PETITION Br I’ROPRIETORS. 27

the considerations by which the government was influenced in its treatment of the action of the House of Assembly in regard to land. An application was made in behalf of officers abroad in the King’s service, who were proprietors of land, prayingr that the arr *ars of quitrent due on their lands should be remitted, and that no proceedings should be taken to dispose of those lands for future arrears until the conclusion of the war, When they might be enabled to settle and improve the same. Thomas Townshend, the colonial secretary, accordingly recommended that no action during the war should be taken against the property of absent officers. A petition was about the same time presented by other proprietors of land in the island, reciting the difficul- ties peeuliarly incident to the island, showing that their expectations, mainly in consequence of the American war, had proved abortive, and complaining that many of the allotments in the island had been sold under the assembly act of 1774, and of the treasury order of 1776,10 oflicers resident in the island, for little more than the arrears and charges of contis :ation. They further prayed for a remis- sion of the quitrents in arrear, and that in future they might have the option of paying the quitrents either in London or “the island. The council proceeded, on the first of l\Iay, to take these matters into consideration, when it was agreed "‘ that all such as, on or before the first of May, 1784, should have paid up all the arrears ot' quitrent due upon their respective lots to the first of May, 1783, should, from the said first of May, 1783, until the first, of lVIay, 1789, be exempted from the payment o['_ more than the quitrent now payable upon each of their lots, and that, for and during the further term of ten years,——to commence from the said first of May, 1780,—the same quitrent only as is now payable on each of their lots should continue to be paid in lieu of the