Having taken this precaution, Hutchinson was really anxious for a meeting of the General Court. He was in great uncertainty both as to public and private affairs. He knew now that Bernard was not to return, but he did not know who was to be the successor; he conjectured that it might be "that the government was to be put on a new establishment, and a person of rank appointed Governor"; and he confessed that he was "ignorant of the Ministerial plan" as to the Colonies. The Legislature was appointed to convene on the tenth of January. But the November packet from England, happening to make an uncommonly short passage, brought him a peremptory order, which he received on the evening of the third of January, to prorogue the time of the sitting of the General Court; and the journals of the next morning contain his Proclamation, setting forth that "by His Majesty's command" the Legislature was prorogued to the second Wednesday in March. "I guess," Hutchinson writes, "that the Court is prorogued to a particular day with an intention that something from the King or the Parliament shall be then laid before them." "Some of the distant members will be on their journey before the Proclamation reaches them; and if the packet had not had a better passage than common, my orders would have found the Court sitting." As a consequence of this unlooked-for prorogation, the main guard continued to be stationed near the Town-House, until a portion of it played its tragic part on the memorable fifth of March.