Since certain features of this program ran counter to the interests of the Council, and others to those of the people, to carry them through would have required resolution, tact, moderation, and ability to handle men. Resolution Nicholson had in abundance, but in other respects he was entirely unsuited for the task he set himself. To vilify men, to call them rascals, to threaten to lash them with his whip was not the way to handle the liberty-loving Virginians. His attempts to bribe the Councillors and the Burgesses with fat jobs and to pack the courts with favorites, might have been more successful had they not been accompanied with such violent bursts of temper and such threats of ruin against any who opposed him. It so happened that the Committee of Trade, finding that the amount of tobacco received in England was far greater than that on which the export duty was paid in Virginia, became convinced that there were great frauds in collections. The fault lay with the naval officers and collectors, they thought. They instructed Nicholson not to appoint the same person to both offices, and not to permit members of the Council to hold either. When the Governor, not wishing to offend, at first failed to comply, they gave him a severe rebuke. In June, 1699, he was forced to turn several Councillors out of their lucrative jobs. This drew from them a violent protest. They denied that they had any knowledge of frauds in the collections. To forbid Councillors to hold these positions was to reverse the custom of many years. The income was their only compensation for their expense in journeying perhaps seventy miles, perhaps one hundred miles, in some cases crossing great rivers, to attend meetings of the Council and the General Court. And though they could not directly blame Nicholson, they probably suspected that it was at his suggestion that the instruction had been made. So it was a soured and discontented group of men who dispersed to return to their homes after the Council meeting ended. [Illustration: The Old Capitol at Williamsburg, showing the north elevation which is a duplicate of the historic Virginia Capitol originally completed in 1705. Courtesy of Colonial Williamsburg, Inc.] [Illustration: The House of Burgesses in the Old Capitol at Williamsburg. Courtesy of Colonial Williamsburg, Inc.] Nicholson's efforts to secure more accurate returns of the quit rents did not put them in better humor. It was well known that it was a common practice for men to "conceal" part of their holdings when the sheriff came round to collect the rent, and, if the sheriff happened to be a friend or a relative, he would not look into the matter too closely. As for the great tracts held by the wealthy, the sheriffs dared not demand the rent. To do so would certainly be bitterly resented and might cost them their jobs. Nicholson was convinced that a strict accounting would greatly increase the returns.