as candidates for the places of Delegates to the proposed Provincial Convention -- the opportunity to obtain place and authority, no matter how ill-founded that opportunity might be, was an object so vastly more important to those aristocratic place-seekers, than all others, that, whether promising or unpromising of success, those who controlled that Committee could not possibly abandon it 3 -- and, consequently, on the fifteenth of March, a Poll was opened in each Ward, at the usual places of Election, under the inspection, in each instance, of the two Vestrymen of the Ward and two Members of the Committee, who had been appointed for that duty ; and the Freeholders and Freemen of the City then formally determined that Deputies should he appointed for the purpose named, and that the eleven nominees of the Committee should be such Deputies, to represent the City and County in the proposed Provincial Congress. 4 The result of the Poll was reported to the Committee on the evening of the same day, [March 15, 1775] when that body ordered "that Circular Letters be "written to all the Counties in. the Colony, informing " them of the appointment of Deputies for this City " and County, and requesting them, with all con- " venient speed, to elect Deputies to meet in Pro- " vincial Convention, at the City of New York, on "the 20th of next April, for the sole purpose of " appointing Delegates to represent this Colony at the '' next Congress to be held at Philadelphia the 10th " day of May next." 5