Wherefore your Memorialists humbly pray your Honor to appoint special Justices in the Room of those taken off as aforesaid,2 in order for the Tryal of the said Prisoners, or otherwise that your Honor wd take such Steps to prevent the Delay of Justice at this important Crisis as in your Wisdom shall seem meet. And as in Duty bound your Memsts shall ever pray. Signd in Behalf of the Town at the Meeting aforesaid. 1Samuel Adams, John Hancock, and John Barret were on March 19, 1770, appointed by the Boston town-meeting "a Committee to draw up a Memorial to the Lieuvetenant Governor and Council praying that special Justices may be appointed for the Superior Court now sitting in the room of those who may be necessarily prevented by sickness from attending their duty; that so the Tryals of the many Criminals now committed may not be postponed. . . ." At the same session the committee reported a draft, which was accepted.--Boston Record Commissioners' Report, vol. xviii., p. 15. [back] 2At this point the words "whom the Town reverence & esteem" were stricken from the original draft. TO JOHN HANCOCK. [MS., Samuel Adams Papers, Lenox Library; a text with slight variations is in W. V. Wells Life of Samuel Adams, vol. i., p. 343.] BOSTON May 11 1770 DEAR SR Your Resolution yesterday to resign your seat gave me very great Uneasiness. I could not think you had sufficient Ground to deprive the Town of one whom I have a Right to say is a most valueable Member, since you had within three of the unanimous Suffrages of your Fellow Citizens, & one of the negative Votes was your own.1 You say you have been spoken ill of. What then? Can you think that while you are a good Man that all will speak well of you--If you knew the person who has defamd you nothing is more likely than that you would justly value your self upon that mans Censure as being the highest Applause. Those who were fond of continuing Mr Otis on the Seat, were I dare say to a Man among your warmest friends: Will you then add to their Disappointment by a Resignation, merely because one contemptible person, who perhaps was hired for the purpose, has blessd you with his reviling--Need I add more than to intreat it as a favor that you would alter your Design. I am with strict truth Your affectionate friend & Brother. 1At the Boston town-meeting on May 8, 1770, Hancock received, as a candidate for representative, 511 out of 513 votes. On June 13, 1770, William Palfrey, acting for Hancock, wrote to Haley and Hopkins: "The removal of the General Court to Cambridge obliges Mr Hancock to be often there." John Hancock. His Book, by A. E. Brown, p. 167. A COMMITTEE OF THE TOWN OF BOSTON TO BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. [MS., Collections of the Massachusetts Historical Society; an incomplete draft is in the Samuel Adams Papers, Lenox Library; the latter text only is in the handwriting of Adams.] BOSTON July 13th: 1770 SIR,