So far there had apparently been no deviation from the earlier system.1 But provision was made in the charter of 1609 that vacancies in the council should be filled by the company. By this process the council must in time become the creature of the company. This seems in fact to have been the method by which the corporation came into possession of governmental powers. The effect of this upon the council was to make it the permanent administrative body within the company.2 The treasurer or deputy called it together, and the former was the custodian. of its seal. The Records and other authorities show that the council sent instructions to the governors, and that with the treasurer it carried on much of the company's correspondence.5 When charges were made against officials, as Governor Argall, it held preliminary hearings, and prepared the case to be laid before the general court. It examined standing orders, which it was proposed to put into force in the colony, before they were presented to the king for his approval. It considered proposed changes in the patent, and in general all business in which the king was likely to be concerned. It deliberated upon the tobacco question, and the rate of salaries to be paid to officials in Virginia. A part of the council was appointed

1 "First you shall understand that his majesty hath granted us an enlargement of our charter with many ample privileges, wherein we have knights and gentlemen of good place named for the King's Council of Virginia to govern us." "Nova Britannia," p. 23, in Force, Tracts, vol. i.

2 Evidence that the personnel of the council soon began to change, and that it came to occupy the position here described, appears in articles 6 and 7 of the charter of 1612, as printed in Stith's Virginia. In the Records appear occasional instances of election of members to the council by vote of the company. Colls. Va. Hist. Soc., vol. vii, pp. 46, 106, 120.

3 Charter, article 10; Orders and Constitutions, p. 9.

4 The Orders and Constitutions state that "all instructions to the governor and council, and all other principal officers in Virginia, shall proceed from the council, and under their hand and seal, . . ."

5 Brown, Genesis, etc., p. 488. Complaint was made in 1619 against Governor Yeardley because he directed all his letters to the council and none to the company. Colls. Va. Hist. Soc., vol. vii, pp. 48, 53; also 168, etc.

6 Colls. Va. Hist. Soc., vol. viii, pp. 29–38, 45, 47.

7 Ibid., vol. vii, pp. 33, 86.

8 Ibid., vol. vii, pp. 17, 98, 109, 113, 186, etc.; vol. viii, pp. 23, 46.

9 Ibid., vol. viii, pp. 68, 96; vol. vii, pp. 112, 119.

on a committee to prepare the acts of the first Virginia assembly for final consideration by the company. It issued broadsides, relations and the other publications of the company.2 The "Orders and Constitutions," in fact, state that at the call of the treasurer or his deputy the council should meet and give faithful advice in all matters tending to the advancement of the plantation, and especially concerning the making of laws and constitutions. The religion of the colonists and the conversion of the natives were to be its peculiar care. Sometimes committees were associated with it, or prepared business for it. Sometimes the council reported to an ordinary court,3 instead of laying matters directly before the quarter court. So important was the council that the whole organism usually went by the name The Treasurer, Council and Company. But the evidence contained in the Records abundantly proves not only that the corporation directly exercised governmental power, but that it was the source whence that power was immediately derived. The "Orders and Constitutions" also clearly show that in the quarter courts officers were to be elected, laws and ordinances passed, lands in Virginia disposed of, and all matters of trade settled. These constitutions say:

Colls. Va. Hist. Soc., vol. vii, p. 56.

2 Brown, Genesis, etc., pp. 337, 439, 445, 463, 761, 775, 797. The more impor tant pamphlets concerning the early history of Virginia, which have been reprinted by Force in his Tracts, were published by order of the council. "Nova Britannia" was addressed to Sir Th. Smith as treasurer and one of the council. Force, vol. i. See Smith's Works, Arber's edition, p. 522, “A Declaration of the Lottery published by the Council." Smith, when he was apparently preparing his Generall History, received for his enterprise the commendation of the company. Colls. Va. Hist. Soc., vol. vii, pp. 113 et seq.

8 Colls. Va. Hist. Soc., vol. viii, p. 96. The only record we have of a session of the council relates to that held in December, 1622, to inquire into the cause of the denunciatory language used by Mr. Wrote against the treasurer and deputy because of their alleged misconduct in relation to the famous tobacco contract. A report on this was made to the company, and it excluded him from the council and suspended him from membership in the corporation. Colls. Va. Hist. Soc., vol. viii, pp. 48-55, 73, 82.

4 Ibid., vol. viii, pp. 24, 26, 786, etc.

5 The letters printed in Neill's History of the Virginia Company, pp. 223 et seq., also prove that, at least in the later years of its history, the company corresponded treely with the authorities in the colony, and they with it. Waterhouse's Relation, concerning the massacre of 1622, was dedicated to the company. Neill, p. 334.

No laws or standing orders shall be made by the company but in this manner: First, after the proposing of them in court, they shall be referred to the examination of a select committy. The committies shall present their labors to the view of the council. The council approving them, they shall be brought to the court of preparation on the Monday before the quarter court and openly read. And lastly, they shall pass the judgment of the quarter court.

We have now seen what the London Company was in its fully developed form. It was a body politic endowed not only with land and rights of trade, but ultimately with powers of government, and with the right to increase at will its own. membership. This we may call the London type of company, which had developed out of the system of 1606 by the merging of the council in the corporation.

We come now to consider an organization of a different type. The Plymouth patentees of 1606 continued under the old charter till 1620. During the interval colonization was attempted by them at Sagadahoc and failed: thereafter only fishing voyages and voyages of discovery were undertaken. Finally, some of the patentees asked for a definite grant of territory and incorporation as his "majesty's council," the number of which should never exceed forty. The request was granted, and the result was the formation of a new company under the name: "The Council established at Plymouth in the County of Devon for the Planting, Ruling and Governing of New England in America." The strongest words of incorporation were used, and the territory between the fortieth and forty-eighth degrees of north latitude, and extending through the continent, was bestowed, with power to grant it out to settlers. The customary rights of settlement and trade were given, though in a somewhat detailed and monopolistic form. Powers of government were also bestowed, and in much the same language as was used in the London charter of 1609. The right was given to constitute offices, to abolish or change the same, to appoint and remove officials, as well those in England as those employed in the colony, and to issue instruc

1 N.Y. Col. Docs., vol. iii, p. 3.

tions for the guidance of magistrates in New England. An official oath was to be formulated for administration to those in the plantation service, and also a judicial oath to be used in examinations touching the plantation or its business.

But the New England council is interesting in the present connection chiefly because of its name and its organization. In name it was the same as the Royal Council for Virginia. In number of members the two were not unlike. The members of both were required to take an oath of office before the lord chancellor, the lord high treasurer or the lord chamberlain. In both cases they were the grantees of governmental powers. But in the London system of 1609 the council, though originally distinct, became merely a part of the corporation, losing thereby its separate existence. In the New England system the council was the corporation, and thus was the grantee of all powers. The two were closely joined, as they were under the London charter, but the corporation was merged in the council, the latter holding the chief place and giving character to the system. This council, then, like the council in the London Company, was the body to which the king addressed his instructions, if he had any to give. Its relation to the king and the privy council was direct. Its relation to the colonists was also direct, and it did not share the work of administration with the corporation, for it was the corporation.

The last distinction to be noted between the New England Council and the London Company is this: the council was a closed body, limited to forty members. Vacancies were to be filled by coöptation. It never could become, then, a large and dignified body, like that which met at Sir Thomas Smith's and John Ferrar's. Its records,1 so far as they have been preserved, show that rarely more than half a dozen members attended its meetings. The only two who were regularly present were Sir Ferdinando Gorges and Dr. Barnabee Gooch. Though the council was located at Plymouth, its meetings were usually, if not always, held in London. These meetings were not called general courts, and were not such, for this 1 Proceedings of the American Antiquarian Society, 1867.

corporation had no generality. There were no ordinary courts. The only executive officer mentioned in the charter is the president. He was elected by the body he served and from its members. His duties, so far as they appear in the charter, were to call meetings of the council and to assist in administering the oaths. The records show that the title of the office was later changed to governor; and, when Sir Ferdinando Gorges held the position, we may believe that the policy of the council was directed by its official head. The records also reveal the fact that the council had a treasurer — for a time, Dr. Gooch a clerk and auditors; and show that committees were appointed to facilitate its work.2 A body so small as the council needed but little administrative machinery. But as time passed it became even smaller. In November, 1632, its members had been reduced from forty to twenty-one,3 and it was resolved that the number "be with all convenient speed filled"; but there is no evidence that this was done. The New England patentees, moreover, were nobles and country gentlemen of the west of England-landed proprietors; the merchant element was almost wholly lacking. As the attendance and membership fell off, the council became more and more like a board of proprietors. Because its membership was limited to forty, and none of those intended ever to settle in New England, all the colonists under this system must be tenants or simply inhabitants. They could never become members of the governing body. The council, in other words, could never expand into a commonwealth. On the other hand, year by year it degenerated toward a proprietorship; and in fact that was the governmental form which it most resembled, and toward which the inclinations of its members naturally gravitated. In the manifesto of the council issued in 1622, and commonly known as Gorges's Brief Relation, the monarchical theory of government was strongly asserted, and a scheme of administration outlined which was clearly provincial, i.e., monarchical in its character. The language of the document is as follows:

1 Records, p. 59.

2 Ibid., pp. 59, 60, 62.

4 Baxter, Gorges, vol. i, pp. 234 et seq.

8 Ibid., p. 110.