s access to the land was necessary; and the
land was monopolized. In the South, where tobacco and corn were the
important staples, the worker was likewise denied the soil except as a
laborer or tenant, and in Massachusetts colony, where fortunes were
being made from timber, furs and fisheries, the poor man had practically
no chance against the superior advantages of the landed and privileged
class. These conditions led to severe reprisals. Several uprisings in
New York, Bacon's rebellion in Virginia, after the restoration of
Charles II, when that king granted large tracts of land belonging to the
colony to his favorites, and subsequently, in 1734, a ferment in
Georgia, even under the mild proprietary rule of the philanthropist
Oglethorpe, were all really outbursts of popular discontent largely
against the oppressive form in which land was held and against
discriminative taxation, although each uprising had its local issues
differing from those elsewhere.

In this conflict between landed class and people, the only hope of the
mass of the people lay in getting the favorable attention of royal
governors. At least one of these considered earnestly and
conscientiously the grave existing abuses and responded to popular
protest which had become bitter.

A CONFLICT BETWEEN LAND MAGNATES AND PEOPLE.

This official was the Earl of Bellomont. Scarcely had he arrived after
his appointment as Captain-General and Governor of Massachusetts Bay,
New York and other provinces, when he was made acquainted with the
widespread discontent. The landed magnates had not only created an
abysmal difference between themselves and the masses in possessions and
privileges, but also in dress and air, founded upon strict distinctions
in law. The landed aristocrat with his laces and ruffles, his silks and
his gold and silver ornaments and his expensive tableware, his
consciously superior air and tone of grandiose authority, was far
removed in established position from the mechanic or the laborer with
his coarse clothes and mean habitation. Laws were long in force in
various provinces which prohibited the common people from wearing gold
and silver lace, silks and ornaments. Bellomont noted the sense of deep
injustice smouldering in the minds of the people and set out to
confiscate the great estates, particularly, as he set forth, as many of
them had been obtained by bribery.

It was with amazement that Bellomont learned that one man, Colonel
Samu