[Illustration: BOSTON MASSACRE MONUMENT. In Boston Common.] THE BOSTON MASSACRE.--At Boston the troops were received with every mark of hatred and disgust, and for three years were subjected to every sort of insult and indignity, which they repaid in kind. The troops led riotous lives, raced horses on Sunday on the Common, played "Yankee Doodle" before the church doors, and more than once exchanged blows with the citizens. In one encounter the troops fired on the crowd, killing five and wounding six. This was the famous "Boston Massacre," and produced over all the land a deep impression. [12] TOWNSHEND ACTS REPEALED, 1770.--Once more the resistance of the colonies-- chiefly through refusing to buy British goods--was successful, and Parliament took off all the Townshend taxes except that on tea. This import tax of three pence a pound on tea was retained in order that the right of Parliament to tax the colonies might be asserted. But the colonists stood firm; they refused to buy tea shipped from Great Britain, but smuggled it from Holland. [13] TEA TAX JUGGLE.--By 1773 the refusal to buy tea from the mother country was severely felt by the East India Company, which had brought far more tea to Great Britain than it could dispose of. Parliament then removed the export duty of twelve pence a pound which had formerly been paid in Great Britain on all tea shipped to the colonies. Thus after paying the three- pence tax at the American customhouses, the tea could be sold nine pence a pound cheaper than before. THE TEA NOT ALLOWED TO BE SOLD.--The East India Company now quickly selected agents in the chief seaports of the colonies, and sent shiploads of tea consigned to them for sale. [14] But the colonists were tempted by cheap tea; they were determined that Parliament would not tax them. They therefore forced the agents to resign their commissions, and when the tea ships arrived, took possession of them. At Philadelphia the ships were sent back to London. At Charleston the tea was landed and stored for three years and then seized and sold by the state of South Carolina. At Annapolis the people forced the owner of a tea ship to go on board and set fire to his ship; vessel and cargo were thus consumed. At Boston the people wished the tea sent back to London, and when the authorities refused to allow this, a party of men disguised as Indians boarded the ships and threw the tea into the water. [15] [Illustration: THROWING THE TEA OVERBOARD, BOSTON.] THE INTOLERABLE ACTS.--Parliament now determined to punish the colonies, and for this purpose enacted five laws called by the colonists the Intolerable Acts:-- 1. The port of Boston was shut to trade and commerce till the colony should pay for the tea destroyed. 2. The charter of Massachusetts was altered. 3. Persons who were accused of murder done in executing the laws might be taken for trial to another colony or to Great Britain. 4. The quartering of troops on the people was authorized.