This satisfied the Virginians for the moment, but during the Restoration period, on learning that the King had made a series of grants in the colony to favorites, they once more petitioned for a charter. And though, after prolonged negotiations, a charter was passed under the Great Seal,[1] it was so unsatisfactory that in 1691 they made still another attempt. When this failed, the colony was forced to remain under its unwritten constitution, based on precedents, royal letters, proclamations, and instructions. This constitution provided that the Governor be appointed by the King. Consequently he represented the authority of the Crown, and through the Crown the interests of England. If he failed to uphold the royal prerogative against the assaults of the Burgesses and the Council he was sure to incur the frowns of his royal master. If the King were bent on ruling the colony with as little interference from the Assembly as possible, it was the Governor who tried to carry out his orders. In other words, in the century long battle between the King and the representatives of the people, it was the Governor who bore the royal banner. The Governors varied widely in character and ability. Sir John Harvey and Francis Nicholson were egocentric men, who tried to lash all who surrounded them into obedience to their will. Alexander Spotswood and Robert Dinwiddie, though not friends of representative government, were able administrators. Hugh Drysdale, William Gooch, and Lord Botetourt, because of their amiable dispositions, won lasting popularity. Culpeper and Effingham were hated as instruments in the hands of Charles II and James II in imposing the Second Stuart Despotism on the colony. Dunmore was detested for his role in the opening years of the Revolutionary War. It is strange that Nicholson, who was in many respects one of the worst of the Governors, should have given an excellent description of the ideal colonial executive. "It is absolutely necessary ... that the Governor ... may be esteemed by the people, ... to be a lover of them and their country ... and above all distributes equal justice."[2] Had he followed his own advice his second administration would not have ended in failure. The powers of the Governor were great, so great that even the British government at times thought they should be used with caution. "All things are made so entirely dependent on the Governor's single will and pleasure, that whenever there may happen an ill man in that post, it cannot reasonably be expected any person ... should either oppose such an one in whatever he may attempt or so much as give any advice," wrote the Lords of Trade in 1698.[3]