yer's clerk appeared and informed Mr. Martin that Mr. Livius had presented the bill of sale and had asked for a writ to demand the surrender of the negro boy. Before issuing the writ, the clerk's chief had thought he would ascertain whether Mr. Martin "had any objection to his doing it." Not unnaturally Martin flared up. "I returned for answer," his deposition tells us, "that I had none; that if Mr. Livius chose to do a thing that would make him more infamous (or to that purpose) than he at present was, I had no objection." Although he spoke in heat, Mr. Martin meant just what he said; for at the time of the original transaction he had taken care to take a receipt for the bill of sale from Livius, and in that receipt, which happily he still retained, was an explicit statement of the terms of the deal. When the lawyer learned this, he advised Mr. Livius accordingly and "dissuaded him from his designs." This episode did not lead to Mr. Martin's recovery of the menacing bill of sale, but being a true Yankee he found another method of spiking his adversary's guns. To use his own words, he “recorded the Receipt in a Notary Publick's office to hinder evil Consequence that might happen by my Loseing the receipt and Expose me to the Mercy of said Livius's honour."

any

Not so businesslike nor so for tunate was another Portsmouth gentleman. This was Samuel Moffatt, who was the husband of Mrs. Livius's sister. Like almost every one else in town Moffatt was at first dazzled by the free-spending newcomer who had married Anna Mason. In fact it was indirectly through Moffatt, and directly through a friend of Moffatt's in Bristol, England, that Peter Livius procured his appointmen to the Council that surrounded Governor Benning Wentworth. But that is another story. Well would it

have been for Samuel Moffatt if his dealings with Mr. Livius had ended there. However, it was not to be so. Soon after Livius's appointment to the Council, Moffatt and George Meserve admitted him as a third partner "in the Brig Triton, which Vessel was fitted out at Boston with a Cargo for the Coast of Guinea & Cost Three thousand four hundred & fifty pounds Sterling, and was carried on in the name of Meserve & Moffatt only." Livius's third cost him £1150. He paid Moffatt £600 at one time and took his receipt for it. At different times he paid in the balance-£550-and then took a receipt for the whole amount-£1150but kept the receipt for the £600 "as he hadn't it about him at the time of taking the last Receipt." Moffatt let the matter go.

The Triton sailed for the coast of Africa, laden presumably with rum, for that was the best medium of trade in that part of the world. There she exchanged her freight for a cargo of negroes, and headed for Jamaica, where her master expected to make a handsome profit by selling the negroes to the sugar planters of that island. On their passage across the Atlantic, however, many of the negroes died; and the prospective profit of the partners was turned into a loss. When this unpleasant news reached Portsmouth, Moffatt communicated it to Livius, and Livius appeared to accept his share of the loss with cheerful resignation. After all it would hardly exceed £200, he said.

But a little later his philosophical mood gave way to sharpness. There was nothing in writing to show that he was a partner in the ill-starred enterprise. And there were receipts. in his possession that could be made. to indicate that he had merely lent £1150-or rather £1750-to Samuel Moffatt. In In the course of time, therefore, Mr. Livius notified his vic

tim that he had his receipt for a large sum of money, and that unless an immediate settlement was made he should be obliged to "pursue such measures as would secure himself." Moffatt was alarmed, and rightly so. Through a third party he replied that if Livius would return the £600 receipt and pay what he owed on a separate account, he would give him security for the true balance. This Livius declined to do. Instead he took out a writ against Moffatt for £200, apparently on the ground that this amount represented the interest due on £1750 for which he showed receipts. "Moffatt, getting intelliintelligence thereof, confined himself to his House; and rather than be held to Bail for so large a sum became Bankrupt." Thereupon Livius, whose scheme would have been largely defeated if the man had actually gone into bankruptcy, withdrew his writ. In place of it, he sued him in three different actions. As a net result of these legal proceedings, it is a pleasure to relate, Mr. Livius won nothing, whereas Mr. Moffatt came away with the troublesome receipt. for £600, and "recovered his Costs."

Soon after he came to Portsmouth Livius had boasted to John Parker that if he were a member of the Council he "would oppose the Conduct of the governor and Council in general." Benning Wentworth was then governor, and perhaps there

some justification for Livius's, sentiments. Yet, whatever his grievance may have been, he does not seem to have fulfilled his promise after taking his place on "the Board" in May, 1765. Instead he vented his displeasure on George Meserve. Meserve, a native Portsmouthian, had the misfortune to be appointed stamp distributor for New Hampshire under the notorious Stamp Act. He was in England at the time of his appointment, but returned to America. late in the summer of 1765. Learn

ing of the extreme unpopularity of the Stamp Act before he landed, he resigned his office forthwith; and upon his arrival at Portsmouth he made a second resignation in public before going to his own house. This was as it should have been, no doubt, and Mr. Meserve would have kept out of trouble if, when his commission arrived some time later, he had refrained from mentioning its receipt. Unfortunately for himself, he felt constrained to show it to the governor and to some other public officers. Then came trouble. The Sons of Liberty assembled, took possession of the offending commission, and obliged Meserve to take oath "that he would neither directly nor indirectly attempt to execute his office."

Although Mr. Livius was a member of the Council and held his office directly from the Crown, he did not hesitate to identify himself with the popular side in these episodes. The governor and the other councillors were content with a discreet neutrality; but not so Peter Livius. There is a deposition showing "that so long. as George Meserve, Esq., the Stamp Master, disclaimed acting in his office, so long said Levius was his fast Friend and did all in his power to protect him. But as soon as said Meserve received his Commission & showed it to the Governor, Secretary, & other officers to indemnify himself, said Levius Joined the popular Clamor against him & became his Inveterate Enemy-That when said Meserve petitioned the General Assembly for Redress of his Losses, said Levius was chosen Chairman of a Committee to hear him; and, as said Meserve frequently told the Deponent in the time of it, he not only as such treated Him in an haughty, imperious manner within doors, but publickly in the Street & insulted him, and finally challenged him."

Livius's threat that he would run counter to the governor and the rest

of the Council was not carried out while Benning Wentworth was in power. But after that gentleman had been superseded in office by his nephew John Wentworth, Mr. Livius decided that the time was ripe for insurgency. The first open break came in June, 1768, when the Assembly passed and sent up to the Council a bill asking the governor to render an account of that part of the provincial revenue known as "powder money"-how much had been received and how it had been expended. The Council nonconcurred, and the bill was killed. Alone among the councillors, Peter Livius took the part of the Assembly. Moreover he insisted that the grounds for his dissent be entered upon the Journal. No conclusive action was taken upon the latter point, but the privilege was denied him for the time being. Besides being a member of the Council Mr. Livius was a judge, appointed presumably by Governor Benning Wentworth. At any At any rate he was a justice of the Court of Common Pleas for a number of years, his administration in this field coming to an abrupt end in 1771. In that year the province was divided into counties, and it became necessary to issue new commissions to the judges. Governor John Wentworth found this an opportune moment for appointing another in the place of Mr. Livius, who had performed his judicial duties with notorious partiality. On at least one occasion it became known that Livius had given legal advice to the defendant in a case which was to come before him

for judgment. The plaintiff protested. Livius replied that at the time he had given his advice he was not aware that he was to sit upon the case. Naturally this did not satisfy the plaintiff, who rejoined, “As the Matter now Comes on, and you have already given the party your Opinion against me, I should think

it out of all Character or Dishonourable for you to set' (or words to that purpose). Whereupon the said Livius gave his Word and Honour that he would not Set; but after the Tryal came on, he insisted upon Sitting & acting as Judge in the Cause." As things turned out, however, the case was put off to another day, when it so happened that Mr. Livius did not sit. But for this happy outcome Livius does not seem to have been responsible.

John Sullivan, who later became. General Sullivan, did not hesitate to express his opinion of Peter Livius as a dispenser of justice. Sullivan was a prominent lawyer of Durham, and it may be that his views were colored, or shaded, by memories of a day in July, 1766, when Livius, representing the Council, brought to the Assembly a petition signed by a number of persons from Durham and other towns "against Mr. John Sullivan for evil practices in him as an Attorney at Law." However that may have been, at a later date Sullivan, under oath, spoke his mind as follows: "I have, for some years before he was set aside from Acting as a Justice, Observed his opinion ever to be in favour of his intimate friends, and where he had no friends immediately interested in the Dispute I have observed his opinion to be in favour of a favorite Lawyer, without attending to the Merits. of the Cause; which observation I have not only made myself but have it Generally from Gentlemen of the fairest Character."

Having been set aside by Governor John Wentworth, Livius determined that he would bring about the governor's downfall. As the story of his attempt to do so is told in Belknap's History and elsewhere, the reader need not be bored with its repetition here. The controversy began in March, 1771, was carried to England a year later, and was ulti

Wentworth in August, 1773. The writer has discovered no document proving that Livius's intention was to gain the governorship of New Hampshire for himself; but is it likely that merely his penchant for making trouble for others induced him to go to England and to give the prosecution of the case his personal attention? There are strong indications, though no absolute proof, that he fully intended to supplant John Wentworth in the governor's chair. The amazing thing about the controversy is that he all but succeeded. Almost as astonishing, unless one is conversant with the mentality of Lord Dartmouth, was the decision of the Colonial Secretary to send Mr. Livius back to New Hampshire to be chief justice of the province, after Wentworth had been vindicated by the Privy Council. Dartmouth actually signed the warrant directing Governor Wentworth to make the appointment; "but this," wrote Wentworth in after years, "upon more mature consideration was thought likely to produce trouble, and he [Livius] had a more lucrative office in Canada."

Livius seems never to have returned to New Hampshire, although his wife and children still resided there. Instead he read law at the Middle Temple, and was admitted to the English bar in 1775. He had a good head for the law. Even his enemies in New Hampshire admitted that his decisions as a judge were excellent, when none of his friends was directly or indirectly concerned in the cases brought before him. He must have given the impression of unusual intelligence in other branches of learning, too, for he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in April, 1773. Not long after this he received the honorary degree of Doctor of Civil Law from Oxford University. John Wentworth had been awarded

seems to have signified little except the good graces of the academic powers.

Mr. Livius very much wished to be elevated to the head of the provincial judiciary and to be despatched to New Hampshire in 1774. But Lord Dartmouth kept him waiting many months. Then came word that he was to go to Quebec as a judge of the Court of Common Pleas. Thither he sailed in the summer of 1775, arriving safely "after a tedious, difficult, and dangerous voyage of one hundred and twentysix days." He found the province in great confusion. An army of American rebels was threatening Montreal, and it was not at all certain that the Canadians would not join them in opposition to the rule of the mother country. the mother country. In November Montreal surrendered. In December the invaders under Montgomery and Arnold appeared before Quebec and laid siege to it. Then came the desperate assault and the defeat of the Americans. "During the siege of Quebec by Mr. Arnold," wrote Wentworth to Belknap, "part of his house, being properly situated, was used as a guard-house. On the attack, his servant was in action; and when over, Mr. L. himself appeared. He also sometimes before the assault walk [ed] up to the walls. Upon the repulse of the Americans, he wrote home a pompous account of his services. 'His house a guardhouse, he himself often at the wheelbarrow in repairing the fortifications, and at all other times with a brown musquet doing duty with & encouraging citizens.' These things were artfully told to the K. just in the moment of joy for the defeat of the enemy and safety of the city, which was much apprehended; and it being suggested that the Chief Justiceship of Quebec was vacant, it was immediately given to him. The

fact was, that he was remarkably shy on all the active business, as I was told by a gentleman present thro' the whole, and only appeared to save appearances, which he afterwards so well improved."

Among the Americans captured at Quebec was a New Hampshire captain, Henry Dearborn of Nottingham. Mr. Livius befriended him, and he was given leave to go home on parole. In return for this courtesy the revolutionary authorities allowed Mrs. Livius and her four children to leave New Hampshire and join the head of their family at Quebec. In July, 1776, they boarded the schooner Polly and departed from Portsmouth in peace.

Almost a year later Livius interested himself in the welfare of another American soldier, but this time. he took care not to be so open in his altruism. The object of his solicitude was General John Sullivan of the American Army. To him he wrote a long letter, dated June 2, 1777. From the revolutionists' point of view this was not the most encouraging period of the war. Howe was in possession of New York City, and Burgoyne was descending from Canada. The bearer of the letter seems to have been an authorized envoy sent to General Sullivan on other business. What became of him we do not know, but on June 16th Livius's letter was removed from the false bottom of a canteen and was read by General Schuyler at Fort Edward. The letter is much too long to quote in its entirety,* yet parts of it surely must find a place in any paper on Peter Livius.

and estate from this imminent destruction." "It is, in plain English, to tread back the steps you have already taken, and do some real, essential service to your king and country." Nor did Mr. Livius hesitate to suggest what immediate form this "essential service" might assume. "In the meanwhile," he wrote, "endeavor to give me all the material intelligence you can collect (and you can get the best), or if you find it more convenient you can convey it to General Burgoyne, and by your using my your using my name he will know whom it comes from without your mentioning your own name." For Sullivan to explain away his recantation would be an easy matter. "That you embarked in the cause of rebellion is true; perhaps you mistook the popular delusion for the cause of your country (as many others did who have returned to their duty) and you engaged in it warmly; but when you found your error, you earnestly returned, you saved the province you had engaged for from devastation and ruin, and you rendered most essential services to your king and country: for which I engage my word to you, you will receive pardon, you will secure your estate, and you will be further amply rewarded."

At this point Peter Livius drops out of New Hampshire history. But the glimpses we get of him in Quebec show him to have been consistent throughout his career. He was appointed chief justice of the province in 1776, and his appointment carried with it membership in the Council. One of the first questions. that came before the Council was that of issuing an issuing an ordinance that would establish a reasonable and uniform schedule of fees. The salaries of most of the Canadian office-holders had recently been bountifully increased, and to General Carleton,