News of the inroad spread, and on the next day crowds gathered in Cambridge with arms in their hands. They assembled before Lieutenant-Governor Oliver's house[329] and forced him to resign. Joseph Warren, in Boston, heard of the tumult and hastened to the spot. His influence prevailed, and the sun went down without the shedding of blood. It was ominous, however, to Gage, and he set to work rebuilding the old lines across Boston Neck, and constructing barracks. He soon encountered difficulties. Somehow laborers could not be hired, nor provisions be bought. Somehow his freight-barges sunk, his carts of straw got on fire, his wagons were sloughed; and somehow, with all his vigilance, a few young men made up for the loss of the powder-house pieces by stealthily carrying off by night some cannon from Boston,[330] besides some others from an old battery in Charlestown. It was soon found that the men on the Neck lines needed protection, and Admiral Graves tried to send up a sloop of war into the South bay to enfilade the road from Roxbury, if occasion came; but her draught was too much, and so he employed an armed schooner. By November the works were finished. Warren thought them as formidable as Gage could make them, but the old Louisbourg soldiers laughed at them and called them mud walls. Meanwhile, in October, the military spirit was taking shape throughout the province. On the 5th the legislative assembly, which had met at Salem on Gage's call, though he sought to outlaw them by rescinding (September 28) his precept, had declared his attempted revocation without warrant in law, and had resolved itself into a provincial congress. The body then adjourned to meet in Concord, where, under John Hancock's presidency, they appointed a Committee of Safety to act as the executive of the province, and chose three general officers,—Preble,[331] Ward, and Pomeroy. The militia was organized, and minute-men were everywhere forming into companies. Gordon tells how the country was astir with preparations. Connecticut was not far behind in ordering her militia to be officered, and in directing her towns to double their stock of ammunition, while she voted to issue £15,000 in paper money,—the first of the war.