Chapter 22 - Page 2

claims which the most indulgent communities make upon
the services of their citizens. Mark understood the great desideratum to
be, not the setting up of theories to which every attendant fact gives
the lie, but the ascertaining, as near as human infirmity will allow,
the precise point at which concession to government ought to terminate,
and that of uncontrolled individual freedom commence. He was not
visionary enough to suppose that he was to be the first to make this
great discovery; but he was conscious of entering on the task with the
purest intentions. Our governor had no relish for power for power's
sake, but only wielded it for the general good. By nature, he was more
disposed to seek happiness in a very small circle, and would have been
just as well satisfied to let another govern, as to rule himself, had
there been another suited to such a station. But there was not. His own
early habits of command, the peculiar circumstances which had first put
him in possession of the territory, as if it were a special gift of
Providence to himself, his past agency in bringing about the actual
state of things, and his property, which amounted to more than that of
all the rest of the colony put together, contributed to give him a title
and authority to rule, which would have set the claims of any rival at
defiance, had such a person existed. But there was no rival; not a
being present desiring to see another in his place.

The first step of the governor was to appoint his brother, Abraham
Woolston, the secretary of the colony. In that age America had very
different notions of office, and of its dignity, of the respect due to
authority, and of the men who wielded it, from what prevail at the
present time. The colonists, coming as they did from America, brought
with them the notions of the times, and treated their superiors
accordingly. In the last century a governor was "_the_ governor," and
not "_our_ governor," and a secretary "_the_ secretary," and not "_our_
secretary," men now taking more liberties with what they fancy their
own, than was their wont with what they believed had been set over them
for their good. Mr. Secretary Woolston soon became a personage,
accordingly, as did all the other considerable functionaries appointed
by the governor.

The very first act of Abraham Woolston, on being sworn into office, was
to make a registry of the entire population. We shall give a synopsis of
it, in order that the reader may understand the character of the
materials with which the governor had room to work, viz:--

Males, 147
Male Adults, 113
Male Children, 34
Male Married 101
Females, 158
Female Adults, 121
Female Children, 37
Female