xii Letter of Transmitted.

The decreased amount of legislation and the reduction in the number of
addresses and messages between the two houses and the Governor, explain
why the record of the proceedings and acts of these six Assembly sessions is
so much less voluminous than that of the four immediately preceding sessions.
As measured by the number of printed pages required to record their activities,
these six sessions average only eighty-three printed pages for each session,
as contrasted with an average of one hundred and seventy-four pages required
to record the activities of each of the four preceding sessions as found in the
last volume of the Archives (LV). For a proper understanding of these
Assembly records they must be studied in connection with the Proceedings of
the Council of Maryland for this period and the Correspondence of Governor
Horatio Sharpe printed in earlier volumes of the Archives of Maryland,

The proceedings of the Upper House, as printed in this volume, are copied
verbatim from the official manuscript libers. The Clerk of the Upper House
who made these entries is guilty of many minor slips in spelling and the omission
of words. The proceedings of the Lower House and the acts of the Assembly,
as they are printed in this volume, exist in both contemporary official manuscript
libers and as contemporary printed pamphlets. The manuscript record and
printed pamphlets have been checked against each other for errors or variations
in their text. The marginal notes as reproduced in this volume of the Archives
are to be found, however, only in the contemporary printed pamphlets, not in
the official manuscript libers. As in preceding volumes, where messages and
addresses are recorded in the proceedings of both houses, if of any considerable
length, they are printed only in the proceedings of the house in which they
originated, if short they appear in the proceedings of both houses. Letters and
reports, if they appear on the records of both houses, are reproduced only in

the proceedings of the Upper House.

The Committee on Publications is indebted to Professor Jacob H. Hollander
of the Johns Hopkins University for the benefit of his advice on several mat-
ters relating to the history of early American taxation. Dr. Elizabeth Merritt
is responsible for the comprehensive index to this volume. Mrs. Vivian E.
Barnes of the Society's staff has rendered valuable assistance in selecting and
helping to prepare the copy for this volume for the press.

The next volume of the Archives will contain the Proceedings of the Pro-
vincial Court for the years 1666 to 1671.

Respectfully submitted,

J. HALL PLEASANTS (editor),
W. STULL HOLT,
RAPHAEL SEMMES,

Committee on Publications.