worth, that we cannot make a
second choice without erring, of one so fit and proper as
yourself to make our addresses to his Highness, the Lord
Protector. Our desires we have intrusted to that worthy
gentleman, Mr. Digges, our late governor; we shall desire you
would please to give him access to you and by your highness.
And as we promise you will find nothing but worth in him, so
we are confident he will undertake for us that we are a people
not altogether ungrateful, but will find shortly a nearer way
than by saying so, to express really how much we esteem the
honor of your patronage, which is both the hopes and ambition
of your very humble and then obliged servants.

"From the Assembly of Virginia, 15th December, 1656."

Superscribed, to the "Right Honorable John Thurlow, Secretary
of State."

The allusion in the close of the letter appears to be to a douceur which
it was intended to present to the secretary.

Digges was instructed to unite with Matthews and Bennet, in London, and
to treat with the leading merchants in the Virginia trade, and to let
them know how much the assembly had endeavored to diminish the quantity,
and improve the quality of the tobacco; and to see what the merchants,
on their part, would be willing to do in giving a better price; for if
the planters should find that the bad brought as high a price as the
good, they would of course raise that which could be raised the most
easily.[236:A] It appears that Digges was appointed agent conjointly
with Bennet. Matthews was elected by the assembly to succeed Digges as
governor; but the latter was requested to hold the office as long as he
should remain in Virginia. Digges departing for England toward the close
of 1655, would appear to have co-operated for a short while with both
Matthews and Bennet. By a singular coincidence, Digges, Matthews, and
Bennet, who were the first three governors of Virginia under the
Commonwealth of England, were transferred from the miniature metropolis,
Jamestown, and found themselves together near the court of his Highness
the Lord Protector, Oliver Cromwell.

Digges was succeeded as governor by Matthews, early in the year 1656.
The laws of the colony were revised, and reduced into one volume,
comprising one hundred and thirty-one acts, well adapted to the wants of
the people and the condition of the country. Of the transactions from
1656 to 1660,