They taunted the soldiers, and
worried them every way they knew, and the soldiers were not slow
to reply. So at last after eighteen months of bickering one March
evening it came to blows. Two or three exasperated soldiers fired
upon the crowd of citizens, five of whom were killed and several
others wounded.
This was afterwards known as the Boston Massacre. It made the people
terribly angry, and next day a great meeting was held in Old South
Church. At this meeting the people demanded that the troops should
be at once removed from the town. And seeing the temper of the
people the Lieutenant Governor withdrew them that same day to a
little island in the harbour.
And now finding how useless it was to try to force taxes on unwilling
subjects, the Government removed all the taxes except one. King
George wanted to show his power. He wanted to prove to the Americans
that he had the right to tax them if he liked. So he insisted that
there should still be a tax on tea.
"The King will have it so, he means to try the question with
America," said Lord North, the easy-going, stupid minister who was
now in power.
But to prove that neither the King nor any one else had the right
to tax them, without their consent, was exactly for what the Americans
were fighting. To them, one tax was as bad as a dozen. It was not
a question of money, but a question of right or wrong, of freedom
or slavery.
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