6. Next came another war with the Indians. Early in 1644, the natives planned a general massacre. On the 18th of April the savages fell upon the frontier settlements, and murdered three hundred people before assistance could be brought. The warriors then fled, but were closely followed by the English. Opechancanough was captured, and died a prisoner. The tribes were punished without mercy, and were soon glad to buy a peace by the cession of large tracts of land. [Sidenote: =The Election of Governors.=] 7. For a while the colonists conducted their government as they wished. The important matter of choosing a governor was submitted to the House of Burgesses; when so great a power had been once exercised, it was not likely to be relinquished. Three governors were chosen in this way, and the _privilege_ of electing soon became a _right_. The assembly even declared that such a right existed, and that it should not be taken away. 8. In 1660 Samuel Matthews, the last of the three elected governors, died. The Burgesses were convened and an ordinance passed declaring that the supreme authority of Virginia was _in the colony_, and would continue there until a delegate should arrive from the British government. The house then elected as governor Sir William Berkeley, who acknowledged the right of the Burgesses to choose. 9. As soon as it was known in Virginia that Charles II. had become king, Governor Berkeley issued writs in the name of the king for the election of a new assembly. The adherents of the Commonwealth were thrust out of office, and royal favorites established in their places. The Virginians soon found that they had exchanged a republican tyrant with good principles for a monarchial tyrant with bad ones. The former commercial system was reenacted in a worse form than ever. The new law provided that all the colonial commerce should be carried on in English ships; the trade of the colonies was burdened with a heavy tax, and tobacco, the staple of Virginia, could be sold nowhere but in England. [Sidenote: =Effects of the Restoration.=] 10. King Charles soon began to reward the profligates who thronged his court, by granting them large tracts of land in Virginia. It was no uncommon thing for an American planter to find that his farm had been given away to some flatterer of the royal household, and finally, in 1673, the king set a limit to his own recklessness _by giving away the whole province_. Lord Culpepper and the Earl of Arlington received a deed by which was granted to them for thirty-one years all the country called Virginia.