OF THE BOSTON TEA PARTY 189 
resigned their commissions, and took oath that they 
would not act in the matter. So when the tea-ships 
at length arrived at New York and Philadelphia, they 
were turned about and sent home without ever coming 
within the jurisdiction of the custom-house. At Charles- 
ton the ships lingered more than the legal term of 
twenty days in port, and then the collector seized the 
tea and brought it ashore; but as there was no con- 
signee at hand to pay the duty, the fragrant leaves lay 
untouched in the custom-house until they rotted and 
fell to pieces. But before these things happened, the bat- 
tle had been fought in Boston. There the consignees, 
two of whom were sons of Governor Hutchinson, re- 
fused to resign; on no account, therefore, would it do 
to let the tea come ashore at Boston, for if it did, the 
duty would instantly be paid. The governor was a man 
of intense legality; he did not approve the sending of 
the tea, but if a ship once came into port, it must not, 
in his opinion, go out again without discharging all 
due formalities. His sons were like him for stubborn 
courage, and thus it was that Boston became the seat 
of war. With those two redoubtable Puritans, Thomas 
Hutchinson and Samuel Adams, pitted against each 
other, it was a meeting of Greek with Greek, and one 
might be sure that something dramatic and incisive 
would come of it. 
In those stormy days the governor so often turned 
his legislature out of doors that it may be said to have 
been in a chronic state of dissolution. In order to 
transact public business on a large scale, the town- 
meetings appointed committees of correspondence, 
whereby town might confer with town and the sense 
of the whole commonwealth be thus ascertained. This 
