Hawthorne, Nathaniel / 2008-07-04 00:00:00

1832
TWICE-TOLD TALES
MY KINSMAN, MAJOR MOLINEUX
by Nathaniel Hawthorne
AFTER THE KINGS of Great Britain had assumed the right of
appointing the colonial governors, the measures of the latter seldom
met with the ready and general approbation which had been paid to
those of their predecessors, under the original charters. The people
looked with most jealous scrutiny to the exercise of power which did
not emanate from themselves, and they usually rewarded their rulers
with slender gratitude for the compliances by which, in softening
their instructions from beyond the sea, they had incurred the
reprehension of those who gave them. The annals of Massachusetts Bay
will inform us, that of six governors in the space of about forty
years from the surrender of the old charter, under James II, two
were imprisoned by a popular insurrection; a third, as Hutchinson
inclines to believe, was driven from the province by the whizzing of a
musketball; a fourth, in the opinion of the same historian, was
hastened to his grave by continual bickerings with the House of
Representatives; and the remaining two, as well as their successors,
till the Revolution, were favored with few and brief intervals of
peaceful sway.
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