Mild as had appeared the temper of the proprietaries, it seemed, however, as if they had determined severely to punish the offending colony, when in 1683 they sent over Seth Sothel as governor. Sothel, like Cranfield in New Hampshire, was an adventurer, whose aim being the acquisition of wealth, he had no conscience as to the means by which it was acquired. He appears, by the report of all parties, to have been of that scoundrel class by which human nature is degraded. He was himself one of the eight proprietaries, and he accepted office merely for sordid purposes. “The annals of delegated authority,” says Chalmers, “have not recorded a name so deserving of infamy as that of Sothel. Bribery, extortion, injustice, rapacity, with breach of trust and disobedience of orders, are the crimes of which he was accused during the five years that he misruled this unhappy colony. Driven almost to despair, the inhabitants at length seized his person, in 1688, in order to send him to England to answer their complaints.” On his entreaties, however, with a moderation which is highly creditable to their Christian power of forbearance, he was permitted to meet their accusations at the next assembly. Sothel fled, fearing less to face the men whom he had injured, than they whose interests he had betrayed. The assembly gave judgment against him in all the above particulars, and compelled him to abjure the country for twelve months and the government for ever. The proprietaries, though they heard with indignation of the sufferings which Sothel had inflicted on the colony, were yet displeased that the colony through its assembly had assumed supreme power, which act was regarded as “prejudicial to the prerogative of the crown, and to the honour of the proprietaries.”