Soon after this affair, fifteen members of the Council, and among them several decided Loyalists, signed an address which was adopted at a meeting held without a summons from the Governor, and which was presented (October 27, 1768) directly to General Gage, as "from members of His Majesty's Council." This address is a candid, truthful, and strong exposition of the whole series of proceedings connected with the introduction of the troops. "Your own observation," it says, "will give you the fullest evidence that the town and the Province are in a peaceful state; your own inquiry will satisfy you, that, though there have been disorders in the town of Boston, some of them did not merit notice, and that such as did have been magnified beyond the truth." The events of the eighteenth of March and of the tenth of June were reviewed: the former were pronounced trivial, and such as could not have been noticed to the disadvantage of the town but by persons inimical to it; the latter were conceded to be criminal, and the actors in them guilty of a riot; but, in justice to the town, it was urged that this riot had its origin in the threats and the armed force used in the seizure of the sloop Liberty. The General was informed that the people thought themselves injured, and by men to whom they had done no injury, and thus was "most unjustly brought into question the loyalty of as loyal a people as any in His Majesty's dominions"; and he was assured that it would be a great ease and satisfaction to the inhabitants, if be would please to order the troops to Castle William.