"We could not find a fitter means to represent the condition of this country to your highness, than this worthy person, Mr. Digges, our late governor, whose occasions calling him into England, we have instructed him with the state of this place as he left it; we shall beseech your highness to give credit to his relations, which we assure ourselves shall be faithful, having had many experiences of his candor in the time of his government, which he hath managed under your highness, with so much moderation, prudence, and justice, that we should be much larger in expressing this truth, but that we fear to have already too much trespassed, by interrupting your highness' most serious thoughts in greater affairs than what can concern your highness' most humble, most devoted servants. "Dated from the Assembly of Virginia, 15th December, 1656." Superscribed, for his "Highness, the Lord Protector." The letter to the secretary of state was as follows:-- "RIGHT HONORABLE,-- "Though we are persons so remote from you, we have heard so honorable a character of your worth, that we cannot make a second choice without erring, of one so fit and proper as yourself to make our addresses to his Highness, the Lord Protector. Our desires we have intrusted to that worthy gentleman, Mr. Digges, our late governor; we shall desire you would please to give him access to you and by your highness. And as we promise you will find nothing but worth in him, so we are confident he will undertake for us that we are a people not altogether ungrateful, but will find shortly a nearer way than by saying so, to express really how much we esteem the honor of your patronage, which is both the hopes and ambition of your very humble and then obliged servants. "From the Assembly of Virginia, 15th December, 1656." Superscribed, to the "Right Honorable John Thurlow, Secretary of State." The allusion in the close of the letter appears to be to a douceur which it was intended to present to the secretary.