The preliminary government lasted but six months and altered the life of the people but little. For "Governor and Company" was substituted "President and Council," a more modish name, as some one said, but not necessarily one that savored of despotism. But however conciliatory Dudley might wish to be, his acceptance of a royal commission rankled in the minds of his countrymen; and his ability, his friendly policy, his desire to leave things pretty much as they had been, counted for nothing because of his compact with the enemy. In the opinion of the old guard, he had forsaken his birthright and had turned traitor to the land of his origin. Time has modified this judgment and has shown that, however unlovely Dudley was in personal character and however lacking he was at all times in self-control, he was an able administrator, of a type common enough in other colonies, particularly in the next century, serving both colony and mother country alike and linking the two in a common bond. Under him and his council Massachusetts suffered no hardships. He confirmed all existing arrangements regarding land, taxes, and town organization, and, knowing Massachusetts and the temper of her people as well as he did, he took pains to write to the King that it would be helpful to all concerned if the Government could have a representative assembly. To grant the people a share in government would, he believed, appease discontent on one side and help to fill an empty treasury on the other; but nothing came of his suggestion. Throughout New England as a whole, the daily routine of life was pursued without regard to the particular form of government established in Boston. In Massachusetts the election of deputies stopped, but in other respects the town meetings carried on their usual business. In other colonies no changes whatever took place. Men tilled the soil, went to church, gathered in town meetings, and ordered their ordinary affairs as they had done for half a century. The seaports felt the change more than did the inland towns, for the enforcement of the navigation acts interfered somewhat with the old channels of trade and led to the introduction of a court of vice-admiralty which Dudley held for the first time in July to try ships engaged in illicit trade. Over the forts and the royal offices fluttered a new flag, bearing a St. George's cross on a white field, with the initials J. R. and a crown embroidered in gold in the center of the cross, that same cross which Endecott had cut from the flag half a century before. To many the new flag was the symbol of anti-Christ, and Cotton Mather judged it a sin to have the cross restored; but others felt with Sewall, the diarist, who said of the fall of the old government: "The foundations being destroyed, what can the righteous do?"