After the middle of the eighteenth century there was much talk among the colonies of liberty. It is possible that not all the people were quite clear in their minds what that "liberty" might mean; but whatever it was, they wanted it. England required nothing more of her colonies than other nations required of theirs. The colonies asked nothing of England that would not be granted to-day as a matter of course. The difficulty was that the mother country was living in the eighteenth century, while the colonists were looking forward into the nineteenth. A demand for liberty was in the air. The pole on which a flag was hung was not called a flag pole, but a liberty pole. Most of the flags on these liberty poles bore mottoes, many of them decidedly bold and defiant. When the Stamp Act was passed, the wrath of the people rose, and now they knew exactly what they wanted--"No taxation without representation." The stamped paper brought to South Carolina was carefully stowed away in a fort. Thereupon three volunteer companies from Charleston took possession of the fort, ran up a blue flag marked with three white crescents, and destroyed the paper. New York's flag had one word only, but that one word was "Liberty." Portsmouth, New Hampshire, had a banner inscribed "Liberty, Property, and no Stamps." In Newburyport, Massachusetts, there was a regular patrol of men armed with stout sticks. "What do you say, stamps or no stamps?" they demanded of every stranger, and if he had a liking for a whole skin, he replied emphatically, "No stamps." One wary newcomer replied courteously, "I am what you are," and was uproariously cheered. In going from one colony to another, it was not uncommon for a man to get a passport from the sons of Liberty to attest to his standing as a "Liberty man." When the stamps made their first appearance, Boston tolled her church bells and put her flags at half-mast. Indeed, a new sort of flag appeared in the shape of an effigy of Oliver, the stamp distributor, swinging from the bough of a great elm which stood by the main entrance to town. The Chief Justice ordered this image to be removed. "Certainly," replied the people politely, "we will take it down ourselves this very evening." So they did, but they laid it upon a bier and marched in a long procession through the old State House. Here, in the Council Chamber, the Governor and his Council were deliberating. Shouts came up from below, "Liberty, Property, and no Stamps!" and "Death to the man who offers a piece of stamped paper to sell!" "Beat an alarm," the Chief Justice commanded the colonel of the militia. "But I cannot," replied the colonel, "my drummers are in the mob." The procession marched on, burned the effigy in front of the distributor's house, gave three rousing cheers, and went home. In New York, when the rumor spread that a ship laden with stamps was approaching, all the vessels in the harbor put their colors at half-mast.