The school-book story of the “Boston Tea Party” has been so deeply impressed upon our minds as one of the glorious deeds of patriotism that its true bearings are obscured. There were many patriots at the time who did not consider it a wise act. Besides Boston, the tea was sent by the East India Company to Charleston, Philadelphia, and New York, and in these cities the people prevented its being landed and sold; but they did not destroy it. They considered that they had a right to prevent its landing and sale; that in doing this they were acting in a legal and constitutional manner to protect their rights; but to destroy it would have been both a riotous act and an attack on private property. The Tory ministry, while having no serious objection to the method adopted in Charleston, Philadelphia, and New York, considered the Boston method decidedly riotous, and from its point of view such a conclusion was natural. It seemed to be of a piece with all the other occurrences which Hutchinson and Oliver had described in their letters, and it confirmed most strongly all the statements and recommendations in those letters. It was decided to punish Boston in a way that she would remember, and in the following March, after careful deliberation, Parliament passed the Boston Port Bill, which locked up the harbor of that town, destroyed for the time her commerce, and soon brought on the actual bloodshed of the Revolution. Meantime the ministry also attended to Franklin’s case. The Privy Council sent word to Franklin that it was ready to take up the petition of the Massachusetts Assembly asking for the removal of Governor Hutchinson, and required his presence as the colony’s agent. He found that Hutchinson and Oliver had secured as counsel Alexander Wedderburn, a Scotch barrister, afterwards most successful in securing political preferment, and ending his career as Lord Rosslyn. Franklin had no counsel, and asked for a postponement of three weeks to obtain legal aid and prepare his case, which was granted. The day fixed for the hearing aroused great expectations. An unprecedented number of the members of the Privy Council attended. The Archbishop of Canterbury, Burke, Dr. Priestley, Izard, Lee, and many other distinguished persons, friends or opponents of Franklin, crowded into the chamber. The members of the Privy Council sat at a long table, and every one else had to stand as a mark of respect. The room was one of those apartments which tourists are often shown in palaces in Europe, somewhat like a large drawing-room with an open fireplace at one end. The fireplace projected into the room, and in one of the recesses at the side of it Franklin stood, not far behind Lord Gower, president of the Council, who had his back to the fireplace.