George Bancroft, History of the United States from the Discovery of the American Continent, Vol. 6, 10th edition.

[203] towns, came together in Faneuil Hall in Convention,¹

Chap. XXXVI} 1768. Sept.

and their number increased, till ninety-six towns and eight districts, nearly every settlement in the Colony, were represented. By the mere act of assembling, the object of the Convention was accomplished. It was a bold and successful attempt to show, that f the policy of suppressing the Legislature should be persisted in, a way was discovered by which legislative government could still be instituted, and a general expression of opinion and concentration of power be obtained. And though at first Otis was unaccountably absent,² they marked their own sense of the character of this meeting by electing the Speaker and Clerk of the late House of Representatives to the same offices in their own body.

‘They have committed treason,’ shouted all the Crown officers in America. ‘At least the selectmen, in issuing the Circular for a Convention, have done so;’ and pains were taken to obtain and preserve some of their original letters with their signatures. ‘Boston,’ said Gage, ‘is mutinous,’³ ‘its resolves treasonable and desperate.’ ‘Mad people procured them; mad people govern the town and influence the Province.’⁴

The Convention, soon after it was organized, requested the Governor to summon the Constitutional Assembly of the Province, in order to consider of measures for preventing an unconstitutional encroachment