BRITISH WEST INDIES. 57 



quired to copy, as nearly as circumstances will admit, 

 the example of the Parliament of Great Britain, 



The freeholders are assembled in each town or 

 parish respectively by the Queen's writ; their 

 suffrages are taken by an officer of the Crown, and 

 the persons elected are afterwards commanded, by 

 royal proclamation, to frame statutes and ordinances 

 for the public safety. When met, the oaths of 

 allegiance, &c, are administered to each of them ; 

 and a Speaker being chosen and approved, the 

 session opens by a speech from the Queen's repre- 

 sentative. The Assembly then proceed, as a grand 

 provincial inquest, to hear grievances, and to correct 

 such pubHc abuses as are not cognizable before 

 inferior tribunals. They commit for contempts ; and 

 the courts of law have refused, after solemn argu- 

 ment, to discharge persons committed by the Speaker's 

 warrant. They examine and control the accounts of 

 the public treasury; they vote such supplies, levy 

 such taxes, and frame such laws, statutes, and ordi- 

 nances as the exigencies of the province or colony 

 require. Jointly with the Governor and Council, 

 they exercise the highest acts of legislation, the 

 judges being sworn to give effect to their ordinances 

 even in matters of life and death ; and many persons 

 are known to have undergone capital punishment 



