ect of a college was renewed, but not carried into
effect. President Bacon resided in York County. He married Elizabeth,
daughter of Richard Kingsmill, Esq., of James City County. Leaving no
issue, by his will he bequeathed his estates to his niece, Abigail
Burwell, and his "riding horse, Watt, to Lady Berkley," at that time
wife of Colonel Philip Ludwell. President Bacon died on the 16th of
March, 1692, in the seventy-third year of his age, and lies buries on
King's Creek,[344:A] as does also Elizabeth, his wife, who died in the
year 1691, aged sixty-seven.[344:B] The name of the wife of Nathaniel
Bacon, Jr., was likewise Elizabeth.

In the year 1690 Lord Effingham, reluctant to revisit a province where
he was so unacceptable, being still absent from Virginia on the plea of
ill health, Francis Nicholson, who had been driven from New York by a
popular outbreak, came over as lieutenant-governor. He found the colony
ready for revolt. The people were indignant at seeing Effingham still
retained in the office of governor-in-chief, believing that Nicholson
would become his tool. The revolution in England seemed as yet
productive of no amendment in the colonial administration. Nicholson,
however, now courted popularity; he instituted athletic games, and
offered prizes to those who should excel in riding, running, shooting,
wrestling, and fencing. The last alone could need any encouragement in
such a country as Virginia. He proposed the establishment of a
post-office, and recommended the erection of a college, but refused to
call an assembly to further the scheme, being under obligations to
Effingham to stave off assemblies as long as possible, for fear of
complaints being renewed against his arbitrary administration.[345:A]
Nevertheless, Nicholson and the council headed a private subscription,
and twenty-five hundred pounds were raised, part of this sum being
contributed by some London merchants. The new governor made a progress
through the colony, mingling freely with the people, and he carried his
indulgence to the common people so far as frequently to suffer them to
enter the room where he was entertaining company at dinner, and diverted
himself with their scrambling among one another and carrying off the
viands from the table--like Sancho Panza's on the Island of Barataria.
There is but one step from the courtier to the demagogue.

Virginia felt the embarrassments which war had brought upon England, and
acts were passed