CHANGES IN FORM OF GOVERNMENT.--SIR EDMOND ANDROS APPOINTED GOVERNOR.--HE OPPRESSES THE COLONISTS AND IS FINALLY DEPOSED. Thus a provisional government took the place of the charter government under which New England had grown so rapidly. A great and successful experiment in political science was suddenly checked, and hopes which had led so many devout and earnest men to renounce the conveniences of home for the perils and discomforts of a wilderness were rudely crushed at the very moment when they seemed nearest their fulfillment. The same blow which fell upon Rhode Island fell with equal fatality upon Massachusetts and Connecticut. The government by charter ceased. The two most active agents of James in this remoulding of the government of the colonies were Dudley, President of the Council, and Randolph, the Secretary, whose despotic conduct in Boston has already been mentioned. Here was a broader and more congenial field. It was resolved as has been seen to address the King in behalf of the Colony, and John Greene, venerable by years and illustrious by public services, was appointed to carry the address to England and advocate it as agent for the Colony. He had watched over the cradle of the Colony--who so fit to stand by its grave. Unfortunately, party had lost none of its virulence even in this supreme hour, and a small minority of dissentients was found to the sober and judicious conduct of the Assembly. Among them were members of the Atherton company, and among their methods of attack were bitter aspersions upon the personal character of the colonial agent. The provisional government found enough to do in preparing the colonies for their new life, and one of their earliest measures was a final organization of King's Province. Among the changes that they made was the changing of the names of its three towns. Kingston, the largest, was called Rochester, Westerly, the next in size, became Haversham, and East Greenwich, the smallest, took the name of Dedford. The western boundary of Haversham was Pawcatuck River. Dedford was extended on the north to Warwick, and enlarged by the peninsula of Potowomut. Part of the actual settlers were living on land to which they had no legal claim. Preëmption rights were granted them and time given them to "arrange with the owners by rent or purchase." At last, on the 20th of December, 1686, the Royal Governor, Sir Edmond Andros, arrived in Boston. He came in a ship of the royal navy and brought with him two companies of the royal army, the first regular troops that had ever been seen in Massachusetts. He had already been in the colonies and knew the spirits with whom he would have to deal. Rhode Island, like her sisters, had everything to fear from his arbitrary will. But she had treated him with respectful consideration on his former visit, and was now treated by him with less than his usual harshness.