last to reduce them to his will. He even ordered their withdrawal from the province; but when they at last submitted, he proceeded no further. Doubtless the sole question with him was not their prerogative as churchmen to hold the land in such a way, though that would have excited his rebuke, but for example's sake; for had they been allowed to acquire lands in an English province, in violation of a law of the kingdom of England, and that one of the most important laws that an anxious people ever passed for their protection, and for which they had been compelled to strive through many years, and to counteract many devious and indirect attempts to circumvent the law, the fact would have struck a death-blow at his tenure of his territory. For a Roman Catholic to enjoy religious liberty in an English dependency, was in that day strange enough, but for a Roman Catholic order to have the power of acquiring property to an untold extent, would have excited the bitterest denunciation. Out of this struggle came the Maryland law requiring the consent of the legislature for any church organization to hold land beyond a small lot for church or house purposes.

Before the colony left England the difficulty of the situation was fully and clearly understood, as is evidenced by a paper drawn up by the provincial of the Jesuits, within the year preceding their departure, for the guidance of the proprietary and the society. For that paper was prepared for arming Lord Baltimore and the members of the Roman Catholic church against certain objections that would probably be made against