Meneval, with the two priests, was confined in a house at Boston, under guard. He says that he petitioned the governor and council for redress; "but, as they have little authority and stand in fear of Phips, who is supported by the rabble, to which he himself once belonged, and of which he is now the chief, they would do nothing for me." [8] This statement of Meneval is not quite correct: for an order of the council is on record, requiring Phips to restore his chest and clothes; and, as the order received no attention, Governor Bradstreet wrote to the refractory commander a note, enjoining him to obey it at once. [9] Phips thereupon gave up some of the money and the worst part of the clothing, still keeping the rest. [10] After long delay, the council released Meneval: upon which, Phips and the populace whom he controlled demanded that he should be again imprisoned; but the "honest people" of the town took his part, his persecutor was forced to desist, and he set sail covertly for France. [11] This, at least, is his own account of the affair. [8] Mémoire présenté à M. de Ponchartrain par M. de Meneval, 6 Avril, 1691. [9] This note, dated 7 Jan., 1691, is cited by Bowen in his Life of Phips, Sparks's American Biography, VII. [10] Mémoire de Meneval. [11] Ibid. As Phips was to play a conspicuous part in the events that immediately followed, some notice of him will not be amiss. He is said to have been one of twenty-six children, all of the same mother, and was born in 1650 at a rude border settlement, since called Woolwich, on the Kennebec. His parents were ignorant and poor; and till eighteen years of age he was employed in keeping sheep. Such a life ill suited his active and ambitious nature. To better his condition, he learned the trade of ship-carpenter, and, in the exercise of it, came to Boston, where he married a widow with some property, beyond him in years, and much above him in station. About this time, he learned to read and write, though not too well, for his signature is like that of a peasant. Still aspiring to greater things, he promised his wife that he would one day command a king's ship and own a "fair brick house in the Green Lane of North Boston," a quarter then occupied by citizens of the better class. He kept his word at both points. Fortune was inauspicious to him for several years; till at length, under the pressure of reverses, he conceived the idea of conquering fame and wealth at one stroke, by fishing up the treasure said to be stored in a Spanish galleon wrecked fifty years before somewhere in the West Indian seas. Full of this project, he went to England, where, through influences which do not plainly appear, he gained a hearing from persons in high places, and induced the admiralty to adopt his scheme. A frigate was given him, and he sailed for the West Indies; whence, after a long search, he returned unsuccessful, though not without adventures which proved his mettle. It