The defiance of Massachusetts was not punished as might have been expected. Clarendon's power was gone, and he was an exile. A board of trade, projected in 1668, never assumed the administration of colonial affairs, and had not vitality enough to last more than three or four years. Profligate libertines gained the confidence of the king's mistresses, and secured places in the royal cabinet. While Charles II. was dallying with women and robbing the theatres of actresses; while the licentious Buckingham, who had succeeded in displacing Clarendon, wasted the vigor of his mind and body by indulging in every sensual pleasure "which nature could desire or wit invent"; while Louis XIV. was increasing his influence by bribing the mistress of the chief of the king's cabal, England remained without a good government, and the colonies, despite bluster and threats, flourished in purity and peace. The English ministry dared not interfere with Massachusetts; it was right that the stern virtues of the ascetic republicans should intimidate the members of the profligate cabinet. The affairs of New England were often discussed; but the privy council was overawed by the moral dignity, which they could not comprehend. Amid all the discord and threats, the New England colonies continued to advance in population, and their villages assumed the dignity of towns. It is difficult to form exact opinions as to the population of the several colonies in this early period of their history. The colonial accounts are incomplete, and those furnished by emissaries from England are grossly false. The best estimate that can be obtained gives to New England, in 1675, fifty-five thousand souls. Of these it is supposed that Plymouth contained not less than seven thousand, Connecticut, nearly fourteen thousand, Massachusetts proper, more than twenty-two thousand, and Maine, New Hampshire and Rhode Island, each perhaps four thousand. The settlements were chiefly by agricultural communities, planted near the seaside, from New Haven to Pemaquid. The beaver trade, more than traffic in lumber and fish, had produced the village beyond the Piscataqua; yet in Maine, as in New Hampshire, there was "a great trade in deal boards."