r-MtW-aar.VJ-T'5 
 
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 CORNELL 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 GIFT OF 
 
 Jeffery R. D. Crockett 
 
CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY 
 
 924 092 886 732 
 
|| Cornell University 
 J Library 
 
 The original of tiiis book is in 
 tine Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924092886732 
 

 ^t.-^z^ 
 
 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 1763 TO 1783 
 
ENGLAND AND 
 AMERICA 
 
 1763 TO 1783 
 
 THE HISTORY OF A REACTION 
 
 MARY A. M. MARKS 
 
 AUTHOR OF "A GREAT TREASON" "MASTERS OF THE WORLD" 
 ETC. ETC. 
 
 ' ' The submission of a free people to the executive authority 
 of government is no more than a compliance with lavs'S which 
 they themselves have enacted." — Junius. 
 
 VOL. I 
 
 (1763 TO 1778) 
 
 LONDON 
 
 BROWN, LANGHAM, & CO. LTD. 
 
 78 NEW BOND STREET, W. 
 
 1907 
 
w 
 
INTRODUCTION 
 
 " We have suffered ourselves to be deceived by names and sounds, the balance 
 of power, the liberty of Europe, a common cause, and many other such expres- 
 sions, without any other meaning than to exhaust our wealth, consume the 
 profits of our trade, and load our posterity with intolerable burdens. None but 
 a nation that had lost all signs of virility would submit to be so treated." — 
 Speech of Mr. Pitt against the Treaties of Russia and Hesse Cassel, Dec. 10, 
 I7SS- 
 
 It is always interesting, and often instructive, to look back and see 
 how the great events of the past appeared while they were taking 
 place, and to compare contemporary views with the final verdict of 
 history. One of the greatest uses of such retrospects is to promote 
 a calmer and more tolerant judgment of the events of our own 
 time. We learn that it is possible for majorities to be in the wrong, 
 minorities in the right. And the character and political action 
 of such minorities, and the manner in which the majorities 
 treated their opposition, will be a pretty sure test of the character 
 and moral standard of the nation as a whole at that particular time. 
 
 Nobody now looks on the quarrel with our North American 
 Colonies as anything but a hideous blunder. Nobody now says 
 that the Ministers who brought it about deserved well of their 
 country. Nobody now thinks that the conscientious but narrow- 
 minded Sovereign, whose influence destroyed the last chances of 
 reconciliation, showed himself thereby to be an enlightened ruler. 
 It is surely worth our while to examine how the quarrel came about, 
 and see what our great-great-grandfathers thought and said of it. 
 Does anything in the story seem to furnish a parallel, or a contrast, 
 for the times in which we live ? History, they say, repeats itself. 
 
 The Seven Years' AVar doubled our National Debt, gave us 
 Canada and Bengal, and lost us America. The Hanoverian Settle- 
 ment, by bringing Hanover into union with Great Britain, involved 
 us in the whole scheme of European politics and European wars. 
 During almost the whole of the eighteenth century, as the keynote 
 
viii INTRODUCTION 
 
 of all our domestic policy was the keeping out of the Stuarts, so the 
 keynote of all our foreign policy was the maintenance of that safe 
 equilibrium which was called the "balance of power." It was 
 especially the ambition of Louis xiv which inspired Europe with 
 dread of any one Power making itself supreme. The very independ- 
 ence of the other States seemed to be threatened by such a pre- 
 dominance ; and many devastating wars were undertaken to prevent 
 it. Marlborough's victories were victories over the attempts of 
 Louis XIV to gain this predominance. The wars were terrible 
 evils, but the motives were not petty. In a very true sense it really 
 was to the interest of all that power should not be concentrated in 
 the hands of one. Upon the whole, it could not then be sjiid with 
 truth that any one class was making the people fight its battles. 
 Even dynastic disputes were closely bound up with the nation's fate 
 — for if their native sovereign were robbed of his dominions by a 
 foreign Power, the people would fall into the hands of foreign 
 conquerors, and be oppressed by strangers whose interests would be 
 opposed to their own. Thus, though the story of these interminable 
 wars is deplorable, it is not altogether degrading — at any rate, the 
 issues were very large, and leaders of men knew what they were 
 fighting for, and declared it openly. They did not profess to be 
 fighting for one thing when in reality they were fighting for another. 
 The fighting was often a mistake, but men were not persuaded to 
 fight for a certain thing, to find out, too late, that they had been 
 tricked into fighting for the precise contrary. 
 
 During these years the very largeness of the issue, and its end- 
 less complications, lessen the interest of the struggle by depriving it 
 of any fixed central figure. Then, too, the Combatants are always 
 changing sides. The moment the Sovereign we are supporting — lest 
 he should become too weak — seems about to become too strong, we 
 throw him over and take up with the other side. Thus, having 
 fought for the Empress Maria Theresa all through the War of the 
 Austrian Succession (i 740-1 748), in the Seven Years' War (1756- 
 1763) we were fighting for her enemy, the Great Frederick, because 
 by that time we were more afraid of France than of Prussia. The 
 war with our American Colonies was a very different affair, and 
 much more interesting. For however desirable we may think it 
 to maintain a sort of equality between the several Powers of a 
 continent, the ins and outs of policy, the ups and downs of war, in 
 such a quarrel, can never have the living, personal interest of a 
 struggle in which the prize is not security against a distant and 
 perhaps hypothetical danger, but actual, immediate independence 
 and unfettered national life. 
 
INTRODUCTION ix 
 
 It has been computed that the Seven Years' War cost a million 
 lives. It exhausted all the Powers concerned, but probably England 
 got the most out of it. She certainly suffered least. For though 
 she contributed her quota to the slain, a good many of the 
 troops she employed were either Hanoverians or Hessians ; and her 
 soil was not invaded, her towns were not sacked, nor her villages 
 burned. The roar of war was faintly heard across the sea, and the 
 most disagreeable thing England had to do was to pay the bill. 
 But she strained her resources to pay it. In 1756, at the very 
 beginning of the war, she was so dangerously drained of troops that 
 the King sent for 10,000 Hanoverians and 6400 Hessians, to 
 protect this country in the absence of our army. There was a fierce 
 debate over this bringing in of " foreign mercenaries,'' and Mr. Pitt 
 swore he would resign if the House moved a Vote of Thanks to 
 the King. But in spite of Pitt's invectives the vote was carried by 
 259 to 92. The Germans came, and encamped at Maidstone and 
 Canterbury — the Hessians, being refused winter quarters by the 
 innkeepers, were obliged to build huts, and sit round fires in the 
 open air. 
 
 George 11, stubborn, rough old fellow as he was, quailed before 
 Pitt, and had said that while Pitt was thrust upon his Councils he 
 did not feel himself a King. He punished him for his speeches on 
 the war by dismissing him from the lucrative office of Paymaster of 
 the Forces, and presently gave the post to Henry Fox, Pitt's great 
 rival, father of the greater rival of Pitt's son. 
 
 The Seven Years' War began. By the end of 1756 the Duke 
 of Newcastle's Government had become impossible. Newcastle, the 
 elder brother of Henry Pelham, had succeeded him as Minister. 
 The Pelhamites may be called the Moderate Whigs; but, as we 
 shall see, parties were by no means clearly defined, and mostly only 
 deserved to be called factions. The Duke of Devonshire was the 
 figurehead of the new Cabinet, of which Pitt, Secretary of State, 
 was the heart and soul. The war was now in full swing, and in 
 February, 1757, the Hanoverians were re-embarked in a hurry, to go 
 and protect Hanover. In the same month Admiral Byng was shot 
 to " encourage the others " ; but General Mordaunt did not take 
 Rochelle any the more for that, though he had the good luck not 
 to be shot. In April the King once more got rid of Mr. Pitt, but 
 was obliged to take him back in June, after the country had been 
 eleven weeks without a Government. ^ 
 
 And still the war went on. The fighting spread over both 
 hemispheres and three continents. In Europe, Frederick the Great 
 
 ^ These eleven weeks were called " the Interministerium." 
 
X INTRODUCTION 
 
 won Rosbach and Leuthen, and lost Hochkirchen. The Duke of 
 Cumberland — "the Butcher" of Culloden, and Pitt's inveterate 
 enemy — made the shameful Capitulation of Klosterseven. Minden 
 was fought, and Lord George Sackville struck off the Privy Council 
 for disobeying Prince Ferdinand's order to bring up the cavalry. 
 In Asia, Surajah Dowla, the ally of the French, took Calcutta, and 
 threw the English garrison into the Black Hole ; and next year 
 Colonel Clive retook the city, and by the great victory of Plassey 
 won Bengal for the East India Company. In America, pig-headed 
 old Braddock, marching against Fort du Quesne ^ (where Pittsburg 
 now is), fell into an ambush of French and Indians. Five horses 
 were killed under Braddock before he fell, mortally wounded, and 
 the only officer who escaped unhurt was Colonel Washington, a 
 young gentleman of Virginia, then aged only twenty-three, but already 
 known as a good officer. He saved the remnant of poor Braddock's 
 army, and prevented the dying General from falling into the hands 
 of the savages. To make up for this disaster General Wolfe took 
 Quebec, and won himself an immortal name. And on the morn- 
 ing of the 25th October, 1760, old George 11 was suddenly called 
 away from his battles and his sieges, and his squabbles with 
 Mr. Pitt; young George in came to the throne, and the longest 
 reign but one in English History began. 
 
 ' Fort du Quesne was one of a line of forts erected by the French from 
 Canada to Florida. 
 
PRINCIPAL EVENTS 
 
 1746, April 16. Battle of Culloden. 
 
 1754, June 14. Conference of Governor Shirley of Massachusetts with the Indians 
 
 at Albany. 
 175s, Ju'y 9- Defeat of Braddock. 
 1756, May 17. The Seven Years' War begins. 
 I757> June 28. Pitt Secretary of State, vfith real power. 
 l7S7i July 3- Battle of Plassey. 
 
 1760, Oct. 25. Death of George II. Accession of George in. 
 
 1 76 1. Agitation in America about Writs of Assistance. 
 
 1763, Feb. 10, The Seven Years' War ends by the Peace of Paris. 
 „ April 1 6. George Grenville Minister. 
 
 1764, Jan. 19. Wilkes expelled the House of Commons. 
 „ Feb. 14. Great Debate on General Warrants. 
 
 1765, March 6. Stamp Act passed. 
 
 ,, July 12 The Marquis of Rockingham First Lord of the Treasury. 
 
 1766, Mar. l8. Repeal of the Stamp Act. 
 
 i> July 30. Fall of the Rockingham Ministry. The Patchwork Cabinet. 
 
 1767, Embarrassments of the East India Company. 
 „ June 15. New York Suspension Bill. 
 
 1768, March. General Election. Enormous Bribery by the East India Company. 
 „ Wilkes returned for Middlesex. 
 
 1769, Jan. 21. Junius writes his first Letter. 
 
 „ June. The Assembly of Massachusetts banished to Cambridge. 
 
 1 770, Jan. 28. Lord North First Lord of the Treasury. 
 ,, March 5. The Boston "Massacre."' 
 
 1771, The Printers before the House of Commons. 
 '773; April 27. The Tea- Bill passed. 
 
 „ Dec. 16. "The Boston Tea- Party." 
 1774, May 10. Accession of Louis XVI. 
 
 ,, June 1. The Boston Port Bill comes into force. 
 
 ,, Sept. 5- The First Continental Congress meets at Philadelphia. 
 '77S> April 19. The Battles of Lexington and Concord. 
 
 „ May 5. The Second Continental Congress meets. 
 
xii PRINCIPAL EVENTS 
 
 I77S> June 12. Washington appointed Generalissimo of llie Continental Armies. 
 ,, June 17. Battle of Bunker's Hill. 
 
 1776, July 4. Declaration of Independence. 
 „ Aug. 27. Battle of Long Island. 
 
 , , Dec. 26. Surprise of the Hessians at Trenton. 
 
 1777, Sept. II. Washington defeated at the Brandywine. 
 ,, „ 26. Cornwallis enters Philadelphia. 
 
 ,, Oct. 17. Surrender of General Burgoyne. 
 
 1778, Mar. 13. France acknowledges the United States. 
 
 „ The French Treaty. War with France. Attempts at a Coalition. 
 
 ,, May II. Death of Chatham. 
 
 ,, June 18. Evacuation of Philadelphia. 
 
 „ ,, Arrival of the French Fleet. 
 
 , , Dec. Conquest of Georgia. 
 I779>june 17. The Spanish Rescript. War with Spain. Attempts at a Coalition. 
 
 ,, „ 21. The Siege of Gibraltar begins. 
 
 „ Aug. 14. The Combined French and Spanish Fleets off Plymouth. 
 
 ,, Oct. 9. Repulse of the Assault on Savannah. 
 
 ,, „ 12. Ireland demands Free Trade with England. 
 17S0, Feb, 8. The Associated Counties. The Yorkshire Petition. The Armed 
 Neutrality. 
 
 „ April 6. Dunning's Resolution on the Power of the Crown. 
 
 „ May 12. Surrender of Charlestown. 
 
 ,, June2-8. The Gordon Riots. Attempts at a Coalition. 
 
 „ Aug. Battle of Camden. Reduction of the Carolinas. 
 
 ,, Sept. 12. Mr. Laurens, with the draft of the Dutch Treaty, captured 
 at sea. 
 
 ,, ,, 23. Major Andre captured near Tarrytown. Flight of Arnold. 
 
 ,, Oct. Great Hurricanes in the West Indies. 
 
 ,, ,, 7. JIajor Ferguson defeated and slain at King's Mountain. 
 
 ,, Dec. 20. War with Holland. 
 1781, Jan. I. Attempt of the French on the Island of Jersey. 
 
 ,, „ 17. Tarleton defeated at the Cowpens. 
 
 ,, Mar. 15. Battle of Guildford. Defeat of Greene. 
 
 ,, ,, The War in the Carnatic. 
 
 ,, April 19. Battle of Hobkirk's Hill. Defeat of Greene. 
 
 ,, May 9. West Florida surrendered to Spain. 
 
 ,, ,, 10. All South Carolina in Rebellion. 
 
 ,, ,, 20. Cornwallis enters Virginia. 
 
 , , Aug. 1 . Cornwallis at Yorktown. 
 
 ,, ,, 20. Washington crosses the Hudson. 
 
 ,, ,, 30. Admiral Parker defeats the Dutch at the Doggerbank. 
 
 „ Sept. 5. Action between Graves and de Grasse in the Chesapeak. 
 
 ,, ,, 28. The French and American Armies arrive before Yorktown. 
 
PRINCIPAL EVENTS xiii 
 
 1781, Oct, 19. Capitulation of Yorktown. 
 
 ,, Nov. 26. Sortie of the Garrison from Gibraltar. 
 
 1782, Feb. II. Lord George Germaine resigns. Attempts at a Coalition. 
 
 ,, „ 22. General Conway's Motion to end the War. (Majority for 
 Ministers, I.) 
 
 ,, „ 27. General Conway's Motion to end Offensive War in America. 
 (Majority against Ministers, 19.) 
 
 ,, Mar. 8. Lord John Cavendish's Resolutions of Censure. (Majority for 
 Ministers, 10.) 
 
 11 i> IS- £ir John Rous' Motion for Withdrawing Confidence. (Majority 
 for Ministers, 9. ) 
 
 ,, ,, 20. Lord North Resigns. 
 
 ,, ,, 27. Lord Rockingham forms a Cabinet. 
 
 ,, ,, 29. Negotiations for Peace with Holland begun by Fox. 
 
 ,, April 10. Richard Oswald sent to Paris. Quarrels of Fox and Shelburne. 
 
 ,, May 23. The Cabinet agrees to recognise Independence. 
 
 ,, June. The Enabling Bill passes. 
 
 , , July I . Death of Lord Rockingham. Shelburne Minister. 
 ,, S- Fox resigns. 
 
 , , , , 9. Negotiations for Peace resumed. 
 
 ,, Sept. 8. The great Assault on Gibraltar repulsed. 
 
 ,, Nov. 30. The American Preliminaries signed in Paris by the United States 
 Commissioners. 
 
 ,, Dec. 5. The King's Speech declares the United States Free and Inde- 
 pendent. 
 
 1783, Jan. 20. Preliminaries of a General Peace signed at Paris, by Great 
 
 Britain, France, Spain, Holland, and the United States. 
 ,, Feb. 14. Fox joins North. 
 ,, ,, 21. Lord John Cavendish moves a Censure on the Peace, carried by 
 
 a majority of 19. 
 ,, ,, 24. Lord Shelburne resigns. The Treasury offered to William Pitt. 
 ,, Mar. 22. The Treasury offered to Pitt a second time. 
 ,, ,, 24. In the Debate on a Motion for an Address, Fox and North 
 
 formally offer to unite with Pitt, who declines. 
 ,, April 2. The Coalition Ministry. 
 ,, Sept. 3. The Definitive Treaty of Peace signed at Paris. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 VOL. I 
 
 CKAP. 
 
 Introduction .... 
 
 Principal Events 
 
 Bibliography .... 
 
 I. State of Parties at the Beginning of the Reign of 
 
 George hi . 
 II. "Gentle Shepherd, tell me where ..." 
 
 III. An Eighteenth-Century View of Colonial Policy 
 
 IV. The Stamp Act ..... 
 V. The Occurrences in North America 
 
 VI. The Fall of the Grenville Cabinet 
 VII. The Great Debate . . . . 
 
 VIII. Franklin 
 IX. The Repeal of the Stamp Act 
 X. The Mutiny Act 
 XI. The Patchwork Cabinet 
 XII. The East India Company 
 
 XIII. Charles Townshend . 
 
 XIV. The Suspension Bill . 
 XV. Lord North . 
 
 XVI. The Last Days of a Parliament 
 XVII. Boston .... 
 XVIII. "The Circulatory Letter" 
 XIX. The Soldiers come to Boston 
 XX. The Commons Concur 
 XXI. The Farmer's Grievances . 
 XXII. Governor Bernard's Departure 
 XXIII. The Occurrences in London 
 
 PAGE 
 
 vii 
 
 I 
 II 
 i8 
 26 
 
 32 
 
 42 
 
 45 
 
 S3 
 
 57 
 
 61 
 
 68 
 
 79 
 
 85 
 
 91 
 
 103 
 
 108 
 
 114 
 
 118 
 
 122 
 
 133 
 142 
 148 
 '59 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 CHAP. 
 
 XXIV. The Horned Cattle Session 
 XXV. The Repeal of the Revenue Act 
 XXVI. Thomas Hutchinson 
 XXVII. The 5th of March, 1770 . 
 XXVIII. The Publicity of Debate . 
 XXIX. Steps towards Religious Liberty 
 XXX. The Company again 
 XXXI. Clive's Defence 
 XXXII. The Select Committee 
 
 XXXIII. The Double Verdict 
 
 XXXIV. A Lull in the Storm 
 XXXV. The Letters. 
 
 XXXVI. "The Boston Tea-Party" 
 XXX\'II. The Dismissal of Fox 
 XXXVIII. The Punitive Bills . 
 XXXIX. The Boston Port Bill 
 
 XL. The First Continental Congress 
 XLI. The Bill of Famine and War 
 XLII. Lexington and Concord 
 XLIII. After Lexington 
 XLIV. Bunker's Hill 
 XLV. The Blockade of Boston 
 XLVI. Canada 
 XLVII. In England . 
 XLVIII. Independence 
 XLIX. The Battle of Long Island 
 
 L. The Fall of Fort Washington and the Retreat 
 
 through the Jerseys 
 LI. The House of Rodrique Hortalez 
 LII. General Lee . 
 LIII. Trenton 
 
 LTV. The King's Debts : the Expenses of the War 
 LV. John the Painter: our Criminal Code in the Eight 
 
 eenth Century . 
 LVI. In New York 
 LVII. "Mr. Lee's Plan" . 
 LVIII. General Burgoyxe . 
 LIX. The Evacuation of the Jerseys 
 
 PACE 
 
 170 
 186 
 200 
 206 
 219 
 231 
 
 243 
 250 
 262 
 271 
 278 
 286 
 294 
 299 
 305 
 319 
 329 
 333 
 352 
 362 
 372 
 378 
 387 
 396 
 412 
 
 417 
 
 429 
 436 
 442 
 
 445 
 453 
 
 466 
 472 
 485 
 489 
 494 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 xvu 
 
 CHAP. 
 
 LX. The Battle of the Brandywine. 
 LXI. Germantown . 
 LXII. The Retaking of Ticondhroga 
 LXIII. The Indians . 
 LXIV. The Turn of the Tide 
 LXV. Freeman's Farm 
 LXVI. The Night after a Defeat 
 LXVII. Sir Henry Clinton's Diversion 
 LXVm. How the News came to London and Paris 
 LXIX. The French Treaty 
 LXX. Chatham's Last Speech 
 LXXL The Army of the Convention 
 LXXn. The Conway Cabal . 
 LXXHL The Evacuation of Philadelphia 
 LXXIV. The Commissioners : the French Fleet 
 
 PAGa 
 504 
 512 
 S18 
 527 
 
 534 
 543 
 553 
 564 
 570 
 
 579 
 598 
 617 
 623 
 632 
 647 
 
 VOL. I. — b 
 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 
 
 OF THE MORE IMPORTANT WORKS CONSULTED 
 
 Adams, John, President of the United States. Works and Life, with notes by 
 C. F. Adams. 1850-6. 
 Familiar Letters of Adams and his Wife during the Revolution. Ed. 
 C. F. Adams. 1876. 
 Albemarle, George Thomas Keppel, 6th Earl. Memoirs of the 2nd Mar- 
 quis of Rockingham and his Contemporaries, with Original Letters and 
 Documents. 1852. 
 Almon, John. Collection of interesting and authentic papers relating to the 
 dispute between Great Britain and America, 1764-75. 1777- 
 The Remembrancer, or Impartial repository, etc. 1775-84. 
 Anecdotes of the life of Chatham, with his Speeches, etc. 1797. 
 History of the Late Minority, 1762-5. 1766. 
 American Loyalists. Case and Claim of the A. L. stated. 1783. 
 
 The Claim of the American Loyalists reviewed and maintained upon prin- 
 ciples of law and justice. 1788. 
 American War. Conduct of Sir William Howe. No. 58 of Almon's 
 "Collection." 1779. 
 Detail of, under Gage, lb.. No. 61. 1780. 
 Anburey, Lieutenant T. Travels through the Interior of America. 1791. 
 (The " Travels " are letters written by Anburey during the American War. ) 
 Annual Register, The. 
 
 Arnold, I. N. Life of Benedict Arnold. 1880. 
 Bancroft, George. History of the United States. 1885-6. 
 
 Joseph Reed. A Historical Essay. 1867. 
 Boston, Massachusetts. Memorial History. Ed. J. Winsor. 1880-6. 
 Buckingham and Chandos, Richard Plantagenet Temple-Nugent Brydges 
 Chandos Grenville, 2nd Duke. Courts and Cabinets of George in. 
 
 1853-5- 
 Burke, Edmund. Works. 1894. 
 
 History of a Short Administration. 1766. 
 Answer to the Electors of Bristol. 1777. 
 Campbell, William W. Annals of Tryon County. 1849. 
 Caraccioli, Charles. Life of Lord Clive. Also, the last Transactions in 
 
 India. 1775-7. 
 Cartwright, Major J. American Independence the Interest and Glory of 
 Great Britain, 1776. 
 
XX BIBLIOGRAPHY 
 
 Chatham, William Pitt, istEarl. Correspondence. Ed. W. S.Taylor and 
 J. H. Pringle. 1838-40. 
 History of, containing his Speeches in Parliament. By Francis Thackeray, 
 
 1827. 
 Enquiry into the Conduct of a late Right Hon. Commoner. (Perhaps Ijy 
 
 H. Cotes.) 1766. 
 Clinton-Cornwallis Correspondence. (The Campaign in Virginia. Re- 
 prints of six rare pamphlets, etc., with unpublished notes and omitted 
 portions.) Ed. Benjamin Franklin Stevens. 1S88. 
 CODMAN, John. Arnold's Expedition to Quebec. 1901. 
 Conway, Monchre Daniel. Life of Thomas Paine. 1892. 
 
 Omitted Chapters of History, disclosed in the Life and Papers of Edmund 
 Randolph, Governor of Virginia. 1888. 
 Cornwallis, Charles, 2nd Earl and ist Marquis. Correspondence. Ed. 
 
 C. Ross. 1859. 
 CoxE, Archdeacon. Memoirs of the Spanish House of Bourbon, 1700-1788. 
 
 1815. 
 DODINGTON, BuBB, Baron Melcombe. Autobiography. (Vol. xxii. of "A Col- 
 lection of the most instructive and amusing lives." 1826-1833.) 
 Drinkwater, Col. John. History of the Siege of Gibraltar. 1840. 
 East India Company — 
 
 Letter of Lord Clive to the Proprietors of East India Stocks. 1764. (No. 
 
 221 of Almon's Collection.) 
 Address to the Public concerning the business between the Government and 
 
 the East India Company. 1767. 8vo. 
 An Attempt to pay off the National Debt by abolishing the East India 
 
 Company and Other Monopolies. 1767. 8vo. 
 Letter to the Proprietors of India Stock. 1767. Svo. 
 Letter to a Minister on the Subject of the East India Dividend. 1767. 
 
 fol. 
 Letter to the Proprietors upon the Question to be balloted for on 23rd 
 
 March, for granting Lord Clive ;^30,ooo. 1767. 8vo. 
 Letter to the Proprietors of India Stock relative to the Critical Situation of 
 their affairs. ("By Earl Poulett" is written on the title-page of a copy 
 in the London Library.) 1767. Svo. 
 State of the East India Company's Affairs, etc., Dec. 1768. 8vo. 
 Letter to a late popular Director, relative to India affairs. 1769. 8vo. 
 Letter from a Proprietor of India Stock in Town to a Proprietor in the 
 
 Country. 1769. Svo. 
 Letter to the Proprietors of India Stock. ("Gvnr Jhnstn" is written on 
 
 the title-page of a copy in the London Library. ) 1769. Svo. 
 Letter of an Old Proprietor. 1769. Svo. 
 Letter to the Proprietors containing a reply to An Old Proprietor's Letter. 
 
 By a Steady Proprietor. 1769. Svo. 
 Observations on the Present State of the East India Company. 1777. Svo. 
 etc., etc., etc. 
 Fitzgerald, Percy. Charles Townshend, Wit and Statesman. 1866. 
 
 Life and Times of John Wilkes. 1S8S. 
 Fitzmaurice, Lord Edmund G. Petty, Baron Fitzmaurice. Life of William 
 Petty, 2nd Earl of Shelburne and 1st Marquis of Lansdowne. 1875-6. 
 Fonblanque, E. B. de. Political and Military Episodes from the Life and 
 Correspondence of the Rt. Hon. John Burgoyne. 1876. 
 
BIBLIOGRAPHY xxi 
 
 Force, Peter. Tracts and other papers, relating ... to the Colonies in 
 North America from the discovery of the Country to the year 1776. 
 Vols, i.-iv. Washington, 1836-46. 
 American Archives : — 
 
 Consisting of a collection of authentic records etc. Fourth Series . . . 
 From the King's Message to Parliament of March 7, 1774, to the 
 Declaration of Independence by the United States. Published by 
 M. PI. C. Clarke and P. Force under authority from Act of Congress. 
 6 vols. Washington, 1837-46. Folio. 
 Fifth Series . . . from the Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776, to the 
 definitive Treaty of Peace with Great Britain, Sept. 3, 1783. By 
 Peter Force, vols, i.-iii. Washington, 1848-53. Folio. 
 Fox, Charles James. Memoir of his Life, etc. With his character by R. B. 
 
 Sheridan. 1806. 8vo. 
 Franklin, Dr. Benjamin. Complete Works, including Correspondence and 
 
 Autobiography. Ed. J. B. Bigelow. 1887-8. 
 Franklin in France. E. E, Hale and E. E. Hale, Junior. 1887. 
 Gentleman's Magazine, The. 
 Gleig, G. R. Life of Clive. 1848. 
 Grafton, Augustus Henry Fitzroy, 3rd Duke. Autobiography and 
 
 Political Correspondence. Ed. Sir W. R. Anson. 1898. 
 Hadden, Lieut. J AMES, Roy. Art., Journal and OrderBooks of Burgoyne'sCampaign. 
 Hanger, G., Baron Coleraine. An Address to the Army in reply to Strictures 
 
 by R. MacKenzie, etc. 1789. 8vo. 
 Historical Manuscripts Commission : — 
 Abergavenny Papers. 
 Carlisle Papers. 
 Dartmouth Papers. 
 
 Royal Institution Papers (known as Carleton Papers). 
 Rutland Papers. 
 
 Stopford-Sackville Papers, etc., etc. 
 Holland, H. R. Vassal-Fox, 3rd Baron. Memoirs of the Whig Party during 
 
 my time. Ed. by his Son. 1854. 
 Hutchinson, Thomas, Governor of Massachusetts. History of the Province 
 of Massachusetts Bay, 1691-1774. Ed. J. Hutchinson. 1828. 
 Copy of Letters sent to Great Britain. 1773. 
 
 Diary and Letters, from the original documents. Ed. by Peter Orlando 
 Hutchinson, 1883-6. 
 Ingersoll, Charles J. Historical Sketch of the Second War between Great 
 Britain and the United States, 1812-15. 1845. (Contains many 
 particulars about the employment of Indians in the Revolutionary 
 War, and a List of the Indians so employed. See also a paper 
 read by Mr. Campbell before the Historical Society of New York, 
 Oct. 7, 1845.) 
 Irving, Washington. Life of George Washington, 1855-7. 8vo. (A large 
 
 octavo edition has Portraits. ) 
 Jay, John, Governor of the State of New York. Correspondence and Public 
 
 Papers, 1763-1826. Ed. H. P. Johnston. 1890-3. 
 Johnson, Dr. Samuel. Taxation no Tyranny. 1775. 
 
 Jones, Thomas, Justice of the Supreme Court of New York. History of New 
 York during the Revolutionary War, etc. Ed. E. F. De Lancey, 1879. 
 (A Publication of the New York Historical Society.) 
 
xxii BIBLIOGRAPHY 
 
 Journals of the House of Commons. 
 Journals of the House of Lords. 
 Junius. Letters. 
 
 Genuine Letters and anecdotes. (Almon.) 1771. 1806. 
 
 With his correspondence with Wilkes, and private letters to H. S. Woodfall. 
 
 Ed. J. M. Good. 1814. 
 Later Edition. Routledge, 1875. 
 Keppel, Hon. Thomas. Life of Admiral Viscount Keppel. 1842. 
 Lafayette, Marquis de. Memoires, etc. 1837-8. 
 
 Lamb, R., Sergeant. An original and authentic journal of occurrences during late 
 American War from its commencement to the year 1783. Dublin. 1809. 
 London Magazine. 1738-71. 
 Mackenzie, Roderick, Major. Strictures on Lieutenant-Colonel Tarleton's 
 
 History of the Campaigns, etc. 1787. 
 Macknight, T. Life of Edmund Burke. 1858-60. 
 Malcolm, Sir John. LifeofClive. 1836. 
 Massachusetts Historical Society's Collections. 
 
 Records of the Governors and Company of Massachusetts Bay. Ed. N. B. 
 ShurtlefiT. 1853-4. 
 Mill, James. History of British India. With notes and continuation by 
 
 H. H. Wilson. 1840-8. 
 Moore, Geo. Henry. Librarian to the Historical Society of New York. 
 " Mr. Lee's Plan. March 29, 1777." The Treason of Charles Lee, 
 Major-General, etc. i860. New York. (Scribner. ) 
 Morris, Gouvemeur. Diary and Letters. Ed. A. C. Morris. 1889. 
 MUNDY, G. B. Life and Correspondence of Admiral Rodney. 1848. 
 Newspapers, Magazines, etc., of the Period. 
 New York Historical Society's Collections. 
 Nicholls, John, M.P. Recollections and Reflections, personal, political, etc. 
 
 1820-2. 
 Paine, Thomas. Works. 1792. 
 Common Sense. 1776. 
 The American Crisis. 1777. 
 Parliamentary History. (Cobbett, afterwards Hansard.) 
 Political Register. 1767-9. 
 
 RiEDESEL. Briefe und Berichte des Generals und der Generalin von Riedesel, 
 
 wahrend des nordamerikanischen Kriegs. 1776-83. Freiburgi. B. 1881. 
 
 Rockingham Party. A Defence of the Rockingham Party in their late Coalition 
 
 with Lord North. 1783. 
 Russell, Lord John, 1st Earl Russell. Life and Times of Charles James Fox. 
 
 1859-66. 
 Sabine, Lorenzo. The American Loyalists. 1847. 
 Selwyn, George. His Letters and his Life. 1899. 
 Sessions Papers. Trials of the Gordon Rioters. 1780. 
 Shebbeare, Dr. John. Answer to Queries ... in a Letter to Dr. Shebbeare 
 
 printed in the Public Ledger, Aug. 10, 1775. 1775. 
 Sparks, Jared. Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, 
 with letters of Benjamin Franklin, Silas Deane, John Adams, and 
 Others. 1829-30. 
 Life of Gouvemeur Morris, with Selections from his Correspondence, and 
 
 miscellaneous papers. 1832. 
 Life of Washington. 1839. 
 
BIBLIOGRAPHY xxiii 
 
 Stanhope, Philip Henry, 5th Earl (Lord Mahon). History of England 
 
 from the Peace of Utrecht. Ed. of 1858. 
 Stedman, C. History of the American War. 1794. 
 Tarleton, Banastre, Lieut-Col. A History of the Campaigns of 1780 and 
 
 1781, in the Southern Provinces of North America. 1787. 4to. 
 ToWNSHBND, Rt. Hon. Charles. National Thoughts, etc. , by a Landowner. 
 
 1767. 
 Walpole, Horace, 4th Earl of Orford. Memoirs of the Reign of George 11. 
 Notes by Lord Holland. 1846. 
 Journals of the Last Ten Years of the Reign of George n. 1822. 
 Journals of the Reign of George iii, 1771-84. (Referred to as "Last 
 
 Journals.") 1859. 
 Reminiscences, written in 1788. i8i8. 
 Letters to the Countess of Ossory, 1769-97. Notes by the Rt. Hon. R. V. 
 
 Smith. 1848. 
 Letters to Sir Horace Mann, Envoy at the Court of Tuscany. Ed. Lord 
 Dover. 1834-44. 
 Wilkes, John. Correspondence with his friends, and memorials of his Life. 
 By J. Almon. 1805. 
 The North Briton, with notes. 1763. Later Ed., 1772. 
 Wilkinson, James. General in the United States Army. Memoirs of my 
 
 own time. 1816. 
 Wraxall, Sir Nathaniel W. Historical Memoirs of his own Time. 1836. 
 Posthumous Memoirs of his own Time. 1836. 
 
 An answer to the calumnious misrepresentations of the Quarterly, British 
 Critic, and Edinburgh Reviews. 1815. 
 
ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 STATE OF PARTIES AT THE BEGINNING OF THE 
 REIGN OF GEORGE III 
 
 "Born and educated in this country, I glory in the name of Briton." — His 
 Majesty's Most Gracious Speech, to both Houses of Parliament, Nov. i8, 1760. 
 
 "We are penetrated with the condescending and endearing manner in which 
 your Majesty has expressed your satisfaction at having received your birth and 
 education among us. What a lustre does it cast on the name of Briton, that you. 
 Sire, are pleased to esteem it among your glories ! " — Address of the Lords on the 
 Accession of George III. 
 
 " Remember, my noble and generous friend, that to recover monarchy from 
 the inveterate usurpation of oligarchy is a point too arduous and important to be 
 achieved without much difficulty, and some degree of danger." — £u66 Dodington 
 to Lord Bute, Dec. 22, 1760. 
 
 The history of the loss of America is the history of a Tory 
 reaction. 
 
 For forty-five years the Whigs had had it all their own way. 
 From the moment that the Elector of Hanover became King of 
 England, the Tories were shut out from politics. Whatever factions 
 might divide the Whigs (and there were almost as many factions as 
 great Whig families), they always united to keep out the Tories — 
 and the Pretender. The Stuarts had shown themselves incapable 
 of becoming constitutional sovereigns, but the country had to pay 
 very dear for keeping them out. For forty-five years progress 
 ceased in England, because the party which naturally stood for 
 progress was solely occupied in maintaining the House of Brunswick 
 on the throne. To do this was the inspiring motive of Sir Robert 
 Walpole's long rule. It was in doing this that he discovered how 
 many men had their price. He had been obliged to buy them, 
 
 VOL. I. — I 
 
2 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 lest they should bring back the Stuarts. In those days, to be a 
 Tory meant, if not to be actually fetching and carrying for the 
 Pretender, to be in the confidence of those who were. The 
 enornaous development of smuggling, after the Treaty of Utrecht, 
 made this fetching and carrying considerably easier and safer than 
 it would otherwise have been. Half the nation — and that not the 
 least high-minded and pious half — had profound scruples as to the 
 right of the Elector of Hanover to the throne. One evening, at 
 family prayers, the Reverend Samuel Wesley, Rector of Epworth, 
 discovered, to his dismay, that his wife refrained from praying for 
 King George ! ^ This is but one instance of the profound cleavage 
 which divided English society on the greatest political question of 
 the time. The effect on politics was strange, and, at first sight, 
 perplexing. But the explanation was simple. The Tories of those 
 days were against strengthening the prerogative — of the wrong 
 king. The Whigs were willing to give the Crown some real 
 power — to defend itself against the machinations of the Pretender. 
 Chatham was the first great Minister who was not handicapped by 
 the necessity of keeping out the Stuarts. But after CuUoden all 
 was changed. For the first time the House of Brunswick felt 
 itself firm in the saddle ; and the Tories began to think that, since 
 the cause of the right King — the King de jure — was irretrievable, 
 they had better make the best they could of the King de facto — 
 admit that by this time he was a quasi-lawful sovereign, and revive 
 and transfer to him those royal prerogatives which it was now hope- 
 less to think of restoring to the Stuarts. It was this feeling which 
 prompted the famous expression in George iii's first Speech from 
 the Throne — "I glory in the name of Briton." The word was 
 " Englishman " at first, but Bute altered it to "Briton" — as was 
 said, that it might include John Stuart — and from this time 
 forward Bute's friends (who were " the King's friends ") all became 
 Britons.^ 
 
 Bute had none of the qualities of a leader, and if he had not 
 happened to take the fancy of a very proud and ambitious 
 princess, of a more courageous temperament than his own, he 
 would never have been heard of out of Scotland, and very little in 
 
 ^ Even the curious and never-explained persecution of Mr. Wesley's family 
 by " Old Jeffrey " is ascribed by one biographer to " a Jacobite goblin," as the 
 disturbances frequently occurred when Mr. Wesley was praying for the ICing or 
 the Prince of Wales. 
 
 2 " When you affectedly renounced the name of Englishman, believe me, Sir, 
 you were persuaded to pay a very ill-judged compliment to one part of your 
 subjects, at the expense of another."— Junius, Letter to the King Dec ig 
 1769. 
 
STATE OF PARTIES IN REIGN OF GEORGE III 3 
 
 it. As it was, he became a rallying-point for the Tory view of 
 sovereignty during the first ten or twelve years of George iii. 
 Those years were crowded with important events, which Tory 
 policy turned into great calamities. The very least reproach which 
 can be made to Bute is, that he took the first step backwards 
 towards absolutism, and that he, with the Princess Dowager, formed 
 the political opinions of George iii — grafting the fine antique 
 Stuart notions of kingcraft on the homely stock of Farmer George. 
 The result was a curious anomaly — a painstaking, plodding man of 
 business imbued with the ideas of an autocrat. " He toiled like a 
 warehouse-clerk"! to restore the royal authority to the place 
 ordained for it by God. He was solemnly and conscientiously 
 convinced that it was so ordained, and that the welfare and safety 
 of his people depended on his restoring it. We mistake when we 
 think of George iii as an idiot with flashes of madness. The 
 groundwork of his character was indeed extreme, almost childish 
 simplicity, but — despite the story of the apple-dumpling — it was 
 a very shrewd simplicity. His correspondence with Lord North 
 shows that he had a clear vision of every situation, — nor did he ever 
 shrink from calling that situation by its true name, — as when he 
 complains that the recruiting in Waldeck is making him "a kid- 
 napper." He had great common-sense. His mind was sane, 
 prosaic, and literal, until his authority was called in question. 
 Then his anger was so intense that the effort to control it made him 
 ill physically and mentally. He describes himself as " trembling " 
 with suppressed wrath. It is pretty certain that his first attacks 
 of mental disturbance were caused by Grenville's opposition, and 
 Wilkes' defiance. The little we know about the later and far more 
 serious attacks shows that his delusions were royal — he never forgot 
 that he was a king, and he neither forgot nor forgave those who 
 in the course of their medical attendance had presumed to use force 
 to restrain him. In his sanity, he is plain, clumsy Farmer George, 
 with little that is kingly about him — hurried and flurried in speech 
 and manner, undignified in appearance, his notions of prerogative 
 resembling rather the irritable, pig-headed obstinacy of the senior 
 partner in a mercantile firm than the imperiousness of a monarch. 
 In his madness he becomes a strangely tragic figure, as we obtain 
 glimpses of him — now tortured by the consciousness of his own 
 condition, now talking of high affairs of State with Ministers long 
 dead and gone. 
 
 The Revolution of 1688 was not the unmixed good it has been 
 represented to be by those whose privileges it assured. Even its 
 
 1 Donne, Correspondence of George in with Lord North. 
 
4 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 boasted "establishment of religious liberty" was little more than 
 a turning of the tables. Not only a free-lance like William Cobbett, 
 but a pre-eminently sober historian like Mr. Lecky, has expressed 
 the deliberate opinion that in the long-run it might have been 
 better for liberty to have kept the Stuarts and made the best of 
 them. It is a startling proposition to those who hear it for the first 
 time ; but a close study of English legislation during the eighteenth 
 century woefully disenchants us with the " Glorious Revolution " of 
 1688, and still more with the Hanoverian Succession. The Stuarts 
 are the most interesting of Royal Houses — the House of Brunswick is 
 perhaps the least so. The virtues and vices of the Stuarts were 
 kingly — those of the Hanoverians were essentially bourgeois. The 
 Stuarts' idea of government was the King and his echo, the Council 
 of State, and his more distant echo, a Parliament filled with royal 
 nominees. Yet the very delight of one half the English people at 
 being rid of the Kings by Right Divine, became a danger. It pro- 
 duced the singular paradox of a turbulent people submitting quietly, 
 sometimes eagerly, to measures passed by the new regime, against 
 which it would have risen in rebellion under the old. The Riot 
 Act is an instance. By that Act — almost the first of George i — any 
 twelve persons assembling together in public, and for the space 
 of one hour refusing to disperse, could be fired on. It may almost 
 be said that we resigned our liberties in our eagerness to preserve 
 them— as the crew of a storm-tossed vessel fiing overboard the cargo 
 which was the object of their voyage. Riot Acts, Test Acts, Penal 
 Laws, and a Criminal Code of ever-increasing severity disgraced the 
 final establishment of " constitutional " government, until the 
 student of history asks in despair whether human progress is any- 
 thing but movement in a circle. 
 
 The English people have done and suffered much to be free, 
 but they have not even yet built upon the only sure foundation — 
 the Rights of Man. They love little issues, and shrink from general 
 principles. They have been content to claim the rights of English- 
 men, and this is perhaps one reason why they have not felt their 
 consciences prick them for denying the rights of Irishmen. This 
 claim of the Englishman has allowed us throughout our history to 
 serve two masters — Liberty and Oppression — at the same time. 
 The open sore of Ireland was so far from being healed by the 
 success of our own struggles for freedom, that the triumph of the 
 rebellious Englishmen here was always the still more utter ruin of 
 rebellious Irishmen there. The wrongs of the English in 1641 
 were to the wrongs of the Irish at the same moment as whips to 
 scorpions. But the Englishmen who were most forward to adven- 
 
STATE OF PARTIES IN REIGN OF GEORGE III 5 
 
 ture life and fortune for their own political and religious rights were 
 the very men who could not be brought to admit that an Irishman 
 had any rights at all — scarcely even the right to exist, certainly not 
 the right to complain of being killed. It was a glaring inconsistency, 
 and it has brought its own Nemesis — a Nemesis not even yet fully 
 recognised by us as the inevitable consequence when a free people 
 plays the oppressor. In the very nature of things, such a people 
 slowly but surely undermines its own most cherished principles, slowly 
 but surely coarsens its conscience and confuses its judgment. And 
 this enfeebling of principle and confusion of judgment act as a 
 drag on progress, which becomes unaccountably slow, until nations 
 which started later on the road to political enfranchisement pass us 
 in the race. 
 
 In the first half of the eighteenth century the situation was 
 acute. The two parties stood each for a dynasty, — the most 
 immediate and appealing issue which can divide a State, because all 
 men can see it, and believe that they understand it, and because the 
 rewards or punishments of successful or unsuccessful action in the 
 matter are so swift and tangible. And these parties were so evenly 
 divided, — or appeared so, — and there was so much uncertainty as to 
 any man's real convictions, that every man distrusted his neigh- 
 bour; and leading politicians who in their hearts preferred the 
 House of Brunswick yet thought it prudent to provide for the other 
 event by keeping up a correspondence with the King over-the-water.^ 
 Such a correspondence could, if detected, be represented as a mere 
 ritse de guerre, and no one could be quite certain which was really 
 the betrayed party — the King or the Pretender. We have Septennial 
 Parliaments, because the risk of more frequent General Elections was 
 too great. Nor could Septennial Parliaments be trusted to stand 
 firm without bribes to stiffen their loyalty. Bribery, which till then 
 had been an occasional incident, became an organised system, the 
 regular payment of a salary. " Satis bibisti ac bribisfi," said someone 
 as he looked on a portrait of the great Sir Robert. But it was not 
 only Walpole, — poor old Newcastle, himself the most disinterested 
 of men, who was more than forty years in office, and left it poorer 
 than he went in, superintended one of the vastest systems of bribery 
 which ever turned representative government into a farce. Above 
 
 ' When the King's health was drunk, it was not always certain which King's 
 it was — 
 
 "Long live the King, and down with the Pretender! 
 God save the King, and bless the Faith's Defender ! 
 But who Pretender is, and who the King, 
 God bless us all ! is quite another thing ! " 
 
6 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 the monument of Abraham Cowley, in Poets' Corner, there is a 
 tablet to the memory of "John Roberts, Esq., the very faithful 
 Secretary of the Right Honourable Henry Pelham, Minister of 
 State to George ii." When Pelham was First Lord of the Treasury, 
 and his brother the Duke of Newcastle was Secretary of State, John 
 Roberts used to stand in the Court of Requests, on the day of 
 prorogation, with the " Minister's pocket-book " in his pocket, and 
 as the members whose names were written there passed through, 
 Roberts took each kindly by the hand, wished him good-bye, and 
 left him with a final squeeze which closed his not reluctant fingers 
 over bills representing a substantial income.^ 
 
 Nor did the falsity of the situation end with bribes. Many an 
 honest man, who would have scorned a bribe, desisted from 
 opposition, fearing to further the cause of the King at St. Germain ; 
 while the dishonest opposed just enough to make themselves worth 
 inscribing in the pocket-book. 
 
 Then came the Forty-Five. It very nearly succeeded. In all 
 probability, if the Duke of Cumberland had been as incompetent as 
 General Wade, and if Charles Edward had not turned back at 
 Manchester, James in would have been crowned in Westminster 
 Abbey. 
 
 The Stuart star set for ever at CuUoden ; but this, instead of 
 placing civil liberty on a firmer footing, only gave her enemies a 
 vantage-ground from which to attack her with more effect. The 
 great Tory families, out of office since the death of Queen Anne, now 
 returned to the arena, and in transferring their allegiance to. the 
 House of Hanover set themselves to make that House as absolute 
 as they formerly hoped to make the Stuarts. Their principles 
 were unchanged — the Fortune of War, the malice of Fate, had com- 
 pelled them to accept the King de facto ; they appeased their 
 consciences by demanding for him the prerogatives of the Kings 
 dejure. Nothing could be hoped from the old King, but there was 
 a young Prince, his grandson, with a mind like wax to receive an 
 impression, and marble to retain it. The accident of a wet day at 
 Egham Races introduced into the circle of Frederick, Prince of 
 Wales, a young, poor, and obscure Scottish nobleman, a scion of 
 the old Royal House.^ Never did the jade Fortune play a more 
 
 ^ It was often from five to eight hundred pounds. When Pelham died 
 George II sent for Roberts and his book, and burned the book then and there to 
 prevent accidents. 
 
 ^Bute formed the idea of the Double Cabinet about 1753. He got it from 
 Baty, who told him official men ought never to be trusted with information of 
 any measure until it was given them to execute. — Almon. 
 
STATE OF PARTIES IN REIGN OF GEORGE III 7 
 
 malicious trick than in that introduction. Never did a lost cause 
 so subtilely avenge itself. The principles which Bolingbroke had 
 tried in vain to plant in English politics, never struck root till 
 Charles Edward, demoralised by Culloden, and abandoned by 
 Louis XV, was drinking himself out of the semblance of a gentleman, 
 frequenting a common ale-house, beating his unfortunate mistress 
 after the manner of a costermonger, and when she fled from him to 
 a convent, asking Louis (who had ignominiously expelled him from 
 his dominions) to kidnap and send her back. The fatality which 
 ever attended the House of Stuart was manifested, even in this 
 short-lived post-mortem triumph of its principles, with the disastrous 
 catastrophe which followed. 
 
 The situation was further complicated by personal enmities and 
 personal friendships, — by the warm attachment between Pitt and the 
 Grenvilles, and by the hatred of Temple for the Bedfords. But the 
 Pelhamites and the Pittites, furiously as they opposed each other, 
 differed but little in principle. Pitt was once of Pelham's party. 
 George Grenville was Treasurer of the Navy in Newcastle's 
 Administration. So acute a politician as Edmund Burke, while 
 telling us that observers perceived that two of the three factions 
 would certainly be compelled to unite to overturn the third, says 
 that no one could foresee which two would coalesce, or which way 
 the balance of power would finally incline. 
 
 Pitt, recalled to office at the darkest moment of the Seven 
 Years' War, had retrieved the glory of England and turned defeat 
 into victory. Never had Minister been so popular, and his 
 popularity was heightened into adoration by his refusal of a title. 
 The name once given to William Pulteney was fondly revived for 
 William Pitt, and the people delighted to call him "the Great 
 Commoner." Amidst every temptation and every discouragement, 
 he held fast by the principles of representative government; and 
 when the leaders of the State were beginning to swerve from these 
 principles, even where Englishmen were concerned, Pitt dared to 
 maintain that we must extend them to Americans. 
 
 Edmund Burke has left us an account of English parties at the 
 beginning of the Seven Years' War. "The gross of the people,'' 
 he says, " seemed to have no further views than a redress of their 
 grievances, by whatever means that could be brought about." The 
 "ruling men of the nation" were divided into three factions. The 
 first comprised the men of the old Ministry — Pelham's and 
 Newcastle's Administrations. It had the greatest "Parliamentary 
 interest." (This means that it could spend most largely on elec- 
 tions, and control the greatest number of seats.) It had also the 
 
8 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 moneyed interest. But it was unpopular, and its abilities were 
 thought of but poorly. 
 
 The second, the party of Lord Bute, was still more unpopular, 
 and made no effort to become less so. It had much less Parlia- 
 mentary interest, but the Court influence of "a powerful 
 connection " enabled it to hold its own with the Pelham faction ; 
 and its abilities were not considered insufficient. The "generality" 
 suspected it of dangerous designs, but no one would say plainly 
 what the designs were. The youthful Heir to the Crown was 
 completely under the tutelage of this party, and was especially 
 influenced by the chief object of abhorrence, John Stuart, Earl of 
 Bute. 
 
 The third party — that of Pitt — had little Parliamentary and less 
 Court influence, but it had a great leader and "a prodigious 
 popularity." The nation believed implicitly in that leader's integrity 
 — which was confessed even by his enemies — and he and his 
 followers laid themselves out to influence public opinion. 
 
 The first two factions, while differing greatly as to what should 
 be the balance of power within the Constitution, differed very little 
 as to foreign policy. Both considered France as our most 
 dangerous enemy, and the efforts of both were directed towards 
 maintaining the balance of power in Europe, that the preponderance 
 of France might be restrained within due bounds. The pohcy of 
 Louis XIV and Louis xv had given much justification for such fears. 
 These factions were both for " seeking our particular safety and 
 liberty in the general safety and liberty of Europe." They were, 
 therefore, in favour of a " close connection " with the Continental 
 Powers, to be kept up by " continual negotiations and large sub- 
 sidies, and even by aiding them with our own troops if the occasion 
 should require such assistance." They agreed that our navy ought 
 not to be neglected, but were more disposed to rely on an army, 
 ready to be used in any European complication. Both parties were 
 "far from being friends to arbitrary power, or in any sort averse 
 to Parliaments." "They loved the Constitution," but were for 
 " preserving the authority of Government in its utmost lawful force." 
 To make government easy, both were for ruling men "by their 
 interests, if they could not by their virtues " ; and both always 
 sought to obtain a majority in Parliament by a judicious distribution 
 of places and employments. 
 
 The third party took a very different view. They also feared 
 the boundless ambition of France, but were for trusting rather to 
 our navy than our army. They said that our insular position 
 pointed out our true policy as one differing greatly from that of 
 
STATE OF PARTIES IN REIGN OF GEORGE III 9 
 
 other nations. "Our natural strength,'' said Pitt, "is a maritime 
 strength, as trade is our natural employment : these must always go 
 hand in hand, and they mutually support one another. By entering 
 that inextricable labyrinth of Continental politics, making ourselves 
 parties in every dispute, exhausting our wealth in buying the useless 
 and precarious friendship of every petty prince, we shall be so far 
 from reducing France, that we shall be attacking her on her strong 
 side, and shall be destroying ourselves by our ill-judged efforts to 
 destroy her. While we preserve our superiority at sea, we need not 
 fear what France can do. The fear of invasion from a Power weak 
 in its marine, is the idlest of all fears." A well-trained militia, 
 " supplying by their zeal the defects of their discipline^' will be a sufficient 
 protection; a standing army, "in whatever shape, is dangerous to 
 freedom.'' Nor need a good Government bribe its people. "A 
 Government pleasing to the people, as every good Government must 
 be, can never be generally opposed." 
 
 The first ten years of George in were one long struggle between 
 a king with high, narrow notions of prerogative, inherited from a 
 petty German Court, and one Minister after another with a more or 
 less clear notion of constitutional government. And the King won. 
 He won, not because he was the King, but because his purpose was 
 more single, his will more inflexible, and his courage more steadfast 
 than those of any Englishman of his time, except Chatham. Within 
 his narrow limits, George iii possessed strong sense. Unfortunately, 
 he started from the false premises of Divine Right and non-resist- 
 ance — but from these premises he drew perfectly logical conclusions. 
 And he never wavered. Once or twice the irresistible force of 
 circumstances broke him ; but he never bent. He never concealed 
 his abhorrence of the concessions he was compelled to make, and 
 he never forgave those who compelled him to make them. He 
 never changed his mind, even after the event. He might intrigue 
 against his Ministers, but that was only because the Constitution left 
 him no other means of circumventing them. When it came to a 
 duel of wills a outrance, Chatham himself could not shake him ; 
 and Chatham himself was out-manoeuvered by him.^ Few men in 
 
 ^ " George in was not a weak man. His objects were little, and injudici- 
 ously chosen ; but no Monarch ever displayed more dexterity in his choice of 
 the means to obtain those objects." — Nicholls, Recollections and Reflections 
 during the Reign of George III, i. 382. Nicholls observes that it was by no 
 means a reign of favouritism, as had been expected. He does not think the 
 ICing was attached to any of his Ministers, except as they furthered his wishes. 
 When he found that Bute " wanted the courage necessary for his purpose, he 
 seems to have withdrawn all his favour from him, and nevermore to have wished 
 to replace him in office." 
 
10 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 a position of authority have had so many virtues and so few faults ; 
 and yet few men have been more mischievous in their day and 
 generation. The second ten years of his reign are the years of his 
 triumph, when he had a Minister after his own heart. They are 
 the most disastrous years of our history. But for him, Chatham 
 would have composed the difference with America. But for him, 
 the Younger Pitt would have begun to heal the old sore of Ireland, 
 which festers to this day. 
 
 Ever since 1688 England had taken what we must call the 
 Liberal side in political issues — the side opposed to arbitrary power, 
 the side which rests the authority of Governments on the consent of 
 the governed, rather than on the divine right of kings. With the 
 accession of George iii the opposite set of principles began to 
 prevail, and the first serious consequence was the loss of America.^ 
 
 ^ "At your accession to the throne, the whole system of government was 
 altered, not from wisdom or deliberation, but because it had been adopted by 
 your predecessor." — ^Junius, Letter to the King, Dec. 19, 1769. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 "GENTLE SHEPHERD, TELL ME WHERE . . .' 
 
 "Why are these things to be palliated and plaistered and whitewashed? 
 For God's sake let us speak of things as they are. A debt is a debt, and if the 
 Minister would but look it in the face like a man, it would be the way to make 
 the lightest of the evil that can be. You cannot lessen, but may increase the 
 evil by delay ... but all the procrastination in the world won't make a debt 
 anything but a debt. . . . See what miserable shifts people are driven to when 
 they try to make less of a thing than it really is."—" The State of the Nation," 
 Gentleman s Magazine, March, 1765. 
 
 The British people liked the Seven Years' War well enough, till 
 they had to pay for it. It is unfair to lay wars to the exclusive 
 account of Kings and Governments — if a war were really unpopular, 
 the most despotic King, the strongest Government, could not carry 
 it on for long. Most wars quicken certain trades for the time ; and 
 as the trades which profit by war are usually tolerably rich to begin 
 with, there is always a somewhat influential commercial opinion 
 ready to support any war which seems to have a prospect of success. 
 It is only later that the wasteful and wasting nature of war-expendi- 
 ture comes home to the bulk of the people, and by that time there 
 is generally no turning back. 
 
 With the accession of George iii the Earl of Bute stepped into 
 power.i jjg -yyas perhaps the most unpopular Minister who ever 
 held seals of office in England. He was not a man of either great 
 parts or resolute will. Like all weak men, he was afraid of seeming 
 to be influenced ; it was said of him that he would spoil what good 
 there was in a measure, by way of making it his own. He had some 
 literary taste, which was no doubt one of the qualities which recom- 
 mended him to the Princess of Wales. His fine person and his 
 political views did the rest. His aim was to make the King 
 independent of Parliament, to be at peace with France, and to stand 
 aloof from Germany ; and on all these points Pitt furiously opposed 
 
 ' " The first wish of George III was to break the party of Pelham, and restore 
 
 peace — a good wish, but injudicious instruments chosen. Bute not qualified to 
 
 be a Minister. After his removal came the Double Cabinet." — NiCHOLLS. 
 
 11 
 
12 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 him. I£ow much of the people's hatred was for the Scotsman, how 
 much for the lover of the King's mother, how much for the author 
 of the Peace, is difficult to decide. As for the Peace, it was enough 
 that Bute made it, and Mr. Pitt was against it. Pitt thought we 
 were getting too little for our money and our blood. There was a 
 loud outcry that we had not our fair share of the spoils, that we were 
 not exhausted, and could go on for two years more. Bute said after- 
 wards that he knew peace was necessary to the country, and came 
 in determined to make it. Make it he did, in spite of Pitt's 
 opposition, and denunciations of the bribery and intimidation, and 
 dishonourable desertion of Frederick, by which it was obtained. 
 Ministers were accused of having given France a hint to lie low, 
 and they would raise a clamour for peace. Especially did the 
 restitution of the French West India Islands, and the concessions 
 in the Newfoundland fisheries, incense the party who were for 
 going on. 
 
 Peace was signed in Paris on the loth of February, 1 763, between 
 England, France, Spain and Portugal. Frederick was left to settle 
 matters for himself with Maria Theresa. The death of his enemy, 
 Elizabeth of Russia, saved him ; his ally left him in the lurch. 
 Those who had been shouting that we could go on for another 
 two years may have been secretly glad they were not taken at their 
 word when the bills came in, and they saw the shifts Ministers were 
 put to to find money.i In the seven years of the war the National 
 Debt had gone up from about ;^7 7,000,000 sterling to ^140,000,000. 
 How was the money to be raised ? The British people of that day 
 had a particular dislike to new taxes ; Ministers were at their wits' 
 end to find a popular object of taxation. ;/^2, 000,000 were to 
 come out of the Sinking Fund — luckless Sinking Fund, always the 
 first resort of a Minister in difificulties ! ;^i, 800,000 was to be 
 raised by striking Exchequer Bills, and ;^2, 800,000 to be borrowed 
 on annuities. The interest on all this was to come out of a duty 
 of ;^8 per tun on French wines, and ;^4 on other wines ; and there 
 was to be a tax of 4s. a hogshead on cider. 
 
 The Cider Bill called forth such a storm as had not been seen 
 even when the Hanoverians were sent for. The cider counties said 
 they would be ruined ; but the objection most loudly put forward 
 
 ^ " No nation ever terminated a war against a powerful antagonist with more 
 reputation than Great Britain terminated the last against the united Houses of 
 Bourbon ; but her expenses were beyond example. . . . We were obliged to 
 supply our armies by husbandmen and manufacturers, while the plough and the 
 loom stood still. France, indeed, was bankrupt, but . . . she mortgaged no 
 such taxes as Great Britain imposed in perpetuity for payment of interest." — 
 "The Present State of the Nation," Genilemaiis Magazine, 1769, p. 529. 
 
"GENTLE SHEPHERD, TELL ME WHERE..." 13 
 
 was that the new tax was an extension of that hated thing, Excise. 
 The tax means that the exciseman may enter the house and 
 pry into the cellar of any man who makes a gallon of cider — and 
 it is :£so fine for resisting him ! Mr. Pitt made one of his burning 
 speeches about an Englishman's house being his castle. " Where 
 are we to lay another tax?" said Mr. Secretary Grenville. "W^y 
 does he not tell us where we can lay another tax? Let him 
 tell me where — only tell me where ! " Mr. Pitt did not tell him 
 where — he only hummed "in a musical tone" a line from the 
 popular song — 
 
 " Gentle Shepherd, tell me where ..." 
 
 The House roared, and Mr. Grenville was the Gentle Shepherd 
 ever after. But in spite of petitions, protests, and riots, the Cider 
 Bill passed, and a very few days later Bute astonished everybody, 
 and disgusted his friends, by resigning. 
 
 There can be little doubt that his courage failed him. He had 
 had a bad fright on November 9, 1761; he was mobbed as he 
 attended the King to the Guildhall Banquet, while Pitt received a 
 great ovation. The Cider Bill Riots had been ugly ; Pitt's speeches 
 were not pleasant, though, as they were made in the Commons, Bute 
 was not obliged to listen to them. Then there was Wilkes, the member 
 for Aylesbury, a dreadful person who had been writing violent 
 articles in his scurrilous paper TAe North Briton. By the advice 
 of his mentor, Bubb Dodington, Bute had set up a paper of his 
 own, and called it The Briton, and Mr. Glover (of " Leonidas ") and 
 other writers wrote for it, supporting Ministers and vilifying Mr. 
 Pitt. So last June, Wilkes had started The North Briton, a paper 
 devoted to reviling Scotsmen in general and the Earl of Bute in 
 particular. Wilkes always called him " the Thane," when he did 
 not call him anything worse, and he had made Bute fifty times 
 more unpopular than he was already. Bute's friends said he was 
 weary of the cares of office, and wanted to retire to the country and 
 his books. Bute himself said that he resigned because he found 
 himself " single in his Cabinet," 1 with his colleagues speaking against 
 him in Parliament. " The ground I tread upon is so hollow," he 
 wrote to Dodington, " that I am afraid not only of falling myself, 
 but of involving my royal master in my ruin." It was a strange 
 expression, and proves that Bute was well aware he was engaging his 
 master in a dangerously unpopular policy.^ 
 
 ' He had turned out all the Whigs who were at first included in his Cabinet. 
 Hence his " singleness." 
 
 2 Bute was compared by Wilkes to Roger Mortimer, the lover of a queen, who, 
 
14 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Bute advised the King to send for Mr. Grenville. George 
 Grenville was a brother of Earl Temple, and a brother-in-law of 
 Pitt, whom George had forsaken to take office under Bute. Bute 
 reckoned that George would be his docile puppet, and continue his 
 policy. But Bute never made a greater mistake. Grenville was 
 not the man to be anybody's puppet — not even Pitt's. He was a 
 man of great ability, with a head for finance ; a staunch constitution- 
 alist, an even pedantic stickler for the supremacy of Parliament. 
 He quickly showed " the Favourite " that he would not be his tool, 
 and Bute began to intrigue to get him out. 
 
 Bute resigned on the 8th April ; on the 19th the King prorogued 
 Parliament, and on the 23rd appeared No. 45 of The North Briton, 
 accusing his Majesty of telling a falsehood in the Speech from the 
 Throne. The new Secretaries, Lords Egremont and Halifax, at once 
 issued a " General Warrant " ^ for arresting the authors, printers and 
 publishers of "No. 45." On the night of the 29th, the King's 
 Messengers entered Wilkes's house in Greal George Street, and 
 seized his papers ; and next day he was committed to the Tower. 
 So began the seven years' civic war, which convulsed the country, 
 occupied the chief attention of one entire Parliament, and ended in 
 the victory of Wilkes and the publicity of debate. 
 
 From the first the King could not get on with George Grenville. 
 He was as obstinate as his Majesty, to whom he talked as though 
 he were making a speech in the House — for hours at a time. 
 Then he was so " disobhging." His dread of having to lay a new 
 tax made him so parsimonious that he would not buy the piece of 
 open field west of Buckingham House, whereby it was presently 
 built on, and the King and Queen were overlooked "from a 
 hundred houses " as they walked in the gardens. Mr. Greenville — 
 as the King always wrote his name — fairly wore him out, and 
 was, besides, always complaining that he had not his Majesty's 
 confidence, and hinting at a secret influence behind the throne, 
 in Mr. Pitt's own style. He never by any chance did as the King 
 
 " from personal motives of power and ambition, hastily concluded an ignominious 
 peace." No. 44 of The North Briton, issued April 2, only six days before Bute 
 resigned, had a furious article on the Minister, who had, "if possible, made the 
 name of Stuart more odious and contemptible than It was before." It threatened 
 him with Strafford's fate. 
 
 ^ " A General Warrant was a warrant for the arrest of a person or persons not 
 named — it could therefore be used to arrest persons on suspicion, and was more 
 suited to the lawlessness of martial law than to the cautious procedure of civil 
 government. Burke calls the process ' a loose office form, which had been con- 
 stantly practised from the Revolution, and never in any instance censured during 
 that period.' " — Annual Register, 1764. 
 
"GENTLE SHEPHERD, TELL ME WHERE..." 15 
 
 wished — Mr. Pitt did not either, but Mr. Pitt was always reverential, 
 even when most disobliging ; whereas Grenville was barely civil to 
 his Sovereign. So when Egremont died in August, the King 
 made a desperate effort to be rid of Mr. Grenville, who made him 
 so miserable that he was almost willing to take back Mr. Pitt. 
 Bute was sent to sound the great man, who consented to wait 
 upon his Majesty — but not privately, as Bute proposed. So, on a 
 certain Saturday, Pitt had himself carried through the Mall at 
 noonday, in his sedan-chair, which everybody about town recognised 
 (it was made in a peculiar manner to accommodate Pitt's gouty 
 leg). He was three hours with the King, and all was arranged. 
 Pitt's terms were what they always had been — his Majesty must 
 recall the Whigs. His Majesty consented — anything to be rid of 
 " Mr. Greenville." Bute was with the King till late that night, and 
 again early in the morning — about which time Mr. Pitt went down 
 to Claremont, to tell the Duke of Newcastle and arrange the new 
 Cabinet. But from Buckingham House Bute went to Kew, where 
 he saw Mr. Jenkinson (afterwards Lord Liverpool) and Mr. Elliott. 
 Jenkinson had been his private secretary, and was now Secretary 
 to the Treasury, and Elliott was Treasurer of the King's Chambers. 
 Both were friends of Grenville, and had places to lose if Pitt came 
 in. So they talked to Bute about what he was doing in saddling 
 himself with Pitt, till Bute went back to the King in a fright ; and 
 at eight that evening Grenville was sent for. The King told him 
 he had thought of "making a change," and had seen Mr. Pitt. 
 "But his terms are too hard — I can't think of complying. You 
 must go on." And the first thing on Monday morning. Alderman 
 Beckford went to Pitt to express Lord Bute's regret that the 
 negotiation had failed, "the terms being too high." He brought 
 a new set of terms which were much too high for Mr. Pitt. Pitt 
 went to the King — who was particularly gracious, as was his way 
 when getting rid of anybody — and told him " affairs could not go 
 on " without the great families who had supported the Revolution 
 Government — thus gently reminding his Majesty who had put him 
 where he was. But the King only replied that his honour was 
 concerned, "and I must support it." So Grenville went on. 
 
 Wilkes was the popular idol. On the 23 rd December, when 
 No. 45 was to be burnt by the common hangman, the mob spat in 
 the City Marshal's face, threw stones at the High Sheriff, rescued 
 the remains of No. 45 from the fire, and marched with it in 
 triumph, yelling, " Wilkes and Liberty ! " to Temple Bar, where 
 they burnt a jack-boot in a bonfire.^ At Drury Lane the King was 
 
 ' Horace Walpole's letter to Lord Hertford. 
 
1 6 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 received in silence ; and when AH in the Wrong was given out as 
 the play for the next night, the gallery cried, " Let us be all in the 
 right — Wilkes and Liberty ! " In the debate on Privilege, Pitt, 
 ill of the gout and wrapped in flannels, spoke for two hours for 
 privilege of Parliament, even in the case of libel. But the House 
 voted that a libel is not privileged, and on January 20, 1764, 
 it expelled Wilkes. Then came on the first of the debates on 
 General Warrants, when Opposition made so formidable an attack 
 that the Government escaped defeat only by adjourning the ques- 
 tion to that day four months.^ Presently afterwards Generals 
 Conway and A' Court were deprived of their commands for speak- 
 ing and voting with Opposition against the Warrants. To make 
 matters worse, the drought of 1762 had caused the slaughter of so 
 many cattle, and the floods which followed had drowned so many 
 sheep and lambs, that meat was dear.^ Wheat was 52s. the 
 quarter, all provisions were high, and, the croakers said, likely to 
 be higher. In proportion as Ministers grew in favour with the 
 King, they fell with the people. It was rumoured that they were 
 reconciled with Bute, and that Bute saw the King continually. 
 This was the situation when Grenville saw himself compelled to 
 present his Budget. The bill for the war was still unpaid. The 
 millions already provided were not nearly enough. Where was the 
 rest to come from ? His Majesty's loyal subjects in England were 
 hardly in a humour for new taxes. The country gentlemen were 
 indignant that the land-tax was still kept at the war-level of 4s. in 
 the pound. The malt-tax could not safely be increased. What 
 was to be done ? " Tell me where — only tell me where ! " 
 
 Then Grenville bethought him of his Majesty's loyal subjects in 
 North America. Part of the debt for the war had been incurred in 
 defending them — the part not spent on the subsidies to Frederick, 
 the Landgrave, and the other German princes. Let the Colonies 
 help us ! 
 
 It was on the loth of March, 1764, that Grenville brought 
 forward the " Resolutions of the Committee of Ways and Means," 
 which were to lose this country the dominion over half a continent, 
 and to fulfil the sinister omen that attended the King's coronation.^ 
 There were twenty-two of these Resolutions. They began with a 
 duty of ;^2, 9s. 9d. per cwt. on all foreign coffees imported into 
 the North American colonies from any place except Great Britain ; 
 
 ' ' ' Barre, with a French bullet still in his face, told the House that by voting 
 for Wilkes he had lost rank and employment." — Trevelyan. 
 
 ° See a letter in the Gentleman' s Magazine for November, 1 764. 
 ' The largest jewel fell from the crown. 
 
"GENTLE SHEPHERD, TELL ME WHERE..." \^ 
 
 and ended with the ;^2, 000,000 to be taken out of the Sinking 
 Fund. Clause 13 explained that the produce of all these duties 
 was to be " from time to time disposed of by Parliament, towards 
 defraying the necessary expenses of defending, protecting and 
 securing the British colonies and plantations in America." And 
 Clause 14 — said by Burke to have been added and passed "at the. 
 close of the night, and at the rising of the House " — ran thus : — 
 
 " That towards further defraying the said expenses, it may be 
 proper to charge certain Stamp Duties in the said colonies 
 and plantations." 
 
 There is a very curious passage in Nicholls' Recollections, which 
 does not appear to have been commented on — perhaps because 
 revenue so very soon became a secondary consideration in the 
 quarrel. The fact he mentions, if correct, makes the Stamp Act 
 merely the first step in that " plot against their liberties " in which 
 the Americans so firmly believed. ^ 
 
 ^ " From the obstinacy with which the King persevered in it, from the eager- 
 ness with which it was proclaimed that it was personally the King's object ; that 
 those who supported it were his friends, while those who opposed it were to be 
 ranked as disloyal, and his enemies ; from this language being held long after 
 the death of Mr. Grenville, when his influence must have ceased, men are 
 induced to suspect that it was the King's measure rather than that of Mr. 
 Grenville" (Recollections, p. 386). Nicholls goes on to say that another circum- 
 stance "leads men to doubt" whether the measure originally proceeded from 
 Mr. Grenville. From the beginning of Grenville's administration, it was mani- 
 festly his object to increase the revenue ; but if his only idea was to make 
 America contribute, "he had no occasion to bring forward the Stamp Act. 
 He had the money already collected. ... It had been deemed advisable to 
 encourage the growth of various articles of American produce, by allowing a 
 bounty on their importation into Great Britain. I have been told that when 
 the Stamp Act was brought forward by Mr. Grenville, the bounties thus payable 
 on American produce amounted to five hundred thousand pounds a year. 
 Mr. Grenville only proposed to raise two hundred thousand pounds a year by 
 the Stamp Act. If revenue alone was his object, it is scarcely credible that he 
 could have overlooked this sum, which was already in the coffers of the public ; 
 and resorted to a mode of taxation, which from its novelty was necessarily 
 uncertain. But revenue was not the object of those who recommended the 
 Stamp Act. Power and patronage influenced their wishes " (388-9). Grenville, 
 however, to the last always spoke of the Stamp Act as his own work. 
 
 VOL. I.- 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 AN EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY VIEW OF COLONIAL 
 
 POLICY 
 
 "The bent and genius of the age is best known in a free country by the 
 pamphlets and papers which daily come out, as containing the sense of parties, 
 and sometimes the voice of the nation." — Lord Somers. 
 
 Early in 1764 a pamphlet was published which sets forth very 
 ably the principles of our Colonial policy. ^ 
 
 The author starts by saying that Commerce now rules the world. 
 Commercial considerations are becoming " the predominant principle 
 that will form the general policy, and rule the powers of Europe." 
 At the beginning of the Seven Years' War, the " lead " in commerce 
 " seemed to vibrate between us and the French," but is now in our 
 hands. The thing is to keep it. Our kingdom will then no more 
 be considered as " the mere kingdom of this island, with its appen- 
 dages of provinces, colonies, and settlements, but as a great 
 maritime dominion, consisting of our possessions in the Atlantic 
 and in America, united into one interest, of which Great Britain 
 will be the commercial center." 
 
 How is this to be brought about ? " It is a general maxim that 
 the trade of colonies should be confined to the mother-country ; but 
 a total infraction of this principle is at present absolutely necessary, 
 not only to the trade of- our colonies, but their existence." The 
 fact is, "they are not naturally united with the interest, and sub- 
 mitted to the dominion of the mother-country." They may even 
 be "at war when we are at peace, the Spanish war is a proof"; or 
 they may be " in full possession of the commerce of peace when the 
 mother-countries may be at war, every war is a proof" Their 
 interest requires a trade independent of the Mother Country, and 
 this independent trade will become the natural, and that with the 
 Mother Country only the artificial, branch of their commerce. The 
 only way to obviate this is to hit on some scheme for giving our 
 
 ^ The Administration of the Colonies. This pamphlet is abridged in the 
 Gentleiiian's Magazine for March, 1764. 
 
VIEW OF COLONIAL POLICY 19 
 
 Colonies a natural interest in us. The first thing to be done is 
 to establish a Department for the General Regulation of Trade. 
 Within its own sphere, it must be " sovereign and supreme," and 
 the King in Council should act on its information in all matters 
 affecting the Colonies. In fact, the author calls for a Colonial 
 Secretary, with a Board under him. 
 
 Our object is to be: "First, that all the profits of their 
 produce and manufactures center in the mother-country. Secondly, 
 that they continue the sole customers of the mother-country. 
 Care should also be taken to keep them unconnected and in- 
 dependent of each other ; because, by a union, they might possibly 
 shake off their dependance upon the mother-country, and set up for 
 themselves.'' "Fortunately, for us, they are settled in different 
 manners," have different forms of government, and different 
 principles both of religion and policy. We have only to secure 
 them in these rights and privileges in order to preserve their 
 disunion. 
 
 We are to strive to keep them as our " appropriated customers " ; 
 they must not export but to a British market, and they must not 
 import but from a British market ; but this should not continue to 
 mean that they may only trade with Britain. There should be 
 British markets established in other countries, and the colonists 
 should be permitted to export to a foreign country, provided they 
 sell to a British House — of course paying the same duties as if 
 trading direct with England. He then instances the various 
 "factories" (at Petersburg, Riga, Hamburg, Lisbon, Cadiz, etc.), 
 but seems not quite sure whether they really do ensure that profits 
 centre in Britain. 
 
 He is clearer as to the advantages of supplying the colonists 
 with East India goods^" in a way that would totally prevent the 
 contraband trade." The East India Company would thus become 
 " the collector of all the surplus silver in America, and perhaps also 
 some of the gold and ivory of Africa." 
 
 He is aware that unwise duties — like that on molasses — may 
 defeat their own object, and destroy a valuable trade. That duty 
 was laid to please the West India Islands — there was " a struggle 
 between the West India and North American traders, who should 
 have the profit of it." We have sacrificed the American interest to 
 the West India ; but the Government must know that this was false 
 policy — the law has been evaded, and a good thing too. Then 
 there is the law about white pines. No pine of 24 inches 
 diameter at 20 inches from the ground, and not private property, 
 may be cut down. This law, passed to preserve white pines for 
 
20 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 masts, operates to their total destruction — &r the colonists evade the 
 law by felling them before they are fit for masts ; and now we have to 
 go a great distance for our masts, and in a short time shall have none 
 at all within practicable reach. If we go on as we are,it will soon 
 take seventy or eighty yoke of oxen to drag the trees from the remote 
 parts where alone they are now suffered to reach the required size. 
 
 Nothing has prevented the Americans from going into manu- 
 factures, but the dearness of labour. Put up the price of imports, 
 and you make it worth their while to manufacture. 
 
 The mingled sense and folly of this reasoning must strike every- 
 one. The author sees that the total dependence of the Colonies on 
 the Mother Country is unnatural and pernicious. He proposes to 
 make it less pernicious by another unnatural arrangement — the 
 costly and roundabout device of intermediate markets, with all' 
 their inconveniences and increased risks of transport. He calmly 
 ignores the " interest " of the foreign nations on whose territory he 
 proposes to estabhsh markets which are to be exclusively for our 
 benefit — nay, are intended to benefit us at their expense, by com- 
 pelling them to accept us as middlemen instead of trading with 
 their customers directly. It never seems to occur to him that the 
 commercial principles which are in future to rule the world may 
 operate to prevent foreign Powers from acquiescing in this snug 
 little arrangement, the intention of which he so candidly explains. 
 
 His very sensible remarks on the effect of " unwise " duties 
 show that he was a free-trader without knowing it. A little deeper 
 reflection would have shown him the high probability that his 
 artificial markets would only have produced analogous evil effects on 
 a vaster scale. His remark on the transfer of the world's trade, as the 
 result of the Seven Years' War, may set us thinking in another 
 direction — on the futility of wars undertaken to divert the trend of 
 commerce. When commerce is setting in a given direction, the 
 country which sees itself losing never retrieves itself by arms. The 
 efforts of France to oust us from India are an instance. In greedily 
 snatching at all, she lost all. If she had let us alone, nothing worse 
 could possibly have befallen her than that which did befall — and it 
 is quite possible that instead of all India being this day a British 
 possession, France might have shared it with us. And if this had 
 been for us both rather as a " sphere of influence " than as a con- 
 quered demesne, it might have been no worse for either of us, or 
 for India, or the world. 
 
 In 1764, English manufacturers spoke with the utmost candour 
 of their desire to prevent the development of American commerce. 
 On February 10, 1773, Isaac Spooner of Birmingham puts the case 
 
VIEW OF COLONIAL POLICY 21 
 
 to Lord Dartmouth, in a letter prompted by fears lest " Mr. Quincy's 
 petition " be granted.^ " If they manufacture the steel and send it 
 over to England it will greatly injure the home trade. ... If they 
 are permitted to make steel, and draw it with Tilt hammers, they 
 will soon manufacture it, that being the next step . . . manufacturers 
 will soon increase with them, to the great prejudice of England . . . 
 nor need I mention to you how greatly any progress in the Iron 
 and Steel Manufacturies will tend to promote the favourite scheme 
 of America ; Independence on (sic) this Kingdom. Tilt hammers 
 are of very general utility in almost every Branch of the Iron and 
 Steel manufacturys, being a more expeditious and cheaper method 
 of preparing both . . . and I think should be absolutely prohibited 
 in America, if we have any power to prevent their use there." 
 
 Mr. Spooner does not call England the " mother-country," 
 probably his fear of the Americans getting leave to use tilt-hammers 
 had for the moment chilled his paternal sentiments. It is really 
 strange that we did not perceive the irony of the expression. We 
 had from the first behaved towards American commerce as a thing 
 we must never allow to flourish. If the colonists were our children, 
 our action had been that of a father with grown-up sons. He is in 
 a large way of business, but he carefully refrains from taking his 
 sons into full partnership, lest they should interfere with his business, 
 and take away his customers. He does not wish them to prosper 
 much, and he does all he can to prevent it. If they ask him to 
 allow them to extend their own little businesses, he exclaims that 
 they intend to set up for themselves and reduce him to beggary, 
 and when they persist in their demands, he brings an action against 
 them, and threatens to seize anything they dare to sell, except to 
 himself. Between a father and his sons, we should, even in 1764, 
 have thought such conduct madness, and the father fallen into 
 dotage ; but for centuries it appeared to everybody the right way to 
 treat Colonies which we were proclaiming a part of our " Empire," 
 therefore to some extent our partners in business. 
 
 One of the most curious features of the contest with America is 
 the fact that we drifted into it with our eyes open. We understood 
 instantly that the Colonies were deeply offended— so we resolved to 
 provoke them further. We saw in their indignation a proof that 
 they intended to cast off our yoke — so we at once set about to 
 make that yoke heavier than it ever was before. Not content with 
 this, we talked about independence long before a single one of the 
 provinces ever dreamed of it. The stock argument of the advocates 
 of "firmness," was, that if we yielded in the matter of internal 
 
 > Hist. MSS. Comm. Report XIV, App. lo, Dartmouth MSS., p. 137. 
 
22 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 taxation, the Colonies would set up for themselves — as though we 
 were determined to show them that they could not have the 
 benefits of union without surrendering their constitutional rights. 
 This view was urged in speeches in Parliament, in the public Press, 
 and in private letters — in every key, from the ferocious howls for 
 blood uttered by that reverend incendiary, Dr. James Scott, up to 
 the calm and moderate reasoning of Grenville himself. It is 
 indeed strange to find Grenville writing to Lord Trevor that, if the 
 new Secretary for the Colonies means to " be reconciled to the 
 ideas of their dependence and obedience, agreeably to the letter 
 and intention of the British Acts of Parliament," then " a firm and 
 temperate conduct must be steadily pursued " ; but " if indepen- 
 dence is to be openly avowed, appearances of resentment against 
 the Americans will only expose the honour of the King and king- 
 dom to fresh insults and contempt." So that, unless we are 
 prepared to grant independence we must be careful not to 
 conciliate the Americans ! 
 
 Those who were now conducting affairs, however, managed to 
 combine the evils of both policies with the advantages of neither. 
 They were not mad enough deliberately to plan another war before 
 they had paid for the first. They did not think they would have to 
 fight America. They were sure bullying would be enough. When 
 they found they were bullying the colonists into armed resistance, 
 they thought a few regiments would be enough. Then an army. 
 Then two armies. To the last, the one contingency that never 
 presented itself to their minds was that the bullying system might 
 finally land them in a situation beyond their control. They thought 
 their choice lay between yielding a certain point, or obtaining it by 
 compulsion. They never perceived that the real alternative was, 
 whether Great Britain should retain her North American Provinces 
 as a part of the Empire, by allowing dependence to become merely 
 nominal — an arrangement which would have perpetuated every 
 solid advantage the Empire ever did derive or ever could derive 
 from colonies — or lose them for ever. As we follow the story, we 
 shall see Administration committing the opposite blunders of haste 
 and delay, vacillation and tenacity, feebleness and violence. A 
 year was taken to consider whether Government should persist in a 
 measure which it seems not to have considered for five minutes 
 before proposing. The year's consideration having shown beyond 
 a doubt that the tax was producing ill-will from one end of America 
 to the other. Government resolved to persist ! Finding that it was 
 injuring British trade, it repealed the measure, and turned resent- 
 ment into gratitude — whereupon it devised a new measure, more 
 
VIEW OF COLONIAL POLICY 23 
 
 obnoxious than the first, and on a far larger scale. Henceforth 
 the colonists knew that even if they succeeded in getting one 
 injurious tax withdrawn, another of the same nature would be 
 promptly substituted. 
 
 There are only two possible ways of preventing discontent from 
 developing into rebellion: one is to avoid legislation certain to 
 arouse dangerous resistance ; the other is to resort at once to force 
 — to call out the troops and mow the people down, till resistance is 
 crushed. The chief disadvantage of the latter method is that 
 though the generation which receives so terrible a lesson is cowed, 
 it is not made loyal, and it almost always happens that the next 
 generation requires a still more terrible lesson, until a Government 
 has so much to do in shooting its own subjects that it can hardly 
 spare soldiers to fight its enemies. And the farther off the country 
 which has to be thus held down, the greater the expense, inconven- 
 ience — and finally, danger — of holding it. In the case of America, 
 the British Government took a middle course — it tried to cheat the 
 Colonies into submission by threats ; but it only succeeded in 
 cheating the British nation into believing that the trouble was the 
 work of a few disreputable agitators, whose hired ruffians would run 
 away as soon as they saw the shako of a British grenadier. The 
 stamps were never expected to bring in more than _^i 00,000 a 
 year ; the tax on tea was never estimated at more than _;^3o,ooo or 
 ;£4o,ooo a year. If the British Parliament had realised that to gain 
 these revenues would cost an Eight Years' War, ;^i 28,000,000, 
 and tens of thousands of British lives ; that, after the victory, a large 
 army must be permanently kept in North America — more than 
 swallowing up all the revenue that could possibly be obtained there, 
 — if they had realised this, would they still have passed the Boston 
 Port Bill? And if they had foreseen that when the Eight Years' 
 , War and the ;^i 28,000,000 were gone, a second British army would 
 surrender to the united armies of France and America, one would 
 think there was no man in Great Britain but would have run out 
 into the streets crying for instant reconciliation with the Colonies. 
 But who can say? A madman was able to bring 100,000 men to 
 London to protest against the repeal of laws which denied to 
 Catholics the rights of citizens; but Chatham himself could 
 not persuade the House of Lords to make up the quarrel with 
 America. 
 
 For a hundred years we had been trying to repress Colonial 
 progress. The Navigation Act, the Trade-Laws, were all intended to 
 prevent the Colonies from having a fair chance. To this end we 
 made 29 Laws, which show ingenuity worthy of a better cause. 
 
24 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 The following is quoted from an American writer, but the facts are 
 to be found on the pages of our Statute Books : — 
 
 "The barbarous code of commercial law, which disgraced the 
 Statute-book of England for the exact century which intervened 
 between the introduction and expulsion of her Colonial Collectors 
 and other officers of the Customs, was entitled to no respect what- 
 ever. Separation would have followed as certainly in 1676, when 
 the Jirs/ attempt was made to fix this code on America, as in 1776, 
 when the experiment failed a second time, if there had been at the 
 one period the same strength and concert ... as existed at the 
 other. There never was a moment, early or late, when the mari- 
 time Colonies would have submitted willingly to the requirements 
 of these statutes, or have submitted to them at all without the use 
 of force. ... An American merchant had to evade the law of the 
 land to give a sick neighbour an orange or cordial of European 
 origin, or else obtain them loaded with the time, risk, and expense 
 of a voyage from the place of growth or manufacture to England, 
 and thence to his own warehouse. If an American ship were 
 wrecked on the coast of Ireland, she must not unload her cargo 
 there, but must send her merchandise to England — then, if it was 
 intended for Ireland, an English ship would take it back." 1 
 
 It is no wonder that a fourth of those who signed the Declara- 
 tion of Independence were merchants ! No people could endure 
 such unnatural restrictions. The colonists did not. An admirably 
 organised system of smuggling made commercial life possible — 
 here, as in all other countries,^ evading all the costly machinery of 
 government. Writs of Assistance were intended to check smug- 
 gling, by extending the right of search. The trade laws were not 
 even workable. The Molasses Act of 1733 was suspended for 
 thirty years — to be revived at the time of the Stamp Act.^ It was 
 the law of nature that America should sooner or later become 
 independent. Nations, like individuals, reach a stage in their 
 growth when the most benevolent control becomes first useless, 
 then injurious. If a father exacted from a grown-up son the un- 
 questioning obedience of a child, the situation would soon become 
 
 ' Sabine, The American Loyalists. 
 
 ^ The duties only made smuggling worth while. Many years later, Mr. Holroyd 
 told Arthur Young that all the "lively young men" in Sussex were employed in 
 smuggling. They could earn a guinea a week as riders and carriers, with no 
 risk, and cannot therefore be expected to work in the fields for 8s. — Hist. MSS. 
 Comm. Report XV, App. 6. 
 
 ' gd. a gallon on rum ; 6d. on molasses ; 5s. a cwt. on sugar not imported 
 from the British sugar islands. Governor Bernard, in 1763, begged that lemons 
 might be free, as they were necessary to health in the climate of Massachusetts. 
 
VIEW OF COLONIAL POLICY 25 
 
 impossible, though the father might have no separate interest to 
 serve. How much more impossible must it be, when a " Mother 
 Country " tries to prevent her Colonies from getting on too well, lest 
 they should injure herself ! No such attempt can ever succeed. If 
 the colony has not the spirit or the power to resist, it will dwindle 
 and pine till it ceases to profit the Mother Country. If it resists 
 and is subdued, all the Mother Country gains is the wretched 
 satisfaction of wasting her own dominions, and sowing ill-will to 
 herself for generations yet unborn. 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 THE STAMP ACT 
 
 " We hardly read a newspaper that does not mention manufacturers of one 
 kind or another going from England, Scotland, or Ireland, to settle in those 
 Colonies ; which, if true, is certainly a matter that should to the last degree 
 prove alarming to these kingdoms. . . . Are we not two ways contributing to 
 the undoing of ourselves ? . . . Must it not then be worth while to look a 
 little way before us?" — Letter in the Gentleman's Magazine for January, 1765. 
 
 " I sat as a stranger in your gallery when the Act was under consideration. 
 Far from anything inflammatory, I never heard a more languid debate in this 
 House. No more than two or three gentlemen, as I remember, spoke against 
 the Act. ... In fact, the affair passed with so very, very little noise, that in 
 town they scarcely knew the nature of what you were doing." — Mr. Burkis 
 Speech on American Taxation, April 19, 1774' 
 
 "Children planted by your care! No! Your oppression planted them in 
 America. Nourished by your indulgence ! They grew by your neglect of 
 them. . . . Protected by your arms ! they have nobly taken up arms in your 
 defence. " — Speech of Colonel Barri, March 6, 1765. 
 
 The " Gentle Shepherd " must have had some misgivings, for the 
 clause relating to the duty on stamps was withdrawn "for the 
 present," to give time for the Colonies to petition upon it. Grenville 
 expected this " petition " to take the form of an offer of a lump sum 
 in compensation ; and when the Colonial agents waited on him to 
 thank him for the promised delay, he told them he was quite ready 
 to receive proposals for any other tax, equivalent to the stamp tax 
 in value ; and he hinted that if the colonists agreed to this they 
 would establish a precedent for being consulted another time, 
 " Tell me where ! Only tell me where ! " 
 
 But it was not Clause 14 over which the several political parties 
 wrangled in the public prints. The appropriation of the Sinking 
 Fund had the first place in these discussions, and next to it the 
 blow which Granville's Budget struck at the inter-colonial trade of 
 North America. 
 
 The British, Spanish, and French colonies of North America had 
 long done a brisk trade among themselves. So important was this 
 trade that it had been carried on, even during the late war, under 
 
 26 
 
THE STAMP ACT 27 
 
 flags of truce, and by roundabout ways, through the Dutch and 
 Danish islands ; until the British Government, discovering that the 
 French were profiting by it, declared it treasonable to supply the 
 enemy with necessaries. But the moment peace was made, this 
 trade had been resumed. Now, at one blow, it was to be destroyed. 
 Armed cutters, commanded by naval officers, were sent over " to 
 stop the smuggling" on the coasts of North America. This de- 
 graded officers to the level of excisemen — the usual custom-house 
 oaths were administered to them. But they were entirely unfit for 
 the work. These " sea-officers " knew nothing of legal niceties, and 
 cared as little. A great temptation was placed in their way — it was 
 so easy to make a mistake, so difficult and tedious for that mistake 
 to be set right. They seized vessels right and left. Colonial as well 
 as Spanish, and complaints could only be settled by wading through 
 interminable piles of bonds, cockets, clearances, certificates, mani- 
 fests, registers ; and when all these had established the fact of an 
 error, there was the further delay of an appeal to the Lords of the 
 Admiralty, 3000 miles and six or eight weeks' sail away. 
 
 Moreover, as though it was intended to press as hardly as 
 possible on the Colonies, the duties must now be paid in specie, 
 which must be sent to England. Even the money which was 
 to be spent in paying the troops sent out " to defend the 
 Colonies " must first come to England, and then go back again to 
 America ! 
 
 As might have been expected, on the first news of Grenville's 
 Budget, the colonists took the alarm. They disowned the right of 
 their agents to make any promises in their name, and they openly 
 questioned the right of the British Parliament to tax them at all. 
 They said that taxes were a free gift ; whatever taxes the Colonies 
 paid must be voted by their own legislatures. When they were 
 reminded that the money was to be spent in defending them, they 
 replied that they would just as lief defend themselves. They were 
 still sore at the way in which the provincial officers had been 
 slighted, and their advice over-ruled, during the late war, and they 
 had not forgotten poor Braddock's disaster. Nor were they without 
 grievances of older date. The law respecting white pines has 
 been mentioned. There were other laws of the same sort — some 
 twenty-nine in all — passed at various times by the jealous old Mother 
 Country to restrain the industries of the Colonies — laws against 
 setting up looms, erecting machinery, even against using the water- 
 falls provided by bounteous Nature for the use of man. Far down 
 in the forests of Maine, great forest-trees were rotting away, because 
 they were marked with the King's broad-arrow, and might be 
 
28 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 wanted one day for his navy. Not one in a hundred of these trees 
 was ever so used, but it was ;^ioo fine to touch one of them. 
 Such things as these were not calculated to make the colonists 
 think that Old England was an unmixed blessing to New England. 
 But in 1765 the colonists would have been almost as frightened at 
 the thought of throwing off the Mother Country, as a schoolgirl of 
 those days would have been at the thought of travelling alone on 
 the coach from London to Edinburgh. 
 
 The very first result of the new Budget ought to have shown 
 England that in trying to make her Colonies pay her debts she was 
 only cutting her own throat. Hitherto the dearness of labour, and 
 the comparative cheapness of imported goods, had prevented the 
 colonists from setting up manufactures of their own. Now that the 
 new duties would put up the price of imports, we made it worth 
 their while to manufacture. They at once resolved to do so, and 
 formed " Associations " pledged to buy of us nothing which they 
 could possibly make for themselves. Well might thoughtful men 
 recall the words of Sir Robert Walpole, spoken in 1739, during the 
 war with Spain, when somebody had a scheme for taxing the 
 Colonies : " I will leave that for some of my successors, who may 
 have more courage than I have, and be less a friend to commerce 
 than I am." 
 
 There were other considerations which might have made even a 
 more "courageous" Minister than Walpole shrink from inflaming 
 New England. The New Englanders were the descendants of 
 men who had gone out into the wilderness to escape from 
 oppression. It was not likely they would tamely submit to it now 
 that they had made the desert to bloom as the rose. If they had 
 refused to bend the knee to the King of England, when they were 
 within his kingdom, was it likely they would fear him when a 
 thousand leagues of ocean flowed betvifeen? 
 
 The case, however, as it appeared to the British Government, was 
 as clear as daylight. Had not Tacitus said that there is no peace 
 without arms, no arms without pay, no pay without tribute ? Was 
 it not just that the Colonies which had profited so much by the war, 
 and whose interests had been the first objects of the Peace — who, 
 moreover, undoubtedly could pay if they chose — should contribute 
 " about a third part of the expense necessary for their own defence " ? ' 
 
 ' An indignant Briton asks : " Is the interest of the Mother Country become 
 so minute a consideration in the British Empire that that interest must be post- 
 poned to the interests of the meanest branch of this Empire ? . . . A people of 
 such perverse hearts can deserve a very small part of our affection." — "A Dutiful 
 Subject," New Daily Advertiser, Feb. 18, 1766. 
 
THE STAMP ACT 29 
 
 About 10,000 men were now found necessary for this — the new 
 provinces must be defended, and a new expense of between 
 ;^3oo,ooo and ^^400,000 must be annually incurred. The Stamp 
 Act was planned to provide for this most reasonable outlay.i 
 
 It made matters worse that the colonists, like the people of 
 England, were just then in a bad humour. A great misfortune 
 had happened in 1 763— a terrible Indian rising, alleged to be in- 
 stigated by the French trading agents. There had been dreadful 
 massacres in the back settlements of Pennsylvania, Maryland, and 
 Virginia. Several British garrisons in Canada had also been mas- 
 sacred. Exasperated by this, a band of persons unknown, from 
 some of the frontier townships, fell upon and murdered in cold 
 blood the harmless and friendly Indians of Lancaster County. It 
 was a wicked and barbarous deed worthy only of savages, and Dr. 
 Benjamin Franklin wrote a noble protest, in which he tried to 
 shame these white murderers by relating instances of the Red men's 
 magnanimity and honour. " O Pennsylvania ! " he says, " once 
 renowned for kindness to strangers. . . . Those whom you have 
 disarmed to satisfy groundless suspicions, will you leave them ex- 
 posed to the armed madmen of your country? Unmanly men! 
 who are not ashamed to come with weapons against the unarmed, 
 to use the sword against women, and the bayonet against young 
 children ! " 
 
 Then he tells how the Royal Highlanders, " brave men and true 
 soldiers, who had often had their ranks thinned in Indian warfare," 
 but " did not for this retain a brutal undistinguishing resentment 
 against all Indians," had protected the remnant, and offered to 
 escort them safely to New York. 
 
 No one can read Franklin's words about this affair without 
 feeling that the choice his countrymen were so soon to make of 
 him, as their advocate with the English people, reflects as much 
 honour on them as on himself Franklin as a man of science, and 
 as the Philosopher of Common-sense, was long since known and 
 ' honoured throughout Europe. He had already done enough for 
 Pennsylvania to earn a name in her history. He had been head 
 of the Provincial Post Office since 1737, and since 1753 Joint 
 Postmaster-General for America. In this office he had brought 
 the revenue up from nothing to a net yearly receipt three times as 
 large as that from the Irish Post Office. In Philadelphia he had 
 founded a volunteer fire-company, a book-club (the beginning of 
 subscription libraries in America), a paid police, a hospital, a 
 Philosophical Society, an Academy — afterwards the University of 
 ' It was expected that the revenue from the stamps would be about ;i'ioo,ooo. 
 
30 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Philadelphia — and a paper currency. He got the streets paved, 
 cleaned, and lighted — he designed a street-lamp like that still in 
 use; he invented a hot stove for sitting-rooms, and refused to 
 patent it because he had benefited so much by the inventions of 
 others. He also invented wall-papers. He was new neither to 
 great public affairs nor to great emergencies. In the panic after 
 Braddock's defeat, Franklin — who had organised Braddock's trans- 
 port and commissariat — was entrusted with the defence of the 
 North- West frontier against the Indians. 
 
 Nothing could shake Grenville's belief in his scheme. Franklin 
 presented a Resolution of the Assembly of Pennsylvania, denying 
 the right of the British Parliament to tax them — in matters of aid 
 their business was with the King, and they would think it their 
 duty to grant aid to the Crown according to their abilities, when- 
 ever required of them in the usual constitutional manner. We 
 thus see that from the very first moment the American Assembhes 
 claimed to be on the same footing as the British Parliament. It 
 was no after-thought, hypocritically put forward on the verge of 
 armed rebellion. 
 
 Franklin says that if Grenville had listened to this he would 
 have got more money voluntarily than he could ever have got 
 from the stamps. Grenville stooped to the meanness of tricking 
 Franklin into naming the stamp distributors, by professing a desire 
 to appoint persons as little offensive as possible — and Samuel 
 Smith circulated it in America that Dr. Franklin had planned the 
 Stamp Act, and was trying to get the -Test Act extended to 
 America ! Franklin says that the colonists paid in taxes full 
 half a crown in the pound. They would once have been pleased 
 with "a consolidating union" by means of "a fair and equal 
 representation of all parts of this empire in Parliament — the only 
 firm basis on which its political grandeur and prosperity can be 
 founded." But the time has passed. "Now they are indifferent 
 about it ; and if it is much longer delayed, they will refuse it "— 
 as Ireland did, though once wishing for it ! He adds, " Every man 
 in England seems to consider himself as a piece of a sovereign over 
 America; seems to jostle himself into the throne with the King, and 
 talks of our subjects in the colotiies." 
 
 The year of consideration passed. The colonists did not 
 suggest any less obnoxious tax, so the Stamp Act became one of 
 the 55 Clauses of the Bill for Taxing the Colonies, which passed 
 the Commons on the 6th of March, 1765, and received the Royal 
 Assent on the 22nd. The Assent was given by Commission, 
 because the King was ill. Never was a fateful measure passed with 
 
THE STAMP ACT 31 
 
 less observation. 1 This time there had been a debate, but the 
 only speech of note was that of Colonel Barre, who with Conway 
 was dismissed the year before for voting against General Warrants. 
 There was but one division in the Commons ; in the Lords, there 
 was neither debate, division, nor protest. 
 
 During the interval between the passing of the Bill and the 
 Royal Assent, the Colonial agents for Connecticut, Rhode Island, 
 Virginia and Carolina, with the agent for the Jamaica traders, had 
 made one last attempt to be heard, but were refused. Nor were 
 the resolutions of the Assemblies of Virginia and Massachusetts 
 Bay laid before Parliament. It struck no one as ominous that 
 provinces so different in foundation, history, character, climate, 
 religion, and trade interests, as Rhode Island and Virginia, should 
 be agreed. But what could Ministers do? The _^io,ooo,ooo 
 deficit must be made good somehow, and the British people 
 were in an ugly temper, while the Colonies were growing richer 
 every day. 
 
 The whole affair is a typical example of what a people may 
 expect when its destinies are controlled by another people three 
 thousand miles away. 
 
 It used to be said afterwards, that if Ministers had not granted 
 that year's delay, and so given the Colonies time to think about it 
 and get up opposition, but had simply sprung the stamps upon 
 them, they would have submitted quietly. It is always so. When 
 some violent measure has goaded a people into insurrection, 
 there are always found persons to say that the measure failed only 
 because it was not violent enough. 
 
 The stamps were sent out, and no ships that ever sailed carried 
 a more fatal cargo than those flimsy scraps of paper. 
 
 1 " Lord Mansfield, as speaker, and the Earls Cower and Manhmont, by 
 virtue of a Commission from his majesty, gave the royal assent to the following 
 bills ..." A list of Bills follows, and in the middle of the list, "for laying 
 a stamp duty in the British colonies in America." — Gentleman's Magazine, 
 March 22, 1765. 
 
CHAPTER V 
 " THE OCCURRENCES IN NORTH AMERICA" 
 
 ' ' Resolved. — That his Majesty's liege people of this his most antient and loyal 
 colony have, without interruption, enjoyed the inestimable right of being governed 
 by such laws, respecting their internal policy and taxation, as are derived from 
 their own consent." — Resolutions of the House of Burgesses in Virginia, May 29, 
 1765. 
 
 "Resolved, nem. con.— That it is the interest, birthright, and indubitable 
 privilege of every British subject, to be taxed only by his own consent, or that of 
 his legal representatives." — Resolutions of the House of Assembly, in Philadelphia, 
 September 21, 1765. 
 
 "The colonies are indebted to the merchants of Great Britain in the sum of 
 several millions sterling . . . but declare it is not in their power, at present, to 
 make good their engagements, alleging that the taxes and restrictions laid upon 
 them . . . have so far interrupted the usual and former most fruitful branches of 
 their commerce, thrown the several provinces into confusion, and brought so 
 great a number of actual bankruptcies, that the former opportunities and means 
 of remittances and payments are utterly lost and taken from them : and that the 
 petitioners are, by these unhappy events, reduced to the necessity of applying to 
 the House, in order to secure themselves and their families from impending ruin." 
 ■ — Petition of the Merchants of London, trading to North America, January 17, 
 1766. 
 
 " Our trade is in a most deplorable situation, not one-fifth part of the vessels 
 now employed in the West India trade, as was before the late regulations. Our 
 cash almost gone before the Stamp and Post Office Acts are to operate ; bank- 
 ruptcies multiplied, our fears increased, and the friends of liberty under the 
 greatest despondency ; what these things will end in, time only can discover ! " — 
 From Boston, June 6, 1765 {London Chronicle, July 11-13, 1765). 
 
 Those who lamented that the Stamp Act was not sprung on 
 America without warning, had this much ground for their reproaches, 
 that Grenville's delay gave the colonists time to realise what the loss 
 of the Spanish trade meant to them. Spain herself was not sorry 
 — these jealous old mother countries were a good deal alike in those 
 days, and thought that the prosperity of a colony was so much out 
 of their own pockets. They no sooner observed it than they began 
 to cast about how to divert it to themselves. But this time Great 
 Britain had cut her own throat. A letter from Kingston, in Jamaica, 
 written in January, 1765, says the place "is become a desert, since 
 
THE OCCURRENCES IN NORTH AMERICA 33 
 
 we were so wise to banish our best friends the Spaniards " — all the 
 trade has gone to the French and Dutch. From Boston, in March, 
 we hear : " Funerals without mourning, or the giving of English 
 gloves, are become so fashionable that there has been but one 
 burial for many months past in the old-fashioned way." ^ And the 
 writer adds that this has saved the town ;^io,ooo during that one 
 year. " It is a pleasure to behold what other savings are made by 
 laying aside a multitude of superfluous articles of British manu- 
 facture, and British produce.'' All this was the result of the laws 
 restricting inter-colonial trade. And now the Stamp Act was to fall 
 upon them, and tax afresh such business as we left them ! As 
 instances of the effect of the Stamp Act, a writer in the Gentle- 
 man^ s Magazine says that a ream of printed bail bonds, hitherto 
 sold for about iss., would with the stamps now amount to nearly 
 ;!f 100. A ream of printed policies of assurance, now costing about 
 £,2, would with the stamps come to ;£i9o. 
 
 When the news came that the Stamp Act had received the 
 Royal Assent, the ships in Boston Harbour hung their flags at 
 half mast, the bells rang a muffled peal, the Act was printed with a 
 death's-head in the place where the stamps should be, and those 
 that hawked it about the streets cried, "England's Folly, and 
 America's Ruin ! " Presently, a new paper, the Constitutional 
 Courant, came out with a head-piece of a snake cut in pieces, on 
 each piece the initial letters of one of the thirteen colonies, and 
 above them. Join or Die. The Act was publicly burnt in many 
 places, and with it the effigies of those persons supposed to have 
 had a hand in it ; while at meetings it was voted that thanks should 
 be given to General Conway and Colonel Barrd, for their speeches 
 in the British Parliament ; and the portraits of these gentlemen were 
 voted to be placed in the "Town Houses." 
 
 These things were known in England, even before the ships 
 with the stamps had sailed, and some captains declined to risk them- 
 selves and their ships. 
 
 They showed their prudence, for most of those who took the 
 stamps were obliged to give them up to the infuriated mobs, who 
 swarmed down to the quays, and threatened to hang any captain 
 then and there who did not surrender all the stamps he had 
 aboard. And, having got them, the mobs burned them, as they had 
 burnt the Act itself. 
 
 By the end of October, news began to reach England of the 
 way in which the Stamp Act had been received. The most alarm- 
 ing accounts came from Boston, New York, and Philadelphia, but 
 
 1 " And that a negro," says the letter in The Chronicle. 
 VOL. I. — 3 
 
34 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 in at least nine of the thirteen North American Provinces a spirit 
 had already manifested itself, which filled with apprehension all 
 prudent observers, both here and in America.^ 
 
 The Americans did not wait for the stamps to arrive ; as soon 
 as they knew that the Bill had become law, they began to show 
 their teeth. But everything goes to prove the truth of their subse- 
 quent protestations, that, so far from entertaining any long-standing 
 intention to cast off the authority of Great Britain, they were dis- 
 posed to put up with a great deal rather than do so. The following 
 extract from a letter printed in the London Chronicle — a Tory and 
 Ministerial paper, be it remembered — puts it very clearly : — 
 
 "We are freeholders, yet have we no right to a voice in the 
 choice of those who claim the power to make laws for us. But 
 even to this might we submit were we not taught and forced by 
 severe partial laws, to consider ourselves distinct from the inhabit- 
 ants of Great Britain. . . . 
 
 "Heretofore, we have been used to speak of England as our 
 mother country, children have been taught by their parents to 
 revere and love its constitution, and to risk everything in 
 defence and support of it; the restrictions from time to time 
 imposed were submitted to . . . but when those impositions are 
 urged as arguments for laying on us still greater ... we cannot 
 be silent. 
 
 " That the Colonies have borne a great deal before they 
 complained must be allowed. . . . No one colony can supply 
 another with wool, or any woollen goods manufactured in it. The 
 number of hatters must be retained . . . the iron we dig from our 
 mountains, we have just the liberty to make into bars, but farther 
 we must not go ; we must neither slit it nor plane it.^ Nor must 
 we convert it to steel, though 'tis a truth well known, that we cannot 
 have steel from England fit for use. Nay, though England admits 
 of steel being imported from Germany, she will not suffer it to be 
 made in her colonies ... in some instances (as in the wines 
 imported from Lisbon) we are obliged to carry the goods to Eng- 
 land, there unload them, and then re-ship them to America ; as if it 
 were not enough to levy a tax, without doing it in the most 
 expensive manner. 
 
 ' "The Assembly of the little state of Rhode Island resolved in September, 
 1765, that the 'first adventurers' of that colony brought with them and trans- 
 mitted to their posterity all privileges and immunities enjoyed by the people of 
 Great Britain, and were by their Charter entitled to all privileges of natural-born 
 subjects. They have been governed by their own Assembly in the article of 
 taxes and internal police, and subjects are not bound to yield obedience to any 
 other law or ordinance." — Hist. MSS. Report XIV, App. 10, p. 19. 
 
 ^ I find a pamphlet, dated as far back as 1718, on the "reasons for making 
 pigg iron but notbarr iron in America," 
 
THE OCCURRENCES IN NORTH AMERICA 35 
 
 "The paper mills, nursed with care and brought to so great 
 perfection in this province, must now fall; at the same time the 
 business and trade of the printers is ruined. ... In a short time 
 all the hard money on the continent will not suffice to pay the 
 taxes laid upon us." 1 
 
 It has, perhaps, never been made sufficiently clear that Grenville's 
 scheme was not merely an enlarged and more injurious form of 
 custom-house duties, but involved the new principle of actual 
 "internal taxation." It thus differed both in degree and in kind 
 from our former policy, and the colonists bring this view very 
 prominently forward in their remonstrances. For a century and a 
 half we had meddled with their commerce, but also for a century 
 and a half we had allowed them to tax themselves by their provincial 
 legislatures. And they had not been niggard — by our own admis- 
 sion they had contributed largely to the cost of the French 
 Wars. 
 
 Could we but have been content to let well alone ! Instead of 
 that, in our haste to make more out of them, we had chosen the 
 same moment for striking such a blow at their commerce as we 
 had never ventured on before, and for imposing a new and onerous 
 system of taxation. If we do not keep this fact well in view, we 
 shall not understand the extraordinary fierceness of their indignation. 
 The Ministerial party, who of course would not confess that their 
 measures could have justly provoked such a feeling, represented it 
 as the work of a few agitators, who harboured the wicked wish to 
 throw off the British connection. But if we reflect that in passing 
 the Bill, of which the Stamp Act formed a part, we were behaving 
 like a landlord who should deprive his tenant of half his customers, 
 at the same moment that he doubles his rent, we shall need no 
 explanation of the colonists' fury. Fury it was, and New England, 
 Puritan New England, and Boston, the heart of New England, led 
 the way. 
 
 When day dawned on the 14th of August, an effigy was dis- 
 covered hanging " on a limb of the great trees, so-called." It was 
 understood to represent Mr. Oliver, Governor Bernard's secretary, 
 who had just accepted the office of Stamp Distributor.^ The mob 
 resisted all attempts to take it down, and the Sheriff reported to the 
 
 > Letter from a Merchant in Philadelphia to his Correspondent in London, 
 dated June 19, 1765. Quoted in the London Chronicle for August 17-20, 
 1766. 
 
 ^ There was also " a jack-boot, with a head and horns peeping out of the 
 top." A jack-boot was, both in England and America, the emblem of Lord 
 Bute. 
 
36 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Council that afternoon that his men could not remove it without 
 imminent risk of their lives. The Council was divided — some were 
 for treating the affair as a rude jest — better to take no notice and 
 let the excitement die down. This was a preconcerted business ; 
 but as the greatest part of the town was certainly engaged in it, and 
 there was no force to oppose it, to take notice of it would inflame 
 the people still more. But after dark, the mob took down the 
 effigy, and brought it past the Town House, where they knew 
 the Council was still sitting. As they passed they gave three 
 cheers, and went on to a new building, lately erected by Oliver 
 to let out for shops, but reported to be intended for the Stamp 
 Office. 
 
 " This they pulled down to the ground in five minutes," says an 
 informant of the British Government, who begs that his name may 
 be withheld ; for " the party, by their tools, give out that if they 
 knew the man that would so far assist Great Britain as to inform 
 against any man, in this or any other province, he should not live 
 many hours." ^ The mob next went to Oliver's house, beheaded 
 the effigy in front of it, and broke the windows, after which they 
 burnt the effigy on Fort Hill, with wood taken from the supposed 
 stamp office. Oliver had sent away his family, but himself remained 
 in his house, with a few friends — but was persuaded to retire, when 
 the mob returned, and broke in, calling for him that they might 
 kill him. Oliver appears to have been only saved by one of his 
 friends making the mob believe he was already safe in the Castle. 
 The Governor and the Sheriff, who went out after eleven at night 
 to " persuade " the mob to disperse, were received with a shower 
 of stones. The colonel of a regiment of miUtia, to whom a written 
 order was sent to beat an alarm, declined, saying that as soon as 
 the drum was heard the drummer would be knocked down and the 
 drum broken. So the mob were left to disperse when and how 
 they might choose. The writer says he could see the bonfire still 
 burning as he wrote. Next day, Oliver promised to resign, several 
 gentlemen having advised him to do so, as otherwise his life would 
 be in continual danger. 
 
 A later letter from the same person says that no one could express 
 disapprobation of " this insurrection " without being in immediate 
 danger. A gentleman who had only said he expected that the 
 soldiers would be sent into Boston had to make a public apology to 
 save himself from being mobbed. A " Church of England clergy- 
 man," who in a sermon "obliquely condemned" the riot, was 
 threatened. One " congregational minister " had prayed for the 
 ' Letter to the Lords of Trade, given in Hansard, 
 
THE OCCURRENCES IN NORTH AMERICA 37 
 
 success of the opposition, but the writer knows others who disapprove, 
 but dare not say so. 
 
 From this time, until the arrival of the ship with the stamps, 
 the mob seem to have had pretty much their own way. The 
 authorities had been obliged to look on and see Oliver's house 
 demolished; the chief people in the town publicly justified the 
 outrage, the mob " became elated," and many old scores were 
 paid off against persons in office. When a mob intended to 
 pull down a house, they used to begin by crying " Liberty and 
 Property!" On the night of the 26th of August, there was 
 another serious riot, the house of the Deputy-Registrar of the 
 Admiralty was destroyed, and all the Admiralty records were 
 burned in a bonfire. The same night they destroyed the house 
 of Mr. Hallowell, Comptroller of the Customs. The house was 
 new, and elegantly furnished — everything of value was destroyed 
 or carried off. 
 
 Lieutenant-Governor Hutchinson had been warned that mischief 
 was intended him, but inasmuch as he had nothing to do with 
 either the Stamp Act or the Customs, he felt secure, and was at 
 supper with his family when he received a message that the mob 
 was coming. He immediately sent away his children, intending 
 himself to remain — but fortunately for him his eldest daughter 
 returned, and refused to go unless he did. The mob broke in, 
 and searched for him, and finding he had escaped, "went to 
 work with a rage scarce to be exemplified by the most savage 
 people." They destroyed "in the most minute manner" everything 
 movable, except such articles of value as family plate, etc., and 
 about ;^iooo in specie — these they " carried off." This destruction 
 of papers was a national loss. Hutchinson had been all his life 
 gathering together a large and valuable collection of manuscripts 
 and documents, relating to the early history of Massachusetts, and 
 those who possessed such things had given them to the Lieutenant- 
 Governor " as to a public museum." It was the only collection of 
 its kind, and it seems astonishing that no one of the " chief men " 
 of Boston tried to save these archives. As for the house itself, 
 we are told the mob was a long while resolved to level it to the 
 ground, and worked for three hours at the cupola — keeping on till 
 daylight. The house was built from a design of Inigo Jones, or 
 his successor. The walls were of very fine brickwork — probably 
 brought over from Holland, like those of the old Province House — 
 and adorned with "ionic pilasters worked into the walls." It 
 resisted all the efforts of this mob of Vandals ; but in the morning 
 the streets were found scattered with " money, plate, gold rings, etc., 
 
38 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 dropped in carrying off."i The writer, with great moderation, puts 
 the loss at ;^3ooo sterling. Even those who had approved the 
 sacking of Mr. Oliver's house were now frightened; but "great 
 pains are taken to separate the two riots." What was done against 
 Oliver was called " a necessary declaration of their resolution not 
 to submit to the Stamp Act." It was even hinted that " if a line 
 was not drawn between the first riot and the last, the civil power 
 would not be supported by the principal people of the town." But 
 even for the last riot, though several persons were arrested, no 
 sufficient evidence was forthcoming, and no one was committed. 
 
 Such was the situation on September ii, when the ship with 
 the stamps arrived. By the advice of his Council, Governor Bernard 
 hurried the bales into the Castle. A great crowd had instantly 
 assembled, and Mr. Meserve, who came over as distributor, was 
 surrounded, and warned as he valued his life not to attempt to 
 distribute them, and not to go into New Hampshire unless he 
 first resigned his office. Oliver, who was advanced in years, was 
 dragged to the Liberty Tree, and made to swear not to distribute. 
 Not long since " he had been a favourite." On a report that the 
 Governor was about to unpack the stamps, the mob became so 
 threatening that Bernard thought it prudent to declare that he had 
 no order and no authority to unpack the parcels, nor to allow anyone 
 else to do so, and had only taken them to the Castle for safety— 
 since, if they were destroyed, the province would be responsible for 
 their full value. 
 
 The Commissioners and Distributors of Stamps in the other 
 provinces were so terrified that they took the hint given to Mr. 
 Meserve, and to a man resigned their appointments. Governors of 
 provinces hastened to prorogue the legislative assemblies, afraid of 
 what resolutions they might pass. That of Virginia had resolved 
 that only the General Assembly of their State, with the King or his 
 substitute, could lay taxes and impositions on the province, and 
 that every attempt to vest this power in any other body is illegal, 
 unconstitutional, and has a manifest tendency to destroy English as 
 well as American liberty. And they were right. For liberty cannot 
 be taken away from one people by another people without undermin- 
 ing the foundation of all liberty, which is the consent of the governed. 
 
 There were riots in many other places — in New York the mob 
 took Lieutenant-Governor Colden's coach out of his stable, and 
 carried it and his effigy about the city, finally burning the effigy, 
 together with one of the devil. The house of Major Jones, 
 
 1 Next morning, as Hutchinson's robes had been burnt, he sat in court in the 
 undress he had on when the mob came, " with a borrowed greatcoat over it." 
 
THE OCCURRENCES IN NORTH AMERICA 39 
 
 "reported a friend to the Stamp Act," was stripped, and everything 
 burnt in a bonfire. At Philadelphia, as soon as the ships with the 
 stamps appeared round Gloucester Point, all the vessels in harbour 
 hoisted their flags half-mast high, the bells were muffled, and tolled 
 till evening. Somebody spiked the guns of the battery, to make 
 all safe ; and thousands of citizens met at the State-House, and 
 sent a deputation to Mr. Hughes, Stamp-master for Pennsylvania, 
 demanding his resignation. Hughes, who was ill in bed, promised 
 that no act of his should assist in carrying out the law, until it was 
 accepted by the other colonies, but refused to resign. When the 
 delegates returned with this reply, they could only prevent the 
 assembly from instantly marching on Hughes' house by representing 
 Hughes as dying. 
 
 On the 7th October, 1765, the delegates from Massachusetts 
 Bay, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, the 
 Delaware counties, Maryland, and South Carolina, met in Congress 
 at New York, and drew up resolutions and petitions to the King, to 
 the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and to the honourable the 
 knights, citizens, and burgesses of Great Britain, in Parliament 
 assembled.! 
 
 All these addresses were couched in respectful terms, but the 
 gist of all was the same — they claimed the full privileges of 
 Englishmen, and, above all, the right not to be taxed save with their 
 own consent. 
 
 On September 25, Governor Bernard convened the General 
 Assembly of Massachusetts Bay, and made a speech, in which he 
 said that the Parliament of Westminster considered it had an 
 indisputable right to make laws for the American colonies. The 
 late outrages were not the way to get the Stamp Act repealed — 
 better submit for the present, and try to persuade Parliament that 
 the Act was inexpedient " at this time." Then he set before them 
 the consequences of refusal to use the stamps. All unstamped 
 papers would be null and void, with a ^^lo fine for each act of 
 each person who signed, wrote, or engrossed such papers. Public 
 business would be completely stopped, and public offices must be 
 shut up, for no officer would incur such penalties as these — so far 
 exceeding any possible gain. No man could sue another for a debt, 
 or an injury. No ship could be unladen — for no clearances could 
 be given for the cargo. So the ports must be shut. And what will 
 become of the tradesmen, the fishermen, the seamen, who will be 
 
 ' When the Commissioners from Boston waited on Lieutenant-Governor 
 Golden, he told them that " such a Gongress was unconstitutional, unprecedented, 
 and imlawful, and he should give them no countenance." 
 
40 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 thrown out of work when navigation has ceased? And do you 
 think no rivals will spring up, and that you will be able to resume 
 your maritime trade when you please? "Can the people of this 
 province subsist without navigation, for any long time ? This 
 province appears to me to be upon the brink of a precipice ! " '• 
 
 The Assembly replied that the Act did not compel them to use 
 the stamps, but only to pay certain monies if they did use them ; 
 and that his Excellency's love and concern for them led him to fear 
 more for them than they did for themselves. After all, papers on 
 matters relating to the Crown were exempt from stamp. The spirit 
 which his Excellency had told them " attacks reputations and pulls 
 down houses " would yet be curbed by the law. But they declined 
 his Excellency's invitation to vote compensation to the persons 
 injured, not being yet convinced that this would not encourage future 
 outrages — and they gave a broad hint that some of those persons 
 did not deserve compensation. And they reminded him how, at the 
 ratification of Magna Charta, in the 37th year of Henry iii, sentence 
 of excommunication was pronounced against all who should make 
 statutes, or observe them, contrary to the provisions of the Great 
 Charter. Bernard, who had no adequate force behind him, was 
 obliged to hear it all. A Government which means to enforce its 
 laws and impose its taxes on a people at the other side of the world 
 must keep a large standing army out there, ready for an emergency. 
 There was no such army in America. 
 
 It would be interesting to know whose hand — whether Bute's, or 
 Grenville's, or the King's— guided our American policy at this crisis ; 
 who was responsible for the manner in which even Governors of 
 provinces and Judges were pressed into the service of the new Act, 
 and made stamp-distributors. But perhaps this was only due to the 
 extreme unpopularity of the stamps, which, by making all ordinary 
 officers afraid to touch them, rendered it necessary to fall back upon 
 the higher officials. That the colonists were determined could be seen 
 from the first moment. They allowed no possible doubt of that ; they 
 instantly fastened upon anyone, no matter what his office, who in 
 any degree allowed himself to appear as a " stamp-master," and by 
 remonstrance, or, if that failed, by threats and riotous assemblages, 
 they compelled him to resign his post, if he had already accepted it, 
 
 ' Long before there were any disorders, Governor Bernard had been advising 
 the repeal of the Charter. "It seems to me," he had said, "that the affairs of 
 America are becoming very critical ; that common expedients would soon begin 
 to fail, and that a general reformation of the American Governments would 
 
 become not only a desirable but a necessary measure. — Governor Bernard to , 
 
 Esq., July II, 1764. 
 
THE OCCURRENCES IN NORTH AMERICA 41 
 
 or to make oath that he would never accept it if he were not yet 
 appointed. From Governor Bernard downward, none dared persist in 
 the attempt to distribute the stamps, and so many were destroyed, 
 that by November i (the day appointed for the Act to become law) 
 not a sheet of stamped paper was to be had in any of the six New 
 England provinces, or in New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, 
 Virginia, Maryland, or the two Carolinas — except that small parcel 
 which Governor Golden had entrusted for safety to the Corporation 
 of New York. Most of the would-be distributors had fled. Not a 
 stamp was used for any purpose, except that of news-printing ; and 
 printers in Canada, where the Act was received, who used stamped 
 paper, could find no sale for their news. 
 
 Amidst these commotions came the news of the fall of the 
 Grenville Ministry. The bells were rung, and the effigies of the 
 ex-Ministers were hanged on the Boston trees, and afterwards 
 burnt in the bonfires. 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 THE FALL OF THE GRENVILLE CABINET 
 
 " His Majesty, offended in the highest degree with the insolence offered him by 
 his present Ministers, would have put any mortal in their places, that could have 
 carried on business, if the three great personages above mentioned [the Duke of 
 Cumberland, the Lord Chancellor and Lord Egmont] could have suggested to 
 him any plan for that purpose. And they undoubtedly vi'ould have done it if they 
 could ; as there is no animal on the face of the earth that the Duke has a more 
 thorough aversion to than Grenville." — Stuart MacKenzie to Mr. Mitchell, June 
 4, 1765. 
 
 The King's illness was described by the Court newsman as a bad 
 cold, and a pain in his chest. It was many years before the public 
 knew that this was the first visitation of a terrible mental affliction, 
 which returned more than once, and finally plunged in gloom the 
 last years of his reign. This first attack was brief, and in his Speech 
 from the Throne of April 24, he alluded to it as " not attended with 
 danger." But it was the occasion of the Regency Bill, and the 
 Regency Bill caused the fall of Grenville's Ministry. In the event 
 of the King's demise during the minority of the Prince of Wales, 
 who should be Regent of the Kingdom ? Not the Princess 
 Dowager ! " The old stubble of the Princess Dowager and Bute " 
 was set fire to once more. As the Bill was first drafted, it excluded 
 the King's Mother even from the Council of Regency; but 
 when it came down to the Commons, Bute's friends inserted the 
 Princess's name, in spite of Ministers; and in the course of an 
 angry discussion Grenville bluntly said he would agree to the 
 amendment, "but he had supposed the omission would be univers- 
 ally acceptable." From this time the King resolved to get rid of 
 him at whatever cost. 
 
 There was distress. Trade was very bad. The fact was that already 
 both England and America were suffering severely from the measures 
 which the promoters had declared would benefit both. In America, 
 commerce was at a standstill. The merchants of New England 
 held British goods to the amount of several millions sterling, but 
 
THE FALL OF THE GRENVILLE CABINET 43 
 
 they dared not sell, and their customers dared not buy. And the new 
 law about specie made it utterly impossible for the Americans to pay 
 their British creditors. The weavers said they were starving because 
 so many French silks were worn since the Peace ; but Opposition 
 retorted that the true reason was the loss of the American market. 
 The day the King went to give the Royal Assent to the Regency 
 Bill "he was followed by an incredible number of Spitalfields 
 weavers, with black flags, imploring his Majesty's gracious inter- 
 position on behalf of themselves and their wretched famiHes." Next 
 day. May 16, they assembled in Moorfields, and marched to St. 
 James's. They had already insulted the Duke of Bedford, and the 
 next night (after surrounding the Houses of Parliament) they began 
 to pull down his house in Bloomsbury Square— shouting that the 
 Duke had been bribed to make the Treaty of Fontainebleau, which 
 brought French silks and poverty into the land. The crisis was 
 very alarming, for there were riots in many places, and the sailors at 
 Portsmouth had mutinied. It began to be said that only Mr. Pitt 
 could set things straight. On the i6th, when Ministers went to 
 take his Majesty's commands for the prorogation, the King said he 
 would only have Parliament adjourned. They asked if he intended 
 to make any change. He replied, " Certainly, for I cannot bear it 
 as it is." 
 
 This time the Duke of Cumberland was sent to Hayes, to offer 
 Pitt almost anything he chose to ask. Pitt said he was ready to go 
 to St. James's "if he could carry the Constitution along with him." 
 The first thing the King demanded was that Northumberland should 
 be First Lord, and Pitt replied that he could not come in under 
 Bute's lieutenant. So Cumberland advised the King to continue 
 his present servants, and once more his Majesty was obliged to tell 
 Mr. Greenville he must go on. Grenville thereupon dictated to his 
 Sovereign the terms on which he would go on — his Majesty must 
 give his royal word never more to consult Lord Bute, and must 
 remove his lordship's brother, Mr. Stuart MacKenzie, from the Privy 
 Seal of Scotland, and the administration of that kingdom. Moreover, 
 the Marquis of Granby must be Captain-General of the Forces. 
 Almost speechless with anger, the King told Grenville to come 
 back for his answer at ten that night. But before that hour, he 
 sent Lord Chancellor Northington to say he would remove 
 MacKenzie — who had been with him in his closet, and had released 
 his Majesty from any promises made to him. Next morning 
 Grenville gave up Granby, but he still insisted on Bute, and gave 
 the King a fortnight to consider of it. 
 
 Grenville knew from Jenkinson that the King saw Bute con- 
 
44 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 stantly.i Negotiations with Pitt were resumed, and again fell 
 through — it has never been known why, as the King appears at 
 last to have yielded nearly everything. Somehow or other, Temple 
 was the cause of the final breakdown. On Saturday, June 22, 
 Pitt wrote to Temple that "things had advanced considerably," 
 that he " augured much good." On Monday, negotiations were 
 broken off by Temple. 
 
 It was manifestly impossible that the King's "present servants" 
 could " continue." The Duke of Cumberland made another attempt 
 to find somebody able to " carry on business." This time he went to 
 Newcastle. Newcastle had been forty-five years in the Cabinet, and 
 for thirty-two years had held high office. He had twice been Minister. 
 When he resigned to make way for Bute, in 1762, Newcastle went 
 out poorer than he came in. He was a very honest man, but he 
 was never very wise, and in his old age his blunders and absence of 
 mind furnished jests for the town. But he consented to join a new 
 Ministry, and in a very few days a Cabinet was formed, with the 
 Marquess of Rockingham as First Lord, General Conway and the 
 Duke of Grafton Secretaries of State, and Newcastle Lord Privy Seal. 
 
 Charles Watson Wentworth, second Marquess of Rockingham, 
 was descended from the sister of Thomas Wentworth, Earl of 
 Strafford, whose great estates this branch inherited. Rockingham 
 was one of the largest landowners in the kingdom. In politics he 
 was a sound constitutional Whig of sterling honesty, zealous for the 
 House of Hanover. He was perhaps the only politician of his 
 time who had never coquetted with Leicester House, or corre- 
 sponded with the party of prerogative. He was a man of good 
 sense and firmness, but not of brilliant talents or fluent eloquence. 
 He has been called a " speechless Minister," from the rareness 
 with which he addressed the Lords. But when he did address 
 them, it was always to the purpose. The unimpeachable integrity 
 of his public and private character was respected even by his 
 political enemies — he had no others. He differed from Pitt as to 
 the right of Parliament, and there was, unhappily, a want of cordiality 
 between them for which Pitt was chiefly to blame. Rockingham 
 had long been a friend and patron of Edmund Burke, and now 
 made him his private secretary. Burke's cousin, William, was 
 private secretary to Conway. 
 
 ' Jenkinson wrote to Grenville that the King and Bute wrote to each other 
 constantly : " The King sends him a journal of all that passes every day, as minute 
 as if your boy at school was directed by you to write his journal to you." — Letter 
 of July, 1765. 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 THE GREAT DEBATE 
 
 "The Opposition are for taking vigorous, as they call them, but I call them 
 violent measures ; not less than dragonades, and to have the tax collected by the 
 troops we have there. For my part, I never saw a froward child mended by 
 whipping ; and I would not have the mother-country become a step-mother. Our 
 trade to America brings in, ' communibus annis,' two millions a year, and the 
 stamp duty is estimated at but one hundred thousand a year." — Lord Chesterfield 
 to his Son, December, 1765. 
 
 "As it is, my resolution is taken ; and if I can crawl, or be carried, I will 
 deliver my heart and mind upon the state of America." — Pitt to Mr. Thomas 
 Nut hall, Bath, Jan. 9, 1 766. 
 
 " In a good cause, on a sound bottom, the force of this country can crush 
 America to atoms. . . . But on this ground, on the Stamp Act, when so many 
 here will think it a crying injustice, I am one who will lift up my hands against 
 it. In such a cause, your success would be hazardous. America, if she fell, 
 would fall like a strong man. She would embrace the pillars of the State, and 
 pull down the constitution along with her." — Speech of Mr. Pitt for the Repeal 
 of the Stamp Act, Jan. 14, 1766. 
 
 " The direful effects of that baneful oration will be but too visible in America. 
 What a pity it is that the old gentleman who pronounced it had not been then 
 better employed solacing his distempered joints with flannel, and cooling his over- 
 heated blood by a milk and water gruel diet." — " Astrea," in the New Daily 
 Advertiser oi'Fth, 11, 1 766. 
 
 ' ' That one man, by whom we have been led captive for many years, at 
 length has set us free. ... In the space of a few days, and even of a speech of 
 two hours, has he brought about this happy revolution. . . . The fall he has met 
 with will, I trust, be a caution to others against treading in the same steps. . . . 
 As the gentleman is now reduced to be but man, let his errors, his destructive 
 errors, be forgotten, and let him be like a dead man, out of mind. I congratulate 
 my country on this greatest victory which England has ever obtained : because 
 without one drop of blood, or a single guinea, America is now truly ours. " — 
 "A. B,," in the jVdze; Daily Advertiser oi ¥eh. 13, 1766. 
 
 It was become absolutely necessary to do something about America. 
 Our merchants were being ruined by being kept out of their money. 
 The Americans said they could not pay, and our merchants con- 
 fessed that the excuse was true. There was nothing between 
 enforcing the Stamp Act by fire and sword, and repealing it. 
 Repeal was violently opposed, a war of pamphlets was going on — 
 
46 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 those who were for repeal maintaining that the Stamp Act would 
 ruin Great Britain, while the other side declared that if the Colonies 
 were not promptly crushed, they would invade this country, and 
 reduce Englishmen to slavery ! ^ 
 
 It was not till the loth of January, 1766, that the Lords began 
 to consider the affairs of America. The King's Speech had been 
 almost entirely upon America, but it contained nothing to allay the 
 fears or the irritation of the Colonies. Orders to Governors and 
 Commanders of forces, to suppress tumults ; an appeal to both 
 Houses to preserve their just rights and authority ; a vague hint of 
 '' alterations in the commercial economy of the plantations," in the 
 mutual interest of " my kingdoms and colonies " ; and a concluding 
 sentence about the "assertion of legal authority,'' did not promise 
 as much conciliation as the new Ministry succeeded in carrying 
 out. 
 
 Petitions poured in — almost every manufacturing town in the 
 kingdom sent one. The petitions were all the same ; decay of 
 trade, owing to the new laws, — thousands of factory hands, seamen, 
 and labourers, out of employment, — exports less, because the 
 rice, indigo, tobacco, naval stores, oil, whale-fins, furs, potash, which 
 we used to receive for export, do not come, and, our factories being 
 at a standstill for raw material, we cannot manufacture for export. 
 Even the agent for Jamaica sent up a petition, setting forth the 
 ill consequences that had attended a Stamp Act there — and this 
 American Act will be as bad, or worse. There were only two 
 petitions from America — from the agents for Virginia and Georgia, 
 and it was understood that this was because the rest were so 
 disgusted at the disregard their petitions had met with last year. 
 
 The great debate took place that same day. It shows us the 
 battle joined, and the two principles of government-by-force and 
 government-by-consent arrayed against one another. 
 
 1 "The frequent invectives published against the Americans, to provoke the 
 nation to embrue its hands in their blood, can surely be of no advantage to this 
 country. . . . And can it be thought such writings (which are unfortunately 
 reprinted in all their papers) will induce them to bear it with greater patience ? . . . 
 The gentle terms of republican race, mixed rabble of Scotch, Irish and foreign 
 vagabonds, descendants of convicts, ungrateful rebels, etc. , are among those with 
 which our colonists have of late been treated." — Gentleman's Magazine, 1765. 
 
 " The Americans imbibe Notions of Independance and Liberty with their very 
 Milk, ancTwill some Time or other shake off all subjection. If we yield to them 
 by repealing the Stamp Act, it is all over : they will from that moment assert 
 their freedom. Whereas if we enforce the Act, we may keep them in Dependance 
 for some Years longer."— "Anti-Sejanus," in The Public Advertiser Feb. 12 
 1766. 
 
iiiii GREAT DEBATE 47 
 
 The debate in the Lords resolved itself into a duel between 
 Lord Chancellor Camden and Lord Chief-Justice Mansfield — once 
 Mr. Attorney-General Murray, so long the object of Pitt's invective. 
 It was even said he had asked for the Chief-Justiceship — so sacri- 
 ficing his certain expectation of the Chancellorship — because he was 
 in such haste to escape the terrible words and looks of Mr. Pitt, 
 who had a way of suddenly turning upon the Attorney-General 
 and fixing him with that eagle eye, while he dropped scathing hints 
 about the days when Mr. Murray was more than suspected of fetching 
 and carrying for the King over-the-water. 
 
 The debate was entirely upon the First Resolution of the " Report 
 of the Committee of the Whole House, relative to the disturbances 
 in America." This Resolution contained the famous "Statutory 
 Declaration " of the right of Great Britain to make laws and statutes 
 for America " in all cases whatever " — thus striking at the root of 
 the distinction between external and internal taxation, and placing 
 the provincial Representative Assemblies under the authority of the 
 British Parliament. 
 
 The dibbelievers in arbitrary right threw Mr. Locke, the Learned 
 Selden, Harrington and Puffendorff at their opponents, who replied 
 that these distinguished persons were only " natural lawyers,'' who 
 knew no law, or cared nothing for it if they did. Lord Lyttelton 
 said there could not be two rights existing at the same time — a 
 right in the Government to make laws, and a right in the people to 
 disobey them. Government " must rest somewhere," or there is an 
 end of all government. He clearly laid down the principle of 
 " inferior legislatures, with restrained powers, subject to the superior 
 legislature," and categorically denied the contention of the colonists 
 that the King alone could make a compact with them. Are the 
 Colonies a part of the dominions of the Crown of Great Britain or 
 not ? If not, you have no jurisdiction — but then you make them 
 independent communities. If they are, they are subjects of Great 
 Britain, and if you allow them to refuse to pay taxes we shall have 
 Englishmen refusing next. 
 
 Camden denied that he was admitting the independence of the 
 Colonies, in saying there are things which a supreme legislature 
 cannot do — it cannot take away private property without making 
 compensation, or condemn a man by a Bill of Attainder without 
 hearing him. The English clergy once denied the right of Parlia- 
 ment to tax them, and claimed the right to tax themselves. They 
 have now dropped that right, but then they now elect their own 
 representatives. The County Palatine of Lancaster taxed itself — 
 no less a person than the great Lord Chancellor Hale admitted the 
 
48 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 right. Guernsey, Jersey and the Isle of Man tax themselves. So 
 does Ireland. And, my lords, even supposing the Americans have 
 no exclusive right to tax themselves, I maintain it would be good 
 policy to give it them. 
 
 Mansfield, in a very long and able speech, laid it down that 
 the British Legislature "represents the whole British empire, and has 
 authority to bind every part and every subject without the least 
 distinction " ; also that the colonists " are more emphatically 
 subjects of Great Britain than those within the realm." Nor need 
 there be representation. Representation arose " by the favour 
 of the Crown." (Mansfield forgot how the Crown was persuaded 
 to grant this favour.) The great Companies — the Bank, the East 
 India and the South Sea Companies, have no representatives. He 
 concluded his very learned speech by a minute description of the 
 several Colonial Governments of North America.^ 
 
 Ex-Chancellor Northington's speech sums up the chief arguments 
 used by his side throughout the dispute with America : " Every 
 government can arbitrarily impose laws on all its subjects." He 
 reminded their lordships that the " Commonwealth Parliament " 
 (he meant the Long Parliament) was very jealous of the Colonies 
 separating themselves from us. But as for ancient history, I am 
 content to go back no further than the Revolution — King William 
 passed an Act declaring the power of the legislature over the 
 Colonies. Several colonies have actually fought each other over 
 differences — the cessation of our authority will result in endless 
 feuds. Are you going to tell the twelve millions of Great Britain 
 and Ireland that you prefer the colonists " who are got rich under 
 their protection " ? They are as much represented in Parliament as 
 the great majority of the people of England are; for of nine 
 millions of Englishmen, eight millions have no votes — but then 
 every Member of Parliament represents not only his own borough, 
 but also every other inhabitant of Great Britain and of the Colonies 
 and Dominions of Great Britain. Taxation would be far heavier 
 under their own government than under " our extreme lenity." My 
 lords, what have these favourite Americans done ? They have 
 called a meeting of their States, and have passed Resolutions, by 
 which, in my opinion, they have forfeited all their charters. My 
 lords, the Colonies are become too big to be governed by the laws 
 they at first set out with — it will be the policy of this country to 
 form a plan of laws for them. If they withdraw allegiance, you 
 must withdraw protection — and then "the little state of Genoa," 
 or Sweden, may soon overrun them ! 
 
 ' See note at end of this chapter. 
 
THE GREAT DEBATE 49 
 
 In the Commons it was a duel between Pitt and Grenville — 'the 
 brothers-in-law, once so closely knit in friendship, now at open 
 war. Pitt's speech is an epitome of his whole political career — it 
 shows us the man in his weakness and his strength, his glaring 
 inconsistencies, his flashes of inspiration. Since the British Parlia- 
 ment became the ruling power, three great magnetic personalities 
 have dominated the politics of their time — Thomas Wentworth, 
 William Pitt, and William Ewart Gladstone. Gladstone will be 
 found to have left the deepest mark on our policy, but for the 
 moment Pitt's influence was the most irresistible of all. He defied 
 all rules. Deeply as he was concerned in party politics, he was 
 never a party man. We shall understand him better if we realise 
 that his political creed contained but two dogmas — a passionate 
 care for the greatness of England, and a burning hatred of despotic 
 power. Between these two great cardinal principles, he oscillated 
 reckless of inconsistency. Even the masterful arrogance with which 
 his enemies justly reproached him played a secondary part, 
 compared with those two supreme considerations. His foibles, 
 his affectations, his amazing changes of front, just as they were 
 beginning to make him ridiculous, were suddenly consumed in the 
 fire of his passion. That passion, once aroused, swept all before 
 it. His oratory appalled the dilettante soul of Horace Walpole, 
 and silenced his adversaries, if it could not convince them. It has 
 been said that no reports of Pitt's speeches convey any idea of 
 the overwhelming effect they produced when uttered. But even 
 in the coldness of reported speech, some sentences still seem to 
 palpitate like flames of fire. 
 
 With all his faults, Pitt remains a great man, a great statesman, 
 a great Englishman, whose large and noble schemes soared as high 
 above the petty hand-to-mouth policy of the Whig opportunists as 
 they did above the reactionary schemes of Bute and the King. In 
 those four years of his " great administration," as it was fondly called, 
 he lifted England from humiliation and weakness to victory and 
 empire. The glory of it belonged to him, for he it was who planned 
 the expeditions which had such signal success. But he saw the 
 suicidal folly of England's attempting to make herself a great 
 military power. " Our natural strength is a maritime strength," he 
 said, "as trade is our natural employment." Now, in the great 
 crisis of his time, his voice rang out like a trumpet-call to rally 
 Englishmen round the standard of Freedom. 
 
 "As he always began very low, and as everybody was in 
 agitation at his first rising," his introduction was not heard, till he 
 asked that the proposed Address might be read a second time. 
 VOL. I. — ^ 
 
so ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 And then he fell upon the Grenvillites. " As to the late Ministry," 
 — and he turned to George Grenville, who sat within one of him — 
 " every capital measure they have taken, has been entirely wrong ! " 
 He damned the new Ministry with faint praise, uttered the famous 
 sentence about confidence being a plant of slow growth in an aged 
 breast, and hinted that they were under "an over-ruling influence" 
 —meaning Bute's. Then he vindicated himself— still glancing 
 at " influence." He reminded the House that he was away ill when 
 the resolution was taken to tax America — if he could have borne to 
 have been carried in his bed, he would have got some kind hand 
 to lay him down on the floor of that House, that he might testify 
 against the tax. The only question of greater importance than 
 this, was "the question debated a hundred years ago, whether 
 you yourselves were to be bound or free.'' We have no right to 
 tax the Colonies. Taxes are a voluntary gift of the Commons alone.i 
 The distinction between legislation and taxation is essential to 
 liberty. The idea of "virtual representation'' of the Colonies does 
 not deserve a serious refutation. " Is an American represented by 
 any representative of a borough — which, perhaps, its own represent- 
 ative never saw ? " And then, with one of his flashes of clair- 
 voyance, he exclaimed, "This is what is called 'the rotten part of 
 our constitution.' It cannot continue the century ; if it does not 
 drop, it must be amputated." 
 
 There was silence when he ceased. At last, Conway got up, 
 and said a few words, and then Grenville rose. He censured the 
 Ministry for losing time. The disturbances in America began in 
 July — this is the middle of January, and nothing has been done. 
 At first, they were only " occurrences," now they are grown to 
 disturbances that seem to border on open rebellion ; and " if the 
 doctrine I have heard this day be confirmed, will soon be revolution." 
 What is the difference between external and internal taxes ? It is 
 granted that this kingdom has the supreme legislative power over 
 America, and taxation is part of the sovereign power. When I 
 proposed the tax, I asked the House if any gentleman would object 
 to this right — no man would attempt to deny it. Great Britain 
 protects America, and America is bound to yield obedience. The 
 nation has run itself into an immense debt to give them protection, 
 and they refuse to contribute a small share of the expense. But 
 "the seditious spirit of the colonies owes its birth to the factions in 
 the House. Gentlemen are careless of the consequences of what 
 they say, provided it answers the purposes of opposition. . . . Let 
 us only hold out a little, they will say ; our friends will soon be in 
 ' In the days of our Plantagenet Kings they were called " benevolences." 
 
THE GREAT DEBATE 51 
 
 power. Ungrateful people of America ! . . . You have given 
 bounties on their lumber, their iron, their hemp . . . you have 
 relaxed in their favour the Act of Navigation, that palladium of 
 British commerce ; and yet I have been abused in all the public 
 papers as an enemy to the trade of America ! " 
 
 When Grenville sat down, " Mr. Pitt seeming to rise,'' the 
 House insisted on hearing him, and would not listen to Lord 
 Strange's point of order. Pitt's second speech — he said it was 
 only the end of the first — was stronger still. "I have been 
 charged," he said, "with giving birth to sedition in America. . . . 
 Freedom of speech has become their crime. Sorry I am to hear 
 the liberty of speech in this House imputed as a crime, but it is a 
 liberty I mean to exercise." And then he burst out, "The 
 gentleman tells us, America is obstinate; America is almost in 
 open rebellion. I rejoice that America has resisted. Three 
 millions of people, so dead to all the feelings of liberty, as volun- 
 tarily to submit to be slaves, would have been fit instruments to 
 make slaves of the rest.'' He said there were not wanting some, 
 when he had the honour to serve his Majesty, to propose to him 
 to burn his fingers with an American Stamp Act. And then he 
 went off into an inconsistent declaration that "our legislative 
 power over the colonies is sovereign and supreme," except in the 
 matter of taxation ; forgetting that authority ceases to be supreme 
 the moment a people acquires the right to tax itself. But it was a 
 great speech ; its echoes lingered long in the people's memory, and 
 England will cease to be England when it is forgotten. He ended : 
 " I beg leave to tell the House what is really my opinion. It is 
 that the Stamp Act be repealed absolutely, totally, and immediately. 
 Let the reason assigned be, that the tax was founded on an 
 erroneous principle. And then, insist as much as you like on 
 your sovereign authority over the colonies, say that we may bind 
 their trade, confine their manufactures, exercise any power 
 whatever, except that of taking their money out of their pockets 
 without their consent." 
 
 After Pitt, Nicholson Calvert rose. He said he had changed 
 his mind — last year he voted for the Stamp Act, because he 
 then thought nothing could be more fair than that America should 
 pay for the force which was to protect her. But since then Mr. 
 Pitt's arguments had sunk deep into his mind, especially as to the 
 colonists having carried with them to America all the rights of 
 Englishmen. "I saw the right honourable gentleman's reasoning 
 founded on the broad basis of liberty." Two principles are set 
 before us — the one, that in all free countries no one can be taxed 
 
52 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 but by himself; the other, that in all countries in the world, there 
 is some one supreme legislature. This House has resolved that 
 Great Britain has this supreme power, and with it the right to tax 
 her Colonies. But is it prudent to assert that right at this moment ? 
 And then he used words which now appear prophetic. " Sir, it has 
 always been my opinion, to lay any taxes upon a numerous people, 
 situated as the Americans are, without their consent, is impossible. 
 It is a widely different thing, sir, the quelling a paltry riot in 
 Moorfields, or Bloomsbury Square,^ to that of making two 
 millions of people, distributed from one corner of the American 
 continent to the other — all unanimous in the opinion of right 
 being on their side — submit to your decisions. It matters little 
 to the question, whether they are in the right or not : they think 
 themselves so. Can this be done by force? The thought of 
 putting it to the trial, sir, strikes me with horror ! Let us not, sir, 
 drive them to despair; the despair of a brave people always turns to 
 courage.^'' 
 
 Note. — Mansfield told the Lords there were three sorts of Colonies in America : 
 King's Provinces, Proprietary Provinces, and Charter Provinces. The King's 
 Provinces are governed by instructions sent to the Governors, who after some 
 time are directed to call Assemblies, and they have the power to make bye-laws 
 for interior government, etc. Pennsylvania and Maryland are Proprietary. 
 Maryland was granted to Lord Baltimore to be held as the County of Durham — 
 which, before it was represented in Parliament, had by Charter a subordinate 
 power to make laws, so as the same were not contrary to those of England. 
 Pennsylvania was granted to William Penn, and the Penns are ' ' Proprietary 
 Kings," and can raise money and make laws. "The Pennsylvanians are 
 among the loudest of those who complain of the Stamp Act . . . they use the 
 King of Great Britain as they do their own Proprietary King." Virginia, 
 Connecticut, Rhode Island and Massachusetts are Charter Governments. 
 " These are all on the same footing as our great corporations in London." And 
 as the Charter of Massachusetts was "vacated in Chancery in Charles It's 
 time for their abuse of it," Mansfield held that it was impossible to suppose the 
 sole power of laying taxes could be in a legislature which our Courts of Chancery 
 or King's Bench could destroy. — Speech in the House of Lords, Feb. 10, 1766. 
 
 ' The allusion is to the Weavers' Demonstration, the day the Regency Bill 
 received the Royal Assent, 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 FRANKLIN 
 
 "When the peace came, and I understood that we had got all America for 
 ourselves, I thought it would be a grand thing for old England ; and that our 
 fellow-subjects in that part of the world would trade with us more exclusively 
 than ever, and be ready to contribute more to the payment of our debts and 
 taxes. . . . When I heard that they were mobbing the King's officers, and 
 declaring openly that the Parliament of England had no right to tax them, I 
 was as much astonished as if a field where I had sown barley should turn up 
 peas. ... It is a great encouragement for the Americans to rebel, when some 
 of our great men at home tell them they are in the right, and the Parliament in 
 the wrong. . . . These are rare times, indeed, Mr. Printer. If we were all 
 of one mind, which common-sense and common honesty should make us to be, 
 upon such an occasion as this, the Americans durst not rebel. ... In my 
 poor opinion, some of our great men do not believe in a future judgment, or 
 else they would never act such a wicked part in this world." — ^John Ploughshare, 
 in the London Daily Chronicle, Feb. 18-20, 1766. 
 
 "The Americans have been increasing in riches these thirty years; . . . 
 they are become at our expense, and for which we are starving, proud, lordly, 
 and ambitious. . . . When once they become independent, they will trade 
 where, and with whom they please. Where then will be your trade ? And how 
 will you then get bread ? . . . where will money be found to pay our taxes and 
 the interest of our debt ? . . . Shall those who have so lately made France and 
 Spain tremble in every quarter of the globe ... be afraid of chastising an 
 American mob, a handful of rioters stimulated to rebellion by their lordly 
 tyrants ? Forbid it, Heaven ! Shall we be eternally taxed even to the utter- 
 most farthing for others? Would ye wish the Americans should lord 
 it over you like the Egyptian task-masters?" — "A Short a:nd Friendly 
 Caution to the good People of England," quoted in the Chronicle of Feb. 
 25-27, 1766. 
 
 In the interval between the 14th of January and the passing of the 
 Bill in the Commons, petitions for repeal had been pouring in from 
 the merchants of almost every great town in the Kingdom — London, 
 Bristol, Lancaster, Liverpool, Hull, Glasgow, York; and Dr. 
 Franklin had been examined before a Committee of the whole 
 House. His examination is given in Hansard. 
 
 Asked if he did not know that the stamp money was to be 
 spent in America, Franklin replied that it would be spent " in the 
 
 5.1 
 
54 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 conquered colonies " — meaning Louisiana and Florida^ — " where 
 the soldiers are, not in the colonies that pay it." Asked if the 
 balance of trade would not bring the money back to the old 
 colonies, he replied that very little would come back. " I know of 
 no trade to bring it back. I think it would come directly to 
 England." He put the numbers of Quakers in Pennsylvania at 
 about a third — out of a total white population of about 160,000, 
 and the Germans at another third. Many of these Germans had 
 seen service as soldiers, both in Europe and America. Asked if 
 they were as much dissatisfied as the English, he replied, " More 
 so, as, in many cases, their stamps would be double." He gave 
 the male white population of North America at 300,000 from 16 
 to 60 years of age. He showed that the chief trade of Pennsylvania 
 was with the West Indies, and the French, Spaniards, Danes, and 
 Dutch, who traded in turn with Spain, Portugal, and Italy. Asked 
 if it was not right that America should pay for our protection, he 
 denied the fact, and said that in the late war the colonists 
 raised, clothed, and paid 25,000 men, and spent as many 
 millions. Asked if they were not reimbursed by Parliament, he 
 said that only a very small part of the expense was covered by the 
 sum voted. 
 
 When he was asked whether he thought the colonists would 
 pay a moderated stamp duty, he replied, "No, never, unless 
 compelled by force of arms." " What was the temper of America 
 towards Great Britain before 1763?" — "The best in the world. 
 They submitted willingly — they cost you nothing in forts, citadels, 
 garrisons, or armies, to keep them in subjection. They were 
 governed by this country at the expense of a little pen, ink, and 
 paper. They were led by a thread. They had not only a respect, 
 but an affection for Great Britain . . . even a fondness for its 
 fashions ... to be an Old-England man . . . gave a kind of 
 rank among us." ^ 
 
 "And what is your temper now?" — "Oh, very much 
 altered." s 
 
 "In what light did the people of America use to consider the 
 
 ' Canada, Nova Scotia, and Florida had accepted the Stamp Act. " In 
 Nova Scotia, they have burnt the Stamp Act, but use the Stamps." — Gentleman! s 
 Magazine. 
 
 ^ " I have lived many years in different provinces of North America, and 
 never knew a native of that land disloyal : they affectionately doated upon their 
 King, and prided themselves in their Country and home, as they called England." 
 — " Pro Patria," New Daily Advertiser, Feb. 27, 1766. 
 
 ^"National grievances are eternally liable to national resentments."^ 
 " Omega," in the New Daily Advertiser, March 2, 1766. 
 
FRANKLIN 55 
 
 Parliament of Great Britain ? " — " They considered the Parliament 
 as the great bulwark and the security of their liberties and 
 privileges. . . ." 
 
 " And have they not still the same respect for Parliament ? " — 
 " No ; it is greatly lessened." 
 
 Asked if he thought the colonists would submit to any future 
 tax, imposed on the same principle with that of the Stamp Act, 
 he replied, "They would not pay it." 
 
 Asked if he thought they could possibly do without cloth from 
 England, he said he believed, before their own clothes were worn 
 out they would have new ones of their own making. 
 
 " Can they possibly find wool enough in North America ? " — 
 " They have taken steps to increase the wool. They entered into 
 a general combination to eat no more lamb, and very few lambs 
 were killed last year. This course will soon make a prodigious 
 difference in the quantity of wool." 
 
 He added that great manufactories like those in England were 
 not necessary — the people would spin for themselves, in their own 
 houses. 
 
 Franklin further said that he thought the " resolutions of right " 
 would give the colonists very little concern, if they were never 
 PUT IN PRACTICE. He instanced Ireland, " where they know you 
 claim the same right, but you never exercise it." 
 
 Towards the end, he seems to have made a speech. He told 
 them that the Colonies would never yield, that they considered they 
 had always shown themselves ready to contribute even above their 
 abilities, and England had showed that she thought so too, by 
 voting them a large sum in compensation.^ He enumerated several 
 expeditions in which they had assisted us — among others, that 
 against Carthagena, in 1739.^ Nor did they require help against 
 the Indians. When they were but a handful they had defended 
 themselves successfully. Now they were much stronger, while 
 
 ^ " Resolved : That it is the opinion of this committee, that it is just and 
 reasonable that the several provinces and colonies of Massachusetts Bay, New 
 Hampshire, Connecticut, and Rhode Island, be reimbursed the expenses they 
 have been at in taking and securing to the crown of Great Britain, the island of 
 Cape Breton and its dependencies." — Committee of the House of Commons, 
 April 4, 1748. 
 
 ^ In the Seven Years' War, 9000 provincials marched from the northern 
 districts on one expedition. Connecticut had 5000 under arms. Massachusetts 
 raised 7000 militia, and taxed herself 13s. 4d. in the £, of personal income. 
 In every year of the Seven Years' War, New Jersey spent £1 a head for each 
 inhabitant. Pennsylvania alone spent about ;^'5oo,ooo, and the whole re- 
 imbursements to the Colonies did not exceed ;^6o,ooo. 
 
S6 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 the Indians were diminished. "They are very able to defend 
 themselves." 
 
 Lastly, he was asked whether, if the Stamp Act were repealed, 
 the colonists would erase from their records the resolutions 
 against the right of Great Britain to tax them ? And would they 
 acknowledge that right ? To which he replied, " No, never . . . 
 they will never do it, unless compelled by force of arms." 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 THE REPEAL OF THE STAMP ACT 
 
 " An event that caused more universal joy throughout the British dominions 
 than perhaps any other that can be remembered." — Burke in the "Annual 
 Register," 1766. 
 
 " Happy, indeed, vifas the scene of this glorious morning (for at past one we 
 divided), when the sun of liberty shone once more upon a country too long 
 benighted." — Pitt to Lady Chatham, Feb. 22, past four, 1766. 
 
 "Joy to you, my dear love. The joy of thousands is yours, under Heaven, 
 who has crovnied your endeavours with such happy success." — Lady Chatham to 
 Pitt, Feb. 22, 1766. 
 
 "The whole trading interest of this empire, crammed into your lobbies, with 
 a trembling and anxious expectation, waited, almost to a winter's return of light, 
 their fate from your resolution. When at length you had determined in their 
 favour, and your doors thrown open showed them the figure of their deliverer - . . 
 from the whole of that grave multitude there arose an involuntary burst of 
 gratitude and transport. They jumped upon him like children on a long absent 
 father. . . . All England, all America, joined in his applause. Nor did he 
 seem insensible to the best of all earthly rewards, the love and admiration of 
 his fellow-citizens. I stood near him : and his face, to use the expression of the 
 Scripture of the first martyr, ' his face was as if it had been the face of an angel.' " 
 — Burke's Speech on American Taxation, April 19, 1774. 
 
 The Bill for the Repeal of the Stamp Act was moved in the House 
 of Commons on Friday, February 21, by General Conway. "Mr. 
 Pitt," says the Gentleman's Magazine, "went to the House upon 
 crutches, which was the fullest ever known, and the subject before 
 the House the most important." And the Annual Register 
 notes that by eight in the morning, members began to take their 
 seats "by pinning down a ticket with their names." There were 
 442 members present. 
 
 The Lobby was full of American merchants, and persons whose 
 interests had suffered by the Stamp Act. 
 
 The Bill was passed after one o'clock on Saturday morning, by 
 
 a majority of 275 to 161, and was carried up to the Lords "in a 
 
 sort of tumultuous triumph " by more than twa hundred members. 
 
 Then they came out into the shouting streets. The great news 
 
 had preceded them. When Pitt appeared, "all hats were in the 
 
 57 
 
58 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 air,'' and a crowd accompanied his chair to his own door. When 
 Granville came out, he was greeted with a storm of hisses and 
 curses. He lost his temper, and seized one man by the throat — 
 for a moment it seemed as though there might be bloodshed. But 
 the captive only said, " If I may not hiss, sir, I hope I may laugh," 
 and laughed in the Gentle Shepherd's face. 
 
 As the news spread — and it spread like wild-fire — the bells of 
 the city churches rang a joyful peal, and kept on all that day, the 
 bells of St. Michael-upon-Cornhill finishing up at near midnight 
 with "forty-five platoons." Shops and coffee-houses were illuminated, 
 the King's health was drunk, and the American traders in the river 
 got out the American colours, ready for celebrating the great day 
 when the Bill should become law. 
 
 More than three thousand letters with the joyful news were 
 despatched that Saturday night ("from the General Post Office in 
 Lombard Street ") by merchants to their correspondents in Great 
 Britain and Ireland. 
 
 It was the same in Boston. When the news came, the bells 
 were set ringing, the ships in the harbour displayed their colours, 
 guns were fired from all the batteries, and in the evening there were 
 bonfires. A day of general rejoicing was appointed, the morning 
 of which was ushered in with music, ringing of bells, and discharge 
 of cannon. Ships and houses displayed flags. At one in the after- 
 noon, "the castle, and batteries, and train of artillery, discharged 
 their ordnance, and at night the whole town was most beautifully 
 illuminated. On the Common, a magnificent pyramid was erected, 
 with 280 lamps (the number that voted for repeal),'^ the four 
 upper rows being ornamented with the figures of their Majesties, 
 and fourteen of the worthy patriots who distinguished themselves 
 by their love of liberty.'' 
 
 At Philadelphia, the principal inhabitants gave a great entertain- 
 ment to the Governor ; and after the feast, they passed a resolution, 
 that " to demonstrate our zeal to Great Britain, and our gratitude 
 for the repeal of the Stamp Act, each of us will, on the 4th of June 
 next, being the birthday of our Most Gracious Sovereign George iii, 
 dress ourselves in a new suit of the manufactures of England, and 
 give what homespun we have to the poor." And South Carolina 
 sent money to England for a marble statue of Mr. Pitt. 
 
 Meanwhile, the Tory Press poured forth its venom, fiercely 
 
 denouncing the Bill, representing the Colonies as grown rich and 
 
 insolent, and dangerous to our very existence, unless we kept them 
 
 well down ; above all, abusing Mr. Pitt, who was freely called a 
 
 ' The number is as given. 
 
THE REPEAL OF THE STAMP ACT 59 
 
 traitor. One of the worst of these " monsters," as someone calls 
 them for trying to inflame the public, was the infamous "Anti- 
 Sejanus," James Scott, Lord Sandwich's chaplain, who, while curry- 
 ing favour by sham attacks on " the Thane," 1 cried for the sword to 
 silence American complaints.^ 
 
 It was said by those who would rather not have seen it repealed 
 at all, that, if the Stamp Act must be repealed, it should be done by 
 a new Parliament, that the foolish spectacle might not be offered to 
 the world of the same legislative assembly making and unmaking a 
 law within a few months. But time pressed. In the state of trade, 
 and of the people's temper, with a " Favourite " working in the dark 
 on a young King's notions of "high prerogative," it was not safe to 
 wait. A false step in politics can seldom be wholly retrieved, and 
 the greater the error the more difficult and hazardous will be the 
 reparation, even though reparation be the only way of escape. But 
 the Court party were not idle. The pamphleteers were at their 
 deadly work, inflaming the public against the colonists.' 
 
 His Majesty had said he would sooner see the devil come into 
 his closet than Mr. Grenville ; but a very few days after the great 
 debate, Bute tried to bring him back. Temple angrily refused to 
 see Bute, but Bedford and Grenville met the Favourite at Lord 
 Eglington's. Pitt heard of the meeting, and in his speech on the 
 Third Reading, taxed Grenville with it. Grenville replied that the 
 conversation was only how to prevent repeal. Next, Rockingham 
 was told that the King was against it — Lord Strange went about 
 saying so. Rockingham put the question to his Majesty, who 
 denied, though he refused to sign an opinion in favour of the Bill. 
 
 Rockingham refused to leave the presence until the King dis- 
 avowed Strange in writing. Few thought that Ministers could go 
 on.* On nearly the last day of February, Rockingham called Mr. 
 Nuthall into his coach in Palace Yard, and charged him with a 
 
 1 Bute. 
 
 ^ "Had this Ministry sent a couple of frigates to vapour about Boston, and 
 ordered the like number to attend New York and Philadelphia, with directions 
 to threaten, when the hired tumults began to show their airs, the Stamp Act 
 had been long before now complied with." — " A Real Patriot," in the New Daily 
 Advertiser, Feb. 14, 1766. 
 
 ^ " That seditious spirit, so apparent among these half Indians, must either be 
 quelled or government must entirely cease in the disobedient provinces. That 
 democratic madness, now so universal here, must either be weeded up, or we 
 must soon expect to see the same weapon drawn upon Britain within this island." 
 — " Astrea," in the Gazetteer and New Daily Advertiser, Feb. II, 1766. 
 
 * Rockingham told the King that the officers of the Royal Household "acted 
 like a corps." 
 
6o ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 message to Pitt, offering to meet him. Pitt replied, courteously 
 declining a conference, unless his Majesty expressly commanded 
 him. His Majesty was said to have put a stop to the plan ; but it 
 is curious that at this particular moment a rumour should have got 
 about that Pitt would go into the House of Lords. Meanwhile it 
 was noticed that the King treated with extreme coldness all who had 
 voted for repeal. 
 
 The detested Cider Tax was also repealed, and the duties on 
 houses and windows. An advantageous peace was concluded with 
 Catherine ii, the affair of the Canada Bills was settled, a little was 
 even done towards setthng the Manilla Ransom. And on the 
 23rd of April the House resolved "That a General Warrant to 
 apprehend the author, printer, or publisher of a libel, is illegal ; and 
 if executed on the person of a member of this House, is also a 
 breach of the privilege of this House.'' 
 
CHAPTER X 
 THE MUTINY ACT 
 
 " If we look back into the history of this country, sir, we shall find, that when- 
 ever men of n particular cast of mind, known by the name of Tories, get any 
 footing in the Government, violent measures ensue. If there are any such in 
 the present Administration ... let them recollect Sylla precipitated the 
 Romans into liberty ; Augustus, who best knew mankind, gently led them into 
 slavery." — Speech by Mr. Nicholson Calvert, in the Debate on the dismission of 
 General Conway, March 4, 1765. 
 
 "If care is taken that none shall be preferred to be judges, justices of the 
 peace, assembly men, or even attornies, who will not make a previous solemn 
 declaration of the supreme power of the British Parliament in America, the mis- 
 chief-making monster Sedition will be banished from that country with the utmost 
 expedition." — " Britannia," in the New Daily Advertiser, March 5, 1766. 
 
 " In the first place, gentlemen, you are to consider that a great empire, like a 
 great cake, is most easily diminished at the edges. Turn your attention, there- 
 fore, first to your REMOTEST provinces : that, as you get rid of them, the rest 
 may follow in order. . . . Take special care the provinces ... do not 
 enjoy the same common rights, the same privileges in commerce, and that they 
 are governed by severer laws, all your making . . . you are to suppose them 
 ALWAYS INCLINED TO REVOLT, and trust them accordingly. Quarter troops 
 among them, who by their insolence may provoke the rising of mobs." — Rules for 
 reducing a Great Empire to a Small one (Franklin). 
 
 If there was never such joy as at the repeal of the Stamp Act, never 
 was joy so premature. Repeal removed a symptom, but left the 
 cause of the mischief untouched. Pitt appears as the greatest 
 statesman of his time in nothing more than his far-seeing com- 
 prehension of the position which Colonies must hold, if they are 
 to be permanently united with the Mother Country. His fierce 
 opposition to the "Declaratory Act" was justified by the event. 
 But even most of the repealers clung to the idea of a " supreme " 
 Parliament, standing between the King and a number of little 
 parliaments. They were incensed when the Colonial Houses of 
 Representatives put themselves on an equality with the Parliament 
 of Westminster, and claimed the same rights and privileges. They 
 could not understand the demands of the colonists to be considered 
 as so many English counties, which happened to be on the other 
 
 61 
 
62 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 side of the world, and their representatives as on the same footing 
 as the representatives of Devon or Yorkshire. The contention 
 that the Assemblies were sister Parliaments seemed monstrous — 
 the distinction they drew between being subject to the King or 
 subject to the Parliament seemed hypocritical. The British Parlia- 
 ment claimed what it called " supremacy," and insisted on its right 
 to meddle as much as it chose in the affairs of people who were 
 its subjects. Against this view Pitt thundered in vain. It was 
 said that any limitation of the power of Parliament was humiliating, 
 and Opposition tried hard to make repeal conditional on the 
 provincial legislatures erasing the resolutions they had passed against 
 the Stamp Act. A large party in the Rockingham Cabinet was in 
 favour of the "statutory declaration," which affirmed the absolute 
 right of Parliament over the Colonies. On the 3rd of January, 1766, 
 the right of Parliament to tax the Colonies was carried almost 
 unanimously in spite of Pitt ; and in the first flush of relief and 
 thankfulness the colonists themselves took little note of it. But it 
 was there, like a sting left in a wound, ready to set up fresh 
 irritation on the first occasion. And the Mutiny Bill instantly 
 furnished the occasion. 
 
 The Mutiny Bill was ostensibly an Act "for punishing mutiny 
 and desertion, and for the better payment of the army and their 
 quarters." It was really a Billetting Act, and was renewed yearly. 
 Granville, in passing the Stamp Act, was so well aware he would 
 offend America, that the Mutiny Bill of 1765 at first contained a 
 clause for the quartering of soldiers in private houses. So much 
 pressure was put on Government by the Colonial Agents, that this 
 clause was dropped ; but another new clause was retained, which 
 ordered the troops to be provided with quarters, firing, bedding, 
 candles, small beer or rum, salt, vinegar, etc. This clause was 
 identical in principle with the Stamp Act, and was introduced 
 expressly to show our right to modify internal arrangements ; but 
 the colonists were in high good-humour at repeal, and as the 
 Mutiny Act expired and was renewed every year, they resolved to 
 obey only those provisions which were not new, and thus make 
 compliance appear voluntary. 
 
 Even those who could not understand the opposition to the 
 Stamp Act, might have realised the effect likely to be produced by 
 a loosely worded demand for the support of troops not even limited 
 as to number.! But no sooner had the Rockingham Ministry 
 repealed the Stamp Act than it renewed the Mutiny Act, with the 
 obnoxious clauses. Franklin had told the House of Commons 
 ' It was, however, understood that the number would be about 10,000. 
 
THE MUTINY ACT 63 
 
 that he did not think the mere Declaration of the right of Parliament 
 to impose internal taxes on America would do any harm, provided 
 THE RIGHT WAS NEVER EXERCISED. The Mutiny Bill did exercise 
 it ; and before the grateful addresses on repeal from the Colonies 
 could reach England, there was a new ferment — this time, in New 
 York. 
 
 The New York Assembly refused to comply with the new 
 clauses, and justified the refusal in an Address to the Governor. 
 The Act was so carelessly drafted that the form of requisition was 
 unconstitutional. It seemed to have meant originally only the 
 furnishing of these things to soldiers on the march — now it was 
 interpreted to mean the furnishing them for the whole year. More- 
 over, the number of troops was not specified. It would be a breach 
 of the Assembly's most sacred trust if it loaded the people with 
 burdens they were incapable of supporting — as interpreted by the 
 Governor, the Act required that the troops should be quartered 
 during the whole year in a very unusual and expensive manner. 
 If, however, the Assembly received " a proper requisition from the 
 Crown," it was ready to take a fair share with the other colonieSj 
 and find barracks, bedding, kitchen utensils, etc., for two battalions 
 of five hundred men each, and one company of artillery, for one 
 year — and to pay for this, there is the £,Z9°° which General 
 Amherst left in the Treasury, to be returned to the province. It 
 added that it looked on this Act as virtually as much an Act for 
 laying taxes on America as the Stamp Act itself 
 
 Governor Moore replied that he was much concerned to find 
 their sentiments so much differing from his own; and should send 
 their Address to the Secretary of State, to be laid before his 
 Majesty. 
 
 As was inevitable, there was friction between the people and the 
 soldiers. In New York city the soldiers took to cutting down the 
 " Liberty tree " on the Common, and as often as they did so the 
 citizens turned out and set up another. In July, 1766, Major- 
 General Gage^ wrote that the 28th regiment, sent into Duchess 
 County to quell " some dangerous riots," had been fired upon by 
 the rioters. There had also been " skirmishes " in Albany County, 
 a few killed and wounded on both sides, and a good many prisoners 
 taken. A captain and fifty men had been left to guard the gaols, 
 and the rest of the regiment had brought the ringleaders into New 
 York. About the same time that this letter arrived came another 
 from Governor Ward, of Rhode Island, full of joy and hope — " this 
 
 ^ Gage was a son of Lord Gage. He fought at CuUoden, and received a 
 medal from the Duke of Cumberland. He was with Braddock, 
 
64 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 most happy occasion,'' " wise, upright, and benevolent measures " of 
 the British Parliament ; " joy, tranquillity and happiness " diffused 
 thereby throughout the Colonies. 
 
 In Boston, the new Assembly was every whit as unsubmissive 
 as the old one. It had a long wrangle with Bernard over the 
 Compensation Bill. It charged Bernard with having interpreted 
 his Majesty's recommendation to make up the losses in the riots, 
 as "a requisition peremptory and authoritative." Compensation 
 would be generosity, not justice, — it could only be made with the 
 express consent of the constituents, — the matter must therefore be 
 adjourned to the next sitting. The Governor replied that his 
 Majesty seemed to be graciously pleased to throw a veil over the 
 late disturbances, provided the Bostonians were all very good boys 
 for the future ; but the King and Parliament were quite determined 
 the sufferers should be compensated — on the score of mere justice 
 and humanity — and he talked about the blessings derived from 
 SUBJECTION to Great Britain. 
 
 The Council changed the word to relation ; and the Assembly, 
 though it retained "subjection," took care to observe that "the 
 CONNECTION with the Mother Country is founded on the principles of 
 filial obedience, protection, and justice." 
 
 The Assembly was determined that compensation should appear 
 as a voluntary act, but the British Government thought this was 
 not for the dignity of Great Britain ; so when application was made 
 to the Lords of the Treasury for the money due to the colony by 
 grant of Parliament, for services during the war, instead of making 
 this an opportunity for renewing the old goodwill, their lordships 
 replied that they meant to keep back the money till compensation 
 was made to the sufferers in the late dangerous riots. Bernard 
 wrote to Shelburne that the town wanted to make the province 
 pay part of the compensation, but Boston ought to pay all, for the 
 riots were generally abhorred by the best men in the province, and 
 by much the greater part of the common people. At last, on 
 December 6, the Compensation Bill passed, but it contained an 
 indemnity clause for all offences committed during the agitation. 
 New York also passed a Compensation Bill, but it described the 
 sum as intended "for charitable purposes," and did not include 
 compensation for Colden's chariot.^ 
 
 Conway had been much blamed by George Grenville for the 
 expression "forgive and forget," ^ in his circular letter to his 
 
 ■■ Colden claimed ^£'195, 3s. 
 
 ^ "You would think it scarce possible, I imagine, that the paternal care of his 
 Majesty for his colonies, or the lenity and indulgence of the parliament should 
 
THE MUTINY ACT 65 
 
 Majesty's Governors in America. Bernard, however, gave 
 Massachusetts no chance of forgetting. Even in congratulating 
 the Assembly on the repeal of the Stamp Act, he could not help 
 sneering at "the borrowed mask of patriotic zeal," and lecturing 
 them on "the late disgraceful scenes." And as soon as the 
 Compensation Bill was through, he got into other wrangles, and 
 a good deal of nagging went on. More serious questions arose — 
 the Mutiny Act, and the question of the Council. Bernard was 
 determined to have the Lieutenant-Governor on the Council ; the 
 Assembly, incensed at Hutchinson's support of the Stamp Act, 
 were equally determined not to have him. 
 
 Few things in the history of this struggle are more tragic than 
 the fate of Thomas Hutchinson. In any other times he would 
 have left behind him one of the most respectable names in the 
 history of Massachusetts. His great abilities, his tenacity of 
 purpose, his strong common-sense, only served to blast his fame. 
 As we read the diaries in which he opens his heart, we realise that 
 to himself he appeared an honest man and a faithful servant, He 
 was a man of education — even of culture, and his History of 
 Massachusetts is a monument to his love for his country. Yet he 
 turned the hearts of his countrymen from him, and he died in 
 exile, broken-hearted, believing himself a victim to personal 
 rancours and trivial interests, refusing to the last to recognise 
 the great principles inspiring the contest in which he had been 
 worsted. 
 
 Hutchinson and Oliver were now two of the most unpopular 
 men in Massachusetts. Bernard resolved to have them both on 
 the Council. On the 4th of February, a Committee of Assembly 
 waited on the Governor to remonstrate on his action in ordering 
 provision to be made for the artillery companies at the Castle. 
 The originating, granting, and disposing of taxes was by the Charter 
 the privilege of their House. His Excellency, by his order, had 
 put it out of their power to testify, by an act of their own, the 
 cheerfulness they had always shown in granting aids to his Majesty. 
 Why was the matter not laid before them last session? Bernard 
 replied that they passed the Compensation Bill with only six days 
 of the session left, and then asked for a recess. And he had 
 ordered an account to be made out of the expenses. This is all 
 of what you call a breach of privilege. 
 
 go farther than I have already mentioned ; yet so full of magnanimity are the 
 sentiments of both . . . that they seem not only disposed to forgive but to 
 forget. . . ." — Mr. Secretary Conway s Circular Letter to his Majesty's Governors 
 in America, March 31, 1766. 
 VOT,. 1. — 1^ 
 
66 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 On the 1 6th, by a large majority, the Assembly resolved that 
 the Lieutenant-Governor, not being elected to the Council, had by 
 the Charter no right to a seat on it, whether with or without a vote. 
 They also sent a message to the Governor to ask whether pro- 
 vision had been made at the expense of the province for his 
 Majesty's troops lately arrived, and by whom? And were any 
 more expected? Bernard replied that provision had been made 
 by a minute of Council, which he now laid before them, together 
 with the account of the expense. He had received no advice of 
 more troops — except by common rumour, to which he gave no 
 credit. 
 
 By this time Bernard's relations with his legislature had 
 degenerated into perpetual nagging. His messages betray the 
 smothered irritation of a man who is being out-generalled, but 
 resolves to yield with as bad a grace as possible. 
 
 Francis Bernard came of a good old Northamptonshire stock. 
 He began as a lawyer, and settled in Lincoln, where he knew the 
 Pownalls. His wife was a niece of Governor Shute of Massachusetts. 
 Bernard had a large family to provide for, and when in 1756 Lord 
 Barrington offered him a Colonial governorship, he accepted it. 
 He succde.ded his friend Thomas Pownall as Governor of New 
 Jersey, Pownall going to Massachusetts. In New Jersey Bernard 
 was thought a good governor, particularly kind to Quakers and 
 Indians. In 1760 Pownall went to South Carolina, and Bernard 
 became Governor of Massachusetts. He went very cheerfully, not 
 knowing that his good days were over. Pownall had inclined to 
 the popular side — and had left the people in a good temper. 
 Bernard wrote, " I am assured I may depend upon a quiet and 
 easy administration. I shall have no points of government to 
 dispute about, no schemes of self-interest to pursue. The people 
 are well-disposed to Hve upon good terms with the Governor.'' It 
 was a sanguine expectation. The history of Massachusetts is little 
 more than the history of the quarrels of the people with their 
 governors. Ellis says that not one of the ten Royal Governors 
 found it agreeable, " not one had a wholly placid administration, 
 or escaped being complained of to the King, and probably not one 
 ever gave it up without regretting he ever held it." But though 
 Bernard early offended a powerful popular lawyer — James Otis — 
 he had little trouble until the Stamp Act upset his peace for ever. 
 
 After this, he appears to have lost his head. It is piteous to 
 see a man, not criminal in intention, apparently bent on blowing 
 up a flame that may set fire to a whole continent. His indiscretion 
 was appalling. When he could not pack his Council as he wished, 
 
THE MUTINY ACT 6^ 
 
 he openly lamented that the Crown ofiScers had "dropped off" 
 from the Council, instead of remaining ex officio, to support the 
 Governor. Hutchinson was one of the most able men in New 
 England. His great abilities as a financier had put Massachusetts 
 on a better monetary footing than any other province of North 
 America. But he was now more unpopular than Bernard himself. 
 In vain did Bernard stoop to bargain with the electors — let in so 
 many of my friends, and I will let in so many of yours. Certain 
 of a majority, they refused to accept his candidates. Bernard 
 refused to accept theirs, and wrote to tell Shelburne of their un- 
 dutiful behaviour. 
 
 He did worse. He told Shelburne that he daily expected a 
 rebellion, and that a fleet and army ought to be sent to take 
 possession of Boston and New York. Such was the state of things, 
 when news came that the King had disallowed the Compensation 
 Bill, and that a new scheme was to be laid before Parliament for 
 taxing the Colonies. Also that "their late great Patron had 
 deserted their cause." ^ 
 
 ' " A spirit of infatuation has taken possession of New York : their disobedience 
 to the mutiny act W-A\ justly create a great ferment here, open a fair field to the 
 arraigners of America, and leave no room to any to say a word in their defence." 
 — Chatham to Shelburne, Bath, Feb. 3, 1767. 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 THE PATCHWORK CABINET 
 
 " He made an administration so checkered and speckled, he put together a 
 piece of joinery so crossly indented and whimsically dovetailed, a cabinet so 
 variously inlaid, such n piece of diversified mosaic, such a tessalated pavement 
 without cement— here a bit of black stone and there a bit of white, patriots and 
 courtiers, king's friends and Republicans, Whigs and Tories, treacherous friends 
 and open enemies — that it was, indeed, a very curious show, but utterly unsafe to 
 touch and unsure to stand on. The colleagues whom he had assorted at the same 
 boards, stared at each other, and were obliged to ask; 'Sir, your name?' — 
 'Sir, you have the advantage of me.' — 'Mr. Such-a-one.' — 'I beg a thousand 
 pardons.' I venture to say, it did so happen that persons had a single office 
 divided between them who had never spoke to each other in their lives, until 
 they found themselves, they knew not how, pigging together, heads and points, 
 in the same truckle-bed."' — Burke^s Speech on American Taxation, 
 
 The Rockingham Administration lasted one year and twenty days. 
 It was a remarkably disinterested Administration. The elevation of 
 Chief Justice Pratt to the peerage as Baron Camden was almost the 
 only promotion it made, and when it was dismissed it did not 
 follow the usual custom of asking for pensions and honours. It 
 asked nothing, and received nothing — for in that sphere, only he 
 that asketh receiveth. It was thus nobody's business to praise it ; 
 but a little after its fall, Burke, in his Short Account of a Short 
 Administration, thus summed up what it did for the country : — 
 
 " The distractions of the British empire were composed, by The 
 repeal of the Stamp-act ; 
 
 " But the constitutional superiority of Great Britain was preserved, 
 by the Act for securi?ig the dependence of the Colonies. 
 
 " Private houses were relieved from the jurisdiction of the Excise, 
 by The repeal of the Cyder-tax. 
 
 "The personal liberty of the subject was confirmed, by The 
 resolution agai?ist General Warrants. 
 
 "The lawful secrets of business and friendship were ren- 
 dered inviolable, by The resolution concerning the seizure of 
 papers. 
 
 ' Lord North and Mr. George Cooke were Joint Paymasters-General. 
 
 68 
 
THE PATCHWORK CABINET 69 
 
 " The trade of America was set free from injudicious and ruinous 
 impositions, the African trade was preserved and extended, and an 
 advantageous commercial treaty was made with Russia." 
 
 The King was deeply displeased at the Repeal of the Stamp 
 Act. The Ministry was torn by dissensions. Towards the end of 
 May, the Duke of Grafton suddenly resigned, on the plea that he 
 would not serve in any administration of which Mr. Pitt did not 
 form a part. The Quebec Bill was the last straw. Among the 
 exploits of the Grenville Cabinet was the foolish Act which swept 
 away the old French laws of Canada, and brought the new 
 province to the verge of rebellion. Rockingham was for restoring 
 the old laws, which the people understood. Chancellor Northington 
 violently opposed this, and at last rudely refused to attend any more 
 Councils. 1 He even went to the King, and told him the present 
 Ministry could not go on. 
 
 In those days, the King could dismiss his Ministers, but the 
 usual practice was to make them so uncomfortable that they 
 entreated his Majesty's permission to resign. If, however, an 
 obnoxious Minister showed no inclination to do this, his Majesty 
 began privately to provide himself with new " servants " ; and at 
 such junctures he always became particularly gracious to his old 
 ones. Rockingham told a friend that the King never showed him 
 such distinguished kindness as after he had secretly determined 
 to be rid of him. 
 
 At the beginning of July it was known that the King had 
 sent for Mr. Pitt, and great was the joy. Pitt was very ill, and 
 he no sooner arrived in London than he was prostrated by 
 a fever; but on July 12 he had an audience of the King at 
 Richmond. 
 
 Parliament had been prorogued once, twice, three times. 
 Everyone knew that the Cabinet was being reconstructed. Then 
 came the great surprise. On July 30, 1766, the whole country 
 was electrified by the news that Rockingham was dismissed, the 
 Duke of Grafton was First Lord of the Treasury, and Pitt — Pitt ! — 
 had accepted a peerage, and was gazetted as Viscount Pitt of 
 Burton Pynsent, and Earl of Chatham ! 
 
 No political event ever caused more astonishment, and few 
 have caused more dismay. The town rang with it. Pitt's friends 
 knew not what to think. His enemies lampooned him in prose 
 and verse, and cried exultingly that now he would do no more 
 mischief. He had lately had a great accession of fortune in the 
 
 ' It was said that, hearing the Cabinet had met without him, he swore it 
 should never meet again. For this he was loaded with pensions and sinecures. 
 
70 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 bequest of Sir William Pynsent, an eccentric Somersetshire baronet, 
 who never saw Pitt in his life, but left him his estate to mark his 
 approval of Pitt's political conduct. Now a parody of "William 
 and Helen " went the round of the Press, and Pynsent's ghost was 
 made to come from the grave to denounce the renegade. Pitt was 
 compared to the other " Great Commoner,'' who committed political 
 suicide by becoming Earl of Bath. The banquet which was to 
 have celebrated his return to office was countermanded ; the lamps 
 hung on the Monument, ready for the illumination of the City, were 
 taken down. Lord Chesterfield wrote to his son that the joke here 
 was that Mr. Pitt had had a fall up stairs, and was so much hurt he 
 would never get over it. And he never did. The Earl of Chatham 
 was as bold and outspoken as Mr. Pitt, but the spell was broken, 
 henceforth he waved his magic wand in vain. 
 
 This great misfortune has always been more or less of a mystery 
 — now important only because the fate of America was bound up 
 with the fate of Pitt, and the Cabinet of Pitt's choosing was to 
 deal our Colonial empire a blow more fatal than the Stamp Act 
 itself. 
 
 Why did Pitt refuse to form a Cabinet in 1765? Why did he 
 consent in 1766? His refusal was disastrous; his consent was 
 more disastrous still. Why did he refuse to unite with Rockingham, 
 and a year later accept the men he did ? What was Temple's part 
 in the miserable business? What was Bute's? What was the 
 King's ? The deeper we go into the memoirs and correspondence 
 of the time, the less we understand. No sooner do we seem to find 
 a clue, than we lose it again. In 1765, Pitt had refused to form a 
 Cabinet unless the King would recall the great Whig families to his 
 councils. Why did he depart from this safe policy in 1766? It 
 sometimes seems as though Temple, with his rancours and his dark 
 underground ways, were the fatal influence in Pitt's career ; but the 
 whole story, and even the character of Temple, is a mystery. 
 Twice Temple appears at the last moment as the evil genius, the 
 diabolus ex viachina. It is possible that there exist letters which 
 could supply the key to the enigma. Probably, if we knew with 
 certainty the part that Temple played, the rest would become 
 tolerably clear. Chesterfield wrote of the negotiations of 1765, 
 "Mr. Pitt would have accepted, but not without Lord Temple's 
 consent, and Lord Temple positively refused. There was evidently 
 some trick in this, but what, is past my conjecture." Yet Chester- 
 field was steeped in all the political gossip of his day. That was a 
 dark intrigue which he could not fathom. It is said that as they 
 went away together from the last audience with the King, in June, 
 
inn r/\iL.J:iWUKK CABINET 71 
 
 1765, Pitt addressed to Temple the words which Virgil puts into 
 the mouth of Anna, after Dido's suicide — 
 
 " Exstinxsti me teque, soror, populumque, patresque 
 Sidonios, urbemque hiam." 
 
 In that same June of 1765 Burke (who did not love Pitt) wrote 
 to Henry Flood : " You may be assured he has it now in his power 
 to come into the service of his country upon any plan of politics he 
 may choose to dictate, with great and honourable terms to himself 
 and to every friend he has in the world, and with such a stretch of 
 power as will be equal to everything but absolute despotism over 
 the king and kingdom." He added : " A few days will show. . . . 
 For his gout is worse than ever, but his pride may disable him 
 worse than his gout." By the last words, Burke meant that Pitt's 
 pride might prevent his uniting with Rockingham. 
 
 This was in 1765. In July, 1766, the negotiations ended 
 abruptly in a sudden and furious quarrel between Pitt and Temple. 
 For the time the breach was complete. Each of the brothers-in- 
 law wrote or inspired an angry pamphlet against the other; but 
 though an extreme rancour is evident, the position of neither Pitt 
 nor Temple can be extracted with any clearness. 
 
 Pitt's acceptance of a peerage is another puzzle. Neither friend 
 nor foe has ever explained it. He had the example of Pulteney to 
 warn him. His sphere was pre-eminently the House of Commons ; 
 he had everything to lose by the exchange to the uncongenial 
 atmosphere of the Lords — " the hospital for incurables," as Chester- 
 field called it. Over and over again in the past Pitt had shown a 
 disinterestedness rare in any age, phenomenal in his own age. He 
 threw up the great prize of the Paymastership (out of which Henry 
 Fox carved a fortune) rather than be Bute's henchman. '^ The 
 pension he accepted in 176E — which offended many of his friends — 
 left him as fierce as ever in opposition. The title conferred at the 
 same time upon his wife enabled him to hold up his head with the 
 Grenvilles, had the wife of Pitt required any other distinction. But 
 the one thing which comes out clearly from the family letters is the 
 
 1 " 'When Pitt was appointed Paymaster, in 1746, it was customary for a sum of 
 ;,£'loo,ooo to remain, by way of advance, in the Paymaster's hands. This money, 
 in the time of his predecessors, was usually invested in government securities, 
 and brought a considerable annual return, which was appropriated by the Pay- 
 master to his private use. Aware of the mischiefs to which the practice had a 
 direct tendency, Mr. Pitt uniformly deposited his balance in the Bank of 
 England, without deriving the smallest emolument therefrom." — Chatham 
 Correspondence, iii. 289, note. 
 
72 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 affectionate attachment of the Granville brothers to Pitt — even with 
 George this feeling survived all political quarrels. 
 
 But it is most probable that Pitt's gout was more fatal than his 
 pride — was the ultimate cause of his showing himself so impractic- 
 able. He had been a martyr to this painful malady ever since he 
 was sixteen. At the end of 1764 it became much worse — for a 
 year he was never able to attend the House. Then came the 
 wonderful rally, when he was the soul of the movement for repeal. 
 But immediately afterwards he fell ill again, and with great difficulty 
 obeyed the King's summons in July. All we know of his temper 
 at that crisis points to the uncontrollable irritation of a man 
 suffering from gout more or less suppressed. If he had been 
 himself, he would never have consented to work with such a 
 Noah's Ark as the Grafton Cabinet. Even the peerage is partly 
 accounted for, by supposing that he no longer felt able to cope 
 with the strenuous conflicts in the Commons. 
 
 But this cannot have been all. There was another cause, and 
 that was the persistent attempt of George iii to shift power from 
 the Commons to the King in Council. With the Ministry reduced 
 to a Council of State, appointed by the King, responsible only to 
 the King, the government of Great Britain would have resembled 
 that of France before the Great Revolution. The King told Pitt 
 he wanted to get rid of party government — " connection," as it was 
 then called — and choose his Ministers irrespective of their being 
 Whig or Tory. He meant that he wanted to do away with 
 Opposition. By destroying the influence of the great Whig 
 families, he could ensure a Parliament permanently packed in the 
 interest of the Crown. He wanted a free choice, untrammelled 
 by the claims of the Whigs, that he might pack his Cabinet with 
 " King's friends." Failing in this, he tried to govern by means of 
 the " double Cabinet " — the Cabinet within the Cabinet, the little 
 clique of " King's friends " behind the Ministry. Bute got the 
 idea of this from Baty, who told him that " official men ought 
 never to be trusted with information of any measure till it was 
 given them to execute.'' And the King succeeded. We find one 
 Minister after another complaining that he has not his Majesty's 
 confidence, and none more loudly than Grenville, once Bute's " dear 
 George.'' The "opaque shadow " of Bute falls over every Cabinet 
 of the first ten years of George in. In those ten years, there were 
 five Administrations, till foreign Powers said the changes were so 
 frequent, that they no longer knew with whom they were negotiating.^ 
 
 '"Five ministers had kept in for just 14 months each, from 'kissing in to 
 kicking out.'" — Tkevelyan. 
 
THE PATCHWORK CABINET 73 
 
 At last, in Lord North, the King found a Minister after his own 
 heart — a pliant tool, with no poHcy but to do his master's will. 
 The North Administration lasted twelve years ! 
 
 Party government has its evils, but the alternative is a worse 
 evil. We owe our liberties to the constant presence of a watchful 
 Opposition. The best Government in the world will not long 
 remain good, if it is not kept up to the mark by wholesome fear 
 of Opposition ; a bad Government, unrestrained by that fear, will set 
 no limit to its attacks on liberty. It is nearly always the case 
 that men who say they are of no party are passively, at least, in 
 favour of the party which is against the party of the people. 
 
 It is certain that at the time we are considering Bute's in- 
 fluence was secretly very active. It is uncertain when that 
 influence ceased — after the death of the Princess Dowager in 1772 
 we hear very little of it; but North was then in power, and the 
 King no longer needed Bute in his intrigues against recalcitrant 
 Ministers. It is certain that Bute was in constant communication 
 with the King, long after George had professed he " never saw 
 Lord Bute," and Bute that he "had not seen the King for many 
 years." That a coldness did at last arise, seems to be proved by 
 the King's anger with that indiscreet person, his aunt, Princess 
 Amelia, who tried to bring about a meeting between him and 
 Bute. Meanwhile, for many years the cry of " influence " was to 
 be used with fatal effect, tossed from one side to the other, in- 
 stilling a feeling of universal treachery, casting the cold shade of 
 doubt even over honest men. It was the stock accusation. No 
 sooner was the Rockingham Ministry in power, than the Grenvill- 
 ites — many of whom had sat in Bute's Cabinet — denounced it for 
 having come to terms with "the Favourite." And though the 
 charge was preposterous, the long delay in summoning Parliament, 
 at a time when every ship from America brought worse and worse 
 news, can only be accounted for by supposing that some secret 
 influence was at work to prevent the repeal of the Stamp Act. 
 But it matters httle when Bute ceased to meddle. The mischief 
 was done, the lesson learnt. The pupil was one who never forgot. 
 The evil genius of George in was the Earl of Bute ; and, with all 
 his virtues, George ni was the political evil genius of his generation. 
 It is hard to forgive Pitt for the Patchwork Cabinet. To have 
 refused so obstinately to work with Rockingham, and then to 
 choose that grotesque menagerie, not even made coherent by 
 loyalty to himself! To refuse his "confidence" to Rockingham, 
 and give it to Townshend ! ' He believed, no doubt, that he could 
 bend them all to his will, and that it mattered little who composed 
 
74 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 the crew as long as he steered the ship. But his failing hand was 
 soon to let go the helm, and Townshend was to snatch it and steer 
 the ship on the rocks. 
 
 It seemed as though the new Cabinet would never be arranged. 
 Chatham was in a strangely overwrought state. It was said — 
 probably with considerable exaggeration — that he offered the great 
 ofBces as a man would fling a bone to a dog. Several gentlemen 
 declined in a huff. And now, at last, he condescended to call on 
 Rockingham, who, with unwonted spirit, sent word "he was out." 
 It must have required considerably more courage to deny him- 
 self to the "late Great Commoner" than to repeal the Stamp 
 Act. 
 
 On the plea that his health would not allow his regular attend- 
 ance in Parliament, Chatham took the Privy Seal himself, and 
 made Grafton i the nominal head of the Cabinet. Grafton is chiefly 
 remembered for what Junius said about him. He called Grafton 
 " a young nobleman already ruined at play," and savagely flung 
 at him his horse-racing, his divorced duchess, his mistress, Mrs. 
 Nancy Parsons — even the bar sinister on his escutcheon. Grafton 
 was, however, not the unmitigated scoundrel Junius called him — 
 nor was he a fool. He was an enlightened and cultivated man. 
 But he was vacillating, and no doubt his devotion to Chatham was 
 his recommendation. He voted for repeal, and was a strong 
 Pittite — had declared he would never form part of any administra- 
 tion which did not include Pitt. But he also voted for the fatal 
 " declaratory clause," and his resignation had been the first sign 
 of the approaching dissolution of the Rockingham Cabinet. 
 Chancellor Northington — who had actually brought down the 
 House on Rockingham's ears — was President of the Council. 
 There were only two men of conspicuous ability in Chatham's 
 Cabinet — Charles Townshend and Lord North. Townshend had 
 no principles at all. North, an amiable and worthy man, of clear 
 intellect but feeble will, was already drifting towards the Tories, 
 though nature had made him a Whig. Charles Townshend was 
 given twenty-four hours to make up his mind whether he would 
 exchange the ^^7000 a year (and perquisites) of the Paymastership 
 for the beggarly ;;^2 5oo paid to a Chancellor of the Exchequer. 
 Finally, he accepted, and the fate of America was sealed. North 
 shared the Paymastership with Mr. George Cooke — "pigging to- 
 gether, heads and points, in the same truckle-bed." So was 
 completed the famous Patchwork Cabinet, of which Burke said 
 that it was a very curious show, but utterly unsafe to touch — 
 ' " He became minister by accident." — Junius, Jan. 21, 1769. 
 
THE PATCHWORK CABINET 75 
 
 " patriots and courtiers, king's friends and Republicans, Whigs and 
 Tories, treacherous friends and open enemies." 
 
 There can be little doubt that the King hoped to make a tool 
 of Pitt, and that as long as he saw a chance of this he flattered and 
 humoured the great Minister who alone could make "affairs go 
 on." As soon as he found that Chatham was as unmalleable as 
 Pitt had been, he hated him. Pitt had a very keen eye for the 
 machinations of Bute, but it is not so sure that he saw through the 
 King's ultimate design. Consciously or unconsciously, George in 
 outwitted him. He led him on to accept a position which 
 placed him at a fatal disadvantage, so that, like Samson, he 
 became weak and as other men. He broke his bonds, indeed, 
 but to little avail — the Philistines feared him no more. 
 
 It was obvious from the first that the Patchwork Cabinet would 
 not work. Before the month of August was over cabals were 
 formed against Chatham. Charles Townshend, coming home with 
 Grafton from the first Council, exclaimed, "What inferior animals 
 he made us all appear ! " But before long Charles was trying to 
 supplant his chief. Chatham was taken with an attack of gout in 
 the night of the 24th of August, and, even when it passed off, 
 dreadful nights of fever and constant pain so shook his nerves that 
 he ceased to attend Councils, urgent as was the need for his 
 presence. 
 
 That summer of 1766 was the wettest ever known in England — 
 from March to August not two fine days successively ; a May so 
 cold and unkind, with such violent storms and heavy rain, that a 
 most promising crop turned out light in the ear, smutty, much 
 blighted, and terribly choked with weeds. Bread went up, 
 provisions were dear. Soon there were bread riots. The people 
 seized the bags of wheat in the market-places, and compelled the 
 farmers to sell at five shillings the bushel. Early in September, 
 a proclamation was issued against " forestallers, regrators and 
 engrossers of corn"; and the price of wheat still rising-^being 
 caused by a real scarcity in other countries as well as our own — 
 on the 26th another proclamation totally prohibited the exportation 
 of grain, and brewers were forbidden to use wheat in distilling. 
 From this time forth we hear no more about the great prosperity 
 of the country. 
 
 The "Embargo" was the work of Chatham and the King. 
 Chatham was too ill to attend the Council which decided on it, 
 and immediately afterwards he left town for Bath, where it was 
 two or three weeks before he could take a pen in his hand to 
 sketch out the King's Speech. The Cabinet he left behind fell at 
 
76 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 once into chaos. There was a great stir over the Embargo — not 
 that anybody denied the necessity of the measure, but that it was 
 done without consent of Parliament. The law required that corn 
 must reach a certain price before there could be an embargo, and 
 even then there must be a special Act. It was said that the King 
 had set a precedent for dispensing with the laws, and that to destroy 
 this precedent there must be an Act to indemnify those who had 
 carried the Embargo into execution. 
 
 ParUament met on the nth of November, and both Houses 
 began at once on the Embargo. The curious thing was that now 
 the parts were reversed — it was Lord Chatham who said that the 
 greatness of the emergency justified a stretch of the Constitution ; 
 while the party which was soon to suspend the Assembly of New 
 York for insisting on its consent to a certain measure being asked 
 before it would submit to that measure, were all up in arms at the 
 idea of a Dispensing Prerogative ; and contended that Parliament 
 ought to have been called together on the i6th of September,^ for 
 one day, — then the Embargo could have been legally enacted, 
 instead of illegally, at a Privy Council, ten days later. These gentle- 
 men were greatly incensed at two unfortunate remarks, one made in 
 each House. In the Commons, Alderman Beckford, in his haste 
 to defend Lord Chatham, said, "Whenever the public is in danger, 
 the King has a dispensing power." These words were ordered to 
 be taken down, after which the " wild Alderman " was formally 
 admitted to explain himself, and the House at last declared itself 
 satisfied. Lord Camden, in the Lords, made a still worse blunder, 
 he said " it was but forty days' tyranny at the outside." Never did 
 Chancellor receive such a wigging. Lest the dressing he got in the 
 House should not be enough, the arguments used against him were 
 thrown together in a long pseudo-speech, which everybody read. 
 
 Chatham's first speech in the House of Lords was made on 
 November ii. After a few words about his own feelings, on 
 speaking for the first time in an unaccustomed place, " before the 
 most knowing in the laws, in the presence of the hereditary 
 legislators of the realm," and remembering that the throne had just 
 been "filled by majesty," he began to justify the proclamation of 
 the Embargo during the recess of Parliament; but the best he 
 could do was to ridicule the idea of summoning Parliament for one 
 day — putting members to the great inconvenience of being obliged 
 to get on their horses and ride post to London, when their presence 
 on their estates was urgently needed to keep order ; and he quoted 
 Mr. Locke to show that a thing may be right, though not strictly 
 ' The day to which it had been prorogued. 
 
THE PATCHWORK CABINET 'jj 
 
 legal. It was clever and adroit, but it was a great descent from the 
 speeches for the repeal of the Stamp Act. 
 
 The next untoward incident was freely attributed to Chatham's 
 desire for an Administration of nonentities, wherein he could reign 
 supreme. Lord Edgcumbe, a respectable elderly nobleman, who 
 had steadily supported the Whigs for the last four years, was 
 requested to resign his office of Treasurer to the Household, that 
 it might be given to Sir John Shelley, a relation of Newcastle's. 
 The reason was no doubt to propitiate the Newcastle faction, and 
 strengthen administration. Conway remonstrated in vain, imploring 
 his great chief not to put this affront on a man of Edgcumbe's 
 character. Chatham, at a stormy interview, told Edgcumbe that he 
 "despised his parliamentary interest, and did not want his 
 assistance, and dare look in the face the proudest connections of 
 this country ! " So they parted ; the King commanded Edgcumbe 
 to resign, and next day the Duke of Portland, the Earls of 
 Besborough and Scarborough, all holding places in the Household, 
 Lord Monson, one of the Chief Justices in Eyre, and Sir Charles 
 Saunders, First Lord of the Admiralty, resigned too, and a few 
 days later, Admiral Keppel and Sir William Meredith, two Junior 
 Lords, followed their example. 
 
 There was the utmost difficulty in filling up these gaps. A 
 negotiation with Bedford failed. Chesterfield wrote : " No mortal 
 can comprehend the present state of affairs. . . . People wait to 
 see who Lord Chatham will take in, for some he must have ; even 
 he cannot be alone, contra mundum. Such a state of affairs, to be 
 sure, was never seen before, in this or any other country. When 
 this ministry shall be settled, it will be the sixth in six years time." 
 (Letter of December 9.) At last it was settled — Chatham "took 
 in " some of Newcastle's friends, and some of Bute's — among these 
 latter was Jenkinson. To a number of implacable personal 
 enmities, Chatham now added a serious increase of unpopularity. 
 The caricaturists hastened to depict him as Bute's creature— we 
 see Bute's hand pulling the wires which move the puppets of the 
 Cabinet — and Chatham is there among them. Or they are 
 enclosed in Bute's plaid waistcoat, while the Favourite himself stands 
 by, brandishing a birch-rod over their heads ; or Bute is Samson, 
 pulling down the house of the Constitution; or he bestrides the 
 way as the Colossus of Rhodes, while Chatham, propped on his 
 crutch, looks up with hands raised in adoration. And it was 
 reported that Bute had said Chatham was a fool, for he had done 
 enough to lose the people, but not enough to gain the Court. 
 
 On the loth of December, when the Indemnity Bill came up 
 
78 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 from the Commons, there was another long and stubborn debate. 
 Chatham repeated the words he had said to Edgcumbe, declaring 
 that he meant to "destroy faction, and that he could look the 
 proudest connection in the face." And the Duke of Richmond 
 showed that he could look the proudest of English Ministers in the 
 face, for he entreated the Lords not to let the aristocracy be brow- 
 beaten by an insolent Minister. To this had Chatham come by 
 that fall upstairs ! 
 
 The Indemnity Bill received the Royal Assent on the i6th of 
 December, and Parliament was prorogued the same day. It was 
 virtually the end of Chatham's Ministry. He returned to Bath — 
 having put his enemies in power, he left them to their own devices. 
 As soon as he was gone, there was once more chaos in the Cabinet. 
 Once, at least, a Council "broke up in confusion." Charles 
 Townshend began to take the airs of a Prime Minister. Grafton 
 and Shelburne wrote imploring Chatham to come back. It was 
 no time to withdraw himself — there was fresh trouble in America, 
 and there were the affairs of the East India Company to be looked 
 into. On both these great questions every principle of Chatham's 
 policy was presently to be reversed. 
 
 But he was now too ill to travel. Early in January he had so 
 severe a fit of the gout that his life was in danger. Nor till the 
 end of the month was he able to use a pen, and then he could only 
 urge his supporters to put off the Company's affairs, if but for a 
 fortnight. 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 THE EAST INDIA COMPANY 
 
 "He said the Company were not proper to have it, nor the Crown, for such 
 a revenue would endanger our liberties." — Mr. Walsh to Lord Clive, giving an 
 account of his interview with Mr, Pitt, in 1759. 
 
 "Believe the word of a Director, that the Company must have many lacs, 
 before they can increase the dividend. Consider, my lord, what a vast sum 
 of their capital has been locked up without interest in Mahommed Ali's debt, 
 the vast fortifications, the fatal Manilla expedition, and the sums locked up in 
 the support of French prisoners, for which no instalments are yet settled ; all 
 form prodigious reductions, which a year's revenue of the whole province 
 of Bengal will barely replace ; not to mention the dreadful breach in the 
 Company's capital before the battle of Plassey." — The Duke of Grafton to Lord 
 Clive, May 17, 1766. 
 
 ' ' There is good reason to believe the treaties concluded in Bengal by Lord 
 Clive, will be productive of a clear yearly revenue of two millions sterling. 
 An object of this importance would, in a few years, ease this country of the 
 burden it labours under ; and therefore our whole wills should be set to 
 make this revenue as durable as possible. All other speculations should give 
 way to this consideration of permanency ; even the existence of the India 
 Company." — The Hon. Thomas Walfole to the Earl of Chatham, Sept. 9, 
 1766. 
 
 A NEW factor was now to be introduced — destined to bring about 
 the final catastrophe in the Colonies. 
 
 Our chief gains by the Seven Years' War were undoubtedly 
 Canada and Bengal. But ever since the troubles in America had 
 begun, the supporters of the Stamp Act had been saying that the 
 conquest of Canada had done the mischief, by leaving the colonists 
 no enemy to fear. Hence their insolence ! And now it seemed 
 as though we were to pay for our cake in Bengal. 
 
 The East India Company's Charter would expire in 1780, 
 and circumstances had drawn the attention of Government to 
 the Company in a way which boded ill for its renewal. As long 
 ago as 1759, Clive had told Pitt that so large a sovereignty was 
 too extensive for a mercantile company. None knew better than 
 Clive how extensive that sovereignty was, and into what extra- 
 ordinary situations it had already brought the Company. When, 
 
 79 
 
8o ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 the day after Plassey, Surajah Dowla was deposed, and Mir Jaffier 
 set up in his master's room, the first of those transactions took 
 place which the Council at Calcutta came to love so much — the 
 selHng the Subahdarship — or, as they called it, the Nabobship — to 
 a new Nabob. The Company demanded 10,000,000 rupees as 
 compensation for losses in the war, to be divided among the 
 English, native, and Armenian inhabitants of Calcutta. Of this Clive 
 was to have 280,000 rupees as a member of the Select Committee, 
 200,000 rupees as Commander-in-Chief, and 1,600,000 rupees as a 
 "private donation." The whole sum claimed — including gratifi- 
 cations to the fleet and army — amounted to ;^2, 697, 750 sterling; 
 but this was too much, even for India; the hungry got only the 
 half of what was promised them, and one-third of that had to 
 be taken out in plate and jewels — for there was no coin or bullion 
 left in Bengal. At the same time, the landowners' right over the 
 Twenty-four Parganas was granted to the Company, whereby it 
 acquired the Zemindari, or right to collect the rents. But in 
 1759, the Emperor of Delhi — nominal suzerain of the Subahdar 
 of Bengal — granted the overlordship (the Dewanee, or right to 
 the land-tax) to Colonel Clive, who thus became the landlord 
 of his own masters ! Moreover, he was enrolled among the 
 Moghul nobles, and received a large allotment of land near 
 Calcutta, which for many years to come appears in the Company's 
 records as " Lord Clive's Jaghir." His claim to be the Company's 
 feudal suzerain was tried in England in 1764, with the result that 
 the jaghir was confirmed to him for ten years — then to revert to 
 the Company for ever. 
 
 Clive was kept at home in 1764 to fight the Company's 
 battles in England — or rather, the battles of the Directors, for 
 the Proprietors were growing troublesome. He exercised enormous 
 influence over elections from 1760 to 1765, but though he bought 
 many Members of Parliament for the Company, he refrained from 
 buying an English peerage for himself, liking to think that his 
 distinctions had been freely bestowed on him. But he was 
 wanted in Bengal. Very soon after he left, Mir Jaffier had been 
 cast down by the Company's servants, and his son-in-law, Mir 
 Kasim, set up ; and this time the Company got the three districts 
 of Bardwan, Midnapur, and Chittagong, with a net revenue of 
 half a million sterling — besides more "private donations." Pres- 
 ently Mir Kasim began to show a will of his own, insisting on 
 his treaty right to exact equal dues from all traders, English and 
 Indian alike. Mr. Vansittart, Governor of Bengal, could not 
 deny the right ; but the " English Factory " at Calcutta was 
 
THE EAST INDIA COMPANY 8i 
 
 furious, and the Council (some of whom were heads of factories) 
 disowned the Governor and his treaty, and as Mir Kasim was 
 obstinate, they proclaimed Mir Jaffier once more, and sent an 
 army against Kasim. 
 
 The campaign was short. In four months Major Adams 
 had conquered Bengal, and Kasim was a fugitive, his courage 
 and capacity forgotten in the horror of the massacre of Patna. 
 The flames spread. Surajah Dowla, Nabob of Oudh, took the 
 field, the son of the Mogul Emperor joined him, and, notwith- 
 standing Munro's victory at Buxar, things began to look very 
 black for the Company. Clive was the only man who could 
 save it, here or there; on April lo, 1765, he reached Madras, 
 and a week later wrote home to the Directors that to-morrow the 
 whole Mogul Empire might be theirs. 
 
 Now, at the beginning of 1767, the situation was this. CHve 
 was on his voyage home, having saved the Company from utter 
 ruin, defeated a dangerous conspiracy among the officers of its 
 own army, and to some extent cleansed the Augean stable of 
 its Civil Service, by abolishing those "private donations" which 
 he himself had found so profitable. He was being fiercely 
 attacked by Mr. Johnstone, a very able and unscrupulous ex-civil- 
 servant, who, with other malcontents, had bought East India 
 Stock the better to wreak their vengeance on the man who had 
 spoiled their game. Behind Johnstone was a strong party of 
 Directors, led by Lawrence Sulivan, a former Chairman, who 
 for several years had ruled the Company absolutely ; and behind 
 all, the great body of the Proprietors, who were simply Stock- 
 holders, and for the most part neither knew nor cared about any- 
 thing East Indian, except the East India Dividend. They were 
 demanding a thorough overhauling of the Charter, and they were 
 against these conquests, which they said rather diminished trade 
 than otherwise, and absorbed money which had much better go 
 to increase the Dividend. On the other side was Boulton, the - 
 present, and Rous,i a former Chairman, with the bulk of the Court 
 of Directors, and all the influence Clive could bring to bear in Parlia- 
 ment. Their object was to get their Charter renewed, before their 
 new Empire was snatched from them. For this they knew they must 
 pay, but they were doing all they could to pay as little as possible. 
 
 ^ "Indeed, Rous, though a very honest man, is the most unfit of all living 
 men to preside and govern a Court of Directors. I am now convinced a man 
 of lighter principles, with more abilities, and a certain degree of resolution, 
 will manage both private and public concerns to more advantage than Mr. Rous." 
 — Lord Clive to Mr. Fowke, September 25, 1766, 
 VOL. I. 6 
 
82 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 The public at large took no active interest in East India 
 affairs, till the Company and the Proprietors began to quarrel 
 over the spoils of the new Empire. The holders of Stock 
 were determined to have their share of the booty, in the shape 
 of a higher dividend — perhaps also in the shape of a division 
 of surplus. They were getting tired of seeing the Company's 
 servants come home as Nabobs, while the poor Proprie- 
 tors of India Stock got only a beggarly six per cent. The 
 Directors explained that they must pay their debts first, and 
 talked of the awful warning of the South Sea Bubble. The 
 Proprietors indignandy replied that the South Sea affair never 
 was anything but a bubble, whereas the East India Company's 
 money-bags were bursting with the riches of Bengal. In a style 
 worthy of a Chancellor of the Exchequer, they said that, of course, 
 there were debts — debts must always be — but what of that? 
 A debt was a very good thing — the Company's creditors dreaded 
 nothing so much as being paid off, and so losing a capital invest- 
 ment. Was not the Dutch East India Company paying twenty 
 per cent, though its revenues were not to be compared with those 
 of the British? The quarrel ran high, and got into the papers, 
 and pamphlets were written on both sides, till everybody knew 
 all the Company's business — its Charters, its wars, its intrigues 
 with the Princes of India, the " revolutions " it got up, and the 
 kingdoms it sold ; its quarrels with its servants, and their gigantic 
 peculations, and the snug arrangements that went on at its Select 
 Committees, and the dissensions in the Council of Calcutta. 
 Above all, everybody knew its enormous revenues — ^2,000,000 
 a year clear, owned to, when the whole revenue of Great Britain 
 was less than nine ! East India Stock quoted at 254, and still 
 going up ! Everybody also knew its debts and embarrassments, 
 its unpaid contracts — ;£2, 728,552 spent on fortifications alone — 
 and its mal-administration in Bengal.^ 
 
 It began to be rumoured that Government intended to interfere, 
 to preserve the revenues of the Company for the benefit of this 
 country, and the Company itself from ruin. Both reasons were 
 
 ^ The Company had its own army in India, and its own crimps in 
 England, who inveigled young men into enlisting, sometimes on pretence of 
 engaging servants. See a story of a man throwing himself out of one of 
 their "lock-up-houses" in Chancery Lane, Gentletnan's Magazine for I767> 
 pp. 91 and 93. The same volume contains an extraordinary proposal to exchange 
 the East Indies for the West, with the Dutch East India Company, a meridian 
 drawn through the Solomon Islands to divide East from West. The reason 
 given is that the East India Company drains this country of ;^8oo,ooo a year 
 in specie. 
 
THE EAST INDIA COMPANY 83 
 
 alleged, and both were true — the Government and the country 
 alternately hoped to live henceforth in good old Roman fashion 
 on the tribute of the conquered province — and feared being ruined 
 by it. 
 
 The Directors called a General Court in a great hurry; but 
 before it could meet, they received notice from the First Lord of the 
 Treasury to get their papers ready to lay before Parliament. 
 Government saw in the misfortunes of the Company an opportunity 
 to get hold of the Company's conquests. At the worst, they must 
 be made to pay well for a new Charter. 
 
 The Directors, in a terrible fright, began to explain that though 
 they might be very rich in Bengal, they were very poor in England. 
 Their remittances were stopped to pay the expenses of administra- 
 tion. They pleaded their poverty, their debts, and their expensive 
 wars so effectually that India Stock fell, and the infuriated Pro- 
 prietors cried that the Directors were running down Stock for their 
 own interests, regardless of those of the poor Proprietors, whose 
 riches were "very inconsiderable ''^ — it was only the servants of the 
 Company who made the enormous fortunes ! 
 
 As soon as the dreadful suggestion was made that perhaps the 
 revenues of Bengal belonged of right to the Crown, and the Company 
 was incapable of territorial rights, the gentlemen of England saw a 
 chance of being rid for ever of the abhorred land-tax. Chatham 
 was clear that the Company had no territorial rights, and another 
 member of the Cabinet was even keener than Chatham — Charles 
 Townshend, brilliant, rollicking, irresponsible Charles, the spoiled 
 child of the House, "the weathercock," whom caricaturists drew 
 with a whirligig in his hand, or as a Jack-o'-both-sides on a see-saw. 
 This charming and dangerous man would plunge every now and 
 then into a serious study, and get up a prodigious mass of details 
 on trade. He had even been President of the Board of Trade. A 
 man of family, he had many of the qualities of an adventurer. 
 Well had it been for his country if he had been content to make 
 " champagne " speeches, to poke fun at friends and foes alike, and 
 protest he had always been against the measure he had just carried. 
 But, unfortunately, underneath his buffoonery there were a settled 
 ambition and magnificent schemes. He had ideas — ideas as rash 
 and wild as the sallies of his wit, which set the House in a roar ; 
 but his ideas seemed to offer a solution of the nation's financial 
 puzzle. He saw that here was a great opportunity. How to raise 
 a revenue without fresh taxation ? — that was the question. Chatham 
 was for depriving the Company of its territorial rights, and reducing 
 it again to a trading corporation. Townshend thought he saw a 
 
84 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 better way. Why not confirm them in those rights, at the price of 
 a yearly ransom large enough to deliver all future Chancellors of 
 the Exchequer from 
 
 "That eternal want of pence 
 Which vexes public men " ? 
 
 George Grenville had sought to make the rustic wealth of America 
 fill up the gaping void of our pubhc debt. Charles Townshend 
 had a bolder and more dazzling scheme. Let us shake the pagoda- 
 tree ! 
 
 Besides his Indian plan, he had another brilliant idea for getting 
 a revenue without burdening the British tax-payer. His glowing 
 allusions to the riches of the East alternated with mysterious hints 
 about a new Board of Customs to be established in North America, 
 which, by a fresh regulation of the tea-duty here, should produce a 
 revenue on imports there. 
 
 America and Bengal, like two planets drawn out of their orbits 
 by a comet, were approaching each other — great would be the 
 kosmic disturbance if they came into collision. 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 CHARLES TOWNSHEND 
 
 " He would be a really great man, if he had any consistency, if you could 
 believe his assertions, or trust his promises." — Smollett, Htmiphry Clinker. 
 
 "He had almost every great talent, and almost every little quality. ... I 
 never felt so little as when he opened his mouth. Yet such alloy did he bear 
 about those marvellous parts, that children and women had more discretion and 
 fewer weaknesses. . . . Ready as Burke's wit was, it appeared artificial when 
 set by that of Charles Townshend, which was so abundant, that in him it seemed 
 a loss of time to think. He had but to speak, and all he said was new, natural, 
 and yet original." — Horace Walpole. 
 
 " He harangued most inimitably on both sides of the question, and in turns 
 was cheered by every party in the House." — Ibid. 
 
 "As to Charles, there was a good ridiculous paragraph in the newspapers, two 
 or three days ago. ' We hear that the Right Honourable Charles Townshend is 
 indisposed, at his house in Oxfordshire, of a pain in his side ; but it is not said 
 in which side. ' "— Zori/ Chesterfield io his Son, in 1766. 
 
 Charles began at once. On the ist of January, 1767, he wrote 
 to Chatham that the General Court of the day before had passed a 
 motion empowering the Directors to treat with Administration. 
 Chatham replied next day, " I need not tell you how entirely this 
 transcendent object, India, possesses my heart and fixes my 
 thoughts." 
 
 Charles had already announced his own opinion- — he was for 
 recognising the Company's territorial rights, but making it pay for 
 them. He saw a magnificent opportunity — such as never occurred 
 to a Chancellor before. He dropped hints of a splendid revenue 
 to be obtained by lenient dealing with the Company. He was 
 against an enquiry — was convinced the Company meant to amend 
 its ways. Chatham, who was convinced that both right and 
 expediency forbade a Company's erecting itself into a sovereign 
 state, tried to take the matter out of Charles's hands by putting up 
 Alderman Beckford to move that the Company's papers be laid 
 before the House. The Company, in a terrible fright, sent " their 
 Chairman and Deputy " to wait on the Duke of Grafton ; and when 
 on the 20th, " the wild Alderman " moved for the papers, Charles 
 
 8S 
 
86 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 entreated him to defer his motion for a few days — everything was 
 on the eve of settlement. And he tallied so well about the rights 
 of the Company, and the enormous profits to accrue to the nation 
 from the bargain about to be made, that next morning India Stock 
 went up six per cent. 
 
 Leave having been given to defer the Motion for the Company's 
 papers, the House went into Committee of Supply on the Army 
 Estimates. By the 26th of January it had got as far as the main- 
 tenance of the troops in the North American Plantations, when a 
 memorable debate took place — in its consequence scarcely less 
 momentous than those on the Stamp Act. 
 
 George Grenville proposed to make the colonists pay for the 
 troops employed in America.^ He quoted Acts of Parliament and 
 Journals. As usual, he harked back to the Stamp Act. He loved 
 that Act as his own child, and was persuaded in his stubborn mind 
 that, with proper firmness on our part, it could have been enforced. 
 He protested that if it were to be done again, he would do it. We 
 must relieve Great Britain from the burdens which the Colonies 
 ought to bear — burdens amounting to nearly _;^4oo,ooo a year, 
 which he reminded gentlemen was near what was produced by one 
 shilling in the pound land-tax. Let America, Hke Ireland, support 
 her own establishment. He moved to charge the Colonies with 
 ;^4oo,ooo annually, for the support of the regiments stationed 
 there. 
 
 Townshend rose. Administration, he said, had already given 
 its attention to this matter. He should bring into the House some 
 propositions which he hoped might tend in time to relieve the 
 people of England, and yet not be heavy on the Colonies. " I 
 know the mode by which a revenue may be drawn from America 
 without offence." The House shook with applause. " Hear him ! 
 hear him ! " came from both sides. " I am still for the Stamp Act," 
 he cried, excited by this applause. " It was only the heats that 
 made it improper at the time. I laugh at the distinction between 
 internal and external taxation ! " Then looking up to where the 
 Colonial Agents used to sit, he continued : " I speak this aloud, 
 that you who are in the galleries may hear me ; and after this, I do 
 not expect to have my statue erected in America ! " Then, as he 
 
 1 "Grenville proposed saddling America with ;^400,ooo per annum, for the 
 support of the troops, but was so miserably mistaken in law and policy, that he 
 was little listened to. He was indeed very spirity in his abuse of your Lordship, 
 and your friend W. B." — Beckford to Lord Chalhatn, January 27, 1767. 
 
 Before the Seven Years' War, the American establishment cost ^70,000 a 
 year. In 1764 the estimates were ;^3So,ooo. 
 
CHARLES TOWNSHEND 87 
 
 sat down, he added, laying his hand on the table in front of him, 
 " England is undone if this taxation of America is given up ! " 1 
 
 But Granville was not appeased. He told the House that 
 trade was depressed ; then, suddenly stopping, and turning to the 
 Treasury Bench : " You are cowards — you are afraid of the 
 Americans! You dare not tax America!" "Cowards?" cried 
 Townshend from his seat. " Dare not tax America ? I dare tax 
 America ! " For a moment Grenville was silent. Then he said, 
 " Dare you tax America ? I wish to God I could see it ! " "I will ! 
 I will ! " cried Townshend, and again he pledged himself to find a 
 revenue in America.^ 
 
 Early in February arrived letters from Governor Moore, with 
 news that the New York Assembly had refused to obey the Mutiny 
 Act. Chatham was very angry; the best friends of the colonists 
 almost gave them up. Was this their gratitude ? 
 
 Next, the Company made the modest proposal that its term 
 should be renewed for fifty years, the profits of its trade to be 
 blended with its revenues. It also demanded that Government 
 should interpose with France to get payment of the sums owed 
 the Company for the maintenance of the French prisoners, — 
 nearly ;,^7oo,ooo, — and with Spain for the settlement of the Manilla 
 Ransom.^ There were other conditions, one being the regulation of 
 the Company's army, and another that of the Company's navy. 
 
 ' In spite of the applause, however, in the division on Grenville's motion only 
 thirty-three voted v^ith the mover. 
 
 ^ "During this interval of Lord Chatham's absence from the cabinet, the 
 King contrived to have the question of taxing the American Colonies again 
 brought forward. By playing man against man, and faction against faction, he 
 at length obtained his wishes, and the American Colonies found themselves 
 reduced to the alternative of unconditional submission, or explicit and avowed 
 resistance." — Nicholls, i. 388-89. 
 
 ^ Near the close of the Seven Years' War, Spain made a secret treaty with 
 France, known as the Family Compact — an agreement to consider as a common 
 enemy any Power which might become the enemy of either. Pitt received 
 information of this Compact, and resigned because the King would not immedi- 
 ately declare war with Spain. Both sides were equally eager to fight, but Spain 
 delayed because her annual Plate Fleet was due. As soon as the ships were 
 safe in Cadiz, Mr. Wall, an Irishman, who was then chief Minister of Spain, told 
 Lord Bristol (our Ambassador) he might leave Madrid when he liked. (December, 
 1 76 1.) Next September, Sir William Draper took Manilla with a force chiefly 
 "furnished by the gentlemen at Madras," consisting of Lascars and Sepoys, with 
 a company of "Caffres," and one of "Topazes." The Archbishop Captain- 
 General made a valiant defence, but he was unprepared — he did not even know 
 the countries were at war. Draper, who piqued himself on his scholarship, drew 
 up the agreement in Latin. For a million sterling the English Commanders 
 promised to preserve the city from plunder. Of this sum, the East India 
 
88 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Grafton was still imploring Chatham to return, and, alarmed at the 
 accounts he received of Charles's conduct, Chatham actually started, 
 but his illness increased, and he was unable to get farther than 
 Marlborough. He remained there at the inn for about a fortnight, 
 astonishing the town by his strange, excited behaviour. It was 
 reported in London that he was out of his mind, and there was 
 some excuse for the rumour. 
 
 " Lord Chatham is daily expected, and till he arrives, nothing 
 worth informing you of is likely to happen ... no member of the 
 opposition speaks without directly abusing Lord Chatham, and no 
 friend ever rises to take his part. . . . Never was known such dis- 
 union, such a want of concert, as visibly appears on both sides : 
 how it will end heaven only knows ! Charles Townshend appears 
 rather out of humour, but his discontents are of no great moment." 
 So wrote Lord Charlemont to Mr. Flood on February 19, 1767; 
 and proceeded to give his friend some account of the debate the 
 day before upon American Extraordinaries — "an excellent debate.'' 
 Grenville moved for an Address, and that the enormous expenses 
 in America be lessened, and the troops withdrawn from the frontiers 
 and forts to the internal part of the provinces. " There was a great 
 deal of good speaking." Conway spoke often and well; George 
 Grenville "very httle in two hours; Charles Townshend . . . 
 excelled himself ... he harangued inimitably on both sides of the 
 question, and by turns was cheered by every party in the House." 
 
 That day Townshend had unfolded his budget more at large — 
 still dropping sumptuous hints about the bargain he was driving 
 with the East India Company. There was considerable commotion 
 among the country gentlemen when he said the land-tax was to 
 remain at 4s. in the pound. In times of peace it used to be only 
 2S., but the Seven Years' AVar and the increase of the Debt had 
 doubled it. Grenville, when he was Minister, had let the country 
 gentlemen know he meant to reduce it to 3s. He had even thrown 
 out hopes of dropping it altogether, " if better methods of taxation 
 were hit on.'' They were now, therefore, much disappointed. In vain 
 did Townshend assure them that a 4s. land-tax, with some other 
 savings, and what would be obtained from the Company, would be 
 
 Company demanded one-third ; and a fourth part of the million being paid soon 
 after, the Company received one-third of ;f 250, 000. The remaining ;f 750,000 is 
 the " Manilla Ransom " — the Spaniards declined to pay the balance. 
 
 The Company had almost the importance of an independent state. In 1771, 
 it explained that it claimed no part of the Manilla Ransom — that being a matter 
 for the captors only. ' ' The Company's claim has a more solid basis, and is 
 founded on a promise made by Government to reimburse the Company the 
 expenses incurred by assisting in the expedition." — Annual Register, 1772. 
 
CHARLES TOWNSHEND 89 
 
 enough to pay off the Four per Cents. In vain he promised, if he 
 were Chancellor another year, to take off a shilling. In vain he 
 told them the 4s. tax was " necessary for one year longer, to give 
 room for the most brilliant operation of finance which this country 
 ever saw, to ensure us dignity abroad, stability at home, and enable 
 us to enter with advantage into any future war." He had 
 reckoned without Grenville and Dowdeswell. Grenville was savage 
 because his pet Stamp Act had been repealed, and Dowdeswell, 
 Charles's fellow-student at Leyden, was smarting at having been 
 turned out that Charles might be Chancellor. Dowdeswell moved, 
 and Sir Edward Isham seconded, that the land-tax be 3s. in the 
 pound sterling ; and when Charles asked where he was to make up the 
 deficiency, Grenville said he would not answer Mr. Townshend with 
 
 the end of an old song — " Tell me, Gentle Shepherd, where " 
 
 a quotation that had been much applauded ; but it always was 
 Lord Chatham's style to spend money and leave others to raise it. 
 
 Ministers were taken by surprise, and the Amendment was 
 carried by 206 to 168. It was the first time since the Revolution 
 that a Government had been defeated on a money-bill, and 
 etiquette demanded that the Chancellor should resign. But, though 
 whenever Opposition worried him, Charles used to call himself a mere 
 " passenger in Administration," he now only began to contrive how 
 by additional taxes in America he could recover the ^^400, 000 
 which he had lost by the shilling knocked off the land-tax. 
 
 At last, on March 2nd, Chatham reached London, but only to 
 shut himself up in his own house, and it was not till the 12 th that 
 he saw the King. His malady increased on him to such a degree 
 that he went to North End, Hampstead, and would see no one. 
 Yet even the knowledge that he was in town acted as a check on 
 Charles, and comforted the King, who was excessively disturbed at 
 the Ministerial defeat. 
 
 It was at a Cabinet Council, held on March 12th, that the 
 interests of America and those of the East India Company actually 
 touched each other. At that Council Charles took a tone so 
 arrogant that Grafton wrote to Chatham, " His behaviour, on the 
 whole, was such as no Cabinet will, I am confident, submit to." He 
 refused to move the " Extraordinaries of America " in the House, 
 unless the whole state of the Colonies was taken into consideration 
 — the forts, the Indian trade, and the disposition of the troops, 
 which must be drawn nearer the great towns. He threatened to 
 resign if this were not done. He had already formed his plan for 
 working off the Company's surplus teas on the colonists. There 
 was also the New York Assembly to punish for refusing to comply 
 
go ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 with the Billetting Act, and the Massachusetts Assembly to punish 
 for its insolence in putting an indemnity clause in the Bill to com- 
 pensate sufferers " in the late times." Governor Moore, surrounded 
 by a number of " outed " stamp-masters as angry as himself, was 
 writing home inflammatory letters, describing America in general 
 as on the point of rebellion, until France and Spain began to send 
 out agents to see how things really stood. For if there was going 
 to be a rebellion, these two Powers thought they saw their way to 
 recovering some of their losses in the Seven Years' War. 
 
 The earnest desire of the gentlemen of England to be relieved 
 from the land-tax played at first the largest part in the persistent 
 determination to tax the American Colonies. We shall wholly mis- 
 understand the situation if we explain it by what may be called 
 sentimental motives. The desire for supremacy is seldom a purely 
 intellectual passion, and it never would have produced the 
 tremendous consequences it has, if it had not allied itself with the 
 grosser passions of greed and luxury. The conqueror always gets hold 
 of the money-bags, and this fact makes his adherents terribly sincere 
 in their devotion. Let Empire become a visible impoverisher, 
 and men will soon think they may pay too dear for supremacy. 
 The abstract theory that Britain has been appointed by Heaven to 
 rule all the waves and a good many of the furrows of this planet, 
 has been appreciably fortified by the concrete persuasion that in 
 ruling them Britain grows rich. In 1767 there was no attempt to 
 disguise the part the British pocket was playing in animating 
 British pride. 
 
CHAPTER XIV 
 THE SUSPENSION BILL 
 
 "And yet there remains among that people so much respect, veneration, and 
 affection for Britain, that, if cultivated prudently, with a kind usage and tender- 
 ness for their privileges, they might be easily governed still for ages, without 
 force or any considerable expense." — Franklin to Lord Karnes, April II, 1767.' 
 
 " Don't fancy that you^can divide the people upon this point, and that you need 
 only divide to govern ; you will by this conduct only unite them the more insepar- 
 ably ; you will make the cause of New York a common cause. ... It is a fact 
 which the House ought to be apprised of in all its extent, that- the people of 
 America, universally, unitedly, and unalterably, are resolved not to submit to any 
 internal tax imposed upon them by any legislature, in which they have not a share 
 by representatives of their own election. This claim must not be understood as 
 though it were only the pretences of party leaders and demagogues ... it is 
 the cool, deliberate, principled maxim of every man of business in America. " — 
 Governor PownalVs Speech against the Bill for Suspending the Assembly of New 
 York, May 15, 1767. 
 
 The time we are considering is not only one of the most important 
 as to the foreign and Colonial policy of the British Empire, it was 
 also a period of very great importance for our domestic policy, and 
 that slow-growing plant, British Liberty, now took a new start. Its 
 growth had been arrested ever since 1702 — that is, ever since the 
 one absorbing business of English statesmen was to keep out the 
 Stuarts, or to wriggle them back to the throne of these kingdoms. 
 The affairs of the Company, and the dazzling visions of the tribute to 
 be got out of Bengal, diverted attention from a very curious question 
 which had dragged on for ten years, from court to court, till at last 
 it reached the House of Lords. This was the Cause between the 
 City of London and the Dissenters, and it was certainly one of the 
 oddest illustrations of religious liberty ever furnished by any 
 country. 
 
 Ever since the isth^ of Charles 11, when the Corporation Act 
 
 ^ This letter was probably intercepted — Kames did not receive it ; but two 
 years after, Franklin, who had kept a copy, sent it to him. 
 
 ^ 1662. The reign of Charles II is reckoned on the Statute Book to begin in 
 1649. 
 
92 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 was passed, no one could be elected into any corporation office who 
 had not received the Sacrament of the Church of England within 
 twelve months before his election. This was, of course, intended to 
 shut out both Papists and Dissenters, and the Dissenters submitted 
 — having a great desire to prove that they were no longer dangerous. 
 But in 1748 the Corporation were in want of money. Up to 1739 
 the Lord Mayor had to live in his own house during his term of 
 office, or to borrow the Hall of his Company. In that year, the 
 Corporation began to build the Mansion-House.^ It cost ;^7 1,000 
 before it was done; and in 1748 the Corporation bethought them 
 of a scheme worthy of Charles Townshend himself. It was very 
 simple — they only passed a bye-law, that any person nominated for 
 Sheriff by the Lord Mayor, and refusing to stand the election of the 
 Common Hall, should be fined ;^4oo and twenty marks ; and any 
 person who, being elected, refused to serve, should pay a fine of 
 _;^6oo. They then proceeded to nominate and elect Dissenters as 
 fast as they could. The motive was too patent. They had set 
 forth as the motive of the bye-law their great desire that only fit and 
 proper persons should fill the office of Sheriff; but one of their 
 Dissenters was blind, and another was bed-ridden — not that this 
 made any difference to the fine. By this ingenious device the 
 Corporation got about _;^i 5,000 out of the Dissenters, and expended 
 it on the Mansion House. This went on for several years, but at 
 last the Dissenters turned restive. Some refused to pay, and Allen 
 Evans was proceeded against in the Sheriffs' Court. Evans ap- 
 pealed to the Court of Hustings, then to the Court of St. Martin, 
 which unanimously reversed the findings of the City courts. But 
 the City would not yield — it appealed in its turn to the House of 
 Lords, and the case was not finally decided till 1771. 
 
 In February, the Directors laid their first set of proposals before 
 Ministers. They demanded exclusive trade and their territorial 
 rights for fifty years ; Government to support the Company's civil 
 and military establishments ; the Company to blend the profits of 
 its whole revenues and trade, and divide the next surplus between 
 the public and the Company — to each a moiety; and to pay 
 ;^5oo,ooo a year to the Treasury.^ 
 
 Encouraged by Townshend's defence of their territorial rights, 
 
 ^ Lord Burlington sent in a design by Palladio, but on a Common Councilman 
 asking whether Palladio was 'a Freeman, and whether he was not a Roman 
 Catholic, the commission was given to the City surveyor. 
 
 ^ Eeckford wrote to Chatham that if these terms were accepted, India 
 Stock would go up to 500, and "be blown up" more than the South Sea 
 Bubble. 
 
THE SUSPENSION BILL 93 
 
 the Directors had raised the East India Dividend from six to ten 
 per cent. — whereupon Stock rose to 263. They were obliged 
 to send Mr. James to the House with the Account of their 
 expenses for their Factories and Settlements, the "sundry 
 expenses" incurred in their wars since 1754, and the sums 
 " received from the Nabobs " ; but they devoutly hoped that these 
 need never be printed. 
 
 Townshend's behaviour had now become outrageous. He 
 observed no decency; he went about teUing everybody that he 
 upheld the Company, because his wife — Argyle's widowed daughter 
 — had become, by the death of the Duchess, a large owner of Stock. 
 This was not true ; but Townshend himself held East India Stock, 
 and it was alleged that every time his speeches sent Stock up, he 
 sold out. He lost no opportunity of " talking at " Lord Chatham. 
 He found fault with measures, disclaimed any share in the govern- 
 ment, and complained that Ministers had settled nothing — the 
 affairs of America and India, and even the Manilla Ransom, were 
 just where they were ! He was always threatening to resign, when 
 he was not hinting that he ought to be the leader — or, as it was then 
 called, "manager" of the House, an office now discharged by 
 Conway. Chatham, though now in town, took even less part in 
 public affairs than when he was at Bath. All through the critical 
 months of March, April, and May, he shut himself up at North 
 End, declining to see Grafton even for five minutes, declining to see 
 the King's physician, taking Dr. Addington's kill-or-cure remedies ; 
 and unable to answer, and sometimes not allowed even to read, his 
 letters. They were not good reading for a patient racked with gout. 
 Shelburne was writing that it appeared to him quite impossible Mr. 
 Townshend could mean to go on in the King's service. Grafton 
 wrote, "His behaviour, on the whole, is such as no cabinet can 
 submit to." The Earl of Bristol wrote still more piteously about 
 "the mutiny in our garrison, the shyness of half friends, the back- 
 wardness of the irresolute, the shameful desertion of those who 
 voluntarily enlisted." Charlemont was writing to Flood, " Charles 
 Townshend is at open war.'' 
 
 On February 16, Lord Clare, one of the Commissioners of Trade 
 and Plantations, came down to the House at his Majesty's command, 
 to lay before it a Petition from 240 merchants of New York. 
 
 This petition sets forth so clearly the workings of Colonial com- 
 merce, that an abstract of it will explain the commercial situation 
 more intelligibly than any general statement can do. 
 
 The Colonies, say the petitioners, require vast quantities of 
 the manufactures of Great Britain, and do not themselves produce 
 
94 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 much which Great Britain requires in return. They are thus driven 
 to seek a market where they can sell, in order to pay for what they 
 want to buy. They therefore trade with the islands, bartering their 
 own produce for rum, sugar, molasses, cotton, and indigo. The 
 sugar, cotton, and indigo serve as remittances to Great Britain ; but 
 the molasses and rum are essential branches of Colonial commerce 
 — they are bartered for fish and rice, and thus a valuable trade is 
 kept up with Spain, Portugal, and Italy, which countries pay chiefly 
 in money or bills of exchange. This qualifies the petitioners for 
 adventures in Africa, where they have the advantage of putting off 
 great quantities of British manufactures, and of receiving in exchange 
 gold, ivory, and slaves, which last, disposed of in the West India 
 Islands, command money or bills. Rum is indispensable in their Indian 
 trade, and, with British manufactures, procures furs and skins, which 
 serve for considerable returns to Great Britain. Then there is the 
 trade to the Bay of Honduras, where for small cargoes of provisions, 
 rum, and British manufactures, they obtain logwood to send to the 
 different ports of Europe. Thus sugar, rum, molasses, logwood, 
 cotton, and indigo are the essentials of their return cargoes, and 
 the chief sources of their credit with Britain. 
 
 The petitioners then speak of the rapid increase of the Colonies 
 — "their inhabitants already exceeding two miUions"; "the vast 
 accession of subjects by the late conquests"; the innumerable 
 tribes of Indians in the countries annexed to the British Crown ; 
 and the utter incapacity of their own islands to supply this demand 
 — surely, then, sound policy demands that these Colonies shall be 
 indulged in a free and unrestrained exportation of all the lumber 
 and produce they raise and can spare. If not, they cannot pay 
 their debts to Britain, and will be compelled to take to manu- 
 facturing for themselves, — which will be attended with consequences 
 very detrimental to Great Britain. The petitioners then proceed to 
 point out the grievances under the two Acts. 
 
 First, there are "the heavy embarrassments which attend the 
 article of sugar.'' Sugar is often the only means of procuring 
 a sufficient return cargo ; 5s. sterling per hundred is so exces- 
 sive a duty that "the fair trader has been induced to decline 
 that branch of business " ; at the same time it is an irresistible 
 incentive to smuggling, to people less scrupulous. The duty is 
 little profit to Britain, since it cannot be duly collected, and it cuts 
 off " one grand spring " of Colonial traffic. The officers themselves 
 will testify to the impracticability of collecting this duty, and 
 merchants have sometimes brought their very plate into the Custom 
 House to discharge it. The petitioners ask, therefore, for a moderate 
 
iri£. sUijl'JiiNblUJN BILL 95 
 
 duty to be laid on foreign sugars ; this will both increase the revenue 
 and benefit the Colonies. 
 
 Another grievance is the compelling merchants to land and 
 store foreign sugars in Great Britain, before they can be exported to 
 other parts of Europe. This most expensive and dilatory regulation 
 is of no material advantage to Britain, and effectually puts it out of 
 the power of the petitioners to meet foreigners at market upon 
 an equal footing ; it is a heavy burden in time of peace, 
 and in time of war a hazard and peril, and must wholly 
 extinguish this useful branch of remittance. Plantation sugar from 
 North America, on being landed in England, has to be declared 
 French, and is thus exposed to the foreign duty in Great Britain ; 
 while the West India merchants are left free to export such sugars 
 as what they are. A moderate duty on foreign rum (except French) 
 would enable them to bring back the full value of their cargoes, 
 especially from the Danish Islands, where they can only receive 
 half the value in sugar and cotton. Then the low price of logwood, 
 its bulk, and the duty, will destroy that branch of Colonial trade, if 
 it must be landed in England on its way to Continental ports. It 
 is the same with lumber and potash — even when intended for 
 Ireland, " where they are so necessary for the progress of their linen 
 manufacture." Nor is flax-seed exempt, though the existence of 
 the linen manufacture immediately depends on it ; and without the 
 delay thus created it could arrive in time for sowing. And all these 
 articles can be imported into Ireland directly from the Baltic, and 
 have to be paid for to foreigners with money, i7istead of to British 
 subjects with British manufactures. Then there are the wines from 
 the islands — these could be exchanged against wheat, flour, fish, 
 and lumber, if the American duty were withdrawn. The North 
 American fishery is an object of the highest importance— besides 
 all else, it is a nursery for seamen, and is clearly so advantageous 
 for remittance, that the petitioners hope the House will cherish it. 
 Another very grievous grievance is the enlarging the jurisdiction of 
 the Admiralty (by the Statute of 4th Geo. iii). The property of the 
 trader is now open to every informer, and the means of justice so 
 remote as to be scarce attainable. The petitioners are very grateful 
 for the opening of free ports at Jamaica and Dominica, but lament 
 that they are in no condition to reap the benefits expected from so 
 wise a policy. The free ports would be of the greatest use, if the 
 Colonial traders were at liberty to bring back the produce of 
 Martinico, Guadaloupe, etc., in return for their lumber and 
 provisions; but they are now prohibited from taking anything 
 except molasses, and there cannot be enough of that for any con- 
 
96 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 siderable trade. ^ The petitioners, therefore, pray for liberty to 
 import into the Colonies all West India productions, in exchange 
 for their own commodities. 
 
 Finally, they say that, although at the last session the necessity 
 for relieving the trade of the Colonies seems to have been universally 
 admitted, " and the tender regard of Parliament for their happiness 
 highly distinguished," yet the commercial regulations then enacted 
 have increased, rather than remedied, the heavy burden under which 
 it already laboured. 
 
 This petition was read, and ordered to "lie upon the table," 
 and no further notice seems to have been taken of it — unless the 
 Revenue Act is to be considered as a reply. Even Chatham, though 
 he said the petition ought to be laid before the House, " and not 
 be smothered in the hands of the King's servants," thought it 
 "highly improper; in point of time, most absurd; in the extent 
 of their pretensions, most excessive," and fallacious and offensive 
 in the reasoning. Shelburne wrote that the merchants "here" 
 (London) disavow it, and say that a Mr. Kelly is the sole author of 
 it, and "the demon who has kindled the fire."^ 
 
 On the 7 th of April, Mr. Secretary Conway laid before the 
 House the papers from America — the Journal of the General 
 Assembly of New York, from the loth of November to the 19th of 
 December, 1766, with extracts and copies of letters from Bernard 
 and Gage to Shelburne ; and copies of Messages between Bernard 
 and the House of Representatives of Massachusetts Bay. 
 
 It was much to have got a Compensation Bill at all out of the 
 Massachusetts Assembly, convinced as it was that the victims of the 
 riots had suffered for conniving at an illegal attempt to deprive the 
 province of immemorial rights. The colonists had contented them- 
 selves with quietly ignoring the "Statutory Declaration," and it 
 would have been well if the "high prerogative people "had imitated 
 them, and taken no notice of the " Act of free and general Pardon, 
 Indemnity, and Oblivion," without which the Assembly had 
 resolutely refused to pass a Compensation Bill. 
 
 But the prerogative people — and, at that moment, the vast majority 
 of Englishmen — were not of this opinion. They thought that British 
 self-respect demanded that the New Englanders should eat humble- 
 
 ^ George Johnstone, then Governor of West Florida, writing on May 4, 
 1765, to John Pownall, Secretary to the Board of Trade, says, on considering the 
 various productions of his Majesty's other Colonies, "he despairs of seeing this 
 settlement flourishing unless Spanish commerce is permitted. Cannot conceive 
 why it is stopped." — Hist. MSS. Report XIV, App. 10 (American Papers), 
 p. 14. 
 
 ' Shelburne to Chatham, February 6, 1767. 
 
THE SUSPENSION BILL 97 
 
 pie. So the Commissioners of Trade and Plantations informed his 
 Majesty that his Attorney and Solicitor-General, having been con- 
 sulted, were of opinion that the Assembly had no power to pass 
 such an Act, and on May 9, the King in Council disallowed and 
 nullified the whole Compensation Bill, and ordered Bernard to 
 require the Assembly to pass another, unmixed with any other 
 matter whatever. 
 
 The resolutions of the New York Assembly caused great indigna- 
 tion at the ingratitude of the colonists. Grenville said this was 
 what we had got by yielding to rioters. Chatham was much dis- 
 pleased, though he still insisted that this was what we had got by 
 our folly in trying to force the Stamp Act upon the colonists. He 
 wrote to Shelburne, " It is a literal truth to say that the Stamp Act, 
 of most unhappy memory, has frightened those irritable and um- 
 brageous people quite out of their senses." All parties united in 
 calling the resistance of New York rebellion; while the Massa- 
 chusetts Compensation Bill was represented as an impudent usurpa- 
 tion of the Royal Prerogative of Pardon. 
 
 At last, on April 15, 1767, Charles Townshend fairly "opened 
 his budget.'' There is no report of the debate — we gather frag- 
 mentary accounts of it from private letters. Charlemont says that 
 Charles Townshend " spoke amazingly well." Somehow or other, 
 notwithstanding the loss of that shilling on the land-tax, he had 
 " fourteen hundred thousand pounds " to pay off the Four per Cents. 
 But the most important parts of his Budget were the proposals for a 
 revenue from America, which should offend nobody. The duties 
 he now proposed constituted the fatal "Revenue Act," which 
 finished what the Stamp Act had begun, and the Mutiny Bill was 
 continuing. The new duties were laid on all glass (crown, plate, 
 flint, white, and green) ; on paper and pasteboards, painters' colours, 
 red and white lead; threepence a pound on tea exported into the 
 British Colonies and Plantations in North America ; and the duty of 
 a shilling in the pound on all teas consumed in Great Britain was 
 taken off. Townshend himself did not pretend that these duties 
 would bring in more than from ;!^35,ooo to ,£40,000 a year. The 
 real object now was to punish the colonists, and assert our 
 sovereign right. Charles was proving that he dare tax America. 
 
 But Grenville was not satisfied. When Townshend had gone 
 through his list, Grenville rose. He ridiculed the new duties as 
 "trifles." " I will tell the honourable gentleman of a revenue that 
 will produce something valuable in America — make paper money 
 for the colonies, issue it upon loan there, take the interest, and 
 apply it as you think proper." The House seemed to like this idea 
 VOL. I. — 7 
 
98 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 — whereupon Charles declared it had been an idea of his own, but 
 it had quite slipped his memory — and now he supposed the honour- 
 able gentleman opposite would take the credit for it ! 
 
 There was no lack of warnings. Charles's cousin, "Tommy" 
 Townshend, said to him, " Take the tax ; but let it have the appear- 
 ance of a port-duty." ^ Franklin says that most of the Cabinet dis- 
 hked it. The first sketch of it had made Shelburne uneasy. It was, 
 indeed, a wanton provocation, so unprofitable as to have all the 
 appearance of petty revenge. For a paltry sum of from ;^3S,ooo to 
 p^4o,ooo a year, Townshend was going to interfere with the trade 
 of Thirteen Colonies, already sore and suspicious, already complain- 
 ing of the restrictions on their trade. But he got his way once 
 more by threatening to resign — if his colleagues feared him as a 
 friend, how much more as an enemy ! 
 
 There seemed no limit to his folly. In June, 1766, while he was 
 still a member of Rockingham's Cabinet, he had proclaimed his 
 opinion that America ought to be deprived of "her militating and 
 contradictory charters," and that her Royal Governors, Judges, and 
 Attorneys ought to be rendered independent of the people, by 
 receiving their salaries direct from Great Britain. As though he had 
 not done enough by the Revenue Act, he now harked back to this 
 proposal. In an inflammatory speech, so much in earnest that 
 he forgot to be witty, he told the House that the Privy Council 
 had advised his Majesty to annul the whole Compensation Bill, 
 and added that he hoped Governors and Judges would in future be 
 made quite independent of the people — New York, he said, was the 
 worst, and he went on to urge the Suspension Bill. Then he talked 
 about the tax on paper currency, till Grenville's "narrow heart" was 
 delighted. So pleased was Charles with his Budget and himself, 
 that he published it in pamphlet-form — the first time such a thing 
 had been done. 
 
 On May 15 came on the Bill for Suspending the Assembly of 
 New York until it provided the troops with everything ordered by the 
 Mutiny Act. There were many debates. Governor Pownall made 
 a long and earnest speech, imploring the House at least to amend 
 
 ' Franklin had been asked whether there was any kind of difference between 
 a duty on the importation of goods and an excise on their consumption ? He 
 answered : " Yes ; a very material one ; an excise, for the reasons I have just 
 mentioned, they think you can have no right to lay within their country. But 
 the sea is yours ; you maintain, by your fleets, the safety of navigation in it, and 
 keep it clear of pirates ; you may have therefore a natural and equitable right to 
 some toll or duty on merchandises carried through that part of your dominions." 
 — Examinatimi of Dr. Benjamin Franklin at the Bar of the House, Jan. and 
 Feb., 1766. 
 
THE SUSPENSION BILL gg 
 
 the Act, and make its meaning clear, before determining to enforce 
 it. He also urged Ministers to consider whether their officers in 
 America had the means of enforcing, if the colonists chose to resist. 
 Grenville stubbornly supported the Act as it stood. In one of 
 many speeches, he stopped short, looked up to the Gallery, and said, 
 "I hope there are no American agents present; I must hold 
 language I would not have them hear." The Speaker said he had 
 ordered their exclusion. But Johnson, Agent for Connecticut, had 
 contrived to get in that night — braving the danger of arrest if he 
 were "spied" — and he heard what the Agents were not to hear. 
 Grenville was proposing to give Colonial Governors power to draw 
 on Colonial Treasurers for the needs of the troops, and a treasurer 
 who refused to honour the draft was to be judged guilty of a capital 
 crime, and to be tried and punished in England. He also proposed 
 a political test, affirming the unlimited sovereignty of Great Britain, 
 which every American must sign before taking office. He carried 
 a motion for an address of sympathy with Hutchinson, Oliver, 
 Ingersoll, and others who had made themselves the most obnoxious 
 to the colonists during what the Massachusetts Assembly had 
 politely called "the late times." 
 
 The Suspension Bill passed on the 15th of June. The Annual 
 Register, in noting the fact, observes, " this will teach the provincial 
 assemblies their inferiority to the supreme legislature." Except for 
 this Bill, America was a good deal neglected at this time. A writer 
 in the Political Register says that the American Secretary wrote only 
 two letters to the Colonies between July, 1766, and the middle of 
 May, 1767 — one to Governor Moore at New York, on August 9, 
 1766, the other to Bernard, on September 12. 
 
 The great business of that session was the settlement with the 
 East India Company. Mr. James continued to bring papers, and 
 to pray that they might not be printed (and so the proceedings of 
 the Select Committee of Bengal become publicly known). The 
 Chairman and Deputy waited on Grafton. Committees of the Whole 
 House sat on the papers, and discussed them in debates, of which 
 only the most meagre accounts have transpired. East India Stock 
 fluctuated with every speech of Mr. Townshend's,^ and the " passenger 
 proprietors " aired their wrongs in frequent and copious pamphlets. 
 
 ' " The Duke of Grafton gave a dinner to several of the principal men in the 
 City to settle the loan. Mr. Townshend came in in his nightgown, and after 
 dinner, when the terms were settled, and everyone present wished to introduce 
 some friend on the list of subscribers, he pretended to cast up the sums already 
 subscribed, said the loan was full, huddled up his papers, got into a chair, and 
 returned home, reserving to himself by this manoeuvre a large share in the loan." 
 — Sir George Colebrooke, cited by Walpote, Mem. of George in, iii. 100. 
 
100 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 And at length — so difficult did the matter appear on a nearer view, 
 and so vast the consequences involved — nothing less than an empire 
 at stake — that a temporary settlement was resolved upon — to be for 
 two years, from February i, 1767. Almost all the demands which 
 had seemed so preposterous to Chatham were granted — the Com- 
 pany was to pay into the Treasury ;^4oo,ooo a year, in half-yearly 
 instalments, and in return its territorial rights were to be admitted. 
 
 As soon as the terms of the settlement leaked out, the proprietors 
 of India Stock made a demand, at the General Court of May 6, 
 for a larger dividend, on the ground that the Company had acquired 
 so much new territory in 1764-5, and had now made so advantage- 
 ous a bargain with Government, that all shareholders ought to par- 
 ticipate at once in the benefit. The Directors, who had to find the 
 first instalment of the ;^4oo,ooo, admitted they had made a good 
 bargain, but they had vast expenses in India, owing to the un- 
 exampled extent and duration of their late military operations. 
 Moreover, their profits were sometimes remote and precarious, while 
 their debts must be met immediately.^ Better pay our debts before 
 we raise our dividend. But the proprietors were determined to 
 share the spoils, and they carried their motion for a dividend of 
 i2| per cent. 
 
 This temporary Agreement was concluded on the 20th of May, 
 and the same day the Company petitioned Parliament to " alter " 
 the duties on tea, " in order to prevent the pernicious practice of 
 smuggling, and encourage the consumption of that commodity," by 
 granting a " drawback " on all teas exported to Ireland, or to any of 
 his Majesty's colonies. They also asked for an alteration in the 
 duties on calicoes, muslins, and raw silk. The Company undertook 
 to indemnify the Chancellor of the Exchequer for any loss to the 
 revenue, if the reduction of the duty was not made up in increased 
 consumption. It was on this clause that the fate of America was 
 finally to turn. No sooner was the Settlement made, than Charles 
 Townshend began to disown his work. He had boasted that this 
 two-years' respite was what he had always insisted upon. As soon 
 as it had become law, it was no advice of his — his opinion was not 
 with it ! 
 
 A few days after the settlement was signed. Ministers resolved to 
 interpose with regard to this enormous dividend. In their turn, 
 they talked about the South Sea Bubble, and declared that if some 
 restriction was not placed on the Company, share-and-stock jobbing 
 would soon reach a greater height than even in the days of the 
 
 ' They had not sold their teas in March, as usual, that they might not appear 
 to he in cash. See the Duke of Richmond's speech on June 25. 
 
THE SUSPENSION BILL loi 
 
 Bubble. There was a violent opposition. Such an interference 
 was called an infringement of private rights, hitherto unheard of in 
 England. Ministers replied that the power and position of the 
 Company was also hitherto unheard of. Chatham did nothing to 
 help — he was still at North End — now sometimes to be met riding 
 on the heath, but speaking to no one, and casting terrifying looks 
 at any who ventured to approach too near. He was reported to 
 be actually insane. Townshend was intriguing, none knew how 
 deeply, with Bute; Conway, sick of the false position in which 
 Chatham's supporters were placed by his absence, was talking of 
 resigning. Grafton had to fight the battle almost alone ; but after a 
 fierce struggle, and long and angry debates in both Houses, and 
 a Protest by nineteen peers, the East India Company's Dividend 
 Bill passed, and received the Royal Assent on June 26, and on 
 July 2 Parliament was prorogued. 
 
 The "East India Restraining Bill" fixed the dividend at a 
 maximum of 10 per cent., till Parliament should reassemble. It 
 also made changes in the voting regulations of the Company, in 
 order to shut out the votes of the small proprietors. There were 
 not wanting those who remarked on the fact that more than sixty 
 members of Parliament were known to be engaged in jobbing in 
 India Stock, and yet sat in judgment on the Company's affairs. 
 
 It was a propos of the Company's business that on the 8th of 
 May, Charles Townshend made the extraordinary exhibition of him- 
 self known as his " champagne speech." Horace Walpole has left 
 an account, written the same day. Charles came down to the House 
 that morning with a black shade over his eye — he said he had had 
 a fall, but Walpole says it was an epileptic fit, brought on by a 
 debauch the night before. He made a calm and sensible speech, 
 though he complained much of Lord Chatham ; and at four o'clock 
 he went away to dine, taking with him Sir George Colebrooke and 
 Sir George Young. Colebrooke positively asserted afterwards that 
 they had but one bottle of champagne among the three of them. 
 Dyson was making an important motion on the India Bill — 
 Townshend's presence was absolutely necessary, and Conway sent 
 for him. About eight he returned, while Grenville was speaking. 
 As soon as Grenville had done, Charles rose, half-drunk, and made 
 the most astonishing speech ever heard in that House. Of it 
 Walpole says that nobody but he could have made it, and nobody 
 but he would have made it if they could. He began by calling God 
 to witness that he had never been consulted on the present motion. 
 There were fourteen men sitting round him who had helped him 
 draw it that very morning ! He complained that he was not taken 
 
I02 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 seriously. What he said was "all i propos to nothing, and yet 
 about everything— about ministries, past, present, and to come." 
 So far as anything could be gathered from this astounding rhodo- 
 montade, it was a proposal for a Rockingham Administration, with 
 Charles Townshend at the head of it. Charles spoke of the Grafton 
 Cabinet as though it were already a thing of the past. "The 
 speech showed him capable of being, and unfit to be first minister." 
 The House listened in a roar of rapture, clapping like an audience 
 at a theatre. His friend Colebrooke thought it was a piece of acting 
 — there was method in many of Charles's eccentricities, and Cole- 
 brooke suspected him of wishing to sound the feeling of the House 
 towards a Townshend Administration. 
 
CHAPTER XV 
 LORD NORTH 
 
 " A leading Minister repeatedly called down for absolute ignorance, ridiculous 
 motions ridiculously withdrawn, deliberate plans disconcerted, and a week's pre- 
 paration of graceful oratory lost in a moment, give us some, though not adequate 
 ideas of Lord North's parliamentary abilities and influence. Yet before he had 
 the misfortune of being Chancellor of the Exchequer, he was neither an object 
 of derision to his enemies, nor of melancholy pity to his friends." — ^Junius. 
 
 " While we are at peace with other nations, our military force may, perhaps, 
 be spared to support the Earl of Hillsborough's measures in America. . . . 
 Drawing lots would be a prudent and reasonable method of appointing the 
 officers of state compared to a late disposition of the Secretary's office." — Ibid. 
 
 " Since the accession of our most gracious Sovereign to the throne, we have 
 seen a system of government which may well be called a reign of experiments." — 
 Junitis to the Duke of Grafton, July 8, 1769. 
 
 The Patchwork Cabinet was a coalition, and a coalition can never 
 be more than a temporary makeshift, adopted to gain time for dis- 
 covering where the chief strength lies. In such a partnership there 
 can be no enthusiasm. The less scrupulous invariably drag the 
 more scrupulous into measures of which they disapprove. Finally, 
 the more scrupulous see no escape but a secession which comes 
 too late to save either their self-respect or their credit with the 
 country. It was so with the Rockinghamites whom Chatham 
 persuaded to remain in 1766. They were dragged along by 
 Townshend, and when they grew alarmed and resigned, they 
 took with them nothing but a reputation for feebleness. 
 
 The Patchwork Cabinet was unworkable. On June 2, the 
 King wrote to Chatham that Northington and Conway meant to 
 resign, and that Grafton declined to form a new temporary Ad- 
 ministration — unless Lord Chatham could fill up the vacancies 
 the present one would infallibly fall to pieces in less than ten 
 days. Townshend, too, would go, "unless additional strength 
 and ability be acquired." Chatham replied by the hand of Lady 
 Chatham, that he was totally incapacitated. He humbly declined 
 to see Sir Clement Wintringham, his Majesty's physician, and 
 implored permission to follow the directions of Dr. Addington, 
 
 103 
 
I04 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 who gave him good hopes of recovery. The King wished above 
 all things to prevent Chatham from resigning — it would be terrible 
 if he recovered and went into Opposition ! There was only one 
 thing his Majesty dreaded more, and that was being obliged to 
 take back George Granville. The country was practically with- 
 out a Government. In July, Northington bluntly declared in the 
 King's closet that he could bear it no longer — and he went out 
 of town. Grafton told the King he could not go on like this. 
 Townshend said he would stay, if "stability" could be obtained 
 — not if Administration was to be merely " patched." Meanwhile 
 it was reported that Chatham had a violent fit of influenza, had 
 been in danger, and made Addington sit up with him all night. 
 And it was generally believed that now, at any rate, Chatham 
 was quite out of his mind.^ 
 
 That summer almost everybody — except George Grenville, 
 who, after Chatham, was far the most capable — was asked to 
 come and help govern the British Empire ; and everybody 
 was afraid to undertake the task. Nobody cared to .become one 
 of a fortuitous concourse of atoms. For a few days it seemed 
 as though the Rockinghamites would return to power, with the 
 Bedfords and Newcastles. The King called this "an intent to 
 storm my closet," but he dared not openly resist, for fear of 
 having to take back " Mr. Greenville." To his great joy, the 
 negotiations fell through on the question of America — Bedford 
 was for coercion, Rockingham still for conciliation. But all 
 saw that a change was inevitable. Chatham no longer counted. 
 At the end of July, a person employed to find out his real 
 condition, reported that he sat most of the day alone, his head 
 leaning down on his hands, which he rested on the table. Even 
 Lady Chatham did not generally stay in the room with him — if 
 he wanted anything, he knocked with a stick. " He says Httle, 
 even to her, if she comes in; and is so averse to speaking, that 
 he commonly intimates his desire to be" left alone by some signal, 
 rather than by any expression." Addington, however, still thought 
 he would recover. 
 
 It was practically an " interministerium." All who were behind 
 
 ■^ " The public here, as well as with you, believe him wholly mad : but I am 
 assured it is not so. He is only fallen into extreme low spirits and into nervous 
 disorders, which render him totally unfit for business, make him shun all company, 
 and, as I am told, set him weeping like a child upon the least accident. Is it 
 not even an addition to his unhappiness that he retains his senses? It was a rash 
 experiment, that of repelling the gout, which threw him into this state of mind ; 
 and perhaps a hearty fit of gout may again prove a cure to him." — David Hume 
 to the Countess de Boufflers. 
 
LORD NORTH 105 
 
 the scenes were certain that Charles Townshend would be First 
 Lord of the Treasury before Parliament reassembled. He had 
 been in communication with the King, and with Bute, who was 
 his wife's cousin. He had paid court to the City of London, and 
 received its freedom in a gold box — this was thought a huge joke 
 by Charles's friends. He seemed to be in sight of the goal. There 
 are in existence 163 skeleton sketches for an Administration, drawn 
 up by the political plotters of the time. One, which was pretty 
 nearly carried into effect, was for shutting out all the Rockinghams 
 except Yorke, and filling the vacancies with the " King's Friends." 
 
 Charles had been drinking very hard of late, and had never 
 been so delightful. Night after night he supped at Conway's, and 
 kept them all in a roar at his sallies till past two in the morning — 
 winding up one night with an imitation of his wife and another 
 great lady, with whom he pretended to be in love. When we try 
 to imagine what a man would have done as the head of a Cabinet, 
 who had contrived to crowd so much mischief into a year as 
 Chancellor of the Exchequer, we are almost reconciled to North's 
 Administration. If Townshend had come to power, his rashness 
 and fickleness would have been to North's, as King Stork to 
 King Log. But it was never to be. The combined excitements 
 of wine, women, and politics were telling upon him. Even before 
 the House rose, some thought he looked very ill. His wife 
 said he was in very low spirits. Towards the end of August 
 it was known that he was laid up — Sir William Duncan had 
 seen him, and pronounced it a " putrid fever," which he had been 
 carrying about for a long time. This may partly explain his 
 extraordinary conduct during the last few months. Duncan 
 thought the fever not dangerous at present, but it might at any 
 moment become so. And, suddenly, it took this fatal turn. 
 When he was told of his condition, Charles showed a patience 
 and resignation in strange contrast to his habitual temper — but 
 in him everything was strange and contradictory. He died on 
 the 4th of September, 1767. He had only just completed his 
 forty-second year. He had sown the wind. He died before his 
 country could reap the whirlwind. 
 
 There was great difficulty in filling Charles's place. On September 
 1 1, Lord Mansfield, Chief Justice of the King's Bench, was appointed 
 ad interim. The Exchequer was offered to Lord North, who 
 declined more than once. Then to Barrington, then to the Duke 
 of Bedford. Not until December i do we find in the " Promotions," 
 "Lord North, Chancellor of the Exchequer, and a Lord of the 
 Treasury." He had been persuaded to accept by the Dowager 
 
io6 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Princess of Wales. It was a sinister omen, but too prophetic of the 
 influences which were henceforth to direct his career. 
 
 Like many other famous Tory Ministers, North had begun as' a 
 Whig. His disastrous Administration has left an impression of 
 incompetence not wholly just. He was a man of superior abilities, 
 but weak of will, an indolent and easy-going man, with a quick wit 
 and a sweet temper ; a good debater rather than a good speaker. 
 He had a singularly ungainly presence, and the story went that he 
 had said he supposed himself, his wife and daughter were three of 
 the ugliest people in England. They were certainly among the 
 most amiable.i North's personal peculiarities are mercilessly 
 described by Horace Walpole. " Two large prominent eyes rolled 
 about to no purpose — for he was utterly short-sighted — a wide 
 mouth, thick lips, and an inflated visage, gave him the appearance 
 of a trumpeter." 
 
 North was the eldest son of the Earl of Guildford. He had 
 done well at Eton and Christ Church in classics, and had made the 
 "grand tour" — he had even "studied the German constitution" 
 under Mascovius. He had held office under Pitt. He was now 
 thirty-five. His abilities had been recognised by the shrewdest 
 political observers. George Grenville said to a man who was 
 sneering at North, " You are mistaken. North is a man of great 
 promise and high qualifications, and if he does not relax in his political 
 pursuits, is very likely to be Minister." Townshend, who always 
 called him " Blubbery North," was walking one day in the Park, 
 when he said to a friend, " See that great heavy, booby-looking 
 changeling — you may believe me when I assure you as a fact, that 
 if anything should happen to me, he will succeed to my place, and 
 very shortly after come to be First Commissioner of the Treasury." 
 No one would believe this ; but the first part of the prophecy was 
 immediately fulfilled. 
 
 From this time, every change was for the worse — that is, it gave 
 more and more power to the " King's Friends." Earl Gower, the 
 new President of Council, the Earl of Hillsborough, Lord Weymouth, 
 Rigby (the Duke of Bedford's lieutenant in the House of Commons) 
 — all these will play their part in driving the quarrel with America 
 to extremity. Soon the King was to have the Cabinet he had been 
 working for ever since Bute resigned in 1763. Shelburne, Chatham's 
 
 ' " His daughter Lady Charlotte Lindsay said of him, ' His only fault was his 
 inability to resist the influence of those he loved.' North bore a strong general 
 resemblance to the Royal Family — a resemblance accounted for by an old piece 
 of scandal." — Memoirs of Rockingham. 
 
LORD NORTH 107 
 
 friend, was dismissed, and replaced by Weymouth. And on 
 January 6, 1768, "the Right Honourable the Earl of Hillsborough 
 took his seat at the board of trade, as secretary for the American 
 colonies." He was the first Colonial Secretary. ^ 
 
 ' Wills Hills, afterwards first Marquis of Downshire, Earl of Hillsborough in 
 the Peerage of Ireland, iJ. 1718. He sat as Lord Harwich. Walpole had called 
 him " a young man of great honour and merit, scrupulous in weighing his reasons, 
 and excellent at setting them off by solemnity of voice and manner." Franklin 
 said of him : " His character is conceit, wrong-headedness, obstinacy, and 
 passion. Those who speak most favourably of him allow all this ; they only add 
 that he is an honest man and means well." — Franklin to Dr. Cooper, February 
 5. 1771. 
 
CHAPTER XVI 
 THE LAST DAYS OF A PARLIAMENT 
 
 " In one of our conversations, I desired Lord Chatham to secure you a 
 seat in the New Parliament ; he assured me he would. . . . Since that, I have heard 
 no more of it ; which made me look out for some venal borough ; and I spoke to a 
 borough-jobber, and offered five-and-twenty hundred pounds for a secure seat in 
 parliament ; but he laughed at my offer, and said, that there was no such thing as a 
 borough to be had now, for the rich East and West Indians had secured them all, 
 at the rate of three thousand pounds at least ; but many at four thousand ; and two 
 or three, that he knew, at five thousand. ... I am looking out for a'chance borough ; 
 and if I can find one, I promise you I will bid like a chapman for it." — Lord 
 Chesterfield to his Son, Dec. 19, 1767, and Jan. 29, 1768. 
 
 " The old Parliament is gone. . . . All the members are now in their counties 
 and boroughs among their drunken electors ; much confusion and disorder in many 
 places, and such profusion of money as never was known before on any similar 
 occasion. . . . The first instance of bribery ... is no longer ago than Queen 
 Elizabeth's time, when , . . ' a simple man . . . had ^wtrt. four pounds' . . . 
 The price is monstrously risen since that time, for it is now no less than four 
 thousand founds! It is thought that near two millions will be spent this 
 election." — Franklin to Joseph Galloway, March 13, 1768. 
 
 The last session of the Twelfth Parliament of the United Kingdom 
 opened badly (on the 24th of November, 1767) with a Speech 
 from the Throne, unmercifully criticised by Mr. Burke. Such, he 
 said, was the condition of the country — so much distress, so many 
 disorders owing to that distress, that every moment of the recess 
 ought to have been devoted to discovering a remedy. But we are put 
 off with a declaration that the laws passed last session have been 
 without effect. God knows what Ministers have been about these 
 four months past ! They have done very little good — it is to be 
 hoped they have not been doing mischief! It is claimed for the 
 Speech that it is " harmless " — there have been times when harmless- 
 ness was not enough. It is hinted that Mr. Townshend had a plan. 
 That lamented gentleman was not a reserved man — surely someone 
 must know what the plan was. What a humiliating thing for an 
 Administration, to tell the House that by the death of a single man 
 all projects for the public good are at an end ! Then we are 
 assured that all is quiet abroad — it is to be hoped so, for we are in 
 
I HE LAST DAYS OF A PARLIAMENT 109 
 
 confusion enough at home. Nothing has been done anywhere — 
 our consuls, envoys and ambassadors have been suffered to loiter 
 at home, instead of repairing to their stations. Even the Manilla 
 Ransom has disappeared from the King's Speech. Burke was 
 especially indignant at the recommendation to the Houses to 
 cultivate "a spirit of harmony." He asked, were we to look to 
 Ministers for an example of harmony? Is it not notorious that 
 they only exist by creating divisions among others — separating 
 friend from friend, brother from brother ? They mean they hope 
 we shall unite in supporting fkem / A sort of union which I hope 
 will never prevail in a free Parliament ! 
 
 It was Conway who had put forward Mr. Townshend's death as 
 the reason why Ministers had not been able to devise a scheme for 
 the relief of the poor. Mr. Townshend's plan, he said, " was lost 
 with him." His lamented friend had promised to prepare one, but 
 it was impossible to find a successor to his abilities. It was a 
 miserable exhibition, and Burke's attack was emphasised by a 
 Petition from the City of London on the high price of provisions. 
 There were other petitions — from the provinces. All the House could 
 think of was to continue the ineffectual laws of last session, prohibit- 
 ing the exportation of corn, and allowing importation from America. 
 
 Hitherto, Colonial affairs had been a branch of the Southern 
 Secretary's department. At the end of 1767, Grafton proposed to 
 divide the office, and appoint a Third Secretary for the Colonies. 
 Moved by not receiving till December 11 papers from New York 
 which reached the Southern Office on October 3, he told Shelburne 
 that the present arrangement was too much forany man — " a Solomon 
 could not do it." So Hillsborough was appointed, and soon after 
 Shelburne was dismissed. Then Conway resigned — high-minded ^ 
 but vacillating Conway, the only man of whom Horace Walpole 
 never spoke ill, but who could never say No unless Pitt was there to 
 back him up. All the Rockinghamites were now got rid of, and a 
 good many of the Bedford Whigs were in their places. But the 
 Cabinet had no soul, and very little life. Intrigues went on, but no 
 one understood them except the King. America was becoming 
 more and more the crucial question — one attempt at coalition after 
 another had split on the rock of conciliation. The Rockinghams, 
 the Bedfords, the Grenvilles could never agree on America. Even 
 Camden, left without his great friend's moral support, wavered, and 
 condemned the resistance of the colonists. His great friend 
 himself was becoming annoyed at their obstinacy. 
 
 ' From a delicacy about the negotiations with Rockingham in the summer, 
 Conway had refused to accept the p^'sooo a year belonging to his Secretaryship. 
 
no ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 But for the body of the people, there were questions far more 
 important than the doings of the tiresome American colonists. The 
 General Election, and the affairs of the East India Company, were 
 the topics of conversation at the beginning of 1768, and if America 
 was mentioned, it was only because the non-importation agreement 
 was so prejudicial to the Company. 
 
 The Company had got out of one crisis, only to get into another. 
 It had now another war on hand, and had met with some disasters. 
 It had meddled incautiously with Hyder Ali (once "a corporal of 
 seapoys," now a powerful sovereign). It would have been wiser to 
 leave the Mahrattas to worry him. Hyder had overrun all the 
 country from Bombay to Madras, and in September, 1767, could 
 have captured the whole of the Company's government, if the five 
 thousand horse who appeared before Madras had been less intent on 
 looting. 
 
 It was an extraordinary situation — "twenty-four gentlemen in 
 Leadenhall-street," administering an empire, while another empire 
 tried to make them share the spoils. A Company so rich that the 
 British people were assured its revenues — could Government but get 
 hold of them — would pay off the National Debt, and abolish the land- 
 tax for ever, and most other taxes too ; yet so burdened with debts 
 as not to have a halfpenny of ready money. East India Stock 
 fluctuating between 260 and 270, when Bank of England Stock 
 was only from 160 to 170. Thirteen million pounds of tea spoiling 
 in the cellars of Leadenhall Street ; six and a half million more 
 pounds expected in fourteen ships from China — twenty million 
 pounds in all, enough for three or four years' consumption, but 
 little sale for it, because the duty made tea a hundred per cent, 
 dearer in England than in foreign parts. Half the bohea drunk in 
 England was never sold by the Company, and never made the 
 acquaintance of a revenue officer, or paid a penny of duty. And 
 all these millions of pounds of tea locked up, though the Revenue 
 Act took off one shilling in the pound sterling for the next five 
 years, on both black and singlo teas. And if the tea could not be 
 worked off somehow, the East India dividend must fall below 6 
 per cent. ; and in that case the country (meaning the Chancellor 
 of the Exchequer) will lose the ;^4oo,ooo yearly tribute, paid by 
 the Company out of the revenues of Bengal. America was the 
 natural market for this tea — and America had made a non-importa- 
 tion agreement. The country began to lose patience.^ 
 
 " ^ The indignation of the English is like that of the Scythians, who, returning 
 from war, found themselves excluded from their own houses by their slaves."— 
 Dr. Johnson. 
 
THE LAST DAYS OF A PARLIAMENT in 
 
 The first parliamentary event of the new year was the extraordinary 
 case of the Mayor and Council of Oxford, who, in view of the 
 approaching General Election, had written to their members, 
 offering to return them to the new Parliament for _;^4ooo down. 
 This, they explained, would enable the Corporation to discharge 
 the City debt, and would save Sir Thomas Stapleton and the Hon. 
 Robert Lee the "opposition, animosity and confusion" of an 
 election. The two members thanked the Corporation for giving 
 them the preference, but, " as we never intend to sell you, so we 
 cannot afford the purchase." They laid the Mayor's letter before 
 the House. The Magistrates who had signed it were commanded 
 to appear, were committed to Newgate, and had to ask pardon 
 on their knees at the Bar. 
 
 After this exhibition of virtue, Parliament turned to the Nullum 
 Tempus Bill — pending since 1767. For nearly seventy years the 
 Duke of Portland had held the Honour of Penrith, always supposed 
 to carry with it Inglewood Forest and the Manor of Carlisle. In 
 1767, Sir James Lowther, another great Cumberland landowner, 
 memorialised the Treasury— the forest and the manor had long 
 been held with no benefit to the Crown, and Lowther suggested as 
 a remedy that he himself should have a lease of them for three 
 lives. One part of the benefit to the Crown would have been the 
 votes of the tenants. Portland was not a supporter of Administra- 
 tion ; Lowther was. The question was whether the title of the 
 Crown had lapsed. It used to be said that after sixty years the 
 King himself could not take away a man's land ; but the claim 
 was based on the maxim, Nullum Tempus occurrit Regi. As all 
 land in England has belonged to the King at one time or other, 
 the Crown could thus claim any man's estate, on the ground that 
 it once belonged to William the Conqueror. The people saw this, 
 and the Duke of Portland's rights became the rights of every man. 
 The Nullum Tempus business was one more attempt to exalt 
 prerogative ; and it was said to be intended to do this in a twofold 
 manner, for Portland was a staunch Whig, and many believed that 
 his lands were to be bestowed on Lowther, in order to strengthen 
 Lowther's "interest" and lessen the Duke's at the approaching 
 Election.! The instant effect of the Bill would be to give the 
 
 ^ "One fatal mark seems to|be fixed on every measure. . . . The extraordinary 
 step you took to make Sir James Lowther lord paramount of Cumberland has 
 ruined his interest in that country for ewer."— Junius to the Duke of Grafton, 
 April 10, 1760. 
 
 It was said that the Treasury set to work to worry the Duke out in a way 
 only worthy of a low attorney, who resorts to sharp practice when his client's 
 cause is dubious. 
 
112 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Crown the power of controlling elections, by resuming lands and 
 re-granting them to its supporters. This made the Bill so odious, 
 that though Sir George Savile's Bill, limiting the claim of the Crown, 
 was lost on the second reading, the Court party was afraid to use 
 its victory, and the question was put off till a new Parliament, with 
 a long life before it, should remove the necessity for caution. 
 
 Almost the last act of the old Parhament was to renew the 
 East India Company Restraining Bill. In spite of strong pressure 
 in Parliament and out, the Bill passed by a very great majority.^ 
 The Directors, at their next Court, voted to reduce the dividend to 
 five per cent., everybody to be forgiven, and all prosecutions 
 dropped for anything which commanders and ofificers of ships might 
 have done in the Company's service. And then, determined that 
 the new Parliament should not serve them as the old had done, 
 they set to work in such earnest to make themselves friends of the 
 Mammon of Unrighteousness, that the Thirteenth Parliament of Great 
 Britain enjoys the distinction of having been bought more dearly 
 than any Parliament before it. Two millions sterling was the sum 
 named as having changed hands at the General Election of 1768. 
 Yet such are the surprises of political cause and effect, this dear- 
 bought " Unreported " Parliament ^ was to be the one which broke 
 down the rule of secrecy, and instead of punishing, rather encouraged 
 the immediate printing of speeches delivered at its sessions. Up 
 to then, such reports as we have are contained in private letters, 
 and notes furnished by speakers, or printed in transparent disguise 
 in the great magazines of the day. Such accounts are veiled 
 in more or less mystery, as the temper of Parliament varied. In 
 
 1732, Sir R 1 W le spoke for the Salt Bill (imploring 
 
 some consideration for unhappy freeholders, groaning under 2S. in 
 
 the pound land-tax) ; and Mr. C r of the E r spoke against 
 
 the Bill to exclude Placemen. But in 1736, the Editor of the 
 Gentleman! s Magazine expresses his gratitude " for any authentic 
 intelligence in matters of such importance and tenderness as the 
 Speeches in Parliament,'' and regrets that he has not been able to 
 get them this month — hopes to have them by next. Soon after 
 the candid reader is reminded of the " difficulty (and sometimes 
 danger) of publishing speeches in Parliament " — the Editor hopes 
 the very words will not be expected. And in 1738, he has grown 
 so cautious that we have the Debates of the Senate of Magna 
 Lilliputia, sitting at Belforborac, in the nth Moon of the Reign of 
 
 ' February 17, 1768. 
 
 ^ Sir Henry Cavendish took very full notes of the more important debates, 
 but these were not published till 1841. 
 
LtiiL JLAST DAYS OF A PARLIAMENT 113 
 
 the Emperor Gorgenti 11 ; and Hugo Pulnub (leader of the high- 
 heeled or patriotic party) and Tsahom Wintinnong (who had ratted 
 to the fiscals) are reported at great length. Instead of a petition 
 from the Merchants of London respecting the Trade to the North 
 American Colonies — as in 1767 — we have in 1738 the Merchants of 
 Mildendo petitioning on the Trade to the Lilliputian Plantation in 
 Columbia ; and instead of the Lord Mayor of London, we have 
 the Prsetor of Mildendo, and Gumdalua, Lettyltno and Feaucks 
 speak in the debate. But as soon as calm is restored after the 
 Forty-Five, we return to the loud whispers of 1732, and listen to 
 Mr. P m and Sir J n H d C n. 
 
 In old days, the secrecy of debate was the security of Parliament 
 — almost its only safeguard against the impeachment of its members 
 for treason. As to an appeal to public opinion, before CuUoden 
 public opinion was so nicely balanced that it was safer not to 
 appeal to it oftener than could be helped — for which reason 
 Parliaments had been made septennial. 
 
 But when Mr. Wilkes became the idol of the public, all was 
 changed. The Whig members of the High Court of Parliament 
 were now as eager to appeal to the higher court of the People, 
 as they had formerly been shy of doing so, — with the people at 
 their back publicity was a defence, not a danger. And so John 
 Wilkes was the godfather of public opinion in England in the 
 eighteenth century. He was not an entirely satisfactory champion 
 of Liberty, but he was its champion, and other causes besides 
 Liberty have had champions as unsatisfactory; even if he was 
 the kettle, there were plenty of Cabinet Ministers who might be 
 called the pot. Sandwich was hardly the man to rebuke Wilkes. 
 
 The Twelfth Parhament was dissolved March 12, 1768. It 
 died neither respected nor regretted. In its seven years of life 
 it had been the docile tool of five Administrations — Pitt's, Bute's, 
 Grenville's, Rockingham's, Grafton's. Charles Townshend had 
 played upon it any tune he chose. The more rash and violent 
 the measures laid before it, the more eager it was to support them. 
 It passed the Stamp Act, almost in its sleep; but offered some 
 opposition to repeal. Since then, it had wobbled with the wobbling 
 Cabinet — had been now for conciliating, now for coercing America, 
 but had never had any well-defined plan for either conciliation 
 or coercion. 
 
 VOL. I. — 8 
 
CHAPTER XVII 
 BOSTON 
 
 "The old world had not its parallel. It counted about 16,000 inhabitants of 
 European origin, all of whom learned to read and write. Good public schools 
 were the foundation of its political system. ... As its schools were for all its 
 children, so the great body of its male inhabitants of twenty-one years of age, 
 when assembled in a hall which Faneuil, of Huguenot ancestry, had built for 
 them, was the source of all municipal authority. ... A property qualification 
 was attached to the right of voting, but it was so small that it did not change 
 the character of the sufifrage. There had never existed a^ considerable munici- 
 pality, approaching so nearly to a pure democracy ; and, for so populous a place, 
 it was undoubtedly the most orderly and best governed in the world." — Bancroft's 
 description of Boston, Massachusetts, History, iii. p. 327. 
 
 With the passing of the Revenue Act, a change came over the 
 tone of the Colonials. Up to now they had accepted the 
 restrictions laid on their trade as a necessary evil, a Law of Nature 
 to which the colonies of all nations were subjected. These 
 restrictions must with time and increase of population have become 
 intolerable, but, hitherto, the new country was not ready to make 
 its own manufactures, and was glad to buy ours. But, since the 
 Seven Years' War, a new system had been inaugurated — a system 
 which placed the Colonies on an altogether different political 
 footing. Until now, the provincial Assemblies had been parlia- 
 ments in exactly the same sense that the Parliament of West- 
 minster was a parliament. When revenue was required, the 
 Assemblies were informed of it, in the same way that the same 
 thing was made known at Westminster, and they raised the money 
 voluntarily, in the same sense that the Parliament of Westminster 
 granted Supply voluntarily, — themselves choosing the ways and 
 means of raising it. The colonists demanded the continuance 
 of this policy. To the last moment of the connection with Great 
 Britain, they protested that they were ready to continue the 
 loyal subjects of the King of England, but absolutely refused to 
 become the subjects of the Parliament of England. There was 
 neither hypocrisy nor inconsistency in the distinction — it was 
 perfectly clear and logical, and showed a grasp of political 
 
BOSTON I I 5 
 
 principles which the majority of our own Liberal politicians have 
 even yet very imperfectly attained to. They saw — what we still 
 refuse to realise — that the government of one people by another 
 people is a farce, which very easily becomes a tragic farce — that 
 it results inevitably in the irresponsible tyranny of a little handful 
 of ofificials, who can always reckon on no too-searching inquiry 
 being made into their conduct on the other side of the world. 
 The only logical answer to the colonists would have been to tell 
 them candidly that henceforth their provincial Assemblies must 
 cease to be legislative, and exist only to pass such Bills as the 
 Royal Governors, acting under instructions from England, should 
 put before them. Ministers presently saw this themselves, and 
 began to talk about revoking the Charters. It was no pedantic 
 stickling for etiquette that made the New York Assembly refuse 
 to vote anything for the troops, except in a manner which should 
 show unmistakably that it did so of its own proper motion — the 
 distinction was vital, and, as they justly said, constituted the 
 difference between liberty and slavery. 
 
 It seemed at one time that Canada also would be provoked 
 into rebellion. The statesmen who presided over our affairs 
 thought that the best way to reconcile a people to a change of 
 government was to make the change as conspicuous as possible. 
 So they had abolished the old French laws — which the people 
 understood, and established British law, which was no doubt 
 infinitely superior; but unfortunately the French of Canada did 
 not understand it, and they felt their property less secure than 
 before. Next the "Protestant" party in England tried hard to 
 introduce some of the penal laws enjoyed by Ireland. Luckily 
 for British rule, saner counsels prevailed, and, in spite of much 
 Protestant protestation, the Catholics of Canada were allowed to 
 sit on juries without renouncing their religious beliefs. A time was 
 at hand when the fiercest Protestant must have been very glad 
 that we gave up the idea of inaugurating our rule in Canada by 
 treating Canadian as we did Irish Catholics. At the same time 
 it must have been difficult to account for not doing so. If right 
 in Ireland, why wrong in Canada ? 
 
 There was another religious question in debate at this time. 
 As though a political quarrel was not enough to demand all our 
 energies, it had been for some years seriously contemplated to 
 establish the Church of England in the Colonies, and a "Bishop 
 of North America " had been talked about. The proposal caused 
 considerable stir and a very strong feeling of opposition, but the 
 poUtical situation was very shortly to become so acute that the 
 
Ii6 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 appointment of a Bishop of North America was deferred to a 
 more convenient season. Considering that the Colonies of New 
 England had been founded by persons who crossed the seas to 
 avoid Bishops, a more impolitic idea could hardly have been 
 entertained. It had the same motive as the rest of the Mother 
 Country's dealings with her children at that time. The constitution 
 of the churches of America was much too democratic and inde- 
 pendent to please statesmen always on the look-out for the first 
 signs of any attempt to throw off allegiance to the British Crown. 
 The bogey of "Independence" was always being brought out to 
 frighten us into " putting our foot down," and the King and his 
 Ministers thought that an Established Church would greatly promote 
 obedience and loyalty. It seemed at one time as though the 
 rupture might come on this question, but the tide of events soon 
 swept it away, and but for a few references to the plan in the 
 letters of Ministers of State, we might forget it was ever proposed 
 to ask the Colonies to endow an Episcopal Church. 
 
 By May of 1767, the Colonies knew that there were to be fresh 
 taxes, and on October 19 they heard in Boston that the Revenue 
 Act was now law. On the 28th, "the freeholders and other 
 inhabitants, legally assembled in Faneuil Hall," considered what 
 could be done. Hutchinson says it was believed that the Non- 
 importation Associations had alarmed the English merchants, and 
 induced them to petition for the repeal of the Stamp Act ; and 
 it was hoped that the like Associations would have the like effect 
 this time also. The Hon. James Otis, Hutchinson's old enemy, 
 was Moderator of the meeting. A petition was presented praying 
 that effectual means might be taken to promote "industry, economy 
 and manufactures, thereby to prevent the unnecessary importation 
 of European goods, which threaten the country with poverty and 
 ruin.'' The "very large and full" meeting voted unanimously to 
 encourage in all prudent and legal ways the produce and manu- 
 factures of this province, and to lessen the use of superfluities, and 
 particularly of the following articles, imported from abroad, viz., 
 loaf sugar, cordage, anchors, coaches, chaises and carriages of all 
 sorts ; horse furniture ; men's and women's hats, gloves, shoes, and 
 ready-made wearing apparel; household furniture; sole-leather, 
 sheathing, and deck-nails ; gold- and silver-thread lace, gold and 
 silver buttons, wrought plate, diamonds, watches and clocks; 
 broadcloths at above los. the yard; muffs, furs and tippets, 
 and " all sorts of Millenery ware " ; women's and children's stays ; 
 silk and cotton velvets, gauze, lawn, cambric, and silks; fire- 
 engines, china-ware, snuff; mustard, glue, oil, malt liquors, cheese 
 
BOSTON 117 
 
 — a list which serves to show how vast a trade the English 
 merchants stood to lose if the American market was cut off. And 
 to encourage home-manufactures, merchants handed round samples 
 — starch ("Poland, and the common sort"), hair-powder ("of the 
 best sort"), glue and snuff ("like Kippen's") — all made in Boston, 
 and all pronounced very good. 
 
 Great was the wrath in England. Angry letters in the news- 
 papers and magazines denounced the weakness which had repealed 
 the Stamp Act, and taught the Americans to think we were afraid of 
 them. We are in the power of our debtors, exclaims a writer in the 
 Gentleman's Magazine ; this is an inversion of the natural order of 
 things ! We repealed the Act lest we should lose our outstanding 
 debts — it was ne moriare, mori — we have cut our throats to save 
 our lives. The taxes on trade to pay the interest on over a hundred 
 and thirty millions of debt are so heavy that our manufactures no 
 longer find a foreign market — we are undersold and beaten out 
 where we once had almost exclusive possession. We thought an 
 exclusive commerce with our colonies (" in whose cause a great part 
 of the very encumbrances which have destroyed our foreign trade 
 were undertaken ") would have rewarded us for our losses. We 
 thought the Americans would be grateful for all we have done for 
 them — to say nothing of their being our blood, and their interest 
 being to stand by us. We thought they would have made up any 
 deficiency in our revenue from customs. But vain, pernicious ideas 
 of independence and separate dominion have got hold of them, 
 fomented by designing seditious spirits there, and treachery and 
 folly here — and they are uniting to prohibit our manufactures ! 
 And of course all the other colonies will follow their example, and if 
 
 the present weak, false, and pusillanimous Ad n are suffered to go 
 
 on abetting the^colonies against the mother country, our children, 
 if not ourselves, will have to surrender to the Americans — nor will 
 it be long first. If this combination is not illegal, it ought to be 
 made so — you can't compel people to buy, but you can make 
 combination illegal. " A tumultuous people " must be awed by a 
 vigorous and steady exertion of the authority of Great Britain. 
 They have trampled on us because we submitted to them. 
 
CHAPTER XVIII 
 "THE CIRCULATORY LETTER" 
 
 "The enemies of the colonists . . . my Lord, are equally the enemies 
 of Britain." — Letter from the House of Representatives of the Province of 
 Massachusetts to Lord Chatham, signed by the Speaker, Feb. 2, 1768. 
 
 "It is moreover their humble opinion, which they express with the greatest 
 deference to the wisdom of the Parliament, that the Acts made there, imposing 
 duties on the people of this province, with the sole and express purpose of raising a 
 revenue, are infringements of their natural and constitutional rights." — Circulatory 
 Letter sent from the House of Representatives of Massachusetts Bay to the Speakers 
 of the respective Hoiises and Burgesses on the Continent of North America, 
 Feb. II, 1768. 
 
 ' ' We have for a long time known your enmity to this province. We have full 
 proof of your cruelty to a. loyal people , . . when you had, by your judicial 
 insinuations, induced a worthy Minister of State (Shelburne) to form a most 
 unfavourable opinion of the province in general, and some of the most respect- 
 able inhabitants in particular ; you had the effrontery to produce a letter from his 
 lordship, as proof of your success in calumniating us." — A Supposed Libel on the 
 Governor of Massachusetts Bay, published in the Boston Gazette of Fehmary 2g, 
 1768. 
 
 " It gives great concern to his Majesty to find . . . that a thin House at the 
 end of a Session should have presumed to revert to a measure of so inflammatory 
 a nature as that of writing to the other colonies." — The Earl of Hillsborough to 
 Governor Bernard, April 22, 1768. 
 
 Four days after the death of Charles Townshend, the Commissioners 
 of Customs in America were appointed, and very soon afterwards 
 they sailed. Among them was Mr. John Temple, a gentleman who 
 knew America well ; his family held estates there, and he himself 
 had married Bowdoin's daughter. He was always friendly to the 
 Americans, and was hereafter to play a dubious part in a very 
 dubious incident. 
 
 It so happened that for a month after the Commissioners 
 arrived, no dutiable articles came in, so they had nothing to do, 
 and all was so quiet that Bernard wrote a favourable report to 
 Shelburne of this good behaviour. He had hardly despatched his 
 letter, when a ship arrived with Shelburne's answer to a former one. 
 Shelburne censured the Assembly, and named several members. 
 
 U8 
 
"THE CIRCULATORY LETTER" 119 
 
 He thought it very extraordinary that a person of the Lieutenant- 
 Governor's very respectable character — whose learning and abilities 
 had been exerted in the cause of America — met with so much ill-will. 
 Bernard had the letter read to the Assembly, but refused to allow a 
 copy to be taken. So it was printed from memory, and afterwards 
 from the copy entrusted to the Speaker on condition no other copy 
 was taken. A violent attack on Bernard appeared in the Boston 
 Gazette — charging him with "a diabolic thirst for mischief," and 
 with giving a worthy Minister of State a bad opinion of the whole 
 province — and then having the effrontery to show a letter from his 
 lordship, to prove the success of his calumnies. Bernard laid the 
 matter before the Council — up to now, he said, he had treated the 
 Gazette with the contempt it deserved, but this was going too far. 
 The Council — now packed with a good many of the Governor's 
 friends — called it " an insolent and licencious attack on the King's 
 representative " ; but the Assembly talked about the liberty of the 
 Press, and drew up a letter to Shelburne, entreating to know of 
 what they were accused, and who was their accuser — hinting pretty 
 plainly that it was the Governor. On March 4, Bernard pro- 
 rogued them, and took the opportunity of lecturing them on their 
 behaviour, and especially on their "extraordinary and indecent 
 observations on a letter wrote, as I may say, in the presence of the 
 King himself." He had hoped, by his manner of communicating the 
 letter, it need never be known " out of the general Court." They 
 had only themselves to thank that it had been dragged into public. 
 
 The Assembly drew up an Address to the King, and wrote 
 letters to the chief members of Opposition, and to their few friends 
 in the Cabinet — Chatham, Conway, Camden and Rockingham — 
 entreating their interest to get the Revenue Act repealed. The 
 King was very angry when he learned this, and still more angry at 
 the "Circulatory Letter," which the Massachusetts Assembly sent 
 to the other provincial Assemblies, begging them to take "such 
 constitutional measures as they judged most proper." The King 
 called this "an unwarrantable combination." The differing 
 constitutions of the Colonies had always been relied on to keep 
 them apart — the slightest move towards concerted action was 
 suspected to cover a wicked design of independence.^ 
 
 The Assembly did not know that Shelburne was no longer 
 Secretary — he was already dismissed when his last letter to Bernard 
 
 ' "Fire and water are not more heterogeneous than the different colonies in 
 North America. Nothing can exceed the jealousy and emulation which they 
 possess in regard to each other." — The traveller Burnahy, 1759-60 (Archdeacon of 
 Leicester). 
 
120 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 was read to the indignant Assembly. By the changes made since 
 the death of Charles Townshend, all who were for conciliating 
 America had been weeded out of the Cabinet, and in their places 
 were North, Gower, Weymouth, Rochford, Hillsborough — all to be 
 the King's ready instruments in substituting brute force for moral. 
 Hillsborough came in, as he said, determined to be firm.i He 
 began at once. He it was who obtained for Hutchinson a grant 
 of ;^2oo a year out of the new duties — that he might be 
 more independent of the people. He did not think — or did 
 not care — in what a light this would place the already detested 
 Lieutenant - Governor. He and Bernard corresponded in secret, 
 planning how to reconstruct the Council, control the Judges, and 
 — as soon as it should be safe to do so — take away the Charter. 
 Bernard was playing a double game — he showed the Council a 
 letter to Hillsborough, recommending the Petition for relief from 
 the Revenue Act ; but he did not tell them he had written another, 
 advising that there should be neither total nor partial repeal. 
 
 The good effect of the repeal of the Stamp Act was all but 
 frittered away. On the anniversary of the repeal, effigies of Paxton 
 and another revenue officer were found hanging on Liberty Tree, 
 but the friends of the people took them down. There was "a 
 temperate festival," and — since those who are contending for their 
 own Uberties ought to show sympathy with others engaged in the 
 same struggle — they drank to Paoli and the Corsicans. Also to the 
 memory of Brutus and Hampden. But though Bernard represented 
 that hundreds were parading the streets with yells. Gage thought 
 the disturbance trifling ; and though in the evening a mob assembled 
 outside the Province House, it dispersed after a little verbal abuse 
 of the Governor. 
 
 Just about this time. Dr. Franklin, who had a sly humour of his 
 own not equalled since Defoe wrote his Short Way with Dissenters, 
 published two satirical "pieces," which attracted much attention. 
 
 ' At an interview on January l6, 1771, Hillsborough told Franklin that 
 Hutchinson had refused his assent to the Bill making Franklin Agent for the 
 House of Representatives of Massachusetts. " Not a, Bill, my lord — it was a 
 Vote of the House," said Franklin. But Hillsborough refused rudely to 
 acknowledge him, and would not read a word of the copy of the Vote, which 
 Franklin handed to him, and said it was an offence to give it. " When I came 
 into the administration of American affairs I found them in great disorder. By 
 my firmness they are now something mended ; and while I have the honour to 
 hold the seals I shall continue the same conduct, the same firmness. ... If that 
 conduct is not approved ... I shall make them a bow, and thank them ; 
 I shall retire with pleasure." Franklin says he worked himself up until he was 
 pale with anger. — Biglow's Life of Franklin. 
 
"THE CIRCULATORY LETTER" 121 
 
 One of them was even taken seriously — as happened also to Defoe. 
 One was entitled, Rules for Reducing a Great Empire to a Small 
 One ; the other, An Edict by the King of Prussia. In this latter the 
 Great Frederick was made to announce to all present and to come, 
 that, whereas the first German settlements in the Island of Britain 
 (led by Hengist, Horsa, and others) were by colonies of people 
 subject to his renowned ducal ancestors, and never emancipated 
 from that subjection ; and whereas the said colonies had hitherto 
 yielded him little profit, though he had defended them from France, 
 it was just and expedient that a revenue should be raised from the 
 said colonists — who would have had to pay taxes, if they had remained 
 in Germany. Wherefore he was about to levy certain customs — 
 enumerated at great length, with perfect gravity, ending with minute 
 provisions forbidding the islanders to make their own beaver furs 
 into their own hats ; and graciously explaining how — lest they should 
 thereby want for hats — they would be permitted to send their furs 
 to Prussia to be made up there, all costs of manufacture, commis- 
 sion, and transit to be of course defrayed by the islanders. In all 
 this Franklin was exactly transcribing the laws passed by the British 
 Parliament to restrain the hat trade in North America ; and he was 
 wicked enough to make the conqueror of Rosbach refer to the 
 Statutes of loth and nth William in, 4th George i, and 5th and 
 23rd George 11. Some simple-minded persons were much disturbed, 
 until assured it was only one of the great philosopher's jokes. 
 
CHAPTER XIX 
 THE SOLDIERS COME TO BOSTON 
 
 " It only needs one steady plan, pursued a little while." — Hutchinson, History 
 of Massachusetts. 
 
 "The Committees, considering themselves only as so many private fellow-sub- 
 jects convened from divers towns, at the request of their inhabitants, have made 
 known to each other the loyal and dutiful disposition of the same ; and their 
 desire that no irregular steps should be taken by the people. . . . We, 
 from the bottom of our hearts, disclaim and detest all pretences of ' usurping ' 
 any of the ' rights of sovereignty,' but also of arrogating to ourselves any the 
 least authority whatever." — Report of the Cojnmittee appointed by the Convention, 
 Sept. 26, 1768. 
 
 " We wish to avoid severities towards you ; but, if you refuse obedience to our 
 laws, the whole fleet and army of England shall enforce it." — Reply of Lord 
 Hillsborough to the Agent of Connecticut, who had presented the petition of that 
 Colony. 
 
 " We have no fondness for the acts complained of; particularly, the late duty 
 Act is so anti-commercial that I wish it had never existed ; and it would cer- 
 tainly have been repealed had the colonies said nothing about it, or petitioned 
 against it only on the ground of expediency ; but the principle you proceed upon 
 extends to all laws ; and we cannot therefore think of repealing it, at least this 
 Session of Parliament, or until the colonies shall have dropped the point of 
 right." — Statement made by Lord Hillsborough to the Colonial Agents, Dec. 6, 
 1768. 
 
 When Election Day came, the Company of Cadets — raised by 
 
 Governor Burnet, as the Governor's bodyguard — refused to attend 
 
 the usual dinner if Hutchinson were invited. 
 
 The new Assembly met on the last Wednesday in May, 1768. 
 
 Bancroft says it was more kindly disposed to England than any 
 
 Massachusetts Assembly for seven years. The two parties in it were 
 
 nearly equal. Parson Shute, of Bingham, preached the sermon, 
 
 denied the supremacy of Parliament, and justified resistance to laws 
 
 not based on equity. But when the first ballot for the Council was 
 
 taken, Hutchinson had sixty-eight votes, where he needed but 
 
 seventy-one. Samuel Adams rose to ask if the Lieutenant-Governor 
 
 was a pensioner — the question was aimed at the ;^20o a year lately 
 
 granted by a secret warrant, under the King's sign-manual, to the 
 
 Commissioners of Customs at Boston. Otis exposed the fact that 
 
 122 
 
THE SOLDIERS COME TO BOSTON 123 
 
 the new revenue was being spent in corruption, and at the second 
 ballot Hutchinson was rejected, to Bernard's great mortification. 1 
 
 Immediately afterwards occurred the affair of Mr. Hancock's 
 sloop, the Liberty — an event chiefly important on account of the 
 indignation it aroused in England against the colonists. 
 
 The new Commissioners had done very little business, and for 
 some time had made no seizure of any value, though the Act was 
 openly set at defiance. A cargo of Madeira — the duty was ;£"] the 
 tun — was landed one night, and carried through the streets by 
 " thirty or forty stout fellows " armed with bludgeons, no officer 
 venturing to interfere. Several other cargoes were smuggled in 
 soon after, and Hancock's sloop Liberty was daily expected from 
 Madeira, and it was openly said that no duty would be paid on her 
 cargo. When she arrived, entry was made of four or five pipes only 
 — as though that were her whole freight. The rest was landed the 
 same night,^ and no duty was demanded. Everyone in Boston 
 knew this. Several days passed, and the Liberty had taken in a 
 quantity of oil and tar, as if for another voyage, when suddenly on 
 Friday, June 10, she was seized for the false entry, and the goods 
 aboard her were also seized, for want of a permit from the Customs. 
 This happened about sunset, "when many people, who had left 
 their work, were upon the wharves." The officers, fearing a rescue, 
 signalled to the Roniney man-of-war, and a boat with armed men 
 came to their aid. The Liberty was towed out into the harbour, 
 and anchored under the Romney's stern. A crowd soon gathered. 
 It was known the Romney had come at the request of the 
 Commissioners — known, too, that she was improving the occasion to 
 pick up seamen. There was a rowdy element in Boston — the men 
 at the rope-walks were a rough lot, and besides them there were 
 "all sorts of expatriated vagabonds," and their numbers were 
 swollen by the continued importation of bond-servants from Ireland 
 and elsewhere. As the Commissioners returned home they were 
 set upon "with clubs, stones, and brickbats." Hallowell was left 
 on the ground covered with blood. Harrison's son (a youth) was 
 knocked down, and dragged by his hair. 
 
 For two or three days there was considerable excitement, but no 
 
 1 In his stead they elected Artemus Ward, General of the Continental Army 
 in 1775. 
 
 ^The tidesman, Thomas Kirk, went aboard her in the afternoon. About 
 9 p.m. a Captain Marshall, in Hancock's employ, tried to bribe Kirk to connive 
 at the landing of the cargo. On Kirk's refusal, he was overpowered, and con- 
 fined below for three hours, during which time the wine was taken out. Marshall 
 worked so hard to get it out, that his sudden death in bed that night was 
 attributed to some injury received while removing the casks. 
 
124 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 riot, except when the Romney pressed a seaman. The man was 
 rescued. Both lawyers and people believed this pressing of New 
 England men returned from sea was illegal. It had never been 
 attempted since it caused a riot in Governor Shirley's time. The 
 Commissioners were frightened — all but one sought refuge on board 
 the Rotjiney, and took the earliest opportunity of slipping into the 
 Castle, where henceforth they held their Boards. The Com- 
 missioner who did not run away was John Temple, who now began 
 to dissociate himself from his colleagues. The Council persisted 
 in making light of the disturbances, and Bernard could not punish 
 anybody without their consent. This defection so scared the 
 Governor that he received with unwonted courtesy a deputation 
 from a great town-meeting in the Old South, and gave a written 
 promise to stop the pressing, i The deputation said nothing about 
 the Liberty, nor did Bernard. But he began to urge Ministers 
 to send a strong naval and military force to America. At the 
 time of the Stamp Act he had told the Assembly that things 
 were in "a very nice balance." They were in a still nicer balance 
 now. 
 
 Ten days later, on June 21, — while the air was still tingling with 
 these excitements, — a ship from England came in, and presently the 
 Governor sent to tell the Assembly that he had his Majesty's orders 
 to make a requisition which he would communicate in the very 
 words in which he received it. He was " merely ministerial in this 
 business." He heartily wished they might see the expediency of 
 submission — if not, he must do his duty. With this alarming 
 preamble, he laid before them half a letter from Lord Hills- 
 borough. 
 
 The requisition which Bernard was instructed to make was an 
 order, in his Majesty's name, "to rescind the resolutions which 
 gave birth to the circular letter," and "to declare their disappro- 
 bation of, and dissent to, that rash and hasty proceeding.'' Bernard 
 protested later that he hoped the Assembly would yield, and not 
 oblige him to make known the threat contained in the other half of 
 the letter. It is difficult, however, to reconcile this with the tone of 
 his message, which ends with a distinct intimation that if they 
 refuse he has a "duty'' to perform. Of course, the Assembly 
 demanded to see the whole letter. With ostentatious professions of 
 regret, Bernard sent it. It contained an order to the Governor to 
 dissolve the Assembly immediately if it refused to rescind. 
 
 ' The deputation came " in a procession of eleven chaises." Bernard had 
 wine handed round, and behaved with marked civility. Now that he could not 
 rely on a majority in the Council, he adopted a very different tone. 
 
THE SOLDIERS COME TO BOSTON 125 
 
 After much deliberation, the Assembly drew up a very long 
 letter to Hillsborough, setting forth the whole case, and distinctly 
 charging Bernard with having once more misrepresented them.^ 
 This letter was read several times to the House, and adopted by 93 
 to 13 ; a resolution, refusing to rescind, was adopted by 92 to 17 in 
 the fullest House ever remembered. Bernard had now no choice. 
 This time he seems to have really wished to proceed mildly. He 
 first prorogued, and then, as it continued impenitent, dissolved the 
 Assembly. 2 
 
 By this time Bernard wished he had never exchanged the peace 
 of New Jersey for the better pay of Massachusetts. He was getting 
 frightened. Ever since 1766 every now and then some letter of his 
 had got into print. It was true that he had never approved of the 
 Stamp Act — he had told Ministers that this was no time to make 
 America contribute, as she would not be out of debt for the Seven 
 Years' War for another four years. He had then suggested that 
 thirty delegates from the Continent, and fifteen from the islands, 
 should go to England, to discuss " terms of relation " between 
 Great Britain and her Colonies. But though he had thought the 
 Stamp Act ill-timed, he had always been clear that the Colonies 
 were not sufficiently subordinated to the Mother Country. He 
 thought the Charters a mistake.^ He was always lamenting that 
 the Judges and great Colonial officials were not appointed and paid 
 direct from England, and were not ex-officio members of the 
 Cabinet. He had continually advised the taking away the Charter 
 of Massachusetts, and altering the whole form of government. 
 His idea of what the government should be pretty nearly corre- 
 sponded to the form we know as a "Crown Colony." He was 
 trying to exchange once more, and had half a promise of the vice- 
 governorship of the great province of Virginia. Meanwhile, he had 
 asked for a furlough to visit England. These last commotions 
 made him fear it might not come in time — yet if he took French 
 leave he would forfeit his salary. He resolved, if Boston grew 
 dangerously hot for him, to retire to Halifax and await his leave 
 there. 
 
 'The letter was written by Samuel Adams. The House had both lists 
 printed. "One list was handed about with every expression of honour and 
 applause ; the other, like the list of the Straffbrdians in the last century, was 
 hung up in contempt and derision. The number 92 was auspicious, and 17 of ill 
 omen, for many months, not only in Massachusetts Bay, but in most of the 
 colonies on the continent." — Hutchinson, History of Massachusetts. 
 
 2 July 2, 1768. 
 
 ^ " Governor Bernard says, there is too much democracy in the government of 
 Massachusetts Bay." — Edmund Burke. 
 
126 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 The Assembly was got rid of for near a year, but there were 
 still the town-meetings, and Otis and Adams were influencing the 
 merchants — a surprising and unaccountable fact, "as they had no 
 connection with commerce." The non - importation resolutions 
 were the chief subject of debate at these town-meetings. Com- 
 mittees had been appointed to "carry about a writing," and get 
 signatures to a promise not to import British goods. Hitherto 
 these engagements had been conditional on the other colonies 
 doing the like; but this time Massachusetts was pledging herself 
 unconditionally. 
 
 On the i/)th of August — the day the stamp-master had been 
 compelled to resign — a vast concourse assembled at Liberty Tree. 
 There was a procession to Roxbury, and an entertainment, and 
 Hutchinson says that persons who had been immediate actors in 
 the riot took part in this celebration. 
 
 A more decisive event was at hand. General Gage, then at 
 New York, was ordered to move " one or two of the regiments at 
 Halifax " to Boston. This order came out by the July packet from 
 England, and therefore was not given on account of the affair of the 
 Liberty. In fact. Gage had been ordered months before to move 
 these regiments whenever Bernard should apply for them. Bernard — 
 after exacting a promise of secrecy — had laid this order before the 
 Council, and asked their advice. They advised him not to apply, 
 and he did not. Hutchinson is very earnest on this point. " These 
 first troops," he says, "were ordered by government in England, of 
 their own mere motion." This was the first direct appeal to force, 
 and it was made to enforce the Revenue Act. 
 
 There was no attempt to conceal that troops were on their way. 
 Early in September an officer arrived to make arrangements for 
 their reception. The Senegal and the Duke of Cumberland sailed, 
 and Bernard let it be known they were gone to Halifax to fetch the 
 soldiers. Immediately the old beacon, used in former times to 
 alarm the country when an enemy's ships hove in sight, was made 
 ready to signal the arrival of " the fleet from Halifax " ; and a town- 
 meeting was called in Faneuil Hall. On the day of meeting, four 
 hundred rusty old muskets in boxes lay on the floor — brought from 
 the lumber-rooms where they had lain for years. When Dr. 
 Cooper had opened the meeting with prayer, James Otis was 
 elected Moderator. Pointing to those boxes, he said, " There are 
 the arms — when an attempt is made against your liberties, they will 
 be delivered." The meeting resolved never to yield the great point 
 of government by consent. Taxes must be levied not by a stand- 
 ing army, but by free consent of the people. A Committee was 
 
ittiL bUJLUlliKS COME TO BOSTON 127 
 
 sent to ask the Governor his grounds for saying the soldiers were 
 coming, and to request him to issue precepts for a General 
 Assembly. Bernard replied that he heard the news " in a private 
 way," and decUned to call an Assembly. 
 
 On the 14th arrived another ship ("forty days from Falmouth") 
 with news that England ^ was very angry, that three regiments were 
 on their way, and that fifty State prisoners were to be sent to 
 England for trial. Boston resolved to call an Assembly for herself. 
 The Selectmen issued a circular letter to every town of the province, 
 inviting committees to come "and give sound and wholesome 
 advice," and "prevent any sudden and unconcerted measures." 
 They also appointed next Tuesday as a solemn fast, " to pray for 
 that wisdom which is profitable to direct." It was also voted that 
 all inhabitants should arm — as many apprehend an approaching war 
 with France.^ 
 
 The " Convention " — Hutchinson will not call it an Assembly — 
 met in Faneuil Hall on September 22, 1768. Ninety-six towns 
 and eight districts were represented, but the town of Hatfield had 
 refused to come, and had entered a protest. 
 
 Cushing was elected Chairman. The first proceedings were so 
 moderate — disclaiming any pretence to "governmental acts," and 
 only praying the Governor to call an Assembly — that Bernard took 
 courage, refused to receive their petition, and sent a message warn- 
 ing them of the great danger they were placing themselves in — 
 ignorance of law might excuse the past, but a step further will take 
 away that plea. The King means to assert his rights, and those 
 who persist in usurping them will repent of their rashness. 
 
 The Convention broke up September 29. The day before 
 advices had come that the fleet from Halifax — the men-of-war and 
 transports, with Colonel Dalrymple and Colonel Carr, and the 14th 
 and 29th of the line — had arrived in Nantasket harbour. There 
 were about 900 men in all, collected from several parts of America. 
 The fleet had narrowly escaped shipwreck off Cape Cod. On 
 the 29th it anchored near Castle William. Bernard summoned 
 the Council to the Castle, letting them know that the officers of his 
 Majesty's fleet and army would be present. The Council attended, 
 but refused to consent to the troops being brought into Boston. 
 There were barracks at the Castle quite sufficient to receive them 
 
 ^ Hallowell had gone to England and given a full account. On July 26, 
 Thomas Whately wrote to Grenville : "The alarm about America is very great. 
 The Stocks have fallen two-and-a-half per cent, on it." 
 
 2 This referred to a recent "incident." A French ship in the Downs had 
 refused to salute, and had been fired into. 
 
128 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 all. Feeling the military behind him, Bernard was "uncourtly 
 and even rude," but the Council were firm. Early on the 30th, a 
 number of boats were observed taking soundings round the town, 
 and at three o'clock the Laiinceston, 40 guns, Glasgow, 20, 
 Mermaid, 18, Beaver and Senegal, 14, and Bonetta, 10, and 
 several armed schooners, with the Rotnney, 60 guns, and the other 
 ships of war already in harbour, came up and anchored round the 
 town — " their cannon loaded, and springs on their cables, as for a 
 regular siege." The whole fleet was under Captain Smith. Boston 
 was now surrounded by fourteen men-of-war. 
 
 On October i, a rumour ran through the town that Boston 
 had been represented to General Giage as in a state of rebellion, 
 and that Gage had sent word more troops were coming from New 
 York. By this time Sheriff Greenleaf and his deputy were busy 
 pressing carts, etc., and it was reported that the troops were to be 
 encamped on the Common — evidently to intimidate the magistrates 
 into finding them quarters, though the law directed under penalties 
 that, until the Castle was full, no troops must be quartered in the 
 town. They were, therefore, as the people said, " flying in the face 
 of an Act of Parliament." 
 
 Dalrymple and Smith were for observing the law; an express 
 was sent to Gage for orders. Bernard slipped away to the country, 
 leaving Dalrymple — who " despised his want of spirit " — to shift for 
 himself. About one o'clock the troops were landed at Long Wharf, 
 and Dalrymple marched them to the Common. Each man 
 received sixteen rounds, and they marched "with muskets 
 charged, bayonets fixed, colours flying, drums playing, the train of 
 artillery bringing up the rear." There was great difficulty in 
 finding them shelter for the night, and an attempt was made to 
 persuade the occupiers of the " Manufactory House " ^ to give it up. 
 " Mr. Brown " was ordered to remove within two hours, but the 
 people barred and bolted the doors, and the Selectmen absolutely 
 refused to give quarters in the town. At last Dalrymple appealed 
 to their compassion — the night was cold, one regiment had not got 
 its camp equipage — he asked that it might lodge in the hall and 
 chambers of Faneuil Hall till Monday — this being Saturday 
 afternoon. At nine o'clock somebody opened the doors, and the 
 14th and part of the 29th were put up somehow— ^some of them in 
 the very room where the Convention had sat, with those rusty old 
 
 'The Manufactory House was built after "the spinning craze" of 1718, 
 when a spinning school was held in the open air on the Common. After a time, 
 a solid brick house was built on the east side of Long Acre ; but it had long been 
 let out in tenements. 
 
THE SOLDIERS COME TO BOSTON 129 
 
 muskets still on the floor. All was quiet on Sunday, but in the 
 evening, by Bernard's order, the Town House.^ and even the 
 Representatives' Chamber, was opened to the troops. On Monday 
 morning Boston saw the Court House and Faneuil Hall full of 
 soldiers, the Common white with tents, and "alive with soldiers" 
 and counter-marchings to relieve guard — the whole town turned 
 into a garrison. 
 
 That day the Court of Sessions met at the Court House, and 
 a motion was made from the Bench that the troops be ordered 
 to remove to a distance from the town. In the afternoon the 
 town artillery was exercised, when their Captain was informed by 
 the officer of the regulars that it was not customary to beat drum 
 or fire after the evening gun. In King Street that day, "the 
 soldiers being gathered," a proclamation was read, offering ten 
 guineas reward to such soldier as should inform of anyone trying 
 to persuade him to desert. It was reported that the Colonel 
 advised the soldiers to accept the money offered as a temptation, 
 but to bring in the offender, "when he would take care it should 
 be the last offer he should make.'' Nothing was spared to make 
 the town realise that it was virtually under martial law. 
 
 That same Monday, at the Council, Bernard showed several 
 letters — one from Dalrymple, another from Gage, another from 
 Lord Hillsborough (again, only part of this last), announcing the 
 despatch of two more regiments from Ireland. The Council 
 steadily maintained the illegaUty of quartering troops in the town. 
 They were the more resolute because they had seen an expression 
 in Dalrymple's letter, to the effect that there was a bad spirit in the 
 town, and that, in consequence, the troops were to be quartered 
 there. They also knew that Gage had said, " he saw no cause to 
 be scrupulous,'' as the people had resolved to rise in open rebellion. 
 The Council asked Bernard why he supposed the troops were 
 sent? The Governor replied. Those from Halifax, on account of 
 the riots in March; those from Ireland, on account of the affair 
 of the Liberty. But the Ministry ordered even the regiments from 
 Ireland before they knew about the Liberty. The Council retorted 
 that his Majesty would never have thought such a step needful 
 unless he had received a greatly magnified representation of the 
 riots. 
 
 The irritation was kept up. Next day (Oct. 4) Hancock's 
 brig, Lydia, which had cleared the Customs and had a pass, was 
 ordered not to proceed to sea without permission from the 
 
 ^ The Province House was often called the State or Town House. The 
 Courts were held in a room on the ground floor. 
 
I30 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Governor. Next day the Council met again— and had to pass a 
 guard in the passage leading to the Council Chamber. Again 
 Dalryraple demanded quarters in the town, though the barracks 
 were standing empty. On the morning of the 6th the town was 
 shocked to see nine or ten men of the 29th (a disorderly regiment) 
 being flogged on the Common by negro drummers, for "sundry 
 misdemeanours." ^ It was also shocked by the number of doubtful 
 (or not doubtful) women, who had followed the regiments from 
 Halifax. That day the South Battery was, by Bernard's order, 
 delivered up to Dalrymple ; and that evening the Governor's 
 portrait in the Hall of Harvard was found with a piece "exactly 
 describing a heart " cut out of the breast. 
 
 The Council protested again, a few days later, against the 
 disturbance being used as a pretext for sending the soldiers. As 
 for the affair in March, it was nothing at all — a few disorderly boys 
 went to the house of Mr. Williams, Inspector-General of Customs, 
 on the evening of the anniversary of the repeal of the Stamp Act. 
 Williams and the neighbours persuaded them to go home ; they 
 did no mischief at all. The affair of the Liberty was a riot, but it 
 was over in a few hours — a few panes of glass were broken, "not 
 more than the value of five pounds." And the barge was burned 
 on the Common, and not as alleged in front of Mr. Hancock's 
 door, and he dispersed the mob. The Commissioners need not 
 have taken refuge on the Romney, nor have got the Romney sta- 
 tioned as though to protect the Castle. Nobody would have 
 hurt them, and they knew it, for they frequently made country 
 excursions, which showed they were not really afraid. The Council 
 wrote all this to Gage, and begged for a full enquiry. Gage replied 
 that " the riots and resolves that were published " had induced his 
 Majesty to order four regiments to this town, " to protect his loyal 
 subjects." He hoped the town would so behave that he could 
 advise his Majesty to remove them. 
 
 These New Englanders were bad to deal with. Gage com- 
 plained that " in this country every man studies law, and any two 
 justices of the peace — the best of them keeper of a paltry tavern — 
 can by law cashier any officer who quarters troops in the town." 
 In the face of this law. Gage dared not act. The troops remained 
 on the Common till the weather grew too severe. Then he had 
 to hire houses, " at very dear rates," and to pay for everything he 
 had, by no means sure that the province would ever reimburse 
 him. The troops in Faneuil Hall were moved to a store on Pitt's 
 
 ^ This flogging of soldiers was one of the things which most disgusted the 
 colonists, and alienated them from us. 
 
THE SOLDIERS COME TO BOSTON 131 
 
 Wharf, those in the Court House to stores on Griffin's Wharf, and 
 those from the encampment went to Major Green's distillery store, 
 "by Green's lane." This was on October 27, and the same day 
 a man of the 14th was shot for deserting. It was asserted that 
 thirty soldiers had deserted in the month. 
 
 By November i, there were more than four regiments in 
 Boston ; but there was nothing for them to do. Hutchinson was 
 pleased to see them — he thought " the red-coats had a formidable 
 appearance." But the desertions continued — the soldiers rather 
 liked the country, and they knew nobody would betray them. 
 Whether by accident or design, the main-guard was posted in an 
 empty house opposite the Province House — "not 12 yards from 
 it"— and two field-pieces happened to point at the very room 
 where the Legislature used to sit. Gage was talking about building 
 barracks on Fort Hill, a flat-topped hill which commanded town 
 and harbour. There was once a fort up there — traces yet remained 
 of the bastions which unlucky Governor Andros held against his 
 rebellious townspeople in the days of James 11. 
 
 As yet no insult was offered to the soldiers. Governor Went- 
 worth, of New Hampshire, writing to Rockingham on November 1 8, 
 says that when the troops arrived in Boston the discipline was very 
 strict, and the officers were very careful. No mischief occurred ; 
 and at night, as the men were waiting for their quarters, the people 
 brought them food and drink, and next day the soldiers were heard 
 saying, " God bless the Commissioners who have brought us to such 
 a blessed country ! " Wentworth adds that there was really no use 
 for this armament, and that " the revenue will not pay half the 
 expense." We shall see that the revenue obtained was ;^295. 
 
 The Council published their reasons for refusing quarters, in the 
 Boston Gazette, and sent a copy to Lord Hillsborough. Bernard 
 calls this " the greatest blow that has ever been given to the King's 
 government. . . . Nine-tenths of the people consider the declaration 
 of the Council just." ^ 
 
 Meantime, every provincial Assembly, as it met, pronounced 
 against the right of Great Britain to tax the Colonies ; and sent 
 
 ^ " We have seen justices attending at liberty tree ; one to administer an oath 
 to the stamp-master, when he was obliged to swear that he would not execute 
 his office ; another to perform the function of toast-master ; a third, but 
 lately, to consult about fortifying the town ; others to make up a procession of 
 forty-five carriages and ninety-two persons, on the 14th of August last. All 
 these are included in two lists which your Lordship has ; that of the five select- 
 men who signed the circular letter for the convention . . . and that of the 
 eight justices who signed the refusal to billet the soldiers." — Sir Francis Bernard 
 to Lord Hillsborough, Boston, November 14, 1768. 
 
132 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 petitions to the King, who rejected them all — Virginia's the least 
 ungraciously. To Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Connecticut and 
 Maryland, he said rudely that " wicked men," who questioned 
 authority, would not be listened to. Charles i himself hardly had 
 a greater aversion to petitions than Farmer George. 
 
 In little over six months from the time the Commissioners 
 began to work, it had come to this — that having passed a Revenue 
 Act to increase our revenue, we were obliged to send a fleet and 
 army 3000 miles across the ocean to collect it. 
 
CHAPTER XX 
 THE COMMONS CONCUR 
 
 " Let gentlemen look . . . they will see how well these Americans are versed 
 in the Crown law. I doubt whether they have been guilty of an overt act of 
 treason ; but I am sure they have come within an hair's breadth of it. I think 
 Governor Bernard has the merit of stopping them in time. . . . The governor 
 has directions not to send any individuals over, but upon full information." — 
 Attorney-General de Grey. 
 
 " Though'the crimes of the Americans may deserve exact justice, it is not wise 
 to treat them with rigour, and drive things to the extremity. ... I would not 
 put this power into the angry hand of Governor Bernard. Let not parliament go 
 into that odious work." — Mr. Cornwall. 
 
 " Why have the Lords named an act which has a very odd meaning ? — an act 
 ' concerning the trials of treasons committed out of his Majesty's dominions ' ? 
 Will not the Americans say, ' we, then, are out of his Majesty's dominions ' ? " — 
 George Grenville. 
 
 ' ' You have drawn it out from the stores of Henry the Eighth ; which are 
 more dangerous than the arms of Boston." — Burke. 
 
 The first business (and a very large part of the whole business) of the 
 Unreported Parliament was with Mr. Wilkes. The instant he heard 
 that Parliament was to be dissolved, he returned from his banish- 
 ment in Paris, and offered himself to the City. The City did not 
 elect him — though he polled 1247 votes; but the County of 
 Middlesex did by an overwhelming majority, and his friends 
 expressed their opinion of the City by breaking every pane of glass 
 in the Mansion House. While they were about it, they also 
 smashed Lord Bute's, and knocked down everybody who declined 
 to bawl " Wilkes and Liberty ! " Every house was illuminated. 
 For fifteen miles out of town, Franklin, on his way to Winchester, 
 saw hardly a door or a window-shutter without " No. 45 " and 
 Wilkes' name scrawled on it. The King sat up all night, expecting 
 an attack on the palace. This was on March 28. On April 27, 
 when Wilkes was committed to the King's Bench — as a returned 
 outlaw — the mob overtook his coach on Westminster Bridge, took 
 out the horses, and drew the carriage back to the Middlesex side, 
 and so along the Strand and Fleet Street to Cornhill— enormous 
 
 133 
 
134 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 crowds all the way — and on to the Three Tuns in Spitalfields, 
 where they kept it up till late. But Wilkes, who always showed 
 great discretion when in contact with the Law, took an opportunity 
 of giving his deliverers the slip, and, disguising himself, reached the 
 prison and surrendered. From that night till the loth of May, when 
 Parliament met, the King's Bench Prison was always surrounded 
 by a mob ; and that day a most determined attempt was made to 
 get Wilkes out and carry him to the House. The military ^ were 
 sent for ; the mob was insolent ; the soldiers fired. Five or six 
 persons were killed — most of them, as usual on these occasions, 
 entirely innocent — a poor woman selling oranges, a man riding into 
 town on the top of a hay-cart, and so on. The most famous victim 
 was young Allen, a boy of seventeen, who seems to have thrown grass 
 at the soldiers. He fled, was pursued into a stable, and shot dead. 
 His actual slayer got off by a pardonable official device. It is not 
 just to punish the instrument, when the instigators go scot-free ; 
 and it was proved in court that Justice Gillam had said publicly in 
 the hearing of the soldiers, " his orders from the ministry were that 
 some men must be killed, and that it were better to kill five-and- 
 twenty to-day than one hundred to-morrow " ; and it was also proved 
 that Gillam referred to a letter Lord Weymouth had written to the 
 Justices of Surrey. 
 
 The new Parliament only met at that season to renew the 
 Embargo. Then it thanked the Lord Mayor for his conduct during 
 the late disturbances, demanded to be informed why the laws were 
 not immediately put in force against John Wilkes, Esq., an outlaw, 
 for returning to this kingdom ; and adjourned till November. 
 
 There were many other riots that year. Seamen, watermen, 
 coal-heavers, rioted for more wages. The Proclamation of May 
 1 1 says that large bodies of seamen have assembled tumultuously 
 on the wharves, have taken possession of ships ready to sail, unbent 
 the sails, struck the yards and top-masts, and so prevented their 
 sailing.^ It was no time to lay on fresh taxes. 
 
 The chief excitement of the summer of 1768 was connected with 
 America, inasmuch as it concerned the very summary dismissal of 
 
 ' " Scotch soldiers under a Scotch ensign." 
 
 - "Here mobs of English sawyers can bum sawmills ; mobs of English labourers 
 destroy or plunder magazines of coin ; mobs of English coal-heavers attack 
 houses with tire-arms ; English smugglers can fight regularly the King's cruising 
 vessels, drive them ashore, and bum them, as lately on the coast of Wales and 
 on the coast of Cornwall : but upon these accounts we hear no talk of England's 
 being in rebellion ; no threats of taking away its Magna Charta, or repealing 
 its Bill of Rights." — Franklin, in the Public Advertiser, about the time of his 
 departure for America. 
 
laJt CUMMUMS CONCUR 135 
 
 Sir Jeffrey Amherst from the Government of Virginia — as the 
 Ministry said, in order to have a resident Governor, but Opposi- 
 tion chose to think it was because Amherst was Chatham's 
 friend; and angry writers to The Prititer declared the true 
 cause was that Amherst had defeated some American scheme of 
 Hillsborough's. (This referred to Lands of the Ohio.^) 
 
 Probably this event had some share in de.termining another, 
 which once would have convulsed all England, but now made far 
 less commotion than Amherst's removal. On October 14, 1768, 
 the Earl of Chatham resigned the Privy Seal, and withdrew from 
 the Cabinet which had long ceased to be his. To the last, the 
 King did his utmost to retain him — as Lord Privy Seal, Chatham 
 could do little mischief, but if he resigned, who could say he might 
 not take up with Opposition ? But Chatham was resolved to go. 
 
 The Political Register for 1768 has a remarkable and evi- 
 dently inspired article on the disappearance of the great Minister. 
 "Having found, in a variety of late instances," says the writer, 
 " that his advice was disregarded, his influence in the state at 
 an end, he chose to resign. The principle now adopted with respect 
 to America is said to have been one cause of his resignation.'' 
 After severe reflections on the foreign policy of the Cabinet, there 
 follows a curious passage on home administration. " Public busi- 
 ness for some time executed only by clerks. Men of profligate 
 character, whose fortunes have been dissipated in scenes of lewdness 
 and debauchery, placed in great offices of honour, trust, and 
 emolument. . . . Corruption practised in the most daring and 
 extensive manner. . . . And to crown all, beyond their incomes, 
 they are known to have accepted of an annual ;^Soo out of the 
 minister's pocket-book, under the denomination of secret service, as 
 the reward for betraying their country." 
 
 Lord Bristol, a friend of Chatham, took the Seal. And so 
 Chatham's career as an English Minister came to an end. The only 
 possible excuse for his conduct since 1766 is the state of his health. 
 Addington's remedies had driven the gout inward, with terrible con- 
 sequences to the patient's nerves. In spite of all that was said, he 
 was never mad, but he was in so shattered a condition, so excited, 
 so irritable and unstrung, as to be utterly unable to play any part 
 in a Cabinet which he could not have made a safe and efficient 
 instrument of government, even though he had been always there, 
 and always at his best. It is a tragic story, and England is the 
 worse for it to this day. 
 
 ^Lord Botetourt, "a broken-down gamester," was appointed Governor of 
 Virginia. 
 
136 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 The Thirteenth Parliament was in its second session before it 
 considered the affairs of America. Ministers had been rather 
 frightened when they heard of the Convention, and had resolved to 
 try a little conciliation — hence the renewed assurances that the 
 revenue laws should be repealed. But when they heard how short 
 a time the Convention had sat, and how easily the troops had been 
 landed, they took heart again. The Americans were only blustering 
 — they gave in on the first display of " firmness." Hallowell, 
 Comptroller of Customs, arrived, to tell Administration all about 
 the Liberty. Examined by North and Jenkinson, he completely 
 reassured them. Resistance to the Acts was not universal — Salem 
 and Marblehead had made no fuss. Once more Ministers resolved 
 to be firm. The Irish regiments must very soon arrive, and then 
 Otis, Hancock, Samuel Adams, Cushing, and the other ringleaders 
 — Bernard had given sixteen names in all — must be seized and 
 brought over to England, to be tried for treason under the 35th 
 Henry viii. 
 
 For at first everybody in England who was not a lawyer had 
 been clear that, in summoning a Convention, the Colonials were 
 guilty of treason. Presently, however, to the great disappointment 
 of everybody, Mr. Attorney-General de Grey said he was afraid it 
 might not be quite treason — these Colonials knew a great deal more 
 law than was good for them, and always contrived to come within 
 a hair's breadth of treason without actually committing it. But in 
 any case, we must mark our displeasure; after which, on a full 
 submission, all may be forgiven. But the provincial Charters must 
 be modified, and the composition of the provincial Councils must 
 be changed. Governors, too, must be made more absolute, and 
 the great Colonial Officers must depend immediately upon the 
 Crown. Meanwhile, on "a rumour of Government intending to 
 suspend American commerce. Stocks fell. America owed four 
 million sterling to the merchants of Great Britain. 
 
 As much perhaps to quiet the merchants as the Colonies, early 
 in December Hillsborough sent for the Colonial Agents — Franklin 
 among them — and made them the most astonishing speech 
 addressed to men with a grievance since the days of Charles i. He 
 told them that if they would waive the point of right, and ask for 
 the repeal of the new Customs merely as burdensome and grievous. 
 Administration was disposed to come into it. Ministers had no 
 fondness for the Acts complained of — indeed " the late Act is so 
 anti-commercial that I wish it had never existed," and if the 
 colonists had said nothing about it, or only petitioned on the 
 ground of expediency, it would have been repealed. The Agents 
 
THE COMMONS CONCUR 137 
 
 replied that they had been strictly charged never to admit the right 
 of the British Parliament to tax the Colonies. In effect, Hills- 
 borough was asking them to allow him to retain the power of 
 making "anti-commercial" laws. 
 
 In the Speech from the Throne, on November 8, his Majesty 
 had told the Houses that the spirit of faction in America had 
 broken out again, and that one colony (meaning Massachusetts) 
 seemed to intend throwing off its dependence on Great Britain. 
 Parliament took the hint. On the 15th of December the 
 Lords passed the following Resolutions, moved by the Duke of 
 Bedford :— 
 
 1. That the votes and proceedings of the Assembly of Massachusetts, last 
 
 Jan. and Feb. imported a denial of his Majesty's authority, and 
 were illegal and unconstitutional. 
 
 2. That the Circular Letters asking the other Assemblies to join in petition 
 
 denying the right of Parliament to tax them, are repugnant to the laws 
 of Great Britain, and subversive of the constitution. 
 
 3. That the town of Boston has for some time past been in a state of great 
 
 disorder and confusion, whereby the officers of his Majesty's revenue 
 have been obstructed in executing the laws, and their lives en- 
 dangered. 
 
 4. That it appears that neither the Council nor the civil magistrates did 
 
 exert their authority to suppress the said riots and tumults. 
 
 5. That in these circumstances, the aid of a military force is necessary to 
 
 protect the civil magistrates and the officers of his Majesty's revenue. 
 
 6. That the declarations and resolutions in the town meetings of the 14th of 
 
 June and 12th of September were illegal and unconstitutional, and 
 calculated to excite sedition and insurrection in his Majesty's province 
 of Massachusetts Bay. 
 
 7. That the appointment of a Convention, and the issuing of a precept to the 
 
 several towns of that province, were proceedings subversive of his 
 Majesty's government, and evidently manifested a design to set up a 
 new and unconstitutional authority, independent of the Crown of Great 
 Britain. 
 
 8. That the elections, by several towns, of deputies, to sit in the said Con- 
 
 vention, were daring insults offered to his Majesty's authority, and 
 audacious usurpations of the powers of government. 
 
 There was some debate, but the Resolutions passed without a 
 division. 
 
 The Address was far stronger — even violent — in tone. It spoke 
 of " wicked and designing men," to be brought to " condign punish- 
 ment," and prayed that all persons, guilty of treason or misprision of 
 treason, should be tried within this realm, pursuant to the 35th of 
 King Henry viii. Both Address and Resolutions passed without 
 a division. 
 
 The Resolutions were sent down to the Commons on Dec. 16, 
 
138 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 but the House was so busy with Mr. Wilkes that it did not 
 take them into consideration until January 25, 1769. That day 
 Alderman Beckford presented the petition of the Council of 
 Massachusetts Bay, but the House ruled that the petition was not 
 passed in a legal assembly of the Council, and could only be 
 received as the personal petition of Samuel Danforth, President of 
 the Council, who had signed it. As such it was read. It recited 
 the early history of the Colony, the heavy customs always paid, and 
 the losses in the "last war" — "the loss of men was great, and to 
 so young a country very detrimental, and could not be compensated 
 by grants of Parliament '' — and it prayed for the repeal of the Acts 
 made for the purpose of raising a revenue in America. It was 
 ordered to "lie on the table." 
 
 On the 26th, Sir George Savile presented another petition — 
 from "William Bollan, Esq., of Boston, in the Province of 
 Massachusetts Bay," ^ praying that the Resolutions of the Lords 
 may not be concurred in by the Commons. There was a long 
 debate as to whether this petition should be read — Ministers said it 
 was long, and would take too much time ; moreover, it contained 
 law arguments, which the House were not good judges of — with 
 other less weighty objections. The reading was lost by 105 to 136. 
 This petition, too, lay upon the table. 
 
 Then began " the grand debate." Concurrence with the 
 Resolutions of the Lords was moved. "The debate was very fine 
 indeed," but it ended in an extraordinary and disgraceful scene. 
 
 Opposition enlarged on the injustice of bringing a man 3000 
 miles to be tried for his life — the expenses of such a trial would 
 ruin the richest man in America, even though he should be acquitted. 
 Administration, who knew that Mr. Hancock, of the sloop Liberty, 
 was that richest man, could have borne to see him ruined — 
 failing being able to see him hanged, drawn, and quartered ; but as 
 they could not well say so, they fell back on the gross ingratitude 
 of the Colonies, their rebellious spirit, and the necessity of marking 
 our displeasure. Treason and rebellion must be put down, and the 
 "republican principle" of Boston must be repressed. And after 
 all, it is unlikely the Statute will ever be put in execution — this 
 proof of our "vigour and lenity" will suffice to bring them to their 
 senses. 
 
 The talk of " vigour " made Grenville very angry. " This 
 resolution is so much waste paper." He pitied Governor Bernard, 
 who was ordered " to preserve the law, but to give no offence. 
 
 ' Bollan presented the petition as Agent for the Council of Massachusetts 
 Bay. 
 
THE COMMONS CONCUR 139 
 
 Now, sir, how are these contradictory points to be attained ? " To 
 whom, sir, are we obliged for this grand plan ? In some countries, 
 when a man proposed a law, his name was made known. " I did 
 propose the Stamp Act, and shall have no objection to have it 
 christened by my name." Of all that were with me in the Govern- 
 ment, " I never heard anyone prophesy that the measure would be 
 opposed. . . . Do not let us stand shiffle-shuffle between two measures. 
 Do not let us make use of big words, and then suffer ourselves to 
 be laughed at, like Ancient Pistol in the play. You are doing 
 absolutely nothing.'' 
 
 North said, whoever was the author of the measure, he adopted 
 it by voting for it. The not repealing the Act " is in itself a 
 measure that will operate in America, where they have been 
 expecting a repeal." And operate it did, but not as he expected. 
 
 The honours of the debate were with Governor Pownall. He 
 attacked the Resolutions of the Lords as false in substance — they 
 were not borne out by the Journals and Proceedings of the Boston 
 Assembly. The first Resolution charged the House of Repre- 
 sentatives with passing a Resolution which it had negatived, and 
 which was not upon their Journals ; the Third and Fourth, with 
 having abandoned the town to riots during some considerable time 
 — whereas the riot (the affair of the sloop Liberty) was a sudden, 
 unpremeditated, temporary affray, over before the magistrates could 
 interpose ; the Seventh and Eighth, with a usurpation of sovereign 
 power, by issuing writs to call a Convention. " Those who said 
 this, did not know what a writ was '' — Pownall produced one to 
 show them. He pressed the Ministry so hard, that North con- 
 sented to withdraw the expression, and substitute the words, 
 " writing letters." There was a warm passage-of-arms, during which 
 Mr. Burke reminded the House that it was asserted there was no 
 such resolve as the Resolution brought its charge against; and 
 George Grenville said this was a short question — if there was such 
 a resolution on the Journals of the Boston Assembly, let it be read. 
 Others cried, "Read! read!" "This threw the whole bench of 
 Ministers and clerks into a most ridiculous confusion, as they could 
 not, when now called upon in the face of the House, find any such : 
 the business of the House stood still ; one side laughing, the other 
 side in the most shameful perplexity, for more than a quarter of an 
 hour." Mr. Baker moved to adjourn, " to give the gentlemen time 
 to produce their evidence." Pownall showed them how the mistake 
 arose, " but as they were not willing to own it, they rested on Mr. 
 Dyson's amendment. And the chorus-men, who at proper times 
 call for the question, helped them out of this dead lift by an 
 
140 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 incessant recitative of the words, ' Question, question, question.' At 
 length, at four o'clock in the morning, the whole House in con- 
 fusion, laughing, etc., the Resolutions and Address were agreed 
 to. Upon which a member remarked, it was indecent to bring us 
 resolves ready cut and dried, only for the drudgery of passing them : 
 it was indecent to do it in the confused manner we did it : it was 
 indecent to do it without evidence, and highly so to answer all 
 arguments with, 'The question ! the question !'" 
 
 So, "laughing and in confusion," the Thirteenth Parliament — 
 bought for two miUions sterhng — voted the Americans guilty of 
 acts which their Journals showed they had not committed, and 
 recommended that military force should be used to punish them for 
 acts of which they were not guilty. 
 
 The debate was resumed on February 8 (1769), when Mr. 
 Rose Fuller implored the House to take time to consider — this 
 business is one on which we ought to debate again and again. 
 The measure is the harshest ever proposed to Parliament. The 
 Americans will think we wish treason had been committed, and 
 will imagine they can only save themselves by going further, and 
 appealing to arms. Where do gentlemen wish this business to 
 end ? We were living at peace with our colonies. Without them 
 we are not able to do anything. The very force which you may 
 require in other parts, is now in America. 
 
 Captain Phipps protested against the folly of reviving the Act of 
 Henry viii. It will be obvious to the Americans that they are being 
 snatched away to be condemned here, because we know they would 
 be acquitted there. These men will think they are being brought 
 here to be murdered. Such measures are more likely to raise 
 rebellions than to quell them ! 
 
 Alderman Trecothick brought up Townshend's name, hinting that 
 he had proposed taxing America to please the King. He accused 
 the Commissioners of acting in a haughty and offensive manner, 
 and Bernard of writing " their retreat will serve our purposes." 
 Frederick Montagu said that London and Westminster had no 
 right to inveigh against Boston for rioting ! As for the statute 
 of Henry viii, it was passed in the worst time of the worst 
 reign that ever disgraced our annals. Four unfortunate persons 
 were tried under it ^ two in Elizabeth's days, one in 1644, 
 and one — Dr. Oliver Plunkett, " titular Archbishop of Armagh " 
 — for Gates' Plot, in 1681. "Plunkett said, 'Here is no jury 
 that either knows me, or the quality of my adversaries ' — I 
 can imagine, sir, an American making use of the same defence." 
 Mr. Seymour called attention to the fact that the House, but lately 
 
THE COMMONS CONCUR 141 
 
 so full about a single individual, was now nearly empty. " When 
 I look round and see the empty benches upon this important ques- 
 tion, I am shocked." Others pointed out that the 35th Henry viii 
 was originally framed to ensure a jury in cases of treason — to 
 prevent the accused being tried in Ireland, where there was no 
 jury. It was therefore intended for his protection — now it is 
 proposed to apply it to Americans to ensure their conviction ! 
 Dyson denied that it was harsh to extend the statute to 
 America — and as for exasperating the colonists, they cannot do 
 worse than they have already done. Lord Beauchamp said we 
 were upon the edge of a precipice — " and no one would drive to 
 an inch " — yet he thought the statute might overawe and intimidate, 
 and so prevent mischief. 
 
 George Grenville, in a speech full of strong sense, urged the 
 House not to stand hesitating. " If you mean to give up the right 
 to tax America, do it like men ; if you do not, take proper measures 
 to show your intention. For the sake of your honour, for the sake 
 of your dignity, show yourselves to be something — if you wish for 
 lenient measures, are these angry ones proper ? " Yet he voted for 
 the Resolutions, because he saw "no prospect of anything better," 
 and would not be the man to heap difficulties upon Administration. 
 Pownall, in another long speech, urged upon the House that it was 
 acting upon a one-sided statement. A friend had said to him : " If 
 you mean to govern the country by the aid of military force, you 
 have not sent a sufficient number of troops ; if you do not mean 
 this, you have already sent too many." Again Pownall asserted 
 that " rebellion was not in their hearts." You cannot force them 
 to rebellion. All they ask is to go back to the old ground, the old 
 policy. " Be content with that — be directed by the spirit of 
 commercial wisdom." Do not ruin the Colonies and yourselves 
 by attempting force. 
 
 But he talked to the winds. The House had formed its opinions 
 on the letters of Governor Bernard — whose name was freely 
 bandied about, for praise or blame, all through these debates. 
 Fuller's motion for delay — at least till we can ascertain the facts — 
 was lost by 65 to 169.1 The House did not even divide on the 
 Resolutions. America was got rid of for a while, and the Commons 
 could return to the battle with Mr. Wilkes, and the overhauling of 
 the accounts of the East India Company — with a view to dividing 
 the spoil with it. 
 
 ' In the debate of February 3, 1769, when Grenville made his great speech 
 against the expulsion of Wilkes, the numbers were, ayes 219, noes 137. 
 
CHAPTER XXI 
 THE FARMER'S GRIEVANCES 
 
 " The Americans have tried divers schemes of intimidation to deter our 
 parliament from maintaining their jurisdiction over them. But none is so futile 
 as that of pretending to recall their orders for British manufactures, in case the 
 stamp act shall not be repealed. . . . Do they imagine that we are ignorant, that 
 none of our provincialists take merchantable commodities from us, except for 
 gain in the way of trade, and by force of necessity, because we will not permit 
 them to supply their vi'arehouses anywhere else. . . . It is as just that they should 
 submit to our parliament, as it is happy for us, that no European nation either 
 can or will be inclined to protect them from our resentment." — Writer in the 
 Gentleman' s Magazine, 1765 (pp. 572-3). 
 
 " A duty of three pence per gallon on foreign molasses is much higher than 
 that article can possibly bear . . . there hath been imported into the colony of 
 Rhode Island only about 1 , 1 50,000 gallons annually : the duty on this quantity is 
 ;^I4,375, a larger sum than was ever in the colony at any one time. This 
 money is to be sent away, and never to return : yet the payment is to be 
 repeated every year. — Can this possibly be done ? . . . can ministers change the 
 nature of things, stop our means of getting money, and yet expect us to pay 
 British taxes and purchase and pay for British manufactures? — Grievances of 
 the American Colonies. Printed by Authority at Providence in Rhode Island. 
 
 With the coming of the soldiers, Bernard cast off all prudence. 
 When Gage came to Boston, the Governor allowed him to attend 
 Council Meetings. The Commissioners returned, and arrested 
 Hancock, for a debt to the revenue of ;^9ooo — forfeiture of the 
 cargo of the Liberty and "treble damages'' On November 28, 
 Bernard and Sheriff Greenleaf were burnt in effigy, while a vast 
 concourse of people looked on. Circulars came from Hillsborough, 
 ordering the Colonial Governors to support the Commissioners ; 
 and private letters ordered them not to lay before their Assemblies , 
 without special orders, any letters, or extracts of letters from the 
 Colonial Secretary. By the 5th of December, this was known in 
 Boston. Indeed, they knew everything in Boston — every word 
 spoken in the British ParUament, every rumour going round town. 
 A bird of the air carried the matter. All was proclaimed upon the 
 housetops. And so, early in 1769, by private letters from England 
 they learned that there was a plan for a change in the representation 
 
 142 
 
THE FARMER'S GRIEVANCES 143 
 
 — members were to be elected in future for counties, instead of for 
 towns. On this the Selectmen waited on Bernard, and asked him 
 what he had been saying about Boston to his Majesty's Ministers, for 
 these fourteen months past ? Bernard replied that Ministers formed 
 their opinion from the actions of the town. The Selectmen called a 
 town-meeting, to draw up an address to the King — as the Governor 
 refuses to tell them what he has said of them, they do not know 
 why troops have been sent. They beg for their removal, and for 
 copies of Bernard's letters, and for other papers that affect their 
 interests, that they may know whereof they are accused, and have 
 the justice of being heard by counsel. This petition was sent to 
 Barre, but no more was heard of it. And at this moment the 
 Resolutions of the Lords reached Boston, with the demand for the 
 principal offenders to be sent to England for trial. This at first 
 caused great exasperation, but letters came at the same time which 
 said that the Crown lawyers themselves were against this proposal 
 — they doubted whether the offence was treason. And healing 
 measures were to be adopted, and the Revenue Act was to be 
 repealed next session, if not this. The 3Sth Henry viii became 
 a jest. 
 
 These shrewd, htigious New Englanders — every other man a 
 lawyer — were quite able to appreciate Lord Hillsborough's meaning, 
 when he told their Agents that the British Government, though fully 
 aware it had made a foolish and " anti-commercial " law, was 
 determined not to repeal it, unless the colonists admitted his right 
 to make another, which other he promised should be repealed in its 
 turn, if you don't complain of it. The colonists were not so simple 
 as to believe that a Cabinet foolish enough not to perceive the effect 
 of its own laws, would be wise enough to repeal them, unasked ! 
 They knew that folly, haste, and ignorance are the last to perceive 
 themselves in the wrong. 
 
 Bernard's position was becoming intolerable, and he was now 
 under considerable personal apprehensions. He had been warned, 
 by a friend in London, that efforts were being made to get copies 
 of his letters and papers, which had been laid before the House of 
 Commons. He now learned that these efforts had succeeded. 
 Mr. Bollan, Agent in London for the Council of Massachusetts, had 
 got copies from Alderman Beckford, who, as a member of the House, 
 had a right to copies of all papers laid before it. Bollan had 
 selected six letters — one from Gage — and sent them over to the 
 Council. They arrived on a Saturday, and the Council sat upon 
 them on Sunday ! On Monday the letters were published, for all 
 the town to read. All except Gage's were dated between November i 
 
144 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 and December 5, 1768, and contained accounts of events which 
 had occurred during that time. Everyone in Boston now knew 
 that Bernard had urged the King to " talte the Council Chamber 
 into his own hands" — in other words, to appoint the members 
 himself. Other similar suggestions he had made, which would 
 utterly destroy the constitutional character of the government. He 
 had mentioned persons by name, thus pointing them out for 
 vengeance. He was charged with having reported to the Colonial 
 Secretary " every sudden, unguarded expression, dropped in debates 
 which sometimes were rather free and familiar conversation, than 
 cautious and formal declarations of advice " ; and with accusing the 
 Council of private animosities, duplicity, and servile dependence 
 on the people. The situation became more acute than ever. 
 
 We had set the Colonies thinking. A great meeting of merchants 
 had been held at Philadelphia on the 25th of April, 1768, at which 
 Mr. Dickenson, author of The Fanner's Letters, read an address. 
 The meeting was called to decide what answer should be given to 
 "our brethren of Boston and New York, who desire to know 
 whether we will unite with them in stopping the importation of 
 goods from Great Britain." Dickenson went back to the beginning 
 — to the coming of the first settlers. They did not divest them- 
 selves of any of the rights inherent in freemen, and no power on 
 earth could lawfully deprive them of what was theirs without their 
 consent, but as they were members of one great empire, "they 
 tacitly acquiesced in the superintending authority of the parliament 
 of Great Britain, and admitted a power in it, to make regulations to 
 preserve the connection of the whole." And though regulations were 
 made which bore hardly on the Colonies, they had submitted out of 
 filial respect and regard for Great Britain. And then he enumerated 
 " some of the most grievous." 
 
 There was the law against making steel, or erecting steel furnaces, 
 " though there are not above 5 or 6 people in England engaged 
 in that branch of business, who are so far from being able to supply 
 what is wanted, that great quantities of steel are yearly imported 
 from Germany." 
 
 The law against plating and slitting mills and tilt hammers, 
 " though iron is the produce of our country," and we require vast 
 quantities of nails and plated iron, as hoes, stove-pipes, etc. 
 
 The restraint laid on hatters, and the prohibition of exporting 
 hats. 
 
 The prohibition of carrying wool, or anything made of wool, 
 manufactured here, from one colony to another. A single fleece 
 
THE FARMER'S GRIEVANCES 145 
 
 of wool, or a dozen home-made hose, so conveyed, is not only 
 forfeited, but the ship, or the waggon and horses which carried it, is 
 seized, and the owner heavily fined. 
 
 Though the Spaniards may cut and carry logwood where they 
 please, the Americans may not send to any foreign market without 
 first taking it to England, landing and re-shipping it, at great expense 
 and loss of time. 
 
 The same for Portugal and Spanish wines. 
 
 A duty on Madeira, which, if re-shipped to England, must pay 
 full duty there without any allowance for what was paid here. 
 
 "The emptying their jails upon us, and making the colonies 
 a receptacle for their rogues and villains ; an insult and indignity 
 not to be thought of, much less borne, without indignation and 
 resentment.'' 
 
 " Not to mention restrictions in the fisheries, the duties on 
 foreign sugar, molasses, etc. ; " thus compelling the Colonies to 
 supply themselves wholly from Great Britain with European and 
 East India goods, at an advance of 20, and sometimes of 40 per 
 cent, on what we could get them for otherwise. 
 
 And, as if all this were not enough, a party has lately arisen in 
 England which is trying to erect a new sovereignty over the Colonies. 
 They began with the Stamp Act. When we resisted it, the Mutiny 
 Bill was to dragoon us into compliance. By the interposition of the 
 London merchants who traded to the Colonies, the Stamp Act was 
 dropped ; but the Assemblies were ordered to furnish the troops with 
 articles some of which are not allowed them in Britain ; and every 
 officer can get a warrant and search any house, by day or night, under 
 pretence of looking for deserters. Then, because the Assembly of 
 New York hesitated to comply, its legislative power was suspended, 
 and an Act was passed asserting the power of Parliament to bind us 
 with their laws in every respect whatever. Then followed the Revenue 
 Act, imposing new duties, and the revenue thus raised is to be 
 applied to rendering our Assemblies useless, and to give the whole 
 power to governors and judges, whom we are not to appoint, and 
 who hold their commissions during the King's pleasure. "Thus, 
 having divested us of our property, they are proceeding to erect over 
 us a despotic government, and to rule us as slaves. . . . You are 
 now, my fellow-citizens, to deliberate, not, whether you will tamely 
 submit . . . that, I am sure, your love of freedom and regard for your- 
 selves and your posterity will never allow you to think of — but, by 
 what means you may defend your rights and liberties, and obtain a 
 repeal of these acts. . . ." It is in your power, by stopping importa- 
 tion from Great Britain, to obtain relief in a peaceable and consti- 
 VOL. I. — 10 
 
146 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 tutional way. No people ever defended their liberties without 
 suffering. "The Roman people suffered themselves to be defeated 
 by their enemies, rather than submit to the tyranny of the nobles." 
 "And, even in the midst of war, the Parliament of England has 
 denied to grant supplies until their grievances were redressed ; " 
 well knowing that no present loss could equal that of liberty. And 
 in the height of the late terrible Indian war, the Assembly of Mary- 
 land and our own refused to grant supplies on terms injurious to 
 public privilege and to justice. But our strength depends on our 
 union — United we conquer, divided we die. 
 
 This famous address from a man who afterwards deserted the 
 Colonial cause marks a great change in Colonial feeling. The 
 new Revenue Act had set the people thinking about all the other 
 Revenue Acts, passed to prevent the Colonies either from competing 
 with ourselves or dealing elsewhere. 
 
 Long as was Dickenson's list, it might have been longer. He 
 does not mention the most iniquitous of all, the Assiento, the most 
 important result for British America of the negotiations at Utrecht, 
 in Queen Anne's time, whereby Great Britain secured to herself the 
 profitable traffic in human flesh which made Queen Anne the 
 greatest slave-trader in the world. Since then we had steadily re- 
 sisted any attempt to limit the trade, so that Georgia had tried in 
 Vain to exclude slavery, and South Carolina to restrict it. 
 
 Almost the last exercise of George ni's authority over the North 
 American Colonies was a refusal to check the slave-trade. In 
 June, 177s, in the very last months of British sovereignty. Lord 
 Dartmouth wrote to a Colonial Agent : " We cannot allow the 
 Colonies to check, or discourage in any degree, a traffic so bene- 
 ficial to the nation." 
 
 NOTES ON THE SLAVE-TRADE. 
 
 It was demanded by St. John in 171 1. "Her Britannic Majesty did offer 
 atid undertake by persons whom she shall appoint, to bring into the West Indies 
 of America belonging to his Catholic Majesty, in the space of thirty years, 144,000 
 negroes, at the rate of 4800 in each of the said thirty years, " paying on 4000 of 
 them a duty of 33J dollars a head. The assientists might introduce as many more 
 as they pleased, at the less duty of 16 J dollars a head; but no Frenchmen nor 
 Spaniard, nor any other person, might introduce one negro slave into Spani.sh 
 America. " For the Spanish world in the Gulf of Mexico, on the Atlantic, and 
 along the Pacific, her Britannic Majesty, by persons of her appointment, was the 
 exclusive slave-trader." Harley advised the assignment of the Queen's portion of 
 the stock (one quarter) to the South Sea Company. By the same treaty England 
 obtained Newfoundland, "subject to the rights of France in its fisheries." — 
 Bancroft. 
 
 Already in 1727, the "vast importation of negroes '' was a subject of complaint 
 
THE FARMER'S GRIEVANCES 147 
 
 in S. Carolina. In 1701, Boston had instructed its representatives to "encourage 
 the bringing of white servants, and to put an end to negroes being slaves." 
 " England was inexorable in maintaining the system. . . . From 1600 to 1700, the 
 English took from Africa about 15,000 a year. The number during the assiento 
 may have averaged annually not far from 30,000." Bancroft thinks about one- 
 eighth died on the passage, and were thrown into the Atlantic. " The party of 
 the slave-trade dictated laws to England." The Statute of William and Mary 
 (1695), for the better supply of the plantations with negroes, says that in the 
 opinion of the King and Parliament, "the trade is highly beneficial and advan- 
 tageous to the kingdom and the colonies." — Bancroft. 
 
 "Were it possible for white men to answer the end of negroes in planting, 
 our colonies would interfere with the manufactures of these kingdoms , . . but, while 
 we can supply them abundantly with negroes, we need be under no such appre- 
 hensions. . . . Negro labour will keep our British colonies in a due subserviency to 
 the interestof their mother country." — The African Slave Trade the Great Pillar 
 and Support of the British Plantation Trade in America, by a British Merchant, 
 I74S- 
 
CHAPTER XXII 
 GOVERNOR BERNARD'S DEPARTURE 
 
 " The European system of elevating a few individuals at the expense of the 
 multitude, and of erecting an aristocratic fabric of wealth and luxury on the 
 labour and servitude of the many, a system peculiar to ancient and extended 
 empires, was happily unknown in New England. . . . The means of subsistence 
 were easy and open to all ; beggars were unknown in the country ; the virtuous 
 confidence of industry and liberty left no citizen to ask alms ; hardly any to 
 accept donations. ... So true it is that liberty, while it constitutes the happiness, 
 increases and confirms the virtue of mankind." — Life of Sir Francis Bernard, by 
 his Son. 
 
 "A gentleman from London would almost think himself at home in Boston, 
 when he observes the number of people, their houses, their furniture, their 
 tables, their dress and conversation, which perhaps is as splendid and showy as 
 that of the most considerable tradesmen in London. . . . Near six hundred sail of 
 ships have been laden here in a year for Europe and the British Plantations. 
 The goodness of the pavement may compare with most in London, to gallop a 
 horse on it is three shillings and sixpence forfeit." — Oldmixon, British Empire in 
 America. 
 
 " How would it have served his Majesty's cause for me to have provoked the 
 people in whose power I was, to have knocked me on the head, or drove me 
 out of the town?" — Bernard to Mr. Secretary Pownall, Sept. 20, 1768. 
 
 "As to Governor Bernard, let him have what merit he will, he appears, from 
 these papers, to be peevish and litigious ; glad to find things wrong, on purpose 
 to represent them to the government at home. . . . He mentions every little dirty 
 story, and writes of an intention to seize Castle William. Sir, all this is inex- 
 cusable, unless, in the following post, he could give us the names of the 
 conspirators." — Bari-fs Speech, Jan. 26, 1769. 
 
 Early in 1769, the struggle between Bernard and the town of 
 Boston became acute. On the i6th of February, a meeting of 
 the Selectmen unanimously voted an address to the Governor, 
 requesting him to contradict the misrepresentations made about 
 the behaviour of the town ; and as there was a report that deposi- 
 tions had been taken, they demanded copies, that the town might 
 have an opportunity of vindicating itself. Bernard replied that he 
 had no reason to think the town had been misrepresented, or that 
 the opinions of his Majesty or his Ministers were founded on any 
 other accounts than those published by the town itself — if they 
 
 143 
 
GOVERNOR BERNARD'S DEPARTURE 149 
 
 could vindicate themselves from charges which arose out of their 
 own pubhcations, they would have nothing to dread. On the 23rd, 
 the Selectmen met again, and voted a second address, demanding 
 to know what they had done against any law, or against the British 
 Constitution? Bernard replied that he referred to no particular 
 disorder in the town, but to the town-meetings, and the proceedings 
 of the Selectmen. 
 
 The irritation at having troops in the town had increased to 
 such a pitch, during the winter, that to avoid disorder sentinels 
 were ordered to challenge nobody at night, and this was carried so 
 far, that one night a sentinel looked on while thieves broke into a 
 house. The sound of the fife and drum on Sundays gave great 
 scandal to a town famous for strict observance of the Lord's Day ; 
 Gage yielded so far as to change the hours of relieving guard, to 
 prevent disturbance during church-time. 
 
 In April, Bernard got his long-expected leave. It was really a 
 recall, but the reason alleged was that he might make a full report 
 to the King. At the same time he was informed that the King had 
 made him a baronet. 
 
 Another unfortunate incident now occurred. The brigantine 
 Pitt, of Marblehead, was boarded just as she came in from Europe, 
 by a boat from the Rose man-of-war, — the Boston station ship, 
 cruising about to impress seamen. The crew shut themselves into 
 the fore-peak with harpoons, and swore they would die before they 
 would be taken. After a long defence, Lieutenant Panton, of the 
 Rose, advancing in spite of warning, was killed by a harpoon. The 
 crew of the Pitt were apprehended, and the question at once arose, 
 How they must be tried ? Otis and Adams insisted on a jury, and 
 not the Court of Admiralty, which had no jury. Bernard was 
 inclined to agree, the Counsel for the King acceded; but Chief 
 Justice Oliver showed that the prisoners could be sent to England 
 under the 35th Henry viii, and would then have a jury; but if 
 tried " in the Plantations," it must be without a jury, under a 
 Statute of William in, intended to prevent trials of pirates by 
 plantation juries, who were not impartial, and had acquitted 
 buccaneers of many acts of piracy against the Spaniards, Moors, etc. 
 Thus, like the 3Sth Henry viii,' the Statute was originally framed to 
 prevent injustice. Judge Oliver was desired to state his reasons 
 in open court, whereby he incurred fresh odium. The prisoners 
 were tried by the Court of Admiralty, the Commander of the Rose 
 being one of the Commission ; but the Court unanimously 
 acquitted the prisoners, because the impressers had no special 
 
ISO ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 warrant from the Lords of the Admiralty, and this, it was ruled, gave 
 the prisoners " a good right " to defend themselves, and at Common 
 Law the killing the lieutenant would not even have amounted to 
 manslaughter. 
 
 This case was on when the writs were issued for the new 
 Assembly. On the sth of May, a Town-Meeting in Faneuil Hall 
 chose James Otis, Thomas Gushing, Samuel Adams and John 
 Hancock as representatives of the town, and on the Sth another 
 meeting gave the representatives their mandate. Their first object 
 was to be the privilege of Assembly — debates must be free, the 
 House must not be surrounded by guards and cannon. And as 
 soon as these are removed, they must enquire why the military have 
 been quartered in the body of the town, contrary to an express Act 
 of Parliament ; and why the Attorney-General enters a nolle 
 prosequi when the repeated offences of the soldiery against the peace 
 are complained of. The representatives must by no means comply 
 with the requisition to provide for the troops — if the General Court 
 is a free assembly, no power on earth can compel it to find this 
 money. Next to the revenue, the late extensions of the jurisdiction 
 of the Admiralty are the greatest grievance. Many of your towns- 
 men have been worn out in attendance on these Courts, defending 
 themselves against extravagant and enormous penalties. Let these 
 Courts be confined to their proper element. While you, in the 
 most ample manner, testify your loyalty to our most gracious 
 Sovereign, you must strenuously maintain the right of petition. 
 
 Before the meeting adjourned, it expressed its high satisfaction 
 at hearing that the merchants had so strictly adhered to the agree- 
 ment for non-importation of European merchandise, and recom- 
 mended the inhabitants not to purchase any goods of the few 
 persons who have imported any articles in the ships lately arrived 
 from Great Britain. And presently we find it stated that all British 
 imported goods are ordered to be stored unopened, whether 
 ordered or not, " so that there is now a total stagnation of trade in 
 New England " ; and the Assembly of New York has laid a tax of 
 5 per cent, on all goods sold as public vendue, and the merchants 
 of New York have forbidden shipmasters to take on board any 
 goods from Great Britain — salt, sail-cloth, card-wire, grind-stones, 
 chalk, lead, tin, sheet-copper, and German steel, excepted. And 
 both New York and Virginia have passed " very high " resolutions, 
 and an address to his Majesty in the best style of Boston itself. 
 
 At its very first meeting, the Boston Assembly appointed a 
 Committee to wait upon the Governor, and complain of the armed 
 force now being employed to overawe the town. Armament by 
 
GOVERNOR BERNARD'S DEPARTURE 151 
 
 sea and land investing their metropolis, and a military guard, with 
 cannon pointed at the very door of the State House, where the 
 Assembly is held, is inconsistent with the freedom and dignity of 
 a Representative Assembly. They desired his Excellency to give 
 effectual orders for the removal of the forces by sea and land 
 during the session of the Assembly. Bernard replied that he had 
 no authority over ships or troops, and could give no orders for 
 their removal. 
 
 When this message came back, the House declined entering 
 on business, "and a solemn and expressive silence ensued." At 
 length the House sent another message to the Governor, to say that 
 it was impossible to believe a military power, or a standing army, 
 was the just and full representative of the supreme executive of the 
 whole empire— if it is, then it is a power without any check here, 
 and therefore is so far absolute. If no redress can be had from 
 the King's lieutenant in the province, nothing remains but to lay 
 a humble petition before their gracious Sovereign. Bernard knew 
 that their gracious Sovereign looked on petitions as a sort of 
 rebellion. He had already been ordered to remove the Assembly, 
 if necessary. He now replied that he had no authority to remove 
 the troops or the cannon — all he could do was to remove the 
 Assembly to a place where these difficulties cannot operate ; and two 
 days later he ordered his secretary to adjourn the Court of General 
 Assembly to Harvard College in Cambridge, there to meet for the 
 despatch of business. 
 
 This had only been done once before, in the time of Governor 
 Burnet of unhappy memory. Bernard hoped the Assembly would 
 refuse to go — then he could dissolve it. As Hutchinson frankly 
 remarks, " The Governor had no interest to induce him to keep the 
 Assembly sitting." He was going to England as soon as the session 
 was over, and he knew that they would not vote him his salary 
 during his absence. And as if on purpose to show that the cannon 
 were in truth intended to command the Assembly, they were removed 
 the very night after the House removed. 
 
 The Assembly changed its place but not its mind. From 
 Cambridge it sent a Committee to expostulate about the guard at 
 the doors of the State House — "the most pointed insult" ever 
 offered to a free people, aggravated by the removal as soon as the 
 Assembly had been removed from its ancient seat, and forced to do 
 business at this inconvenient distance from the State Records, etc. 
 The House had been reproached with wasting time and treasure to 
 no purpose, but no time can be better employed than in the pre- 
 servation of our rights, nor treasure better expended than in 
 
152 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 securing " that true old English liberty that gives a relish to every 
 other enjoyment." 
 
 This was on the 15th of June. Bernard seems to have made no 
 reply; but on the 21st, he sent a message, recommending the 
 Assembly to come to business — particularly: i. The support of 
 Government (meaning his own salary). 2. The Supply of the 
 Treasury. 3. Payment of the Provincial Debt of ;^io5,ooo. 
 4. The Tax-Bill. 5. The Impost-Bill. 6. The Excise-Bill. 7. The 
 Establishment of Forts a.nd Garrisons. 8. The Truck-trade, etc., 
 and offering every assistance consistent with duty. And on the 28th, 
 he stirred them up again, by sending a message to signify his recall, 
 " to lay before his Majesty the true state of the province." He also 
 acquainted the House with his Majesty's instructions for the appli- 
 cation of the salary when the Governor is absent — one-half is to 
 be paid to Lieutenant-Governor Hutchinson — at the same time 
 intimating that he had been given to understand he was to be 
 continued Governor, so they might as well vote the whole salary, 
 the same as at other times. 
 
 On the 4th of July the Assembly replied to the message of 
 June 21. They admitted that the service of the Crown and the 
 interest of the people are very compatible objects — especially under 
 such a Monarch as we have, who makes the welfare of his people 
 the sole end of his government. If your Excellency had imitated 
 him we should have had fewer disputes. If business was in arrears, 
 it was the fault of those who brought the province into this difficulty. 
 He himself had suspended his assent to the establishment for forts 
 and garrisons. " Was it your duty to the King, or your regard to the 
 people, that hindered you ? " 
 
 On the 1 2 th they replied to the second message. They 
 " cheerfully acquiesced " in his repair to Great Britain, and felt a 
 peculiar satisfaction at hearing he was to give a true account of 
 affairs; and they persuaded themselves that, while the Governor 
 was employed in setting his own conduct in the most favourable 
 light, they would be able to answer for themselves. They were sure 
 that when the King knew it, he would be very angry with those who 
 had wickedly misinformed his Ministers. As for the salary, he was 
 already fully paid up to the 2nd of August — the day he was to 
 embark, and as they had not been made to understand he would be 
 continued, the House could not make any unprecedented grant of 
 money for services they had no reason to expect would ever be 
 performed. They would provide for another Governor, whenever 
 his Majesty was graciously pleased to appoint one. 
 
 Bernard would have replied by adjourning the Assembly at once, 
 
GOVERNOR BERNARD'S DEPARTURE 153 
 
 but he was obliged to wait till they had voted his salary. Instead 
 of doing this, they were writing letters to Hillsborough, passing 
 " Resolves," and drawing up a petition — voted unanimously when 
 109 members were present — praying his Majesty to be graciously 
 pleased to remove Sir Francis Bernard for ever from the government 
 of the province of Massachusetts Bay, and place one in his stead 
 worthy to serve the greatest and best Monarch on earth. 
 
 In the middle of this ferment, came news from England that the 
 British Government intended to take off the duties on paper, glass, 
 and colours. 
 
 Immediately, the merchants of Boston called a meeting, and 
 voted unanimously that the taking off of these duties would not 
 relieve trade from the present difficulties, and they confirmed their 
 agreement not to import until the Revenue Acts were repealed. 
 And now paper-mills are " actually in agitation," and notices are being 
 circulated through the provinces, requiring every family to be careful 
 of its linen rags, that the plan may not fail for want of materials. 
 
 Bernard's friends had advised him not to ask the Assembly to 
 make the grant for Hutchinson. Of course they refused ; and they 
 harped on the "standing army." Was not Boston quiet? True 
 there were frays between the soldiers and the townsmen, but no 
 civil magistrate would ever call in the military, and the soldiers were 
 tried in the civil courts as easily as if they had been civilians. At 
 last, in sheer weariness and disgust, the 64th and 65 th were ordered 
 to Halifax. The commanding officers did not find Boston "an 
 agreeable station " — Halifax was much gayer. One regiment had 
 started, and the other was embarking, when the Resolves of the 
 Assembly were published in the papers. These Resolves, passed 
 unanimously in a House of 107 members, declared that "no 
 laws " made by any authority in which the people have not their 
 representatives, can be obligatory upon them. Mackay, Colonel of 
 the regiment, and Hood, Commander of the ships, consulted with 
 Bernard, and it was resolved to remain for the present. An express 
 was sent to Gage at New York, but the express was recalled — the 
 House had modified the Resolves — which it said had been published 
 prematurely. The words now stood, "laws imposing taxes." The 
 ships and the troops departed for Halifax. 
 
 Governor Wentworth happening to come to Cambridge, on 
 business of the Court of Admiralty, was received with great honour — 
 the Council waited on him, and he was given an entertainment. 
 The public prints carefully explained, for Governor Bernard's benefit, 
 that the people wished to show how much they could respect 
 a worthy Governor. To mark this still more, Bernard was not 
 
1 54 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 invited as usual to tlie annual dinner at the Visitation of the 
 Schools. A more practical token of displeasure was the refusal of 
 the House to pay the barrack-master of Boston the sums he was out 
 of pocket for the troops. The troops, they said, were not needed, 
 and the Acts for imposing taxes ought to be called Acts for raising 
 a tribute in America, to be dissipated among place-men and 
 pensioners. They are even worse than the Stamp Act. 
 
 Governor Bernard had now been eleven years in America — two 
 years as Governor of New Jersey, and nine in Massachusetts. If 
 he had gone at the end of his first five years, he would have been 
 spoken of as one of the best of the Royal Governors. But he had 
 many children, and wished to make provision for them, and when 
 it came to choosing between the King and the people not one of 
 the Royal Governors of Massachusetts had ever hesitated to throw 
 the people over. He was recalled, because Ministers were getting 
 frightened — Bernard had depicted the situation in very alarming 
 colours, and a little conciliation was now to be tried. Just before 
 he sailed, Bernard received circular letters from Hillsborough, with 
 assurances that "administration is well disposed to relieve the 
 colonies from all real grievances arising from the late acts of 
 revenue " ; and that " it is their intention to propose, in the next 
 session of parliament, to take off the duties upon glass, paper, and 
 colours, upon consideration of such duties being contrary to the 
 true principles of commerce.'' Bernard's last act as Governor of 
 Massachusetts Bay was to pubhsh this second official confession of 
 folly and ignorance on the part of the Government. It seemed as 
 though England actually desired to teach the colonists to trust 
 neither her wisdom nor her justice, and to be always prepared for 
 some foolish Act of Parliament, which it would take a year or two's 
 agitation and interruption of business to get repealed — only presently 
 to begin again with some other foolish Bill of the same sort.i 
 
 ' Folly in Governors is worse than all the wickedness in the world. — Burke. 
 
 Grafton charges Hillsborough with altering the Circular Letter of 1769, after 
 he read it to the Cabinet. A majority had amended it "by words as kind and 
 lenient as could be proposed by some of us." When they saw the minute — after 
 the despatch had been sent off by "a quick departure" — they were persuaded it 
 was not in the words or form of the last correction agreed to by the Cabinet. 
 Camden charged Hillsborough with omitting the "soothing" portion, and 
 insisted on seeing the minute again. Hillsborough could not find it — said he 
 had looked a whole morning in vain. Worse, still, the version sent (and 
 shown the King) said the Cabinet was unanimous, whereas the majority was only 
 one. Grafton says that Camden lost the King's favour for his attack on 
 Hillsborough. Grafton also noticed that "his Majesty was more forward to 
 dictate his will to me than to enquire first my opinion ... as had been his usual 
 practice. " — Memoirs. 
 
GOVERNOR BERNARD'S DEPARTURE 155 
 
 Bernard prorogued the Assembly on the 15th of July. The 
 parting was angry. He rated them for stopping business on the 
 most trifling pretences, "for weeks together." The assertions, 
 declarations, and resolutions which they had issued were "an 
 invasion of the rights of the imperial sovereignty." To his 
 Majesty must they be referred, and then, " By your own acts you 
 will be judged." You need not fear misrepresentation — your enemies 
 cannot say worse of you than your own publications. I shall take 
 care that the King has true copies. 
 
 A fortnight later he sailed for England in the Ripon man-of-war, 
 sent from Virginia for him. Earlier in the year he had seriously 
 considered the practicability of seizing Hancock, Samuel Adams, 
 and others, and sending them to England to be tried for treason. 
 He did not dare attempt to take them with him. The bells of the 
 Old South rang for joy of his departure, guns were fired from 
 Hancock's wharf, the Liberty Tree was hung with flags, and in the 
 evening a great bonfire was lighted on Fort Hill.i 
 
 The Resolves give so clear a view of the situation, and so 
 admirably expound the principles of civil liberty as they were 
 understood in the eighteenth century, that a somewhat full resume 
 must be given as much as possible in the words of the original, only 
 shortening where the sense allows. 
 
 The Resolves begin by declaring : That that House bears the 
 firmest allegiance to their rightful sovereign. King George the Third ; 
 That the sole right of imposing taxes on the colony of the Massa- 
 chusetts Bay is vested in the House of Representatives, with the 
 consent of the Council, and of his Majesty the King of Great 
 Britain, or his governor for the time being ; That it is the indubitable 
 right of the subject to petition the King for redress of grievances ; 
 That it is lawful for subjects to confer with one another, on dutiful 
 addresses for relief from common burdens ; That Governor Bernard, 
 by a wanton and precipitate dissolution of last year's Assembly, and 
 refusing to call another, acted against the spirit of a free con- 
 stitution ; That Governor Bernard, in his letter to Lord Hillsborough, 
 gave a false and highly injurious representation of the conduct of 
 his Majesty's truly loyal and faithful Council of this colony, and of 
 the town of Boston; That Governor Bernard, by representing it 
 was necessary for the King to have the Council in his own hands, 
 has discovered his enmity to the true spirit of the British constitution, 
 at the very time he was professing himself a warm friend to the 
 Charter ; That the establishment of a standing army in this colony, 
 in time of peace, is an invasion of the natural rights of the people, 
 ' August 2, 1769. 
 
156 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 and of those which they claim as free-born Englishmen, confirmed by 
 Magna Charta, the Bill of Rights, and the Charter of this province ; 
 That a standing army is not knotvti as a part of the British con- 
 stitutio7i in any of the King^s domi?iions, and any attempt to establish 
 it manifestly tends to the enslavement of the people ; That the 
 representations of the Governor have been the cause why this force 
 was sent ; That whoever gave orders for quartering common soldiers 
 and camp women in the Court House of Boston, and in the 
 Representatives' Chamber (where some of the principal archives of 
 the government have been deposited), and the placing a main-guard 
 with cannon pointed near the door, designed " a high insult," and 
 an indication that the military power was supreme; That his 
 Excellency General Gage, in his letter to Lord Hillsborough of 
 October 31, among other exceptional things, said, "From what has 
 been said your Lordship will conclude that there is no government 
 in Boston ; and in truth, there is very little at present, and the 
 constitution of this province leans so much to the side of democracy, 
 that the government has not the power to remedy the disorders that 
 happen in it ; " That this letter displays as much ignorance as 
 malice, for that great prince William in gave us our Charter, and 
 this ought to have placed it above the General's reprehension, and 
 led him to ask whether the disorders have not arisen from the 
 arbitrary disposition of the Governor, and not from too great a 
 spirit of democracy in our constitution ; That this House expresses 
 their deep concern that too many in power at home and abroad so 
 clearly avow the most rancorous enmity to " the free part " of the 
 British constitution, " and are trying to render the monarchy 
 absolute in every part of the British-Empire." 
 
 Then follow particular instances of encroachment — the extension 
 of the powers of the Court of Admiralty, the frequent instances of 
 Nolle prosequi by the Attorney and Advocate-General, etc.^ 
 
 Who first dared think of Separation ? The precise date at 
 which the idea of Independence arose has often been discussed. 
 Tories, unable to understand a hatred of tyranny per se, have 
 always maintained that the whole trouble with America was the 
 work of a handful of agitators, who made political capital out of 
 the blunders of the British Government ; the grievances were mere 
 pretexts — the real reason was the desire to be independent. At 
 the same time they are unanimous in assuring us that neither 
 rebellion nor separation was desired by more than this handful. 
 This view was maintained up to the very end of the business, and 
 Tory historians have continued to maintain it. 
 
 ' The Resolves are dated July 8, 1769- 
 
GOVERNOR BERNARD'S DEPARTURE 157 
 
 The question can be decided as well now as at the time. We 
 still possess the only evidence worth anything on such a question— 
 the sort of language used by contemporaries, and the general prob- 
 abilities of the situation. As to the first, there can be no possible 
 doubt that Englishmen were the first to talk of separation. They 
 talked about it from the moment they learned that America meant 
 to resist the Stamp Act. It is the staple argument against any 
 concession, the bogey which is trotted out to scare and silence those 
 who take part with the colonists. "Don't pay any attention to 
 what they say — they are only trying to cast off our rule." We 
 may indeed be said to have put the idea into their heads. And 
 we not only put it into their heads — we seemed resolved to show 
 them that they had better carry it into effect. From George iil 
 and his Ministers down to the most scurrilous scribbler hired to 
 support Government, we told them that there was nothing for 
 them between docile submission to whatever taxes and trade 
 restrictions we chose to impose, and complete independence of us. 
 
 There is every evidence to show that, for many years after the 
 dispute began, the Colonists neither wished to stand alone nor 
 believed themselves capable of doing so. Within historical memory, 
 Europe had not seen a colony become a people. Our Colonies 
 felt themselves to be children, unable to stand alone. As long as 
 France was a power in North America, they were too thankful 
 for the protection afforded to their infant condition by Britain's 
 mighty arm to complain much of her interference with their trade. 
 Any foreign Power into whose hands they might fall, once that 
 protection withdrawn, would do the same. The day we won 
 Canada, we destroyed this motive for submission and loyalty. 
 And the Seven Years' War did more than this — it taught the 
 colonists war. Almost every officer who led the provincial troops 
 at the beginning of the Revolution had learned war at Quebec or 
 Cape Breton. 
 
 The more we consider the language used on both sides, the 
 less necessary does it seem to suspect the Americans of hypocrisy 
 in their protestations of loyalty to George in. Every time they 
 used such language they were acknowledging afresh the sovereignty 
 which we are told they were preparing to reject. They were 
 putting themselves in the wrong, they were also strengthening 
 those feelings of general loyalty in which we are entreated to 
 believe. If they were not sincere in these expressions, why did 
 they take such excessive care to prevent even the " implication " 
 6f an acknowledgment of the right of Great Britain to tax them ? 
 Why so profuse in acknowledging one claim, and so stubborn in 
 
iS8 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 rejecting the other? Hillsborough's was not the only hint given 
 them that Ministers would repeal the obnoxious Acts, if the colonists 
 would acknowledge the right, and confine their remonstrances to 
 questions of expediency. Throughout the years which pre- 
 ceded the resort to arms, Great Britain placed herself in the 
 ridiculous position of offering to amend her blunders, if the 
 aggrieved party would admit her right to make such blunders. 
 Why did not these unscrupulous plotters, who were trying to 
 deceive the British people by professions of sham loyalty — why 
 did not they accept repeal on these terms, and get ready to demand 
 a like repeal next time ? The agitator rejoices in an occasion for 
 agitation. But these agitators behaved exactly as persons behave 
 who wish to avoid a next time for agitation. 
 
 If the British Government had followed Pitt's advice, — given 
 up the right of taxation, and put the Colonial Assemblies on the 
 footing they demanded, and on which they had been practically 
 ever since the Charter of King William, — we might have gone on 
 for another half-century, forbidding them to manufacture tilt- 
 hammers, or sell in one colony the hats and woollen goods made 
 in another. But though a timely modification of our claim would 
 have deferred, it could not have prevented the American Colonies 
 from out-growing us. In the inevitable course of Nature they 
 must have become a nation. The more nominal our sovereignty, 
 the longer it would have lasted — that is all. And to keep it by 
 force would have cost us even more than it did to lose it. 
 
 Probably the first American to face the possibility of separate 
 existence was Samuel Adams. His frail body held a fearless 
 soul. Long before any of the other leaders looked beyond the 
 redress of present grievances, his keen intellect had perceived 
 that one British people can never remain subject to another. He 
 had perceived, too, that, as Thomas Paine was soon to say, 
 " England and America belong to different systems. England to 
 Europe, America to itself." But even Samuel Adams did not 
 suppose it would come so soon ; and to the vast majority of the 
 colonists the idea would have seemed absurd, much later than 
 1769. Only when we forced them to realise that they must 
 choose between the position of a subject race and this tremendous 
 experiment, did the idea of Independence take root — and, perhaps, 
 but for Thomas Paine, the men of that generation would hardly 
 have found courage to begin the world again, alone. 
 
CHAPTER XXIII 
 THE OCCURRENCES IN LONDON 
 
 "By a letter from Lancaster, the violences committed on account of the 
 ensuing election at that town and at Preston, exceed belief ; murdering, maim- 
 ing, pulling down of houses, destroying places of public worship, and breaking 
 the furniture and burning the effects of each other, are among the acts of the 
 enflamed mob."^ — Gentleman's Magazine, March 7, 1768. 
 
 On the 27th of January, 1769, Wilkes' petition was considered.^ It 
 recited all the proceedings taken against him since April, 1763, 
 when he was apprehended for No. 45, and his house entered 
 and searched under a General Warrant. It also charged Philip 
 Carteret Webb, Solicitor to the Treasury, with having used public 
 money to bribe one Michael Curry to steal the Essay on Woman, 
 and Lord Mansfield with having altered the record the day before 
 the trial. North adroitly moved that petitioner's counsel be heard 
 only on these two points — the altering of the record, and the 
 suborning of evidence — thus avoiding the great constitutional 
 issue. Next day, the House sat till midnight on this motion, and 
 carried it by 278 to 131. 
 
 On the 31st, Wilkes was brought up again by the Marshal of the 
 King's Bench. He proved the altering of the indictment, and he 
 got the word " blasphemy " taken out of the endorsement ; but 
 very late on the night of February i, the House voted his 
 complaint frivolous and his aspersions groundless. 
 
 Next morning, he was brought up again on another matter. He 
 had somehow got hold of a copy of the letter written by Lord 
 Weymouth — ^just before the riot in St. George's Fields — to Mr. Ponton, 
 Chairman of the Lambeth Quarter Sessions, the letter to which 
 
 ' Colonel Burgoyne was the ministerial candidate. He was alleged to have 
 gone to the hustings with a pistol in each hand. He was fined ;^iooo, but it is 
 not clear that the fine was ever paid. 
 
 ^ " I declare for the right of petitioning, as established at the Revolution . . . 
 
 you are so afraid of the weight of this argument, that you will not have it heard." 
 
 — Speech of the Right Hon. George Grenville, January 26, 1769. 
 
 159 
 
i6o ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Justice Gillam had alluded, as his " orders from the Ministry." 
 Wilkes had sent this letter to the St James' Chronicle, with 
 comments by himself.^ Asked what defence he could make, 
 Wilkes replied that he gloried in what he had done — he thought 
 it his duty to bring to light " that bloody scroll," and only wished 
 he could impeach the noble lord who wrote it. The debate which 
 followed became in the hands of ministerialists a defence of 
 Weymouth, rather than an indictment of Wilkes. They urged 
 the state of London, the dangerous mobs, the civil magistrates 
 afraid to execute the laws, the constables only a part of the mob. 
 There was thus no remedy but the military. Accordingly, the 
 House resolved, by 239 to 136, that the introduction to the copy of 
 Lord Weymouth's letter, " of which John Wilkes, Esq., a member 
 of this House, has confessed himself the author and publisher, is 
 an insolent, scandalous and seditious libel, tending to inflame the 
 minds of his Majesty's subjects, and to subvert good order and 
 legal government." Next day. Lord Barrington moved the 
 expulsion of John Wilkes. Rigby, Bedford's henchman, seconded 
 the motion. Burke, Dowdeswell, Beckford, Cornwall, Thomas 
 Pitt, all spoke against it, but the great speech was George Grenville's. 
 He pointed out the danger of such a precedent, and bade the 
 House consider that, though it might begin against the odious and 
 the guilty, once established, it was easily applied to the meritorious 
 and deserving — the most eminent members of the State might 
 thus be ostracised " by the worst species of ostracism." Especially 
 he insisted on the injustice of handing on a punishment from one 
 Parliament to another, and so making it perpetual. Wilkes had 
 been punished by fine and imprisonment, and expulsion from 
 another Parliament, and now it is sought to punish him again ! 
 
 By 219 to 137, the House again expelled Wilkes, and issued a 
 writ for a new election; on February 16, Wilkes was re-elected 
 without opposition, and next day the House again declared his 
 election void. Ministers brought up the precedent of Sir Robert 
 Walpole, who was expelled for bribery ; and, being re-elected, the 
 House determined he could not be returned for the same 
 Parliament as that which expelled him. Dowdeswell fastened 
 on this, and proposed they should expel Mr. Wilkes over and over 
 again — to be sure, this would open such a door for expulsions 
 that no man's seat would be safe. You expel the worst man in 
 the House. There is always a " worst " man— where will you 
 stop? And as for obscenity and impiety, do half a dozen members 
 
 ' It was printed in the Chronicle of December 10, 1768. Weymouth's letter 
 was dated, "St. James', Ap. 17, 1768." 
 
THE OCCURRENCES IN LONDON i6i 
 
 of this House ever meet over a bottle, that their discourse is 
 entirely free from it ? Even in the Cabinet — " that pious reform- 
 ing society " — who is to throw the first stone at Wilkes ? The 
 House Hstened, and thought it wiser not to expel Wilkes again — 
 it only declared him incapable, by 235 to 89. And as there had 
 been a riot at Brentford, the new writ was delayed for a month. 
 
 It was of no use. On March 16, Wilkes was returned un- 
 opposed for the third time. Next day the House for the third time 
 declared his election void, and issued a new writ. In an angry 
 debate on April 7, Burke charged Ministers with contriving the 
 riots they pretended to fear — they had employed one Captain Fall, 
 who led the sailors' riots, and had given him a pension for what 
 he had done. 
 
 There had been so many demonstrations by Mr. Wilkes' friends, 
 that Ministers felt it necessary to get up a counter-demonstration 
 of their own. A meeting was called at the King's Arms Tavern, 
 to consider of a Loyal Address to the King, but the Wilkesites 
 turned out the others, and held the meeting themselves. The 
 loyal party had to leave their Address for signature at a public 
 office over the Royal Exchange. Six hundred " merchants and 
 tradesmen " affixed their names — induced, as was freely alleged, by 
 money from the Treasury. And what sort of "merchants and 
 tradesmen " ? Thomas Whately told Grenville that he saw among 
 the names that of an ex-footman of his father's, now set up as a 
 broker, and was assured there were not fifty names better than Tom 
 Broughton's — and many were worse, for they were names of 
 men "used" to seeing their names in the Gazette, having been 
 bankrupt more than once. 
 
 On March 22, a cavalcade set out in coaches for St James' 
 Palace, but two-thirds of them never got beyond Temple Bar. 
 "A desperate mob" so insulted, pelted, and maltreated them, 
 that several coaches turned back ; others proceeded by " by-ways." 
 In the Strand, a hearse with two white and two black horses 
 (said to be driven " by a gentleman " ) took the lead of the 
 procession. On one side of the hearse were portrayed the soldiers 
 firing at young Allen, and on the other McQuirk knocking old 
 Mr. Clark on the head at Brentford. At the Palace-gate, there 
 was a terrible scene — an attempt was made to drive the hearse 
 into the Courtyard, but Lord-Steward Talbot, with great courage, 
 though "deserted by his own servants," arrested two rioters 
 himself. But his staff of office was broken in his hand, and his 
 friends pulled and his foes pushed him back into the Palace. 
 Meanwhile the Riot Act had been read, and the military — who 
 
 VOL. I. — II 
 
1 62 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 behaved this day with great moderation — secured fifteen of the 
 more pertinacious. The hearse drove off to Carlton House (the 
 Princess of Wales') and thence to Lord Weymouth's — " at which 
 places the driver made a particular kind of compliment, and then 
 retired." 
 
 Mr. Bohem, Chairman of the meeting at the King's Arms, was 
 so severely handled that he had to quit his coach and take refuge 
 in Nando's Coffee House. The coach was rifled, and he very 
 nearly lost the Address — it was recovered with great difficulty, and 
 those who had already arrived at the Palace waited in the utmost 
 anxiety. When their unfortunate Chairman did arrive, he was 
 so covered and blinded with mud — so " drenched and coated," that 
 he could not enter the Presence Chamber, where the King, his 
 Ministers and Courtiers, had been kept waiting for him for hours. 
 But at last the Address got upstairs, and was read to the indignant 
 Monarch. 
 
 Only five of the rioters were detained in custody, and the 
 Grand Jury of Middlesex threw out the bills. ^ 
 
 On April 13 a fourth election was held at Brentford. This 
 time Ministers had got two candidates of their own in the field — 
 Colonel Luttrellj^ brother of Lord Irnham, and Mr. Sergeant 
 Whitaker. It was remarked that the electors all gave their votes 
 singly, and not by four at a time, as before, so that the poll went 
 on very slowly. This arrangement was no doubt intended to 
 relieve ministerial voters from finding themselves one to three. 
 Wilkes was re-elected; he had 1143 votes, Luttrell 296, and 
 Whitaker 5. After the poll — which closed at five o'clock — a 
 number of horsemen with colours flying, attended by several 
 thousand people, rode through St. James' Street, the Strand, and 
 over London Bridge to the King's Bench, to congratulate Wilkes. 
 Next day the House sent for the Sheriffs with the return ; but the 
 Sheriffs were so long in coming that the House " got into confusion 
 
 ' On April 12 there was a procession of freeholders on horseback, through 
 Charing Cross, Pall Mall and Piccadilly. It lasted two hours. Some com- 
 panies were several hundred strong. All marched with bands playing and 
 colours flying, and blue ribbons in their hats, with "Magna Charta," and " Bill 
 of Rights " inscribed. — Annual Register. 
 
 ^ Luttrell was a Colonel of horse — said to be too ready with his sword (he is 
 infamous for his brutality in the Irish Rebellion). He sat for a Cornish borough 
 with II voters — 10 of them excisemen. He infuriated the mob still more by 
 using Lord Holland's house for his committee, and by issuing an advertisement 
 calling on " gentlemen " to join him in giving a lesson to the mob. But when 
 the day came, the few gentlemen who had responded thought it more prudent 
 to go to Brentford by back ways. Fox canvassed for Luttrell. 
 
THE OCCURRENCES IN LONDON 163 
 
 and riot for two hours, and then the night was so far advanced 
 that it became improper to enter into any new debate that 
 night " ; so, they adjourned till to-morrow, though it was a Saturday, 
 and Parliament never did anything of importance that day, since 
 the time when it used to adjourn that Sir Robert might go 
 a-hunting. 
 
 There was a warm debate that Saturday morning. Mr. Onslow 
 moved that Henry Lawes Luttrell ought to have been returned a 
 knight of the shire for the county of Middlesex — if the person at 
 the head of the poll was incapable, the next was always chosen. 
 The Attorney-General abused the Sheriffs, and talked about the 
 late infamous riot ; North " spoke long, but chiefly to the passions " 
 — Wilkes had given the Ministry great trouble, and unless an end 
 was put to this the whole kingdom would be in confusion — " though 
 he owned he did not think this measure would put an end to 
 the distraction." Beckford reminded Government of Rehoboam ; 
 Burke showed that this quarrel was not between the House and 
 the Freeholders of Middlesex, but between the House and all 
 England; and Grenville made an even greater speech than his 
 first — the gist of it, that Parliament is not above the law, and that 
 a vote of the House bound the House for the session it was made, 
 but could not bind the people. " If the ministry will take such 
 headstrong measures, the vengeance of a deluded, injured people 
 must fall on them." 
 
 The House, by 197 against 143, voted that Luttrell was legally 
 returned, and he took his seat. The Freeholders of Middlesex met 
 at Mile End, and drew up a petition, which was heard by Counsel at 
 the bar of the House, on May 8. The House reaffirmed LuttrelFs 
 election by 221 to 152, and next day Parliament was prorogued. 
 
 The famous dinner at the Thatched House took place that 
 same night. Seventy-two members of Opposition dined together, 
 and the great toast of the evening was a sentence from Mr. Henry 
 Cavendish's speech the night before — it was called fondly, "Mr. 
 Cavendish's creed," and it ran : " I do, from my soul, detest and 
 abjure, as unconstitutional and illegal, that damnable doctrine and 
 position, that a resolution of the House of Commons can make, 
 alter, suspend, abrogate, or annihilate, the Law of the Land." 
 
 The year 1769 was not entirely taken up with riots and petitions, 
 nor was Mr. Wilkes' business the only unpleasant one for the 
 Thirteenth Parliament. On the 28th of February his Majesty 
 sent a message to say that he was in debt to the tune of 
 ^5 13,31 r, and relied on the zeal and affection of his faithful 
 Commons to pay it. Now the Civil List used to be reckoned 
 
i64 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 at ^800,000 a year, more or less, but, as it often was less, the 
 King at his accession had compounded for ,3^800,000 a year 
 fixed, and the Civil List had been supposed to be on a better 
 footing than ever before. So the House was not pleased. Papers 
 were called for, and questions were asked, especially how it 
 was that with the revenues of Wales and the Duchy of 
 Cornwall, and the new duties laid in the new West India Islands, 
 — all this in addition to a clear ;^8oo,ooo a year, — so virtuous 
 a prince was so deep in debt? Ministers replied indignantly, 
 that nobody ought to ask questions about so virtuous a prince, 
 who besides had given up to the nation more than ;^7oo,ooo 
 — his share of the prize-money in the late war. Decency demanded 
 the instant supply of his Majesty's wants. So the House 
 agreed to pay first, and ask questions afterwards, though Colonel 
 Barr6 said this was never done anywhere but in Ireland — there, 
 certainly, we paid the bill first, and then examined if we really 
 owed it. 
 
 On the 2 1 St of January, Junius' first letter appeared in the 
 Public Advertiser. It was a masterly review of the situation from 
 the King's accession, ending with a savage attack on the Cabinet. 
 We could have got better secretaries, if we had chosen them by lot ! 
 It asked how the debt on the Civil List was to be paid — " anyhow 
 let it not be by a lottery, like the repairs of a country bridge or a 
 decayed hospital." For three years these terrible letters fell like 
 bombshells into the ministerial camp.^ 
 
 Again it rained petitions, remonstrances, meetings, until 
 Administration, in self-defence, got up more counter-demonstrations. 
 " Addresses " to his Majesty were presented from four Enghsh 
 Counties,^ from the two Universities, and the cities of Bristol, 
 Liverpool, and Coventry. But the "petitions" and "remon- 
 strances " — Middlesex leading the way — poured in from seventeen 
 Counties, and were signed by more than 60,000 electors. Many 
 of them — Yorkshire, Westminster, and others — prayed for an 
 immediate dissolution. All declared that no mere vote of Parlia- 
 
 1 "Junius, and such writers as himself, occasion all the mischief complained 
 of. . . . How are any man's friends to be provided for, but from the influence 
 and protection of the patron?" — Sir William Draper's reply to Junius, Jan. 26, 
 1769. Towards the close of his letter, Junius attacked the Marquis of Granby, 
 then Commander-in-Chief — he had provided at the public expense "for every 
 creature that bears the name of Manners," and neglected the rest. Sir William 
 Draper hereupon took up the cudgels for Granby. Junius retorted by accusing 
 Draper of having dropped his agitation about the Manilla Ransom, as soon 
 as he had got the Bath and the colonelcy of the i6th Foot. 
 
 '^ Surrey, Kent, Essex, and Salop. 
 
THE OCCURRENCES IN LONDON 165 
 
 ment can change the law of the land — if the law is altered, it must 
 be by an Act, not a vote. There were plain and unvarnished 
 assertions that the country was being governed by bribery and 
 corruption, and that the King was influenced by evil counsellors. 
 As for the Middlesex Petition, it might have been drawn up in 
 Boston. It even mentioned the fact that the evil counsellors " had 
 produced the same grievances and apprehensions in America as 
 here." 
 
 The present ParUament had cost so much more than usual, 
 that Administration was very loath to lose it so soon, especially as it 
 appeared but too probable that the next might contain still fewer 
 of the "King's Friends." The King looked on all petitions as 
 incipient rebellion. It was said that he laughed rudely in Lord 
 Mayor Ladbroke's face, when he presented the petition of the 
 Livery. It was a fact that he made no reply, but handed the 
 paper to a lord-in-waiting, and turned away to converse with the 
 Danish Minister. 
 
 And all this while the terrible letters of Junius went on, holding 
 up Ministers to the hatred and contempt of the nation, and con- 
 ferring on them an immortality which even their own misdeeds 
 would never have given them.^ 
 
 The custom of public meeting in England dates from the 
 summer of 1769, and the meetings held all over the country to 
 protest against the Middlesex Election, and to demand "a new 
 choice of representatives." The custom of publishing parlia- 
 mentary debates dates from the time when Mr. Grenville cor- 
 rected Mr. Henry Cavendish's notes of his great speech, and 
 sent it to the papers. As Wilkes truly said in his address to the 
 Freeholders of Middlesex, "This contest is between the present 
 administration and all the electors of Great Britain. There is 
 nothing personal in it. The cause is national."^ 
 
 The Company's affairs were again— or perhaps still — in an acute 
 stage. On November 21, 1768, the Select Committee had had 
 to tell the Directors that they could not pay their debts. The 
 Treasury is exhausted. It can only be replenished by letting those 
 
 ' The multitude, in all countries, are patient to a certain point . . . the 
 original fault is in government. Perhaps there never was a change, in the 
 circumstances and temper of a whole nation, so sudden and extraordinary as 
 that which the misconduct of Ministers has, within these few years, produced 
 in Great Britain." — ^Junius, Jan. 21, 1769. 
 
 ^ "As we are Englishmen, the least considerable man among us has an interest 
 equal to the proudest nobleman in the laws and constitution of his country." — 
 Hid. 
 
1 66 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 who have made their fortunes in India pay their money into the 
 Company's government in India, to be repaid by the Company 
 in England, with bills payable in English money. But the pay- 
 ment of these loans became very inconvenient, the sole source of 
 ready money was the sale of the investment, or the goods sent 
 home from India and China. If the value of these goods happened 
 to be less than the amount of the bills drawn, there was a deficit ; 
 if too many goods came, there was a glut. A great deal of money 
 was absorbed in the task of governing the territorial possessions. 
 Then in May came bad news by the Valentine indiaman. The 
 most conflicting rumours disturbed the proprietors and the money- 
 market. By this time the proprietors were at open war with the 
 governing body, and very interesting revelations were made. The 
 proprietors accused Clive of putting about the entirely false report 
 that the Governor and Council of Bengal meant to set up Shaw 
 Alum on the throne of the Great Mogul — they also said that he had 
 lately wasted at least a miUion sterling, and was always multiplying 
 expenses to gain influence and votes. They described how the " old, 
 steady, permanent proprietors " were become the dupes of the bulls 
 and bears, who told them one day that the Company was flourish- 
 ing, and the next that its affairs were desperate — that China cargoes 
 are falling off, and yet that there must be more ships ; that it is not 
 for want of men and officers that the Company can't beat Hyder, 
 and then a day or two after that there must be 440 officers more. 
 And so " the innocent dupes, male and female, are hurried into the 
 India House by their leaders, to vote away the little property they 
 possess." A " piece of jockeyship " had been played at the April 
 election, — the greatest contest ever known, — ^^13,000 worth "of 
 capital stock," issued out to qualify one set of gentlemen, was used 
 for the other by the person to whom the money was entrusted, and 
 so the election was turned the wrong way ! Angry writers in the 
 Gentleman^! Magazine lamented the days when the Company had 
 neither place-men nor stock-grabbers, but merchants who knew 
 India were at the head of affairs — markets were studied, and 
 changes allowed for ; whereas now, for six years the lists of orders 
 have been simply copied — there is " no assortment, no taste, 
 nothing new," and so sales .have fallen off". Then the arrange- 
 ment about remittances has been so made as to throw all the cash 
 into the hands of the Dutch, Danes, and French, — the French 
 got so much ready cash in Bengal, that they were able to send home 
 twelve ships laden with the choice of Bengal and Coromandel, 
 besides two million pounds of China teas. At such a moment, 
 the Company .could not afford to have any military disasters. 
 
THE OCCURRENCES IN LONDON 167 
 
 In June, when some inkling of the truth got out, Stock fell 
 to 242. The Directors divided their correspondence into three 
 parts — that relating to Bengal, that relating to the war with Hyder, 
 and that relating to the treaty between him and the Mahrattas. 
 They were preparing a statement for Government, and there 
 was much in the correspondence which Government must not 
 see. But, with all their care, things leaked out, and in July 
 dreadful tales began to be circulated, of misgovernment, rapacity, 
 injustice, cruelty — even of the poisoning of inconvenient persons ; 
 and, along with these, persistent rumours of military disaster. On 
 the sth the Directors proposed to send out "Supervisors,'' who 
 were to examine into all things, and to have powers superseding 
 those of all other officials. There were furious battles at General 
 Courts over this. The " old " proprietors complained of this new 
 expense, — ^^200,000 a year on annihilating the Company's present 
 governments in India, — if we are to prosper in this fashion, there 
 will soon be no dividend at all ! Meanwhile the wrangle about 
 the fortifications continued. Were they to be regarded as assets, 
 since they could not be sold ? Ought they not to be so regarded, 
 since they protected the Factories ? 
 
 On July 7, an event took place which would once have 
 transported the nation with joy — which even now produced a 
 great sensation. Chatham had recovered, and was at the levee, 
 where the King received him most graciously — still afraid to 
 offend him.i 
 
 The East India Directors, too, must have trembled, for Chatham 
 was the great enemy of their territorial power, and that power was 
 just now bringing them into sore straits. There was a new com- 
 plication, and an unfortunate accident let the cat out of the 
 bag. 
 
 At the Court of August 11, the inadvertent reading of a 
 passage intended to be omitted from a letter betrayed the fact 
 that the Company's affairs in the Gulfof Persia were in a "very em- 
 broiled state " — a matter wholly unknown except to the Committee 
 of Secrecy; "a stop was put to the further elucidation of it, for 
 fear of affecting the Company's stock." All through the month 
 there were hot debates as to how far the military and naval officers 
 to be lent to the Company were to be under the Company's orders, 
 
 ' "You desired me to write, if I knew anything particular. How particular 
 would content you ? Come, would the apparition of my Lord Chatham satisfy 
 you? Don't be frightened, it was not his ghost. He, he himself, in froprid 
 persond, walked into the King's closet this morning, and was in the closet twenty 
 minutes after the levee." — Horace Walpoleto Conway, July 7, 1769. 
 
i68 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 and what powers the Supervisors should have. Meanwhile every 
 indiaman that arrived brought bad news, until the climax came 
 on September 26, when the Dutton arrived with letters dated 
 March 8. The Directors boldy declared that "affairs on the 
 coast of Coromandel " were " much in the same situation " ; but it 
 was of no use. So circumstantial a report got about that Hyder 
 was actually at the gates of Madras, and that his demands were so 
 exorbitant it was thought they could not be complied with, that 
 East India Stock fell to 212. Now the powers of the Super- 
 visors and the control of the frigates were hurriedly settled. On 
 October i, the Hake and the Stag sailed from Spithead, and next 
 day, the three Supervisors — Henry Vansittart, late Governor of 
 Bengal, Mr. Scrafton, of the Bengal Council, and Colonel Ford — 
 embarked on the Aurora. The frigates parted company on the 
 voyage. The Hake and the Stag came safe to port, but the Aurora 
 was never heard of more.' 
 
 On November 13, the Essex, from Bombay, brought alarming 
 accounts of dissensions in the Councils, injustice and rapacity on the 
 part of the officials, and such mismanagement and oppression that 
 there had been a general desertion of sepoys. Even some officers 
 had gone over to Hyder ! It was true that Hyder had appeared 
 before Madras. The Council had made a treaty with him^all 
 forts to be restored, each side to pay its own expenses, prisoners 
 to be mutually exchanged, and — astonishing and fatal condition — 
 a perpetual league, offensive and defensive, with Hyder. A week 
 after the Directors confirmed this treaty, and so the year ended 
 for the Company. 
 
 If the news from the East was bad, the news from the West 
 was not good. In August the country learned that Boston had 
 refused to provide for the troops, and had sent a petition to the 
 King praying for Bernard's removal.^ 
 
 Lord Mayor's Day, 1 769, was more exciting than usual. Beckford 
 was Mayor a second time. He was now so much out of favour at 
 
 ^ With the Supervisors sailed William Falconer of The Shipwreck. He 
 was in the merchant service, when by dedicating his poem to the Duke of 
 York he obtained the rank of midshipman in the Royal Navy. At the Peace, 
 he began his Universal Marine Dictionary, and had just finished it, when he 
 accepted the office of purser to the Aurora, and private secretary to the Super- 
 visors. The First John Murray, — then Lieutenant MacMurray, and just starting 
 as a publisher — offered Falconer, his old friend and brolher-Edinburghian, 
 a partnership in the new concern. Falconer received the letter on board the. 
 Aurora. 
 
 ^ This petition was not presented until after the Governor had arrived in 
 England. 
 
THE OCCURRENCES IN LONDON 169 
 
 Court, that Lord Chancellor Camden was the only great officer of 
 State who attended the banquet, with only five of the Judges and five 
 of the Aldermen. Earl Temple was there, with his Countess — her 
 diamonds and jewels estimated at ;!^i 50,000. Also Lord Shelburne 
 and Lord Effingham. Mr. Boswell was in the Stationers' barge. 
 Next day, in the Court of Common Pleas, a jury found a verdict for 
 Mr. Wilkes against Lord Halifax, for the seizure of his papers and 
 the imprisonment of his person. The damages were cast at ;^4ooo, 
 but the mob thought they should be _;^2o,ooo, and the jury had 
 to be withdrawn privately — lest they should be "insulted" — a 
 euphemious expression. The story went that those of the jury 
 who were for higher damages were brought down by being assured 
 his Majesty had declared his intention of defraying all Lord Halifax's 
 costs. 
 
CHAPTER XXIV 
 THE HORNED CATTLE SESSION 
 
 " When Junius began to write, the state of parties was very singular. There 
 were no less than four. — The first may be called the ministerial party, officially 
 so. — The second consisted of a number of persons who called themselves the 
 kin^s friends ; and being entirely under the direction of the interior cabinet, 
 could be transferred to the support of either the ministry, or the opposition, 
 according as it suited the secret views of the court. This dreadful system began 
 with the present reign, under the auspices of Lord Bute ; and gave to the court 
 the complete control of parliament, by having the power to throw this weight 
 into either scale. There is nothing so dangerous in all the history of the 
 Stuarts." — Almon's Preface to the Letters of Junius, 1806. 
 
 "My Lords and Gentlemen, — It is with much concern that I find 
 myself obliged to open this session with acquainting you, that the 
 distemper among the horned cattle has lately broke out in this 
 kingdom.'' 
 
 These words, with which the King opened Parliament on the 
 9th of January, 1770, raised such a storm of ridicule, that the 
 session is known as "the Horned Cattle Session." It became a 
 test of loyalty to believe in the sufferings of the horned cattle 
 — Opposition maintaining that the cattle had the plague only to 
 spare Ministers the embarrassment of mentioning Mr. Wilkes. The 
 speech contained but one passage which was not pure verbiage — 
 that relating to America. It called the measures of the colonists 
 "unwarrantable." 
 
 The Address expressed much concern for the horned cattle, 
 said a little in a good many words on our foreign policy, — just then 
 extremely critical, — and ended by lamenting the failure of his 
 Majesty's endeavours to bring back his subjects in America to a 
 just sense of their duty. Their lordships also promised to avoid 
 all heats and animosities among themselves ; but the debate which 
 followed was a very angry one. The moment the Address was 
 seconded, Chatham rose. The Duke of Portland had lately written 
 to Rockingham that Chatham was high in spirits, and in fury^ 
 
 ' Chatham would not join Opposition properly so-called. " The Marquis is 
 
 an honest and honourable man, but ' moderation, moderation ! ' is the burden 
 
 170 
 
THE HORNED CATTLE SESSION 171 
 
 and his first words showed that he meant to give Ministers 
 all the trouble he could. But he spoke calmly, and with great 
 effect. He said that his age and infirmities might have excused 
 his continuing in retirement, but he came there to urge the 
 hereditary counsellors of the Crown to lay the true state of the 
 nation before their Sovereign — the distress, the discontents and 
 grievances. As for the cattle, there was sufficient power in the 
 Crown to deal with any sudden emergency — he himself had once 
 used it to save a starving people from famine. Then, after touching 
 on foreign policy, he came to America. Unhappy measures had 
 divided the colonists from the mother-country, and drawn them 
 into excesses, but these excesses ought to be treated with tender- 
 ness, for they were " the ebullitions of liberty " — signs of a vigorous 
 constitution. He did not know how things were now going ; but 
 it had been a maxim with him, when he had lost his way, to stop 
 short, lest by advancing (as he feared a noble duke had done) from 
 one false step to another, he should "wind himself into an inextric- 
 able labyrinth," and never be able to recover the right road. As 
 yet the House did not know enough to say whether the proceedings 
 of the colonists were "unwarrantable" or no — they were passing 
 sentence before they had heard the cause, or knew the facts. The 
 combination to supply themselves with goods of their own 
 manufacture had indeed alarmed him much for the commercial 
 interests of this country, but how could it be called illegal ? Better 
 say "dangerous." The discontent of two millions of people 
 deserved consideration — the foundation of it ought to be removed ; 
 that was the true way to stop such combinations. Now he would 
 only say that liberty was a plant that deserved to be cherished. 
 " I love the tree, and wish well to every branch of it. Like the 
 vine in Scripture, it has spread from east to west, embraced whole 
 nations with its branches, and sheltered them under its leaves." 
 And the Americans have purchased their liberty dear, since they 
 quitted their native country, and went in search of freedom to a 
 desert. Then he came to the encroachments on British liberty, 
 and particularly to the case of Mr. Wilkes. The discontents of 
 the nation arose from his expulsion ; the Address ought to say so. 
 He moved as an Amendment a promise to consider the proceedings 
 whereby the Middlesex electors were deprived of their free choice 
 of a representative. 
 
 of the song among the body. For myself, I am resolved to be in earnest for the 
 public, and shall be a scarecrow of violence to the gentle warblers of the grove, 
 the moderate Whigs and temperate statesmen." — Chatham to John Cakraft, 
 July 28, 1770. 
 
172 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Camden, who followed, said he had accepted the Seals without 
 conditions — he meant not therefore to be trammelled by his 
 Majesty — "I beg pardon, by his Ministers." He had suffered 
 himself to be so too long — for some time he had beheld with 
 silent indignation the arbitrary measures pursued by the Ministry; 
 he had often " drooped and hung down his head in Council," and 
 disapproved by his looks those steps which he knew his avowed 
 opposition could not prevent. But now he would openly and 
 boldly speak his sentiments. As to the incapacitating vote, he con- 
 sidered it a direct attack upon the first principles of the Constitu- 
 tion ; and if, as a Judge, he was to pay any regard to that vote, or 
 any other vote of the House of Commons, in opposition to the 
 known and established laws of the land, he should look upon 
 himself as a traitor to his trust, and an enemy to his country. In 
 a word, he accused the Ministry, if not in express terms, yet by 
 direct implication, of having formed a conspiracy against the 
 liberties of their countrymen. 
 
 Mansfield began his speech in such a manner that many thought 
 he would make the same declaration. He owned he was " per- 
 fectly of the same opinion,'' and that if, as Judge, he " was to have 
 an eye to the incapacitating vote of the Commons, he should look 
 upon himself as the greatest of tyrants, and the greatest of traitors.'' 
 Nevertheless, with regard to this vote, in another view, he would 
 say nothing ; he had often been asked his opinion of it, in public, 
 and in private, by friends and strangers, within doors and without ; 
 had never given his opinion, would not now give it, and did not 
 know but he might carry it to the grave with him. If the Commons 
 had passed an unjustifiable vote, it was a matter between God and 
 their own consciences — nobody else had anything to do with it. 
 The Lords had no right to enquire into it, and any attempt to do 
 so would be a gross attack on the privileges of the Commons, and 
 would throw the whole country into a flame. A Conference of 
 the Houses would never be consented to by the Commons. If 
 the King dissolves Parhament, the new House, "if they know 
 anything of their own privileges, or the laws of this country," will 
 declare our proceedings to be a violation of the rights of the 
 Commons. 
 
 It was a specious argument, but it proceeds on the assumption 
 that however illegal any action of one House may be, the other 
 must affect not to observe it. And if the Lords must not enquire 
 into a usurpation of the Commons, the Commons must not 
 enquire into a usurpation of the Lords. Chatham perceived this, 
 and rose a second time, in one of those bursts of indignation which 
 
THE HORNED CATTLE SESSION 173 
 
 inspired many of his finest speeches. " My lords," he exclaimed, 
 " I thought the slavish doctrine of passive obedience had long 
 since been exploded, and when our kings were obliged to confess 
 that their title to the Crown had no other foundation than the 
 known laws of the land, I never expected to hear a divine 
 infallibility attributed to any other branch of the legislature. . . . 
 Power without right is the most odious and detestable object that 
 can be offered to the human imagination : it is not only pernicious 
 to those who are subject to it, but tends to its own destruction. . . 
 I affirm that the House of Commons have betrayed the rights of 
 their constituents, and violated the Constitution ! " What have 
 we gained by all the glorious efforts of our ancestors, if " instead 
 of the arbitrary power of a King, we must submit to the arbitrary 
 power of a House of Commons ? Tyranny, my Lords, is detest- 
 able in every shape ; but in none so formidable as when it is 
 assumed and exercised by a number of tyrants." Then he laid 
 down the purest principles of democracy — decisions of Courts 
 are an evidence of law, but they are not law ; and before they can 
 arrive at even the authority of evidence, it must appear that they 
 are founded in and confirmed by reason ; that they are submitted 
 to without reluctance by the people ; and-^most important thing 
 of all — they must not violate the spirit of the Constitution. " This 
 is not a vague expression — we all know what the Constitution is ; 
 we all know that its first principle is, that the subject shall not be 
 governed by the arbitrium of any one man, or body of men (less 
 than the whole legislature), but by certain laws, to which he has 
 virtually given his consent, which are open to him to examine, 
 and not beyond his ability to understand. . . . What ! If the 
 Commons should pass a vote abohshing this House, abolishing 
 their own House, and surrendering to the Crown all the rights and 
 liberties of the people, would it only be a matter between God and 
 their own consciences, and would nobody else have anything to 
 do with it ? You would have to do with it — I would have to do 
 with it — every man in the kingdom would have to do with it ! " 
 Then he called on Mansfield to declare his opinion, unless he 
 would lie under the imputation of being conscious of the illegality 
 of the vote against Wilkes, but restrained by some unworthy motive 
 from avowing it to the world. 
 
 Mansfield did not reply. Thirty-six Peers voted for the 
 Amendment. After the division,^ Rockingham moved that the 
 Lords should meet next day, as he had a proposal of great 
 national importance to make. Lord Pomfret very rudely said he 
 
 ' The numbers were 203 to 36. 
 
174 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 would be glad to hear the Marquess at a proper time, but now had 
 a previous motion to make — that the House adjourn till that day 
 sen'night. Earl Temple said the House knew the purpose of this 
 adjournment — it was to settle Administration, now shattered and 
 falling to pieces, and particularly to dismiss the Chancellor, and 
 appoint some obsequious tool in his place, who would do as he 
 was commanded. Shelburne said, when the present worthy 
 Chancellor was dismissed, the Seals "would go a-begging"; he 
 hoped there would not be found in the kingdom a wretch so base 
 and mean-spirited as to accept them on the terms on which they 
 must be offered. 
 
 It was known instantly in the Commons that Chatham had 
 made his greatest speech since the Stamp Act.^ There, a debate 
 as angry was going on. The King's Friends brandished the horned 
 cattle in the forefront; but Dowdeswell bluntly declared that the 
 distemper was an invention of Lord Northington's tenants in 
 Hampshire, to procure a quick sale for their cattle — an imaginary 
 terror, designed to prevent our noticing real ones — an artifice to 
 divert our minds from the violation of our rights. He moved 
 as an Amendment, the addition of these words to the Address : 
 " To acquaint his Majesty of the necessity there is of immediately 
 enquiring into the Causes of the unhappy Discontents which at 
 present prevail in every part of his Majesty's Dominions." Beckford 
 said Ministers were trying to conceal fire with smoke. Lord Clare 
 said he had just returned from a tour through the country, and had 
 heard of no discontents. Mr. Cornwall had also been on a tour, 
 and had heard nothing about the cattle. 
 
 The Attorney-General scoffed at the petitions. "This House 
 has passed a judicial vote, the Petitions complain of that vote. This 
 House, once chosen, is to all legal intents " the people collectively " 
 — to oppose its judicial proceedings is to subvert our Constitution by 
 the root. His brother, Thomas de Grey, said that the Westminster 
 Petition only contained the names of two persons " of the rank of 
 gentlemen." A ferment was kept up by a few despicable mechanics, 
 headed by base-born people, booksellers and broken tradesmen, 
 and the petition was signed by the scum of the earth, the refuse 
 of the people, unworthy to enter the gates of his Majesty's palace. 
 Here Sergeant Glynn called him to order, and de Grey had to 
 explain that he only meant those who signed were not men of 
 consequence, and that their chairman was a bookseller. George 
 Onslow explained that he meant the petitioners were not men 
 of property, or in the commission of the peace. He boasted of 
 
 ' These speeches of Chatham's were not pubUshed till 1792. 
 
iJrlJt!. HUKMED CATTLE SESSION 175 
 
 having introduced Luttrell — a worthy in place of an unworthy 
 member. In the midst of an exceedingly stormy scene — many 
 gentlemen rising to speak for the feeling of their own counties, 
 and the Marquess of Granby declaring that he regarded his vote 
 for Luttrell as the greatest misfortune of his life,i — Sir George 
 Savile said he had now had time to cool, and he said again, as 
 he had said before, that in voting for Luttrell, that House had 
 betrayed the rights of its constituents. In great anger, Sir Alexander 
 Gilmour sprang up and cried that men had been sent to the Tower 
 for less. Glynn said debates could not be honest if the tongue 
 was shackled by a slavish fear of giving offence to a majority. North 
 hoped neither the gentleman who mentioned the Tower, nor the 
 gentleman who spoke the hasty words, would think any more about 
 either. But the debate continued to be very angry, until Colonel 
 Barre created a diversion by demanding of Lord Hawke an account 
 of the dispute between the Courts of Great Britain and France. 
 
 North assured the House that there was no probability of 
 war, and that he would, "as minister or no-minister," make no 
 servile submissions to France or any other Power. From this 
 it was an easy transition to America, and Barr^ passionately com- 
 plained of the words of the King's Speech of November, 1768, 
 which declared that Boston was manifesting a disposition to throw 
 off dependence on Great Britain. The debate went on with 
 great acrimony — America and the Middlesex Election were tossed to 
 and fro like shuttlecocks. Burke — who began with grossly personal 
 remarks on Lord North ^ — defended the right of petitioning. " If it 
 is a fault to persuade by writing, meeting, and speaking, let Lord 
 North tell us what means of persuasion more eligible he has dis- 
 covered. The Ministers of the unhappy Charles the First told the 
 same tales — when the people were ready to tear the crown from his 
 head, they persuaded him that there was no discontent but among 
 those who endeavoured to open his eyes. In America and here, the 
 same baleful influence has been working. And when we want to 
 redress public grievances, and guard the liberty of election, we are 
 recommended to suppress an infection among the horned cattle — 
 as though this House possessed only the qualification of cow- 
 doctors ! " 
 
 ' " I now see the Middlesex Election in another light ; I now see, that though 
 this House has an unquestionable and long-established right to expel, a right to 
 incapacitate is lodged only in the legislature collectively." 
 
 2 " Sir, the noble lord who spoke last, after extending his right leg a full yard 
 before his left, rolling his flaming eyes, and moving his ponderous frame, has at 
 length opened his mouth," 
 
176 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Young Charles Fox made his first recorded speech m this debate. 
 He complained of the licence gentlemen had taken in their language 
 that day. Meredith had said that the sentence in the Address, 
 thanking the King for approving the conduct of the House, " would 
 be construed out of doors " as meaning that the King approved 
 their conduct in the matter of the Middlesex Election — whereas 
 every endeavour should be used to keep the King out of present 
 disputes. Fox said it did not mean any particular measure, or 
 every measure. Burke retorted that he was very glad to hear the 
 House meant nothing by their Address. At last the division was 
 taken, and the Amendment was lost by 254 to 138. 
 
 The great struggle with Wilkes had now entered upon its second 
 stage, and had become a constitutional question, involving the 
 foundations of democratic government. By the irony of fate, it 
 was waged simultaneously with the other great constitutional 
 struggle on the other side of the world. The retorts of Opposition 
 to the sneers of Administration are worth noting. They spoke of 
 their duty to their constituents, and when twitted with having 
 drawn the graziers and clothiers of Yorkshire into a quarrel which 
 only concerned Middlesex, they replied that those who see 
 oppression approaching must give warning of it. As for hunting 
 for petitioners, as they were accused of doing — there was no 
 need for that — the petitioners sought them ; every independent 
 freeholder in the kingdom was filled with alarm. As to the 
 majority of gentlemen of large fortunes not having signed the 
 petitions — this was not altogether the fact. But many gentlemen 
 were much influenced ; justices were appointed by the Crown ; 
 and no body of men were under greater influence than the clergy 
 — yet even some of them had signed. And are the bulk of the 
 freeholders of no account ? Is their opinion of no weight, when 
 they are in fact the least amenable of all to menace, fear, and 
 influence? 
 
 The last relics of the Patchwork Cabinet were falling to pieces. 
 Granby had already resigned. Chatham was urging Camden not 
 to commit "the unpardonable weakness to resign in such a crisis." 
 Camden's colleagues had almost ceased to hold any communication 
 with him, even before his speech on the 9th. The King was 
 only waiting to find a new Chancellor. On the i6th the Marquess 
 of Granby resigned all his offices, except the command of the 
 Blues. On the 9th he had voted for the Amendment, and had 
 expressed his repentance for having voted the incapacity of Wilkes. 
 Junius' " Letter to the King,'' which had appeared in the Public 
 Advertiser on December 19th, had made a tremendous sensation — 
 
THE HORNED CATTLE SESSION 177 
 
 every copy being sold in a few hours ; and in other letters, which 
 scorched and flayed, the Invisible One was pursuing Grafton.^ 
 These letters threw the nominal head of the Cabinet into such 
 agonies of mind, that he was sometimes for days together too 
 unnerved to transact business. At last, on the 17th, word was 
 brought to Camden to attend at the Palace that evening, and 
 deliver up the Great Seal. That morning the King had provided 
 himself with a new Chancellor. Charles Yorke, the second son 
 of Lord Chancellor Hardwicke, was an amiable man, of brilliant 
 literary talents, very ambitious, but weak. He had been in Pitt's 
 first Administration, and had remained on with Bute and Grenville. 
 He had declined the Chancellorship, when offered by Rockingham 
 — as was said, because he believed that Administration would be 
 unstable — but had consented to be Attorney-General. Since then 
 he had identified himself with the Rockinghams. On the 16th 
 " he received hourly invitations from the ministry to accept the seals ; 
 but he declined, and assured several members of Opposition,^ 
 particularly Lord Rockingham himself, that he never would or could 
 accept, on terms which he could not but look on as derogatory to 
 his particular sentiments, as well as the interest of his country." 
 On the morning of the 1 7th, he received a message from the King 
 desiring him to attend immediately at the Queen's House. There, 
 "he was so warmly solicited by him in person, that unable to 
 withstand such repeated requisitions, he assented. On his way 
 
 home, he called at Lord R m's, when meeting several members 
 
 of the Opposition, he told them what had happened, at which they 
 one and all upbraided him, in such poignant terms, of his infidelity, 
 that he was instantly taken ill ; from whence he was immediately 
 removed to his own house, where he continued so till Saturday 
 evening (the 20th) when he died." It was given out that he had 
 broken a blood-vessel, but everyone believed that he committed 
 suicide. After this tragic event, Shelburne's extraordinary prediction 
 was fulfilled — the Great Seal went a-begging, and was put in a 
 Commission of three Judges ! Mansfield, who had refused it, 
 consented to sit on the Woolsack, as Speaker ad interim of the 
 House of Lords. What must have been the conditions of slavish 
 submission which made it impossible to find an ambitious lawyer 
 willing to accept the second great ofifice of state in England ? Nor 
 was a Commander-in-Chief appointed in Granby's room. The 
 King had made his best servants afraid or ashamed to serve him ! 
 A brilliant lawyer, son of a Lord Chancellor, had died a natural or 
 
 ' A copy of the " Letter to the King " was found stuck up in the Palace. 
 2 Letter in the London Evening Post, January 30, 1770. 
 
178 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 unnatural death of mortification at having been persuaded to accept 
 the Chancellorship of England 1 
 
 Two days after Yorke's death, came on, in the Lords, the great 
 debate on the State of the Nation, introduced by Lord Rockingham's 
 motion. Rockingham showed that the present state of things did 
 not arise from any immediate and temporary cause, but " had 
 grown upon us by degrees from the moment of his Majesty's 
 accession to the throne." The persons in whom his Majesty had 
 confided " had introduced a total change in the old system of 
 English government — adopting the fatal maxim that the royal 
 prerogative alone was sufficient to support government, to whatever 
 hands the Administration should be committed." Among the 
 abuses he complained of was one which does not appear in the 
 histories, — " the general sweep through every branch and department 
 of Administration," — removes, "not merely confined to the higher 
 employments, but carried down, with the minutest cruelty, to the 
 lowest offices of state " ; so that " numberless innocent families," 
 which had subsisted on salaries from ^50 to ;^2oo a year, " had 
 been turned out to misery and ruin,'' with as little regard to justice as 
 compassion. At the same time, the increase of offices in America 
 — since it was admitted that the revenue to be expected was very 
 inconsiderable — was evidently dictated by the desire to strengthen 
 the prerogative, by having a greater number of officers there. 
 Rockingham then spoke of the debt on the Civil List — no account 
 offered, no enquiry permitted to be made, not even the decent 
 assurance that such extraordinary expenses should be avoided in 
 future. On the contrary, there had been a pretty plain hint that 
 the expenses of the King's civil government could not be confined 
 within the revenue granted by Parliament. Then the attempt to 
 assert the King's right in perpetuity — as in the late case of the 
 Duke of Portland, in order to serve the purposes of an election. 
 Ireland's affairs were in confusion. In America, violent measures 
 had been adopted — and not even consistently, for while the King's 
 Speeches and the language of the Ministry at home denounced 
 nothing but war and vengeance, his Majesty's Governors out there 
 were instructed to promise relief and satisfaction. Here he quoted 
 Lord Botetourt's speech ^ to the Assembly of Virginia, last May, in 
 
 ' Botetourt died of a fever in 1770. The Virginians liked him. He was 
 conciliatory, and was much chagrined that Ministers wrote saying the grievances 
 should be redressed, and then left the tea-duty unrepealed. Dunmore, who 
 succeeded him, was haughty. He let the province see that he found Williamsburg 
 dull after New York — of which he was Governor for a short time. Washington 
 was on very friendly terms with Dunmore. 
 
THE HORNED CATTLE SESSION 179 
 
 which he assured that House, from Lord Hillsborough, that the 
 present Administration " never intended to lay any further taxes on 
 America, and meant to take off the duties on paper, glass, etc., on 
 consideration that such duties were contrary to the true spirit of 
 commerce." 
 
 Before Chatham could second the motion, Grafton rose, and 
 said he would second it, though he knew it was aimed at himself. 
 His feeble denials only sufficed to show that Rockingham's indict- 
 ment was true ; his still feebler excuses, that Administration had 
 really no excuse to offer. Then Chatham rose, and made one of 
 his boldest speeches. He said that the foundation of our political 
 existence was corrupted. The Constitution had been grossly violated. 
 Until that wound was healed, it was vain to recommend union to 
 Parliament — unless grievances were redressed he would never wish 
 to see the nation united again. " If the breach in the Constitution 
 be effectually repaired, the people will of themselves return to a state 
 of tranquillity — if not, may discord prevail for ever ! " " When the 
 liberty of the subject is invaded, and all redress denied him, resist- 
 ance is justified." " Magna Charta, the Petition of Right, the Bill 
 of Rights, form that Code which I call the Bible of the English 
 Constitution." He alluded to Corsica; and combated Grafton's 
 contention that only an immediate attack on the interest of this 
 nation can authorise interposition in defence of weaker States. He 
 thought we ought to have interposed on behalf of Corsica. Next, 
 he referred to the Civil List — the waste of the public money was 
 not so important as the pernicious purpose to which we had reason 
 to suspect that money had been applied. For some years past 
 there had been an influx of wealth into this country, which had 
 been attended with many fatal consequences, because it had not 
 been the regular, natural produce of labour and industry. "The 
 riches of Asia have been poured upon us, and have brought with 
 them not only Asiatic luxury, but, I fear, Asiatic principles of 
 government — the importers of foreign gold have forced their way 
 into Parliament, by such a torrent of private corruption as no 
 private hereditary fortune could resist. The corruption of the 
 people is the great original cause of the discontents of the people 
 themselves, of the enterprise of the Crown, and the notorious decay 
 of the internal vigor of the constitution." He then digressed into 
 some remarks on rotten boroughs, at strange variance with his 
 general principles. He thought these boroughs, "corrupt as they 
 are, must be considered as the natural infirmity of the Constitution 
 — like the infirmities of the body, we must bear them with patience. 
 The limb is mortified, but amputation might be death." He 
 
i8o ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 thought there were gentler remedies. The representation of 
 the counties was on the whole pure and uncorrupted. That 
 of the great cities was equally respectable, " and there are many of 
 the larger trading towns which still preserve their independence — it 
 is in these that the strength of the constitution lies, not in the little 
 dependent boroughs." He would increase that strength, " because 
 I think it is the only security we have against the profligacy of the 
 times, the corruption of the people, and the ambition of the 
 Crown." 1 
 
 On the 28th, the Duke of Grafton resigned, and Lord North 
 became First Lord of the Treasury — an office he was to hold for 
 twelve years.^ The last remains of the Whigs were cleared out. 
 The only names of note among their successors were the truculent 
 bully, Thurlow, who now became Solicitor-General, and Charles Fox, 
 now a Junior Lord of the Admiralty. The work of Bute and the 
 King was complete. For twelve years the King was to be his own 
 Minister. If his nominal Ministers had, as Burke said, no " kind 
 of system, right or wrong; but only invented occasionally some 
 miserable tale for the day, in order meanly to sneak out of difficulties 
 into which they had proudly strutted," it was because they had no 
 policy but the King's will. To please the King they strutted into 
 those dangers, and, to cover that this was their motive, they invented 
 those miserable tales. North's speeches are so often a tissue of 
 transparent sophistries, because he had nothing better to say. His 
 own judgment told him that the policy was what Opposition said it 
 was ; but he had to please the King. 
 
 Yet even now, with the King supreme in the Cabinet, and with 
 a venal House of Commons, whose support had been bought and sold 
 for two millions sterling. Opposition kept up a stubborn fight — always 
 worsted, but always returning to the assault. On January 24 there 
 had been another acrimonious debate in the Commons, on a Motion 
 for Redress of Grievances before granting Supply. Next day the 
 famous motion was moved by Dowdeswell, " That in matters of 
 
 ELECTION THIS HoUSE IS BOUND TO JUDGE ACCORDING TO THE LaW OF 
 
 THE Land." The motion put the House into a dilemma — to deny the 
 principle was to give Parliament " a monstrous and alarming power " ; 
 there was indeed no limit to what a House packed with King's Friends 
 might vote. But to admit it would inevitably lead to the rescinding 
 of the vote on the Middlesex Election. So North, who was good 
 
 ' Chatham was for a " more equal representation, by additional knights of 
 the shire." — Letter of 1771. 
 
 2 "Your Grace was the firm minister of yesterday ; Lord North is the firm 
 minister oi to-dxy."— Junius to the Duke of Grafton, February 14, 1770. 
 
THE HORNED CATTLE SESSION 
 
 181 
 
 at such expedients, proposed as a rider, " And that the judgment of 
 the House, declared in the expulsion of John Wilkes, was agreeable 
 to the said Law of the Land." And so the motion passed, by 224 
 to 180. 
 
 In the Lords, Rockingham moved the same declaration,^ and 
 Chatham made a powerful speech. After the division, though it was 
 now past midnight, Lord Marchmont moved, " That any Resolution 
 directly or indirectly impeaching a judgment of the House of 
 Commons, in a matter where their Jurisdiction is Final, would be a 
 violation of the constitutional rights of that House." Opposition 
 said that " the Scotch kept this motion in their pockets"- — as neither 
 Marchmont nor Mansfield (who supported it) had opened their 
 mouths till now. Marchmont on this occasion, with insolence 
 scarcely credible, threatened Opposition that if they went but one 
 step farther they would justify the calling in " foreign assistance." 
 The Duke of Richmond asked him iwhat he meant by "foreign 
 assistance," but Marchmont shuffled it off. Egmont said the 
 petitions were treasonable — the people had no right to present 
 them. Chatham in vain pleaded for an adjournment, if but for two 
 days — " If the Constitution must be wounded, let it not receive its 
 mortal stab at this dark and midnight hour." But at half-past one 
 in the morning this monstrous proposition was put and carried. 
 Thus the Lords gave the Commons a sort of royal prerogative, 
 whereby they must never be said to do wrong. They trusted 
 always to have a Lower House as venal as this. 
 
 In the debate on Lord Craven's motion ^ for steps to be taken 
 " for an increase of seamen in the Navy, to protect the trade of his 
 Majesty's subjects," Chatham made a speech which sheds a 
 curious light on the early years of the reign of George in, and 
 partly, no doubt, accounts for some inconsistencies in Chatham's 
 own conduct. After condemning the conduct of the Ministry in 
 almost every particular concerning the Navy, he went on to speak 
 of secret influence, which " had subsisted from the first moment of 
 his Majesty's accession." He called it dangerous, base, uncon- 
 stitutional and wicked. It had undermined and overturned every 
 administration, however "constituted or supported." He spoke of 
 " an invisible, irresponsible influence — of the pernicious counsels of 
 a favourite, who had occasioned all the unhappiness and disturbances 
 in the nation," and whose agents had extended his pernicious 
 politics and principles to the government of the colonies. Though 
 this favourite was at that moment abroad, his influence, by his 
 confidential agents, was as potent as if he were present. "Who 
 ^ February 2. ^ March 2. 
 
1 82 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 does not know the Mazarinade of France — that Mazarin absent was 
 Mazarin still ? " The late Peace showed his influence. Then raising 
 his voice, he said deliberately, " This country was sold at the late 
 Peace ; we were sold by the Court of Turin to the Court of 
 France " ^ — he would not then say what other persons were concerned, 
 but what he had stated was a fact. He himself had been duped by 
 this influence when he least suspected treachery — in particular at the 
 time when he was taken ill, and obliged to go to Bath "for a short 
 week." Before he set out, he had formed some plans with great care — 
 they were, he believed, of the utmost importance to the country — they 
 had been approved in Council; the King himself had given his 
 approbation. But when he returned, he found his plans were all 
 vanished into thin air. He was going on, when Grafton rose, " to 
 defend the King — though if I understand rightly the words which 
 have been spoken, they are only the effects of a distempered mind, 
 brooding over its own discontent." Chatham replied, " I rise 
 neither to deny, to retract, nor to explain away, the words I have 
 spoken." His Majesty had always been " every thing gracious and 
 amiable in the closet " — the obstacles of which he complained came 
 from the secret influence, working first by secret treachery, then by 
 official influence, then in public councils. "A long train of these 
 practices has at length unwillingly convinced me that there is 
 something behind the throne greater than the King himself." As 
 to the noble duke, as soon as I was taken ill, he gradually deviated 
 from everything that had been settled and solemnly agreed to — 
 " till at last there were not left two planks together of the ship 
 which had been originally launched. As to a distempered mind, I 
 have a drawer full of proofs that my principles have never given way 
 to any disease." 
 
 Next day, in the debate on the Civil List, Chatham spoke in 
 support of a motion for Enquiry. " I can never consent to increase 
 
 ^ Wraxall (Own Times) says that John Ross Mackay, who had been private 
 secretary to Bute, and afterwards for seventeen years Treasurer of the Ordnance, 
 once after dinner at Lord Besborough's, in Cavendish Square, in 1 79°, said that the 
 Peace of 1763 vi'as carried by money — he was the channel. " With my own hand 
 I secured above 1 20 votes on that vital question to Ministers. Eighty thousand 
 pounds were set apart for the purpose. Forty members of the House of Commons 
 received from me a thousand pounds each. To eighty others I paid five hundred 
 pounds apiece. " Wilkes knew this in 1 764, and that this caused the debt on the Civil 
 List. Robinson, and under him Brummell, did this business during the American 
 War (Bradshaw did it for Grafton). But Wraxall thinks that towards the close 
 of North's Ministry the practice declined, or at any rate became more decent ; 
 members were no longer paid in bank-notes, out of " the minister's pocket-book," 
 as in the time of Walpole, Pelham, and most others. 
 
THE HORNED CATTLE SESSION 183 
 
 fraudulently the civil establishment, under pretence of making up 
 deficiencies, nor will I bid so high for royal favour: and the 
 minister who is bold enough to spend the people's money before 
 it is granted (even though it were not for the purpose of corrupting 
 their representatives), and thereby leaving the people of England 
 no alternative, but either to disgrace their Sovereign, by not paying 
 his debts, or to become the prey of every unthrifty or corrupt 
 minister — such minister deserves death." Then — apparently on 
 some sudden impulse, for the words have no connection with what 
 goes before or follows — he made the well-known allusion to 
 George 11. " The late good old King had something of humanity, 
 and amongst other royal and manly virtues, he possessed justice, 
 truth, and sincerity in an eminent degree ; so that he had something 
 about him by which it was possible to know whether he liked you 
 or disliked you." Then he spoke of pensions. " I have been told 
 I have a pension, and that I have recommended others — It is 
 true, and here is a list of them — you will find the names of 
 General Amherst and Sir Edward Hawke — they were given as 
 rewards for real services — they were honourably earned in a different 
 sort of campaigns than those at Westminster." 
 
 Next he spoke of Camden, whose public and private virtues 
 only " made his station more precarious." " My suspicions have 
 been justified. His integrity has made him once more a poor 
 and a private man ; he was dismissed for the opinion he gave in 
 favour of the right of election by the people." Here Marchmont 
 called Chatham to order — some lords even cried, "To the bar, 
 to the bar ! " Marchmont moved that the Earl of Chatham's words 
 be taken down. Chatham promptly seconded the motion. "I 
 neither deny, retract, nor explain the words. I do re-affirm the 
 fact, and I desire to meet the sense of the House; I appeal to 
 the honour of every lord in this House, whether he has not the 
 same conviction." Rockingham, Temple, and many other lords 
 "did upon their honour affirm the same." Sandwich and 
 Weymouth would have withdrawn the motion; but Marchmont, 
 encouraged by Mansfield, persisted, and moved that nothing 
 had appeared to justify such an assertion. Then it was moved 
 to adjourn. The clerk read the words spoken by Chatham— 
 " That the late Lord Chancellor was dismissed for giving his vote 
 in this House." Then Marchmont's second motion was moved 
 and carried. But Chatham continued. "My words," he said, 
 "remain unretracted, unexplained, and re-affirmed. I desire to 
 know whether I am condemned or acquitted ? " No answer being 
 given, he went on : " If I am to go off acquitted, I do now declare 
 
1 84 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 to you, that there are many men to impeach, and many measures 
 to arraign ; and by God's blessing, I will arraign and impeach 
 them." He was reproached for having advised the King 
 to take Grafton — he had pushed him on, forced him on 
 the King, as First Minister. " I did indeed recommend him 
 for the Treasury," said Chatham ; " but I never could be sup- 
 posed to have thought of that boy as the First Minister of 
 a great nation. I advised his Majesty to take him, but there 
 is such a thing as time as well as tide ; and the conduct of 
 the noble duke has convinced me, that I am as likely to be 
 deceived as any other man, that I am as fallible as my betters." 
 Then reverting to the question, he quoted Walpole's words, 
 " Those who gave the power of blood, gave blood." So those 
 who gave the means of corruption, gave corruption. " I will 
 trust no sovereign in the world with the means of purchasing the 
 liberties of the people." The King had assured him he never 
 intended to exceed the allowance made by Parliament ; therefore, 
 "at a time when there are no marks of personal dissipation in 
 our King," and "no marks of any considerable sums having 
 been expended to procure the secrets of our enemies," it is 
 most extraordinary that a request for enquiry should be refused. 
 " Does the King mean, by undrawing the purse-strings of his 
 subjects, to spread corruption through the people, to procure 
 a Parliament, like an infamous packed jury, ready to acquit his 
 Ministers at all adventures ? I do not say, my lords, that corruption 
 lies here, or that corruption lies there, but if any gentleman in 
 England was to ask me whether I thought both Houses of 
 Parliament were bribed, I should laugh in his face, and say, 
 'Sir, it is not so.'" "An enquiry into the Civil List is 
 expedient, proper, and just; a refusal of it at this time will not 
 add dignity to disgrace — it will only add ridicule and folly to 
 enormity." 
 
 The Lords rejected the motion for Enquiry. 
 
 Nothing was less desired than the asking of questions. 
 Especially must the allusion to " the late Peace " have made some 
 quake who heard Chatham, for on the 24th of January, Dr. 
 Musgrave had been examined at the Bar of the Commons, on 
 his statements as to the means whereby the late Peace was obtained. 
 The doctor had been told in Paris that eight million livres had 
 been sent into England to buy a peace, and that the money was 
 divided between Lord Bute, Henry Fox, and the Princess 
 Dowager ! That mysterious personage the Chevalier d'Eon 
 was closely connected with this story, which the House pro- 
 
THE HORNED CATTLE SESSION 185 
 
 nounced to be "in the highest degree frivolous and unworthy 
 of credit." 1 
 
 ' The mysterious Frenchman (later called M. le Beau) seems to have 
 denied that the Princess' was the third name. " All he knew was that it was 
 a lady, mistress of a man of great quality." Madame de Pompadour was 
 mentioned as being bribed on the French side. No doubt there was something 
 in it. Persons of great importance were brought in by Musgrave's informant, 
 and we never hear that any of them complained of the use made of their names 
 by Musgrave. Both English and French seem to have been anxious not to 
 enquire too closely into the matter. 
 
CHAPTER XXV 
 THE REPEAL OF THE REVENUE ACT 
 
 '■ A greater misfortune cannot befall a trading Nation than to have a Minister 
 at the head of its Finances totally ignorant of the Nature, the History, and 
 the general State of Commerce, yet at the same Time so all-sufficient, so 
 self-enamoured, as to prefer his own reveries to the soundest Advice." — " Anglo- 
 Americanus, "in the Pullic Advertiser, Feb. 8, 1766. 
 
 ' ' They never had any kind of system, right or wrong : but only invented 
 occasionally some miserable tale for the day, in order meanly to sneak out of 
 difficulties into which they had proudly strutted. . . . They were put to all these 
 shifts and devices, full of meanness and full of mischief, in order to pilfer 
 piecemeal a repeal of an act which they had not the generous courage, when 
 they found and felt their error, honorably and fairly to disclaim. By such 
 management ... so paltry a sum as three-pence in the eyes of a financier, so 
 insignificant an article as tea in the eyes of a philosopher, have shaken the 
 pillars of a commercial empire that circled the whole globe. " — Burke on Ajnerican 
 Taxation, April 19, 1774. 
 
 " The body of the English people must assert their own cause . . . they will 
 not surrender their birthright to ministers, parliaments, or kings. 
 
 ' ' We can never be really in danger, till the forms of parliament are made use 
 of to destroy the substance of our civil and political liberties ; till parliament 
 itself betrays its trust, by contributing to establish new principles of government." 
 — Junius, on the City Address and his Majesty's answer, March 19, I770- 
 
 Three days after this scene in the Lords, the affairs of America 
 came before the Commons, in the shape of a petition from the 
 merchants of London trading to North America.^ Its presenta- 
 tion was made the opportunity for the long-promised Bill to repeal 
 the Revenue Act. As soon as the petition had been read, Lord 
 North moved the repeal of all duties laid on by that Act, with the 
 exception of that on tea?- In his speech he said of the Revenue 
 Act, that it "must astonish every reasonable man to think how 
 so preposterous a law could originally obtain existence from a 
 
 1 March 5. 
 
 ^ " I see nothing uncommercial in making the Americans pay a duty upon 
 tea. I give no opinion, one way or the other, what it may be right to do in 
 a future session ; provided America shall have behaved with duty and proper 
 respect, and take no undue steps to enforce the repeal of this act. " — Lord North, 
 April 19, 1774- 
 
THE REPEAL OF THE REVENUE ACT 187 
 
 British legislature."! He knew how extremely unacceptable to 
 many gentlemen any favour to America would be, but in the 
 vehemence of their resentment against their fellow-subjects beyond 
 the Atlantic, they must not forget the prosperity of this kingdom. 
 As to the duty on tea, he did not see the Americans had any 
 mighty reason to find fault — we are taking off another tax of a 
 shilling in the pound. This is only threepence, so they will 
 save ninepence on every pound they buy. They can't call that 
 oppression ! If we abolish this tax, they will only think we are 
 frightened, and we shall be giving up our just right to tax them. 
 "The properest time to exert our right of taxation, is when 
 the right is refused." They will soon be tired of doing without 
 our goods. It is true our exports to North America have fallen 
 off — in 1768 they were ;^2, 378,000, andin 1769, only ;^i, 634,000; 
 but this is not as bad as it looks, because, foreseeing the non- 
 importation scheme, the importers laid in a double quantity 
 in 1768. 
 
 Governor Pownall urged complete repeal, not " as an American 
 measure," for the leading people there do not now wish it to be 
 repealed. The measure has had the effect of making them look to 
 their own internal native supplies, and has raised a spirit for labour 
 and manufacture within. " It has placed their commerce on 
 economy, instead of luxury." Their leaders think this state of 
 things salutary, and wish it to continue. Then he went minutely 
 into the state of British trade to North America — " It is in an alarm- 
 ing suspense." He took the rise and fall of exchange, all over the 
 colonies — this rise and fall is your commercial barometer ! The 
 exchange has fallen, and in proportion as it has fallen so has your 
 trade diminished. Then he showed them the folly they had com- 
 mitted in taxing articles of our own trade ; how, at first, having no 
 other shop to go to, the colonists had been obliged to allow us to 
 put our own prices on commodities we supplied ; but we had gone 
 still farther, and taxed them on these commodities. "You have 
 treated us as the overseers of great works and manufactures treat 
 the poor labourers under their direction. You set the price of our 
 labour, and you set also the price of those supplies which we must 
 purchase by the fruits of our labour ; while you are enabled to con- 
 fine us to the purchasing them from you alone — and would you 
 
 ' "When we consider this law as a measure of finance, the fact upon your 
 table proclaims its insufficiency, for the sum returned, as its whole net produce, 
 amounts but to ;£'2g5 and a few shillings. ... It lays a duty upon painters' 
 colours. . . . Can anyone imagine that there is no red or yellow ochre on that 
 great continent?" — Pownall. 
 
1 88 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 superadd a tax to all this ? " Then the tea. By your bargain with 
 the East India Company, you have made it no longer the interest 
 of this great corporate merchant to export teas to North America. 
 For as there is a drawback of 25 per cent, on every pound of tea 
 exported from this island, and the Company is bound by the agree- 
 ment to make good every deficiency caused by this drawback, it 
 would rather not export. It would rather the Dutch supplied 
 North America with tea. This case is infinitely more anti-com- 
 mercial than any trifling duty laid on your own manufactures. In 
 the first place this drawback of 25 per cent, does not amount to a 
 shilling (as has been said), but only to yd., or thereabout, in 
 the pound — so it can only operate as a bounty of 4d. But 
 it is no bounty at all; because whatever duty the East India 
 Company pays originally at the Custom House, on importing teas 
 from Asia, that sum is added to the price of their tea in their sales. 
 So the exporter to America draws back only that sum he has 
 already paid in the price of his purchase ; " by which means, there 
 is an advantage in favour of the Dutch teas imported into the 
 colonies against the British teas, of 25 per cent, difference — 
 surely more anti-commercial than the duties you propose to 
 repeal ! " And the tea will not raise enough to pay the expenses of 
 collection — it won't raise more than ;!^7ooo a year, if that. And all 
 this, to keep up your claim to a right you cannot enforce ! 
 
 Pownall also showed that if there was not " that suspense of 
 trade in this country " of which merchants complained, they would 
 not be obliged to remit specie instead of goods to America — the 
 balance of trade in our favour would supply all that was wanted 
 there, whereas, as was shown by the " accounts of extraordinaries " 
 now lying on the table, ;£'j6,ooo had been advanced to the con- 
 tractors to enable them to purchase Spanish and Portuguese 
 bullion. 
 
 George Grenville, always so intensely sore on the question of 
 America, said he felt called on to speak, " because the principal 
 confusions of that country are supposed to originate with me." But 
 if the Stamp Act was injudicious in mode, it was at least salutary 
 in intention, and meant for the common good of both countries — 
 the Revenue Act was " diametrically repugnant to the principles of 
 commerce,'' yet did us no good — "it does not bring in ;^i6,ooo a 
 year." He could not suppose partial repeal would "reduce the 
 colonies to temper," and yet a total repeal would not " sufficiently 
 provide for the dignity of the nation." " I shall not therefore give 
 my voice on the present question." 
 
 Barr^ said we were undoing with one hand what we did with the 
 
THE REPEAL OF THE REVENUE ACT 189 
 
 other — having promised the East India Company to put its teas 
 upon the same level as those of the Dutch (" whose moderation in 
 price obtains a preference at every market "), we laid a fresh duty on 
 tea, and laid it so that it must act as an absolute prohibition to the 
 sale of the Company's teas throughout English North America. In 
 1768, the teas sent to America amounted to ^132,000, whereas in 
 1769 they were only ;^44,ooo, "and probably this year will not 
 exceed a quarter of that sum," as the colonists are daily more angry 
 at our proceedings, and agreements have been entered into for the 
 absolute disuse of tea. 
 
 But no argument could prevail. The anti-commercial Act, 
 admitted to be preposterous, was repealed partially, with the avowed 
 object of retaining the power of passing other anti-commercial Acts. 
 By 204 to 142 the tax on tea was retained. The 204 were voting 
 the Independence of America. 
 
 Governor Bernard was largely responsible for the retention of 
 the tea-duty. He it was who persuaded Ministers that the Non- 
 importation Associations were breaking up — America was in the 
 greatest distress for want of our goods, could no longer subsist 
 without them, and must submit to any terms we chose to impose. 
 It was pretended that the duty on tea was left to serve the East 
 India Company ; in reality, it was left — as was frankly admitted 
 later — to preserve the right to tax. If the intention had been to 
 serve the Company, the duty would have been taken off Singlo. 
 America drank Bohea ; but it was not Bohea, it was " the sort called 
 Singlo" which lay so heavy on the Company's hands, and 
 Ministers hoped to tempt the Americans by the offer of good tea, 
 not of the inferior sort. Bohea was the more saleable. If the 
 duty had been taken off Singlo, and those millions of pounds thus 
 worked off on America, the Company could have got rid of its 
 Bohea. The Company must be supposed to have understood its 
 own business, and the Company was earnest for the removal of the 
 duty. 
 
 It seemed as though an evil fate pursued Administration in all 
 its dealings with America. On the 21st of April — less than six 
 weeks after the Repeal of the Revenue Act — very ugly news came 
 from America of a riot in Boston. The soldiers had fired on the 
 people, the alarm-bells had been rung, the inhabitants had taken up 
 arms. Captain Preston, whose men fired, was in custody. Next 
 day more than 3500 men, well-armed, had marched into Boston, 
 and as many more were expected — lastly, the people had compelled 
 the Lieutenant-Governor to remove all the troops to the Castle. 
 
 Strange to say, Ministers now seemed in no hurry to do any- 
 
ipo ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 thing. It was near the time for Parliament to be prorogued, and 
 
 they were willing to wait till it was gone. But on May 8 
 
 Governor Pownall moved for an Address to the Throne, setting 
 
 forth all the disputes in America, since the appointment of a 
 
 Commander-in-Chief. He asked for an enquiry, to see whether 
 
 the Crown had been misinformed, whether Ministers had "by 
 
 secret narratives, which have been suppressed among a few," made 
 
 suggestions of treasons, and told his Majesty that America will 
 
 not be subject to lawful authority. Also to know what strange 
 
 cause can have produced so strange an effect, and brought so 
 
 total a change in the temper of subjects as loyal and affectionate 
 
 as any his Majesty has within his dominions — especially the 
 
 people of Massachusetts Bay, whom Pownall had the honour to 
 
 know "in their better days," when his Majesty's Government there 
 
 was in a very different state from what it was now. There was 
 
 never a more affectionate colony. " They have no other idea 
 
 of this country than as their home; they have no other word to 
 
 express it, and till of late, it has been constantly expressed by the 
 
 name of home." Think of the services of that province in the 
 
 expedition to Quebec, think of the Siege of Louisburg, think of 
 
 Crown Point. When they were only asked to raise 2300 men, 
 
 as a "quotha" of 7000, they raised the whole 7000. They 
 
 kept up a ship of war, and an armed sloop, to protect the trade in 
 
 those seas. And for these expenses they raised during the war 
 
 ;^8o,ooo per annum. Now they are changed, and I will tell you 
 
 why. We suspended the Assembly of New York, because it 
 
 "would not will as we had willed, and this spread an alarming 
 
 apprehension throughout the continent, which we have confirmed 
 
 by threatening to dissolve other Assemblies, if they will not 
 
 rescind resolutions come to in their deliberative capacity." 
 
 The Boston Council has been represented as totally democratic — 
 formed and directed by the will of the people; but "as it hath 
 more authority within the province than any other council, in any 
 other part of his Majesty's American dominions," so it has always 
 been more ready to comply with every matter where the honour 
 or interest of his Majesty's government there could be concerned, 
 than any other council, formed on any other plan. 
 
 The whole of this careful and learned speech was a protest 
 against the appointment of a military ofiScer, over whom two 
 Governors had successively declared they had no command. 
 This martial law it is which has caused this state of confusion ; 
 this is what has alarmed the people. 
 
 The same day the House debated on Burke's Resolutions. 
 
THE REPEAL OF THE REVENUE ACT 191 
 
 They were to the effect that the disorders in America had been 
 caused by " ill-judged and inconsistent Instructions; by dissolving 
 Assemblies, and yet allowing the new Assemblies to sit without 
 disavowing their former acts." Also that it is "unwarrantable, 
 dangerous, and an high breach of the privilege of this House," 
 to promise to the American Assemblies the interposition or 
 influence of his Majesty, or of his confidential servants, with 
 this House. That the faith of the Crown ought not to be 
 pledged to the said Assemblies, for the laying on, or laying off 
 of any taxes or duties whatsoever. And that to lay before this 
 House suggestions of treason, or misprisions of treason, in 
 America, in order to bring this House into a plan for punishing 
 such supposed treasons, when in reality no such treason exists, 
 is an audacious insult to the dignity of Parliament. 
 
 But all this came to nothing. A majority of more than a 
 hundred negatived the Resolutions. Nor had the debates in the 
 Lords any better fortune. On May 14 Chatham's motion for 
 an Address to the King to dissolve Parliament was negatived 
 without a division. In the debate of the i8th the American 
 papers were read — among them some of Hillsborough's letters. 
 The Duke of Richmond charged Ministers with shameful neglect 
 of a situation hourly growing more alarming. He moved a set 
 of Resolutions blaming particular actions — especially Hillsborough's 
 letter to Governor Bernard with the order to dissolve the Assembly ; 
 and his letter to Lord Botetourt, Governor of Virginia, which 
 personally involved his Majesty in the measures of his Ministers. 
 He also severely blamed the " suggestions " of treasons which did 
 not exist, and to punish which no steps had been taken, even if 
 they did exist. 
 
 Hillsborough hinted that the noble duke thought it criminal 
 to vindicate the supremacy of the Mother Country. " My 
 criminality is my principal boast. The star of America shall 
 never have my voice, to shine either upon the destruction or the 
 disgrace of Englishmen. The colonies are our subjects." I trust 
 we shall " beg our subjects to condescendingly yield obedience to 
 our inherent pre-eminence." It is entirely the fault of Opposition 
 that we have not come to an accommodation of these unfortunate 
 dissensions— they are continually exciting the Colonies to demand 
 concessions which the Mother Country cannot consistently allow. 
 They deplore the loss of trade, and advise the Americans not 
 to deal with us. "In fact, my lords, their whole patriotism is 
 a despicable avarice of employment" — they want to distress 
 Administration, not to serve their country. So this poor kingdom 
 
192 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 must be sacrificed to her dependencies, and the British Parliament 
 must rescind its laws at the bidding of a provincial assembly. 
 Can you, my lords, restrain your indignation at this abject pro- 
 position? "Is not the whole Englishman maddened in your 
 bosoms, at the remotest thought of crouching to the creatures of 
 your formation ? Have you erected colonies to be your masters ? " 
 
 Here there was a cry of " Adjourn ! " but Rockingham re- 
 minded the House that the Mother Country herself was not always 
 able to restrain the spirit of her own populace, " upon particular 
 occasions." She should therefore learn to make the same excuses 
 for the Americans, which she requires for herself. " Few popular 
 insurrections have ever taken place in an English government, 
 without having a strong appearance of justice, if they were not 
 originally justified by the error of the governors." Temple said 
 Ministers were afraid of their conduct being examined, lest their 
 mismanagement should come to light. Especially they tell us, 
 in Speeches from the Throne, to consider the state of America, 
 and when we try to consider it, they call for an adjournment. 
 On the last day but one of the session, we are no farther on than 
 when it began — everything is still unsettled and alarming. Gower 
 said if the session had not been taken up with the Middlesex 
 Election, something might have been done with America — 
 Opposition said that the Middlesex Election was an affair of the 
 last moment to the British Empire, and now they are angry that 
 we have spent so much time on it that we cannot attend to 
 America. Majorities are always called corrupt by Opposition ; and 
 the kingdom is always on the brink of destruction according to 
 them — he hoped the same remarks would be made in succeeding 
 ages, when " the public-spirited worthies of the present hour are 
 either consigned to oblivion, or hung up to the ridicule of 
 posterity." Then the House adjourned, and next day Parliament 
 was prorogued. 
 
 The excitements of 1770 did not concern America. Far other 
 questions absorbed attention, and sometimes aroused fury. The 
 first was the expulsion of Wilkes. 
 
 On the ist of March a memorial was presented to the Court of 
 Common Council, setting forth that the petition of last June had 
 never been answered. " The subjects of the most despotic prince 
 on earth, when they humbly petition their sovereign on the score of 
 grievances, at least expect an answer." Six of the Livery signed 
 this memorial. Great debates followed ; but by a very great 
 majority the Memorial was received. A meeting of the Common 
 Hall was then called ; Beckford took the chair, and in the course 
 
THE REPEAL OF THE REVENUE ACT 193 
 
 of his speech, said he would tell the Livery his political creed. It 
 was " that the number of little paltry rotten boroughs, the number 
 of placemen and pensioners, and the corruption of the electors as 
 well as elected, were the instruments that would in time prove the 
 ruin of the state. There must be a more equal representation of 
 the people, the number of placemen must be limited by law, and 
 the servants of the Crown must be obliged to show fuller accounts 
 of the money they spent — a milHon of money must not be 
 accounted for in one line ! " 
 
 Then an " Address, Remonstrance and Petition " was produced, 
 and read to the meeting. It spoke with extreme plainness of " the 
 same secret, malign influence, which through each successive 
 administration, has defeated every good, and suggested every bad 
 intention " ; and under which the majority of the House of 
 Commons "had done a deed, more ruinous in its consequences 
 than the levying of ship-money by Charles the First, or the 
 dispensing power assumed by James the Second. The forms of 
 the Constitution, like those of religion, were not established for 
 form's sake, but for the substance." " We do not owe our liberty to 
 nice and subtle distinctions, and we will not be cheated of it by 
 them." This Remonstrance was twice read, and was received with 
 " long and continued acclamations." 
 
 The next thing was to present it, and next day the Sheriffs went 
 to St. James' to know when his Majesty pleased to be waited on. 
 They had to wait till the lev^e was over. Then Lord Denbigh 
 came and spoke to them. He asked, among other questions, 
 whether the City had ever presented a remonstrance to a King 
 before ? Mr. Sheriff Townsend asked whether a King of England 
 had ever before turned a deaf ear to the petition of 60,000 
 freeholders? At last they were admitted to the closet, and his 
 Majesty told them he would take time to consider and to consult 
 his Secretary of State. ^ The day after, Weymouth wrote to the 
 Sheriffs, to ask how the remonstrance was authenticated, and what 
 was the assembly which had adopted it ? The Sheriffs went again 
 to the palace, and again saw the King — Lord Bolingbroke pushing 
 back the City Remembrancer, as he would have followed the others 
 into the closet. The Sheriffs told his Majesty that the remonstrance 
 was adopted by the Livery of the City of London, in Common Hall 
 assembled. Again his Majesty took time, but finally consented to 
 receive it. So on the 14th, Lord Mayor Beckford, the Sheriffs, the 
 Committee of the Livery, and one hundred and fifty-three of the 
 Common Council, went in their coaches to St. James', attended by 
 
 1 March 8, 1770. 
 VOL. I. — 13 
 
194 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 all the City officials, from the Common Sergeant and the Common 
 Clerk, down to the Common Crier. The King received them on the 
 throne. The Common Sergeant began to read the Remonstrance, 
 but was "in too much confusion to proceed," so the Common 
 Clerk, Sir James Hodges, read it to his Majesty, "very properly 
 and distinctly, with a suitable and judicious emphasis." In his 
 answer (written by Dyson), the King said the Remonstrance was 
 disrespectful to himself, and injurious to his Parliament. Next 
 day the Public Advertiser said that the King had turned to his 
 courtiers and burst out laughing. 
 
 The " Catilines of the City " were not abashed. They pre- 
 pared a second Remonstrance — this time they called it humble. 
 It implored his Majesty in very affectionate terms to dissolve this 
 present Parliament, remove his " evil ministers,'' and extinguish 
 "that fatal influence which had caused so much national 
 discontent." It was on the occasion of presenting this second 
 remonstrance that Beckford horrified the King and his courtiers by 
 making a speech.^ Beckford maintained it was very humble and 
 dutiful. The courtiers called it " impudent, insolent and un- 
 precedented." 2 It is engraved on the pedestal of his statue in the 
 Guildhall.3 
 
 The King was very angry. He said to Conway, that sooner than 
 consent to a dissolution he " would have recourse to this " — laying 
 his hand on his sword. And when on the 29th of May the City 
 had to approach him again with the compliments of the 
 Corporation on the birth of a princess, he stipulated for no ex- 
 temporaneous speeches. 
 
 It was Beckford's last appearance. He died of a fever on the 
 2ist of June, leaving the bulk of his enormous fortune to his only 
 legitimate son, the author of Vathek. 
 
 On the 2nd of June, John Almon, the bookseller, was tried in 
 the Court of King's Bench before Lord Mansfield for seUing Junius' 
 " Letter to the King " in the London Museum, a magazine which he 
 did not print, nor did he know that it contained the Letter. The two 
 
 ' June I, 1770. 
 
 ° Unprecedented it certainly was ; and it was improper, because, if the King 
 can do no wrong, he must always be supposed to act under the advice of his 
 Ministers, which he cannot do if he is drawn into replying to an extemporary 
 address. It has been said that the words on the pedestal are not those Beckford 
 actually spoke, but were written after his death by Home Tooke. It is, however, 
 evident that Beckford said something to the same effect, even if not in these 
 precise words. Chatham's letter to him, of May 25, which says, " the spirit of 
 Old England spoke," proves this beyond a doubt. 
 
 ^ It was said that Chatham drew up this Remonstrance. 
 
THE REPEAL OF THE REVENUE ACT 195 
 
 messengers sent to buy it, said they received it from " somebody " 
 — adjuged by the Court to be Almon's servant. He was therefore 
 found guilty, but the Court took time to consider sentence. No 
 doubt Almon was selected on account of his active political 
 partisanship. All the magazines contained the Letter, and all the 
 booksellers sold it. 
 
 On the 13th, Henry Sampson Woodfall, printer of the Public 
 Advertiser, appeared before the same Court, "for a seditious 
 printing and publishing of a paper signed. Junius'' Mansfield told 
 the jury they had only to consider the printing and publishing — not 
 the nature of the paper. He "did not leave it to the jury whether 
 the paper was innocent or not." The jury retired a little before 
 noon, and at four, when the Court rose, were not agreed. It was 
 nearly nine when they delivered their verdict at Lord Mansfield's 
 own house. They found Woodfall " Guilty of Printing and 
 Pubhshing only.'' It was reported that a verdict of "Not Guilty" 
 would have been given at five o'clock, but two jurymen — the King's 
 plasterer and a baker — stood out. 
 
 The verdict was ambiguous. Two motions were made in 
 Court — Thurlow, for the Crown, claiming it as one of "Guilty"; 
 Sergeant Glynn, for Woodfall, demanding why defendant should 
 not be discharged. Mansfield's influence was not sufficient to 
 prevent the Court of King's Bench deciding that there must be 
 another trial. 
 
 Almon was not sentenced till November — when he was fined 
 ten marks {£,(>, 13s. 4d.) and ordered to find sureties for his good 
 behaviour for two years — himself to be bound in ;^4oo, and his 
 sureties in ;!^2oo each. Mansfield left another Judge to pronounce 
 this sentence. Woodfall's second trial ended in a fiasco. Thurlow, 
 in proving publication, said he had not a copy of the original 
 newspaper. "That's not my fault, Mr. Attorney," said Mansfield 
 — and so the trial broke down ! The fact was, the foreman of the 
 first jury had pocketed the copy, and had afterwards destroyed it. 
 Junius wrote terrible letters to Mansfield, and Camden asked him 
 in the House of Lords a string of questions which he refused to 
 answer ; while in the Commons, Sergeant Glynn told the House that 
 in the reign of Alfred the Great forty judges were hanged ! " This 
 precedent I do not mention as an example for your imitation." 
 
 The trial of Almon was the inspiring cause of the important 
 debate of November 27, 1770, "On the Power of the Attorney- 
 General to file Informations Ex-Officio." Captain Constantine Phipps 
 made a vigorous speech. He called this power " a cousin-german 
 of the Star-chamber." Its very nature is arbitrary, incompatible 
 
196 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 with the spirit of free government. An Attorney-General is ahvays 
 the creature of the Ministry — he is their shuttle-cock, all his hopes 
 depend upon them. He must do what they tell him, or good-bye to 
 his hopes of ^{^3000 a year pension, and of the office of Chief Justice 
 in Eyre ; " he must bid the King's bench and the Chancellorship 
 adieu for ever." By this ex-ofificio power, he can, of his own 
 motion, or at the bidding of a Secretary of State, " christen any 
 paper by what name he chooses." He can call it "an infamous, 
 seditious, or treasonable libel." And then he can file an information 
 and commence a prosecution, without hearing any evidence, or 
 examining a single witness. "Sir, can anything savour more of 
 tyranny and despotism ? " Even if a man can clear himself, he 
 may be ruined by the expense. Thus any person obnoxious to a 
 Minister or an Attorney-General "may be unjustly suppressed." 
 He read the Act 4 & 5 of William and Mary, made to prevent 
 " malicious informations in the Court of King's Bench," and moved 
 for a Bill to explain and render it more effectual. His motion was 
 lost by 164 to 72. 
 
 The Opposition which fought these great constitutional battles 
 of this period has left an indelible mark on English history and 
 English politics. The great speeches of its great orators are a part 
 of the glory of England. Could they be blotted out of our memory, 
 half of our boasting would be vain. When we talk about Britons 
 never being slaves, we do so as the political heirs of the men 
 who fought a losing battle in their time — almost invariably swept 
 down by the overwhelming numbers of the " King's Friends," but even 
 in defeat handing on the sacred fire of liberty to generations yet 
 unborn. It is good for us to remember that the most famous of all 
 English Oppositions, since party government came into existence, 
 hardly ever carried a single motion, and yet saved English Liberty. 
 And among this goodly company of patriots must be reckoned the 
 name of George Grenville, who, in spite of his one grand mistake, 
 was always true to the great principles of the Constitution. He was 
 very unfortunate as a Minister; and that he came into office as 
 Bute's nominee is one of the many perplexing facts of this period. 
 But he lost office because he would not further the King's un- 
 constitutional attempt to make his Ministers literally his " servants." 
 He took the constitutional side on all the great questions which 
 agitated the country in the next few years. He withstood the 
 arbitrary power of Ministers in the matter of General Warrants — first 
 cousins to letires de cachet and orders of the Star Chamber. He 
 did what was harder — he withstood the arbitrary power of the 
 House of Commons, in the matter of the Middlesex Election. His 
 
THE REPEAL OF THE REVENUE ACT 197 
 
 great Bill for Settling Controverted Elections put an end to the old 
 system of secret (and packed) Committees, and ensured a disin- 
 terested tribunal.! He consistently opposed the increase of 
 military power, whether in England or Ireland. After his first 
 great mistake as to America he took up the unassailable position that 
 something like consistency ought to mark our policy; and that if 
 we meant to conciliate, we ought to do so generously — if to assert 
 our authority, to do so effectually; but all his speeches on this 
 subject show that he was against proceeding to extremities. Nor, 
 in blaming him for the initial error, must we forget that that error 
 would have been repaired but for the still greater errors of the 
 Revenue Act. 
 
 George Grenville died on the 13th of November, 1770, and with 
 his death Opposition almost dissolved. The differences which 
 divided it became more paralysing than ever. The more honourable 
 lost heart, and talked of ceasing to attend debates and provoke 
 divisions which only revealed their weakness. The more ambitious, 
 seeing nothing to be made out of Opposition, reconciled themselves 
 with Administration. Of these were several of the Bedford Whigs, 
 and Wedderburn, who now joined the Cabinet as Solicitor-General. 
 He owed his conversion — and his promotion — to Charles Fox, who 
 on the rgth of February, 1770, when the House had been for hours 
 debating the Middlesex Election, and Wedderburn had convinced 
 even ministerialists that there was no precedent for annulling an 
 election, suddenly produced a precedent, so recent that it disposed 
 of Wedderburn's argument. The House roared with applause, and 
 the King made Fox a Junior Lord of the Admiralty.^ 
 
 Wedderburn had been thought unlike all other parliamentary 
 lawyers — he appeared to speak because he himself was convinced. 
 In May of 1770 he denounced the attempt to tax the Colonies in 
 words which thousands in America quoted to each other, as 
 showing that at last the English people saw they had been in the 
 wrong. He had predicted — he had all but justified rebellion. He 
 became worth buying, and let it be known he could be bought — 
 after which he fell foul of Ministers more fiercely than ever. He 
 even deceived Chatham. When, on January 25, 1771, it was 
 announced that Alexander Wedderburn, Esq., had become Solicitor- 
 General, the impression was profound. Feeling that he must say 
 
 ' Grenville, who knew that he was dying, asked the House to cheer his last 
 days by passing the Bill. It went easily through the House. He then brought 
 in the Bill for an Enquiry into the Civil List. North jested this down, and when 
 other members asked for an explanation, " the House yelped it down." 
 
 ^ February 28, 1770. 
 
198 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 something, he said that he had been a follower of Mr. Grenville — 
 Mr. Grenville's death had set him free. When the writ for his re- 
 election was read, there was a deep groan. When he had to walk 
 up the floor between men he used to denounce, " he blushed as 
 red as fire." Years after, when North said the Whigs talked of 
 patriotism and justice, when they meant pensions and places, all 
 eyes turned to Wedderburn — sitting at North's elbow, pale as 
 death. 
 
 There was a tremendous excitement, at the end of this year, 
 about the seizure of the Falkland Isles by Spain, and the tame 
 conduct of Ministers in accepting restitution without an explicit 
 acknowledgment of our right to the islands. In this debate 
 Chatham made a powerful speech, which the King must have 
 rejoiced to know was made in that House, and not the other. At 
 one moment he diverged from foreign to home politics. " There 
 are men, my lords, who if their own services were forgotten ought 
 to have an hereditary merit with the House of Hanover. . . . There 
 are other men, my lords — looking sternly and shaking his fist at 
 Lord Mansfield — who, to speak tenderly of them, were not quite so 
 forward in the demonstrations of their zeal to the reigning family ; 
 there was another Cause, my lords, and a partiality to it, which 
 some persons had not at all times discretion enough to conceal. I 
 know I shall be accused of attempting to revive distinctions. My 
 lords, if it were possible, I would not wish the favours of the Crown 
 to flow invariably in one channel. But there are some distinctions 
 which are inherent in the nature of things. There is a distinction 
 between right and wrong, — betiveen Whig and Tory.'' 
 
 On the loth of December, just as Camden had been putting his 
 very awkward questions to Mansfield about his charge to the jury 
 in The King v. Wood/all, the Duke of Manchester began to speak 
 about the defenceless state in which Ministers had left the country 
 (and only two ships at Gibraltar, and one of them leaky) ; when 
 Lord Gower desired the House might be cleared — such things 
 ought not to be publicly divulged — in so crowded a House, there 
 might be emissaries from Spain — persons were admitted who took 
 notes — a noble lord had said his speech was in print. Richmond 
 protested — people would say the Lords were afraid of their pro- 
 ceedings being known. Then there arose such an uproar that 
 Chatham spoke for some time without being heard. He sent 
 Richmond to Mansfield (still acting as Speaker) to tell him he 
 wanted to speak to a point of order. But it was of no use, and at 
 last he, with eighteen other lords, left the House. It happened 
 that there were some members of the Commons present, come, to 
 
THE REPEAL OF THE REVENUE ACT 199 
 
 deliver a Bill. They were promptly " hooted out of the House." 
 They hastened back to the Commons, and informed the Speaker 
 of the affront put upon them, and through them on that House ; 
 and one of them moved that the House be cleared, Peers and all. 
 A majority was against this, but under the Rule ^ all were ordered 
 to withdraw — among them Richmond and Rockingham. The 
 Commons were very angry, but their wrath soon cooled, and the 
 chief result of it all was a duel between Lord George Germaine and 
 Governor Johnstone ; and this was only important because in a 
 manner it rehabilitated Germaine's personal courage, and so paved 
 the way for his taking office.^ 
 
 ' A member had only to say, "Mr. Speaker, I espye strangers !" and the 
 House must be cleared. In our time, there must be a vote of the House. 
 Upon some clamour a day or two afterwards, the Speaker said, " Pray, gentle- 
 men, be orderly ; you are almost as bad as the other House ! " 
 
 ^ It was allowed that Germaine showed great coolness at this meeting with 
 the fire-eating ex-Governor ; and the belief of his apologists was strengthened, 
 that his conduct at Minden was prompted only by temper and rancour against 
 Prince Ferdinand. 
 
 About 1773 or 1774 Burke thought of inviting Lord George Germaine to lead 
 the Opposition in the House of Commons. 
 
CHAPTER XXVI 
 THOMAS HUTCHINSON 
 
 " The town of Boston met, and passed a number of weak but very criminal 
 votes ; and as the governor declined calling an assembly, they sent circular 
 letters to all the towns and districts, to send a person each that there might be a 
 consultation at so extraordinary a crisis. They met and spent a week, and 
 made themselves ridiculous, and then dissolved themselves ; after a message to 
 the governor, which he refused to receive ; a petition to the King, which I 
 daresay their agent will never be allowed to present, and a resolution which 
 they have published, ill-natured and impotent. . . ." — Letter of Lieutenant- 
 Governor Hutchinson, Oct. 4, 1768. 
 
 " America was in such a state, that it seems to have been good policy to abstain 
 wholly from further taxes of any kind." — Hutchinson, History of Massachusetts. 
 
 " In the first place, gentlemen, you are to consider, that a great empire, like 
 a great cake, is most easily diminished at the edges. Turn your attention, 
 therefore, first to your remotest provinces ; that, as you get rid of them, the 
 nextmay follow in order." — Franklin's Rules for Reducing a Great Empire to 
 a Small One. 
 
 Thomas Hutchinson had been left to face the storm from which 
 Bernard had escaped. He had represented Boston for ten years, 
 and it had once been proposed to make him the Agent for the 
 province to London, but he had declined to leave his place. To 
 say the truth, he had had too many places — no one had ever held 
 so many at one time before. 1 He had been at the same time, 
 Lieutenant-Governor, Chief Justice of the Superior Court, a Judge 
 of Probate in the Suffolk Court, and a Councillor. As long ago as 
 1762 the Assembly had protested against the Lieutenant-Governor 
 sitting on the Council, or the Chief Justice holding any other 
 judgeship. Both he and his sons were in business as tea-merchants. 
 His attitude at the time of the Stamp Act had caused great 
 indignation, and the destruction of his house, and of many 
 invaluable documents he had spent his life in collecting, had 
 embittered his temper and shaken his nerves. He was no ordinary 
 man, but he probably was less courageous and less firm of will than 
 
 ' It is only just to say that the salary of a Judge was only about ;^I20 a year, 
 with some fees, said not to cover travelling expenses. 
 
THOMAS HUTCHINSON 201 
 
 he appeared. He had dear vision, strong sense, and strong ani- 
 mosities — he was obstinate rather than firm — he advocated extreme 
 measures, began to carry them out, exasperated his opponents to 
 the highest point — and then quailed before the storm himself had 
 raised. It was natural that he should resent the abominable 
 outrage he had suffered. A wise Home Government would have 
 provided for a capable but unconciliatory official, in some other 
 way than by giving him the government of the colony he had so 
 grievously offended, and which had so grievously offended him. 
 Conway had been deluded into making him Lieutenant-Governor, 
 but by the time Bernard left, the British Cabinet knew it was 
 appointing the most unpopular man in Massachusetts. 
 
 Except for the murderous assault on James Otis, things were 
 pretty quiet till the new year. Otis — Hutchinson's old enemy — 
 had already shown signs of the excitement which finally overset 
 his reason. He had been lately in a controversy with the revenue 
 officers, and had attacked them in the Boston Gazette. A few days 
 afterwards, as he was sitting in the British Coffee House, he was 
 set upon by Robinson, a Commissioner of Customs, and several 
 army and navy officers. He was savagely beaten, and received a 
 sword-cut on the head, from the effects of which he never really 
 recovered, though he lived many years, and actually took part in 
 the Battle of Bunker's Hill. 
 
 Early in October a ship arrived with English goods. She 
 belonged to two of the principal merchants in Boston — Messrs. 
 Greene and Boylstone. They had not signed the Agreement. 
 The Committee was on the watch, and Greene and Boylstone 
 thought it wise to consent to sell nothing till the time had expired. 
 Among the consignments were eighteen chests of tea for Thomas 
 and Elisha Hutchinson, sons of the Lieutenant-Governor. He 
 advised them to sign, but he wrote privately to Grenville, Jenkinson, 
 and Hillsborough, urging that Parliament should immediately 
 change the municipal government of Boston. Meanwhile he gave 
 large orders for more tea for his sons, and sent instructions for its 
 being so sent as to escape the vigilance of the Committee. 
 
 And yet it was true that the agitation seemed to be dying down. 
 At the next election, five towns, Springfield, Hatfield, Hardwicke, 
 Norwich, and Sheffield, elected rescinders ; and at New York, in 
 the hotly-contested election of 1769, — the last ever held under the 
 Crown, — the Government candidates were returned, instead of John 
 Morin Scott and the Sons of Liberty. The whole de Lancey 
 family was on the Tory side. Sir Henry Moore was dead— one of 
 those " show governors " who, knowing their own total unfitness, 
 
202 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 always acted on the advice of old Cadwallader Golden, Lieutenant- 
 Governor and virtual governor of New York for so many years. 
 Lord Dunmore was appointed, but long before he could arrive, 
 the de Lanceys got a vote in the Assembly for two thousand pounds 
 to pay the troops. In a few months Botetourt died, Dunmore was 
 transferred to Virginia, and General Tryon, Governor of North 
 Carolina, came to New York. 
 
 The Non- importation Agreement, too, was wearing itself out. 
 Nothing kept it up but the knowledge that the British Government 
 was determined at all costs to maintain the right to tax. People 
 were beginning to hanker after European goods. New Hampshire 
 stood out altogether ; but Rhode Island was privately importing, 
 "to their very great gain." Virginia and Maryland had sent two 
 gentlemen to Boston, intimating that the Southern Colonies were 
 not prepared to go as far as Massachusetts. Pennsylvania and 
 New York even disapproved the repeal of all the Revenue Acts — 
 they were for retaining some which happened to favour themselves. 
 But the omission of Tea from the duties to be repealed displeased 
 all, and more than counter-balanced any good effect. The 
 retention of the duty on tea showed that Great Britain still insisted 
 on her right to play tricks with American commerce. A Committee 
 was appointed to examine all cargoes, and publish the names of 
 importers, unless they gave up the goods at once to the Committee. 
 This new Merchants' Meeting was still sitting when Bernard sailed. 
 
 The Agreement expired at the end of the year, and immediately 
 some merchants began to sell. As they would thus forestall the 
 others, the Committee interposed, insisting that no one should sell 
 until goods ordered from England after January i, 1770, should 
 arrive. Hesitating patriotism was quickened by the fear of being 
 named in the Boston Gazette. Some cargoes were held over, 
 others were reshipped. 
 
 Meanwhile the presence of the soldiers was a constant irritation. 
 Frays became frequent in Boston during the winter. The people 
 would hiss at the soldiers, and though the officers tried to keep the 
 peace, there was ill-feeling on both sides. The news from New 
 York did not tend to abate it. There, the military were more 
 insolent than in Boston. On January 21 the soldiers cut down 
 the Liberty Tree once more, after it had stood safely nearly three 
 years. They were thrice repulsed before they succeeded. Next 
 day the people assembled in the fields, and passed resolutions 
 never to employ a soldier, and to treat as enemies to the Con- 
 stitution any except sentinels found after dark with arms, or after 
 roll-call without arms. The soldiers replied by an insolent placard. 
 
THOMAS HUTCHINSON 203 
 
 Two days of affrays followed, in which the citizens had the 
 advantage. Boston highly applauded the spirit shown by the 
 "Yorkers."! 
 
 The ill-feeling increased. A bookseller, also proprietor of a 
 newspaper, not only persisted in selling, but opposed the Non- 
 importation movement in his paper. He even ridiculed the 
 political Evening Club, and gave the members ludicrous nicknames. 
 Worse still, he let out the fact that some of the principal merchants 
 who had promised not to import were departing from their 
 engagement. One day he was coming up King Street with his 
 partner, when he met a person he had thus charged. From words 
 they came to blows. A mob collected. The two obnoxious 
 persons had each a pistol in his pocket, and it was said that the 
 partner's went off as he fell in the scufHe. This enraged the mob. 
 The bookseller fled to the mainguard, the people followed and 
 demanded him. Both regiments were placed under arms. By 
 an unfortunate coincidence the bookseller's mob was joined by 
 another, which had just tarred and feathered an unlucky seaman, 
 under the mistaken belief that he was an informer. For some 
 hours things looked serious. The two mobs coalesced, and 
 paraded the streets till late in the evening — still dragging with them 
 their wretched victim in his tar and feathers, and compelling the 
 inhabitants to put lights in their windows. At last they let the 
 poor seaman go, and dispersed. This was the first riot since the 
 soldiers came. Hutchinson summoned the Council, but it refused 
 to call out the military. The bookseller hid for some days, then 
 gave up his business and left the province. 
 
 Hutchinson himself was involved in the next affair. His two 
 elder sons, Thomas and Elisha, had been obliged to sign the 
 agreement, and to allow the Committee to put a padlock on the 
 warehouse where they kept their tea. Now that the term had 
 expired, they demanded the tea, but were refused — they must wait, 
 and start fair. They took off the padlock, removed the tea, and 
 began to sell. Others did the same. At once a Merchants' 
 Meeting was called, the Committee again demanded the tea, and 
 when it was refused the whole body of the meeting went to the 
 house of the Lieutenant-Governor — his sons being of his household 
 — to make the demand in form. Hutchinson harangued them out 
 of a window, and required them to disperse, as if they were rioters. 
 But next morning — as he says, being persuaded by seeming friends, 
 who represented the possibility of personal danger to Thomas and 
 Elisha — he sent for William Phillips, Moderator of the meeting, and 
 
 ^ Bancroft. 
 
204 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 engaged that his sons should deposit the price of the tea sold, and 
 return the rest. He speaks with bitter regret of this " error in his 
 public trust," and says he felt " more trouble and distress of mind 
 from it, than he had done when his house and great part of his 
 property were destroyed. He was triumphed over, and reproached 
 for the concession by the men who, under colour of friendship, 
 advised him to it. The peace of the town was not restored." 
 
 Again he summoned the Council ; again they refused to act. 
 He sent for all the Justices within fifteen miles, but after consulta- 
 tion with each other they advised him that there were times when 
 irregularities could not be restrained — the people were agitated 
 from a sense of danger to their just rights and liberties ; they 
 declined to take any measures for stopping the merchants' meetings. 
 Several of the Justices even attended those meetings, and voted for 
 the resolutions. Lastly, Hutchinson sent the Sheriff to read a paper 
 to the meeting, desiring it to disperse, as it was illegal. The meeting 
 sent back a written message ^ that they believed their meeting was 
 warranted by law, and that they were determined to keep consciences 
 void of offence towards God and man. 
 
 Still some merchants refused to comply, and rabbles took to collect- 
 ing outside their shops to prevent customers from entering. Posts 
 were set up, with hands pointing in derision. Theophilus Lillie, who 
 had begun to sell, found such a post before his door. A neighbour, 
 one Richardson, a tide-waiter, and informer for the Customs, asked 
 a countryman to drive his cart-wheel against it. It would seem that 
 some boys came by, carrying coarse paper paintings — figures of 
 importers. Whether Richardson attacked them or no was disputed, 
 but a crowd collected, the boys hooted, threw snowballs and 
 stones, and drove Richardson into his house. Some said he fired 
 instantly — others that the mob were forcing their way into his 
 house before he fired. The shot killed a boy of eleven, the son of 
 a poor German. The mob were for hanging Richardson then and 
 there, and had got a halter, but were persuaded to take him to a 
 Justice. A grand funeral was given to the poor boy. Hutchinson, 
 whose mind always ran on the most ill-omened precedents he could 
 find, compares it to that of Sir Edmundbury Godfrey, and of 
 "young Allen, killed in St. George's Fields." 
 
 A great deal of pains has been taken to prove and to disprove a 
 very early intention on the part of the Colonies to throw off the 
 yoke of Great Britain. Half as much pains bestowed on examining 
 into what we were making that yoke mean, must convince every 
 
 ' Bancroft says that Hutchinson kept this message, which was in Hancock's 
 handwriting, intending to make use of it if Hancock were brought to trial. 
 
THOMAS HUTCHINSON 205 
 
 student of human nature that nothing but overwhelming physical 
 force could maintain any government as impossible as the British 
 had become in North America. The only wonder is that they so 
 long endured the restrictions on their trade. But they knew no 
 better — restrictions were the fashion of the time ; and as long as the 
 French were in America the British flag was a defence from foreign 
 conquest. 
 
 All the evidence shows that if the Home Government had not 
 flaunted its right to make more of these acknowledged " anti- 
 commercial " laws, whenever it might feel disposed ; if the 
 soldiers had been removed before blood had been shed ; if the 
 whole of the Revenue Act had been repealed — things would have 
 quieted down, and separation might have been deferred for a 
 generation. But it must have come — at the latest when the popula- 
 tion of the Colonies overtook that of Great Britain. And long 
 before that it would have become impossible to control a people 
 beyond the sea, so like us in political sentiment and stubborn 
 independence, so unlike in outward conditions. As Paine soon 
 after said, England and America belong to different spheres. 
 Already the provinces counted one-third as many inhabitants as 
 these islands. The only possible end was separation. In the 
 latter part of the eighteenth century, the privilege of a titled 
 Governor, and a few decorations to prominent citizens, would have 
 counted as nothing compared with the priceless right of a nation to 
 work out its destiny on the lines marked by Nature. 
 
 The Stamp Act, taken alone, might have been forgotten, as an 
 isolated mistake. But we left nothing undone to show that it was 
 part of a policy. We appeared determined to teach the colonists 
 what government from a distance means, and how intolerably it 
 hampers a country's energies. Not content with this, we carefully 
 impressed on them that our chief object was to get as much money 
 out of them as possible — even though the loss to them might be 
 very great, and the gain to ourselves very small. It was the height 
 of imprudence to retain the tea-tax at the very moment we were 
 filling Boston with soldiers — it seemed as though we wished them 
 to realise that their money was being extorted from them at the 
 point of the bayonet. And to do this about a threepenny duty was 
 the most conspicuous way of showing them that above all things 
 else we desired to keep them in subjection. 
 
CHAPTER XXVII 
 THE 5TH OF MARCH, 1770 
 
 "A military force should be employed in the last extremity, not in the first 
 instance." — George Grenville. 
 
 " Something may and must be done to humble the leaders of the people of this 
 town, and so keep the inhabitants in order. I have tried the Council, and re- 
 presented to the Judges the illegality of the town-acts. They say there is no 
 possibility of helping it — the body of the people are all of a mind, there is no 
 
 stemming the torrent. . . . ■ tells me, he is fully convinced that nothing but 
 
 sharp external force will bring Boston into a state of subordination. " — HtUchinson' s 
 Letter, ma7-ked " Secret and Confidential" March 25, 1770. 
 
 As each succeeding mail from England made it more certain that 
 the tea-duty would be continued, the movement for non-consumption 
 revived. The women were joining. " One week 300 wives of 
 Boston, the next no more, with 126 of the young and un- 
 married," ^ renounced tea till the Act should be repealed. The 
 Superior Court of Suffolk County found bills of indictment 
 against Sir Francis Bernard, Thomas Gage, Esq., Commander- 
 in-Chief of his Majesty's forces on the Continent, the Five 
 Commissioners of Customs, and the Collector and Comptroller 
 for the Port of Boston, "for slandering the Province to the 
 King's Ministers." And though, of course, nothing came of this, 
 the boldness of the Judges was startling. It was even said that 
 Samuel Adams had ended a speech, " Independent we are, and 
 independent we will be." 
 
 As the winter wore on, the insolence of the soldiers, and 
 the friction between them and the townspeople, increased. It 
 would perhaps be unjust to say that Hutchinson wished for a 
 collision as an excuse for more extreme measures ; but he wished 
 for the more extreme measures ; and at a most critical moment, 
 when fully warned that the soldiers were in a dangerous temper, 
 he took no precautions — he did not even tell the colonels they 
 must confine their men to barracks. The blood shed on the 
 5th of March, 1770, must therefore for ever be on his head. 
 
 ' Bancroft. 
 206 
 
intL siH (Jt MARCH, 1770 207 
 
 Hutchinson's own account, as he gives it in his History, 
 must be taken as the best case he could make out for himself. 
 He admits that "the two regiments were a continual eyesore" 
 to the inhabitants of Boston, and that "there appeared a rooted 
 enmity on both sides." He says that the officers took pains to 
 keep the men from showing their resentment, but admits they 
 found this impossible ;' and he intimates that the disturbances 
 at New York, about the cutting down of the Liberty Tree there, 
 " tended to encourage the people in Boston." Discontent, he 
 says, was evidently increasing all the month of February. On 
 Saturday, March 3, Lieutenant-Colonel Carr, who commanded 
 the 29th, made complaint to Hutchinson of the frequent abuse 
 offered to his men, and particularly of a fray the morning before, 
 at Gray's Ropewalk,i in which a soldier was very dangerously 
 wounded. On Monday Hutchinson showed this letter to the 
 Council, and several members advised him to remove the troops. 
 It was even said that these small frays would be followed by one 
 more general. When, after this warning, Hutchinson tells us 
 that in the evening parties of soldiers were driving about the 
 streets, and that both they and the "clusters of inhabitants" in 
 different parts of the town, seemed to have "something more 
 than ordinary upon their minds," it is impossible to acquit him 
 of criminal neglect of duty, if he really wished to avoid a riot, 
 and of something much worse if he intentionally abstained from 
 action. 
 
 There was great apprehension in the town. Gray had gone 
 to Dalrymple. A corporal of the 29th had warned Matthew 
 Adams to stop indoors on Monday evening, "for mischief 
 would be done — the soldiers were determined to be revenged 
 on the ropewalk people." Early in the evening there were but 
 few people in the streets. Witnesses at the trial swore that the 
 parties of soldiers driving about, challenged the townspeople, 
 and struck at them with sticks and sheathed cutlasses. People in 
 different parts of the town were insulted. Some time between 
 eight and nine, a party poured out from the barracks of the 14th 
 in Brattle Street, armed with clubs, cutlasses, and bayonets, 
 Ensign Mall, at the gate of the yard, crying, "Turn out, and I 
 will stand by you ! kill them ! stick them ! knock them down ! 
 run your bayonets through them ! " Headed by this boy, they ran 
 through the archway of Higglestone's Alley, but Lieutenants Minchin 
 and Dickson — to their credit be it recorded — with great difficulty 
 
 ' "Gray's Ropewalk, near Green's Barracks in Atkinson Street,'' afterwards 
 Pearl Street. The barracks of the 29th were here. 
 
2o8 ENGLAND AiNU amukh^a 
 
 drove them back to barracks. They seem, however, to have got 
 out again later. 
 
 Soldiers were gathering in King Street, where a dozen gentle- 
 men stood together a little below the Town House, and a few 
 people in front of the Custom House, "where the King's money 
 is lodged." There was a young moon, with a cloudless sky 
 above the new-fallen snow. A crowd of 'boys were pelting the 
 sentry at the Custom House with snowballs and bits of ice. The 
 sentry abused them, and they returned the abuse. Probably it 
 was at this moment that a captain of the 14th passed, and a 
 barber's boy called after him, "There goes a mean fellow, that 
 hath not paid my master for dressing his hair 1 " The sentry 
 left his post, and followed the boy into the middle of the street, 
 bidding him show his face. " I am not ashamed to show my 
 face to any man," said the boy pertly. The sentry, with his 
 musket, "gave a sweeping stroke on his head, and made him 
 reel and stagger, and cry very much.'' A fellow-apprentice asked 
 the sentry what he meant. The sentry swore at him, and 
 threatened to " give him something," if he did not get out of the 
 way ; and fixing his bayonet, he ran at him, pursuing as the boy 
 ran away. This collected a few more persons near the Custom 
 House, and by alarming the sentry, was the immediate cause of 
 the catastrophe — he knocked on the Custom House door, and 
 two persons came out, and ran to the mainguard, where they 
 spread a report that the people were murdering the sentry. It 
 seems to have been at this moment — 9 o'clock — that the bell of 
 the Meeting House at the head of King Street rang out as if for 
 fire, and brought many people running thither, supposing there 
 was a fire. Captain Preston declared he was told the bell was a 
 signal to call in the country-people. At the same time, a party 
 of soldiers ("about ten grenadiers"), armed with clubs, cutlasses 
 and bayonets, rushed up from Cornhill, where they had assailed 
 and wounded several, even slashing at persons standing at their 
 doors. They entered King Street from Exchange Lane, brandish- 
 ing their arms, and crying, "Where are the cowards?" 
 
 Most of the people had gone off when the soldiers burst into 
 King Street. Suddenly seven or eight soldiers rushed out from 
 the mainguard, their arms glittering in the moonlight, shouting, 
 " Where are they ? Let them come ! " Preston himself says that 
 they " rushed through the people, and by charging their bayonets 
 in half circle, kept them at a distance." He also says that " some 
 well-behaved persons " asked him if the guns were charged. " I 
 replied, yes. If I intended to order the men to fire ? I answered 
 
THE sTH OF MARCH, 1770 209 
 
 no." Knox, "the bookseller," — hereafter to be General Knox, 
 Secretary of War for the United States,— deposed that he was 
 remonstrating with Preston — whose men had attacked several 
 persons with bayonets on no provocation — some even who had 
 their backs towards them. Preston seemed in great haste and 
 very agitated. Knox took him by the coat, and told him for 
 God's sake to take his men back again — " For if they fire, your 
 life must answer for the consequences." "I know what I am 
 about," said Preston. Just then a soldier was struck by a stick 
 — some said by a piece of ice ; he raised his gun and fired. 
 Preston says he reprimanded him, that a general attack was then 
 made by the crowd, and that some persons from behind called 
 out, "Damn your bloods, why don't you fire?" Instantly three 
 or four of the soldiers fired, one after another, and directly after, 
 three more, in the same confusion and hurry. "The mob then 
 ran away, except three unhappy men, who instantly expired." 
 
 The three persons killed outright were Crispus Attucks, a 
 mulatto, Samuel Gray, a young man from the Ropewalk — shot 
 from behind as he bent over Attucks — and James Caldwell, also 
 shot from behind. Samuel Maverick, a lad of seventeen, died next 
 morning, and Patrick Carr on the 14th. Six others were badly 
 wounded. The town declared, and the weight of evidence shows, 
 that the mob was mostly composed of boys and lads. Of the 
 slain, Attucks was the only one who had taken any active part. 
 
 As soon as the slaughter was known, all the bells of the town were 
 rung, and a large body of townsmen assembled in King Street, and 
 remained there until the soldiers had returned to barracks. Immedi- 
 ately after the catastrophe, two or three ran to the Lieutenant- 
 Governor's house (about half a mile off), and implored him for God's 
 sake to go to King Street, or there would be a general action 
 between soldiers and people. Hutchinson went instantly, called for 
 Preston, and asked him why he had fired without orders from the 
 Civil Magistrate. He says the noise was so great that he could not 
 hear Preston's answer. Then some who feared for Hutchinson's 
 personal safety cried, " The Town House, the Town House ! " and 
 with irresistible violence he was forced up by the crowd into the 
 Council Chamber. There a demand was immediately made that 
 he should order the troops back to barracks. He refused — would 
 act in the morning — the law should take its course — he would live 
 and die by the law. "Order the soldiers to barracks," said a 
 gentleman. "I have no power," said Hutchinson. With great 
 difficulty he was persuaded to look from the window opposite the 
 mainguard, and see that the soldiers were still drawn up in position 
 
2IO ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 ready to fire. A party had in fact tried to march with beat of drum 
 to Murray's Barracks, and the main body of the 29th was now 
 drawn up in King Street under arms, their lines extending across 
 the street, facing the crowd. At one moment the first rank knelt, 
 and the whole platoon presented their guns. Witnesses swore they 
 were heard to say, " This is our chance ! " At length Hutchinson 
 did look, and after a time he sent for Colonel Carr, and told him 
 to take the men back to barracks. Then he went out on the 
 balcony, and called to the great body of the people, expressing his 
 great concern at the unhappy event, and his intention to order a full 
 enquiry. He urged them to go home peaceably, On this there was 
 a cry, " Home ! — home ! " and great part went home. Hutchinson 
 remained in the Council Chamber till three in the morning, con- 
 ducting a preliminary examination. A hundred of the townspeople 
 remained with him, to watch the examinations. Dalrymple was 
 summoned. At first Preston could not be found, but at length he 
 surrendered, and he and the whole corporal's guard which had fired 
 were placed under arrest. All night the drums were rolling, and 
 there were cries of, " Town-born, turn out ! " 
 
 The Council met early next morning. The Selectmen were already 
 waiting to tell the Lieutenant-Governor that minds were exceedingly 
 disturbed, and that unless the troops were removed the most terrible 
 consequences were to be expected. A town-meeting had been called 
 for eleven o'clock. The Justices of Boston and the neighbour-towns 
 were there, to give their opinion that if the troops remained in the 
 town it would not be possible to restrain the people. Hutchinson said 
 he had no authority to move them — " The King put them there." But 
 he had sent for the colonels and would tell them of the application. 
 The Selectmen went away to Faneuil Hall, the colonels arrived at 
 the Town House, and very soon Samuel Adams, Hancock, and 
 thirteen more came as a Committee from the town-meeting, to say that 
 soldiers and people can no longer live together safely — nothing but 
 the prompt removal of the troops can prevent further carnage. Not 
 only this town, but all the neighbouring towns, are resolved they 
 shall go. " An attack on the King's troops will be high treason," 
 said Hutchinson, "and every man would forfeit his fife and estate." 
 While the Committee waited in another room, Dalrymple proposed 
 to move the 29th — the most obnoxious regiment — till Gage's pleasure 
 could be known. Hutchinson informed the Committee of this 
 offer, and rose from Council, intending, as he says, to receive no 
 more application on the subject ; but the Council and Dalrymple 
 prayed he would meet them again after noon. Dalrymple was 
 strong for moving the 29th — it had always been intended to quarter 
 
THE 5TH OF MARCH, 1770 211 
 
 it in the Castle. As is often the case, it was the soldier who was 
 willing to make a concession, and the civilian who was for driving 
 the matter to extremity. Dalrymple even said that if the Council 
 would unanimously advise the Governor to desire him to move the 
 troops, he would do it, even without a positive order. So when 
 Hutchinson met his Council after dinner, he found it unanimous — 
 it had been divided in the forenoon. Even the Secretary of the 
 Province had gone over, while the colonels had been reinforced by 
 the commander of one of the men-of-war. 
 
 As soon as they were met, another Committee came from the 
 town-meeting. Samuel Adams led them again, and as they faced 
 each other, Hutchinson must have remembered the affidavits he had 
 got up, with the aid of Bernard and Oliver, and had sent to 
 England, to form the basis of a charge of treason, under the statute 
 of Henry viii. The Committee came to say that the reply of the 
 morning was unsatisfactory — all the troops must be removed. 
 There are near three thousand people assembled, and nothing less 
 than total and immediate removal will satisfy them. Hutchinson 
 repeated that the troops were not under his authority. Dalrymple 
 spoke again of moving the 29th. " If you can move one, you can 
 move both," said Adams. " It is at your peril if you refuse.'' To 
 Hutchinson he said, " The meeting is become very impatient. A 
 thousand men are already arrived from the neighbourhood — the whole 
 country is in motion. Night is approaching — they wait for your 
 answer.'' He saw Hutchinson's knees tremble, and his face grow 
 pale. As usual, Hutchinson was thinking of ill-omened precedents 
 — this time it was Governor Andros and the Revolution of 1688. 
 When the Committee had retired, the members of Council gave 
 their opinions separately, with their reasons. Tyler said, "These 
 are not the people vrho pulled your house down — they are people of 
 the best character among us, men of estates, and men of religion. 
 You cannot prevent the people taking up arms — there are 10,000 of 
 them ready, in Boston, Charlestown, Roxbury, and the other near 
 towns, determined the troops shall go." Others said that men 
 would come from Worcester County and the Vale of the Connecticut. 
 The whole Council was strongly for sending all the troops to the 
 Castle at once. But Hutchinson still held out ; and Dalrymple, on 
 hearing about the 10,000 men, began to draw back a little from the 
 responsibility of removal. It was late. The people were still in 
 the streets. Hutchinson repes^ted that he had no power to order 
 the troops to be removed, though he desired it. 
 
 By this time Dalrymple dared not act upon this. It was a 
 dead-lock. The officers were growing restive at their humiliation. 
 
212 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Expresses were posting to Gage for orders. As soon as this was 
 known, the fear that Gage would order the troops to remain in town 
 redoubled resistance — another town-meeting was called, this time 
 in the Old South. Hutchinson received another visit from Samuel 
 Adams and his friends. There was an angry scene. Adams 
 warned the Governor of the resentment of the whole people. 
 Hutchinson gave a peremptory refusal. Then Adams appealed 
 once more to Dalrymple, and that same evening the 29th, and next 
 day the 14th regiments were removed to the Castle. In a private 
 note, Hutchinson says Dalrymple was much distressed, but " brought 
 it on himself" by offering to move the 29th. It was an ungrateful 
 remark — by moving the regiments, Dalrymple saved Hutchinson 
 from the frightful danger of a second collision. The sequel proved 
 that the people were not to be intimidated. If there had been 
 another affray, the townsmen would not again have been shot down 
 without defending themselves. Those who best knew their temper, 
 knew that before Gage could send reinforcements there might not 
 have been a British soldier left alive in Boston. 
 
 The funerals of Gray, Caldwell, Maverick, and Attucks took 
 place on the 8th. The shops were closed ; the bells of Boston, 
 Charlestown, Roxbury, and Cambridge were tolled. The procession 
 began to move between 4 and 5 in the afternoon. The hearses met 
 in King Street, very near the fatal spot. Those who followed 
 walked six deep ; never was seen so great an assemblage in the 
 streets of Boston. 
 
 Even now Hutchinson continued to irritate the people. The 
 Assembly met for a short session. It had expected to be allowed 
 to return to Boston, but Hutchinson said it was the King's pleasure 
 it should continue to sit at Cambridge. But the words of 
 Hillsborough's letter ran, " unless the lieutenant-governor has more 
 weighty reasons for holding it at Boston, than those which were 
 mentioned by the secretary of state against it." Hutchinson says 
 that he saw no reason sufficient " to justify him in the eyes of the 
 King." As usual, he tried to throw the responsibility on someone 
 else — he made the Representatives suppose he had a " peremptory 
 order " ; but when they asked to see it, he flatly refused to show it. 
 There was great indignation, but, by the Charter, a new Assembly 
 must be elected in May, and Hutchinson hoped it would be more 
 tractable. He had been offered Bernard's succession, but his health 
 was beginning to suffer from "the vexations of a short administration 
 of 6 or 8 months," and he quailed at the prospect of the Governor- 
 ship. He desired to be excused from the honour intended him, 
 and he even asked to resign the Lieutenant-Governorship, and to 
 
THE sTH OF MARCH, 1770 213 
 
 be allowed to end his days as Chief Justice, a post he had already 
 held for ten years, with " more satisfaction thahhe had ever received 
 in any of the three branches of the legislature." 
 
 On March 12 the Committee drew up a Report '^ of these 
 occurrences. It was submitted to a town-meeting on the 19th, 
 and ordered to be printed, and a vessel was chartered to take out 
 copies to London — they were transmitted to Governor Pownall. 
 With them went a circular letter to the Duke of Richmond and 
 others. This account says that the soldiers had been insolent from 
 their first coming. They landed "with all the appearance of 
 hostility, marching with ensigns of triumph ! Since then they have 
 been abusing the people, rescuing prisoners, and even firing on 
 the inhabitants in the street, when in the peace of God and the 
 King ; and when we have applied for redress in the course of the 
 law of the land, our magistrates and Courts of Justice have 
 appeared to be overawed by them." It also asserts that when the 
 soldiers fired on the 5th of March, several muskets were discharged 
 out of a window of the Custom House. The account was prepared 
 by Bowdoin (Commissioner Temple's father-in-law), Pemberton, 
 and Dr. Joseph Warren. It refers to the affair of Captain Wilson, 
 of the 59th, proved guilty, "not long after the soldiers arrived, of 
 enticing negroes to rob and murder their masters, and repair to the 
 army for protection." 
 
 With another of his unfortunate comparisons, Hutchinson says 
 that poor Patrick Carr, who was mortally wounded, but lingered 
 many days, said before he died that he had never seen soldiers bear 
 so much from mobs in Ireland, as Preston's guard did from the 
 people on this occasion — a fact which ought to be recorded in 
 justice to Irish mobs. 
 
 Richardson's trial came on for the shooting of the German boy 
 in February. In spite of the Court ruling that it was at most only 
 manslaughter, the jury brought it in murder. On a technical 
 pretext sentence was deferred till next term, and when that time 
 came, Richardson, brought into Court early in the morning, pleaded 
 the King's pardon, and absconded (the word is Hutchinson's) 
 before anyone knew anything of the matter. The trial of Preston 
 was delayed, to give time for minds to cool. Meanwhile, the 
 election took place, and again the Assembly was ordered to meet 
 at Cambridge. 
 
 The Instructions given by the town of Boston to their new 
 representatives were written by Josiah Quincy, a young lawyer of 
 twenty-six. In language strangely solemn — the shadows of an early 
 ^ " A Short Narrative," etc. 
 
2 14 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 death were already gathering round him — he spoke of the perilous 
 times, the alarming prospect; unwarrantable and arbitrary exac- 
 tions, grievances, discontents, convulsing every part of the British 
 Empire — " under God, only stern and inflexible fortitude can save 
 us from destruction.'' A series of occurrences, and especially the 
 late journals of the House of Lords, afford reason to believe there 
 is a deep-laid plan of imperial despotism, partly executed, for the 
 extinction of all civil liberty. That admirable work of ages, the 
 British Constitution, seems just tottering to ruin. You must 
 summon up the whole united faculties of mind and body, if we 
 are not to be overwhelmed beneath the ruins of our rights. Then 
 much on the grievance of sitting at Harvard, on the " mystical 
 jargon " of the high-prerogative crown-lawyers, with exceedingly 
 disrespectful remarks on King James, First of England, who once 
 " dared " to tell a Parliament to abstain from discussing affairs of 
 State ; and very earnest exhortations to a union of the Colonies. 
 It is now no time to halt between two opinions — if we recede, the 
 dogs of war will be let loose upon us ; the demands of fraud, 
 violence, and usurpation are insatiable : it is no time to listen to 
 either cajolings or threatenings. Bear yourselves then like the 
 faithful representatives of a freeborn, awakened, and determined 
 people, who, conceived in liberty, will never give it up till they 
 yield their souls to God who gave them. 
 
 Hutchinson — who sent this document home — says that it 
 appeared to indicate the design of a general revolt, and, along with 
 the message at the close of last session, caused the first measures 
 taken to guard against rebellion — the troops sent till now having 
 been merely intended to suppress mobs and tumultuous assem- 
 blages. 
 
 The Assembly began at once to protest against its banishment. 
 The Representatives demanded to know the reason for it, and 
 Hutchinson dared not tell them that his own letters were the 
 reason. They complained of the inconvenience of sitting in one 
 town, when all the public documents and offices were in another — 
 to say nothing of the disturbance to the studies of Harvard. 
 Hutchinson replied that they could easily send for the few papers 
 they really needed ; and as for the studies of Harvard, the vacation 
 was just going to begin — and, anyway, the hearing the debates 
 would be an education for the students. So flippantly did an old 
 Harvard man talk of his College. The Assembly retorted that, 
 if they moved the records, and built themselves a suitable house, 
 they " have no assurance that the next freak of a capricious minister 
 will not remove the court to another place." Out of a House of 
 
THE 5TH OF MARCH, 1770 215 
 
 102, 96 voted that it was not expedient to proceed to business while 
 they were constrained to hold their session out of Boston. 
 Hutchinson replied that he was afraid of offending the King ; and 
 asked if they thought it safe to leave Castle William and Fort 
 Pownall unprovided for ? And that Act of the province for raising 
 a tax of _;^8o,ooo? And the Act for hmiting suits at law; and 
 many others? You can pass these as well at Cambridge as at 
 Boston. 
 
 The Council and the House were resolute. The House sent 
 long messages, quoting precedents,^ answering the Governor's plea 
 of prerogative, by asserting that prerogative has no just foundation 
 but the good of the community. As it was very much to the 
 hurt of the community that the House did not sit at Boston, they 
 were certain his powers must be sufficient to allow their return — 
 finally, that they refused to proceed to business until he did. 
 Hutchinson replied that his Majesty thought it for the good of the 
 community to have them sit at Cambridge — he could not move them 
 without further instructions. He had " thought fit " that the 
 general court should convene at Cambridge. He must be the final 
 judge of fitness and expediency, by virtue of his commission. 
 
 By 96 to 6, the House resolved to do no business until removed ; 
 and Hutchinson prorogued them on June 25, when they had sat near 
 a month. 
 
 They met again on July 25, and Hutchinson, after a long speech, 
 to prove that it was just as legal to convene them at Cambridge as 
 at Boston, told them if they persisted in their refusal he must 
 prorogue them again. They sent up a worse message than the 
 former ones— this time they quoted " the great Mr. Locke/' whose 
 opinions on government appear in most of the speeches of the 
 friends of America at Westminster. The great Mr. Locke had 
 asked, in this matter of prerogative, who was to be the judge 
 whether the power was made a right use of? and had answered his 
 own question by saying that there can be no judge on earth — the 
 people have no remedy but an appeal to heaven. "We would, 
 however, by no means be understood to suggest, that this people 
 have occasion at present to proceed to such extremity." 
 
 1 The House had sat in Boston every year from 1692 to 1 72 1, in which year, 
 the small-pox being in Boston, and the members afraid to sit there, Governor 
 Shute moved it to Cambridge — but it was expressly promised that this should not 
 form a precedent. A few years later, the unlucky Governor Burnet, in one of his 
 many disputes with his legislature, removed it to Salem. It had very occasionally 
 been moved afterwards — usually when the small-pox was in Boston, The 
 House had always shown great jealousy of these removals being construed into 
 precedent. 
 
2i6 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 For, when a people talk about appealing to heaven, they mean 
 that they are prepared to appeal to arms. 
 
 Hutchinson says, he hoped, as they did business with so little 
 difficulty in the spring, that this time too they would have yielded. 
 Then he would soon have let them return; But he saw that they 
 were retaliating for his claim to decide where they should sit, by 
 exerting the power given them by the Constitution of determining 
 when they should do their business. " This was bidding defiance." 
 
 He answered them on the 3rd of August, in a long, rambling, 
 quibbling speech — a weak bandying of words. They doubt whether 
 the King really wishes the Court held at Cambridge — " I have no 
 doubt of it." He does not show his Majesty's orders, because he 
 knows his Majesty desires him not to do so. They have called 
 the instruction of June, 1768, "an impudent mandate." He presumes 
 they do not know it was an order from his Majesty. They have no 
 right to suppose these orders are the acts of the Minister, and not of 
 the King. The affairs of America are grown so serious, that his 
 Majesty is giving them his immediate attention— every order there- 
 fore from the Secretary of State must be supposed to come immedi- 
 ately from the Crown, and ought not to be treated with contempt. 
 Then the freedom with which they have spoken of the attorneys 
 and solicitors-general, will, he fears, bring dishonour on themselves 
 — these offices have for fifty years past been filled by persons of the 
 highest reputation. As for the quotation from Mr. Locke, it does 
 not apply to their case — nobody is trying to enslave or destroy them, 
 and as they very prudently do not wish to be understood to mean 
 they have occasion to appeal to heaven, he is at a loss to conceive 
 why they quoted Mr. Locke at all. They talk of the Charter as a 
 compact — when they refuse to do business, are they not failing in 
 performing their part of the compact ? They have said that this 
 is to reassert the doctrine of Chief Justice Tresilian, in the time 
 of Richard 11 ; but what Tresilian said was, that the King had the 
 government of Parliament, and might appoint what shall be first 
 handled, what next, and so on, and punish as traitors any that 
 acted contrary to his pleasure. He shall now prorogue them again, 
 and hopes when next they meet they will join with him in what is 
 necessary for the real interest of the province. Then he prorogued 
 them, and soon something happened which drove these technical 
 quibbles out of their heads. 
 
 There was a small provincial garrison in Castle William, — a fort 
 on an island two and a half miles below the town, so situated with 
 regard to the channel for ships, that no ship could pass in without 
 being commanded by the Castle guns. The garrison was composed 
 
THE 5TH OF MARCH, 1770 217 
 
 of young men of the province, and was under the command of the 
 Governor. The Castle had been repaired at the expense of the 
 province, and contained stores belonging to it. Phillipps, one of 
 the Committee at the time the troops were removed, was the 
 colonel. One evening, early in September, 1770, the news spread 
 through the town that the provincial garrison had been turned out, 
 and that Dalrymple was in command at the Castle. 
 
 A fortnight before Gage had written from New York, proposing 
 this, and asking how best it could be done ; and Hutchinson, 
 supposing it the General's own idea, had replied that it was in- 
 expedient, and Gage had agreed. But now he had sent a copy 
 of an order from the King in Council, and a letter from Hillsborough, 
 ordering him to seize the Castle, as soon as Gage should appoint 
 the officer to command it. Hutchinson received this order at 
 Milton, six miles from Boston, where he had a country-house. He 
 fully realised the gravity of the step, and the indignation it would 
 arouse. Everything in the Castle was the property of the town, and 
 to hand it over to the King's troops " would set the people in a 
 flame." At first he thought of writing again to Gage, advising 
 delay, but, " before the express was ready, he altered his mind." 
 He reflected that if the intention got wind, execution would be 
 more difficult, and then all the consequences of the delay would be 
 charged on him. He summoned the Council, and sent an order in 
 writing to Dalrymple to replace the provincial sentinels by King's 
 troops on the island. When the Council met, having first exacted 
 secrecy upon their oaths as councillors, he informed them of the 
 order — not for advice, but to let them know he meant to retain the 
 ammunition and stores. The Council tried to vote that the stores 
 should be removed by the town, but the vote was lost. Then 
 Hutchinson went to Dorchester Neck, and crossed to the island in 
 a barge. He entered the state-room of the Castle, and called for 
 the keys. There was an angry scene with Phillipps, but he was 
 finally compelled to give up the keys, and Hutchinson handed them 
 over to Dalrymple. He so much feared public wrath, that next day 
 he took refuge in the Castle, and stayed there a week. 
 
 The House reassembled on October 2, and Hutchinson form- 
 ally acquainted them with what had been done. It was a clear 
 violation of the Charter, and the House sent "a very angry 
 message," that very false representations must have been made to 
 their Sovereign, and if he was privy to them, the Lieutenant-Governor 
 ought to communicate them. Another long duel of words followed 
 — the House announced its intention of examining the parties 
 present at the transfer — the Lieutenant-Governor might be present 
 
2i8 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 if he chose. He did not choose. The Houses kept a day of 
 prayer, and requested Hutchinson to appoint a day of solemn 
 humiliation for the whole province, but as it happened to be close 
 on " Thanksgiving," he recommended them to add their prayers to 
 their thanksgivings. And he thought he had triumphed, because 
 the Assembly, in view of " new and insupportable grievances," 
 resolved to go to business after all. 
 
 At last, on October 24, Captain Preston was tried for " the 
 murder committed in King Street on the 5th of March." Josiah 
 Quincy and John Adams (hereafter to be the first American Envoy 
 to the Court of St. James') defended the prisoner. The main 
 question was, did Preston give the order to fire ? But all the four 
 Judges — Trowbridge, Oliver, Cushing, and Lynes, charged that 
 even if he did, it was not murder, since there was a riot. The jury 
 acquitted him, because it was not proved that he gave the order to 
 fire. Two of the soldiers were found guilty of manslaughter ; the 
 rest were acquitted, because one man of them had not discharged 
 his musket, and the jury were afraid of condemning an innocent 
 person. In a singularly ungenerous account of these trials 
 Hutchinson calls this a result "much to the dishonour of the 
 inhabitants of Boston." It was really greatly to their credit that 
 resentment was allowed to have so little influence. 
 
CHAPTER XXVIII 
 THE PUBLICITY OF DEBATE 
 
 " Sir, whether the proclamation be legal or not, I shall not now say. ... As to 
 Mr. Twine Carpenter, I shall certainly oppose the giving him any support ; he is 
 neither more nor less than a familiar of Mr. Wheble, called his devil ; by a com- 
 pact between this devil and Wheble, the devil arrests him. This arrest, the 
 city magistrates determined to be illegal, and therefore they bound the devil 
 over to answer for what he had done. Now, as it manifestly appears, that the 
 devil and the printer are in compact, I think the wisest thing we can do, is 
 to leave the devil to the printer, and the printer to his devil. Whether printer 
 beats devil, or devil beats printer, is of no consequence. There may possibly be 
 the devil to do, and certainly there will be the devil to pay ; but that is nothing 
 to us. . . ." — Mr. Solicitor-General Wedderhum on the Proceedings against the 
 Printers, March 20, 1 77 1. 
 
 "The Report being read[of the Committee relative tothelateObstructionsof the 
 Execution of the Orders of this House], the House burst out into a roar of laughter 
 at the impotency of the conclusion." — Parliamentary Debates, April 30, 1771. 
 
 It will have been seen that the whole aim of George iii's policy- 
 was to destroy the spirit of the Constitution, while preserving the 
 letter. The parties described by Almon were the avowed 
 ministerialists, who voted with Ministers ; and the " King's Friends," 
 who voted as the inner Cabinet (who alone were in the secrets of 
 government) might direct, and who were sometimes ordered to vote 
 with Opposition, when the visible Cabinet was to be thwarted in the 
 interests of the invisible ; or when one wing of Opposition was to be 
 strengthened to weaken the other. By means of his " Friends " — 
 some of whom were members of Opposition itself, bought over for 
 a price, or a place — the King could pull every string on which he 
 would have Parliament dance. Every conclusion was foregone; 
 only on some very rare occasion, when a more acute crisis than usual 
 frightened these unprincipled hirelings into throwing over party for 
 a moment, was any division in the House of Commons an expression 
 of that House's convictions. To secure the unquestioning obedience 
 of the King's Friends, and ensure that they should be Jacks-of-both- 
 sides at need, the money of the Civil List was poured out like water, 
 while the King's grocer and tallow-chandler went unpaid. Each 
 
 219 
 
220 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 year brought the same appeal to the dutifulness of the House, to 
 raise the amount by which his Majesty was in arrears ; each year, 
 Opposition asked how it was that a sovereign with no private vices 
 — who had no mistresses, and did not lose at cards, and whose 
 Court might almost be called parsimonious as to outward show — was 
 always getting deeper and deeper in debt? Each year they said 
 openly that the reason was that the King was always providing him- 
 self with more and more " Friends." 
 
 The extreme interest of this period lies in the fact that, when 
 bribery, corruption, and "influence" had rendered Parliaments the 
 pliant tools of a King inflated by ideas only fit for an absolute 
 monarchy, the people themselves stepped into the breach. Noble 
 as was the stand made by the Opposition of those times, it could 
 have done nothing but for the support it received from without. 
 Within the walls of Parliament, it hardly secured a single division ; 
 but it breathed a soul into the whole people. It is deeply interest- 
 ing to watch this stirring of the waters — the first beginnings of that 
 current of public opinion which sixty years later swept away the 
 whole system of rotten and pocket boroughs, and struck the most 
 effectual blow at corruption, by making constituencies too large 
 to be bought and sold. That Parliaments are fallible, that their 
 decisions may be illegal, and that the people may call them to 
 account by demanding a General Election — these articles of faith 
 are professed in all the speeches of Opposition upon the Middlesex 
 Election, and they were endorsed by enthusiastic meetings all over 
 the country. The active participation by the people in their own 
 government was no longer to be confined to the moment of an 
 election, after which it was a kind of treason to arraign their repre- 
 sentatives — it was to be continuous ; and, as was inevitable, this view 
 quickly embodied itself in a demand for the full and immediate 
 pubhcation of the debates. The year 1771 marks the beginning of 
 regular and avowed reports of the debates in Parliament. Wilkes 
 was at the bottom of the movement. Public interest in the debates 
 was never more intense than in the days when " influence," and the 
 "double cabinet," had reduced Parliamentary government to an 
 elaborate farce. So keen was the interest, that for the last year 
 several of the great magazines had published the debates under the 
 merest pretence of a veil — the title of Debates in a Newly- 
 established Society, and more or less transparent travesties of the 
 speakers' names — even this concealment to be more often than not 
 thrown off in the Index to the completed volume. Only one im- 
 portant restriction was observed — these debates must not be published 
 in the session in which they took place. Thus the public were 
 
THE PUBLICITY OF DEBATE 221 
 
 always many months behind in their knowledge of how their repre- 
 sentatives had acquitted themselves in fight. 
 
 The printers of newspapers — we now call them "editors" — had 
 long chafed under this restriction. Wilkes now urged them to risk 
 all, and "try the question." Accordingly, on the 8th of February, 
 1 77 1, R. Thompson, of the Gazetteer and New Daily Advertiser, 
 and John Wheble, of the Middlesex Journal, printed the debates. 
 
 The House lost no time. That same day Colonel Onslow made a 
 complaint, and moved that the printers be brought to justice for in- 
 fringing a standing order of the House, against printing in newspapers 
 the transactions of the House of Commons. He had been repre- 
 sented in these newspapers as having made a motion to stop the 
 liberty of the Press, by preventing the speeches of members being 
 printed during the session. Other members said that this practice 
 had got to an "infamous height" — members are represented as say- 
 ing what they did not say, and their interests with their boroughs are 
 hurt by it. It was never done — even in the most violent opposition 
 to Sir Robert Walpole, no speeches were published, except during 
 the intervals of Parliament, "and then only in a decent manner." 
 Opposition acknowledged the abuse, but said that Cinna,i and other 
 ministerial writers, also personally abused the most respectable 
 gentlemen who differed from them. If the speeches were never 
 made, they were no speeches, therefore could not be punished — not 
 that this practice was a new one, for Charles the First had authorised 
 his " minister. Lord Clarendon," to publish speeches merely to mis- 
 represent members. Opposition said that this prohibition was a 
 usurpation — the House assumed it in the bad times of 1641, when 
 its privileges were used in defence of the people, and were acquiesced 
 in for that reason — their usurpations being considered securities for 
 their independence ; but now these weapons were being converted 
 into instruments of tyranny. The constituents ought to know what 
 their representatives did, that they might know whether to re-elect 
 them. Onslow's motion was carried, and the printers were ordered 
 to attend next Monday. 
 
 They did not come. On the 19th they were again ordered to 
 attend — an attempt to add "for contempt of this House" was 
 hastily dropped. After this, messengers were sent to the printers' 
 houses, who always reported that they found them not at home. So 
 when on March 4 the Deputy Sergeant-at-Arms told the House he 
 had made diligent search, but had not been able to meet with the 
 printers, the House resolved on "an humble Address to his 
 Majesty," for a royal proclamation to apprehend John Wheble and 
 
 ' A writer in the papers, Itnown to be under the patronage of Lord Sandwich. 
 
222 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 R. Thompson. On the 12th Colonel Onslow told the House he 
 had got " three brace of printers more." He then complained of 
 the Morning Chronicle and London Advertiser, printed for William 
 Woodfall ; the St. James^ Chronide, printed by Henry Baldwin ; The 
 London Packet, for T. Evans ; The Whitehall Eve?iing Post, printed 
 by T. Wright ; the General Evening Post, sold by S. Bladon ; and 
 the London Evening Post, printed for J. Miller ; as containing the 
 debates and misrepresenting the speeches of several of the members 
 of this House, in contempt of the orders, and in breach of the 
 privilege of the said House. And he moved that the London 
 Chronicle be delivered in at the table and read. 
 
 Opposition very earnestly opposed this — they warned the House 
 that they had already tried to punish two printers, who would 
 probably get the better of them in the end ; that they had better 
 consider well ; the speeches were no disgrace to the members who 
 made them — if they did not complain, the House need not do so. 
 Then many of the papers were disguised with blanks, disguised 
 names, etc., and it might be difficult to fill these up. And every 
 newspaper in England — near 200 — had done the same. If 
 the House prosecuted them all, it would have no time for any 
 other business — it is attacking " a hive of bees or an hydra, who 
 would sprout 100 heads for one cut off." But, by 140 to 48, 
 the House agreed to Onslow's motion, and ordered William 
 Woodfall to come before it on Thursday next. Then paragraphs 
 from the St. James' Chronicle were read — among others, "Jeremiah 
 
 Weymouth, the d n of the kingdom, spoke as follows." Whereon 
 
 Colonel Barre moved, that "Jeremiah Weymouth, the d n of 
 
 this kingdom, is not a member of this House." The Minister 
 could not well say he was ; and nobody chose to say that Jerry 
 Dyson was, so the previous question was moved, but lost. Then, 
 Colonels Barre and Onslow rising to speak, the Speaker called on 
 Onslow, though Barr6 rose first, whereupon the ministerialists made 
 an attempt to get a ruling which would have given the Speaker 
 uncontrolled power to select the member he chose, though not 
 " first up " — Dyson himself proposing this amendment. To prevent 
 this, the minority again moved for adjournment. No fewer than 
 34 divisions were taken this night, mostly for adjournment, 
 the others on all and every point which Opposition could seize 
 upon, such as : That The London Packet be read ; That Thomas 
 Evans be ordered to attend, together with all his compositors, 
 pressmen, correctors, blackers, and devils ; then, That the White- 
 hall Post be read; and so on, till finally, at four in the morning, 
 it was carried, That the Printers shall attend the House. 
 
THE PUBLICITY OF DEBATE 223 
 
 On the gth, the Royal Proclamation was published in the 
 Gazette, with a reward of ;^5o for apprehending the two 
 printers, and on the 15th Wheble was apprehended by one 
 Carpenter, variously described as a brother printer who had a 
 grudge against him, and as Wheble's "devil" acting in concert 
 with his master. Wheble was carried before Alderman Wilkes, 
 then sitting at the Guildhall. As the proclamation was the sole 
 ground of the arrest, Wilkes discharged the prisoner, who then 
 charged Carpenter with assault and unlawful imprisonment. 
 Wilkes immediately wrote to Lord Halifax — lately become Southern 
 Secretary — to inform him of what had occurred, and express his 
 opinion that Wheble had been arrested " in direct violation of the 
 rights of an Englishman, and the chartered privileges of a citizen 
 of this metropolis.'' He had therefore bound him over to prosecute 
 Carpenter. 
 
 The same day John Miller of the London Evening Post was 
 arrested by a Messenger of the House, and taken before Lord 
 Mayor Brass Crosby, Beckford's successor, and Aldermen Wilkes 
 and Oliver. The Deputy Sergeant-at-Arms showed a warrant from 
 the House of Commons, but the Lord Mayor discharged the 
 prisoner, who thereupon gave the Messenger in charge, and was 
 bound over to prosecute. When the House heard this, it ordered 
 John Wilkes to attend this House to-morrow morning. 
 
 Wilkes replied that he noticed this order did not require him 
 to attend in his place. In the name of the freeholders of Middlesex, 
 he again demanded his seat. " When I have been admitted to 
 my seat, I will immediately give the House the most exact detail 
 of my conduct relative to the late illegal proclamation." Thus 
 the House found itself once more defied by its old enemy. In 
 its wrath it made another mistake, and found itself defied by a 
 new one. 
 
 North did not want to engage in this new quarrel — he had had 
 enough of Wilkes. It was the King who was resolved to send 
 Crosby and Oliver to the Tower. Sir Gilbert Elliott, a King's 
 Friend, made an inflammatory speech, asking the House if it was 
 afraid of a Mayor and two Aldermen? The Court majority was 
 made up of pensioners, lawyers (who had just seen one man made 
 Attorney-General for attacking the principles of liberty, and another 
 man made Solicitor-General for ceasing to defend them); West 
 Indians, " with more slaves than constituents," and East Indians, 
 with the spoils of Bengal up their sleeves. Crosby and Oliver were 
 ordered to attend in their places. 
 
 Brass Crosby had begun life as an attorney. He had married 
 
224 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 two rich widows, and (his enemies said) had employed their 
 fortunes in deahng in seamen's tickets. His manners were rude, 
 and his appearance was coarse, but he was able and courageous. 
 He had lately defended the City's rights in another matter — when 
 the Admiralty's press-gang came within the bounds, and seized 
 three men, Crosby had released the prisoners, and committed 
 the lieutenant who took them. OHver was a West India merchant, 
 and is described as " a perfect gentleman." 
 
 On the morning of March 19, handbills were dispersed about 
 the City, to make known that the Lord Mayor — although he had 
 been confined to his room for sixteen days with a severe fit of 
 gout — was going to the House "to support your rights and 
 privileges." An hour or two later another handbill invited citizens 
 to bring the Lord Mayor back "in triumph from the House of 
 Commons." They did so. Crosby set out at two in the afternoon, 
 "very feeble and infirm, but in good spirits." A prodigious crowd 
 " of the better sort " were at the Mansion House, and cheered him 
 all the way to Westminster. " On his arrival there, one universal 
 shout was heard for near three minutes," the people calling to 
 him as "the people's friend, the guardian of the city's rights and 
 the nation's liberties." Arrived, he showed an undaunted spirit — ■ 
 calling for the City Charter, and justifying his action as legal ; and 
 though probably he was technically in the wrong in disregarding 
 the Warrant of the House, the House soon put itself so hopelessly 
 in the wrong that this point mattered little. At five he asked 
 permission to retire. The populace had waited for him, and drew 
 his coach back from St. Paul's to the Mansion House. A noisy 
 and disorderly debate followed. North moved, and Wedderburn 
 and Fox seconded, that Mr. Morgan, clerk to the Lord Mayor, 
 do attend this House to-morrow morning, with the minutes taken 
 before the Lord Mayor relative to the Messenger of this House, 
 giving security for his appearance.^ 
 
 Next day the House debated for nine or ten hours whether 
 counsel should be heard for Crosby — decided in the negative — on 
 Savile's motion, denying the right of the House to enforce its 
 orders within the City of London (also lost) ; and then con- 
 sidered whether Wilkes' letter should be read. Thomas de Grey 
 advised them to let him alone — proceedings would hurt themselves 
 and benefit him. It was in this debate that Wedderburn made 
 his humorous speech about the arrest of Wheble by his own 
 " devil." Wilkes was again ordered to attend this House ; and then 
 
 1 On March 14, the printers Baldwin, Wright, and Bladon were reprimanded 
 on their knees at the Bar of the House. 
 
THE PUBLICITY OF DEBATE 225 
 
 the Lord Mayor's clerk was called in and ordered up to the table. 
 The book was opened, and the recognisance of William Whitham, 
 Messenger to the House, was read. Here Aldermen Oliver, 
 Sawbridge, and Trecothick, with other members, "shocked at 
 this violent and arbitrary attack on the laws of the land," left the 
 House. When they were gone, North moved that the Messenger's 
 recognisance be erased out of the Lord Mayor's book, and they 
 made the clerk erase it. 
 
 This was the 20th. Next day the Common Council met, and 
 thanked the Mayor and Aldermen for defending our excellent 
 Constitution. They also determined not to pay the Messengers 
 of the House the ;£^o reward promised by the proclamation. 
 
 On the 25th, when the Lord Mayor attended again, there was 
 again "a prodigious concourse." As members went into the House 
 they were asked if they were for the Lord Mayor, and if they said 
 No some of them were two hours getting through the crowd. 
 Selwyn was hooted and hustled by mistake for Onslow. The 
 High Constable of Westminster was called in and examined as to 
 " a tumultuous crowd," which interrupted members coming into the 
 House, and he explained that he had tried in vain to disperse them. 
 The House had the entry in its Journal of February 27, 1699, read 
 — on which day there was also a tumultuous crowd outside. 
 Several Justices of the Peace were called in, and ordered to dis- 
 perse the people, which they at last succeeded in doing — the House 
 all this while debating what the Lord Mayor had done, and what 
 should be done to him. At last, at ten o'clock, feehng very ill, he 
 obtained leave to withdraw, and his friends outside took the horses 
 from his coach, and drew him all the way home by torchlight. 
 
 Then there was a fierce debate — the printers, the Lord Mayor, 
 Alderman Oliver, the influence of the Princess Dowager- — all were 
 mixed up together in furious recrimination. The House hesitated 
 between censure, expulsion, and the Tower. It would have pre- 
 ferred expulsion, but its former experience was not encouraging, so 
 it chose the Tower. At past midnight, a motion for the previous 
 question having been lost by 272 to 90, it was carried: That the 
 Discharge of Miller was a Breach of Privilege ; That to hold the 
 Messenger of the House to bail for a pretended assault was also 
 a Breach of Privilege. And then, at near one in the morning ' 
 of the 26th, Wallace proposed to proceed against Alderman 
 Oliver. Barrd said no Court would proceed on a new trial at this 
 hour. But a motion for adjournment was lost by 2r4 to 97. 
 When Oliver's friends asked what was the charge against him, 
 Charles Fox replied, " What we shall move against the gentleman 
 
226 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 will depend upon what he shall say in his defence." Oliver said 
 that he asked for no delay. Welbore Ellis moved that Richard 
 Ohver be committed to the Tower. Onslow seconded. Then 
 Barr6 rose in wrath. " Listen," he said, "listen ! for if you are not 
 totally callous, I will speak daggers to your souls, and wake you 
 to all the hells of guilty recollection ! That I may not be a witness 
 of this monstrous proceeding, I will leave the House, nor do I 
 doubt that every independent man will follow me. These walls are 
 baleful, they are deadly, while a prostitute majority holds the bolt 
 of parliamentary omnipotence, and hurls its vengeance only upon 
 the virtuous ! To yourselves, therefore, I consign you ! " Then he 
 walked out, Dunning and about thirty others following him.i The 
 ministerialists were furious — they almost drew their swords on 
 Barre. Voices cried " To the Bar ! " But the grim old soldier 
 looked at them, and they thought they had best let him go. In a 
 furious speech. Fox — then in the most truculent vein of his most 
 truculent days — said the business of the nation was " to choose us 
 — it is ours to maintain the independence of Parliament." At 
 seven in the morning of the 26th, Oliver was carried quietly to the 
 Tower.^ 
 
 On the 27th " an amazing number of people " accompanied the 
 Lord Mayor to the House. The Justices, the High Constable, and 
 the guards were all at Westminster. The Lord Mayor was seven 
 hours reaching the House. ^ There were more Justices than 
 constables — the latter were soon overpowered, and one of their 
 staves was dashed through the glass of North's coach. He was 
 pulled out, his hat was torn into a hundred pieces, the mob " de- 
 molished the chariot, and but for Sir William Meredith's interfering, 
 would probably have demolished him." The cries of the assailants 
 told Meredith that they mistook North for Charles Fox, who was 
 like him in figure. Charles had made himself the most unpopular 
 man in the country — he had been foremost in keeping Wilkes out 
 of the House, and was now engaged in keeping secret what was 
 done inside. Presently the heraldic foxes on his coach pointed 
 him out to his enemies. They broke up the coach, rolled Charles, 
 in his fine clothes, in the gutter, and pelted him with oranges, stones 
 and mud.* 
 
 ^ Barre's letter to Chatham. 
 
 2 The House voted Oliver's committal by 1 70 to 38. 
 
 ' Besides the Aldermen and Common Councillors, he was attended by a long 
 procession of "merchants, bankers, shopkeepers, and brokers." 
 
 ^ A great deal of smuggling was done in French laced suits. Not long 
 before a whole tailor's shop, which Charles was bringing over for himself and 
 his friends, was seized and burnt by the searchers at the Dover Custom House. 
 
THE PUBLICITY OF DEBATE 227 
 
 It was impossible to transact business. The Justices came to 
 the Bar to say they could not even read the Riot Act. The Sheriffs 
 — luckily they were members of the House — went out, attended by 
 other members, and by five o'clock had quieted the crowd so far 
 that the debate could be resumed. Welbore Ellis moved for an 
 enquiry into the disturbance. Fox " behaved like an apprentice," 
 called his colleagues assassins, and spoke of the prisoners as criminals, 
 while members as they came in from dinner called, " Question ! 
 question ! " North made the most singular exhibition. With tears 
 running down his cheeks he complained that he could not resign — 
 that he was made the scapegoat of a policy he detested, and was at 
 the mercy of the " insolence of a vile cabal." This was aimed at 
 Sir Gilbert Elliot, the leader of the King's Friends, who pulled the 
 strings on which the Minister was compelled to dance. But then 
 he went on to accuse the minority of having hired the mob, " to do 
 without what they despaired of doing within." 
 
 As Crosby was so ill, it was proposed to commit him only to the 
 custody of the Sergeant-at-Arms ; " but his lordship told the House 
 he was much recovered, and desired to go to his honourable friend 
 in the Tower." The numbers on the division were 202 to 39. 
 Barr^ and others refused to vote. The Lord Mayor was allowed to 
 sleep at the Mansion House, and was taken to the Tower at four 
 next morning, before the gates were opened. The people mobbed 
 Fox again in Palace Yard, and he angrily complained to the House 
 — this was owing to the Sheriffs having " used gentle methods of 
 p^suading them to disperse the day before — they ought to have 
 used compulsive methods.'' Not only had he been insulted that 
 day, but the King had been insulted going to the House of Lords. 
 
 Throughout this business, the House had been chary of attacking 
 Wilkes. They now repeated their order to attend, but his letter 
 demanding to attend in his place was not read. At last they 
 ordered him to attend on the 8th April — and, equally afraid of his 
 obedience or disobedience, adjourned to the 9th (" on account of 
 the Easter holidays "). The King himself had said, " I will have 
 nothing more to do with that devil Wilkes." Wilkes had beaten 
 George in in obstinacy ! His Majesty also now had the good sense 
 to express himself as "averse to meddling with the printers." 1 
 
 The Dukes of Manchester and Portland, Lord Rockingham, 
 Lord Temple, Admiral Keppel, Mr. Burke, Mr. Dowdeswell, and 
 many others, attended by the Sheriffs, waited on the Lord Mayor 
 and Mr. Oliver in the Tower ; and on the ist of April two carts, 
 " filled with persons intended to represent some imaginary criminals 
 1 The King to Lord North, March 17, 1771. 
 
228 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 of high rank," went through the City to Tower Hill. In the first 
 cart was a chimney-sweeper, who acted the part of clergyman. 
 The person in the first cart " was pretendedly beheaded," put into a 
 hearse, and carried off. 
 
 On the 5 th — the day the Lord Mayor was brought up privately to 
 Chief Justice de Grey's, in Lincoln's Inn Fields, and re-committed — 
 two more carts went to Tower Hill. In the first was an executioner, 
 " having the care of three figures painted on pasteboard, near as 
 large as life," hanging on a gallows. They had nightcaps on, and 
 handkerchiefs over their eyes, and their names were written on their 
 backs — "two persons of rank, and an alderman"; in the second 
 cart were four such figures ; and they were all burned on Tower 
 Hill, and presently their dying speeches were cried about the 
 streets. 
 
 In the debate on the Budget (April 10) Lord North promised 
 to take a shilling off the land-tax next year. We have made peace 
 with Spain, " with advantage and honour." Trade flourishes ; the 
 American disputes are settled; "there is nothing to interrupt the 
 peace and prosperity of the nation, but the discontents of a 
 desperate faction,'' and these will subside every day. 
 
 Barr^, Burke, and Dowdeswell replied with great warmth that 
 the Peace would be short, and that the Lottery was an iniquitous 
 project to bribe the servants of the public to betray their trust — it 
 will put ;^i 50,000 into the pockets of the subscribers — whom 
 Ministers can select. Cornwall said he should call for an enquiry 
 next year, as to who had had these tickets. A few days later he 
 made a motion not to allow members of the House to subscribe for 
 more than twenty tickets in the Lottery. He showed how these 
 ministerial lotteries were engines of bribery. It was easy to con- 
 trive that the friends of Administration should be the subscribers. 
 In this way, in 1769, ^^i 20,000 was shared among the Ministers' 
 friends. This year, it is the same — the Minister divides among his 
 dependents as many tickets as they want, and upon each ticket they 
 gain ;^2 ; so if a member has two hundred tickets, he gains ;^4oo. 
 Will such a sum not influence his vote ? 
 
 Of course the motion was lost. 
 
 A few other events of this eventful session deserve to be noticed. 
 The first was the affair of the Shoreham voters. There was a 
 Society at Shoreham called "the Christian Club," professedly a 
 charitable society, but its charity ended at home. It was in reality, 
 a conspiracy to sell the borough to the highest bidder. The 
 members were sworn to secrecy, by as many oaths and penalties as 
 Freemasons. A select committee did the business — they never 
 
THE PUBLICITY OF DEBATE 229 
 
 appeared or voted at an election ; but they told the others how to 
 vote, and when the election was over shared the money between the 
 members. All would have gone well if they had not quarrelled 
 with the returning ofificer, who was one of them — he returned the 
 other candidate on the ground that he knew many votes given to 
 the first were corrupt. Now all came out, and the House was 
 obliged to take notice of the affair. Eighty-one freeholders of 
 Shoreham were disfranchised by name. 
 
 Alderman Sawbridge's motion for a Bill to shorten the duration 
 of Parliaments was lost ; so was Chatham's for a Dissolution. The 
 present Parliament had been bought so dear that Administration 
 was in no hurry to buy another. Nobody replied to the Duke of 
 Richmond's motion to expunge the Resolution of February 22, 1770, 
 concerning the Middlesex Election. 
 
 Parliament was prorogued on the 8th of May — this set the 
 prisoners free. As soon as the park guns were fired, the Tower gates 
 were opened — a cavalcade was in waiting far more imposing than that 
 which escorted the King to the House of Lords. The Lord Mayor, 
 in his state-coach, attended by the Sheriffs, the Aldermen in their 
 scarlet robes, the Common Councilmen, and the Honourable Artillery 
 Company, came in triumph to the Mansion House, the Artillery 
 Company first firing a salute of twenty-one guns at the Tower gates. 
 Crowds lined the streets all the way, and people stood at their 
 windows applauding. The City was illuminated that night, and the 
 mob broke the Speaker's windows. 
 
 This was the last great public demonstration for several years. 
 Wilkes and Home quarrelled soon after, and henceforth feeling was 
 divided, every City patriot being for one or the other. From this 
 time the Whigs and Radicals became two distinct sections of the 
 Liberal Party. The immediate result was a decline in the vigour of 
 Opposition.! -phe disorganisation begun by the death of George 
 Grenville was completed by the enormous and crushing majorities 
 of the last session. The King's Friends were too strong. A " sullen 
 torpor " seemed to take possession of Opposition in Parliament, and 
 the quarrels of Wilkes and Home soon delivered Administration 
 from all fear of opposition outside Parliament. 
 
 But the Printers had won.^ The case of the Messengers ended 
 in a Nolle Prosequi, the Attorney-General ruling that " it was indecent 
 that the name of the Crown should continue as the protector of a 
 messenger of the House of Commons." So the House had to 
 
 ' Albemarle, Life of the Marquis of Rockingham. 
 
 2 When brought before the House, all the Printers declared that their papers 
 would be ruined if they ceased to report the Debates. 
 
230 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 pocket the affront, and the debates were printed more boldly than 
 ever. The Printers laughed at the authority of the House, and in 
 the next session they even published the votes. The House took 
 no notice, and in March, 1772, made an Order, by which persons 
 brought to the Bar received judgment standing, unless it should be 
 otherwise directed. 
 
CHAPTER XXIX 
 STEPS TOWARDS RELIGIOUS LIBERTY 
 
 " Liberty is indeed a glorious thing ; but liberty in the church is now growing 
 like liberty in the state. It is liberty run mad . . . liberty of thinking and 
 judging is one thing, and liberty of public preaching is another. . . . Thought is 
 free, but public preaching should be laid under some restraints and regulations. 
 But it may be said, why not allow liberty of preaching, as well as liberty of 
 printing ? Because the liberty of the press is not attended with such dangerous 
 consequences. , . . No wise statesman would allow a full toleration to any 
 religion, without knowing in the least what that religion is. Now what security 
 do these men offer to give that their doctrines shall not be subversive of public 
 peace ? . . . They will subscribe ' a declaration of their believing that the Holy 
 Scriptures of the Old and New Testament contain a revelation of the mind and 
 will of God, and of their receiving them as the rule of their faith and practice. ' 
 And is this all ? Can anything be conceived or expressed in lower and meaner 
 terms than this ? . . . Would not any Papist, would not any Fanatic, would not 
 any Heretic freely make the same declaration? . . . There is no sect even of 
 half Christians that would not make at least this declaration. . . . And will your 
 lordships grant your license to any such teachers and preachers? . . . There 
 would be nothing then that can hinder the doctrines of Popery from being 
 preached, as freely as any other." — Dr. Newton, Bishop of Bristol, on the Bill for 
 the Relief of Protestant Dissenters, May 19, 1771. 
 
 " Some gentlemen talk of raising barriers about the Church of God and protect- 
 ing His honour. . . . What! man, a poor contemptible reptile, talk of raising barriers 
 about the Church of God ! He might as well talk of guarding Omnipotence, and 
 raising barriers about the throne of heaven . . . that Church against which the 
 gates of hell shall not prevail ! " — Sir George Savile on the Clerical Petition. 
 
 A CURIOUS little incident occurred early in this session. Dr. Nowell, 
 Principal of St. Mary Hall, Oxford, preached the usual sermon on 
 the 30th of January. It happened that only the Speaker and four 
 other members attended. Next day the House thanked the doctor, 
 and desired him to print the sermon — Sir William Dolben and Mr. 
 Popham were to convey this message. Accordingly, Dr. Nowell 
 printed his sermon, and members who had not the privilege of 
 hearing it, now read it, when " there appeared an universal detesta- 
 tion of the high church doctrines contained in it, it being to all 
 intents a libel on King and people." Tommy Townshend said it 
 ought to be burnt by the common hangman. North admitted he 
 could not defend the doctrine. Gibbon says the House was nearly 
 
232 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 agreeing to burning the sermon, when it recollected that it had 
 thanked Nowell for preaching it ! So then it was proposed to 
 expunge the vote of thanks. Sir William Dolben^who had moved 
 that vote — said he did so at the request of the Speaker — it was 
 seconded by Mr. Popham — both had heard it preached. He 
 defended the sermon, and complained of the spleen of Mr. 
 Townshend, who had thrown it three times on the table declaring 
 it ought to be burnt. Mr. Popham acknowledged he had heard — 
 and had disapproved ; " but Sir William insisted that I must have 
 been mistaken," and that the Sermon did not say what I thought it 
 did. " Now I have read it, I find I have been misled by Sir William 
 Dolben ; for I declare I think it the most exceptionable sermon I 
 have ever seen." The Speaker said he had not approved of it either, 
 and had mentioned the " disgust " it gave him to a gentleman who 
 " I was sure would tell the preacher of it again." He thought the 
 offensive passages would be left out in printing. Montague said the 
 Clergy were in a very disagreeable situation when obliged to preach 
 on the 30th of January. He remembered when a clergyman was 
 refused the Thanks of the House, because he preached in the 
 opposite extreme to Dr. Nowell. "What can the Clergy do? I 
 intend to bring in a Bill to abolish the service." Newdigate, "with 
 extreme violence and heat," justified both the preacher and Charles 
 the First — he must own that King had one fault, which was complying 
 too easily with the wishes of his people — he instanced the execution 
 of Strafford, whose warrant Charles signed though he knew he was 
 innocent. With more of the virtues of Charles " as a King and a 
 gentleman." Lord Folkestone said the service for the 30th of 
 January need not be a guide to any Englishman, for it was drawn 
 up by Father Peters, confessor of James ir. 
 
 Nowell had exhorted his Majesty to " copy closely the blessed 
 Martyr's example " — Sawbridge hinted that he hoped to be made a 
 bishop for this. " And I fear that our censure may have the same 
 success." Dolben wound up the debate by saying he never would 
 confess that Charles the First was a tyrant — he considered that 
 monarch a perfect pattern to royalty. Nevertheless, the House 
 felt that if Nowell was to be applauded, none of them, from the 
 King downwards, ought to be there — and the motion to expunge 
 was carried without a division.' 
 
 1 " I am glad to find Mr. Montague's motion has been rejected, as it will keep 
 many worthy men in good humour ; besides the abolition of the day would not be 
 very delicate." — The King to Lord North, March 2, 1772. The "worthy men" 
 were the divine-right Tories, who had now come over to the side of the King 
 de facto. 
 
STEPS TOWARDS RELIGIOUS LIBERTY 233 
 
 On February 4, 1771, the great cause of the Chamberlain of 
 London against Allen Evans was finally decided in the House 
 of Lords, greatly to the honour of that House, and of Lord Mansfield, 
 whose conduct in matters of religion was as admirable as in politics 
 it was usually unworthy. Mansfield pitilessly exposed the action 
 of the Corporation — they chose Evans for Sheriff because they 
 knew he would refuse to take the Sacrament at Church, therefore 
 could not serve ; therefore, as they hoped, could be made to pay the 
 fine of ;!^5oo for refusing to serve — a fine many Nonconformists 
 had paid before him. Mansfield's argument was unanswerable. 
 He said that, before the Toleration Act, to refuse the Sacrament 
 was in the eye of the law a crime, every man being required by law 
 to receive it at church once a year. " But the case is quite altered 
 since the Act of Toleration : it is now no crime for a man to say he 
 is a Dissenter, nor is it any crime in him not to take the Sacrament 
 according to the rites of the Church of England : nay, the crime is 
 if he does it contrary to the dictates of his conscience." " Con- 
 science is not controllable by human laws, nor amenable to human 
 tribunals. Persecution will never produce conviction. Persecution 
 is against natural religion, revealed religion, and sound policy." 
 There was no occasion to revoke the Edict of Nantes ; the 
 Jesuits needed only to have advised a plan similar to what is con- 
 tended for in the present case ! " Make a law to render them 
 incapable of office ; make another, to punish them for not serving. 
 If they accept, punish them ; if they refuse, punish them. My Lords, 
 this is a most exquisite dilemma, it is a trap no man can get out of ; 
 it is as bad persecution as that of Procrustes. If they are too short, 
 stretch them ; if they are too long, lop them. Small would have been 
 their consolation to have been gravely told, the Edict of Nantes is 
 kept inviolable ; you have the full benefit of the Act of Toleration, 
 you may take the Sacrament in your own way with impunity ; you are 
 not compelled to go to Mass. Was this case but told in the City of 
 London as of a proceeding in France, how would they exclaim 
 against the Jesuitical distinction ! " 
 
 The House immediately gave judgment for Evans, nemine con- 
 tradicente. 
 
 Perhaps this set men thinking about the whole question of a 
 dominant Church. On the last day of this year the undergraduates 
 of Cambridge University presented a petition to the Vice-Chancellor, 
 praying for relief from subscribing the Thirty-nine Articles of the 
 Church of England on taking their bachelor's degree. There 
 was a similar movement at Oxford. On February 6, 1772, afar 
 more important petition was presented to the House from about 
 
234 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 250 clergy and other professional men, praying for relief from 
 subscription. This petition was a result of the impression made 
 by Archdeacon Blackburne's celebrated work, The Confessional. 
 At the beginning of 1771, by desire of some of his brethren, the 
 Archdeacon published Proposals for an application to Parliament 
 for relief. Paley drew up the petition, and Sir William Meredith 
 presented it.' It was violently opposed by Sir Roger Newdigate, 
 who represented it as a Socinian movement. The best speech was 
 that of Sir George Savile — a truly beautiful defence of religious 
 liberty. His position was simple — as Protestants, we have all a 
 right to judge for ourselves what Scripture teaches ; in subscribing 
 the Articles, we accept the interpretation of other men. It was 
 remarkable that no one had a good word for the Articles themselves 
 — many even owned they were self-contradictory and unscriptural ; 
 but they kept out somebody, and they were "Articles of Peace." 
 They did not ask what kind of peace is maintained by refusing to 
 amend what ought to be amended, or what kind of Church is 
 maintained by telling all who propose to amend anything that they 
 ought to leave it. But the argument of arguments in this question 
 is the undeniable fact that a forced subscription keeps out the 
 conscientious, and lets in the unconscientious — shuts out the 
 scrupulous, and admits the unscrupulous. 
 
 Charles Fox " did not shine in this debate," nor could it be won- 
 dered at. " He had sat up playing hazard at Almack's, from Tuesday 
 evening 4th, till five in the afternoon of Wednesday 5th." ^ For four 
 nights and days, he had been to bed but once — drinking hard, 
 playing harder, and losing hardest of all, till his friends declined to 
 believe that such persistent ill-luck could be the work of chance. 
 
 ' February 6. 
 
 - An hour before he had recovered ;r^l2,ooo that he had lost, and by dinner, 
 which was at five o'clock, he had ended by losing ;,£'i 1,000. — Horace Walpole, 
 Last Jouiyials, i. 12. 
 
 This same night, after speaking, Charles won back ;£'6ooo, and next day set 
 out for Newmarket. Walpole gives a most extraordinary description of the 
 young bloods at Almack's (in Pall Mall). They played only for rouleaus of £,^0 
 each. ' ' They began by pulling off their embroidered clothes, and put on frieze 
 great-coats, or turned their coats inside outwards for luck. They put on pieces 
 of leather (such as worn by footmen when they clean the knives) to save their 
 lace ruffles ; and to guard their eyes from the light, and to prevent tumbling 
 their hair, wore high-crowned straw hats with broad brims, and adorned with 
 flowers and ribbons ; masks to conceal their emotions when they played at Quinze. 
 Each gamester had a small neat stand by him with a large rim, to hold their tea, 
 or a wooden bowl with an edge of ormolu, to hold their rouleaus. They borrowed 
 large sums of Jews at exorbitant premiums. Charles Fox called his outward room, 
 where those Jews waited till he rose, \}s\e. Jerusalem Chamber." — Last Journals, i. 7. 
 
STEPS TOWARDS RELIGIOUS LIBERTY 235 
 
 Suddenly, he washed his face — which some declared was the begin- 
 ning and end of his ablution — went down to the House, and delivered 
 an odd double-edged speech half for, half against the Petition. 
 He thought religion was best understood when least talked about, 
 and he thought the Articles savoured of Christian charity. On the 
 other hand, they ought not to be thrust down the throats of young 
 persons twelve years old (as they were at the Universities). He had 
 had to subscribe them himself at twelve — whereas a young man need 
 not take the Oath of Supremacy till sixteen. A great majority rejected 
 the Petition — even Burke voted against it. Most, however, would 
 have been willing to relieve men of any other than the clerical 
 profession. For them, they insisted that assent to the most pro- 
 found doctrines of religion should remain a performance necessary 
 for getting up in the world. 
 
 The Clerical Petition came from the Church. Next, Protestant 
 Dissenters prayed for relief. 
 
 Although, since 1688, they had a legal right to exercise their 
 religion, their ministers, schoolmasters, and private tutors were 
 obliged to subscribe the doctrinal part of the Thirty-nine Articles.^ 
 Those who did not were legally subject to heavy penalties for each 
 offence— penalties which had fallen into abeyance, but, not being 
 repealed, could always be revived. For a long while, however, as 
 the Calvinistic tendency of the Articles made them not unacceptable 
 to Dissenters, subscription was not complained of. Eut by 1772 
 the old Calvinism had much declined — men like Doddridge had 
 arisen, and there was a greater freedom of thought, and with it a 
 growing objection to sign the Articles. 
 
 On the 3rd of April, 1772, a Bill was brought in by Sir Henry 
 Hoghton, " to Relieve Protestant Dissenters.'' At the first reading, 
 there were only two dissentients — Sir Roger Newdigate and Sir 
 William Dolben. On the second, a division was taken, when 
 70 voted Aye, and 9 No. The noes protested their love for relig- 
 ious liberty, but thought there might be too much of it ; and Dolben 
 hinted that some of the supporters of " this wicked motion " were 
 of those who say in their hearts " There is no God." Newdigate 
 talked about Charles i, and made the House laugh by calling him 
 "the only canonized saint of the Church of England." Dyson 
 having quoted Mr. Locke's " Letter on Toleration," Sir Roger sug- 
 gested that "that great philosopher " was probably a Presbyterian. 
 He thought Mr. Locke's Letter the most excellent piece of reasoning 
 he had ever read ; but the system was too pure to suit the depravity 
 of man. The religion of every country bore the colour of its civil 
 ^ That is, the Articles not relating to Church Government. 
 
236 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 government — in a monarchy it was monarchical, in a republic 
 republican ; he wished to prevent the Dissenters from " giving a 
 shock" to our present Establishment, and having more privileges 
 than the Church — especially as they are on so much better a footing 
 already, being empowered to elect their own ministers. Sir William 
 Meredith said that the cruelty and inefficacy of the penal laws were 
 alone a sufficient argument for the Bill, and instanced the case of 
 Mrs. Fenning, now on the table. She was in danger of losing all 
 her property by these laws, and this was a refutation of the argument 
 for retaining such laws — that it was not in the heart of man to put 
 them in execution. To this Newdigate replied that he was not 
 very averse to the abolition of the penal Statutes, but Mrs. Fenning 
 was a Papist, and no one had ever yet proposed to repeal the penal 
 laws against that sect of Christians. Hoghton quoted Bishop 
 Warburton, that the " mark of the beast is persecution " ; and that the 
 Church in which religious liberty is maintained may truly be called 
 Christian. All the great names of Opposition spoke for the Bill. 
 
 In the Lords, Chatham and Richmond warmly supported it, but 
 the Bishops of London and Llandaff said it was a motion to relieve 
 Socinians and Deists, and frightened the House with quotations 
 from Dr. Priestley. The Bill was lost by 102 to 29. But the 
 bringing in of such a Bill at all was a sign of a change in public 
 opinion. 
 
 The King's Speech of January, 1772, promised peace, but after 
 continuing the Embargo (as there was still great scarcity of corn, 
 after the poor harvest of 1771) the first thing the Commons did 
 was to consider Mr. BuUer's motion for 25,000 more seamen for 
 the Navy. Admirals Saunders and Keppel opposed it. Keppel 
 said that when we sent ships, the French did so too, till we trusted 
 entirely to the prudence of our commander, whether or no he should 
 engage us in war. Lord North used the extraordinary argument 
 that the extra men were necessary, "not only to cope with the 
 French, but to be a check on the present officers of the East India 
 Company — who, for want of proper laws, disobeyed their masters, 
 and thereby as suddenly as exorbitantly increased their own 
 finances ; a conduct which might hazard the loss of those dominions 
 to this kingdom." Dowdeswell said this enormous increase in 
 our peace expenses was worse in its consequences than an 
 expensive war — for that was temporary, this perpetual. Stocks 
 had been kept under par during this last peace, because the 
 hopes of paying off our debts had diminished ; " this method 
 will consume us like a slow poison." But the Bill passed without 
 a division. 
 
blEFS TOWARDS RELIGIOUS LIBERTY 237 
 
 The death of the Princess Dowager,^ on February 8, 1772, at the 
 age of fifty-two, removed a figure at once prominent and obscure — 
 so much was believed of her, so little proved. That she filled the 
 head of a King of England with notions dangerous to a con- 
 stitutional sovereign and to the liberties of a free people, is certain ; 
 the rest is conjecture. A strangely resolute, haughty, unbending 
 nature, seeking sympathy from none but Bute, she carried to the 
 grave the secret of her relations with him. Her death was hastened 
 by the news from Denmark that her daughter Caroline Matilda — 
 youngest and best beloved of the King's sisters — was a prisoner in 
 the Castle of Cronborg, accused of adultery with Count Struense. 
 Two days before her death she wrote to the King of Denmark, 
 but she was dead before the reply came promising that the unhappy 
 young Queen should be treated leniently. 
 
 On February 17 there was a recrudescence of the Nullum 
 Tempus question. A member ^ whose estates were Abbey lands 
 (and whose title-deeds had once been nearly sold for waste- 
 
 ' " She had long struggled secretly with a humour in her blood, which she 
 had fatally brought into the family, and for the last three months her sufferings 
 had been dreadful, and menacing her life, yet her fortitude was invincible, 
 and she kept up to the last that disguise and reserve which predominated so 
 strongly in her character." — Walpole, Journal of the Reign of George in. 
 The Princess died of " an abscess in her throat" — others called it cancer. She 
 would let no one but "her German page or surgeon look into her throat " — and 
 once, Sir John Pringle, at the King's earnest request. The Monday before she 
 died, reading in a newspaper that she was in danger, ' ' she instantly called her 
 coach, and drove through the streets to Kew," though she fainted by the way. 
 Her last act was an attempt to reconcile the King with the Duke of Cumberland. 
 After receiving the news from Denmark, she took hardly any nourishment but 
 cordials. Bute was with her two hours on the 6th. Her extraordinary resolution 
 could not conceal that she was dying. Bute went again next day — while the King 
 and Queen were with her, but she declined seeing him. The King and Queen 
 remained all that night at Carlton House. She died early_next morning. "To 
 the astonishment of all mankind," she left no will ; and " to their greater 
 surprise, no money ! " Yet for twenty years she had enjoyed ^64,000 a 
 year, and had lived "most privately" — though "most charitable." Every- 
 one had expected she would leave at least ;^300,ooo. Walpole thinks she 
 assisted her brother, the Duke of Saxe-Gotha, but says that report suspected 
 Bute, who had bought the estate at Luton "for ;^i 14,000, before he was 
 visibly worth £20,000," had "built a palace" there, another in "town . . . 
 in short had given but too much handle to ill-natured conjecture." The 
 people "huzzaed for joy" at her funeral, and behaved with great 
 indecency. 
 
 ^ Henry Seymour. He said that the family of a law-member "was at this 
 instant ;f 120,000 the worse by the claim of a bishop upon his lands, after the 
 quiet possession for a hundred years." This was called "the Church Nullum 
 Tempus Bill." 
 
238 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 paper by a discharged servant) asked leave for a Bill to secure 
 holders of Church lands against claims of more than sixty years' 
 standing. North opposed the motion, because the member had 
 not told the House the details of his Bill. Fox fell upon North for 
 introducing a new parliamentary rule, and Ministers were more 
 nearly defeated than they had been since Fox saved them on the 
 old Nullum Tempus Bill. A day or two later, Fox resigned his 
 place as a Junior Lord of the Admiralty. Some said it was anger 
 with North. 1 Horace Walpole hints that it was by the direction of 
 his father, who was dissatisfied at not obtaining the earldom he 
 had asked for. But there was a far more important reason than 
 either of these; and the alarm, approaching to panic, caused by 
 the desertion of this wild and dissipated boy, showed that Ministers 
 guessed what he meant to do. The very day he resigned, the 
 King's Message about the Royal Marriage Bill was delivered to the 
 House of Commons. It was brought in in the Lords on January 
 30 — the day after the dreadful news came from Denmark. The 
 private marriages of two of the King's brothers were the cause of 
 the Bill.2 It " teemed with seeds of future civil wars, by bastardiz- 
 ing children of the Royal Family born in wedlock which had not 
 the King's consent." Princes marrying Enghshwomen, and having 
 issue, such issue would be preferred by the nation to " foreign and 
 unknown descendants of George 11." ^ For no descendant of 
 George 11 (except the issue of foreign marriages, over whom, of 
 course, the Kings of England could not continue control) could 
 marry without first obtaining the King's consent. " The House of 
 Commons had just maintained the Thirty-nine Articles, one of 
 which affirms that all Christians have a right to marry." 
 
 The first draft was terrible — there was no limit of age, the 
 period was for " natural life." But " the general disapprobation 
 and the defection of Charles Fox terrified Ministers so much " that 
 
 ' "The Rt. Hon. Mr. Ch. Fox dlspatch'd the following laconic letter to Ld. 
 N — th : ' My Lord, you have grossly insulted me, and I will resent it. I am just 
 going to set out for St. James's to resign my seat at the N — y board to the King. ' " 
 — Gentlemaii s Magaziiu, 1772, p. 93. 
 
 Fox himself told Lord Ossory that his reasons were very complicated — 
 the Royal Marriage Act was his chief reason. — Lord John Russell, Life of 
 Fox. 
 
 ' The young Duke of Cumberland had married the vvidowed sister of Colonel 
 Luttrell. Junius called on Middlesex to rejoice — a greater than themselves now 
 knows what it is to have a Luttrell forced on him against his will ! The Duke 
 of Gloucester had married — or was about to marry, it was not yet certain which — 
 Lady Waldegrave, niece of Horace Walpole. 
 
 * Horace Walpole. 
 
STEPS TOWARDS RELIGIOUS LIBERTY 239 
 
 the Bill was altered next day to the age of twenty-five— Mansfield, 
 "called upon by Ministers at Midnight," drafted it with this 
 "softening alteration." It was got through the Lords in a few 
 days. Rockingham insisted on summoning the Judges; but 
 Mansfield contrived to prevent their opinion from being explicit. 
 Camden made a bold speech against a Bill which did not even 
 allow the princes to be heard by counsel. Shelburne was "very 
 warm " against the Bill. Grafton was first for hearing the Judges — 
 and then explained himself away. The Duke of Richmond was 
 the most vigorous of all.i The day the Bill was read a second time, 
 the Duke of Cumberland came to the House, but except the 
 Dukes of Richmond and Bolton, not a soul spoke to him, and 
 Richmond advised him to leave the House.^ 
 
 The Bill probably passed all the easier because Chatham was 
 ill. Temple went three times to Court to assure the King that he 
 would do nothing to weaken the Government further, now it had 
 received the shock of Fox's resignation — he wished to get rid of 
 the Bill, but not at the price of upsetting the Cabinet. 
 
 In the Commons there was more trouble. Nobody liked the 
 Bill, but the King was sullenly determined it should pass. When 
 he suspected that Burgoyne had purposely absented himself from 
 a division, he was about to dismiss him from the governorship of 
 Fort William. The country knew little about the business. All 
 reporters were excluded. The debate lasted ten hours. De Grey 
 said it had become a question of bodily strength. The House 
 was "very restive." In particular was the Bill abhorrent to the 
 House of Fox. Fox's father. Lord Holland, ran away with the 
 daughter of the Duke of Lennox, in whose veins was the blood of 
 the Stuarts. Charles' aunt, Lady Sarah Lennox, would have been 
 Queen of England but for Bute and the Princess Dowager — and 
 perhaps for a fortunate accident which removed Lady Sarah from 
 the scene for a few weeks.^ 
 
 The second reading did not come on till February 26. Charles 
 
 ^ Both Dukes were descended from Charles II. Richmond was a Lennox. 
 
 ^ It is fair to say that Cumberland's private character was very bad. In 
 July, 1770, Lord Grosvenor obtained ;^io,ooo damages in the King's Bench 
 against him for seducing Lady Grosvenor. (The damages were laid at 
 ;^ioo,ooo.) Grosvenor's own conduct had been such that he was unable to 
 apply for a divorce. The King had to find the money — with costs, ;^i3,ooo 
 — which he said he had difficulty in raising. The Duke of Gloucester was 
 a very different" man, and much liked. 
 
 ^ She broke her leg, and before she could return to Court the King had 
 been worked on to give up his intention. Lady Sarah was the mother of the 
 Napiers. 
 
240 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 was still but twenty-three, but already he " could confound the reason- 
 ing of his opponents," ^ and he had more than once saved the Govern- 
 ment from defeat. He now fought the Bill persistently. He had 
 never spoken so well as now — but he had never spoken in so good a 
 cause. In its final shape the Bill enacted that no descendant of 
 George ii (other than the issue of princesses married out of 
 England) shall be capable of contracting marriage without the 
 consent of his Majesty, his heirs or successors, under a sign- 
 manual; and any marriage contracted without such consent first 
 obtained, shall be null and void. But a prince can marry, after 
 the age of twenty-six, if he has entered his intention to do so on the 
 books of the Privy Council, twelve calendar months before, and if 
 both Houses of Parliament have not expressed their disapprobation 
 of the marriage. The Bill was fought inch by inch in both Houses. 
 Rockingham and Camden tried to restrict it to the children and 
 grandchildren of the reigning King, and to the heir-presumptive, 
 and to omit the annulling clause for persons of full age. "Thurlow 
 thought the Royal Family went ad infinitum. The Speaker 
 thought it would be monstrous if it did." ^ The Bill passed in the 
 Lords with two strong Protests. 
 
 It was perhaps for his services in getting the Marriage Bill 
 through the Commons, that on the i8th of June North was 
 invested with the "blue ribband" of the Garter. 
 
 The country said that Charles Fox had turned patriot. Gibbon 
 wrote that he was learning to pronounce the words, "country, 
 liberty, corruption." But he did not go into Opposition, as was 
 expected. He was modestly silent, or spoke briefly and mildly on 
 questions connected with the Admiralty. "No one thought he 
 would always sit among the army contractors and Anglo-Indians 
 below the gangway." Toward the end of the year the Cabinet was 
 almost reconstructed, solely to take him in again — and keep him 
 out of mischief. Jenkinson was made a Joint- Vice-Treasurer for 
 Ireland, and Fox got his vacant place of Junior Lord of the 
 Treasury.' 
 
 ' Almon says this of him while still a ministerialist. 
 
 ^ Beaumont Hotham's " Letter to John Lee." This is the only account of the 
 proceedings in the Commons on February 20, the day the King's Message came 
 to both Houses. ' ' We have rallied much better than was expected. The Great 
 Champion of the day was the Speaker Norton ; but I believe before he had 
 finished his speech, the Ministry conceived him to be more their enemy than 
 their friend." The numbers were 200 to 164 on the right of the Kings of England 
 to control all marriages in the Royal Family. 
 
 '"A King's friend was thrust upstairs into an Irish Vice-treasurership, a 
 nobleman who had been a friend of Chatham (Edgcumbe) was thrust downstairs, 
 
STEPS TOWARDS RELIGIOUS LIBERTY 241 
 
 As a side-light on the eighteenth century, a curious little inci- 
 dent may be mentioned here — it was indirectly connected with 
 the marriages of the Royal Dukes. Colonel Luttrell was much 
 offended at the small account made of himself and his sister, the 
 new Duchess — all the more galling, because to the frowns of the Court 
 was added the cold shoulder of the public in general. His sister 
 was become as unpopular as her husband — while the levee of the 
 Duke of Gloucester was crowded in defiance of the royal displeasure, 
 nobody went near the Cumberlands. Luttrell, thus universally 
 unpopular, saw an opportunity of at least annoying the Court. 
 Smuggling had become universal. The exorbitant prices of London 
 tradesmen caused many of the nobility to import goods from France. 
 Even Ministers of smaller foreign Courts had turned smugglers — 
 indeed, the Spanish Ambassador was almost the only foreign 
 envoy who did not stoop to use an Ambassador's privilege to 
 defraud the British revenue. The Venetian, Neapolitan, and 
 Bavarian Envoys seem to have been the worst — the Bavarian, 
 Haslang, was said to have maintained himself for thirty years by 
 gaming and smuggling. The London cabinet-makers complained 
 that as many goods ^ as would have employed four hundred journey- 
 men for many months to manufacture from rough materials, had 
 been smuggled in, duty-free, " under the privilege of foreign ambassa- 
 dors." Luttrell offered to carry their petition to the House of 
 Commons, "and did, at the head of a multitude of clamorous 
 tradesmen." He made an alarming speech. He trembled, he 
 said, for the safety of the Heir of the Crown. " The House was 
 amazed. Yes, continued he, the Prince of Wales is often at the 
 house of the principal smuggler; and as the mob, some day or 
 other, provoked past bearing, will indubitably attack and demolish 
 that palace of contraband commerce, the life of the successor 
 himself may be in danger." Still they did not understand. North 
 asked who it was? Luttrell, "in a more than half whisper, which, 
 from the silence of curiosity, was heard distinctly by the whole 
 
 and a large bag of public money flung after him, and the chair at the treasury 
 table, which had been emptied with so little ceremony, and so great expense to 
 taxpayers, was respectfully offered to Fox."— Gibbon. 
 
 ^The "goods" were parts of chairs, etc, "disjointed, but in such a 
 manner as to require very little trouble in the completion; these they stiled 
 lumber, and rated them so much under value, as to be able to pay the duty of 
 75 per cent." The cabinet-makers had complained of this about four years ago, 
 with the result that care was taken to make the goods pay duty to the real 
 value, " which entirely disconcerted that diabolical scheme." Thus disappointed, 
 the smugglers had recourse to the privilege of Ambassadors. — See Statement in 
 the " Gentleman's Magazine," 1772. 
 
242 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 House, named Lord Holderness, the governor of the Prince, who, 
 with his wife, was indeed a notorious dealer in prohibited mer- 
 chandise." In fact — though Colonel Luttrell did not say so, Lady 
 Holderness had, in Mr. Grenville's Administration, occasioned the 
 laws against smuggling to be executed more rigorously. On one 
 single journey from Paris, she " imported " one hundred and four- 
 teen gowns. They were unluckily seized, and her ladyship's friends 
 and herself were disappointed. But when Lord Holderness became 
 Warden of the Cinque Ports, she resumed business, carrying on 
 " a smuggling intercourse " at Walmer Castle itself, for importing 
 French clothes and furniture.'- In these very awkward circum- 
 stances. North begged the cabinet-makers to wait till next winter, 
 when he would endeavour to redress their grievances. 
 
 On February 23, 1773, Meredith made another attempt to 
 relieve Undergraduates from subscription to the Articles. This 
 time. Fox spoke with seriousness — wishing, no doubt, to undo the 
 effect of his levity last year. The Bill passed the Commons, but 
 was lost in the Lords — as the King had recommended. More 
 Bishops voted against it than members of the Commons — only 
 Green of Lincoln was for the Bill.^ 
 
 ' Mr. Holroyd told Arthur Young that all the " lively young men " in Sussex 
 were employed in smuggling — could earn a guinea a week as riders and carriers, 
 with no risk — cannot therefore be expected to work in the fields for 8s. — Hist. 
 MSS. Comin. Report XV, App. pt. 6. Out of the season, Lady Carlisle's own 
 chairman filled up his time by landing tea from smugglers in the Thames. 
 
 ^ The ICing told North to see that the Bill was thrown out in the Lords, 
 but "not to be too hard on those well-affected gentlemen who owed their seats 
 to nonconformists." When he was told that Bishop Green had voted for the 
 Bill, he said, " Green ! Green ! Green shall never be translated ! " 
 
CHAPTER XXX 
 THE COMPANY AGAIN 
 
 " It is better lo make no Alterations. It is the Ultimatum of the Treasury. 
 There, Gentlemen, take it ; or go into Parliament ; and God knows the con- 
 sequence." — -Speech of the Chairman'^ of the East India Company, Feb. 2, 1769. 
 
 "The East India Company are at this time sovereigns of a rich, populous, 
 fruitful country, in extent beyond France and Spain united ; they are in 
 possession of the labour, the industry, the manufactures of 20 millions of subjects ; 
 they are in the actual receipt of between 5 and 6 millions a year." — Speech of Lord 
 Clive in the House, Feb. 27, 1769. 
 
 " I appeal to the knowlege of every gentleman in the House, when I remind 
 them of the system of warfare which the East India Company have been carrying 
 on within themselves. The military have been setting at defiance and tearing 
 to pieces the civil agents ; the civil agents have been setting at defiance and 
 tearing to pieces the Directors ; the Directors have been setting at defiance and 
 tearing to pieces the Proprietors. " — Ibid. 
 
 " The scandalous method by which the Company raise their militia should be 
 abolished. There is but one season of the year when they can raise them at 
 all ; and then they are shut up in lock-houses." — Ibid. 
 
 When Lord North opened his Budget on the ist of May, he said, 
 "There is the fairest promise of peace that I ever knew. Ten years 
 more of peace, and we shall have paid off 17 millions of the 
 National Debt. Ten years more of peace, and we shall be in a 
 condition, without any additional taxes, to undertake such wars as 
 preceded the last." " We do not stand in need of more conquests. 
 Our dominions are at least as extensive as we could wish ; and 
 their improvement, not their extension, should be our chief aim." 
 He then unfolded his plan for paying off the debt — a plan " the 
 most just to the shareholder, and the most beneficial to the stock- 
 holder and the public." _;^i, 500,000 of the 3 per cent. Annuities 
 was to be paid oif by Michaelmas, in two instalments — the stock- 
 holders were invited to accept £,()o in money, and the interest due 
 for every ;^ 1 00 stock. As a further inducement, for every ;^ 100 
 stock thus paid off, the stockholder would receive four Lottery 
 Tickets — to be paid for at ;^ 1 2, i os. each, in four instalments. There 
 
 ' Mr. Boulton. 
 243 
 
244 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 would be 60,000 of these tickets, and ^^600, 000 was to be 
 distributed in prizes, among the "proprietors of the fortunate 
 tickets." 
 
 The books were opened next Monday morning at the bank, 
 at eleven o'clock, and the whole was subscribed before one. 
 
 In spite of these fair prospects, the East India Company was in 
 worse trouble than ever. After it had bought a respite with the 
 ;^4oo,ooo a year, Administration pretty much let it alone, and it 
 made friends to itself among the general public by constantly 
 raising its dividend. In 1769, the dividend was 11 per cent; in 
 1770, it was 12 ; and in 177 1, it was raised to 12^ — the extreme limit 
 now allowed by law. But all the while, dreadful tales were being 
 circulated — -accusations of colossal fraud, extortion, and treachery — 
 even of poison and murder, and of Nabobs made and unmade for 
 sums equal to a king's ransom, sums promptly distributed among a 
 few of the Company's servants, who set at defiance the Company's 
 orders ! Even through the shouts for Lord Mayor Crosby, a 
 frightful rumour had made itself heard, that two millions had 
 perished in Bengal by famine and pestilence; that the manu- 
 factories were at a stand for want of workmen ; and that for two 
 or three years to come it would be impossible for investments to be 
 made in Europe. Later reports had declared that the calamity 
 was not as great as this — notwithstanding the Famine and 
 Pestilence, the whole of the Company's revenues had been collected, 
 the investments made, and nine ships already freighted. This 
 was reassuring; but probably the reports had helped on the 
 rejection of the East India Recruiting Bill in April. This was a 
 Bill to allow the Company to raise a military force for the protec- 
 tion of their possessions. Colonel Burgoyne had opposed it on the 
 ground that it would interfere with our own recruiting, besides 
 bringing a German force over here, contrary to the Act of 
 Parliament, and another of Irish Catholics, contrary to the law of 
 the land — for the force was to consist of 600 " German Protestants," 
 700 " Irish Catholics," and 700 English. Those who were for the 
 Bill rested chiefly on the fact that it would put an end to "the 
 infamous system of locking-up houses, where men are decoyed and 
 detained contrary to law, to the causing of riot and tumult." The 
 debate is interesting for the speech of General Smith, whose name 
 was so often before the public in Hyder All's war. Smith said 
 that when he left Bengal, the European army consisted of 3000 
 men, in very good discipline, " considering the sort of men," who, 
 being chiefly raised in London, were the riff-raff of the people, 
 mostly boys under 17, or "old men above 40 or 60 years old. 
 
THE COMPANY AGAIN 245 
 
 fitter when they arrived for the hospital than the ranks." "The 
 Seapoys were almost too good." He objected to the Germans — 
 "they were always ready to desert to the enemy," especially if 
 things went wrong — and the Indian princes offered half a crown 
 a day to European deserters. But the chief objection to the Bill 
 came out later — the Company could afford to offer so much more 
 than the regular army, that they would get our men away ! On 
 the division, the numbers were equal — 45. The Speaker said he 
 should vote for getting rid of these infamous methods of raising 
 men. Other members having come in, another division was taken, 
 when the numbers were 50 and 51. So the Bill was lost. 
 
 What a tragedy, what a satire is the story of the East India 
 Company's conquest of Bengal ! Power too great for human 
 virtue to use without abusing; riches too vast, and too suddenly 
 obtained, for human self-control — an empire won in a day, and 
 everybody rushing to buy a share in Fortunatus' Purse. And 
 before seven years were past, or the world had done gaping at 
 this amazing prospect, the Company is on the verge of bankruptcy ! ' 
 With the wealth of the Indies in fee, it is asking leave to borrow 
 ;^6oo,ooo ! Instead of paying ;^4oo,ooo into the Treasury, it is 
 trying to get a Treasury loan of _;^i, 500,000 ! Then the hideous 
 revelations of the Company's mal-administration in Bengal — the 
 rice-famine and the forestallers, the wretches dying of starvation 
 in the streets of Calcutta, and a hundred of the Company's servants 
 not able to fling the corpses into the Hoogly fast enough ! Then 
 the enquiry, and the ocean of corruption and iniquity it brought 
 to light; the dishonest attempt to throw the brunt of the 
 responsibility on Clive — his equally shameless defence of himself 
 — his crimes and his wrongs ; the strange double verdict by 
 which the House condoned the terrible tale of Surajah Dowla and 
 Mir Jaffier ; and Clive's death by his own hand. Surely all this is 
 a tragedy as great as ever inspired moralisings on the vanity of 
 human greatness. 
 
 By April, 1772, the Company owed a million, and had nothing 
 in its treasury. It was in debt to the Bank of England, to the 
 Customs, to the Treasury ; and the Directors were quarrelling 
 violently among themselves. In this terrible predicament, they 
 
 ' To this it may be added, that however great the opulence of Bengal might 
 be, yet, 'as it was not founded upon any inherent treasure in mines, but 
 depended solely upon the labour and industry of the people, upon commerce, 
 manufactures, and agriculture, it cannot be supposed that it could long bear 
 the sending of between seven and eight hundred thousand pounds sterling of 
 its capital stock annually out of the country, without a possibility of return. — 
 Annual Register, 1773, *65. 
 
246 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 were compelled to eat humble pie, and ask Government to help 
 them by a loan, though the loan necessarily involved the enquiry 
 which they dreaded more than Hyder Ali himself — or a hundred of 
 him — the enquiry they had been staving off for seven years. 
 
 The glorious prospect of untold riches was changing to panic — 
 absolute ruin seemed to stare the Company in the face ; and with 
 the Company, it seemed as though the British Empire itself 
 might come down. India had for some years been yielding a 
 clear produce to the public and individuals of between two and 
 three millions sterling a year. If this should be lost, where 
 could Administration turn to find a substitute? The tale was 
 frightful. Tyranny, extortion, extravagance, famine ! The Com- 
 pany had no longer any control over its own servants — was com- 
 pelled to confess this, and crave for new powers. Its military 
 expenditure was more appalling than ever — that .;^2, 728,552 for 
 fortifications alone, was still unpaid. The army was mutinous — 
 in 1766, Clive had put down what was really a conspiracy of the 
 Company's officers to usurp the chief control. All the rules made 
 in Leadenhall Street were set at nought in Bengal and at Madras 
 Then came the most terrible part of all. In 1770, the rice crop 
 was short, and English capitalists, by buying up all the rice there 
 was, caused a famine so severe that after the Nabob of Oude 
 had distributed all his stores to the people, they continued to 
 die by thousands in the streets of Calcutta ; dogs and vultures fed 
 on the corpses in sight of all men, and the Europeans themselves 
 nearly fell victims to their own monopoly — by which monopoly, 
 while speculators grew rich, the Company itself was reduced to 
 the very verge of bankruptcy. 
 
 Outside, the clamour increased. Many servants of the 
 Company, who had been dismissed, or who had been allowed to 
 resign, on account of malversation while in office, had returned 
 home, breathing vengeance against the men who had stopped their 
 schemes, and more especially against Clive. They bought stock, 
 that they might have the right to attend meetings, and to vote at 
 Courts. Three years before, Clive had overthrown the once 
 all-powerful Sulivan ; but Sulivan was still powerful, and his 
 interest among the Directors was still so great, that Rous, the new 
 Chairman, found it difficult to muster a sufficient number of 
 Directors to sign his ordinary letters. Through the Chairmanships 
 of Boulton and Dudley, Sulivan's influence continued very strong, and 
 was said to be favoured by Chatham and Shelburne. Administra- 
 tion had talked very big, but had done nothing, and was suspected 
 of not intending to do anything, and of only keeping the threat of 
 
THE COMPANY AGAIN 247 
 
 enquiry hanging over the Company's head, until it could bring 
 about the great changes it did intend to make in the Company's 
 Charter. Things were in this position when, on the 3rd of March, 
 at a meeting of proprietors, the Directors announced that they 
 had prepared a plan for the better regulation of their servants 
 in India. " Great debates ensued," and some personalities were 
 exchanged between Sir George Colebrooke and a Mr. Balls, " not 
 much to the credit of either." But it was agreed at last that the 
 Company should apply to Government for a new Charter.^ 
 
 The pamphlets of the time are interesting reading even yet. 
 Out of the recriminations of the opposing factions, we can re- 
 construct the situation. The position was one of the most 
 singular in the history of conquest and of commerce. In 1756, 
 the conquest of Bengal wrought an entire revolution in the 
 Company's affairs and policy. Sulivan sprang into power, and 
 for several years had almost absolute authority. At first, he was 
 a supporter of Clive ; afterwards, he became his bitter opponent. 
 The author of a vigorous pamphlet, printed in 1769, charges 
 Sulivan with having " entirely changed the Company's affairs, and 
 brought it to the verge of ruin." " Through him," he says, " our 
 system of trade is changed to a scene of war." This writer is 
 far from thinking that trade follows the flag — on the contrary, 
 " Empire in India can be no benefit to any European power ; it 
 is trade, not sovereignty that is our interest to pursue, and the 
 change of our own manufactories for theirs, by which only it can 
 be of advantage. These, conquests cannot promote, but must 
 destroy. The interest cannot lie on one side ; our emoluments 
 and those of the natives must be reciprocal."''- 
 
 Another writer says the Company pretends to be poorer than 
 it is — goods are purposely kept unsold, and bad debts so 
 
 ^ In April, 1772, Lord George Germaine, through a third person, made a 
 communication to Colonel Barre, giving his opinion of India affairs — "that 
 he knew no way of setting matters right but one, which was to throw the whole 
 into the hands of a single person ; that he knew but of one man in the kingdom 
 whose character for firmness, disinterestedness, honour, civil and military 
 talents, pointed him out for such an undertaking, which was Colonel Barre." 
 Shelburne seems to have thought it might do (see his letter to Chatham of 
 April 13). He had heard it repeatedly mentioned — "but at present we are 
 a hundred miles off honest inquiry." Such a proposal from the Ministry or 
 the Directors would be "either hollow or trifling," but "from Lord G. G. 
 who has nothing to do with either, and whose reputation is not to risk, but to 
 make, must arise from some dark, selfish plan." Barr^ appears to have thought 
 so too. He declined to consider becoming the first Governor-General of Bengal. 
 
 2 Letter from a Proprietor of India Stock, in Town, to a Proprietor in the 
 Country. 
 
248 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 represented as to make the profits of 1768 appear only £,62,2,26. 
 The Company will be worth at least 20 millions when the Charter 
 expires! "In 1767, the Directors owned we were rich in India, 
 but poor here; the 1768 Directors allowed we were rich in both, 
 but the cash account was low; in 1769, we are rich in England, 
 but have a very expensive war in India." 
 
 On the news of our acquisitions in Bengal, says a third, we 
 rushed to invest — we could not hold too much stock. Then 
 somebody made the dreadful suggestion that the revenues of 
 Bengal might possibly belong to the Crown — that Parliament 
 
 might examine our affairs. "The alarm once given, L ds, 
 
 Lacquais and Merchants ran with equal haste to the Alley. Stock 
 fell 30 per cent., while the terror and anxiety in every countenance 
 afforded a truly ridiculous and comic scene." ^ 
 
 Another letter, challenging the Company's right to make war 
 and peace, charges a Director with having said, at the meeting of 
 August, 1772, that "they had given as much power to the King's 
 officers as they thought convenient, and were not willing to give 
 more." He contrasts this cavalier reply with the " civility " of the 
 King's Message. 
 
 We find other writers complaining that "the old steady 
 permanent proprietors " are the dupes of the rest, who are 
 alternately bulls and bears — now spreading it that affairs are 
 flourishing, then a few days later telling us they are desperate, and 
 we must waste another ;!^2oo,ooo a year more on Supervisors, and 
 "the annihilation of our present government." "We are so 
 amazingly prosperous, that we shall not be able to make a dividend 
 at all. They tell us in the same breath that our China cargoes 
 are falling off, and that we must have more ships. Before Mr. 
 Vansittart sailed, we had men and officers enough to beat Hyder — 
 now we must have 440 officers more.'' Lord Clive multiplies expenses 
 to gain influence and votes — at least a million has been lately spent 
 unnecessarily on the military establishment of Bengal; and Clive 
 has spread a report that the Governor and Council intend to 
 "place Shaw Aulun on the throne of Indostan.'' The innocent 
 dupes, male and female, are hurried into the India House by their 
 leaders to vote away the little property they possess. 
 
 ' " In Parliament, the attack upon the Company was led by a Gentleman, 
 who has ever been considered as a strange mixture of folly, wildness, good 
 sense and absurdity ... he seemed to think it lawful to treat any rich body 
 of men as our King John did the Jew, who had seven teeth drawn, before he 
 consented to part with his money." — Letter to the Proprietors, 1769. (This 
 writer is for Rous.) 
 
THE COMPANY AGAIN 249 
 
 On this the partisans of the Directors ask how a friend of 
 Sulivan dares talk of expense? 
 
 All these writers agree as to the value of the prize. It is not 
 wonderful that a Minister at his wits' end for new taxes, should 
 have resolved that if the Company wanted a new Charter it should 
 pay for it. It began to be rumoured that Government intended to 
 interfere, to preserve the revenues of the Company — for the benefit 
 of this country, and to save the Company from itself. Both reasons 
 were alleged, and both were true. The Government and the 
 country alternately exulted in the hope of living henceforth on the 
 tribute of Bengal, and trembled lest they should be crushed beneath 
 their Indian Empire. The Directors called a General Court in a 
 great hurry, but before it could meet, they received notice from the 
 First Lord of the Treasury to get their papers ready to lay before 
 Parliament. The Government saw its opportunity in the conquests 
 and the misfortunes of Leadenhall Street. Now or never was the 
 time to make the Company pay well for a new Charter. 
 
CHAPTER XXXI 
 CLIVE'S DEFENCE 
 
 " When I entered the Nabob's treasury at Moorshedabad, with heaps of gold 
 and silver to the right and left, and these crowned with jewels" — here he added 
 an oath, and violently struck his hand on his head — " My God ! Mr. Chairman, 
 at this moment do I stand astonished at my own moderation ! " — Clive before the 
 Select Committee, 1772. 
 
 The East India Judicature Bill was moved in the House of 
 Commons by Mr. Sulivan, March 30, 1772. It was "for the 
 Better Regulation of the Affairs of the East India Company, and 
 of their Servants in India, and for the Administration of Justice in 
 Bengal." It restrained the Governor and Council from engaging 
 in trade, totally altered the Court of Judicature, and the mode of 
 administering justice, and greatly enlarged the Company's powers 
 of dealing with its servants. The Judges of the new Court were 
 to be appointed by the Company. 
 
 Opposition instantly demanded an enquiry ; before a new 
 Charter is granted, we must know, said Mr. Cornwall, on what facts 
 these new powers are asked for. This Bill never got beyond its 
 second reading, but it occasioned a very long speech ^ from Clive, 
 in which, while attempting to exculpate himself, he revealed a whole 
 system of shameless plunder. It was the final cause of the enquiry. 
 It is the best, as it is necessarily the most authoritative, evidence 
 on British rule in India at that time. 
 
 " I stand charged," he began, " with having been the cause of 
 the present melancholy situation of the Company's affairs in 
 Bengal." They were in a very dangerous situation when he was 
 sent out by a General Court, in 1764, to undertake the management 
 of the Company's affairs. His own fortune was then already 
 made — "happy in my family, happy in my connections, happy in 
 everything but my health, which I lost in the Company's service." 
 But he had obeyed the call to go to "a distant, unhealthy chmate, 
 
 ' The speeches of Clive and Johnstone are printed in the Parliamentary 
 Debates, "from their own corrected copies." 
 
 260 
 
CLIVE'S DEFENCE 251 
 
 to undertake the envious task of reformation." He was badly 
 supported — there was a strong party who wished the Company to 
 be saved by anyone but himself. Thirteen Directors were for him, 
 to eleven against him. When he got out, he found his powers were 
 "so loosely and jesuitically worded," that the Council at once 
 contested them. " Three paths were before me." He might have 
 thrown in his lot with the Council, and encouraged them not to 
 execute the new covenant, which forbade the receipt of presents ; 
 " and although I had executed the covenants myself, I might have 
 contrived to return to England with an immense fortune, infamously 
 added to the one before honourably obtained." Or he might have 
 "given up the commonwealth, and left Bengal without an effort 
 to save it." But he took the third path—" I determined to do my 
 duty to the public, although I should incur the odium of the whole 
 settlement. I took the resolution of cleansing the Augean stable." 
 This was what occasioned the public prints to teem with scurrility 
 and abuse of him, ever since his return. " But it was that conduct 
 which enables me now, when the day of judgment is come, to look 
 my judges in the face." 
 
 He went into the several charges. First, the monopoly of 
 cotton. He knew nothing about cotton. "Trade was not my 
 profession. My line has been military and political. I owe all I 
 have in the world to my having been at the head of an army ; as 
 to cotton, I know no more about it than the Pope of Rome." Then 
 the monopoly of diamonds. The Company's servant can only remit 
 his fortune to England in one of two ways — by paying the money 
 into the treasury in India, and receiving bills on the Company, 
 payable in England — or by diamonds. " By the acquisition of the 
 Duannee, and the successful endeavours of the Select Committee, 
 the Company's treasury was so rich, that we could not have been 
 justified in drawing bills upon the Company (at home)." The 
 jaghir had to be remitted. "For this purpose, and this purpose 
 only, I sent an agent into a distant and independent country to 
 make purchases of diamonds. The diamonds were not sent 
 home clandestinely — they were registered, and the duties were 
 paid, and I lost 3 per cent, on the transaction. This is all I 
 know of a monopoly of diamonds." 
 
 The next charge was that he had debased the currency. This 
 is a subject very much out of my sphere. I am totally unacquainted 
 with the proportions of alloy." I can only tell you the principle 
 on which we formed the plan of a gold currency. " Everybody 
 knows, that silver is the only current coin in Bengal, and that 
 gold is merely a species of merchandise." The Select Committee, 
 
252 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 afraid "the prodigious annual drains of silver to China and other 
 places " would soon cause a scarcity of silver in Bengal, tried to 
 make gold circulate in coin. " We knew there must be great 
 quantities of gold in that country." As for himself, he got not a 
 farthing advantage, and he never sent a single rupee or gold mohur 
 to be coined in his life. 
 
 The greater part of the speech was taken up with the next 
 charge — of having established "a monopoly of salt, betle nut, 
 tobacco, and other commodities, which occasioned the late famine." 
 How could a monopoly of salt and the rest, in 1765 and 1766, 
 cause a want of rain, and scarcity of rice in 1770? The salt 
 monopoly was agreed to between Mr. Vansittart and Cossim Ali. 
 The Company's servants were to trade inland, paying a duty of 
 9 per cent. The Directors, "alarmed at the word monopoly, 
 seemed never to have examined, and I am sure never thoroughly 
 comprehended, the principles and effect of it." Many years ago,, 
 the Company sent "an expensive embassy "to the Great Mogul, 
 to obtain certain privileges — among others, that "of trading duty 
 free." The Company never carried on any inland trade — their 
 commerce was confined to exports and imports only. Yet their 
 servants claimed a privilege of carrying on an inland trade, duty 
 free. "The absurdity of a privilege so ruinous to the natives, and 
 so prejudicial to the revenues of the country, is obvious." No such 
 claim was set up, nor such trade carried on, " at the revolution in 
 1757, nor to my knowledge under my government, which ended 
 at the beginning of 1760." The first appearance of the claim was 
 in Governor Vansittart's time — he prevailed on the Nabob Cossim 
 Ali to let the English carry on an inland trade in salt, paying a 
 duty of 9 per cent. — " which in fact was no remedy to the evil, 
 because the natives paid infinitely more." The Council disavowed 
 Mr. Vansittart, and insisted on their right to all inland trade duty 
 free. The Nabob, enraged, threw open the trade throughout his 
 country, and abolished all duties, that his own subjects might 
 trade upon an equal footing with the English. This "disobliged 
 the Council, who insisted that the Nabob should not suffer his 
 own subjects to trade duty free, but that the EngHsh alone should 
 enjoy that privilege." The Directors did not "clearly" know all 
 this till 1762, when they disapproved of these transactions in the 
 strongest terms, and positively forbade their servants to carry on 
 any inland trade whatever. But it was continued, with exemption 
 from duties, except 2^ per cent, for salt, by a treaty with Mir 
 Jaffier, after Cossim Ali was deposed. 
 
 Suddenly, in the midst of this explanation, Clive introduced the 
 
CLIVE'S DEFENCE 255 
 
 burning question of "presents." "It is necessary, the House 
 should know that there are but two ways by which gentlemen can 
 acquire fortunes in Bengal — by the inland trade, and by presents." 
 The export and import trade had been dwindling away for some 
 years, " and was not worth the attention of the servants " — even free 
 merchants and mariners could scarcely live by it. And now the 
 new covenants were to prevent presents. " But we must consider 
 a little the nature of the funds for presents." Every revolution in 
 Bengal was attended with some diminution of the Nabob's authority, 
 and with some advantages to the Company. Cossim Ali, when Mir 
 Jaffier was deposed, had to make over to the Company territorial 
 possessions to the amount of between six and seven hundred thou- 
 sand pounds a year. When Mir Jaffier was reinstated, he added 
 above sixty thousand pounds a month more — so the Company got 
 half his revenues. He was allowed to collect the other half for 
 himself. "But, in fact, he was no more than a banker for the 
 Company's servants, who could draw upon him as often, and to 
 what amount they pleased." The new covenants "were intended to 
 prevent this mode of raising fortunes; but the Select Committee 
 went much deeper ; they struck at the root of the evil, by procuring 
 the whole for the Company." 
 
 " It was not expedient, however, to draw the reins too tight. It 
 was not expedient, that the Company's servants should pass from 
 affluence to beggary'' — they must have some emoluments, especially 
 the higher servants. " The salary of a councillor is, I think, scarcely 
 ^300 per annum : and it is well known that he cannot live in that 
 country for less than ^3000 " — and the same in proportion for the 
 rest. It was necessary "that an establishment should take place, 
 and the Select Committee thought that the trade in salt, betle nut, 
 and tobacco might answer the purpose. The great object was to 
 regulate this trade for the advantage of the Company and the 
 Company's servants, without oppressing the natives." " The House 
 will observe that I make no mention of the Nabob ; because the 
 Company, to whom the reveimes now belonged, stood in his shoes ; 
 a circumstance which seems never to have been thoroughly ad- 
 verted to by the Directors, even to this day." 
 
 The Company's declared intention was that its servants should 
 benefit by this trade. Mr. Sumner took the medium price of salt 
 throughout the country, for above twenty years past, and fixed the price 
 at from 12 to 15 per cent, below that medium — hence it was thought 
 no grievance could fall on the poor. A duty of 35 per cent, was put 
 on by the Company ; this amounted to about ;!^i 20,000 a year, and 
 all the Company's servants, except writers, had shares according to 
 
254 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 their rank. " But I soon found there was some defect in this plan." 
 It was really a monopoly. Trade was taken out of the hands of 
 some of the merchants. There were too many of the servants, and 
 the duty was too small. Clive therefore proposed another plan, by 
 which the salt was to be sold at Calcutta, instead of by agents up 
 the country, and only to "the black merchants." The duty was 
 now put at 50 per cent, "which would produce _;^i6o,ooo per 
 annum." 
 
 In the course of this long explanation, Clive gave some very 
 interesting facts. In Bengal, the maundl'of salt (80 lbs.) stood the 
 maker in about 2s. 6d. " The duty to the Company and the 
 advantages to the servants" came to as much again — 100 per cent, 
 on the whole. " Salt in England," I am told, " stands the maker in 
 about 8d. per bushel (56 lbs.), and the duty is 3s. 46.. per bushel, 
 or 500 per cent." In London, salt is sold at 5s. the bushel — some- 
 thing less than a penny a pound. The whole quantity of salt con- 
 tracted for was 24 lacs of maunds, or 192 millions of pounds. Mr. 
 Sulivan had computed the inhabitants of Bengal at 15 millions. 
 " I strike off 5 millions for infants and accidents. Then divide the 
 192 millions of pounds by the other 10 millions of inhabitants, and 
 we shall find the quantity of salt consumed in one year, by the rich 
 and by the poor, will be under 20 lbs." It is certain the poor 
 do not consume half the quantity. These 20 lbs. will cost the 
 individual at Calcutta rather less than is. 3d. ; and at Patna, the 
 greatest distance, rather less than 2S. 6d. The lowest wages in 
 Bengal are 2 rupees a month, or ;£$ per annum. " The poor man 
 can scarcely be said to be at any other expence than for eating." 
 He drinks nothing but water, he wears no clothes, his house is mud 
 or clay, thatched with straw. Can is. 3d. to 2s. 6d. a year for salt 
 be a grievance to him ? " The eyes of the world have been blinded 
 by publications " — the truth being that a number of " black 
 merchants," who used to live by this trade, were the only people 
 who had a grievance; for the Company's servants not only 
 monopolised the salt, but " by virtue of their power and influence, 
 not only bought it at what price they pleased, but sold it at what 
 price they pleased." 
 
 Every now and then he lets fall the most damaging admissions — 
 as when he says, in praising his reforms, that a governor will still be 
 able to acquire "a handsome independency," though he will not be 
 able to "amass a fortune of a million or half a million, in the space 
 of two or three years " ; and again, " If stability can be assumed in 
 such a government as this, where riches have been acquired in 
 abundance, in a small space of time, by all ways and means, and 
 
CLIVE'S DEFENCE 255 
 
 by men with or without capacities," it can only be by forbidding the 
 governor to trade. 
 
 He showed his accounts from the day of his leaving England. 
 "The balance against me is ;^58i6." He told how Mir Jaffier 
 loved him so, that on his deathbed, in the presence of his wife and 
 his minister, he desired his son to give Clive 5 lacs of rupees 
 (;^7o,ooo) as a legacy. A great lawyer "now the Speaker of this 
 Honourable House,'' gave his opinion that Clive had a right to this 
 legacy ; another great lawyer, a member of this House, said the 
 same privately ; the Court of Directors confirmed the right. But 
 Clive gave the whole, and about ;^4o,ooo more, "which I prevailed 
 on the Nabob to bestow," for a mihtary fund, to benefit oflScers and 
 soldiers invalided in India, and their widows. 
 
 When he made as if to stop, and the House cried, " Go on," he 
 returned to the question of presents. He described the Bengalese. 
 They were always under an absolute despotism. "In inferior 
 stations, they are servile, mean, submissive, and humble. In 
 superior stations, they are luxurious, effeminate, tyrannical, treach- 
 erous, venal, cruel." From time immemorial, an inferior has never 
 come into the presence of a superior without a present. The 
 Nabob told him that the small presents he received amounted to 
 _;^3oo,ooo a year, "and I can believe him, because I know that I 
 might have received as much during my last government." " Even 
 before we took part in the country troubles," governors and others 
 received presents. There is not an officer in his Majesty's fleet 
 or army, not a governor, not a member of Council, nor any other 
 person civil or military, who has not. "With regard to Bengal, 
 there they flow in abundance indeed." Let the House imagine a 
 country with 15 millions of inhabitants, a revenue of 4 millions 
 sterling, and trade in proportion. "By progressive steps, the 
 Company have become sovereigns of that empire." Can it be 
 supposed their servants will not expect to get something out of it ? 
 But the Company's servants have not been the authors of these acts 
 of violence of which it is the fashion to accuse them — the natives of 
 the country committed them, acting as their agents, "and for the 
 most part without their knowledge. These agents never desist till, 
 according to the ministerial phrase, they have dragged their masters 
 into the kennel; and then the acts of violence begin. The 
 passion for gain is as strong as the passion for love." Then he 
 showed how " the banyan (the native secretary) lays his bags of silver 
 before the Company's servant to-day; gold to-morrow; jewels the 
 next day ; and if these fail, he then tempts him in the way of his 
 profession, which is trade. He assures him goods may be had 
 
256 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 cheap, and sold to great advantage up the country.'' The Com- 
 pany's servant cannot fly — so he yields. " In short, flesh and 
 blood cannot bear it." Consider the education of a young man 
 who goes out to India— every man's great object is to get his son 
 a writership in Bengal — usually at the age of 1 6. His relations tell 
 him how sure he is to make a fortune — " my lord such-a-one, and 
 my lord such-a-one, acquired so much money in such a time ; and 
 Mr. such-a-one, and Mr. such-a-one, so much in such a time." 
 Thus their principles are corrupted at their very setting out ; and 
 as a good many go out together, they inflame each other's expecta- 
 tions to such a degree, that in the course of the voyage they have 
 settled when they can return. 
 
 Then he drew a marvellous picture of these writers — as one of 
 whom he himself began his career. 
 
 Let us take a view of one of these writers, arrived in Bengal, 
 and not worth a groat. As soon as he lands, a banyan, worth per- 
 haps _;^ioo,ooo, desires to have the honour of serving this young 
 gentleman, at 4s. 6d. a month. The Company has provided 
 chambers — they are not good enough — the banyan finds better. 
 The young man takes a walk about the town ; he sees other writers, 
 only a year out, in splendid apartments, or with houses of their own, 
 riding fine prancing Arabian horses, going in palanquins and chaises ; 
 they keep seraglios, give entertainments, and treat with champagne 
 and claret. The banyan tells him he may soon be as well off as 
 they. He lends him money- — then the young man is at his mercy. 
 The advantages of the banyan are those of the master — who in 
 acquiring one fortune generally spends three. But this is not the 
 worst — he is in a state of dependence on the banyan, who commits 
 acts of violence and oppression for his own interest, under the pre- 
 tended sanction of the Company's servant. Hence arises the 
 clamour against English gentlemen in India. 
 
 "I will now pass to other matter: matter as important as ever 
 came before the House. India yields at present a clear produce to 
 the public and to individuals, of between two and three millions 
 sterUng per annum. If this object should be lost, what can 
 administration substitute in the stead of it ? " I tremble when I 
 think of the risk we lately ran — and the French have only suspended 
 their views, not given them up. If France gets our possessions, she 
 will soon add to them all the rest of the East Indies ; the empire of 
 the sea will follow, she will gain universal monarchy. 
 
 But danger abroad being for the present suspended, let us think 
 of the danger at home. Our affairs in Bengal are in a very deplor- 
 able condition ; the nation cannot receive their ^^400,000, or the 
 
CLIVE'S DEFENCE 257 
 
 proprietors their p^2oo,ooo increase of dividend much longer unless 
 something is done. These great sums depend on the Company's 
 revenues, and the Company's revenues depend on the Company's 
 or the public's trade. There are no mines of gold or silver in 
 Bengal — all must come through trade. On the civil and military 
 expenses depends whether we shall have any surplus revenue — if they 
 swell too high, you cannot receive anything. The revenue depends 
 in some degree, and the happiness and prosperity of the people 
 depends wholly, on the inland trade. Indeed, the true cause of the 
 distress in Bengal is that the Company's servants and their agents 
 have taken the whole of that trade into their own hands — they have 
 traded not only as merchants, but as sovereigns ; and by grasping 
 at the whole of the inland trade, have taken the bread out of 
 the mouths of thousands and thousands of merchants, who are 
 now reduced to beggary. 
 
 He showed the accounts of the prime costs of the Company's 
 investments from Bengal, for seven years preceding the acquisition of 
 the " Duannee " ; the gross collections had not decreased consider- 
 ably till 1770 — ^ which was the year of the famine; but the civil and 
 military expenses had been gradually increasing " ever since I left 
 Bengal, in the beginning of 1767. And here lies the danger. The 
 evil is not so much in the revenues falling short as in the expences 
 increasing." The best thing is to reduce these charges. Why 
 should we try to increase the revenues ? They are of no use unless 
 we can invest them ; and to raise them beyond a certain point is 
 to distress the country, and ruin numbers who have from time 
 immemorial derived their subsistence from them. The increase is 
 due to the fact that before the Company had the duannee, their 
 agents had other ways of making fortunes — they had presents. 
 These are at an end. They had to find some other channel — so 
 they increased the civil and military charges. " Every man now, 
 who is permitted to make a bill, makes a fortune.'' It is not the 
 simple pay of officers and men — it is the contingent bills of con- 
 tractors, commissaries, engineers, etc. " These intolerable expences 
 have alarmed the Directors, and persuaded them to come to Parlia- 
 ment for assistance." Soon they will go to Administration, and tell 
 them they cannot pay the ;^4oo,ooo, and must lower their dividend. 
 
 " I attribute our situation to four causes — relaxation of govern- 
 ment in my successors ; great neglect on the part of Administration ; 
 notorious misconduct on the part of the Directors; and the 
 violent and outrageous proceedings of the General Courts, in which 
 I include contested elections." ^ 
 
 ' In Leadenhall Street. 
 
258 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 As for Mr. Verelst, who succeeded me, so far from wantmg 
 humanity, as Mr. Bolts asserts, he had too much. " Humanity has 
 been his ruin ''^if he had had less, it would have been better for 
 the nation, the Company, the natives, and himself. He was too 
 lenient — if he had followed my example and advice, he might have 
 kept off the evil day. But he could not have done much against 
 the mischiefs done by the Directors themselves, when they took 
 away the powers of the Select Committee. 
 
 The Company have acquired an empire more extensive than any 
 kingdom in Europe, except France and Russia. It might have 
 been supposed Administration would have given it some attention. 
 They treated it as a South Sea Bubble ; " they thought of nothing 
 but the present time ; they said. Let us get what we can to-day, let 
 to-morrow take care of itself;" they thought of nothing but the im- 
 mediate division of the loaves and fishes. They even instigated 
 a parcel of temporary proprietors to bully the Directors into their 
 own terms. 
 
 As for the Directors — one would have thought that they would 
 have supported the Select Committee, which had restored tran- 
 quillity to Bengal, brought good order out of anarchy, made peace 
 with Surajah Dowla — so obtaining^6oo,ooo for the Company — got 
 the duannee of Bengal, Bahar, and Orissa — which gave the Company 
 a net income of ;^i, 300,000 ; paid off most of the bond debt in 
 Bengal — near ;^goo,ooo — and so enabled the Company to 
 assist Government with _;^4oo,ooo a year, and increase their 
 dividend by ;^2oo,ooo. But they dropped the prosecutions 
 against those gentlemen in Bengal, whom the Committee had 
 censured. " Thus they gave a stab to their own vitals." Their 
 servants in India were anxiously waiting to know whether they 
 were to be punished. The lenity or weakness of the Directors 
 removed their doubts. From that instant all covenants were 
 forgotten, and that relaxation of government began, which is 
 still so much to be dreaded. Next they destroyed the powers 
 of that Committee they had so highly approved. They divided 
 the powers between the Council and the Committee; so both 
 have been distracted with altercations and disputes for power. 
 As if this was not enough, they restored almost every civil 
 and military transgressor, who had been dismissed — they even 
 rewarded some of them. And now they come to Parliament, 
 with a Bill of Regulations, one clause of which is to put such 
 practices out of their power in future. 
 
 " With regard to General Courts ; I believe I need not dwell 
 long on the consequence of them." Their violent proceedings were 
 
CLIVE'S DEFENCE 259 
 
 subversive of the authority of the Court of Directors. The agents 
 abroad knew this, so they never scrupled to set the orders of the 
 Directors at defiance, and they have escaped punishment " by means 
 of the over-awing interests of individuals at General Courts." Now, 
 the first half of the year is employed by the Directors in freeing 
 themselves from the obligations incurred by their last elections ; 
 and the second half is wasted in incurring new obligations, to secure 
 their next election. And they send out orders so fluctuating and 
 contradictory, that their servants — who generally understand the 
 interest of the Company much better than the Directors — have to 
 follow their own opinion. 
 
 " I have opened my budget : it is not a ministerial budget : it is 
 an East India budget ; which contains many precious stones — 
 diamonds, rubies, of the first water and magnitude; and there 
 wants only a skilful jeweller to polish them and ascertain their real 
 value." 1 
 
 With this broad hint, Clive ceased. His speech had produced 
 a great impression, but Governor Johnstone made short work 
 of his defence. He had seen the charges, and Clive's answers 
 had rather confirmed than lessened his idea of his guilt. In the 
 first place, Clive had not even got the heads of the charges 
 correctly — he was never accused of the cotton monopoly — the 
 Council did that ! And the diamonds were made an illustration, 
 not a charge. As to the salt tax, he has " pretended to amuse you 
 with calculations of the most cruel and fallacious kind, stating how 
 much he extracted from each individual on the article of salt," 
 and not mentioning the other commodities. He shows you how fit 
 these poor creatures are to be squeezed in his engines of oppression. 
 Who does not know that every species of extortion can be 
 vindicated by such arguments? It is not only the difference 
 of taxation in "free and arbitrary countries, it is the wicked 
 principle of such regulations, contrary to the law of nature, that 
 destroys human industry, checks incitements to labour, and pro- 
 duces famine and all other evil consequences that have followed 
 in Bengal." The charge did not say the monopolising of salt, 
 betle nut, and tobacco had produced the late famine — but the 
 monopoly of these things, and " of other commodities." He 
 owns that thousands and thousands of merchants were set adrift 
 — is not that enough to convulse any state to its centre? The 
 highest salt duty ever collected in Bengal was ;^7 2,000 a year — 
 
 ' Lord Clive had urged that he had had opportunities of making the vastest 
 fortune that could have been acquired since the fall of the Roman republic. — 
 Walpole, i. 206. 
 
26o ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 the general medium was _5^4o,ooo. The orders he complains of 
 "were all wrote by one whom he always treated as his most 
 intimate friend, and signed by others whom I cannot call his 
 friends, indeed, but his most servile tools in office." Yet he 
 disobeyed them ! He owns he took presents, but says he gave 
 them away to his friends — ;,^i3,ooo to a Mr. Maskelyne — a relation, 
 and once his fellow-writer — ;^i 5,000 to Mr. Strachey ("whose 
 merit is acknowledged by all") — ;^i 2,000 to Mr. Ingham, ^^2000 
 to Mr. Philpot, his footman — and yet he says he has not broken 
 his covenant ! 
 
 Then the fraudulent coinage. He pleads ignorance — do not 
 all men know that purity of coin is a principal consideration in 
 government? Did he not know that "the private principles of 
 the coinage" only allowed an alloy of 8 per cent, above the 
 current standard? In the progress of the frauds, it was coined 
 with 30 per cent. "Will he deny, that in two years from its 
 establishment, the once flourishing kingdom of Bengal could not 
 exchange 100 gold mohurs at the presidency? Will he deny 
 that the Company lost _;^3oo,ooo by the project?" I must 
 believe, after what he has said, that he left this profit also to 
 his friends ! 
 
 Johnstone said a great deal about the peculation of revenues 
 — Clive had been charged with making ^^300,000 out of this. 
 " His lordship has introduced his reasons for this appropriation 
 by a long-winded minute, with a catalogue of all the virtues which 
 ought to adorn an East India governor." A man of sense would 
 know that something iniquitous was to follow — "I might as well 
 quote the Cadi, or Judge's commission, to prove that oppressions 
 have never prevailed in Hindostan ! " Johnstone openly expressed 
 his doubts about the legacy. Mir Jaffier died four months before 
 Clive arrived at Calcutta the last time. Several months more 
 elapsed before any man heard a word of the Will — at length, 
 Nuncomar, the late minister, was imprisoned, "and soon after he 
 was delivered of this wonderful secret." I have examined this 
 matter in another place much more exactly than I can do here, 
 and am satisfied the artful minister imposed upon his lordship. 
 Johnstone charged Clive with having destroyed all government, 
 and established "a system of uncontrolled fraud and rapine." 
 And he has taken the credit for other men's conquests — it was 
 not he who added Bengal, Bahar, and Orissa to the British 
 Empire. Johnstone concluded by demanding " an enquiry into the 
 affairs of the British Empire in Asia." 
 
 On the 13th of April, on the motion of Colonel Burgoyne, the 
 
CLIVE'S DEFENCE 261 
 
 motion for a Select Committee of thirty-one members was carried 
 without a division.! 
 
 ' The members were Colonel Burgoyne, Sir W. Meredith, Sir G. Savile, Lord 
 George Germaine, Mr. Rose Fuller, Mr. F. Vane, Colonel Barre, Mr. Solicitor- 
 General, Lord Howe, Mr. R. Sutton, Mr. Attorney-General, Mr. Thomas Pitt, 
 Mr. Wellbore Ellis, Sir Gilbert Elliott, Mr. G. Rice, Mr. Pulteney, Mr. Charles 
 James Fox, Mr. Cornwall, Lord Folkestone, General Conway, Mr. Hotham, 
 Mr. IL Ongley, Mr. G. Johnstone, Mr. Alderman Trecothick, Mr. Edward 
 Bacon, Mr. A. Curzon, Sir John Turner, Captain Phipps, Mr. Gregory, Lord 
 Clive, and Mr. Strachey. 
 
CHAPTER XXXII 
 THE SELECT COMMITTEE 
 
 "However impolitic, it would be an honest wish that it had never been in 
 our power to use the words, ' our Indian empire.' " — Dr. Burrell on the Address, 
 Nov. 26, 1772. 
 
 ' ' When the state of the season made it apparent that the crop of rice would 
 be generally defective, the English capitalists became eager purchasers. ... A 
 traffic of unexampled iniquity now began . . . the cities were thronged with 
 starving multitudes . . . thousands died daily in the streets. Thus . . . was 
 an unmerited reproach entailed on the British name. . . . Such was the inter- 
 mixture of their revenues with the public finance, that the Company's ruin was 
 regarded as portending downfall to the whole edifice of the British Empire." — 
 Adolphus, Hist, of England, i. 529-30. 
 
 "We now talk of the British Empire, and of Titus and Trajan, who were ab- 
 solute emperors. In my time, it was the British monarchy. " — Horace Walpole. 
 
 Sir George Savile refused to serve on the Select Committee, 
 " being against the whole system of India affairs. He looked on 
 their trade as destructive, either from bringing in too great an 
 increase of money, which would overturn the liberty of this 
 country, or from many of the importations, tea especially, being 
 destructive of the healths of the people of England." He also 
 protested against territorial acquisitions, as "public robberies in 
 the name of the kingdom," and should look on himself as an 
 accomplice if he abetted these transactions in any way. 
 
 The Committee came at once to the dark affair of the 
 deposition of Surajah Dowla — the lac of rupees given by Mir Jaffier 
 to each member of Council, the two lacs or more to each of the 
 Select Committee, the sixteen lacs to Clive himself, the two treaties, 
 the "fictitious" and the "binding," and the Thirteenth Article 
 of the "binding" treaty, suppressed by Vansittart, because the 
 Company must not know it was pledged to stand by Mir Jaffier 
 against all who should contest his right. It was on the faith of 
 this Article that Mir Jaffier agreed to all the rest. This was the 
 only Article which bound the English to anything — the other 
 twelve only bound Mir Jaffier ! ^ The Directors only learned the 
 
 ' Article XIII was the only one written in English. The others were in Persian. 
 
 262 
 
THE SELECT COMMITTEE 263 
 
 existence of this secret Article from the Dutch East India Company, 
 who wrote to them complaining of the unwarrantable conduct of 
 their servants in India. 
 
 Clive acknowledged writing to the Directors on December 15 
 1762, that, to the best of his knowledge, there was no such Article. 
 He now hinted pretty plainly that when he entered Moorshedabad 
 at the head of his victorious army, he could have possessed 
 himself of the whole of Surajah Dowla's treasure. " On that day, 
 being under no kind of restraint but that of my own conscience, I 
 might have become too rich for a subject." He did not say how 
 much he took, but he protested that, since then, he had not 
 benefited himself one single shilling — the jaghir only excepted. 
 " / have been placed in great and eminent stations, surrounded with 
 temptations ; the civil and military power were united in me, a circum- 
 stance which has never happened to any other man ; the Committee 
 will therefore judge whether I have been moderate or immoderate 
 in the pursuit of riches." 
 
 To add to the embarrassment of the Directors, towards the 
 end of April, news came that the Aurora, with Vansittart and 
 the other Supervisors on board, had never been heard of since 
 she left the Cape of Good Hope on the 27th of December last. 
 By another month, it appeared certain she was lost.^ At once 
 the Company began to consider the sending out new Supervisors — 
 it must account for being unable to pay the ;!^4oo,ooo to Govern- 
 ment ; the blame must be thrown on somebody, and the Company's 
 servants in India were the obvious scapegoats. Then, in May, 
 
 ' "May 31, 1771. — The Aurora frigate is supposed to have been lost or 
 foundered in the Gulph of Sofala, or Channel of Mozambique ... a channel 
 dangerous at all seasons, even to those who are acquainted with it, on account of 
 the shoals . . . Mr. Vansittart, it is said, was so averse to this navigation, that 
 if an outward-bound East Indiaman had been at the Cape, he would have quitted 
 the Aurora. One of his sons accompanied him in this fatal voyage." — Gentle- 
 viands Magazine, 1773, ^37' 
 
 There were many reports — one, on July I, that the ship was taken in the 
 eastern seas by a Dutch man-of-war. The crew had mutinied, killed the Captain 
 and officers, and "commenced pirates." Had made themselves immensely rich 
 by plundering the Spaniards, but mistook the Dutchman for a merchant ship, 
 and were secured. It appears that the crew really were much dissatisfied before 
 they sailed, and that a boy who was going with Vansittart ran away, because 
 he did not like the look of things. The passengers of the Lord Camden, India- 
 man, told the pirate story, but her Captain knew nothing of it, and it was much 
 doubted. On Nov. 19, "A black who said he was one of five persons saved 
 from the shipwreck of the Aurora," was examined before the Directors, and said 
 that the frigate was cast away " on a reef of rocks off Mocoa" ; that he was two 
 years on a desert island, before he was taken off by a ship. "It is believed 
 that he went out in the Aurora, but that he had quitted her at the Cape. " 
 
264 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 came news that the Company was again at war. This time, it 
 was the "King" of Tanjore. The pretext was that the French 
 meant to get hold of that kingdom on a dormant claim for an 
 old debt ; but some said the Council of Calcutta, seeing their 
 power threatened, wanted to get hold of the spoils of Tanjore 
 before the new Charter could come into operation. 
 
 Public uneasiness was increased by the failure of the great house 
 of Neal, James, Fordyce, & Downs, in June. It was the greatest 
 blow for fifty years to trade and credit. It seemed at first that 
 every bank in London would go. Sir Richard Glynn broke, and 
 Sir George Colebrooke (now Chairman of the East India Company) 
 was only saved by the Bank of England issuing notes to meet the 
 run on him. The news reached Edinburgh in forty-three hours — 
 a space of time scarcely credible. The great Bank of Ayr had 
 ;^3oo,ooo of paper out in London alone. Colebrooke was one 
 great cause of the calamity, and if he had gone, it would have 
 spread to Holland. Fordyce's speculations, which started the 
 crash, began with "a great stroke" in India stock, in 1765. 
 
 All this while, the Company was like a man who, having stumbled 
 in running, tries to save himself by running faster. Ever since 1769, 
 it had been raising its dividend, till now it had stood for eighteen 
 months at 12^. But an end came. On the 8th of July, the cashier 
 perceived that the Directors had no cash, and told Sulivan. 
 
 Something must be done. The Company would need ;!^2, 247,000 
 during the next three months, and could only look to receive 
 _;£954,200 — a deficiency of a million and a quarter. On the isth, 
 the Directors borrowed ;i^4oo,ooo of the Bank for two months; 
 on the 29th, they asked for ^^300,000 more. The Bank would only 
 lend ^200,000. So on August 10, "the Chairman and Deputy" 
 (Colebrooke and Sulivan) waited on Lord North, and told him they 
 must have a million. North " heard them dryly," and told them 
 they must go to Parliament. At last the dreaded moment had come. 
 To go to Parliament was the first step to a new Charter. 
 
 On September 27, 1772, at a great meeting of Proprietors in 
 Leadenhall Street, Sir George in the Chair told an angry assembly 
 that, owing to unforeseen circumstances, it was desirable to postpone 
 settling the next half-year's dividend till Christmas — the reasons 
 being the extraordinary drafts made on the Company from Bengal, 
 and the indemnity on teas. Mr. Creighton asked where the wonder 
 would cease? One while we are told the Company is so flourishing 
 that it can pay a dividend of 5;^ per cent, for the half-year, and 
 then, that the Company is in such straits, it can pay no dividend 
 at all. " How can twenty-four great merchants be so far out in 
 
THE SELECT COMMITTEE 265 
 
 their calculations ? " He suggested that the Directors ought to be 
 dismissed, and moved for a Committee of Proprietors to enquire 
 into the Company's affairs. Colebrooke said he should have it at 
 once. In the first place, he was not in the Direction when the 
 high dividend was planned — he really did not know, till he came 
 to the Chair, that the treasury was not equal to the demands. It 
 was owing to their servants in Bengal drawing so much more than 
 was expected. Then the indemnity on teas, and the sum due to 
 Government, "all coming down on them together.'' By Christmas, 
 a great part of the goods now in warehouse would be sold — then 
 they could do justice to their proprietors. Creighton asked indig- 
 nantly how Sir George, a merchant, a man of immense fortune, 
 whose trade was money, had not foreseen this ? Was he not afraid 
 of the spectres of the widow and the fatherless ? The unfortunate 
 Fordyce well saw the fate of East India stock — if he could have 
 held out, he would now be one of the richest subjects in these 
 kingdoms. General Smith urged the Directors not to borrow of 
 Government. Borrow of us ! He would begin by lending them 
 ;^5o,ooo next morning. " Mr. Impey '' — a sinister name — also came 
 to their aid ; so did Mr. Dempster, who " smiled at the distresses 
 of the Company " — there's only a little temporary scarcity of cash. 
 When our ships come in, you will all be one million sterling more 
 in pocket than last year. 
 
 Meantime some rather bad news seems to have been received 
 from Tanjore — at the end of October, we are told, "it should seem 
 that the natives begin to be acquainted with the advantages of 
 military discipline." 
 
 The Gentleman's Magazine for December, 1772, contains a 
 "Plan for relieving the East India Company from the present 
 temporary Distress, in Point of Cash, from their own Resources, 
 without having Recourse to Government, for any Loan whatever." 
 The plan is, to turn into money the 18 million pounds of unsold 
 tea, which will remain in their warehouses, after the sales of 1774, 
 "besides about 6 millions, sold, but uncleared." Already, they 
 have 17 millions unsold; and thirteen ships will bring over 8 
 millions more in 1773. The writer explains that when the Company 
 acquired the revenues of Bengal, they had to do something with 
 their money — or, as he expresses it, to increase their investments 
 in India. They could not use it for the purchase of the textile 
 manufactures of Bengal, because, to encourage our own manu- 
 factures, "we prohibit the wear of all foreign printed, painted, and 
 stained goods." So "they naturally turned their thoughts to Tea," 
 and procured the Act of Parliament, taking off is. per pound on 
 
266 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 black and singlo teas, for five years, undertaking to indemnify the 
 revenue for anything it lost by the bargain. And expecting the 
 lowered price would bring increased consumption, they enlarged 
 their sales. The Company, however, have had to pay very large 
 sums on the indemnity — in fact, they are losing at the rate of 
 ;!{|'285,ooo per annum, all told, including warehouse rent and 
 expenses. They must either cease to buy, or find a "foreign vent" 
 for their superfluous stock of teas on hand. They ought to be allowed 
 to re-export it, free of duty. The writer tries to show the certainty 
 of a profit, since the Company could then afford to undersell Sweden, 
 Holland, and France. But, even if they sold at cost price, they 
 would be so much cash in hand, to meet their engagements. As 
 for the smuggling of tea being increased, that might be if our 
 smugglers could not be supplied by the other East India Companies. 
 They are so, constantly, and the smuggler makes half a crown a 
 pound — and more on the high-priced teas. This proposal, after- 
 wards referred to as " Mr. Herries' scheme," makes no mention of 
 America as a market for the surplus ; but early in January, 1773, a 
 General Court recommended the Directors to obtain an Act " for 
 them to export their surplus teas to foreign markets, clear of all 
 drawbacks and duties, as well as to take off the threepence in the 
 pound duty in America." The application was made to Lord North, 
 but he refused. There were only two discordant notes in the King's 
 Speech of November 26, 1772, but these two were on weighty matters 
 — the bad harvest, and consequent dearness of corn ; and the East 
 India Company. The Hon. Mr. FitzPatrick (Charles Fox's great 
 friend), who moved the Address in the Commons, said the Company 
 was in the most alarming and dangerous situation — Parliament must 
 interpose at once. The dividend has fallen to 6 per cent., and it 
 will be an act of the highest fraud if the Directors divide a single 
 shilling. Here the speaker digressed into expressions of thankful- 
 ness that the country was out of the European war between Russia 
 and Turkey, and on the various advantages of a ten years' peace, 
 and the happy prospect of its long continuance. 
 
 Dr. Burrell, who seconded, came at once to the Company. 
 Every member must tremble at entering on the discussion, yet entered 
 on it must be. " A more important charge was never offered to your 
 care. Whether a Charter, even supposing it unbroken, is so sacred 
 a thing, that the State must fall rather than infringe it, is a question 
 I will not suppose you will ever be called upon to decide on. But 
 we may ask how territorial revenues, nearly equal to our annual 
 income, have been squandered ? Was it folly or misfortune, in- 
 discretion or crime ? This is no trifling question, whether men of 
 
THE SELECT COMMITTEE 267 
 
 this or that description shall ascend the throne of Leadenhall 
 Street. It is the stake of Empire ; and on the issue, perhaps, will 
 be determined, whether Great Britain is to be the first nation in 
 the world, or a ruined and undone country." Then he uttered 
 some most solemn words, which must have resounded in the ears of 
 all those who were afterwards members of the Secret Committee. 
 " Great and powerful was Spain, before she waded through blood to 
 the sovereignty of Mexico and Peru. Happy perhaps had it been, and 
 I am sure more honourable, if the military achievements of Britain 
 had never stained the archives of Delhi. If report has not exceeded 
 the bounds of truth, the Company would have been in no worse 
 situation, if the wealth of Bengal had never been wrung from the 
 hands of its innocent possessors." 
 
 That same day. Lord North moved for a Committee of Secrecy. 
 Mr. Hussey said Ministers always tried to conceal matters. He 
 did not charge them with " any sinister views of stock-jobbing," 
 but they were seldom averse to it, and their opportunities of early 
 intelligence made it to them "a lucrative trade.'' Lord North 
 must know all the Company's secrets already — he won't need 
 thirteen friends to teach him how to speculate in the Alley. One 
 of the greatest services he can render this country is to stop " that 
 destructive gaming in the funds which has lately shook the trading 
 interest." It is hard to say where it will end. 
 
 North replied that great complaints had been made of the 
 disclosure of the Company's secrets last session. Burgoyne — now 
 General — defended the late Select Committee. He intended to 
 move its revival. "It is universally allowed, and clearly proved, 
 that the East India Company is rotten to the core. All is equally 
 unsound, you cannot lay your finger on a single healthy spot ! " 
 AH laws, human and divine, have been trampled under foot. " It 
 seems strange to pass over the enormities of the East, and institute 
 . a minute enquiry into the petty larcenies of Leadenhall Street." 
 
 The motion for a Secret Committee, and that for the revival of 
 the Select Committee, were both carried. 
 
 Then came the Bill to Restrain the Company from appointing 
 new Supervisors. The Company was distressed for cash, yet 
 proposed this expensive Commission, " which they say will be paid 
 out of the savings of Mahomed Resim Aly Cawm." Mr. Dempster 
 said the very idea of a Secret Committee was unconstitutional. The 
 Company is in a deficiency of cash, but not in a ruinous condition. 
 The abuses in India, and particularly in Bengal, make it necessary 
 to appoint a set of independent gentlemen — we have found six, and 
 though the expense has been calculated at ;j£'i 20,000, we may save 
 
268 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 millions by it. Sulivan said the Directors had already suspended 
 the departure of the Supervisors, but Wedderburn replied that 
 was not enough — if a General Court ordered them to sail, they 
 might be " many leagues at sea before we can possibly meet.'' So 
 the Restraining Bill ought to be passed at once. Governor 
 Johnstone, the great enemy of the Directors, yet opposed this 
 Bill as unconstitutional. One of his statements may be quoted. 
 He said that Mr. Vansittart had confessed to him, " with his usual 
 candour, that all that pretended parade which is generally given 
 out as a reason for vindicating such a waste of the Company's 
 money, was quite unnecessary." 
 
 The Company's counsel, Impey and Adair, were heard at Bar- 
 The admissions made on this occasion on behalf of the Company 
 are significant. It was admitted " that many abuses prevail in 
 India ; that those in Bengal exceeded those in Bombay, and those 
 in Bombay those at Fort St. George ; that if the army in Bengal were 
 put upon the same footing as that at Fort St. George, the saving 
 would exceed half a million ; that even the army at Fort St. George 
 was more expensive than it ought to be. That in Bengal, 171 
 civil servants cost the Company ^^265, 000 annually; that at 
 Bombay, 96 civil servants cost ;^i 24,000 annually, but at Fort 
 St. George 114 cost only ^^50,000." That the "arbitrary tax 
 called Matoot, under colour of repairing bridges, ways, etc., had 
 been diverted by the Select Committee ^ to their own private use, 
 and was increased if the harvest was plentiful, so that in one 
 district it equalled the whole annual rent of the farmers ; that this 
 enormity was for five years concealed from the Directors " ; and 
 that when compelled by a " refractory member " of Council to let 
 it appear in the minutes, it was excused by saying, "that it would 
 appear insufferable to the Direction, however necessary it might be 
 in the eyes of the natives," " those miserable wretches, out of whose 
 bowels it was iniquitously wrung.'' That Mr. Sykes of the Select 
 Committee, " touched of this Matoot 24,000 rupees for his table, 
 18,000 for his dresses, and 18,000 for other expenses; and that 
 this tax, when mentioned on the Company's books, was wrote 
 off, 'To Profit and Loss'— that is a total loss." That the "Salt 
 Society " now owed the Company half a million, for monopolising 
 salt, betle nut, and tobacco, against the Company's express directions. 
 That for the last three years " the net receipts at Bengal had 
 exceeded the disbursements by ;^i,592,644, which had not been 
 accounted for by the Governor and Council." With a long list of 
 other instances in which the Company had been fleeced of the 
 ^ This is, of course, the Select Committee of 1765, sitting at Calcutta. 
 
THE SELECT COMMITTEE 269 
 
 spoils of which itself had fleeced the unhappy natives of India. 
 Well might the Directors plead that Supervisors, if honest, might 
 " save millions." 
 
 After excusing the Company's embarrassments by making these 
 terrible charges against the Company's servants, Impey and Adair 
 went on to complain that " the scheme of the indemnity on tea " 
 had cost the Company "between payments to Government and 
 losses on shipping, and other articles, not much less than a million 
 sterling; that "the Salt Society had lent the Company money 
 at compound interest; and that till 1765," that is, till the Select 
 Committee of Lord Clive had the direction of affairs, " the 
 civil and military expenses of the Company in Bengal had never 
 exceeded ^^700,000"; in 1766 they amounted to ^^900,000, until 
 in 1771 they had swelled to the enormous sum of ;^i, 800,000 
 sterling. 
 
 Witnesses were called to the Bar, "and proved everything 
 alleged by the Counsel." ^ 
 
 In the Debate, the Company members tried to frighten the 
 Government out of meddling. If the Company's interest and 
 credit sink, the nation may sink with them. But the supporters 
 of the Bill retorted that the Company could not be trusted to 
 redress these grievances — it had already tried, and had only made 
 confusion worse confounded. " Unlimited power will for ever 
 debauch the best of men," said Mr. Crawford. Sykes and Lord 
 Clive were in their places, and heard all this. Sykes made no 
 reply ; Clive made a brief evasive speech, which if it had any 
 meaning, meant that the Supervisors could not do any good, if 
 they tried, and probably would be afraid to try. Dempster made 
 a miserable defence. The Directors did not know — the Directors 
 sent out "most positive orders." "Nothing that could be done by 
 men in Leadenhall Street " had been omitted. The Salt Society has 
 been told it must refund or be prosecuted. Why is the Company 
 treated as a criminal ? The territorial revenues have not enriched 
 them a single sixpence — they have not embezzled these revenues, 
 they have only divided the profits of their increased trade. The 
 territorial fund has been exhausted by Government, by the 
 Company's servants, "and by a noble lord, who, not to say a 
 word of his friends, has reaped more of that harvest than the 
 Company." 
 
 It was not till then that Clive made his great speech. 
 
 ^ The witnesses were, " Mr. Wilkes, keeper of the Company's records ; Mr. 
 Hoole, auditor of Indian accounts ; and Mr. Tookey, who takes care of their 
 custom-house accounts." — Parliarnentary Debates, XVII, 657. 
 
270 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Burke declaimed passionately against the Bill, hinting that 
 Government only wanted to seize the territorial revenues for them- 
 selves. It was in the course of this speech that Burke uttered 
 the memorable words, "Unconstitutional acts, founded on uncon- 
 stitutional motives, spring from unconstitutional acts founded on 
 constitutional motives.'' 
 
 North denied that he had plundered the Company ; " and since 
 their affairs have turned out in so wretched a manner, I am of 
 opinion that the two millions is much better employed in this country 
 than in India, to build walls round their camps, with locks and keys 
 to keep the men from deserting.'' Sykes rose at last. He was 
 concerned to find his honour attacked. The Matoot was agreeable 
 to the form of government established by Lord Clive and the 
 Select Committee. 
 
 At the Bar of the Lords, on December 3, Mr. Tookey swore 
 that the Company's servants had drawn, in excess of their orders, 
 _j^i,o63,o67, IS. 2d., for the year 1771, and that the Company 
 had paid to Government on the indemnity on tea near _;^28 1,000, 
 and now owe for the same ^^202, 000 more, and have lost ;^3oo,ooo 
 on the price of tea. That since their agreement with Government, 
 they have paid into the Treasury ^1,800,000, and still owe 
 _j^2oo,ooo since September ; " and another ,^^200,000 will fall due 
 the 25 th of this instant December." With many other figures, 
 showing how much better off the Company was before it possessed 
 the " duana " of Bengal. 
 
 The Restraining Bill passed by very large majorities in both 
 Houses. 
 
 All through this year, in Debates in Parliament, and in articles 
 in the great Magazines, we have the "Assize of Bread." This 
 Committee — of which Governor Pownall was Chairman — reported 
 in favour of the loaf of Queen Anne, made of the whole flour of 
 the wheat, without bolting. By "some defect" in Alderman 
 Dickenson's Act of 1757, though none of this bread ("the fittest 
 for the poor") was made, "the wheaten, that is commonly sold, is 
 not that which is intended by law." By which ingenious arrange- 
 ment, the poor suffered not only in the nutritive quality of their 
 bread, but lost also one pound by weight in every 8 lbs. The 
 millers seem to have been the gainers. The Committee recommend 
 that the miller be required "to return the whole grit." 
 
 So ended the year which saw the First Partition of Poland. 
 
CHAPTER XXXIIl 
 THE DOUBLE VERDICT 
 
 ' ' His lordship ironically complimented the vast extent of abilities of Lord 
 North, in limiting the continuance of the territorial acquisitions in the Company's 
 possessions for six years. He said he might call his lordship the lion of 
 government, and the India Company the jackall, or lion's provider." — Speech of 
 Lord Clive, May 3, 1773. 
 
 " It came out before the Secret Committee that in 1766 he had obliged the 
 Great Mogul, his tool, to write a letter to the King, telling his Majesty that 
 he had sent him a rich present of diamonds. ' I may write the letter,' said 
 the Mogul, ' but you know I have no diamonds.' ' Do you write the letter,' 
 said Clive, ' and I will find the diamonds.' He did : he plundered a Nabob. 
 One of the diamonds was alone worth ^£^12,000. Thurlow, a proper bloodhound 
 to pursue such a tiger, offered to take up Lord Clive, as Attorney-General. . . . 
 Wedderburn, the Solicitor-General, no honester than the accused or the criminal, 
 was a warm advocate for the latter. . . . Lord North wavered. " — Walpole, Za^/ 
 Journals, i. 206. 
 
 " In short, the appearance on Lord Clive's side of those flimsy and contemptible 
 men Lord Barrington and Jenkinson, carried the tide of Court favour along with 
 them ; and the pusillanimous, uncertain, contradictory variations and indeci- 
 sion of Lord North, who wavered from censure to encomium,^ who aimed at 
 punishment and held out recompense, and who at last, almost in terms, 
 proposed to take away his fortune, and then restore it, turned the scale. 
 But why do I say turned the scale ? ... It had been determined before ; Lord 
 Clive had bought the Court — it was past a doubt. ... To complete Lord 
 Clive's triumph, and its own shame . . . after having stated that presents 
 acquired by military influence were illegal, they acquitted and thanked the 
 man who had confessed and gloried in the facts of which he was accused. . . . 
 Lord North . . . wrote immediately to the King, complaining how he had been 
 abandoned by his Majesty's creatures. His Majesty as usual soothed him 
 with promises — and he deserved the treatment, by once again submitting to 
 be soothed."— /i5zrf. i. 244, 245. 
 
 The moment had come when America and Bengal should cross 
 each other's path. The Company's teas were now become a 
 public question. In January, 1773, a correspondent writes to the 
 Gentleman's Magazine on " the present distress of the East India 
 
 1 He said Lord Clive had virtues enough to balance his faults. (Walpole's 
 note.) 
 
272 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Company." No one can be surprised at it, says the correspondent, 
 ignoring the Directors' account of their servants' depredations. 
 " Our Colonies sent annually to England ;^6oo,ooo for the single 
 article of tea." But when they had to choose "whether they 
 should be slaves under that importation, or freemen importing 
 it from a foreign market, the tea remained in the Company's ware- 
 houses, and the ^600,000 went to Holland and Denmark." This 
 has been going on for five years, and now makes three millions differ- 
 ence in their cash account, is the true cause of the great quantity 
 now on hand, and has helped to the present universal stagnation 
 of all business. 
 
 On the 7th of January, a General Court empowered 
 Sir George Colebrooke and the Directors to obtain an Act of 
 Parliament for exporting the surplus teas to foreign markets, " clear 
 of all drawbacks and duties, as well as to take off the 3 per cent, 
 duty in America." 
 
 The Company's teas were becoming nearly as pressing a question 
 as the Company's affairs — besides the threatened ruin to the 
 Company, there was the high price of tea in England, and the 
 increase of smugghng. It was computed that about two million 
 pounds of tea were smuggled annually into this country — " an article 
 which by habit is now become a necessary of life,'' says a corre- 
 spondent of the Ge?itkman's Magazine.^ 
 
 The first stage was the debate on the loan (March 9). Once 
 more the House resolved itself into Committee, "to take into 
 consideration the affairs of the East India Company," and their 
 Petition for a loan of ;!^ 1,5 00, 000 for four years, at 4 per cent. North 
 said it had been asserted that the subsidy paid by the Company to 
 
 ^ " It is found by the last year's accounts transmitted by the Commissioners, 
 that the balance in favour of Britain is but about eighty-five pounds, after 
 payment of salaries, etc., exclusive of the charge of a fleet to enforce the 
 collection. Then it is observed that the India Company is so out of cash 
 that it cannot pay the bills drawn upon it, and its other debts ; and at the 
 same time so out of credit, that the Bank does not care to assist them, 
 whence they find themselves obliged to lower their dividends ; the apprehension 
 of which has sunk their stock from two hundred and eighty to one hundred 
 and sixty, whereby several millions of property are annihilated . . . besides a loss 
 to the treasury of four hundred thousand pounds per annum, which the company 
 are not able to pay as heretofore." — Franklin to Cushing, London, Jan. 5, 1773. 
 
 The same letter remarks on the imprudence of ' ' losing the American market 
 by keeping up the duty on tea." This has thrown the trade into the hands of 
 the Dutch, Danes, Swedes, and French, who, according to the reports of customs 
 officers in America, "now supply by smuggling the whole continent," not with 
 tea only, but with India goods, " amounting as is supposed in the whole to five 
 hundred thousand pounds sterling per annum." 
 
THE DOUBLE VERDICT 273 
 
 Government was excessive, and that therefore Government was 
 bound to come to the Company's rescue; but the fact was, 
 Government had lost by them — the ;^4oo,ooo had by no means 
 made up for the loss on the Customs. The Company proposed 
 the amount — they ought to have known whether they could afford 
 it. He complained that, after all the Committees, "we still want 
 the necessary information ; there is still much to come to light." 
 We only know enough of the malversation abroad to see the 
 absolute necessity for immediate interposition. A Company with 
 a revenue of almost ^^4,000,000, and exporting British articles 
 to the amount of ^^400,000 a year, is an object of national import- 
 ance — and next September it will be deficient ;^i, 300,425. But 
 what to do ? The Directors have borrowed too much upon bonds 
 already. And we can't wait to find out whether they are to blame, 
 and make them find the deficit if they are — the Company may be 
 ruined by delay. "An instantaneous step must be taken." He 
 proposed that the pubUc should advance ;^r, 400,000, and 
 Government should forego the ^^400, 000 from the territorial 
 revenues till this loan should be repaid. Meanwhile, no dividend 
 to be above 6 per cent., with other provisos of a like nature — in 
 return for all which the Company may keep their territorial posses- 
 sions for the six unexpired years of their Charter. 
 
 As might be expected, there was a furious opposition ; General 
 Courts were called, there was much mutual recrimination, and much 
 coming and going between Leadenhall Street and Westminster. 
 But the Ministry was strong, and the revelations of the doings in 
 Bengal had made the Company odious. To save those territorial 
 possessions which had been the cause of all their woes, they even 
 agreed to the sweeping changes in their constitution. The 
 qualification to vote in the Court of Proprietors was raised from 
 ;^5oo to ;^iooo of Stock; every holder of ;!£'3ooo Stock was 
 to have two votes; holders of ;,^6ooo, three; of ;^io,ooo, four. 
 Only six Directors were to retire every year. There was to be a 
 Governor-General of the provinces of Bengal, Bahar, and Orissa, 
 with a salary of ;;^25,ooo a year, and four Councillors with ;^8ooo 
 each. The other Presidencies were to be subordinate to Bengal, 
 and a Supreme Court of Justice was to sit at Calcutta, with a 
 Chief Justice at ;^8ooo a year, and three assistant Judges at 
 ;^6ooo each — all these to be appointed by the Crown. 
 
 All former opposition had been as nothing to that now made. It 
 was said the changes were subversive of the Constitution — the rights 
 given under the Charter were treated as dust. Twelve hundred 
 Proprietors were suddenly disfranchised — deprived of any share in the 
 
274 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 direction of their own affairs. Moreover, by this long lease of 
 power the Directors were placed beyond the control of their con- 
 stituents, and could gratify themselves and their friends unchecked. 
 And while the Proprietors will be helpless, the Company will be 
 under the Minister's thumb, and forced to pay these enormous 
 salaries to officials they do not choose, and may greatly object 
 to.i The City of London, appealed to by the Company, petitioned ; 
 once more counsel were heard at the Bar; but all was in vain. 
 On the loth of June the East India Bill passed the Commons 
 by more than 6 to i ; and on the 19th, after a warm debate, it 
 was carried in the Lords by 74 to 17. 
 
 The Company was very angry with all these Committees, 
 which dived into its most secret affairs, and with the Debates which 
 proclaimed them as from the house-tops — for the Debates were now 
 printed in all the great Magazines, and read by everybody. Worst 
 of all was the Bill, which was taking away its property 
 without its consent. The Company's embarrassments were a 
 national danger — its discontent was a political danger, for it was 
 strong enough to control a General Election. Something had to 
 be done to appease its resentment, and help it to pay its debts. 
 The obvious means was the Tea. So a Bill was brought in which 
 virtually gave the Company the monopoly of Tea in the Colonies. 
 The measure had much to recommend it. It might be made the 
 means of bringing the Colonies to reason. When Charles Town- 
 shend's Revenue Act was repealed, the duty on tea was left 
 expressly to preserve the right of taxation. The same thing was to 
 be done again. 
 
 The Tea Bill was agreed to by the Commons, on April 27, in 
 the same easy fashion as the Stamp Act had been agreed to nine 
 years before. It allowed the drawback on "all teas sold at any 
 of the East India Company's sales, or imported under licence, 
 after the 10th of May, 1773"; and included "all the duties of 
 customs paid upon the importation of such teas." The Com- 
 missioners of the Treasury were empowered " to grant licences to 
 the East India Company, to export teas to the British plantations 
 in America, or to foreign parts, provided that ten million pounds' 
 weight of teas be left remaining in the Company's warehouses." 
 
 This exempted the Company's teas from all duties hitherto 
 payable in England on re-exported teas, but it left the duty of three- 
 pence on the pound of tea exported to America. And there can be 
 
 ' " Downing-street squeezed Leadenhall-street ; Leadenhall-street was there- 
 fore compelled to squeeze its servants in India, who were in their turn com- 
 pelled to squeeze the natives." — Burke, March 23, 1773. 
 
THE DOUBLE VERDICT 275 
 
 no doubt that this threepence was the final determining motive for 
 remitting the ninepence. For, as was once more urged, if the 
 Company's embarrassments had been Government's first concern, the 
 duty would have been taken off " Singlo " teas, and not only off 
 " Bohea.'' It was " Singlo " which was choking their warehouses. 
 The Directors quickly saw that the Bill was not as good as it looked. 
 They represented to Government that America took their Bohea — 
 that sort of tea was never a burden. But considerable pressure was 
 brought to bear. It was asserted that the resolution for allowing the 
 drawback was agreed to by a Committee of three Directors — when 
 there ought to have been eleven. But it was in vain that Govern- 
 ment was entreated to let the American duty be taken off Singlo. 
 The object was to tempt the colonist with the good tea, not with the 
 inferior. The Directors even waited on North more than once at 
 his own house. The last time, wearied by their importunity, he 
 told them it was to no purpose making objections — the King would 
 have it so. " The King meant to try the question with America."'^ 
 
 Before this, one of the most extraordinary incidents in Clive's 
 extraordinary story had taken place. On the loth of May 
 Burgoyne brought up the Report of the Select Committee. He 
 said it contained accounts of crimes which it shocked human nature 
 even to conceive of — he particularised Clive's enormous bribe to 
 Omichund to procure the assassination of his master the Nabob. He 
 said he looked on the deposition of Surajah Dowla, and bringing 
 about the revolution in favour of Mir Jaffier, in 1756, as the origin 
 of all the subsequent evils, and of the temporary distress, " if not the 
 total destruction," of the Company. He moved three Resolutions : 
 That all acquisitions made by a military force, or by treaty with 
 foreign Powers, belong of right to the State ; That it is illegal to 
 appropriate them to private use; and That very great sums of 
 money and other valuable property have been acquired in this way, 
 in Bengal, from Princes and others, and been converted to 
 private uses. 
 
 Clive said little, " and with arrogant haughtiness, referred to his 
 great services, to the approbation of the King and the public, and 
 to the insolent defence he had already made." 2 
 
 At past ten at night it had not yet been decided what should be 
 put to the House ! Wedderburn's motion for the previous question 
 had not been seconded, and so could not be put — " there remained 
 none but Burgoyne's, which had not been mitigated or corrected." 
 
 1 Letter of Sir Philip Francis, quoted in the Chatham Correspondence, iii. 
 444, note. 
 
 ''■ Walpole's description of the debate, Last Journals. 
 
2/6 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 It happened that the House was exceedingly crowded. There had 
 been no talk of spying strangers — it would have been impolitic to 
 exclude many "who might be proprietors of India Stock, and 
 impolite, as many ladies were present too '' — and the ladies might 
 hold Stock, and have votes. But the heat was intolerable — " the 
 younger men, who had gone away to dinner and returned flushed 
 with wine," were roaring impetuously for the question.^ And so, 
 almost without a negative, and " in a tumultuous manner," the 
 "Sovereignty of three Imperial vast provinces" was transferred from 
 the Company to the Crown. 
 
 It was no sooner done than North began to waver. But the 
 attack on Clive continued. On the 19th — after a two days' debate 
 — Burgoyne went once more through the catalogue of Clive's 
 crimes — the fictitious treaties, the murder of Surajah Dowla, the 
 bribes, the treacheries, the presents. At last it was carried by 119 
 to 81 to hear Clive's witnesses, and the House adjourned to 
 the 2 1 St. 
 
 That day Burgoyne moved his terrible motion : " That it appears 
 to this House, that Robert Lord Clive, baron of Plassey in the 
 kingdom of Ireland, about the time of the deposing of Surajah 
 Dowla, Nabob of Bengal, and the establishing of Mir Jaffier on 
 the musmud, did, through the influence of the powers with which 
 he was entrusted as member of the Select Committee, and 
 Commander-in-Chief of the British forces, obtain and possess him- 
 self of 2 lacs of rupees as Commander-in-Chief; and a further 
 sum of 16 lacs of rupees, or more, under the denomination of 
 private donation ; which sums, amounting together to 20 lacs and 
 80,000 rupees, were of the value in English money of ^^234,000; 
 and that in so doing the said Robert Lord Clive abused the powers 
 with which he was entrusted, to the evil example of the servants of 
 the State." 
 
 There was a strange medley of attack and defence — Meredith, 
 Thurlow, Fox, Barrd, for the question; Wedderburn, Burke, 
 Admiral Saunders, and Lord George Germaine, for Clive. 
 
 Burgoyne had given notice that if his motion was carried, he 
 should propose one on Clive's jaghir. Ministerialists were alarmed 
 — Clive commanded ten votes — he must not be driven to despera- 
 tion. The House agreed to divide the motion, and to take first the 
 statement of facts, ending with the words, "English money, of 
 _;^234,ooo." At five in the morning, this portion was carried; and 
 
 ' In a letter to Mason, of May IJ, 1773, Walpole maliciously says that the 
 House was so very hot "the young members thought it would melt their rouge 
 and wither their nosegays." 
 
THE DOUBLE VERDICT 277 
 
 then Burgoyne moved the last clause, containing the censure. 
 This, too, was carried. Then the Solicitor-General moved : "That 
 Robert Lord Clive did, at the same time, render great and meritorious 
 services to this country." This also was carried ; and so Clive was 
 condemned and acquitted in the same breath.^ 
 
 The loth of May, 1773, is a memorable date. An event took 
 place, little noted at the time, but destined to be remembered when 
 Surajah Dowla and Mir Jaffier are forgotten, and even the services 
 and the crimes of Clive are confused together in a dim memory of 
 Plassey. For on that loth of May the Tea Bill came into force. 
 
 ' Lloyd Kenyon, the future Chief Justice, wrote to his father : " I am quite 
 out of temper with all politics. Ten days ago I was in hopes Lord Clive and the 
 other Nabobs would have been brought to justice for their peculations, but on 
 Wednesday last, the House of Commons thought good to acquit him, by a large 
 majority. The whole Rockingham party joined in his favour. Before this 
 sample of their virtue, I had a better opinion of them than of any other party, 
 but now ray opinion of them is very much altered, and some of their leaders 
 know it. I cannot forbear suspecting that some lacs of rupees have been 
 employed in obtaining this victoiy." — Letter of May 25, 1773. Hist. AfSS. 
 Cotnm., Kenyon Papers. A few days later, another letter gives a less improbable 
 explanation. ' ' The upshot of this business is to be imputed to the Rockingham 
 party, who, for reasons best known to themselves, all in a body took part with 
 Lord Clive, with a view, I suppose, to add him and his friends to their number. I 
 thought much better of them before than I shall ever do again. " — ^June 8. 
 
 "... the person whose arguments were most serviceable to the accused was 
 Lord George Germaine. He was allowed to have surpassed himself, and to have 
 compressed into a few pithy manly sentences the sum of all that could possibly 
 be said in alleviation or excuse, in justice or policy." — Walpole. 
 
 On November 22, 1773, Clive died by his own hand. He had long been 
 subject to fits of melancholy. 
 
CHAPTER XXXIV 
 A LULL IN THE STORM 
 
 " There is a lull at this moment. Now, then, is the time to refit your rigging, 
 to work out the vessel from amidst these breakers, and to get her under way in 
 her old safe course. ... If the present season is suffered to pass away without 
 anything being done by parliament, the settlement of the affairs of America will, 
 perhaps, be forever impracticable. . . . When we consider this law as a measure 
 of finance, the fact upon your table proclaims its insufficiency, for the sum 
 returned, as its whole net produce, amounts but to ;^2g5 and a few shillings." — 
 POWNALL. 
 
 ' ' You may think me prolix, but it is from not desiring that the heat of a boy 
 may throw me so much off my guard as to draw this country into another addi- 
 tion of 50 millions to the National Debt ; we must get the Colonies into order 
 before we engage with our neighbours." — The King to Lord North, Kew, 
 Aug. I, 1772. 
 
 For the first two years after the repeal of the Revenue Act it did 
 indeed seem as though the King had triumphed. That Act had hardly 
 been repealed three months, when non-importation was at an end. 
 The July packet took orders to England for everything but Tea. 
 But the Government was not satisfied — it wanted to punish, and to 
 prevent. Never again must an insolent colony say what taxes it 
 will and what it will not pay. So Hutchinson was ordered to hand 
 over Castle William to the King's troops. Boston was made the 
 rendezvous for the King's ships, instead of Halifax.! fhe Assembly 
 was not recalled from Cambridge. The King was planning a com- 
 plete subjugation of his rebellious province of Massachusetts. 
 Hutchinson was writing to Hillsborough, making suggestions, 
 mentioning " ringleaders " by name, and assuring his Majesty that 
 "if the kingdom is united and resolved, I have but very little doubt 
 we shall be as tame as lambs." He even debated the relative 
 advantages of laying aside taxation as inexpedient, or of dealing with 
 the people as being " in a state of revolt." He proposed to starve 
 them into submission, by no longer allowing the New England 
 fishermen to fish on the shores of Newfoundland. 
 
 ■ By the Order of Council of July 15, 1770, which also ordered the seizing of 
 Castle William. 
 
 278 
 
A LULL IN THE STORM 279 
 
 In July, 1771, the never-ending altercation between the Assembly 
 and the Governor, on the question of removal, took on a new phase. 
 For fifty years the Commissioners of Customs had paid the Colonial 
 income-tax. They chose this moment to complain to the Colonial 
 Secretary, and Hillsborough sent orders that the Governor must refuse 
 consent to any Bill which taxed the salary of any officer paid by the 
 King. The sum was not worth regarding — the Commissioners had 
 been assessed at no more than was paid by persons with less income 
 — but the Assembly, as a matter of principle, sent up the Bill with 
 these items, and Hutchinson was compelled to reject the whole 
 Bill. 
 
 The Assembly said that it knew of no Commissioners of his 
 Majesty's Customs, " nor of any revenue which his Majesty had a 
 right to establish in America " ; and that the Governor, in withhold- 
 ing his consent from the Bill, had " effectually vacated the Charter.'' 
 Fortunately, the session was just at an end ; and the news from 
 England of a great change of opinion in favour of America, and of 
 the probable fall of the North Cabinet, brought a lull in the storm. 
 The people were weary of strife, and would have hailed a complete 
 reconciliation. There was also a split in the patriotic party — Han- 
 cock, a vain and unstable man, had quarrelled with Samuel Adams, 
 and Hutchinson had hopes of tempting him over to the side of 
 Government. Samuel Adams was in despair — the spirit of liberty 
 seemed to have fallen asleep, and the twelve men-of-war in Boston 
 Harbour were the visible sign of the overwhelming power of Great 
 Britain. Otis had become hopelessly insane. There was no heart 
 left in anyone. Yet in Georgia and South Carolina the Royal 
 Governors had incensed the people ; and in North Carolina, Tryon 
 and his creature Fanning had by their oppressions caused an actual 
 insurrection of the " Regulators,'' which had just been quenched in 
 their blood. The people of Illinois, tired of the corruption and ■ 
 exactions of the military commander, were demanding a Governor 
 whom they should appoint for themselves. Gage scouted the idea 
 of a regular constitutional government for these backwoodsmen— 
 "they don't deserve so much attention." And in Virginia, the 
 legislature was trying to get rid of the slave-trade. The curse of 
 slave labour was making itself felt, and the numbers of the negroes 
 and coloured people were increasing so much that the province was 
 alarmed. Thomas Jefferson was bringing in a Bill for permitting 
 unrestricted emancipation. It was not Virginia's first attempt to 
 abolish the slave-trade, but all her laws on the subject had been 
 disallowed. On December 10, 1770, the King issued an instruction 
 under his own hand, commanding the Governor of Virginia, "on 
 
280 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 pain of the highest displeasure, to assent to no law by which the 
 importation of slaves shall be in any respect prohibited or restricted." 
 There was, indeed, a movement throughout the provinces for abol- 
 ishing the whole accursed institution. Maryland, New Jersey, 
 Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, were all 
 ready to join. Franklin was denouncing the pharisaic hypocrisy of 
 a nation which had just refused to allow a single slave to be carried 
 away from England to be sold abroad, and yet was rejecting 
 the petition to put an end once for all to the traffic in human 
 flesh.i 
 
 Great and manifold have been the consequences, and it is 
 impossible that we as a nation can wash our hands of them. 
 
 For five years there had been no contested election in Massa- 
 chusetts. At last, after the legislature had been compelled for 
 between two and three years to sit at Cambridge, Hutchinson, in 
 the summer of 1772, suddenly recalled it to Boston. And now there 
 ensued an obstinate struggle on the whole question of the salaries of 
 Crown officials, now paid through warrants under the King's sign- 
 manual, drawn on a perennial fund raised by an Act of Parliament. 
 The Assembly maintained that, while the power of the King was 
 protected by the right of nomination, the power of the colony was 
 protected by the exclusive right of finding the money. It was sound 
 constitutional doctrine, and anything short of such a distribution of 
 power was an abnegation of the Charter. The Assembly aimed 
 especially at Hutchinson, whose salary of ;^i5oo a year was so 
 paid as to render him entirely independent of the people. 
 
 Hillsborough had begun his career as Colonial Secretary by 
 granting Hutchinson ;^2oo a year out of the new Customs. He 
 ended it by announcing that the King, " with the entire concurrence 
 of Lord North," had made provision for rendering the Judges 
 also stipendaries of the Crown. Hillsborough's " firmness " had not 
 gained him friends, even in the Cabinet. The King himself was 
 tired of his bullying way. But he fell because he had opposed a 
 grant to the Ohio Company of twenty-three million acres west of the 
 Alleghanies. These were the " Lands of the Ohio,'' which, together 
 with Nova Scotia, had so large a share in bringing about the Seven 
 Years' War. Hillsborough opposed this grant, fearing that the 
 backwoodsmen would be too independent. Dr. Franklin persuaded 
 Camden, Gower, and others, to become shareholders, and by their 
 influence the Board of Trade was able to persuade the Lords of 
 
 ^ He referred to the case of the negro Sommerset, whose master brought him 
 to England, turned him adrift when he fell sick, and two years afterwards 
 seized him as his slave. 
 
A LULL IN THE STORM 281 
 
 Council to plant the new province. On this, Hillsborough resigned 
 in a huff, and the Earl of Dartmouth became Colonial Secretary.i 
 
 The King thought he had gained the day, when he made Judges 
 and Governors dependent on his good pleasure for their salaries. 
 He had only focussed the spirit of resistance. Britain soon had 
 some reason for calling America rebellious. Roused by the appeal 
 of Boston, the towns of Massachusetts, assembling at town-meetings, 
 were uttering very alarming sentiments. Marblehead — rather cool 
 formerly — now said that it felt " unavoidable disesteem and reluctant 
 irreverence for the British parliament " ; adding that it was " a great 
 and uncommon kind of grievance " to be compelled to carry the 
 produce of Spain and Portugal — received in exchange for its fish — to 
 Great Britain, and there pay duty. Further, that it " detested the 
 name of Hillsborough." Petersham said that the late appointment 
 of salaries, whereby Judges depended on mere will and pleasure, 
 completed a system of bondage as wicked as was ever fabricated by 
 man. Gorham said, " Better risk our lives and fortunes in the 
 defence of our rights, than die piecemeal in slavery." The small 
 new town of Woolwich did not think its answer " perfect in spelling," 
 but sent it all the same. A little before this Dr. Joseph Warren of 
 Plymouth had said despondently, " the towns are dead." But now 
 there were ninety votes to one in Plymouth alone for "fighting 
 Great Britain." By the end of December the towns were in session 
 in town-meeting "from the Kennebec to Buzzard's Bay," and a 
 Union of Colonies began to be talked of as a practical possibility. 
 Gushing and Samuel Adams began to write letters in the Boston 
 
 ' "Who wears a coronet and prays.'' Dartmouth's appointment was hailed 
 in America as an earnest of a change of policy. He received many con- 
 gratulatory letters, and a negress wrote him an ode. Unhappily, he threw him- 
 self into the policy of coercion with as little reluctance, if with less insolence, 
 than Hillsborough himself. His conscience does not seem to have revolted either 
 at the employment of Indians, or at the maintenance of the slave-trade. It is, 
 however, certain that a more conciliatory feeling prevailed in England at this 
 moment. Franklin says: "With regard to the sentiments of the people in 
 general here concerning America, I must say that we have among them many 
 friends and well-wishers. The dissenters are all for us, and many of the 
 merchants and manufacturers. There seems to be even among the country 
 gentlemen a general sense of our growing importance, a disapprobation of the 
 harsh measures with which we have been treated, and a wish that some means 
 may be found of perfect reconciliation. A few members of parliament in both 
 Houses, and perhaps some in high office, have in a degree the same ideas ; but 
 none of these seem willing to be active in our favour, lest adversaries should take 
 advantage and charge it upon them as betraying the interests of this nation." — 
 Letter of Dr. Franklin, July, 1773, "possibly to the Provincial Congress.'' 
 Hist. MSS. Comm. Report XI, App. 5 (MSS. of the Earl of Dartmouth), 
 P- 337- 
 
282 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Gazette very much bolder than any which had appeared before. 
 " The people in every town must instruct their representatives to 
 send a remonstrance to the King, and assure him, unless their 
 liberties are immediately restored whole and entire, they will form 
 an independent commonwealth after the example of the Dutch 
 provinces, and offer a free trade to all nations." This was high 
 language indeed ; and at the suggestion of Samuel Adams, the towns 
 of Massachusetts resumed a regular correspondence on the infringe- 
 ments of Colonial rights, and the best methods of asserting them. 
 Hutchinson thought this scheme "such a foolish one that it must 
 necessarily make them ridiculous.'' 
 
 But it was the Commissioners of the British Stamp Office who 
 looked ridiculous, when they came to make up their accounts for 
 America, and found that the expenses of collecting;^! 500 exceeded 
 ;^i 2,000. And most of the ^^1500 was from Canada and the West 
 Indies. As for the tax on tea, it had done still worse — even in Boston 
 seven-eighths of the tea consumed was Dutch, and in the South the 
 proportion was greater still. The whole remittance of last year on 
 teas and wines, and other articles taxed indirectly, was hardly ;^85, 
 and the ships and soldiers used in collecting it had cost "some 
 hundred thousands," while the East India Company had lost sales to 
 the amount of over _j^6oo,ooo a year — enough to have paid the subsidy 
 due to Government, and left a handsome balance for the dividend. 
 
 There was no end to the anti-commercial nature of our scheme. 
 But for this miserable threepence the East India Company would 
 have got the whole American tea-trade into their hands — their tea 
 was considered of better quality than what was smuggled ; if offered 
 at the same price, the contraband trade — which we professed to 
 desire to stop — would have stopped of itself. It would no longer have 
 paid to smuggle tea, when tea was ninepence a pound cheaper than 
 before. But the King " meant to try the question with America.'' 
 
 Not content with the irritation already excited, the British 
 Government was reviving the attempt to bring offenders to England 
 for trial. Those Rhode Islanders who burned the Government 
 schooner Gaspee'^ were to be delivered to Admiral Montagu, and 
 sent over to England for condign punishment. Thurlow had 
 already said their crime was " worse than piracy " — yet no one had 
 been killed in the affair. When Admiral Montagu held his court, 
 and demanded the arrest of these men, Stephen Hopkins, sometime 
 Governor, and now Chief Justice of Rhode Island, refused either to 
 do it or allow it to be done. 
 
 There were now eighty towns in committee, and the Speaker of 
 
 ' On June 9, 1772. 
 
A LULL IN THE STORM 283 
 
 Massachusetts was writing to the Speaker of Virginia. The first 
 thing the Boston Assembly did when it met in January, 1773, was 
 to vote the salaries of the Judges. Hutchinson delayed his assent. 
 The House sent to say that the people without doors were alarmed 
 at the report that Judges were to be paid by the Crown. The very 
 next day Hutchinson informed them that his Majesty had ordered 
 the salaries to be allowed, but no warrants for payment had been 
 issued, so he must delay his assent, lest the warrants when they 
 come should overlay as to time. Eight days after a deputation 
 waited upon the Governor, They were sure his Majesty would 
 never have made this order if he had not been misinformed as to 
 the constitution and appointment of our Judges. Did he not say 
 on his accession that he "looked upon the independence and 
 uprightness of the judges as essential to the impartial administration 
 of justice " ? At last, after more altercation, Hutchinson assented to 
 the grants for last year ; but when the House voted similar grants 
 for the current year, he declined to confirm, saying he had always 
 waited till the year had expired. He seemed determined to make 
 the dependence of the Judges as conspicuous as possible. 
 
 A long list of grievances had been put forth, and was in print in 
 English publications by August of 1773. It began by saying that 
 "The spirit of governing by force a populous and wide-extended 
 empire, is too mighty for the feeble race of party politicians," who 
 have ruled since the commencement of the present reign. While the 
 colonists "were suffered to enjoy the rights of Englishmen, they 
 gloried in the English name." But now the British legislature has 
 assumed the powers of legislation for the colonists without their 
 consent. We are treated with less decency and regard than the 
 Romans showed even to the provinces they had conquered — they 
 left every province to raise the taxes in the way most easy to them- 
 selves. The new army revenue-officers^invested with powers more 
 arbitrary than any man or body of men ought to have ; the revenue 
 thus raised applied to destroy the liberties of the people, by making 
 their Governors and Judges independent of the people, and by 
 quartering troops in a free city; the adjourning of Assemblies to 
 inconvenient places of meeting ; the forbidding the Council to meet, 
 unless called by the Governor ; the seizing of Castle William, the 
 provincial fortress; the late suspension of the Assembly of New 
 York, till they should comply with an arbitrary act of the British 
 Parliament; the extension of the power of Admiralty Courts, 
 whereby we lose the right of trial by jury, and can be dragged from 
 one part of the continent to another; the restraining us from 
 erecting slitting-mills, to manufacture our own iron — an infringe- 
 
284 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 ment of the right God has given us to use our own skill and 
 industry ; and the unreasonable and grievous restraint on the 
 manufacture of hats ; the proposal to send us to England for trial, 
 so that, whether condemned or acquitted, we shall be ruined by the 
 expense ; the attempt to establish an American Episcopate ; and 
 lastly, the frequent alteration of boundaries of colonies, whereby 
 many settlers, having bought the soil of the natives, and obtained 
 confirmation of their title from this province, have found themselves 
 transferred without their consent to New Hampshire, and have had 
 to get a new confirmation. And now they hear they are to be 
 again transferred, to New York. 
 
 This last grievance was evidently felt very bitterly, and the 
 Governor of New Hampshire was charged before the Privy Council 
 with acting in collusion with his Council to deprive people of their 
 lands, and changing the Judges until he found some to decide the 
 question in his favour. 
 
 With inconceivable want of judgment, Hutchinson lost no 
 opportunity of a wrangle with the House. Thus, in June he had 
 refused to confirm a number of bills because the year of the King's 
 reign was " expressed in plain English, instead of the Roman 
 language as usual." The House said if the Governor thought this 
 made the bills of an extraordinary nature, they would put the year 
 in Latin — it was immaterial to them. 
 
 Meanwhile, as a result of our policy, the whole of the American 
 revenue in each of the last two years was considerably less than that 
 collected on molasses alone " before the new laws." " Exclusive of 
 the great expense of the Board of Commissioners, and other 
 appointments," it is said to amount to about _;^i4,ooo a year. 
 Hutchinson was growing alarmed, and the more alarmed he was 
 the more uncompromisingly he insisted on the supremacy of 
 England. He had the folly to talk to a continent seething with 
 discontent, about the impossibility of anything between supreme 
 authority of Parliament and total independence. His Council 
 replied that he supposed an unlimited power in Parliament, which 
 can only belong to the Sovereign of the Universe. From the nature 
 and end of government, the power of supreme authority of Parlia- 
 ment must be hmited ; and they appealed to Magna Charta, and the 
 Petition and the Bill of Rights. But they declared that " Inde- 
 pendence they had not in contemplation." Hutchinson, who had 
 himself provoked this discussion, answered with legal quibbles, 
 persistently evading the great question whether there was, or was not^ 
 any limit to the power of Parliament.^ 
 
 ' See Hutchinson's History of Massachusetts, vol. iii. 
 
A LULL IN THE STORM 285 
 
 The friends of Government were talking of nothing but the 
 revocation of Colonial charters, and Hutchinson was privately 
 advising "the prohibition of the commerce of Boston." On the 
 other side, each year, as the 5th of March came round, and the 
 " martyrs " were commemorated in Faneuil Hall or the Old South, 
 the speakers grew more uncompromising in their assertion of pro- 
 vincial rights. 
 
 Just about this time Mr. Commissioner Temple said the King's 
 cause in America had been more hurt by his own servants than by 
 all the world beside. Temple now returned to England, and 
 presently became involved in the mysterious affair of Hutchinson's 
 Letters. 
 
CHAPTER XXXV 
 THE LETTERS 
 
 " I have been basely betrayed. A number of my letters, four it is said, which 
 I had wrote to the late Mr. Whately, in confidence, together with a number 
 of other letters, wrote him by my very good friend Gov''. Hutchinson, have 
 been somehow or other filched out of his Cabinet, and transmitted hither, with 
 design to injure us . . . most people suspect Mr. Temple, but I mention his 
 name to you in confidence. He is suspected, I say, but I know no other reason 
 for it but because he was the late Mr. Whately's correspondent." — Lieutenant- 
 Governor Oliver to Robert Thompson, Esq., Boston, June 3, 1773. (Given in the 
 Diary and Letters of Thomas Hutchinson. ) 
 
 "Though I have never wrote anything criminal — yet — I have wrote — what 
 ought not to be made public." — Letter of Governor Hutchinson. 
 
 "The favorite part of his discourse was levelled at your agent, who stood 
 there the butt of his invective ribaldry for near an hour, not a single Lord 
 adverting to the impropriety and indecency of treating a public messenger in so 
 ignominious a manner, who was present only as the person delivering your 
 petition. . . . If he had done a wrong, in obtaining and transmitting the letters, 
 that was not the tribunal where he was to be accused and tried. The cause was 
 already before the Chancellor. . . . This part of his speech was thought so good, 
 that they have since printed it, in order to defame me everywhere . . . but the 
 grosser parts of the abuse are omitted, appearing, I suppose, in their own eyes, 
 too foul to be seen on paper." — Franklin to Thomas Gushing, describing the 
 hearing of the Petition for the recall of Governor Hutchinson, by the Lords 
 of the Comtuittee for Plantation Affairs, Jan. 29, 1774' 
 
 Franklin never divulged from whom he had the Letters written 
 by Governor Hutchinson, Lieutenant-Governor Oliver, Paxton, 
 Commissioner of Customs, and other persons in Boston, to Mr. 
 Thomas Whately, a member of Parliament who had connections in 
 Pennsylvania. Whately, a man of great political ability, had been 
 an Under Secretary of State in George Grenville's Ministry,, and was 
 his intimate friend.^ He died in June, 1772, and his papers came 
 into the possession of his brother William, a banker in Lombard 
 Street. A little before the death of Grenville, Franklin was one day 
 conversing with "a gentleman of character and distinction," and 
 
 1 He was Member for Castle Rising ; also "Keeper of his Majesty's private 
 roads, and Guide to his Royal Person in all progresses, etc." — See Gentle- 
 man's Magazine, June and July, 1772. 
 
THE LETTERS 287 
 
 strongly condemning the sending of troops to Boston as a most 
 dangerous step. The gentleman replied, "Not only the measure 
 you censure, but all the other grievances you complain of, were 
 proposed to Administration, solicited, and obtained by some of 
 the most respectable among Americans themselves, as necessary 
 measures for the welfare of that country.'' Franklin refused to 
 believe this, whereupon the gentleman promised to bring him proof. 
 A few days after he produced the Letters. Franklin could no 
 longer doubt — he recognised the hands. The Letters were signed, 
 but the name of the person addressed was not on them ; and when 
 Franklin sent them to America he did not know to whom they 
 had been written. They were given to him as Agent for the 
 Massachusetts House of Representatives, on purpose that he might 
 transmit them to the Colonies. That he was not justified in doing 
 so can only be maintained by those who are prepared to maintain 
 that if Franklin had discovered a correspondence revealing a 
 conspiracy to murder King George in, he would have been bound 
 in honour to keep the secret. These Letters contained proof of a 
 plan for destroying the liberties and institutions of a Continent. 
 But Franklin believed that in making them known he was pro- 
 moting a reconciliation, by showing that the most obnoxious 
 measures had not originated with the British Government. As he 
 wrote to the Committee of Correspondence at Boston, " My own 
 resentment has by this means been exceedingly abated." And so 
 it would have been with all in America, but for the manner in 
 which the British Government took the affair. 
 
 Franklin had received the Letters subject to certain restrictions 
 as to copying, etc., and they had been in America six months before 
 they were laid before the Assembly of Massachusetts. The wonder 
 is that such a secret was so long kept in any sense. At last (after 
 John Adams had taken them round with him on a tour) it became 
 impossible to prevent whispers. Hutchinson was away, settling a 
 very old boundary dispute between New York and Massachusetts. 
 He settled it to the advantage of Massachusetts, and flattered 
 himself he should be received cordially on his return. He had 
 some little uneasiness about the Letters — the whispers had reached 
 him — but ever since the Council got hold of Governor Bernard's 
 letters, more caution had been exercised to prevent copies being 
 taken, and he trusted he was safe.^ 
 
 The Assembly had not met many days, when Mr. Hancock in- 
 formed the House that within forty-eight hours a discovery would be 
 
 ' In 1766 it began to be asserted that the Stamp Act had originated in the 
 province. They began to publish Bernard's Letters in '66 and on into '68. 
 
288 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 made which would put the province in a happier state than it had 
 been in for fourteen years past. The audience in the gallery, of 
 course, told everybody. Great expectation was excited. When the 
 time came, Samuel Adams, after desiring that the galleries might 
 be cleared, produced the Letters, and read them to the House. 
 
 After a debate, the Assembly, by loi to 5, voted that the 
 tendency and design of the Letters was to subvert the Constitution 
 of the Government, and to introduce military law into the province. 
 Hutchinson knew not what to do. To stop the proceedings by pro- 
 rogation or dissolution would be worse than letting them continue. 
 He contented himself with sending to ask for a transcript of their 
 proceedings, and by somewhat feebly denying that he had ever 
 written any letter tending to subvert the Constitution — the King 
 himself desired rather to preserve it entire. His Letters, if genuine, 
 could be only part of a private correspondence on the Constitu- 
 tion of the Colonies in general. Finally, in his speeches to the 
 Assembly he had said everything which was in the Letters. As for 
 the sentence, " There must be an abridgement of what are called 
 English liberties," he only meant that, in a remove from the state of 
 nature to the most perfect state of government, there must be a 
 great restraint of natural liberty ; and that a colony, three thousand 
 miles distant, cannot enjoy all the liberty of the parent State, "as 
 they might have done if they had not removed " ; a remark which 
 shows at what a loss Hutchinson was for an excuse — for none could 
 know better than the Historian of Massachusetts that a colony 
 three thousand miles distant from the parent State is apt to take 
 to itself as much liberty as it chooses. 
 
 It happened as Franklin had expected. As soon as these 
 Letters were shown to the House of Representatives, resentment was 
 withdrawn from the Mother Country, and fell, " where it was proper 
 it should," on the heads of Hutchinson "and those caitiffs, who 
 were the authors of the mischief." Both the Council and the House 
 took this view. They passed a number of resolutions, one of which 
 said that these Letters show there has been for many years a plan 
 formed by men born and educated among us, to raise their own 
 fortunes, and advance themselves to posts of honour and profit at 
 the expense of the rights and liberties of the American Colonies ; 
 and that, therefore, they are justly charged with " the great corrup- 
 tion of morals, and all that confusion, misery, and bloodshed, which 
 have been the natural effects of the introduction of troops " ; with 
 much more in the same strain, ending with a resolution for a 
 Petition to his Majesty to remove his Excellency Thomas Hutchin- 
 son, Esquire, Governor, and the Honourable Andrew Oliver, 
 
THE LETTERS 289 
 
 Esquire, Lieutenant-Governor, of this province, from the govern- 
 ment thereof for ever. 
 
 As soon as it was known in England that the Letters had been 
 divulged, everybody asked who did it ? Temple was the first to be 
 suspected. Though a Commissioner of Customs, he was known to 
 favour the " patriot " party in America, and he was the son-in-law 
 of Bowdoin. He also had a grudge against Hutchinson, who, as 
 Temple wrongly supposed, got him dismissed ^ the public service as 
 Surveyor-General of Customs for Massachusetts. William Whately 
 was also accused. He defended himself in the Public Advertiser, 
 and mentioned that Temple had asked to see Thomas' papers, in 
 the hope of finding among them a certain paper on the Colonies 
 which he had sent Thomas. Temple took this as a suggestion that 
 he had used this opportunity to purloin the Letters, and demanded 
 that William should retract. He did so in a manner which Temple 
 considered unsatisfactory. He challenged Whately ; a duel was 
 fought,^ and Whately was rather dangerously wounded. Franklin 
 then wished he had spoken ; and upon a rumour that Whately — 
 who felt the accusation acutely- — meant to meet Temple again, he 
 wrote to the Advertiser^ entirely exculpating both gentlemen — 
 " both of them are totally ignorant and innocent. ... I alone am 
 the person who obtained and transmitted the letters in question. 
 — Mr. W. could not communicate them, because they were never 
 
 ' This was not so, and Temple was very penitent when he found his mistake. 
 He called on Hutchinson in London, in August, 1774, and expressed great regret 
 at having fought Mr. Whately, but does not seem to have categorically denied 
 procuring the Letters. William Whately, who was on very friendly terms with 
 Hutchinson, told him of some circumstance — Hutchinson does not say what it 
 was — which would, if true, exonerate Temple from having purloined the Letters 
 from WTiately's files. Franklin, in his letter, had already done so. And though 
 he does not say that Temple could not have taken the Letters from someone else, 
 his words, "a transaction and its circumstances of which both of them are totally 
 ignorant and innocent," can only mean that Temple had nothing to do with the 
 affair. Again, Franklin had said publicly that the Letters were given him by 
 "an English member of parliament." Some, therefore, suspected "Mr. Pownall" 
 — I presume this must mean ex-Governor Pownall, and not his brother, who held 
 a government-secretaryship. A passage in John Adams' Memoirs only leaves 
 the question more uncertain than ever. Mr. Adams, writing to Dr. Hosack on 
 January 28, 1820, says, " Mr. Temple, afterwards Sir John, told me in Holland 
 that he had communicated these letters to Dr. Franklin." But Mr. Adams adds, 
 " Dr. Franklin declared pubUcly that he received them from a member of parlia- 
 ment, which Mr. Temple was not." See Hutchinson's Diaries, passim, for his 
 interviews with Temple. They were extremely friendly. 
 
 2 They met in Hyde Park, oh December 11, 1773. Temple is described as 
 " Lieutenant-Governor of New Hampshire." 
 
 8 December 25, 1773. 
 
290 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 in his possession ; and, for the same reason, they could not be taken 
 from him by Mr. T." 
 
 The whole fury of indignation was now turned on Franklin. 
 He was accused of having stolen the Letters, and violated every 
 principle of honour. It happened that at this very moment,^ 
 the Massachusetts Petition for the removal of Hutchinson 
 and Oliver was to be heard at the Cockpit, before the Privy 
 Council. Thirty-five lords were present, " so large a number 
 not having been known upon any occasion." Franklin had 
 already been served with a subpcena, at the suit of William 
 Whately, on the charge that, the Letters having " by some means 
 or other " come into Franklin's hands, to prevent discovery, 
 Franklin, or some other person by his orders, had erased the 
 address. But the petition was based on the Letters, Franklin 
 had to present it; the opportunity was too good to be lost. 
 There was no shred of proof, or attempt of proof, and the whole 
 charge was false, except that Thomas Whately had delivered the 
 Letters to some other person for perusal. Franklin was questioned 
 on oath, but the plaintiff was not required to make his charge on 
 oath. Franklin said on oath that the Letters were given to him, 
 as Agent for the House of Representatives of Massachusetts Bay ; 
 when they were given to him, he did not know to whom they 
 had been addressed, nor, till then, that such Letters existed, nor 
 did he erase any address, nor know that any other had done so. 
 
 For nearly an hour Wedderburn, now Solicitor-General, baited 
 Ur. Franklin, while the Lords of the Council frequently burst out 
 in loud applauses or laughed outright. Wedderburn's "invective 
 ribaldry " descended to the most odious personal allusion. 
 Franklin had stolen the Letters — " they could not have come to 
 him by fair means." He had violated the sacredness of private 
 correspondence, he had forfeited all the respect of societies and of 
 men. People will lock up their escritoires, and hide their papers 
 from him. He will henceforth think he is libelled if he is called 
 a man of letters — he will think they mean, a man of three letters / 
 He robbed one brother, and nearly caused the murder of another — 
 and perhaps the hanging of another party ; hurt a worthy Governor, 
 put the fate of America in suspense, and then, with the utmost 
 insensibility, avows himself the author of all. " I can only compare 
 it to Zanga, in Dr. Young's Revenge.'' 
 
 Franklin "stood close to the fireplace," with the Council 
 seated at the table. His old friend. Dr. Bancroft, who stood on 
 the opposite side, had a full view of him as he stood there, " con- 
 
 ' January 29, 1774. 
 
THE LETTERS 291 
 
 spicuously erect," in "a full-dress suit of spotted Manchester 
 velvet." Franklin once boasted that he " could on occasion keep 
 his countenance as immovable as if his features had been made 
 of wood," he did so now. Dr. Priestley — smuggled in by Mr. 
 Burke — was watching his friend, and noting that no person 
 belonging to Council, except Lord North, behaved with a decent 
 gravity. Next morning, these two breakfasted together, and 
 Franklin told Priestley he had never before been so sensible of the 
 power of a good conscience, for if he had not considered the 
 thing for which he had been so much insulted as one of the best 
 actions of his life, he could not have supported it. He repeated 
 that he did not know such Letters existed, till they were brought 
 to him, as Agent for the Colony, to be sent to his constituents. 
 This was Saturday. On Monday morning Franklin received an in- 
 timation from the Postmaster-General that the King had no further 
 occasion for his services as Deputy Postmaster-General in America. 
 
 Their Lordships unanimously dismissed the petition of the 
 Assembly, as "groundless, vexatious, and scandalous." 
 
 Franklin put away the suit of spotted Manchester velvet. 
 The next time he wore it was the day he signed the Treaty 
 between the King of France and the United States of America. 
 
 Careful comparison of dates often throws much light on a 
 difficulty. These Letters were first mentioned to Franklin a little 
 before George Grenville's death — which took place on November 
 13, 1770. They were given to him only "a few days " later, so 
 were probably given before Grenville died. They were given 
 to Franklin in his character of Agent, that they might be shown 
 to certain persons in America, for the exoneration of the Home 
 Government. Thomas Whately, to whom it is acknowledged the 
 Letters were written, died on May 26, 1772. At the time of 
 receiving the Letters, Franklin did not know to whom they were 
 written. He received them under certain restrictions, and this 
 may account for the delay in forwarding them. They had been 
 six months in America before the Massachusetts Assembly met 
 in May, 1773. It usually met on the isth of the month. 
 Hutchinson says, " a few weeks before the session began, it was 
 whispered that there were letters procured from England, written 
 by some great men, which were proofs of a conspiracy, etc." ; and 
 on the 3rd of June, Oliver was writing that he had been betrayed. 
 We must take it, therefore, that the Letters reached America not 
 later than November, 1772; and this implies that they left 
 England somewhere about six weeks earlier — probably in 
 September. This would suggest that Whately's death made 
 
292 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Franklin feel free to use the Letters, if we did not know that the 
 giver had, eighteen months before, intended them to be seen in 
 America. That giver was a member of Parliament. The only 
 member of Parliament conspicuously mixed up with the business 
 is Thomas Whately himself. At any rate these dates show that 
 the originals of the Letters were out of his possession from 
 November, 1770. Therefore, of course, his brother William "could 
 not communicate them." 
 
 Mr. Bancroft and Biglow with him think that the Letters were 
 intended to produce an effect on Grenville,^ were shown by 
 Whately to Grenville, by Grenville to Temple, and at Grenville's 
 death were among his papers. But this, besides other difficulties, 
 is incompatible with the Letters being in Franklin's hands before 
 Grenville's death. We may, perhaps, say with safety that the 
 Letters were never in the hands of the executors either of George 
 Grenville or of Thomas Whately— Franklin's possession of them 
 effectually prevented this. Is it possible that Thomas Whately 
 himself gave the Letters to Franklin, intending them to be shown ; 
 but that he could not make up his mind as to the proper time 
 for showing them — probably for Hutchinson's sake ; and that he 
 restrained Franklin from time to time during the remaining 
 eighteen months of his life — never, however, withdrawing the 
 permission to show them some time ? Mr. Bancroft suggests that 
 Hutchinson wrote the Letters for Grenville's eye, and there is 
 no difficulty in supposing this. But in that case Grenville must 
 either have returned them to Whately, or handed them on till they 
 reached the unnamed member of Parliament who gave them to 
 Franklin. It would still be quite possible for this unnamed person 
 to have been Thomas Whately. William's statement is at second- 
 hand, and does not tally with a known fact. He says that Temple 
 told him he had seen the Letters among Thomas' papers, "and 
 would have them in a day or two." This must mean after Thomas' 
 death ; and William Whately's account of Temple's looking over 
 the paper probably suggested the story. But how could Temple 
 see them there when Franklin had them? Lastly, we have 
 Franklin's assurance that Temple and William Whately were 
 " both of them totally ignorant and innocent " ; and Hutchinson's 
 statement that a year after William Whately told him of some 
 circumstance which would exonerate Temple. Whately was so 
 incensed with Temple that he thought of fighting a second 
 duel — it is not likely he would be over-ready to defend him to 
 Hutchinson. We must bear in mind that the object of publication 
 ' To induce him to urge coercion more definitely. 
 
THE LETTERS 293 
 
 was, with both giver and receiver, to lessen the anger of the 
 colonists with the Home Government. 
 
 Notes. — On August 15, 1774, Dartmouth told Hutchinson that "a gentleman 
 of very good character " had assured him that before the Letters were sent to 
 America, Temple informed him he had seen them among Whately's papers, 
 and would have them in a day or two ; that Temple accordingly showed him 
 a packet addressed to Dr. Franklin, and said these were the Letters referred 
 to. Dartmouth said, either the gentleman or Temple must have spoken 
 falsely. Hutchinson remarks, "This leaves the affair still in a strange state." 
 A few days later, Hutchinson wrote to Dartmouth, to ask whether Temple's 
 declaration might consist with his having only received the Letters from 
 Franklin, and sent them back again, without having taken them himself from 
 Whately's files — "as I wished not to be unjust." — Hutchinson's Diary. 
 
 In November of the same year, John Pownall told Hutchinson that 
 Williams ( ' ' now Commissioner of Customs in America " ) was the man who 
 told North he saw the Letters directed to Franklin in Temple's possession, 
 and that it was on this information that Temple was removed. This Williams 
 made himself very disagreeable to the other Commissioners. — Diary. 
 
 The Cabinet prevented Franklin's constituents of New England from 
 paying him anything, or even reimbursing his expenses, and issued a 
 special instruction to the Governor not to sign any warrant for that purpose 
 on the Treasury of Massachusetts. Franklin says, "The injustice of thus 
 depriving the people there of the use of their own money, to pay an agent 
 acting in their defence, while the Governor, with a large salary out of the 
 money extorted from them by act of Parliament, was enabled to pay plentifully 
 Mauduit and Wedderbum to abuse and defame them and their agent, is so 
 evident as to need no comment. But this they call Government 1 " (Franklin's 
 Letter. ) Franklin also says that he was surprised at William Whately's attack. 
 He could have excused him for not thanking him for saving him a second duel — 
 it might have looked as if he were afraid. Bnt Franklin had helped him to 
 recover an estate in Pennsylvania, which had belonged to Whately's grandfather, 
 a Major Thompson. One day, however, William Strahan, M.P., the King's 
 Printer, called on Franklin, just after being at the Treasury, and showed him 
 what he called "a pretty thing" — an order for ;^I50 payable to Dr. Samuel 
 Johnson, said to be one half his yearly pension, and drawn by the Secretary 
 to the Treasury on William Whately. "I then considered him as a banker 
 to the Treasury for the pension money, and thence as having an interested 
 connexion with Administra,tion, that might induce him to act by direction of 
 others in harassing me with this suit ; which gave me if possible a still meaner 
 opinion of him than if he had done it of his own accord." — See "Franklin's 
 own Account of the Letters," Works, v. p. 378, etc. 
 
CHAPTER XXXVI 
 "THE BOSTON TEA-PARTY" 
 
 "I sincerely believe the destroying of tlie tea was the effect of despair." — Chatham 
 on the Bill for Regulating the Government of Massachusetts Bay, May 27, I774' 
 
 " When I see that all petitions and complaints of grievances are so odious to 
 government, that even the pipe which conveys them becomes obnoxious, I am at 
 a loss to know how peace and union are to be maintained. . . . Grievances cannot 
 be redressed unless they are known ; they cannot be known but through com- 
 plaints and petitions. . . . Wliere complaining is a crime, hope becomes despair." — 
 Franklin to Thomas Cashing, Feb. 15, 1774. 
 
 While Mr. Solicitor-General was calling Dr. Franklin a common 
 thief, an event had already taken place at Boston which changed 
 the whole face of affairs. The people had thrown the East India 
 Company's tea into Boston Harbour, and instead of helping the 
 Company to pay their debts, it was tossing in the waters of the bay. 
 
 The Home Government had thought it would accomplish four 
 great purposes at once, by leaving the threepenny duty on tea — 
 establish a precedent for taxing America ; raise a large revenue there ; 
 save the credit of the East India Company ; and recover the 
 ;^4oo,ooo a year which the Company could pay if it sold its tea. 
 The Company, however, were never sanguine — they did not like the 
 scheme ; they were, they protested, unwilling to interfere in this 
 quarrel, and the decision to " risque it,'' and send the tea-ships, is 
 said to have been carried by a majority of one Director, and that 
 one the Chairman. Even so, the Company only agreed to send 
 the tea on the Government undertaking they should not be 
 losers. 
 
 As soon as ever the Americans heard the tea was coming, they 
 resolved that it should not be landed. New York, Boston, 
 Philadelphia, South Carolina, all resolved on this. Boston had been 
 selected for the largest consignment. One-third of it was consigned to 
 the Governor's sons.^ In the night between November i and 2, a 
 knock came to the door of each consignee, with a summons to 
 
 1 " History of the Dispute with America.'' From the Boston Gazette. — 
 
 Almon, 1775. 
 
 294 
 
"THE BOSTON TEA-PARTY" 295 
 
 appear without fail at Liberty Tree, next Wednesday at noon, and 
 resign his consignment. Notices were posted up desiring the 
 freemen of Boston and the neighbour-towns to meet as witnesses, at 
 the same time and place. On the appointed day, a large flag was 
 hoisted on the pole by the Tree, the bells of the Old South rang 
 from eleven till noon. Adams, Hancock, Phillips, and the rest of 
 the town Committee, with five hundred more "witnesses," were there. 
 But the consignees did not appear ; so after a while the assembly 
 marched to Clarke's warehouse in King Street, where they knew the 
 consignees were. " From whom are you a Committee ? " asked Clarke. 
 "From the whole people." "And who are the Committee?" "I 
 am one," said Molineux. Dr. Warren read a paper, requiring the 
 consignees to promise to send the tea back. " I will have nothing 
 to do with you ! " cried Clarke angrily, and so said all the others. 
 So Molineux read another paper, declaring those who refused to 
 comply enemies to their country, and no more was done that day. 
 
 On the 17 th, a ship which had had a short passage brought 
 news that the tea-ships had sailed. Next day a legal town-meeting 
 was held, to entreat the consignees to resign. They were inflexible. 
 But they were frightened at the silence in which the meeting had 
 broken up ; and Hutchinson proposed to flee to the Castle. 
 
 The meeting had adopted the resolves of Philadelphia, and had 
 pledged themselves, by all means in their power, to prevent the 
 sale of the East India Company's teas. Three vessels were expected 
 every hour. "A man of the most influence" among the people 
 advised the Governor to recommend the consignees to reship the 
 tea. This person warned Hutchinson that he could protect neither 
 the persons of the consignees nor their tea, if the ships came into 
 harbour above the Castle. There was a little rioting that night — 
 Clarke's windows were broken. A consignee fired with ball oh the 
 mob from one of the windows. 
 
 From this day there were almost daily town-meetings. The 
 Governor called his Council. One of the members reminded him 
 how Sir Robert Walpole had abandoned the Excise Bill, when he 
 found he could not enforce it without bloodshed. The consignees 
 sent up a petition for protection — they promised to wait further 
 directions from the Company, and meanwhile not to sell the tea.^ 
 The Council were afraid of becoming liable for any damage to the 
 tea. All the near towns, Dorchester, Brookline, Cambridge, 
 Charlestown, Roxbury, were rallying to Boston. 
 
 ^ The teas were consigned to three different houses^one part to two of the 
 Governor's sons, another to Clarke, and the third to Benjamin Faneuil and 
 Joshua "VVinslow. 
 
296 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 On Sunday night, November 28, the Dartmouth, Captain Hall, 
 with six hundred chests of tea on board, came into Boston Harbour. 
 In his Diary Hutchinson says he wished the ship to anchor below 
 the Castle, so that she could go out to sea again ^ if the tea could 
 not be landed, but that Adams and others of the Committee 
 ordered the captain at his peril to bring up the ship to land the 
 other goods. The ship was brought up to Griffin Wharf, and 
 was constantly watched by the people. 
 
 It was proposed to let the tea be landed, but locked up. But it 
 was urged that this was too great a risk — once let the tea come 
 ashore, and it would be impossible to prevent its being sold ; and in 
 any case, if the tea were landed the town would be liable for the 
 duty. While the Governor was sitting in Council at the State 
 House, the town was sitting " in legal meeting " in a meeting-house 
 close by — Hutchinson felt that the government was no longer in his 
 hands. The consignees had taken refuge in the Castle. That 
 afternoon the town-meeting resolved that Rotch, owner of the ship, 
 should be directed not to enter the tea, and Captain Hall not to 
 suffer any of it to be landed, at their peril. Twenty-five of the 
 inhabitants, with a captain, kept watch over the ship that night- 
 Next day, when the town-meeting resumed its sitting, Hutchinson 
 sent the Sheriff with a proclamation, ordering those present to 
 separate at their peril. When the proclamation had been read 
 there was a general hiss. The question was put whether they would 
 cease their proceedings. The meeting refused, nemine contradicente? 
 
 After this, the Committees of Correspondence held daily meet- 
 ings in Faneuil Hall. Two other tea-ships had now come in — 
 they were ordered to lie alongside the same wharf, that all might be 
 under one guard. 
 
 It was clear that the tea would never be landed; but, once 
 above the Castle, ships required a pass from the Customs, and 
 this the Collector refused to give till his dues were paid. After 
 twenty days, on the duty being still refused, the ship could be 
 seized. Something must be done. On the 14th of December 
 there was a great meeting in the Old South ; the people came into 
 Boston from twenty miles round, Rotch was sent for and ordered 
 to demand a clearance from the Collector, that the Dartmouth might 
 put to sea. A Committee of ten was appointed to accompany him, 
 and the meeting was adjourned to Thursday the i6th. That day, 
 which was destined to decide the future of America, would be the 
 
 ^ He, however, says that this ship brought the winter supply of goods for 
 New England, and the merchants would not have submitted to such a loss. 
 " Hutchinson. 
 
"THE BOSTON TEA-PARTY" 297 
 
 twentieth since the arrival of the Dartmouth. The moment mid- 
 night sounded that night, the Customs officers could seize her, and 
 land her cargo at the Castle. Rotch reported that the clearance 
 was refused. He was ordered to go at once to the Governor and 
 apply for a pass. Seven thousand of the men of New England sat 
 waiting. From time to time some of the leaders addressed the 
 meeting from the pulpit, but often the silence was so profound that 
 the rain could be heard driving against the windows. In one of 
 these pauses, Josiah Quincy the Younger spoke from the gallery. 
 "Shouts and hosannahs," he said, "will not end this day's trials. 
 Let us consider the issue." The great assembly replied as one man 
 that they had considered — they were resolved that the tea should 
 not be landed. Again he spoke, warning them that there must be 
 more than words. It was now five o'clock, and Rotch had not 
 returned. It was resolved to wait one hour more. It was known 
 that Rotch had had to go out to Milton, to the Governor's country- 
 house. With his usual tactics, Hutchinson had gone there to be as 
 far off as possible. The sands were running out — the tea-ships 
 must be got past Castle William before midnight. All had been 
 prepared — men were waiting ready to work them down the harbour 
 the instant the pass arrived. Without a pass the Castle would fire 
 on them, and Rotch had said he was loath to stand the shot of 
 3 2 -pounders. 
 
 It was six o'clock, and a number of candles had long been 
 lighted, when Rotch and the two gentlemen sent with him as 
 witnesses returned, weary and muddy with their journey on that 
 stormy day. The whole assembly rose to its feet as the three made 
 their way up the long aisle of the Old South, to the table below the 
 pulpit — the table on which the sacramental symbols had so often 
 been spread. Amidst breathless silence it was announced that the 
 Governor refused to grant a pass until the ships should have cleared 
 the Customs. A sound " between a sigh and a groan " broke from 
 the vast assembly. Then Samuel Adams put the resolution that 
 Rotch had done what he could; and added solemnly, "This 
 meeting can do no more to save the country." So he dissolved the 
 meeting, with an exhortation to keep order. 
 
 Just then a wild Indian whoop was heard in the street, and was 
 answered by some in the galleries. " Boston harbour a tea-pot to- 
 night ! " shouted a voice, and amid cries of " Hurrah for Griffin's 
 Wharf ! " the whole assembly poured out, and, mingling with a great 
 multitude collected outside, took the way to the southern wharves. 
 
 The secret of what happened next was so well kept, that only a 
 few doubtful traditions have attempted to identify any of the actors. 
 
298 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 All that is certain is, that as the multitude flocked down to the 
 water's edge, persons disguised as Mohawks mingled with it — by 
 twos and threes, coming no one could tell whence — until they 
 gathered in a troop, estimated by some at about fifty. In all that 
 great multitude there was almost utter silence. 
 
 The rain had ceased, and the moon was shining brightly as the 
 multitude came out in sight of the wharves. Sentinels had been 
 posted — no one was allowed to pass to Griffin's Wharf, but the 
 shores and other wharves were black with people. All Boston was 
 looking on, as the Mohawks swiftly boarded the tea-ships. So 
 profound was the silence that the spectators heard the ripping 
 open of the chests, and the splash as the tea was thrown into the 
 gleaming water. In less than four hours every chest in the three 
 ships had been emptied — 342 chests in all. When all was done, 
 the Mohawks marched back to the sound of fife and drum, escorted 
 by the multitude. It is said that as they passed Admiral Montagu's 
 house, the Admiral called from the window, " Well, boys, you've 
 had a fine pleasant evening for your Indian caper — but there'll be 
 the fiddler to pay yet ! " 
 
 That night more than the Company's tea was lost — British 
 sovereignty in America was cast into the sea. 
 
 Next day, and for many days after, the tea lay in long lines like 
 seaweed, tossing on the ripples of the harbour. 
 
CHAPTER XXXVn 
 THE DISMISSAL OF FOX 
 
 " The part of Mr. Fox must naturally beget speculations ; it may, however, be 
 all resolved, without going deeper, into youth and warm blood." — Chatham to 
 Shelburne, March 6, 1 774. 
 
 Fox is SO important a figure, that even at this moment, when the 
 American quarrel was hurrying on to civil war, the circumstances 
 attending his dismissal ought to be told. They were singular 
 enough — or rather, it was singular that Fox should have played the 
 part he did in them. They were the indirect cause of transforming 
 Charles James Fox from a truculent, insubordinate, and indiscreet 
 ministerialist, ready to defend the most doubtful measures, into a 
 statesman of wide views and definite aims. Incidentally the affair 
 afforded the Thirteenth Parliament the opportunity of making 
 another blunder. 
 
 Thomas de Grey and William Tooke both held land in the 
 parish of Tottington in Norfolk. De Grey, who was lord of the 
 manor, had cast his eye upon the " common fields," and was trying 
 to enclose them. He put up a fence. Tooke — who had gone to law 
 with him before this on questions of fish-ponds and common rights 
 — pulled it down. There was an action for trespass, a challenge, 
 and a citation in the King's Bench. While this case was still pend- 
 ing, and the title to the lands still in litigation, de Grey got Sir 
 Edward Astley to present a private Bill, " to enable Thomas de 
 Grey to divide and enclose the common fields of Tottington parish." 
 Astley also presented a petition from de Grey and another from 
 Tooke — de Grey setting forth that the enclosure and division would 
 greatly improve the lands; while Tooke represented that a great 
 part of the owners had not consented to the proposal, " which, they 
 have reason to believe, is solely intended for the great gain and 
 emolument of Thomas de Grey, Esq., who hath already made many 
 encroachments upon the commons of the said parish." This 
 petition also alleged that no notice had been given for a meeting of 
 landowners, and asked that leave for a Bill be refused until the dis- 
 
300 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 puted rights be settled, "according to the laws of the land." Not- 
 withstanding this, de Grey's influence was sufficient to get the Bill 
 brought in and read a first time three days after (February lo). 
 
 Tooke had no friend in the House to speak for him, except the 
 two Aldermen, Townsend and Sawbridge, and he knew their support 
 would do him more harm than good. He consulted his friend Mr. 
 Home, who hit upon a strange expedient for creating a sensation 
 which would delay the Bill. He resolved to libel the Speaker, in a 
 letter to the Public Advertiser. The letter was signed, " Strike — 
 but Hear." It was very long, and very abusive. The Speaker had 
 prevented Astley from presenting the Petitions to the House, by 
 having them presented only to himself, professing to be astonished 
 that the same person should present counter-petitions, and putting 
 off the House by saying, " It is only a common petition for a 
 common enclosure." This Home called a " wilful falsehood and pre- 
 meditated trick," and a " scandalous violation of the trust reposed in 
 you " ; and so, by your connivance, the rights and property of any 
 private gentleman in this kingdom may be transferred by the House 
 of Commons to another, in a fortnight (the time to be taken in 
 passing the Bill), even without its own knowledge.^ And if he 
 happens to have gone to Yorkshire, when he comes back he may 
 find his land transferred. 
 
 The same afternoon, in a very full House, the Speaker explained 
 why he had come in late — he had been charged with a crime which 
 if true would make him unworthy of that honourable seat, or even 
 of a place in the House. He was charged with a predilection for Mr. 
 de Grey — whom he did not so much as know, except for seeing him in 
 the House — and for his brother the Chief Justice, who was a party 
 to the Bill. Sawbridge himself exonerated the Speaker from partial- 
 ity ; the Speaker said he was satisfied, if members approved his con- 
 duct, and the Clerk was going to read the Order of the Day, when 
 there were cries of " Privilege 1 " and " Move ! " and Herbert rose and 
 moved that Henry Sampson Woodfall, the printer of the Public 
 Advertiser, do attend this House on Monday next. Mawbey said 
 the Speaker could appeal to the Courts of Law ; and the House 
 would have been but too glad to be excused from fighting his battle 
 if Fox had not joined in the fray. The Speaker, he said, had been 
 grossly libelled — he hoped they would preserve their prerogative, 
 and not appeal to an inferior Court for protection. That House 
 
 ' "The moment Mr. de Grey's Petition was read, the Speaker instantly 
 muttered in a low voice, and as hastily as possible, ' All you that are for the 
 question, say Aye ; all you that are against it, say No ; the Ayes have it. Now 
 bring up the other.' "—Hornets Letter, 
 
THE DISMISSAL OF FOX 301 
 
 was as much above the King's Bench as the King's Bench was 
 above the Common Pleas ! The printers had got off so easily 
 last time they thought they had a right to libel members. 
 "We are now warm in the matter, and had better go through 
 with it ! " 
 
 North agreed that the liberty of the Press had got to such a height 
 that something must be done. He supposed the printer would not 
 come ; they must then send their Messenger to take him up ; then 
 some City Alderman would take up the Messenger, and then the 
 Alderman would be taken up — he would go to prison for two or three 
 months — it would make him popular and " establish him a patriot." 
 Dempster asked the House to consider " of what our power con- 
 sists : is it not the power of the people ? Can we destroy their 
 liberty without destroying our own ? " This motion is levelled at 
 our greatest blessing, the liberty of the Press. But it was of no use 
 — Fox's speech had stung them ; they ordered, nem. con., that 
 Woodfall attend this House on Monday. 
 
 He came (February 14). He confessed that he printed the letter ; 
 he had it from Mr. Home ; he saw that the petitions were quoted, 
 and he read no more, his business subjecting him to hurry. Asked 
 if that was all he had to say, he replied that he had been a printer 
 twenty years, and had never incurred the displeasure of the House 
 before. " I have voluntarily obeyed the summons, and throw 
 myself upon the mercy of the House." The House would have 
 been content to commit him to the custody of the Sergeant-at-Arms ; 
 but Fox in a furious speech demanded he should go to Newgate — 
 he had committed an atrocious crime. The House had lost the 
 confidence of the people, not by the Middlesex Election (" as was 
 foolishly thought "), but by tamely submitting to so many insults — 
 they had allowed John Miller, "a paltry printer," to hold them in 
 contempt — he had not yet obeyed their summons, and he supposed 
 never would. But this time Charles' eloquence failed — he could 
 not persuade the House to punish Woodfall, who had come, because 
 Miller had not come. Fox insisted on dividing the House — North 
 felt obliged to vote with Fox, but begged his friends not to do so, 
 and by 153 to 68 Woodfall was handed over to the Sergeant- 
 at-Arms. 
 
 The House next sent for Home. The House was crowded in 
 expectation, but instead they got a polite letter, explaining that 
 Home did not know whether they meant him, as they called him 
 " reverend." ^ Herbert moved that Home had committed a breach 
 of privilege, and that " the said reverend John Home, for his 
 ^ Home had lately left the Church. 
 
302 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 said contempt, and breach of privilege, be taken into the custody 
 of the Sergeant-at-Arms." William Burke asked them if this was how 
 they preserved their honour? Not long ago they took up a 
 chimney-sweeper and a milkman, and brought them to the Bar. 
 Was it for their dignity to have the lowest wretches in God's 
 creation kneel prostrate before them ? Onslow said it was true he 
 had brought a milkman before the House — but he was so respect- 
 able that a Magistrate refused ;^4oo bail for him. And the 
 chimney-sweeper might, for aught he knew, be of as much conse- 
 quence as some of our modern patriots. It was all done to discover 
 the author. If he had been supported on that occasion, the 
 House would not have been troubled now. My life was once 
 actually threatened — " I had the honour. Sir, to be hanged in effigy 
 on Tower-Hill, on the same gibbet with you ; indeed, in the 
 dying speeches, the patriots paid me the greater compliment, for 
 they gave out that I died penitent, but that you, Sir, remained 
 hardened to the last." The House roared, but the motion was 
 carried. 
 
 Next day Home appeared — •" neatly dressed in grey," but with- 
 out his gown. He spoke respectfully, denying his contempt. There 
 was an adjournment. It appeared that the witnesses were com- 
 positors of Woodfall's — one printed the MS. but did not know the 
 writing, the other had heard his master say that Home was the 
 author. After long, tedious, and foolish debate, Woodfall and 
 Home were brought in and freely forgiven by the Speaker. And 
 two days after Fox pounced on Woodfall again. He had dis- 
 covered a letter in that morning's Public Advertiser, signed " A South 
 Briton," tracing the corruption of the times to the rebellion against 
 James ii — thus libelling the Glorious Revolution. He persuaded 
 the uneasy House to order the Attorney-General to proceed against 
 the author and publisher of the said false, scandalous, and traitorous 
 libel. The words of Junius were fulfilled — " The time is come when 
 the body of the English people must assert their own cause : . . . 
 they will not surrender their birthright to ministers, parliaments, or 
 kings." 1 
 
 Fox's conduct had been so outrageous, that people would not 
 believe he did not act under secret orders from the King. Chatham 
 wrote that sensible people thought he could not have behaved to 
 
 ^ It was in this debate that Fox, egregiously in the wrong as he was, yet pro- 
 tested against the names of Dr. Sheebeare and Dr. Johnson being coupled 
 together. Charles was good enough to add that he " would be very much against 
 prosecuting a man of great literary abilities, for any opinions which he may 
 happen to drop in works not professedly political." 
 
THE DISMISSAL OF FOX 303 
 
 North as he did without support from some part of Administration, 
 and that that part must have some encouragement from the Closet. 
 But they were wrong— Fox's own wild, reckless temperament and 
 ungoverned passions could account for all. But there is little doubt 
 that he was much irritated with North, who had refused a grant 
 of lands in St. Vincent's. Walpole says that Burke and Garrick 
 engaged Fox to solicit this grant, and adds that Burke had a double 
 motive — if the grant was made he could have sold his shares. If 
 it was refused. Fox might be disgusted and join Opposition. The 
 King had never forgiven, and never would forgive, Fox for his 
 speeches on the Royal Marriage Act ; and though he had till now 
 been on the right side, the King very clearly perceived his danger- 
 ous independence, and still more dangerous courage. George in 
 liked more supple servants. Charles' tone on the Dissenters' 
 Relief Bill had also offended the King. "That young man," he 
 wrote to North, "has so thoroughly cast off every principle of 
 common honour and honesty that he must become as contempt- 
 ible as he is odious, and I hope you will let him know you are not 
 insensible of his conduct towards you." 
 
 Charles knew he had gone too far. On the 15 th of February, 
 when his friends asked him at Almack's whether North had turned 
 him out, he replied, " No ; but if he does, I will write to congratulate 
 him, and tell him, if he had always acted with the same spirit, I 
 should not have differed with him yesterday." 
 
 A week afterwards, a Messenger of the House gave Fox a 
 note. It was short, even shorter than a former one attributed to 
 Charles — 
 
 " Sir ; His Majesty has thought proper to order a new Com- 
 mission of the Treasury to be made out, in which I do not see your 
 name. — North." 
 
 So ended Charles Fox's career as a Tory. 
 
 He was just twenty-five. Hitherto his oratory had been effective 
 chiefly for its reckless vigour, and for the art with which every now 
 and then he would turn an opponent's argument against him. 
 It is scarcely unfair to say that his eloquence had consisted in 
 bluster — of a superior kind, indeed, but still bluster. Charles was 
 always too much of a fighting man to please the King — his Majesty 
 had always considered Charles a dangerously irrepressible person. 
 But his extraordinary vigour made him terrible. Without becoming 
 less vigorous, he was now to take a side which would call out 
 qualities that till now had lain all but dormant. For the present, he 
 left himself at liberty. He had for some time been intimate with 
 Burke, but he did not as yet join Opposition; and on February 25, 
 
304 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 he was a teller for the Noes in the division for making George 
 Grenville's Election Bill perpetual.* 
 
 ' The essence of this excellent Bill was a Committee of members of the House, 
 so chosen as practically to ensure impartiality. Not daring to abuse the Bill 
 itself, Ministers tried as much as they dared to set a limited term — say, seven 
 years. It was only to be an experiment. De Grey said it was "an innovation." 
 Rigby had more courage. He outdid himself in coarse and indiscreet bhmtness. 
 He asked Sir Edward Astley whether he thought his voters would go for him 
 from Lynn to Norwich without so much as a pot of beer? — "and yet by the Act 
 of King William the new Committee must find this bribery after the test of the 
 writ." Some, he said, had talked of gentlemen being in leading strings ; foi 
 his part, he had never found any inconvenience from his ! Walpole says he 
 helped the Bill, by disgusting several who had been disposed to vote against it, 
 " and nobody said a word more against the Bill but Sir William Dolben, a bigoted 
 tory, who, however, reflected on Charles Fox, and observed that he talked as if 
 the fate of Caesar and of Rome depended upon his conduct. He was tender in 
 years, but tough in politics, and if he did not mistake had already been twice in 
 and twice out of place." — Walpole, i. 324-5. 
 
CHAPTER XXXVIII 
 THE PUNITIVE BILLS 
 
 " It is through the American trade of tea that your East India conquests are 
 to be prevented from crushing you with their burden . . . they must have that 
 great country to lean upon, or they will crush you with their burden. 
 
 " Incredible as it may seem, you know that you have deliberately thrown away 
 a large duty, which you held secure and quiet in your hands, for the vain hope 
 of getting one three-fourths less, through every hazard, through certain litigation, 
 and possibly through war. No man ever doubted that the commodity of tea 
 could bear an imposition of three-pence. But no commodity will bear three- 
 pence, or will bear a penny, when the general feelings of men are irritated, and 
 when two millions of people are resolved not to pay. The feelings of the 
 colonists were formerly the feelings of Mr. Hampden, when called upon for 
 the payment of twenty shillings." — Burke on American Taxation, April 19, 
 
 1774- 
 
 " Lord North expressed himself in higher terms than ever upon the news from 
 Boston, and said it was to no purpose any longer to think of expedients ; the 
 Province was in actual rebellion, and must be subdued. He would not allow the 
 thought that the Kingdom was not able to do it. As for Hessians and Hanover- 
 ians, they could be employed if necessary ; but he was of opinion there was no 
 need of foreign force ; at present they could not be sent ; two regiments it was 
 determined should go from Ireland in the spring, and as many more might go 
 from one part or another as should be wanted. The Acts must and should be 
 carried into execution. " — Hutchinson's Account of a Conversation at Lord North's, 
 Nov. 19, 1774. 
 
 Vengeance did not tarry. 
 
 On the 7th of March, 1774, Lord Dartmouth brought down 
 the King's Message about the "violent and outrageous proceedings 
 at the town and port of Boston," and the measures to be taken for 
 " securing the just dependence of the colonies upon the Crown and 
 Parliament of Great Britain." In the short debate which followed, 
 Opposition said this was the effect of the Stamp Act, and Ministers 
 said it was the effect of the repeal of the Stamp Act. 
 
 On the 14th Lord North moved the Boston Port Bill. 
 
 The Boston Port Bill was a Bill to kill Boston. Boston will not 
 let the tea be landed. Nothing shall be landed at Boston. The 
 Bill was for the "immediate removal of his Majesty's revenue 
 VOL. I. — 20 
 
3o6 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 officers from the town of Boston, and the discontinuance of landing 
 and discharging, lading and shipping of goods, wares and merchan- 
 dise at the said town, or within the harbour thereof." 
 
 Boston has been the ringleader in all riots — on Boston therefore 
 the punishment ought to fall. Boston has been in riot and confusion 
 for seven years. The other Colonies are peaceably inclined. North 
 explained that the port would not be reopened until full satisfaction 
 had been made to the East India Company — nor then, unless his 
 Majesty should be thoroughly convinced that the laws of this country 
 would be better observed in future. Nor was this Bill all he meant 
 to propose — " other parts, of more nice disquisition, will remain for 
 future consideration of Parliament." 
 
 He quoted precedents for a collective punishment — the City 
 of London, fined when Dr. Lambe ^ was killed by unknown 
 persons ; the City of Edinburgh, fined for the affair of Captain 
 Porteous ; and the town of Glasgow, part of the revenue seques- 
 tered till satisfaction was made for the pulling down of Mr. 
 Campbell's house. (But none of these towns had its trade 
 taken away.) 
 
 Mr. Grosvenor, who seconded, said the proceedings of Boston 
 were " all entirely owing to the repeal of the Stamp Act." Dempster, 
 a Company member, was unwilling the indemnification should be 
 collected all over America — from innocent people. When Alderman 
 Sawbridge began to speak, the House began to cough, and to call 
 for the question. Byng asked whether we were not punishing 
 ourselves in preventing English ships from trading to Boston? 
 Barre was for a fine instead of the Bill. " I think Boston ought to 
 be punished, she is your eldest son." Here the House laughed, 
 and he went on, " I mean your daughter, she is a noble prop," you 
 had better cherish her. But as he thought that if the Commons 
 were unanimous, Boston would pay the indemnity, he would vote 
 for the Bill. 
 
 On the 23rd, in Committee, Rose Fuller urged that the punish- 
 ment was too severe for the first offence — the precedents were not 
 in the least similar. The Bill would only "lead to confederacies " ; 
 it cannot be carried into execution without a military force — if we 
 send a small one, the Boston mihtia " will immediately cut them to 
 pieces " ; if we send a larger — 6000 or 7000 — the Americans will 
 "debauch them." Either way, we shall only hurt ourselves. He 
 moved for a fine — he thought ;^i 5,000 would make amends to the 
 
 ^ Lambe was Buckingham's physician. In June, 1628, when Buclcingham 
 was being denounced in the Commons, Lambe was set on and beaten to death in 
 Uie street, none of the perpetiators being ever discovered. 
 
THE PUNITIVE BILLS 307 
 
 East India Company (" and be in some measure a relief to poor 
 Malcolm"!). 
 
 Herbert said Boston would certainly refuse to pay a fine — and 
 then we must take this measure. Better take it at once. It is 
 useless to reason with them — Americans are a strange set of 
 people — they always decide the matter by tarring and feathering. 
 North denied it was the first offence— Boston began many years ago 
 to endeavour to throw off obedience to this country ; this was the 
 first time Parliament had punished her. This Bill will show 
 her we are in earnest, and " It will be enough to show that 
 Great Britain is in earnest." Boston won't submit unless we show 
 we mean to punish her. We can't prevent some of our people 
 suffering a little, but we must compare these temporary inconven- 
 iences with the loss of that country, and its due obedience. Fuller 
 had said the Americans would not pay their debts unless we 
 complied with their wishes. They threatened us with the same 
 thing if we did not repeal the Stamp Act. We repealed it, and 
 they did not pay their debts. Our " unanimity will go half-way to 
 their obedience to this Bill " — it won't take an army. " The good 
 of this Act is, that 4 or 5 frigates will do the business without any 
 military force." But if a military force is necessary, I shall not 
 hesitate. If the Act does produce rebelhon, " the rest of the 
 colonies will not take fire at the proper punishment inflicted on 
 those who have disobeyed our authority." And then lenient measures 
 will be at an end, and the consequences of their rebellion will be upon 
 them, and not on us. Let us be firm. 
 
 Gascoigne asked if the late proceedings of the Assembly looked 
 peaceable? They had passed a law for purchasing twelve brass 
 cannon. This people will hardly ever be brought to reason, except 
 by the Bill — the moment a person offers to reason, they tar and feather 
 him, or daub his house " with excrement and tar." A military force 
 will not be in the least necessary. Limiting their trade is the only 
 way to bring such merchants to their senses. Byng was totally 
 against prohibiting British trade — by preventing importation to 
 Boston, you will create that association you wish to annihilate. 
 " You are not punishing the Bostonians ; you are punishing the 
 Enghsh merchants." Dempster denounced the Stamp Act as the 
 cause of all the disorders. " He was very sure the destruction of 
 America would be certain if we should offer to tax it." He thought 
 the Bill gave Government too much power — there was no limit of 
 time. We should treat the Colonies as our children — "nourish and 
 
 ' A Custom-house officer who had been tarred and feathered, and made to 
 ride a rail. 
 
3o8 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 protect them." Fox took the same view. Conway spoke for 
 the Bill but thought old grievances should not be raked up. The 
 incorrigible Mr. Van said the town ought to be knocked about their 
 ears. " You will never have proper obedience till you have destroyed 
 that nest of locusts. ' Delenda est Carthago.' " This expression 
 shocked Barr^ — he reminded the House that this was "the first 
 vengeful step " ; he feared the next proposition " would be a black 
 one." He added; "You have not a loom nor an anvil but what 
 is stamped with America; it is the main prop of your trade. 
 America employs all your workmen here." 
 
 On the third reading, Dowdeswell said the Bill punished British 
 merchants more severely than the Bostonians. Nor was it just to 
 single out Boston — Philadelphia and New York sent back the tea ; 
 and if Charlestown (in South Carolina) let it be landed, it was only 
 to be put in a damp cellar, where it was all mildewed. " You ask 
 why the Americans don't pay their debts ? If you stop the exports, 
 you of course stop the payment of the debts." 
 
 The Port Bill passed the Commons on the 25th of March. It 
 was late, the House was noisy, there was no division. 
 
 Nor was there in the Lords, though Shelburne, writing to Chatham 
 (again too ill to take any active part), says that the Port Bill had 
 a fuller, "and by all accounts a fairer,'' discussion there than in 
 the Commons. The Ministry were divided — some called it only 
 " commotion," some " open rebellion " in Boston. Mansfield 
 called it "the last act of overt treason" — but the luckiest for this 
 country, because, if it passes, we "shall be passed the Rubicon"; 
 the Americans will know that we shall temporise no longer ; and if 
 the Bill passes with tolerable unanimity, Boston will submit, and 
 "all will pass sine cxde.^' 
 
 The House listened patiently, " though very late at night," while 
 Shelburne ^ described the loyal state in which he left the Colonies, 
 "with some other very home facts." The Bill passed on the 29th,- 
 and received the Royal Assent on the 31st. 
 
 In vain Boston petitioned. In vain Franklin offered to pay the 
 Company for the tea. Ministers were determined to have obedi- 
 ence, and Boston was as determined as ever not to obey. North 
 reiterated the necessity of unanimity. If we carry this Bill unan- 
 imously, that will go far to convince the Americans that we mean it. 
 The beauty of this Act is, that three or four frigates will do the 
 business. 
 
 Gage 2 had told the King that the Americans would be "lyons, 
 
 1 Shelburne to Chatham, April 4, 1774. 
 
 ^ Gage had only lately come over to England. As soon as he heard 
 
THE PUNITIVE BILLS 309 
 
 whilst we are lambs; but, if we take the resolute part, they will 
 undoubtedly prove very meek." He thought he could play the lion 
 effectually with four regiments. 
 
 On the 28th North asked and obtained leave to bring in the 
 " other parts, of more nice disquisition." The gist of the " Bill 
 for Regulating the Government of Massachusetts Bay," was to 
 strengthen military power in America. " The civil magistrate has 
 been, for a series of years, uniformly inactive." The Governor 
 cannot call out the military without the consent of seven of his 
 Council. " I propose to take the executive power from the hands 
 of the democratic part of government." The Governor was in fact 
 to have the whole power-^to "act as a justice of peace"; and to 
 appoint all civil officers, except the Chief Justice and the Judges of 
 the Supreme Court, who were to be appointed by the Crown, and 
 to be removable only by his Majesty. Town-meetings must not 
 be held without the consent of the Governor, except for the annual 
 elections. "Juries are improperly chosen; I think a degree of 
 regulation highly necessary." 
 
 Lord George Germaine did not think the Bill went far enough — 
 he wished to " add his mite of preservation " to America, by pro- 
 posing more changes still. For instance, in the election of the 
 Council. He would certainly put an end to their town-meet- 
 ings. " I would not have men of a mercantile cast every day 
 collecting themselves together, and debating about political matters." 
 The juries " require great regulation." I would wish to make the 
 constitution of America as much like ours as possible — the Council 
 like the House of Lords. And a Court of Chancery should be 
 established — the Assembly of the province ought not to determine 
 matters. " At present, their assembly is a downright clog upon all 
 the proceedings of the governor ; " the Council, too, are always 
 thwarting him. There is really no government^only " a tumult- 
 uous and riotous rabble," who ought to be "following their 
 mercantile employment," and not troubling themselves with 
 politics and government, which they do not understand. 
 
 North thanked the noble lord for every proposition he had 
 thrown out — "they are worthy of a great mind," and ought to be 
 adopted. " I see the propriety of them." 
 
 The Bill was brought in on April 15. Dowdeswell said it 
 destroyed the Charter, under which the Americans had flourished 
 for nearly fourscore years, " and we have reaped the benefit of their 
 labour." Their charter was granted in King William's time, and 
 
 that "coercive measures" were contemplated, he offered the King to return "at 
 a day's notice." — George III to Lord North, February 4, I774. 
 
3IO ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 " is more adapted to the spirit of a free people than any charter that 
 can possibly be framed by any minister now." Governor Pownall 
 gave the House an account of how juries were chosen in America. 
 "The House at first did not much attend;" but his knowledge of 
 American affairs soon compelled them to listen. He explained that 
 the Assembly, not the whole body of the people, chose the Council. 
 The Selectmen were " a kind of aldermen." There was a careful 
 and ample arrangement for ensuring a supply of proper persons to 
 serve on juries. Business would almost stand still if town-meetings 
 could not be held without consent of the Governor — these towns were 
 often three hundred miles from the capital, and all municipal business 
 was done at the town-meetings. He ended by begging that the 
 Laws of Massachusetts Bay might be laid before the House. 
 
 Along with this Bill went one which was ironically called, " A Bill 
 for the Impartial Administration of Justice in Massachusetts Bay." 
 North said he hoped it would effectually secure the province from 
 future disturbances — it was a Bill to give every man a fair trial, 
 which the juries of that country were not likely to do. So the 
 Governor was to be empowered to send him to any other colony, 
 " where the same spirit has not prevailed " ; or to Great Britain, if 
 he cannot have a fair trial in any of the Colonies. The Customs of 
 England to pay the costs. He only proposed this Bill for four 
 years. " We must consider, that everything that we have that is 
 valuable to us is now at stake; and the question is very shortly 
 this ; whether they shall continue the subjects of Great Britain or 
 not?" "One thing I much wish — the punishment of those individ- 
 uals who have been the ringleaders. Our attention will be active in 
 that point." But we must guard against any illegal proceedings, 
 or we shall find ourselves at last in the same dilemma we were in 
 at first. In this speech North announced that Hutchinson was 
 recalled, and that General Gage was appointed Governor and 
 Commander-in-Chief — thus uniting the military and civil powers. 
 This, and the allusion to his desire to punish the ringleaders, 
 betrayed the true object of the Bill. 
 
 Many opposed this Bill who had acquiesced in the Port Bill- 
 It happened that it was read a first time (April 21) in a very thin 
 House — only 41 members present. Sawbridge said they were 
 taken by surprise — " It is cowardly." And the Bill is cruel and 
 ridiculous — does anyone suppose that a man who chanced to see a 
 person murdered in America would come over here to give 
 evidence against the aggressor? Would any American hazard a 
 trial here, or expect justice here ? North said he could not foresee 
 a thin House. If the Bill is bad, in God's name throw it out ; but 
 
THE PUNITIVE BILLS 311 
 
 if it is good, you cannot be too unanimous. The more unanimous 
 you are, the more effect the Bill will have. 
 
 In the Debates of May 2 it was urged that the Americans had not 
 been heard in their defence. The Bill was really intended to protect 
 soldiers who should have shot down the people. Dunning said it was 
 neither peace nor the olive-branch — " it was war, revenge, and hatred 
 against our own subjects. We are now come to that fatal dilemma, 
 ' resist, and we will cut your throats ; submit, and we will tax 
 you.'" 
 
 The most powerful speech was Barry's. He fulfilled his promise 
 of reserving his opposition for the worse measures yet to come- 
 He said the Bill was "glaring, unprecedented." The noble lord has 
 not produced one instance of a man not having a fair trial — what has 
 happened is in the teeth of his proposition. Captain Preston and 
 the soldiers, who shed the blood of the people, were fairly tried, and 
 acquitted, by a Boston jury. " When a Commissioner of the Customs, 
 aided by a number of ruffians, assaulted the celebrated Mr. Otis in 
 the midst of the town of Boston, and with the most barbarous violence 
 almost murdered him, did the mob, which is said to rule the town, 
 take vengeance on the perpetrators of this inhuman outrage 
 against a person who is supposed to be their demagogue ? No, Sir, 
 the law tried them ; the law gave heavy damages against them, 
 which the irreparably injured Mr. Otis most generously forgave 
 upon an acknowledgment of the offence." 
 
 This Bill sets the military power above the civil. " I have been 
 bred a soldier. I respect the profession . . . but there is not a 
 country gentleman of you all who looks upon the army with a more 
 jealous eye, or would more strenuously resist the setting them above 
 the control of the civil power. No man is to be trusted in such a 
 situation." (Every man who heard his words must have thought of 
 what Clive had said about such a situation.) " When I stand up 
 as an advocate for America," he went on, " I feel myself the 
 firmest friend of this country. Alienate your colonies, and you 
 subvert the foundations of your riches, and your strength." Instead 
 of the olive-branch, you have sent the naked sword. " By the 
 olive-branch I mean the repeal of all the late laws." 
 
 Wedderburn said the olive-branch ought to go in one hand, 
 but the sword in the other. Captain Phipps observed that he was 
 glad Hutchinson was recalled — he thought him one of the worst 
 servants the Crown ever had. Lord Carmarthen (eldest son of the 
 Duke of Leeds) made one of those fatal speeches which must have 
 seemed to the Americans as the tearing off of a mask. He asked 
 why the colonists were suffered to go to America, " unless the profit 
 
312 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 of their labour should return to their masters here ? " No one seems 
 to have protested against this doctrine. North rose to defend 
 Hutchinson. He did not know a man of greater merit, " nor did 
 I ever hear any charge brought against him." He is not recalled 
 for any misconduct — he deserves the thanks of this assembly. Van 
 wound up the debate in a characteristic speech. If the Americans 
 oppose these measures, " I would do as was done of old, in the 
 time of the ancient Britons, I would burn and set fire to all their 
 woods, and leave their country open ... if we are likely to lose 
 that country, I think it better lost by our own soldiers than 
 wrested from us by our rebelHous subjects." The furious Welshman 
 had his wish — we lost America that way. Leave for the Bill was 
 granted without a division, and it passed on May 9 by 239 to 64. 
 
 In the midst of these Debates, Rose Fuller made a desperate 
 effort, on April 19, to get the tea-duty repealed before these punitive 
 measures were passed. He urged that the other measures would 
 be totally ineffectual without a repeal of the tea-duty. Those who 
 spoke against his motion did so on the score of supremacy of 
 Parliament. They wished " to keep the right." Phipps once more 
 told them they would be as much hurt as the Americans. The tax 
 was " trifling and absurd." Sure, too, to be evaded — " God and 
 nature had given them an extensive coast, and of course an 
 opportunity of smuggling." And how can we " expect obedience 
 from them, when the emoluments of that country are taken from 
 them to supply the luxuries of men who live in this ? " Before 
 Lord Botetourt was Governor, Virginia " was annnally plundered 
 of ;^Sooo by the non-residence of former governors." He knew 
 a person in that country who held eleven offices, "the emoluments 
 of which were appropriated to the support of men of bad description 
 in this." 
 
 This, however, was but carrying out Carmarthen's theory, that 
 the colonists were only there to work for their masters here. 
 
 The great, the immortal speech was Burke's. Passages from it 
 have been so often quoted that they are known to everyone. But 
 these refer to the characters of Ministers, and the changes of 
 administration. The statesmanlike review of the past is less well- 
 known, and at this crossing of the Rubicon it is full of lessons and 
 warnings on more crises than this of America. Here is the gist of it, 
 as briefly as is compatible with conveying any just idea of the views 
 taken by Opposition at this momentous turning-point. As far as 
 possible Burke's very words are used. 
 
 The speech was immediately provoked by Cornwall's attack on 
 the Rockingham Administration, and its Repeal of the Stamp Act. 
 
THE PUNITIVE BILLS 313 
 
 Burke asked why, if Government disapproved of the Repeal of the 
 Stamp Act, they repealed five taxes of the Revenue Act ? You say 
 you repealed them on commercial principles — Lord Hillsborough's 
 Circular Letter to the Governors says so. Then repeal the 
 remaining tax on the same principles ! You say, if we repeal it, 
 what will become of the preamble ? 1 Where is the revenue ? Five- 
 sixths are already abandoned. Does the poor solitary tea-duty 
 give you a revenue ? The object of the Act is gone already. And 
 if commercial principles are to be studied, tea was the last article 
 you should have left. The taxes you repealed were without 
 comparison fitter to be kept — infinitely less likely to be evaded by 
 contraband. For instance, there was red and white lead. You have, 
 in this kingdom, an advantage in lead amounting to a monopoly. 
 You sometimes tax your own export — you ventured to do so after 
 the last war, when you put a duty on coals. But " tea is perhaps 
 the most important article in the mighty circle of our commerce. 
 This is an awful and instructive lesson on the mischief of not having 
 large and liberal ideas in the management of great affairs. You 
 have never looked at your interests in one connected whole. The 
 servants of the State have taken bits and scraps, without regard to 
 their relations.'' "They never had any kind of system, right or 
 wrong ; but only invented some miserable tale for the day, in order 
 meanly to sneak out of difficulties into which they had proudly 
 strutted." So it has come about that "a tax of three-pence has 
 shaken the pillars of a commercial empire that circled the whole 
 globe." 
 
 Do you forget how you were on the verge of bankruptcy last 
 year? "The monopoly of the most lucrative trades, and the 
 possession of imperial revenues, had brought you to the verge of 
 beggary and ruin." The vent of the ten millions, locked up in 
 this tea, rotting in the Company's warehouses, would have pre- 
 vented this distress ; America would have been that vent — America, 
 where tea is next to a necessary of life. " It is through the 
 American trade of tea that your East India conquests are to be 
 prevented from crushing you with their burthen . . . they must have 
 that great country to lean upon, or they tumble upon your head." 
 The same folly has lost you the benefit of the West and the East. 
 Never did people suffer so much for the empty words of a preamble ! 
 
 You will force the Colonies to take the teas ? Has a seven 
 
 ' The preamble of the Revenue Act asserted the expediency that a revenue 
 should be raised in America for defraying certain charges of administration 
 there. Burke called on the Clerk of the House to read the preamble, which was 
 done. 
 
314 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 years' struggle forced them ? We all know that lea will bear an 
 imposition of threepence, but no commodity will bear a penny 
 when two millions of people are resolved not to pay. Would 20s. 
 have ruined Mr. Hampden ? 
 
 You say your dignity is tied to it. What dignity is there in 
 perseverance in absurdity ? Five years ago, when we proposed 
 repeal, we were laughed down. Five days afterwards. Lord 
 Hillsborough wrote his Circular Letter, promising repeal, and 
 assuring the Colonies that we did not mean to lay any fresh 
 taxes. 
 
 Then Burke showed how all our laws — Navigation Acts, and all 
 — had been directed to establishing a monopoly of trade, and not for 
 raising a revenue. And as long as we "forgot revenue," we not 
 only acquired commerce but " created the very objects of trade in 
 America,'' and raised the trade of this kingdom at least fourfold. 
 America had the compensation of our capital, "which made her 
 bear her servitude.'' She also had "the substance of the British 
 constitution." She chose most of her magistrates ; she paid them 
 all. " This whole state of commercial servitude and civil liberty 
 is certainly not perfect freedom ; but comparing it with the 
 ordinary circumstances of human nature, it was a happy and a 
 liberal condition." You are now going to take away these com- 
 pensations. 
 
 Then he spoke of Charles Townshend, who, "in a brilliant 
 harangue,'' dazzled the country gentlemen "by playing before 
 their eyes the image of a revenue to be raised in America." This 
 was " the first glimmering of this new colony system." George 
 Grenville was a great man, and we owe him much, continued 
 Burke, referring to Grenville's Election Bill ; he had a masculine 
 understanding, and if he was ambitious, his ambition was of a 
 noble and generous strain. But he took too narrow and legal 
 a view of things, and thought our flourishing trade was due more 
 to our laws than to our hberty. He, too, "considered his objects 
 in lights that were rather too detached." The Act of Navigation 
 was his idol. He " looked with too exquisite a jealousy " on 
 smuggling, and, to put it down, he straitened the bonds of 
 navigation, and stopped the coasting intercourse between the 
 Colonies till America was on the point of having no trade 
 at all. The idea of an American revenue opened out a 
 new principle ; and we cried out for fresh taxes, just as the 
 Colonies were crying out that they were crushed by those the 
 war had brought. 
 
 At this point Burke would have stopped, but the House 
 
THE PUNITIVE BILLS 315 
 
 called to him to go on. He continued his masterly recapitulation. 
 He referred to the stock accusation of the Court party, that the 
 disturbances in America were owing to the change of Ministry. 
 It was pretended that the colonists only took courage when their 
 friends were in power. Burke showed that the news had not 
 reached them. "Thus perish the miserable inventions of the 
 wretched runners for a wretched cause ! " 
 
 After describing the Patchwork Cabinet, Burke returned to 
 Townshend. " He was the delight and ornament of this House. 
 If his knowledge was not equal to that of some others, he knew 
 how to bring together all that was necessary to his argument, 
 " better by far than any man I ever was acquainted with. He 
 hit the House just between wind and water." And not being 
 too zealous for any question, he was never more earnest or more 
 tedious than the House wanted him to be. He seemed to lead, 
 because he always followed. In this question, said Burke, the 
 characters of men are of great importance. " Great men are 
 the guide-posts and land-marks in the State." Those who never 
 saw Charles Townshend do not know what a ferment he was 
 able to excite in everything by his mixed virtues and failings. 
 As soon as he found that repeal was in bad odour, he declared 
 that a revenue must be got out of America. And then " the 
 whole body of the courtiers drove him onward." They always 
 talked as though the King was humiliated, until something of 
 the kind was done. In his Revenue Act, Townshend tried to 
 please everybody — the partisans of a revenue, by the preamble ; 
 the colonists by taxing British manufactures ; and the British 
 merchants by making the taxes trivial, and, except that on "the 
 devoted East India Company's tea," laid on none of the grand 
 objects of commerce. "This Revenue Act of 1767 formed 
 the fourth period of American policy." How have we fared 
 since then ? " What woeful variety of schemes, what enforcing, 
 what repealing, what bullying, what submitting, what doing and 
 undoing, what shiftings, changes, and jumblings ! " 
 
 Then, coming to the immediate question, he asked if they 
 meant to draw a revenue from America. If you do, speak out; 
 fix this revenue, define it, provide for its collection.^ Fight 
 when you have something to fight for. If you kill, take posses- 
 sion — do not appear as madmen, who murder without an object, 
 
 ^ According to an estimate laid before Parliament in 1774, the exports from 
 Great Britain in 1773 were ;^I3, 226, 740; and the imports were ;^II, 832,469. 
 Exports to America on an average of three years were ^^3, 370,000, and com- 
 modities imported from the Colonies for the same period ;^3, 924,606, 13s. 4d. 
 
3i6 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 But a better way will be peace. I am not going into metaphysical 
 distinctions of right. Be content to bind America as you always 
 did — by trade. You did not tax her in the beginning. Let that 
 be a reason for not taxing her now. " Nobody will be argued 
 into slavery." They bear the burdens of unlimited monopoly, 
 will you bring them to bear the burdens of unlimited revenue 
 too? "The Enghshman in America will feel that this is slavery. 
 Reflect how you are to govern a people who think they ought 
 to be free, and think they are not ? " 
 
 Rose Fuller's motion was lost by 182 to 49. 
 
 The Third Reading of a Bill for Quartering Troops in America 
 was put off that Chatham might be well enough to attend. Of 
 his speech on May 25, Mr. Sheriff Sayre said to Lady Chatham, 
 that if the two countries could have heard it "they would have 
 run and embraced each other.'' Chatham said that the spirit 
 shown by the Americans was the same spirit which had moved 
 them to leave their native country, " where slavish and tyrannical 
 principles" then prevailed. "They are great instances to instruct 
 the world, what great exertions mankind will naturally make, when 
 they are left to the free exercise of their own powers." He 
 condemned the destruction of the tea ; but said " they perceived 
 your intention was renewed to tax them, under a pretence of 
 serving the East India Company." " I sincerely believe the 
 destroying of the tea was the effect of despair." Throughout, 
 Administration had purposely incited them to these violent acts. 
 " What other motive could there have been to dress taxation in 
 the robes of an East India Director," but to break peace and 
 harmony? "I am an old man — I would adopt a more gentle mode 
 of governing America ; for the day is not far distant, when she may 
 vie with us, not only in arms, but in arts." The Bill passed the 
 Lords by 57 to 16. 
 
 On the loth of May, 1774, the old King of France, Louis xv, 
 died of the small-pox, and his very young grandson became 
 Louis XVI. King George much regretted the death of Louis xv, 
 being unable to " foresee who will have credit with his successor." 1 
 
 Opposition had long been calling for a Government for Canada, 
 and at last Ministers brought in the Quebec Bill.^ This Bill 
 excited more uneasiness and opposition than any of the Bills for 
 punishing the old Colonies. The hne taken by Ministers in 
 defending it was very curious — they seemed to be using the 
 language of Opposition when they said that they had not given 
 Canada an Assembly because " it was thought very unequal, even 
 
 ' Letter to Lord North, of May 4. ^ May 26. 
 
THE PUNITIVE BILLS 317 
 
 cruel," that an Assembly, chosen by the small body of English 
 settlers, should govern so large a one as the French; and that 
 it was thought "more humane" to leave them their old French 
 laws, " which they understood." Opposition insisted on an enquiry, 
 and witnesses were examined at the Bar. The evidence given was 
 very interesting. General Carleton said the Canadians would rather 
 be without an Assembly, seeing the troubles that came of them ; 
 and when they found an Assembly, if they had one, would be chosen 
 from the old British subjects only, "they expressed horror at the 
 idea of one." There were but 360 Protestants in Canada, and 
 most of them not even men of substance, but traders and " reduced 
 soldiers" — most of them "by no means proper for an assembly 
 to be chosen from them." There were 150,000 French, all Roman 
 Catholics. He said Canada had prospered, and the population 
 had increased, since the conquest, but this was owing "to the 
 change from a state of war to one of peace." The former Govern- 
 ment was "extremely military," always undertaking military ex- 
 peditions at a distance, whereby great numbers of men were lost, 
 and taken from the culture of the earth. He did not think the 
 change of laws, or the free export of corn, had produced this 
 prosperity, for " there must be the people before there can be the 
 cultivation." Mazferes, late Attorney-General, said the Canadians 
 would be contented with any government given them, "provided 
 it be well administered." But he was of opinion that more freedom 
 might have been granted. The examination took a startling turn, 
 when Dunning asked whether, since the French code was to be 
 in force, a Governor could imprison the King's subjects under 
 lettres de cachet. Finally, Mazferes said he thought he could, unless 
 Habeas Corpus were made to be in force — a clause to that effect 
 had better be inserted. One French Canadian gentleman said his 
 people would like an Assembly, but could not afford to pay for it. 
 They would certainly like a freer government. 
 
 But while Opposition denounced the Bill as tyrannical and 
 despotic, they denounced it still more fiercely as "establishing 
 the Roman Catholic religion." They said the capitulation had 
 only promised a bare toleration — the Bill went farther. It granted 
 the Romish clergy a legal right to tithes from the Catholics ; while 
 the Protestant clergy were left at the King's discretion. At least, 
 both should have been provided for. For all this, several amend- 
 ments were carried, which gave still more religious liberty — in 
 particular, a simple Oath of Allegiance was substituted for the 
 Oath of Supremacy. This would enable Catholics to be on the 
 Council. It is distressing to be obliged to relate that Chatham 
 
3X8 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 violently opposed this. He called it making the Catholic religion 
 the established religion of that vast continent. We might as well, 
 he said, take down our bells and pull down our steeples. The 
 whole series of supremacy laws, from Henry viii downwards, 
 constituted a clear compact that all establishments by law are to 
 be Protestant. Lyttleton's reply to this speech was more en- 
 lightened than that of the great statesman. He said that far from 
 thinking no true Protestant could agree to the change in the Oath, 
 he thought no true Protestant could refuse to concur. To oblige 
 Catholics to deny the Pope's supremacy was to compel them to 
 abjure their religion. " Opposition always grew and strengthened 
 under the scythe of persecution, and fanaticism was never for- 
 midable till it was oppressed." As for pulling down our steeples, 
 even if that happened the evil would not be great, for Christian 
 men could meet in the faith of Christ and in Christian charity 
 without these things, which to the truly devout were of little 
 importance — the mere externals of religion. It was our policy to 
 give the Canadians more freedom than France had done. Chatham 
 had said he feared this political separation of Canada from America 
 might divide their interests, and French Canada be used to quell 
 British America. Lyttleton said he did not fear this ; but if 
 America resisted the lawful power of Great Britain, he saw no 
 reason why the loyal Canadians should not help to subdue them. 
 
 In these words we probably see the inner meaning of the 
 political portion of the Bill, The great merit of it was that it 
 really did secure to French Canadians a religious liberty worth 
 the name. And well for us was it that it did so. If even a 
 shadow of the disabilities suffered in England (not to speak of 
 Ireland) by Catholics, had been inflicted in Canada, the probability 
 is that when we lost America we should have lost Canada too. 
 France would have recovered a province whose inhabitants saw 
 their religion only "barely tolerated," and every career barred by 
 an Oath their consciences would not allow them to take. 
 
 Hutchinson landed at Dover on the 29th of June, and 
 on the ist of July Lord Dartmouth brought him to the King. 
 He convinced his Majesty that " they will soon submit " ; and that 
 " the Boston Port Bill was the only wise and effectual method that 
 could have been suggested for bringing them to a speedy sub- 
 mission, and that the change in the legislature will be a means 
 of establishing some government in that province, which till now 
 has been one of anarchy." The people of Boston seemed much 
 dispirited the day he sailed; Boston would be abandoned to her 
 fate, and Rhode Island sneered at the Covenant. 
 
CHAPTER XXXIX 
 THE BOSTON PORT BILL 
 
 " Let this Bill produce a conviction to all America, that we are in earnest . . . 
 if they are obstinate, the measure will be severe ; if not, mild. — I believe that 
 Boston will not immediately submit to a fine, nor to the intention of the present 
 Bill, unless it comes attended with a mark of resolution and firmness that we 
 mean to punish them, and assert our right." — LORD North, March 23, 1774. 
 
 "The town of Boston ought to be knocked about their ears, and destroyed. 
 ' Delenda est Carthago.' "—Mr. Van on the Port Bill. 
 
 "Three thousand miles of ocean lie between you and them. No contrivance 
 can prevent the effect of this distance in weakening government. , . . Nothing 
 worse happens to you, than does to all nations, who have extensive empire. . . . 
 Nature has said it. The Turk cannot govern Egypt, and Arabia, and Curdistan, 
 as he governs Thrace. . . . Despotism itself is obliged to trick and huckster. 
 The Sultan gets as much obedience as he can. He governs with a loose rein 
 that he may govern at all. . . . This is the immutable condition, the eternal law, 
 of extensive and detached empire." — Burke on the Motion for Conciliation, 
 March 22, 1774. 
 
 Boston had been chosen as the place where to " try the question.'' 
 At the other American ports, when it was found that the tea could 
 not be landed, captains were allowed to return without breaking 
 bulk. Only at Boston were the people given no other choice 
 but to let the tea come into the town or to destroy it. 
 
 This time, however, Hutchinson was cowed, and over and over 
 again we find him mentioning that he thinks it advisable to take 
 up his lodging in the Castle. He did so, immediately after the 
 " tea-party " ; when, on summoning the Council, he could not get 
 a quorum. When he did get one — at Cambridge — a member 
 bluntly told him the people had taken the government into their 
 own hands, and any attempt to restrain them would only enrage 
 them, and render them more desperate. A proclamation, with 
 a reward for discovery, would be laughed at, and even if any 
 individual were charged the Grand Jury would probably not find 
 a true bill. 
 
 The Assembly was not to meet for five weeks. Before that 
 another vessel arrived with tea; but her owners were "friends to 
 
 319 
 
320 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Liberty," and connived at tiie Mohawks reappearing and despatch- 
 ing the cargo as before.^ At New York, the tea on board Captain 
 Chambers' ship was served the same. 
 
 So great were Hutchinson's fears, that when the Assembly met 
 he took no notice of what had happened, wishing "to avoid an 
 undesirable answer." He " mentioned such things only as were 
 least likely to give room for any harsh or unkind return." He 
 had been a long time learning this wisdom, and, like most of our 
 experience, it came too late. 
 
 Hutchinson felt his position to be intolerable. It is impossible 
 not to pity this man, who was intended by nature for a sober and 
 respectable man of business, but who had miserably allowed himself 
 to become the tool of oppression. From having been trusted 
 and honoured, he was become hated and despised. He had 
 shown himself obstinate, and yet weak. He was now genuinely 
 alarmed. He believed that an armed rebellion was on the point 
 of breaking out — many were forming themselves into military 
 companies, and drilling, under the orders of officers of their own 
 choosing. With despair he saw that the British Government would 
 not resort to that "sharp external force" which he had so long 
 been warning them was the only way of obtaining submission. 
 The news of the dismissal of Dr. Franklin and Mr. Temple had 
 only increased the anger excited by the Letters, and the Letters 
 themselves caused Hutchinson to be openly denounced as a 
 traitor, and compared with the worst of former Governors, who, 
 like him, had tried to sacrifice Colonial to British interests. He 
 had already begged for an order to go to England, had received 
 it, and was taking his passage, when the death of the Lieutenant- 
 Governor,^ on March 3, compelled him to defer his departure till 
 a new Lieutenant-Governor could be appointed from England. 
 
 The Assembly was impeaching Chief Justice Peter Oliver of high 
 crimes and misdemeanours, for receiving his salary from the Crown. 
 That year the 5 th of March was commemorated with more en- 
 thusiasm than ever. The speeches were bolder, and " derisive 
 transparencies " of the Governor and Chief Justice were exhibited 
 from windows in King Street. As the Assembly persisted in the 
 impeachment of Oliver, Hutchinson refused to pass its grants, and 
 dissolved on March 3r. 
 
 The affair of the Letters, and the treatment of Franklin, were 
 
 ' "The brig Fortune, Capt. Gorham, from London, having on board 28 chests 
 and ahalf of the East India Company's tea." — Gentleman's Magazine, p. 284. 
 
 '' Andrew Oliver. It was asserted that his death was hastened by the attacks 
 upon him. He was no relation of the Chief Justice. 
 
THE BOSTON PORT BILL 321 
 
 highly resented in the sober city of Philadelphia. " The effigies of 
 Alexander Wedderburn, Esq., charged with traducing the American 
 colonies, and insulting their Agent before his Majesty's Privy 
 Council, for doing his duty;" and of "Thomas Hutchinson, Esq., 
 Governor of Massachusetts Bay, convicted of an attempt to incense 
 Great Britain against her colonies," were put on a cart, and taken 
 through the streets, with a label on the breast of each, " couched in 
 very rancorous and scurrilous verses " ; and were hanged and burnt 
 in the evening, amidst the acclamations of a vast concourse of 
 people. 
 
 Things were in this temper, when news came that the British 
 Parliament had passed a Bill to take away the port of Boston. 
 
 The first copy of the Bill was brought to America by Captain 
 Cooper, on May 15. His ship left the Downs on April 10. The 
 Bill was immediately printed " on mourning paper, with a black 
 border," and was cried in the streets of New York and Boston, as 
 
 " Barbarous, Cruel, Bloody and Inhuman Murder ! " 
 
 It was not Massachusetts, but New York, that first proposed a 
 General Congress of delegates from all the Colonies, to agree 
 about Non-importation, till the Boston Bill should be repealed. 
 The day after this copy arrived, the old Committee of Corre- 
 spondence convoked the inhabitants. The Tory element in New 
 York, and especially the influence of the De Lancys, was strong 
 enough to get a new Committee of fifty appointed — a very mixed 
 body, including Tories and wavering Whigs, but also some of the 
 most zealous of the Sons of Liberty. The majority was strongly 
 Loyalist, and the deliberations of the Committee were principally 
 directed to bringing about a reconciliation with Great Britain, on 
 terms which should restore " the just freedom " of America. 
 
 Gage arrived on the 19th of May.^ He brought with him the 
 four regiments which he had said would be enough. He was 
 received "as Governor and Commander-in-Chief with all possible 
 honours and respect." It might have been added, " and as Vice- 
 Admiral," for he united that command to the others. Both Houses 
 were there (the Council is always spoken of as the Second House), 
 and seven companies of provincial troops. Gage especially remarked 
 the military appearance of the " Boston Grenadiers," and of their 
 Colonel, Knox the bookseller. Perhaps he thought of poor 
 Braddock's last words : " We shall know how to deal with them 
 better next time." 
 
 His troubles began at once. Next day, there was a meeting at 
 Faneuil Hall, to consider the Port Bill. It was resolved, nem. con., 
 ' Ann. Reg. Chronicle, \Tli\. 
 VOL. I. — 21 
 
322 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 that if the Colonies come to a joint resolution to stop all importation 
 and exportation to Great Britain, and every part of the West Indies, 
 till the Act for blocking up this harbour be repealed, North America 
 and her Hberties will be saved ; but if not, there is high reason to 
 fear that fraud, power, and the most odious oppression will rise 
 triumphant over right. This vote to be sent to all our sister 
 colonies. 
 
 On the 25th of May, 1774, General Gage, last royal Governor 
 but one of the province of Massachusetts Bay, opened the last 
 Assembly that was ever to sit under British rule. He informed 
 it, that after the ist of June, it must remove to Salem. 
 
 The Port Bill was to come into operation on the ist of June. 
 On that day. Governor Hutchinson sailed for England. He had been 
 addressed by 124 "merchants and principal gentlemen of Boston, 
 the episcopal clergy, the Magistrates of Middlesex County, and the 
 chief gentlemen of Salem and Marblehead." That morning, he 
 walked from his house at Milton along the road to Boston, bidding 
 adieu to his neighbours, and shaking hands with them. Near 
 Dorchester Neck, he got into his coach, which had followed him, 
 and drove to the Point, where a boat waited to take him on board 
 the Minerva. With him went his son Elisha. Governor Bernard 
 had heard the bells of Boston ringing for joy at his departure. 
 Hutchinson heard them ringing too — but a muffled peal. The 
 newspapers had come out again with mourning borders. At noon, 
 the doors of the Custom House were shut to the tolling of the Old 
 South Bell. 
 
 Henceforth, no ship may come in, no sail may be unfurled, no 
 ferryman may carry a passenger, or a pound of sugar, across to 
 Charlestown, no lighter may land hay from the islands, no boat may 
 bring sand from the hills on the mainland ; a scow may not take in 
 iron or timber, nor a float land sheep, nor a farmer bring over his 
 produce, nor a boat ply between pier and pier. All business is 
 transferred to Salem, 17 miles off. Lord North has said he will 
 set Boston 1 7 miles from the sea. 
 
 In Williamsburg, the House of Burgesses of Virginia had 
 appointed that day as a Solemn Fast, to implore Divine Interposition 
 for averting the threatened destruction of civil rights and the evils 
 of civil war, and to give the people one heart and one mind to 
 resist firmly. Lord Dunmore promptly dissolved them. At Phila- 
 delphia, all business was suspended, nine-tenths of the citizens (but 
 not the Quakers, though they were sorry for Boston) shut up their 
 houses, and the bells rang muffled all day. At Harvard, the 
 day was observed as a day of mourning — the town hall was hung 
 
THE BOSTON PORT BILL 323 
 
 with black, the shops were shut. Less devout towns called general 
 meetings. 
 
 It appears from Gage's letter to Dartmouth of July 5, that at a 
 town-meeting in Boston, " the better sort of people tried to make a 
 push to pay for the tea," and " annihilate the Committee of Corre- 
 spondence." But they were outvoted, and instead the " Solemn 
 League and Covenant" was issued, pledging the town to non-im- 
 portation. Gage had his agents — not to be called spies, but officers 
 in the royal service. Among them was Daniel Leonard, who had 
 been elected to the Assembly for his professions of patriotism, and 
 his engaging manners. He was on the Committee of Nine (on the 
 State of the Province). The Committee, however, were not quite 
 sure of Leonard, and he heard nothing but vague proposals for con- 
 ciliation, until he believed, and made Gage believe for a time, that 
 the Assembly would vote an indemnity to the East India Company, 
 as soon as more troops arrived. The Assembly, removed to Salem, 
 with all other public offices, was protesting against its removal. In 
 replying to Gage's Speech, the Council expressed the hope that his 
 administration would be "a happy contrast" to that of his pre- 
 decessors. Gage refused to receive the Address — those predecessors 
 had been approved by the King, a reflection on them was an insult 
 to the King and an affront to himself. 
 
 By June 17, he had given up hope of an indemnity, and had deter- 
 mined to dissolve before the Assembly could fix time and place for the 
 General Congress. The Assembly was aware of his intention. So full a 
 House had never beenknown. One hundredand twenty-nine members 
 were present that morning. Samuel Adams had the door locked, and 
 put the key in his pocket. Then the House began to pass resolutions 
 as fast as it could — first, for renouncing the consumption of East 
 India teas, and as far as possible of all goods exported from Britain 
 or the West Indies, till our public grievances are redressed. Next, 
 Adams proposed the First of September for the Congress, the place 
 to be Philadelphia — well out of reach of the troops. Just then, the 
 Governor's Secretary knocked at the door, with a Message from the 
 Governor. The House, guessing the import of the Message, sent 
 word it had ordered the door to be locked — it was discussing 
 moderate and conciliatory measures. So the Secretary had to read 
 his Proclamation and dissolve the Assembly outside the door, in the 
 ears of the crowd on the stairs. It was perhaps the shortest Pro- 
 clamation ever made — it had been drawn up in haste to dissolve 
 before the House could pass its resolutions. Thus ended the last 
 sitting of the last Assembly under the Charter. 
 
 That same day, a meeting in Faneuil Hall (John Adams presid- 
 
324 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 ing) voted, with but one dissentient, that the Committee of Corre- 
 spondence write forthwith to all the other colonies, to tell them " we 
 are not idle," and are anxiously waiting for the Continental Congress. 
 A town-meeting at Salem sent word to Gage that " Nature herself 
 forbade Salem becoming the rival of that convenient port, Boston." 
 
 Assisted by Hutchinson's "Addressers," Gage now made a great 
 effort to get up a meeting for paying for the tea. On the 27th 
 of June, so great a throng assembled at Faneuil Hall, that it 
 was necessary to adjourn to the Old South. There the friends of 
 Government moved a vote of censure on the Committee of Corre- 
 spondence. Samuel Adams left the chair, as his conduct was being 
 called in question, and faced his opponents from the floor. But at 
 the adjourned meeting next day, the censure was rejected by a great 
 majority, and the " Solemn League and Covenant " to suspend all 
 commercial relations with Great Britain till the Acts should be 
 repealed, was adopted. Gage answered by a Proclamation ordering 
 the arrest of any person who offered this document for signature. 
 
 Admiral Graves ^ now arrived in a ship -of -war; but the 
 larger the forces collected in Boston, the worse grew the 
 situation all over the continent. From Massachusetts to South 
 Carolina, the Colonies were calling meetings to protest against the 
 Port Bill, to enter into non-importation agreements, and to choose 
 delegates to the General Congress. And as soon as Boston's plight 
 was known, substantial marks of sympathy began to arrive — South 
 Carolina sent rice. North Carolina collected ^2000, Windham in 
 Connecticut sent 258 sheep, "a gentleman of Norwich " drove in 
 291 more, and Major Israel Putnam 130 — a gift from Brooklyn 
 parish; the French and English inhabitants of Quebec sent 1040 
 bushels of wheat ; Colonel Washington of Mount Vernon headed the 
 subscription list of Virginia with j£$o. Philadelphia voted ;!{^2oo. 
 The backwoodsmen of Augusta County sent 130 barrels of flour for 
 the poor of Boston. From every town and village of New England 
 stores and money came pouring in. Even New York, the centre 
 of British patronage, had destroyed her tea. And at Newport 
 in Rhode Island a paper was being distributed, headed, " Join or 
 Die ! " 
 
 Gage issued proclamation on proclamation, until he got down 
 to the venerable Proclamation for the encouragement of piety and 
 virtue, and the preventing of wickedness and vice. 
 
 Hitherto, he had only had to contend with the opposition to the 
 Port Bill. On the 6th of August, he received the official copy of 
 
 ^ This was Samuel Graves, not the Admiral who played so considerable a part 
 in the War, 
 
THE BOSTON PORT BILL 325 
 
 the Act for Regulating the Government of Massachusetts, and his 
 real troubles began. The Act in effect abrogated the Charter. The 
 whole power of appointment — even of legal officers — was placed in 
 the hands of the Governor. He began at once to put it in force. 
 He chose his new Council, "agreeable to the late Act." Thomas 
 Oliver was sworn-in as Lieutenant-Governor, and the Selectmen of 
 Salem were summoned before Gage, and warned that he meant to 
 enforce the new laws. They talked about the old laws of the 
 province. He arrested six of them, and three were sent to gaol, 
 but when they arrived, the " keeper " refused to admit them ! This 
 seems to have been the only arrest Gage ever ventured to make. 
 He dared not touch Hancock, but he revoked his commission as 
 Colonel of the Governor's Company of Cadets — whereupon, the 
 Cadets disbanded themselves, and sent back the King's standard to 
 the Governor. 
 
 On the 26th of August, there was almost an insurrection. 
 It was Assize-day at Worcester. Two thousand men marched 
 thither in companies. The jurors refused to serve; the clerks of 
 the Court expressed their repentance for having summoned them 
 under the new Acts — they did not consider what they were about. 
 If the people will forgive them, they will do so no more, " let the 
 consequence be what it will." They published these abject apologies 
 in the papers. Next, the insurgents turned their attention to the 
 " mandamus " ^ Councillors. They forced Timothy Paine to stand 
 with his hat off and read his resignation. Some fled, all resigned. 
 Of the thirty-six new Councillors, only about thirteen had taken 
 the oaths. Next Lord's Day, when George Watson, a heretofore 
 respected townsman of Plymouth, took his seat at meeting, attired 
 as usual in his scarlet Sabbath cloak, his friends and neighbours got 
 up, put on their hats, and walked out — George hanging his head 
 as they passed his pew, that he might not look them in the face. It 
 was more than he could bear — he resigned. 
 
 The same 26th of August, another body marched to Springfield 
 early in the morning, with drums and trumpets, and set up a black 
 flag on the Court House, threatening death to any who entered. 
 The Judges signed a promise not to exercise their commissions. 
 It was impossible to execute the Acts. 
 
 The 29th was Assize-day at Boston. Gage came in to support 
 Chief Justice Oliver. The Judges took their seats, but the jurors 
 refused to serve, and one of them reminded the Court that the 
 Chief Justice still stood impeached by the late Representatives of 
 
 ' So called because summoned by mandamus from the Governor, instead of 
 being elected, as formerly, by a Committee of the out-going Council. 
 
326 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 the province. The jurors said further, that the Charter had been 
 changed with no warrant but that of Act of Parhament. The 
 Judges waited on the Governor, and told him they could not exercise 
 their functions either in Boston or out of it — the army was too small 
 for their protection, even if they could find any jurors. Thus the 
 grand scheme for reducing Massachusetts to obedience by changing 
 her government was dead before it was born. Gage was even 
 obliged to remove himself and the remains of his Council to Boston 
 (in violation of the Port Bill), because they dared not show their 
 faces at Salem. 
 
 Gage had already seized such provincial military stores as he 
 could lay hands on, and now, before sunrise on the ist of 
 September, he sent a party up the Mystic River to seize a large 
 store of powder at Medford.^ What he seized was in part private 
 property. As soon as it was known, several thousands, "mostly in 
 arms,'' assembled at Cambridge, intending to march on Boston, but 
 were dissuaded by " the principal gentlemen of the town." Dr. 
 Warren, who crossed from Charlestown to confer with the Cambridge 
 Committee, found four thousand persons standing round the steps of 
 the Court House, listening to Judge Danforth so quietly that the old 
 Judge's voice could be distinctly heard. He was assuring them that 
 he would never act as a member of Council. The High Sheriff also 
 promised not to execute any precept under the new Act of Parlia- 
 ment. 
 
 Lieutenant-Governor Oliver, who fled to Boston, told Admiral 
 Graves that this was "not a mad mob," and earnestly implored 
 Gage not to send out the troops, until he had more to send. 
 
 Gage saw the wisdom of this advice. He had long ceased to 
 think that four regiments were enough. He now thought it would 
 take "a very respectable force." He was annoying the King by 
 writing for more and more troops, and by at last positively proposing 
 to suspend the Acts — an idea which seemed to his Majesty " the 
 most absurd that can be suggested." ^ 
 
 Before this. Gage had written to Carleton at Quebec for Indians. 
 Carleton's commission empowered him to enlist " the Indian tribes 
 from the coast of Labrador to the Ohio, and march them against 
 rebels into any one of the plantations in America." But Carleton 
 did not like it. "You know," he wrote back, "what sort of people 
 they are." Gage himself was somewhat ashamed, but gave orders 
 to propitiate the Chiefs by gifts and subsidies. Meantime, he began 
 to fortify Boston Neck, the only entrance to Boston by land. He 
 
 ^ Or rather, Quarry Hill, between Medford and Cambridge. 
 2 The King to Lord North, Nov. 19, 1774. 
 
THE BOSTON PORT BILL 327 
 
 brought the cannon from the Castle, and posted the 59th on the 
 Neck ; and when the Selectmen came to ask what this meant, he 
 replied that he was only preparing in case the provincials attacked 
 him. 
 
 With almost incredible folly, he had timed his attempt to seize 
 the powder with the moment of the annual muster of the Massa- 
 chusetts Militia. It never disbanded. Nor could Gage get 
 carpenters to work on his fortifications — though there was much 
 distress, and many unemployed. In vain he sent to New York for 
 workmen — nobody cared to build a fort to overawe his countrymen. 
 
 This rally of the Massachusetts Militia marks the change from a 
 political to a military struggle. Although, even then, a return to 
 the policy "before 1765 " would have restored obedience, from this 
 time both sides began to face the probability of war. The Americans 
 looked forward with heavy hearts — the Ministerialists with some- 
 thing like light ones. Long before Lexington, '' a person near the 
 top " said to Hutchinson, " the farther your people go the better — 
 your reduction will be the more effectual." 1 
 
 The elections for a new Assembly were held as usual, but when 
 the day came, Gage did not meet the members ; so after waiting for 
 him all day, they resolved themselves into a Provincial Con- 
 gress — explaining that they did so for lack of an Assembly. 
 Presently Gage wrote home to Dartmouth that " popular fury was 
 never greater than now in Massachusetts Bay." 
 
 Lest it should be thought that " popular fury " was confined to 
 Massachusetts, an extraordinary affair may be mentioned, at Anna- 
 polis, the capital of Maryland. The brig Peggy Stewart arrived 
 there in the middle of October, with 2320 pounds of tea, on which 
 the owner at once paid duty. There was great indignation ; a com- 
 mittee kept watch to prevent the tea being landed, the public 
 meetings were crowded with people from the country, and at last 
 the two importers and the owner of the brig jointly expressed con- 
 trition, and offered to burn "the detestable article." This not 
 satisfying the crowd, the owner — after consulting with Charles 
 Carroll — actually offered to burn his brig too ! The crowd accepted 
 the offer ; the three offenders went on board " with hats off," and 
 lighted torches in their hands, and set fire to their own property, and 
 so the tea and the Peggy Stewart were consumed in one holocaust. 
 Such a story must dispose of the stock explanations of " designing 
 demagogues," "agitators," few irf number, yet able to inflame a 
 whole people, otherwise quite contented. If the movement against 
 the tea duty had not been very genuine, not all the agitators the 
 
 ' Diary. 
 
328 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 world ever saw could have prevented a reaction after such a scene 
 as this. The main body of the people must have been convinced 
 that their interests were at stake, and that the tea duty was part of a 
 vital question, affecting the future of the whole continent of North 
 America — the question whether that continent was to be farmed out 
 in the interests of an island three thousand miles away, or was to 
 develop on natural lines, untrammelled by unnatural restraints on 
 her manufactures and commerce. 
 
CHAPTER XL 
 THE FIRST CONTINENTAL CONGRESS 
 
 " I do hot wish to come to severe measures, but we must not retreat. ... I 
 have no objection afterwards to their seeing that there is no inclination for the 
 present to lay fresh taxes on them, but I am clear there must always be one tax 
 to keep up the right, and as such I approve of the Tea Duty." — The King to Lord 
 North, Kew, Sept. II, 1774. 
 
 "Resolved, nem. con., 2. That our ancestors were at the time of their 
 emigration . . . entitled to all the rights, liberties, and immunities, of free and 
 natural born subjects within the realm of England. 
 
 " Resolved, nem. con., 3. That by such emigration they neither forfeited, sur- 
 rendered, nor lost, any of those rights. 
 
 "Resolved, 4. That the foundation of English liberty, and of all free govern- 
 ment, is a right in the people to participate in their legislative council." — 
 Resolutions of the Atiierican Congress, \1']\. 
 
 " At the conclusion of the late war ... a plan for enslaving your fellow- 
 subjects in America was concerted. . . . Prior to this . . . you restrained our 
 trade in every way that could conduce to your emolument ... we nevertheless did 
 not complain. . . . We believe there is yet much virtue, much justice, and much 
 public spirit in the English nation, — to that justice we now appeal. . , . Place 
 us in the same situation that we were in at the close of the last war, and our 
 former harmony vdll be restored." — Memorial to the British People, Oct. 25, 
 1774- 
 
 The First Continental Congress met at Philadelphia, in 
 Carpenters' Hall, on the 5th of September, 1774. The first Presi- 
 dent of Congress was Peyton Randolph, ofthe old historic Randolphs 
 of Virginia, who boasted that in their veins flowed the blood of 
 Pocahontas. Twelve out of the thirteen provinces were represented 
 — Georgia alone hung back.^ 
 
 They began by a sort of Declaration of Rights : — 
 
 " The inhabitants of the English colonies in North America, by 
 
 ' They are officially described as "The good people ofthe several colonies of 
 New Hampshire, Massachusetts Bay, Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, 
 Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Newcastle, Kent, and 
 Sussex on Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina and South Carolina, 
 alarmed at the arbitrary proceedings of the British Parliament and administration, 
 having severally elected deputies to meet and sit in general congress in the city 
 of Philadelphia, etc." — Proceedings of the American Congress. 
 
330 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 the immutable laws of nature, the principles of the EngHsh constitu- 
 tion, and the several charters or compacts,'' are entitled to all the 
 rights possessed by their ancestors, as English subjects — rights 
 never ceded nor forfeited — and "are entitled to a free and exclusive 
 power of legislation, in their several provincial legislatures, where 
 their right to representation can alone be preserved, in all cases of 
 taxation and internal policy, subject only to the negative of their 
 sovereign in such manner as has been heretofore used and accus- 
 tomed." 
 
 There was much discussion as to whether they should 
 admit the principle of the Navigation Acts ; Virginia had never 
 meant to accept them. Duane of New York now proposed it, and 
 at last John Adams was persuaded to acquiesce ; and so it was 
 resolved that they " cheerfully consent to the operation of such 
 acts of the British parliament as are, bona fide, restrained to 
 the regulation of our external commerce, for the purpose 
 of securing the commercial advantages of the whole empire to the 
 mother country, and the commercial benefits of its respective 
 members ; excluding every idea of taxation, internal or external, 
 for raising a revenue on the subjects in America, without their 
 consent." 
 
 There was much more in the same strain — of the right to be 
 tried by their peers, according to the Common Law of England ; 
 the right to assemble peaceably, to consider their grievances, and 
 to petition the King. They also resolved, that a standing army, 
 kept in time of peace, without the consent of the colony, is against 
 law. 
 
 There were fifty-five members of Congress — each province had 
 sent as many as it pleased. The question of population at once 
 came up. Patrick Henry said it was unjust that a little colony 
 should have an equal vote with a large one. A delegate from New 
 Hampshire replied that the little colony, too, risked its all. From 
 this discussion we obtain some idea of the population of the North 
 American Colonies in 1774. The total was given as about 3,000,000. 
 But this was far from accurate — the backwoodsmen had never been 
 counted. The actual returns were, Whites, 2,100,000; Blacks, 
 500,000.^ 
 
 When Patrick Henry had said, in the opening speech, " I am 
 not a Virginian, I am an American," the Colonies began to be an 
 organic whole ; though it was to be many a long year before the 
 
 ' Population of the Colonies in 1774, as given to Congress on this occasion. 
 By an account of numbers in Connecticut on Jan. I, 1774 — in the whole six 
 counties, 191,393 whites, and 6464 blacks. 
 
THE FIRST CONTINENTAL CONGRESS 331 
 
 welding was complete. It was finally decided that each colony 
 should have one vote, irrespective of size. 
 
 The next question was, whether Congress should be opened 
 with prayer. Some, like Washington, were Episcopalians, others 
 were Congregationalists. Samuel Adams said he was a Congrega- 
 tionalist, but "could hear a prayer from any man of piety 
 and virtue, who was a friend to his country." Dr. Duche, 
 an Episcopalian, was appointed, and prayers were to begin 
 to-morrow. 
 
 This day's proceedings were rudely interrupted — an express 
 came from Putnam to say that Gage had made an attack on the 
 people, that Massachusetts and Connecticut had risen in arms, and 
 that Boston was being bombarded. 
 
 The bells of Philadelphia rang a muffled peal. The Psalm 
 for the day seemed strangely appropriate,^ and the Chaplain 
 was so moved that he broke out into a fervent extemporary 
 prayer, worthy of a New England divine — of Dr. Cooper 
 himself. It was soon found that the rumours were grossly 
 exaggerated, but the extreme gravity of the situation was evident 
 to all. 
 
 Congress voted that eleven ^ Acts of Parliament, or parts of 
 Acts, were such violations of Colonial rights, that their repeal was 
 "necessary to restore harmony between the colonies and Great 
 Britain"; and resolved to import no merchandise from Great 
 Britain and Ireland after December i, 1774, nor export any 
 thither after September 10, 1775. Two of the South Carohna 
 delegates withdrew over this — Carolina would be ruined. Rice was 
 then exempted, and the delegates returned. 
 
 Congress refused to petition Parliament, but drew up a Petition 
 to the King, and an Address to the People of Great Britain. They 
 knew that there must soon be a new Parliament, and they hoped 
 by an appeal to the Electors to secure one in which other 
 counsels should prevail. But it was a resolution of October 8 
 which made the King resolve to make no concession. This 
 resolution approved the opposition of Massachusetts to the 
 execution of the late Acts, and declared that if force were used 
 against her, " all America ought to support her." This was enough 
 for the King. The faintest semblance of concerted action had 
 
 ^ Psalm XXXV. : " Plead Thou my cause, O Lord, with them that strive 
 with me : and fight against those that fight against me." — See John Adams' 
 letter. 
 
 ° The Acts chiefly complained of were, 4 Geo. ill, 15 & 34; 5 Geo, III, 25 ; 
 6 Geo. in, 52 ; 7 Geo. iii, 41 & 46 ; 8 Geo. in, 22. 
 
332 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 always been denounced as the sure sign of intended rebellion — as, 
 in fact, in itself a kind of treason. i 
 
 The loth of May, 1775, was appointed for their next meeting; 
 and on October 29, the First Continental Congress broke up. 
 The policy inaugurated by the Stamp Act had in eight years 
 brought twelve of the thirteen colonies to the verge of armed 
 rebellion. 
 
 ' One more act of the First Congress must be mentioned. In 1770, the 
 King had forbidden the Governor of Virginia, "on pain of his highest displea- 
 sure," to assent to a law just passed by that Assembly against the slave-trade. 
 Congress now passed without opposition a covenant to discontinue that trade 
 wholly, from the ist of December next. 
 
 It is to this that Granville Sharp refers in a letter to Lord Dartmouth, Dec. 
 4, 1774. He says that had the warning he sent Lord North three years ago 
 concerning the African slave-trade and maintenance of slavery been regarded he 
 believes the present misunderstanding would not have happened. Sharp says 
 he has carefully examined "the nature of the pretensions on this side the 
 water and their legality," and in a short time will lay before Dartmouth "proofs 
 in favour of the much injured Americans." — Hist. MSS. Coinin. Report XIV, 
 App. 10, p. 236. This letter is explained by a previous entry (p. 113) of "an 
 Order of the Lords of the Committee of Council for plantation affairs," dated 
 Dec. ig, 1772, referring to the consideration of "this Board an Address of the 
 House of Burgesses of Virginia to the King, praying that the Gov'', of that 
 Colony may be permitted to assent to such Laws as may check the importation of 
 Slaves from the Coast of Africa into the said Colony." The Address was read 
 Jan 25, 1773. It appears to have been dated about May I, 1772. (The originals 
 of these papers are in the Record Office, America and W. Indies, vol. 210, fols. 
 91 and 95.) 
 
CHAPTER XLI 
 THE BILL OF FAMINE AND WAR 
 
 ' ' Lord North expressed himself in higher terms than ever upon the news 
 from Boston. . , . ' I will venture to tell you Parliament was dissolved on this 
 account — that we might, at the beginning of a Parliament, take such measures as 
 we could depend upon a Parliament to prosecute to effect. ' "^Hutchinson, Diary, 
 Nov., 1774. 
 
 "Our conduct has been that of pert children ; we have thrown a pebble at a 
 mastiff, and are surprised it was not frightened." — Horace Waif ok to Conway, 
 Dec. 15, 1774. 
 
 ' ' Nothing can be more calculated to bring the Americans to a due submission 
 than the very handsome majority that at the outset hath appeared in both 
 Houses of Parliament." — George III to Lord North, Jan. 23, 1775. 
 
 ' ' Mauduit expressed his astonishment and indignation at the Colony Agent's 
 admission into the House of Commons to hear the debate. Yesterday Lord 
 Clare was so unguarded, as, in answer to the motion to allow of flour, etc. , to 
 say : ' We must pinch them ; they must be compelled to submit without delay. 
 If they are able to hold out, we know that we are not. What's done must be 
 done at once, or they will finally conquer.' Franklin all the while in the 
 gallery, staring with his spectacles ; and no doubt, before this time, the relation 
 of this speech is on its way to America." — Hutchinson, Diary, March 9, 1775. 
 
 "Such governors as have made themselves so odious that they can no longer 
 remain with safety to their persons, recall, reward them with pensions. You 
 may make baronets of them too. ... If you are told of discontents in your 
 Colonies, never believe that they are general, or that you have given occasion 
 for them. . . . Lastly, invest the general of your ar7ny in the provinces with 
 great and unconstitutional powers, and free him from the control of your own 
 Civil Governors." — Franklin, Rules for reducing a Great Empire to a Small One. 
 
 Since the accession of George 11, only one Parliament had been 
 dissolved before its time, and that was in 1746, the year after the 
 Rebellion. The Thirteenth Parliament had still six months of 
 life in it, but it was thought better to dissolve at once, "in order 
 to remove all danger of a departure from such measures as may be 
 found necessary '' — in other words, the new Parliament was to be 
 hurried into existence that Ministers might be sure of a free hand 
 in America. There was also another reason. The Civil List was 
 bound to come before Parliament very soon — the King's butchers, 
 bakers, and grocers, his cooks and his footmen, were clamouring 
 
334 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 for their due. A Parliament just about to face its constituents 
 would be afraid to be generous with the public money. Better let 
 a new Parliament, with a long life before it, deal with the business, 
 and give the country time to forget it before another Election. 
 Another reason, perhaps, was a wish not to give Opposition too 
 much time to prepare. A few constituencies had been getting up 
 a "test" for candidates — pledging them to promote Bills for 
 shorter Parliaments, for the exclusion of placemen and pensioners, 
 and for more fair and equal taxation — also for repealing the last 
 American Bills, and the Quebec Bill. The freeholders of Middlesex 
 had offered this test to Mr. Wilkes and Sergeant Glynn, and they 
 had signed it. 
 
 There were a few who hoped that the premature dissolution 
 indicated an intention to conciliate America — the old Parliament 
 had swallowed so many of its own measures, that it was im- 
 possible to ask it to swallow any more. But the English people 
 had been told that Massachusetts refused to pay a few thousand 
 pounds for property destroyed by a mob ; and refused to accept a 
 revision of her Charter, because she was conspiring with other 
 colonies to become independent.^ There was an unaccountable 
 apathy among commercial men. 
 
 The traffic in seats was brisk — though less so than last time, 
 when the East India Company was the purchaser. Candidates 
 were less afraid to spend upon their free and independent electors — 
 they had had time to study the Grenville Act ; and as it was certain 
 that the Government would be in want of votes, they might reckon 
 .on seeing their money back. But the people gained two victories ^ 
 
 ^ Even those merchants who are most likely to be overwhelmed by any real 
 American confusion, are among the most supine. The character of the Ministry 
 either produces or perfectly coincides with the disposition of the public. — Burke 
 to Lord Rockingham, in the autumn of i774- 
 
 " Notwithstanding the surprise, and shortness of the time, some of the elec- 
 tions were contested with extraordinary perseverance and ardour. — Ann. Reg., 
 
 1774- 
 
 The selling of seats, however, was still a regular business. On Oct. 5, 1774, 
 North desires Cooper to tell Lord Falmouth, "in as polite terms as possible," 
 that North wishes to "recommend" to three of Falmouth's six Cornish seats. 
 The terms, he expects, are ^^2500 a seat, to which North is ready to agree. 
 But the same day North writes to Robinson that his "noble friend is rather 
 shabby in desiring guineas instead of pounds," but North "would not let the 
 bargain go upon so slight a difference." Among other interesting particulars 
 we learn that Mr. Legge can only afford £i,oo. So, "if he comes in for 
 Lostwithiel, he will cost the public 2000 guineas." Gascoign shall have 
 the refusal of Tregony, if he will pay ;f 1000, " but I do not see why we 
 should bring him in cheaper than any other servant of the Crown." On 
 
THE BILL OF FAMINE AND WAR 335 
 
 — Edmund Burke was returned for Bristol, pledged to support 
 conciliation with America, subject to the preservation of British 
 supremacy. And when Middlesex once more returned John 
 Wilkes, the King himself was too tired of fighting " that devil," to 
 try to keep him out any longer. Wilkes and Middlesex were more 
 obstinate than King George in. So after a ten years' struggle, 
 Wilkes forced his way back to the House, and presently was 
 elected Lord Mayor of London. 
 
 The Fourteenth Parliament was opened by the King in person, 
 on the 29th of November, 1774.'^ The Speech from the Throne 
 fitly ushered in its proceedings — fiercely denouncing the Americans, 
 and passing over in silence the Partition of Poland. In each 
 House, Opposition made a gallant but ineffectual effort to prevent 
 American affairs from being dealt with until the whole of the 
 papers were laid before Parliament ; but their motion was lost in 
 the Commons by 264 to 73. 
 
 To avoid alarming the nation too soon, the Estimates were 
 made very low — 4000 men less than usual for the Navy, and the 
 Land-tax kept at three shillings. Opposition asked where the men 
 for America were to come from? Were they to be taken from our 
 guard-ships ? It was significant that those who were most eager to 
 employ force against the colonists were the most unconcerned 
 about home defence. Burke compared the House to a dead, 
 senseless mass, which had neither sense, soul, nor activity, except 
 as derived from the Minister. But, he said, " there is system in 
 this " — they despise Parliament, but they will come to it when they 
 have blundered. 
 
 Governor Johnstone said, before we voted the Estimates, we 
 ought to know what Government intends to do with regard to 
 America. Otherwise, while we are thinking of depriving our 
 fellow-subjects of their just rights in America, we may, as a proper 
 punishment, lose our own. He reminded those " who conceive 
 that men ought to yield their rights," because they are distressed, 
 of what "the late Parliament of Paris had endured." Those 
 worthy patriots have secured to their country more essential rights 
 "than have been obtained by three civil wars." Speaking of 
 taxation and representation, he put an odd dilemma — "Can any 
 position appear more ridiculous to those who maintain the 
 doctrines of virtual representation, than that a borough should 
 
 November 19, Robinson is to let Cooper know whether he promised 
 Masterman .^2500 or ;^3000 for each of Lord Edgcumbe's seats. — Hist. MSS. 
 Conim. Report X, App. I, Abergavenny MSS. 
 
 ' The Thirteenth Parliament was dissolved, September 30. 
 
336 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 send two members to parliament, without house or inhabitant ? 
 Many who hear me, and are strenuous against American Charters, 
 sit for such boroughs ! Legislation can exist without the power of 
 taxation — Ireland is a proof. Mr. Rigby, posed with this argument 
 last session, said, ' We could tax Ireland.' I remember there were 
 some gentlemen in the gallery, whom I immediately perceived, by 
 the contortions in their countenances, to be Irish members." Next 
 day Rigby had apologised — no parallel could be drawn between 
 Ireland and America, "for Ireland had a paraphernalia." This 
 satisfied both the Enghsh and Irish members."^ 
 
 Efforts were not wanting to ward off the impending calamity. 
 Franklin, his old friend Dr. Fothergill, a London physician in a 
 large practice, and David Hartley, laid their heads together, and 
 drew up a paper which they called " Hints for Conversation " — really 
 the draft of a treaty for conciliation. It had been shown to 
 Dartmouth, who approved it. But Sandwich's attack on Franklin 
 put an end to the idea. Early in 1775, Chatham made a last 
 attempt to persuade Rockingham to attempt the repeal of the 
 Declaratory Act — that Act which Franklin had said would be 
 quite harmless, if never enforced. But this, too, failed. 
 
 In the very last days of 1774, Dr. Franklin — who since the 
 affair of the Letters had attended no meetings of Council, and had 
 remained in England at great personal risk — had a number of 
 informal interviews with Lord Howe, to discuss proposals for an 
 accommodation. These proposals were briefly : Massachusetts to 
 pay for the tea, and England to repeal all the Acts complained of. 
 But all came to nothing. There is the testimony of Thomas 
 Jefferson that North said: "A rebellion was not to be deprecated 
 on the part of Great Britain ; " and that when this remark was 
 
 ^"A short answer was given by a blunt Mr. Van. 'The Honourable 
 Gentleman (Burke) has been strewing flowers to captivate children. I have 
 no flowers, Mr. Speaker, to strew : all I have to say is, that I think the 
 Americans are a rebellious and most ungrateful people, and I am for assuring 
 the King that' we will support him in such measures as will be effectual to 
 reduce them.' The honesty of the man and his singular manner, set the whole 
 House into a balloo ! and answered Burke better than Cicero could have done 
 with all his eloquence." — Hutchinson to Mr. Sewall, Dec. 10, 1774. 
 
 "There's a strange silence upon American affairs, to me unaccountable, 
 considering the importance of them, unless it proceeds from amazement. It is 
 whispered that Lord N. in the Cabinet, is more backward than most of the rest 
 of the Ministers." — Hutchinson, Diary, Dec. 19, 1774. 
 
 " Cornwall attributed the delays which attended business of all sorts to I<ord 
 North consulting so many persons, who are of very different opinions ; he re- 
 mains undecided, and after.he appears decided, is apt to change," — HuTCHiNSON, 
 March 11, 1775. 
 
THE BILL OF FAMINE AND WAR 337 
 
 repeated to Franklin, in disgust and despair he ceased to negotiate 
 with Howe. 
 
 When, on January 19, 1775, the American papers were laid before 
 the House, the unwillingness to show them was explained. One 
 Governor after another wrote of the determination of the colonists 
 not to s.ubmit to the late Acts. The letters were not only from 
 Gage of Massachusetts— besides his alarming accounts of the pro- 
 ceedings of the General and Provincial Congress, the mandamus 
 Councillor disturbances, the people exercising themselves in arms, 
 and getting ammunition and artillery " wherever they can procure 
 them, good or bad," Wentworth of New Hampshire had to tell of 
 the surprise of Fort William and Mary, and the taking away of the 
 stores; Wanton of Rhode Island frankly confessed he had no 
 power; Golden of New York— the most hopeful of all the 
 Governors — wrote that "if not rescued, the colonies must soon 
 fall into distraction and a total annihilation of government"; 
 Deputy-Governor Penn said the temper of the people was " warm," 
 and opposition to the Acts universal — to his very great surprise, 
 the General Assembly has approved the transactions of Congress. 
 Lord Dunmore of Virginia wrote from his refuge on board the 
 Fowey. Deputy-Governor Eden of Maryland believed his province 
 would undergo any hardship rather than acknowledge the right 
 of ParHament. Lieutenant-Governor Bull of South Carolina finds 
 "an universal spirit of jealousy against Great Britain, and of 
 unanimity towards each other." Even Sir James Wright, in 
 Georgia, has " some mal-contents, and violent liberty-people, for 
 whose conduct he cannot be answerable.'' And since the return 
 of the delegates from Congress, the province "has been in hot 
 water." Governor Martin of North Carolina complains that he 
 cannot enforce even what common decency requires — Judge 
 Drayton has made a speech to the Grand Jury, exhorting them " in 
 the most solemn manner" to "hold their liberties dearer than their 
 lives " ; in consequence of which the Grand Jury has presented as a 
 most dangerous grievance the power of Parliament to make laws 
 to bind the Americans.^ 
 
 Next day Chatham moved to withdraw the troops from 
 Boston. The late Acts were "the proscription of a people, 
 unheard. The people of America, condemned, and not heard, 
 have a right to resist." Years ago Dr. Franklin had told him 
 
 ' ' ' There cannot be a greater error than to suppose that the present commotions 
 in America are owing to the arts of demagogues. Every man thinks and acts 
 for himself in a country where there is an equal distribution of property and 
 knowledge." — Letter from Philadelphia, Dec. I, 1774. (Almon.) 
 VOL. I. 2 2 
 
3 38 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 that the Americans would not lament anything we might do to 
 them, "while they had their woods and their liberty." When 
 you consider the " decency, firmness and wisdom " of the papers 
 transmitted to us from America, you cannot but respect their 
 cause. " I have read Thucydides — have studied and admired 
 the master-states of the world. For solidity of reasoning, 
 sagacity, wisdom, no body of men can stand in preference to 
 the General Congress of Philadelphia." Attempts to impose 
 servitude on such men must be fatal. " We shall be forced 
 ultimately to retract — let us retract while we can, not when we 
 must." 1 
 
 His motion was lost by 68 to i8. 
 
 The Merchants of London and Bristol had petitioned the 
 House of Commons for reconciliation with America. They set 
 forth that they had exported, or sold for exportation, "very large 
 quantities of the manufacture of Great Britain and Ireland " — 
 here follows a list, ending " with almost every British manu- 
 facture " ; together with large quantities of foreign linens and 
 other articles, imported from Flanders, Holland, Germany, "the 
 East Countries," Portugal, Spain, Italy, "which are generally 
 received in these countries in return for British manufactures ; 
 they have also exported great quantities of East India goods, 
 "part of which receive additional manufacture in Great Britain"; 
 and receive returns from North America in "pig and bar iron, 
 timber, staves, naval stores, tobacco, rice, furs, whalebone" — • 
 another long list. Also ivheat flour, Indian corn, and salted 
 provisions, when, on accoii7it of scarcity in Great Britain, these 
 articles are permitted to be imported. They also receive " circuit- 
 ously " from Ireland (for flax-seed, etc., exported from North 
 America) by bills of exchange on the merchants of this city 
 trading to Ireland. The Petition goes through the whole trade 
 between America and the West India Islands, between those 
 islands and Italy, Spain, France, Portugal, Germany, Flanders, 
 Holland, and "the East Countries." At this moment, there 
 is due from the Colonies in North America, to the City of London 
 only, two miUions sterling and upwards. Thousands of seamen 
 are bred and maintained, thousands of ships are employed in 
 
 ' At Chatham's particular desire, Dr. Franklin was present on this occasion. 
 Chatham took the doctor by the arm, and led him to the door " near the bar, 
 where were standing a number of gentlemen, waiting for the peers who were to 
 introduce them, and some peers waiting for the friends they expected to intro- 
 duce ; among whom he delivered me to the door-keepers, saying aloud, ' This 
 is Dr. Franklin, whom I would have admitted to the House.'" — Franklin. 
 
THE BILL OF FAMINE AND WAR 339 
 
 this trade. But in the year 1765 "there was a great stagnation 
 in the commerce between Great Britain and her colonies," in 
 consequence of a certain Act for granting stamp-duties. That 
 Act was repealed next year, upon which trade " immediately 
 resumed its former flourishing state." But in 1767 an Act was 
 passed for granting certain duties in the British Colonies, on tea, 
 and many other things, "when the commerce with the colonies 
 was again interrupted." In the year 1770, part of this Act was 
 repealed, when the trade to America soon revived, except in the 
 article of tea, on which a duty was continued, "whereby that 
 branch of our commerce was nearly lost." In the year 1773, 
 an Act passed to allow of a drawback of the duties on the export- 
 ation of tea to his Majesty 's Colonies in America, and to empower 
 the East India Company to import tea duty free ; " and by the 
 operation of these and other laws," the minds of his Majesty's 
 subjects in the Colonies have been greatly disquieted, and a total 
 stop is now put to the export trade with the greatest and most 
 important part of North America. The petitioners are threatened 
 with grievous distress, and thousands of industrious artificers and 
 manufacturers with utter ruin. But they put their trust in the 
 new Parliament to apply healing remedies. 
 
 Meredith — bought over by a place in the Household — tried 
 to gain time by referring the Petition to a special committee, — ■ 
 an inquiry would cause delay, — there was still hope of quenching 
 the flames in America, if proper and effectual means were applied. 
 North again protested that he had only meant to serve the 
 Company — who had such a great quantity of tea in their ware- 
 houses. He could not foretell that the Americans would resist 
 being able to drink their tea gd. a pound cheaper. Johnstone 
 said he could not sit still and hear the noble lord plume himself 
 on wishing to oblige the Company — it was notorious that the 
 Company asked him to repeal the duty of 3d. a pound on the 
 exportation, and offered to let Government retain 6d. if the 3d. 
 was remitted in America. The noble lord had admitted that 
 the tea was as much an anti-commercial tax as any of the rest. 
 "I know," said he, "the various intrigues, solicitations, and 
 counter-solicitations, that were used to induce the chairman and 
 deputy chairman to undertake this rash and foolish business." 
 
 There was another petition from the Merchant Venturers of 
 Bristol, and a third from the Merchants of Glasgow. All were 
 referred to the Committee, and no more was heard of them. 
 
 On the ist of February, Chatham moved his " Provisional Act 
 for Settling the Troubles in America." It gave the sole right of 
 
340 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 levying taxes to the provincial Assemblies ; authorised the meeting 
 of the General Congress in Philadelphia, on the 9th of May next, 
 to consider making due recognition of the supreme superintending 
 power of Parliament, and a free grant to the King, his heirs and 
 successors — to be applied by Parliament to the alleviation of the 
 National Debt. This "just and free aid" to be "in such honour- 
 able proportion " as becomes great and flourishing Colonies towards 
 a parent country labouring under the heaviest burdens, of which no 
 inconsiderable part have been taken on ourselves "for the defence, 
 extension, and prosperity of the colonies.'' It also repealed all the 
 obnoxious Acts. 
 
 Sandwich, " in a petulant, vehement speech," opposed this plan — 
 it ought to be immediately rejected with contempt. He could never 
 believe it the production of any British peer — it appeared to him to 
 be the work of some American — " here he turned his face towards 
 Dr. Franklin, who was leaning on the Bar, and said he fancied he 
 had in his eye the person who drew it up — one of the bitterest and 
 most mischievous enemies this country had ever known." ^ 
 
 The Address to the King "upon the disturbances in North 
 America," assured him of the Commons' " fixed resolution, at 
 the hazard of our lives and properties, to stand by his Majesty 
 against all rebellious attempts, in the maintenance of the just 
 rights of his Majesty and the Two Houses of Parliament." 
 
 During the debate,^ North compared the burdens of America 
 with those of England. Our taxes amounted to 10 millions, 
 those of America to ^75,000. Reckoning ourselves at 8 millions 
 (" supposed "), and the colonists at 3, this was 6d. a head annually 
 for them, and at least 25s. for us. On this occasion Colonel 
 Grant said he was certain the Americans would not fight — he 
 had served in America and knew them well. They would never 
 face an English army — they had none of the qualifications that 
 make a good soldier. He ridiculed their " enthusiasm in 
 
 ' Franklin says, "This drew the eyes of many lords to me, but as I had no 
 inducement to take it to myself, I kept my countenance as immoveable as if my 
 features had been made of wood." Franklin says he found it harder to keep his 
 countenance when Chatham, in claiming the Bill as his own, alluded to the 
 gentleman so injuriously reflected on as one whom all Europe held in high 
 estimation, and ranked with our Boyles and Newtons. 
 
 * Feb. 2, 1775) Hutchinson went to the House, but the disturbance in the 
 lobby was so great, that members were stopped coming in, and I^ord G, 
 Cavendish moved the gallery should be cleared. It was a late sitting. At 10 
 o'clock Hutchinson returned, and found the House still up, and expected to sit 
 till 3 or 4 in the morning. Franklin, ' ' who seemed in great agitation," passed 
 him in the lobby. About 430 members were present. — Hutchinson's Diary. 
 
THE BILL OF FAMINE AND WAR 341 
 
 religion," and their disagreeable manners and way of living. Fox 
 spoke "better than usual," on the inexpediency, injustice, and 
 folly of the motion, and prophesied " defeat on one side of the 
 water, and ruin and punishment on the other." Wilkes, after 
 saying that " successful resistance is a revolution, not a rebellion," 
 added, "Who can say whether, in consequence of this day's 
 violent and mad Address to his Majesty, in a few years the 
 independent Americans may not celebrate the glorious era of 
 the revolution of 1775, as we do that of 1688?" Many other 
 warnings were uttered — of the dangers to be feared from France 
 and Spain, when they should see us embroiled ; of the dangers • 
 of a struggle with our Colonies, where victory could but bring 
 with it perpetual resentment. But Charles Fox's Amendment 
 was lost by 105 to 304, and the angry and foolish Address was 
 agreed to.i 
 
 The justice of the strictures on the low Estimates was soon 
 seen. On the loth the King sent a message to say that "for 
 supporting the just rights of his Crown " some addition to his 
 forces by sea and land would be necessary. 
 
 Then the House went into Committee on the American papers, 
 and North moved the dreadful Bill for "Restraining the Trade 
 and Commerce of the New England Colonies " — a Bill to pro- 
 hibit the whole of New England from fishing on the Newfound- 
 land Banks. North said the "restraints of the Navigation Act 
 were the colonists' charter, and the relaxations of that law so 
 many acts of grace and favour — when the colonies cease to 
 merit these, it is but reasonable to recall them. The Newfoundland 
 Fisheries are our undoubted right; we may dispose of them as 
 we please. The Act is to be temporary, and exemptions will be 
 granted to particular persons, on the Governor's certificate of 
 their good behaviour." 
 
 Governor Johnstone said that Nature had given that Fishery 
 to New and not to Old England. The Bill was to starve a whole 
 people, except such as a Governor might favour. 
 
 North's Bill "for Conciliating the Differences with America "^ 
 was a mere impudent juggle with words. It allowed the Provinces 
 to tax themselves "to our satisfaction." When the Governor, 
 Council and Assembly of any province shall propose to make pro- 
 vision for " contributing to the common defence," it will be proper, 
 if such proposal is approved by his Majesty, to forbear to levy any 
 tax or duty, except such as are " expedient " for the regulation of 
 
 ^ Horace Walpole calls this vote (of P>bruary 2, 1775), a vote for a civil war. 
 ^ February 20. 
 
342 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 commerce — the expediency referring of course to the interests 
 of Great Britain. North thought that this took away all ground 
 of suspicion as to the purpose to which the money would be 
 appropriated. He recognised that there were purposes "for 
 which the Americans would never grant it." It may be said, 
 Shall we treat with rebels ? But I am not treating with rebels — 
 it has never been said yet that all Americans are rebels. There 
 is a rebellion in Massachusetts, but I should be happy to open 
 the door to the rebels' return to their duty. 
 
 A storm of ridicule broke from Opposition. Governor 
 Johnstone reminded Ministers how they had once charged the 
 East India Company ;^i 1,000,000 for ships, forces, etc., sent to 
 their assistance, "but owned afterwards it was not so much.'' 
 Perhaps the millions now so roundly charged to the account of 
 America were also not so much. 
 
 On this futile Bill, which only said it would not be "proper" 
 to take from the Americans more than the King wanted to take, 
 one very illuminating speech was made. It was Governor Pownall's 
 and it throws a light far back into the past of our Colonial policy. 
 
 Some idea of rendering the Colonies more subordinate to the 
 Crown plays a considerable part in pre-revolution Colonial history. 
 Several of the Royal Governors of Massachusetts, in particular, 
 attempted this — Andros, Dudley, and, later, Shirley. Shirley is 
 described as an enterprising man, who saw in the growing prosperity 
 of the colony an opportunity for aggrandising himself, by pro- 
 moting the interests of the British Cabinet. It is significant that 
 his chief Ministers were Hutchinson and Andrew Oliver, who were 
 afterwards to gain so unenviable a notoriety ; and his advisers were 
 Russell, Paxton, Ruggles, and others — almost every one of whom 
 took a leading part in supporting the attempt of the Grenville 
 Ministry to tax America. Governor Shirley sounded the Commis- 
 sioners who met at Albany, in 1754, to settle matters with the Six 
 Nations of Indians.^ A union of the Colonies was being talked of, 
 as the danger was very great from the French and the " wavering " 
 Indians — who sometimes made common cause with the French 
 against the British. In the course of this discussion at Albany the 
 question of taxation for defence was raised. 
 
 ' Franklin was at Boston in 1754, and Shirley told him as a profound secret 
 " the great design of taxing the colonies by Act of Parliament." Franklin gave 
 in writing his reasons against the scheme. One was, "The people always bear 
 the burden best, when they have, or think they have, some share in the direction." 
 The project was abandoned, Shirley was removed, and ' Pownall became 
 Governor, Bernard succeeded Pownall. 
 
THE BILL OF FAMINE AND WAR 343 
 
 Pownall, who had now made his peace with North, began with 
 an apology — he had always been an advocate for the Colonies, not 
 their accuser, like some governors. " I had early opportunity of 
 seeing the commencement of this business. I was at the Congress 
 held at Albany in 1754. I had the means of knowing the real 
 opinions of some of the first men of business and ability in that 
 country. I saw that a crisis of this nature was then taking its rise 
 . . . the whole scope therefore of my conduct whilst I was employed, 
 and of every opinion I have given, whenever I have been listened 
 to, has been to advise such modes of policy, as might prevent 
 matters coming to the point at which they are now arrived." But 
 now the Americans are actually resisting the Crown and Parliament 
 — they are " opposing rights which they always acknowledged," they 
 are arming ; and we must arm too. We must oppose force to force 
 — the Americans have made this necessary. And then, to justify 
 the oppressions of to-day, he went on to show that we had always 
 oppressed them. While denouncing rebellion, he quoted a preced- 
 ent from rebels! "I refer myself to the parliament that sat after 
 the execution of Charles the First, when the government was formed 
 into a repubhc"^ — with totally unconscious humour, he added, "a 
 parliament that perfectly understood the distinction between that 
 resistance which is justifiable, and that which is rebellion." The 
 Colonies stood for the King, and declined to obey the Parliament, 
 they "revolted from the government of the state, denied the 
 authority of parliament, and set up a government of their own." As 
 though determined to make the Americans understand that the form 
 of government which happened to prevail here would make no 
 difference in the treatment the Colonies might expect, he declared 
 that the case was not very different from the present. 
 
 " See, then, what was the method taken by that parliament : 
 they made a law totally to prohibit from trade Virginia, Barbadoes 
 and the rest of the Colonies under that revolt." 1 " It is a precedent 
 which has weighed with me for acquiescing in the Port Bill and the 
 Restraining Bill." 
 
 Then he praised North for his humanity in not driving the 
 Americans to desperation. "And now I wish the Committee 
 would attend to what I am going to say " — America must in future 
 be governed under a constitution that must be settled by compact — 
 
 ' Pownall read the Act. It passed on October 3, 1650. It prohibits Virginia, 
 Barbadoes, Antigua, the Bermudas, St Christopher's, and other islands, " from 
 any manner of commerce or traffic with any people whatsoever " ; and forbids 
 "all manner of persons, foreigners and others, all manner of commerce, traffic 
 and correspondency whatsoever," 
 
344 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 otherwise this country "must hold its dominion there by the tenure 
 of war, and that will cost more than they are worth, and finally ruin 
 both." The whole trade must be regulated, or you will have end- 
 less disputes. " Their Charters cannot be considered as such compact ; " 
 for if so, the King making terms with parts of his dominions might 
 " dismember the empire, and set all the various parts of it together 
 at variance and in war." Parliament must interfere, and give the 
 Colonies, once for all, " such a constitution as is fit for such depend- 
 ent communities within the empire," — just as was done in the 
 union "of the two parts of the present kingdom." 
 
 After much perfectly empty debate, the Conciliatory Propositions 
 were agreed to. They were, as Dunning well said, "futile and 
 treacherous." 
 
 The Bill to take away the Fishery was again discussed. It was 
 said the people could not subsist. Dundas, Solicitor-General for 
 Scotland, replied that whether the people could subsist or not was 
 no part of his consideration. The Act was coercive, and the 
 speediest operation was the most effectual. Lord John Cavendish 
 said he was shocked at " the perfect ease and alacrity with which 
 they voted famine to a whole people." He supposed to kill by 
 starvation was not sanguinary — " provided you do not shed a man's 
 blood, you may destroy him gently any other way." 
 
 On this Bill, witnesses were examined before the House of Lords. 
 One " Mr. Benjamin Lister of Poole," and his friend Captain Davis, 
 were very earnest for the Fishery to be taken away for ever — " it 
 would be a benefit to Great Britain." It appeared that it would also 
 be a gain to Mr. Benjamin Lister of Poole, and to Captain Davis. 
 Davis told the Lords he had already " enlarged his capital," and would 
 enlarge it more if the Bill passed. The town of Poole was petition- 
 ing for the Bill. 
 
 And now a flood of pamphlets ^ was poured out from the Press, 
 to influence the public mind and stifle opposition to these measures. 
 The country gentlemen were " anti-American " almost to a man ; 
 but the common people abhorred the thought of war with America, 
 and the merchants, aroused by the danger, were petitioning for 
 conciliation. 2 
 
 Then came Burke's Resolutions for Conciliation, and his great 
 speech of March 22, 1775. In this speech he gave the figures of 
 our Colonial exports — six millions in 1772. And in 1704 our 
 whole exports were but six and a half millions. He adverted to 
 the wonderful fact that for nearly a year " a vast province has sub- 
 
 ' Dr. Johnson's Taxation no Tyranny appeared now. 
 - Camden's Letter to Chatham, February 12, 1775. 
 
THE BILL OF FAMINE AND WAR 345 
 
 sisted in a considerable degree of health and vigour, without 
 governor, council, judges, or executive magistrates." Perhaps these 
 things are not of the importance we imagined? Or perhaps there 
 are things more important still ? We learn from this speech that 
 there had been a proposal to " reduce the high aristocratical spirit 
 of Virginia and the southern colonies," by emancipating their slaves. 
 " An offer of freedom from England would come rather oddly, 
 shipped in an African vessel with a cargo of three hundred 
 Angola negroes, and the Captain publishing his proclamation 
 of liberty, at the same moment that he advertised the sale of his 
 slaves ! " 
 
 As before, overwhelming majorities rejected Burke's proposals. 
 
 Lastly came David Hartley, who in a strong speech restated the 
 wrongs of the colonists. In 1 767 Lord Hillsborough's Circular Letter 
 promised never to raise a revenue by taxation ; but now Lord North 
 boasts that he has put the question on the true ground — a demand 
 for a substantial revenue. Hartley reminded the House of the 
 services the Americans had rendered in the late war. They turned 
 its fortune, " at both ends of the line.'' Hence the annual compen- 
 sations and compliments — up to March, 1763, since when they are 
 represented as a burden on the common cause. They took 
 Louisburg from the French single-handed — dragging the cannon over 
 a morass, and carrying the shot on their backs. They conquered 
 Arcadia and Nova Scotia. Much more they have done, and in 
 return we have kept watch and ward over their trade, to see that they 
 should only buy from us, and at our own price. The preambles of 
 the Navigation Act, and all the American Acts, avow the interests 
 of Great Britain as the object. If the Colonies make a hat, or a 
 piece of steel, an Act of Parliament calls it " a nuisance." " I call 
 your Statute Books to witness." 
 
 Hartley's proposal, like all those which were bona fide, was to go 
 back to the former state of things, and pass an Act of Oblivion 
 over "these unfortunate -troubles." "Make your requisitions free," 
 said Hartley, "let them be founded on reason and justice; no 
 subjects will be deaf to reason, justice, and common interest. It 
 is the right of all free-born subjects to decide upon the necessity or 
 application of the money required of them. A refusal, in a reason- 
 able case, is as yet without an example." 
 
 But his motion was negatived without a division. So were his 
 three motions for the repeal of the late Acts. 
 
 This was not enough. On March 30 another Bill was brought 
 in, " to Restrain the Trade of the Southern Colonies of America." 
 North said, as the Southern Provinces had joined in Non- 
 
346 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 importation, it would be partiality not to treat them like New 
 England. In the Debate — besides the strong representations 
 from Opposition on the folly and wickedness of this attempt to 
 starve a Continent into obedience — a great deal was said about 
 America as the nursery for the British Navy. Ministerialists 
 ■asserted that if our trade increased by this destruction of American 
 trade, we should have a greater number of seamen. Mr. John 
 Luttrell denied this. Very few American seamen returned in 
 English vessels from America — fortunately so, for we have no 
 employment for them, and they would be a burden upon us. 
 He appealed to the naval members to say whether we did not 
 impress American seamen in every part of the world, whenever 
 the service required men ? American seamen have been con- 
 sidered so "intermixed with the seamen of this country," that 
 no commanding officer has thought of enquiring into their 
 numbers — the idea would have been thought ridiculous and 
 dangerous. True, you cannot lay hands on them in the first 
 half-hour, but you can get thousands of them as quickly as you 
 could recall English seamen from foreign service. He then spoke 
 of the practical impossibility of seizing American vessels, or dis- 
 covering false clearances or certificates. " There are those that 
 hear me, who perfectly well remember the dexterous tricks 
 practised in the late war, by almost every nation." ^ Then, too, 
 the King's ships cannot keep the sea in safety for more than 
 half a year, on the northern coasts of America, and the Americans 
 know every shoal, sounding, rock and creek — it is not very 
 pleasant for a King's officer to risk his ship on a lee-shore that 
 he does not know — not to pursue an enemy, but to destroy a 
 friend. 
 
 On the third reading (April 5), the Marquess of Granby made 
 a passionate appeal to the House. " In God's name, what 
 language are you holding out to America ! ' Resign your property, 
 divest yourselves of your privileges and fteedom, renounce every- 
 thing that can make life comfortable — or we will destroy your 
 commerce, and if you express the sensations of men at such 
 harsh treatment, we will declare you in a state of rebellion, and 
 put yourselves and your families to fire and sword ! ' " 
 
 Much was said of the hard case of Nantucket — an island almost 
 entirely inhabited by Quakers, who had taken no part in resistance. 
 
 ' A letter of Sir George Rodney in 1782 to Aretas Akers, agent for the 
 prisoners of war at St. Christopher's, states that "in the last war" (i.e. the 
 Seven Years' War), "flags of truce were got for 30 Johaneses, to go to other 
 islands, and were the means of treasonable correspondence being carried on." 
 
THE BILL OF FAMINE AND WAR 347 
 
 Seth Jenkins, " a Quaker," — one of the witnesses, — said the people 
 could not subsist above a month if the fishing were cut off. " No 
 other men could carry on the whale fishery, as they do not under- 
 stand it, nor could the people of Nantucket get employment from 
 others ; their craft would be entirely lost." 
 
 In the Lords, on the i6th of March, Camden warned them that 
 this Bill would produce war — civil war. The fishery is not only the 
 trade, it is in a great measure the food of New England. You first 
 inflicted a general punishment for a particular fault. From their 
 trade you went to their municipal rights, their constitutions, their 
 charters, their liberties. " And now this Bill of Famine and War 
 finishes the climax of severity." Other counsels have been given, 
 but they were rejected with disdain, though they came from a 
 personage whose character gave them authority — from a great man, 
 the greatest perhaps that this age or this country has produced — to 
 whom this country owes her present prosperity, "and I am sorry to 
 say it, her pride of conquest, which has infatuated her with the ideas 
 of victory and certain success." You have listened rather to Mr. 
 Benjamin Lister of Poole and his brother politician — they have 
 instructed your lordships in the political system of Great Britain 
 and America. They have satisfied you that the fishery now carried 
 on by New England can be supplied and continued by men and 
 ships from Great Britain and Ireland. And why? "Because, my 
 lords, Mr. Lister of Poole, and his friend Captain Davis, are to get 
 two or three hundred a year by this Bill." 
 
 Sandwich did not think Camden could be serious as to the 
 impracticability of conquering America. " Suppose the colonies do 
 abound in men, what does that signify? They are raw, undis- 
 ciplined, cowardly men. I wish there were 200,000 of them, 
 instead of only 40 or 50,000 — the more the better — if they didn't 
 run away, they would starve themselves into compliance. Sir Peter 
 Warren told me that at the siege of Louisburg, to try the courage of 
 the Americans, he put them in the front — they pretended to be very 
 much elated, and boasted what mighty things they would do — but 
 when the moment came, every one of them ran away, and threatened 
 to go home, if the British soldiers were not put in front. I can tell 
 the noble lord, all Americans are like these fellows — the very sound 
 of a cannon would carry them off." 
 
 In the course of the Debate in the Commons, Alderman Bull 
 made a very interesting statement about tea — " the occasion of these 
 unhappy disputes." He said the Company wished to send their tea 
 to Europe as well as to America, and applied for an Act for that 
 purpose. Bull was consulted by a Director, but thought the scheme 
 
348 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 a wild one, which could not be carried out, and if it could, would 
 only injure the Company, as they could not sell their tea at so high 
 a price as at home. This Director was well aware that the Americans 
 would not receive the tea — would think it was sent "to ensnare 
 them," and " would most certainly destroy it." Yet what were the 
 Company to do with " their great load of tea"? And how raise the 
 money they were so distressed for ? It was proposed to hold two 
 sales — one in March, the other in September, and to put up the 
 whole stock. Each sale was expected to produce about _;^i, 200,000 ; 
 so the Company hoped to manage without borrowing the ;z^ 1,400,000 
 they wanted. It was said they had six years' consumption rotting 
 in their warehouses — the real fact was, that they had 16 and a half 
 million pounds' weight, none of which had been more than a year 
 and a half in their warehouses, most was only last year's tea ; none 
 had suffered by keeping. The annual consumption, on the average 
 of the last five years, was 8 million pounds ; so they only had enough 
 for two years, not six. If these sales had taken place, Bohea — the 
 principal sort in demand for exportation — would have fallen 4d. or 
 5d. a pound, which might have increased the demand for export-and- 
 home consumption up to 12 million pounds per annum. Bull 
 thought it would, " because the four foreign East India Companies, 
 the Dutch, Danes, French and Swedes, annually import more than 
 8 millions, though it is known they do not themselves consume near 
 half that quantity" — the rest is smuggled to England, Scotland, 
 Ireland, and America. Deducting the gd. drawback, tea would be 
 only i5d. a pound — only i8d. with the "fatal American three- 
 pence " — and this might have induced the Americans to receive it 
 as before — from the merchants, though not from the Company. 
 This would have put an end at once to all smuggling, "for neither 
 the Dutch or any other company would think it worth their while to 
 send tea to America, to be sold under i8d. a pound." 
 
 Bull concluded by expressing his belief that the tea was not sent 
 to America, either to raise money for the Company, to get rid of 
 their tea, or to prevent smuggling, " each of these ends might have 
 been answered without offence to any individual. The purpose for 
 which the tea went to America, and the consequence, are evident 
 now to every man's understanding." No member rose to challenge 
 Bull's words. The Southern Trade Bill passed by 192 to 46. 
 
 On April 11 the Company came up again, in the Debate on 
 the " Bill to oblige the East India Company to export a certain 
 quantity of English Manufactures." Governor Johnstone called it 
 anti-commercial, absurd, ridiculous. It is contrary to every principle 
 of trade to force a merchant to export what he cannot sell. " There 
 
THE BILL OF FAMINE AND WAR U9 
 
 are now lying in the warehouses of Bengal ;^"27o,ooo worth of 
 British woollens, rotting and eating by moths " ; and you want to 
 make the Company send out more. If you want to encourage the 
 woollen trade, you might just as well order the Company to make a 
 bonfire of the same quantity, to entertain the mob, next time the 
 King comes to the House. North said the Company was not 
 obliged to send cloth — they might send more saleable articles. 
 Burke said this was simply a tax on the Company. It was humili- 
 ating — it seemed to show that British goods are such a drug on the 
 market that their exportation must be forced. " Nor can I see why 
 we should feed the moths of Bengal." Why not clothe the poor 
 here, and make the Company pay for it ? Here Van broke in very 
 rudely. The East India Company could export British manu- 
 factures, but will not, "for reasons best known to themselves." 
 Why don't Bristol, Liverpool, and Glasgow export on their own 
 account? Ending with a sneer at Burke as member for Bristol — 
 "I suppose for his knowledge of trade.'' North said he would not 
 allow it was a tax — it was " a mere guard for the protection of 
 commerce ; it had always been, and the Company had thriven on 
 it." So the Bill to feed the moths of Bengal was brought in. 
 
 In the Debate on the Budget, North showed once more the 
 lightness with which he was entering on the struggle with the 
 Colonies. The dreadful consequences predicted by some would 
 be easily averted by America returning to her duty. If not — the 
 question would be a very simple one, whether she should be inde- 
 pendent, or we should avail ourselves of our indubitable rights to 
 secure to this nation the great benefits of our trade and commerce 
 with America. As for a war with France and Spain resulting — 
 France was too wise — but let her break with us if she pleased. 
 
 In May a Remonstrance from the General Assembly of New 
 York was presented in the Commons by Burke. "Nothing," he 
 said, " could be more decent and respectful." Apparently without 
 a division, the House refused to consider it. In the Lords, a 
 similar, but not identical, " Memorial " was introduced by the Duke 
 of Manchester. Denbigh said that "memorials" are presented 
 " from one crowned head to another '' — from an American Assembly 
 a memorial is unheard of, and ought not to be read. And by 45 to 
 25 the Lords refused to read it.i 
 
 Furious with his Colonies, furious with Chatham, the King began 
 to prepare for "reducing" America. Sir William Howe, Burgoyne, 
 and Clinton were made Major-Generals. Howe had just been 
 
 ' The New York Assembly had never retracted. It was allowed to meet 
 again. — See Gentleman's Magazine. 
 
350 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 returned in the Whig interest for Nottingham, and his constituents 
 deeply resented his going to fight the colonists. He had promised 
 them not to go I They reminded him of his dead brother, that 
 idolised young Lord Howe, who fell at Ticonderoga, and whose 
 monument America had placed in Westminster Abbey. " You 
 should have refused to go against them," wrote one indignant 
 constituent,^ adding a wish that if he went, he might fall. Howe, 
 who was an amiable man, replied apologetically that he could not 
 help himself — he was commanded to go. Chatham's eldest son 
 resigned his commission rather than serve against America. So 
 did Lord Effingham,^ whose ancestor led the English Fleet against 
 the Armada. So did Admiral Keppel. Granville Sharpe, who held 
 a lucrative post in the Ordnance, refused to take any part in sending 
 military stores to America, and presently resigned. 
 
 There were great preparations. "Upwards of loo cannon, of a 
 new construction, so light as to be carried by a man on horseback," 
 and 10,000 stand of arms were shipped from the Tower the day 
 the Generals sailed. A few days before orders had gone from 
 Dartmouth to Gage to seize all Colonial forts and stores, and arrest 
 all persons "thought to have committed treason"; and to employ 
 force, " without waiting " to require the aid of a civil magistrate. 
 North, whose conscience was tormenting him, also sent copies of 
 a pamphlet which Sir John Dalrymple ^ had written for him, and 
 had printed at the public expense. It urged submission, but definitely 
 renounced the right of taxation ! This appeared to the Americans 
 an act of deliberate treachery, designed to keep them quiet till the 
 army could arrive; but it was only the weak protest of North's 
 conscience against his weak compliance with the King's will. 
 
 Franklin was present at most of the great debates upon the fate 
 of his country. No doubt Ministers were not sorry he should be 
 convinced that Great Britain was in earnest. It had long been the 
 fashion to speak of him as a pick-pocket — he had even been insulted 
 
 ^ A grocer wrote less unkindly : " If you should resolve at all events to go, 
 I don't wish you may fall, as many do, but cannot say I wish success to the 
 undertaking. These, Sir, are the sentiments of many liere, as well as of Your 
 obedient servant, Samuel Kirk." — Nottingham, February 10, 1775. 
 
 ^ " As I cannot, without reproacli from my own conscience, consent to bear 
 arms against my fellow-subjects in America in what, to my weak discernment, is 
 not a clear cause, ... I humbly beg that I may be permitted to retire." — 
 Letter of Lord Howard of Ejjingham to Lord Barrington, April 10, 1775. 
 
 ^ Sir John made one exceedingly unwise remark — referring to Rockingham's 
 Ministr)', he had the incredible folly to say, " If you are inclined to pay com- 
 pliments to an administration, which we do not complain of, it is very unfair in 
 you to withhold them from that prince, by whose nod alone they were permitted 
 to do anything." 
 
iniL isiivL, ur i'/iiviiiNt aND war 351 
 
 in the course of a debate. On the i6th of March, when in the Debate 
 on the Fishery Bill, Sandwich not only called the Americans 
 cowards, but accused them of entering into Association to escape 
 their debts, Franklin left the House in indignation, never to return. 
 
 It was, indeed, time for him to be gone. Wedderburn was 
 saying he ought not to be allowed to return to America. Hutchinson 
 appears to have let North know that Franklin was going. But 
 Franklin still delayed, hoping Chatham would do something. When 
 all failed, the valiant old man told himself that union with Britain 
 was unnatural — from that moment, he, for one, knew that the 
 breach could never be healed.^ 
 
 The three Generals sailed on April 2 1 . Lexington had already 
 been fought; and on the sth of May a curious distorted rumour of 
 it startled London. It was reported that a battle had been fought, 
 and Gage had lost a thousand men. 
 
 The same day Franklin sailed in the Pennsylvania packet. 
 
 ' On Franklin's last day in London he was with Priestley, looking over 
 American newspapers, and telling him what to extract for the English Press — 
 the tears running down his cheeks. Part of the same day he was with Burke. 
 Before he left England, Franklin had offered to pay for the tea at his own risk, 
 if the Acts were repealed. — Franklin to Hartley, February 2, 1780. 
 
CHAPTER XLII 
 LEXINGTON AND CONCORD 
 
 " My Lords ! the way must be immediately opened for reconciliation ; an hour 
 now lost may produce years of calamity . . . the first drop of blood shed in 
 civil and unnatural war will make a wound that years, perhaps ages, may not 
 heal. . . . What though you march from town to town and from province 
 to province ! How shall you be able to secure the obedience of the country 
 you leave behind you in your progress to grasp the dominion of 1800 miles 
 of continent? . . . We shall be forced ultimately to retract; let us retract 
 while we can, not when we must." — Speech of Lord Chatham on his Bill for the 
 Removal of theTroops from Boston, Jan. 20, 1775. 
 
 " My Lords, let the Americans talk about their natural and divine rights ! their 
 rights as men and citizens ! their rights from God and nature ! I am for 
 enforcing these measures." — Speech of Lord Gower. 
 
 " I was expressing my concern a few days ago to a person who is near the top 
 lest Franklin's return to America should excite to still greater acts of revolt — 
 * Give yourself no concern,' says he, ... * I know the state of the nation 
 in every part. I never knew it more united — more determined in anything 
 than in American measures. These measures are not through Ministerial 
 influence . . . while we continue united, the farther your people go the better : 
 — better for us, and better for you, because your reduction will be the more 
 effectual.'" — Hutchinson to Chief Justice Oliver, March 24, 1775' 
 
 By the spring of 1775, Boston was become a camp of refuge for 
 loyalists. General Timothy Ruggles had entered into an " Associa- 
 tion " with the loyalists of Massachusetts, for mutual defence against 
 the rebels — a word already used by the friends of the British 
 Government. They said that they meant to support each other 
 in disregarding the Non-importation agreement, or, as they put 
 it, " in the free exercise of our undoubted right in eating, drinking, 
 buying and selling what, with whom, and as we please." 
 
 Gage was master of the body of Boston, but its soul had 
 slipped away, and was preparing to encounter him in another 
 fashion than of old. 
 
 Every ship from England brought news of more Acts passed 
 against the Colonies — Acts which, if they could have been carried 
 out, would have ruined the Colonies they were intended to bring 
 into the old obedience. The dreadful words of the furious 
 
LEXINGTON AND CONCORD 353 
 
 Welshman, Van, seemed to have been taken literally — sooner than 
 lose her power over her Colonies, England would destroy them. 
 It seemed to be, "Give up your liberties — the liberties we our- 
 selves have guaranteed to you by 'Charter and compact'— or 
 die ! " 
 
 On February 9, the Second Provincial Congress of Massachusetts 
 (214 in number) appointed a Committee of Safety of eleven 
 members, to resist the execution of the Acts, and empowered it 
 to take possession of the powder and other military stores belong- 
 ing to the province. From this moment, every step taken led 
 on to the final catastrophe of an appeal to arms.i 
 
 A Glasgow ship had been compelled to go back from New York 
 without breaking bulk. Pennsylvania was resolving to kill no 
 sheep under four years old, to establish woollen manufactures ; 
 to make salt and saltpetre, gunpowder and paper ("the saving 
 of linen rags is particularly recommended ") ; to make nails, wire, 
 tin-plates, copper utensils, types for printing, and the like. The 
 Provincial Congress unanimously approved the resolutions of the 
 General Congress, and shut up the Law-Courts. The Provincial 
 Congress was recommending the making of firearms and bayonets, 
 and declaring the deepest detestation of all persons who supplied 
 the troops in Boston with timber, spars, tent-poles, bricks, " or 
 any materials which may enable them to distress the inhabitants." 
 All the counties of Virginia were forming companies. In Con- 
 necticut, nothing was talked of but the appeal to arms. The 
 Marylanders were "all in motion,'' holding meetings, choosing 
 Committees, and laying in arms and ammunition. 
 
 For eight years, the Colonies had tried constitutional means — 
 votes of their legislatures, petitions, remonstrances, appeals — and 
 the only answer had been threats and increased exactions, until 
 at last the British Cabinet had shown itself ready to destroy their 
 means of living, if it could in no other way bring them to submit 
 to laws, however foolish and injurious, passed by the Parliament 
 3000 miles away. Each successive Parliament had been less and 
 less disposed to confine its interference to external trade and 
 Colonial manufactures — interference long submitted to, as men 
 submit to an evil which they suppose is a law of nature. But 
 
 ' The times are got to be very serious. Great preparations on both sides for 
 an engagement, and the sooner it comes the better — the sooner we shall get to 
 be a peaceable people. . . . Our country people are determin'd to oppose the 
 measures of Parliament at the risk of their all, but it is doubted whether they 
 will fight long. Such an enthusiasm and madness of the people never was 
 before in any part of the globe. — Dr. Peter Oliver in Boston to Elisha Hutchin- 
 son in England, Feb. l8, 1775. 
 
3 54 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 now the colonists began to perceive that it was only a law of 
 nature for those who could not, or dared not resist, and that 
 those who want their just liberties must take them. 
 
 And if each Parliament came to Westminster more determined 
 than the last to impose its will on the disobedient Colonies, each 
 successive threat of physical force made the Colonies resolve to 
 try what physical force there might be on their side. Gage found 
 it impossible to build his new fort — no Bostonian or New Englander 
 would work at it — as soon would a man have forged handcuffs 
 for his own father ; nor would any workmen come from New York. 
 The soldiers deserted freely. The militia had never disbanded — 
 all through the winter they had been disciplining themselves. 
 Firearms and bayonets were being made, and a select number of 
 the militia undertook to hold themselves in readiness to be 
 called out on the shortest notice. They were called the " minute- 
 men.'' 
 
 Gage was reconnoitring with a view to military operations. 
 Among the things left behind by the British, when Boston was 
 evacuated in 1776, was a paper entitled, "A Narrative of General 
 Gage's Instructions," addressed to Captain Brown of the 52nd 
 and Ensign D' Bernicre of the loth, and dated Feb. 22, 1775. 
 These officers are directed to go through the counties of Suffolk 
 and Worcester, "taking a sketch of the country as you pass." 
 It was not to be a regular plan, but roads, distances, nature of 
 the country, were to be marked, " particularly all passes " — length, 
 breadth, way in and out, and whether to be avoided by going 
 some other road. Also " all rivers and fords, woods and heights, 
 situations of villages and towns, churches and churchyards, whether 
 capable of defence," or "fit for encampment." The officers dis- 
 guised themselves as countrymen, "in brown cloaths and reddish 
 handkerchiefs round our necks." Their account gives a graphic 
 idea of the state of feeling. They were evidently excessively 
 nervous, and not without reason. They dared neither venture 
 into an inn kept by enemies, nor ask the way to the houses of 
 friends. They were occasionally suspected, and once were 
 recognised. At one place, the landlord of the inn, when asked 
 what there was for breakfast, replied, " Tea, or anything they 
 chose " — " an open confession what he was.'' At " Buckminster's 
 Tavern " (near Framlingham), they heard from their window a 
 captain of militia haranguing his men after an exercise. His 
 advice was interesting: "he particularly told them they would 
 always conquer if they did not break, and recommended them 
 to charge us coolly, and wait for our fire, and everything would 
 
LEXINGTON AND CONCORD 355 
 
 succeed with them — quoted Csesar and Pompey, brigadiers Putnam 
 and Ward, and all such great men; put them in mind of Cape 
 Breton, and all the battles they had gained for his majesty in 
 the last war, and observed that the regulars must have been 
 ruined but for them." After which he "dismissed the parade, 
 and the whole company came into the house and drank until 
 nine o'clock," and then went home "full of pot-valour." 1 
 
 The sth of March that year falling on a Sunday, was kept 
 on the 6th. The Old South was crammed to hear Dr. Joseph 
 Warren's oration on the " Massacre." In the crowd were forty 
 or fifty British officers. With a just doubt of the motive which 
 had brought them, Samuel Adams very politely asked the people 
 in the front pews to give up their seats to these gentlemen. The 
 officers could not refuse this civility, which probably prevented 
 an ugly riot, for Colonel James told Hutchinson some years after 
 that one of them was prepared with an egg, to throw at Warren 
 if he said anything against the King. "That was to have been 
 a signal to draw swords, and they would have massacred Hancock, 
 Adams, and hundreds more ; and, he added, he wished they had." 
 But, planted by Adams just under the pulpit, in full view of the 
 meeting, they thought better of it.^ 
 
 The crowd was so great that Warren had to enter by a ladder 
 from the window behind the pulpit. There were officers sitting 
 on the pulpit stairs — one or two actually in it, behind the orator. 
 Warren — -unconscious how near he was to a catastrophe which 
 would have made the 6th of March the most infamous anniversary 
 in Colonial history — spoke eloquently on the baleful effects of 
 standing armies in times of peace. He described the night after 
 
 ^ "Thursday, Ap. 27, 1775. — In part of a letter from Boston, in the papers 
 of this day, it is said, that Capt. Brown, and another officer of the 52d regiment, 
 at Boston, being sent to take a survey of the roads about that country, very 
 narrowly escaped being tarred and feathered at Marlborough. They were 
 entertained there by a Mr. Barnes, and, though in disguise, were discovered 
 by a drummer, who had formerly deserted from the same regiment. The 
 consequence was, the people assembled in great numbers, and surrounded the 
 house ; the two officers got to Boston, but Mr. Barnes' house was almost tore 
 to pieces, and his {am\ly dieadMly {lightened."— Geni/eman's Magazine, 1775, 
 p. 205. 
 
 D' Bernicre's account shows that this was an exaggeration. He says that 
 Barnes came to Boston o. few days afterwards, and told them the Committee 
 of Correspondence had searched his house, but makes no mention of any 
 damage. 
 
 2 Hutchinson's Diary. He adds, "I am glad they did not; for I think it 
 would have been an everlasting disgrace to attack a body of people without arms 
 to defend themselves." 
 
3 56 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 the massacre, and the present state of the town — filled with armed 
 men, and the harbour crowded with ships -of- war. At one 
 especially passionate appeal, a captain on the stairs held up his 
 hand with half a dozen pistol-bullets lying on the palm. Warren 
 dropped his handkerchief over the hand, and went on. 
 
 Although Gage is spoken of as himself an amiable and well- 
 meaning man, he allowed his officers to give great provocation. 
 Thus, the i6th of March having been appointed by the Provincial 
 Congress as a Fast, we read, " On that day, a party of the 4th 
 pitched two market-tents within ten yards of their place of 
 worship, and with three drums and three fifes, kept beating and 
 playing during the whole time of divine service." 1 Next day, 
 Hancock's "fine seat near the Common" was maltreated, the 
 fences broken down, and the enclosures defaced ; and on the 
 i8th, the Neck-guard seized 13,425 musket-cartridges, with 3000 lbs. 
 weight of ball, all private property, which the Governor refused 
 to restore on the application of the owner. 
 
 Lord Dartmouth had written a circular letter to the Colonial 
 Governors, ordering them to do their utmost to prevent deputies 
 being appointed to the Colonial Congress in Philadelphia. The 
 same letter spoke of "pretended grievances." The pretended 
 grievances of a people whose port had been shut up, their fishery 
 taken away, and their whole government changed to a despotism ! 
 
 Having seized all the provincial stores of powder and ammuni- 
 tion immediately around Boston, Gage made up his mind early in 
 April to have the cannon at Concord, eighteen miles off. If he 
 happened to find Hancock and Adams there, so much the better — 
 he dared not venture on an arrest in the ordinary way. 
 
 On Tuesday, the i8th of April, 1775, Dr. Joseph Warren and 
 another member of the Committee of Safety, coming from a 
 Committee meeting at " Wetherby's Tavern," noticed some British 
 officers riding outside Charlestown Neck, and suspected that 
 the Governor was about to make the swoop which it was known 
 he contemplated. They drove back to the tavern, to warn their 
 friends — above all, to send a special messenger to Hancock and 
 Adams. Returning to Boston, Warren sent Paul Revere, of the 
 "Sons of Liberty," to warn them again. It was now late in the 
 evening. Two friends rowed Revere over to Charlestown, five 
 minutes before the sentinels received an order to allow no one 
 to pass. A chance word, overheard by Lord Percy, had let the 
 British know that the expedition had got wind. Revere borrowed 
 a horse in Charlestown, and rode hard for Concord, rousing every 
 
 ' Letter given in the Gentleman's Magazine, 1775, p. 250. 
 
LEXINGTON AND CONCORD 357 
 
 house as he went. Meantime, a lantern in the steeple of the 
 Old North Meeting-House had given the alarm to the minute- 
 men, and a second lantern had told that the attack would be 
 by Charlestown Neck. 
 
 That night, eight or nine hundred men — "the grenadiers and 
 light infantry" — under Lieutenant-Colonel Smith of the loth, and 
 Major Pitcairn of the Marines, embarked "at the bottom of 
 Boston Common," and landed at Phipps' Farm, "a little way up 
 Charles River.'' By that time, bells were ringing and signal-guns 
 firing ; and as Smith advanced on the road to Concord, he found 
 the alarm had preceded him ; so he detached six companies under 
 Pitcairn, to secure two bridges on different roads beyond Concord, 
 and thus it came about that the first blood shed in the War was 
 drawn at Lexington. 1 
 
 Paul Revere, riding hard — and once nearly captured — had 
 reached the village of Lexington just after midnight. Adams 
 and Hancock were at the house of the Rev. Jonas Clark. They 
 had gone to bed early "to oblige the family,'' and were asleep. 
 By two in the morning, they were marshalling the minute-men 
 on Lexington Green — 130 answered the roll-call. In Concord, 
 the bell of the Meeting-House was ringing, and the inhabit- 
 ants were mustering — their minister, William Emerson, at their 
 head. 
 
 The King's troops came in sight of Lexington "just before 
 sunrise." About 150 men were drawn up in two lines" near the 
 Meeting - House. Drums were beating and alarms sounding. 
 Jonas Parker, "the best wrestler in Lexington," who commanded 
 the militia, had promised never to run from British troops. 
 Pitcairn brought up his men at a run, and when "within a few 
 rods," cried, " Disperse, you rebels ! Damn you, throw down 
 your arms and disperse!" The troops "huzza'd," one or two 
 ofificers discharged their pistols, four or five soldiers fired, and 
 then "there seemed to be a general discharge from the whole 
 body." Eight of the rebels were killed and one was wounded. 
 A few shots were returned. Jonas Parker ordered his men to 
 disperse. He had been wounded by the first discharge, but 
 continued to fire until a soldier ran him through. In all, eight or 
 nine were killed, and nine wounded. The rest dispersed. The 
 King's troops had one man wounded, and Pitcairn's horse was 
 grazed. The British accounts say that the rebels fired from 
 
 } Lexington was a village of about 700 inhabitants, six miles below Concord. 
 2 "In two lines, with intervals as wide as the front of the divisions."— 
 D' Bermcre's account. 
 
358 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 behind a stone wall, and from the Meeting-House, and other 
 houses. This was the Battle of Lexington.' 
 
 Pitcairn then marched on to Concord, "without anything 
 further happening." The troops arrived between nine and ten. 
 The Light Infantry " took the hills that lay the length of the town," 
 and the Grenadiers the lower road. As they approached, they 
 found a considerable body of the rebels on the high ground above 
 the North Bridge, about three-quarters of a mile from the town ; 
 and Parsons of the roth was sent with ''six hght companies" to 
 take the bridge — D' Bernicre being sent with him to show him 
 the way. At the bridge. Captain Lowrie was left with three 
 companies to hold it, while the rest went to search for stores. 
 They found that most had been removed, but they destroyed what 
 there was. While they were doing this, Lowrie was attacked by 
 about 1500 rebels, and driven from the bridge. Parsons returned 
 to support him. The rebels were destroying the bridge — had 
 already taken up some planks. "But we got over," says 
 D' Bernicre ; " had they destroyed it we were most certainly all 
 lost." There was some actual fighting here — one British account 
 calls it "an action." One lieutenant was killed, and another 
 made prisoner. This was the Battle of Concord. 
 
 Meantime, Smith was destroying all the stores he could find. 
 Two 24-pounders discovered in an inn-yard were spiked ; the 
 trunnions of "three iron cannon" were knocked off; some new 
 gun-carriages and a great number of wheels were burnt ; and a 
 considerable quantity of " flour, gunpowder, musket - balls, and 
 other articles '' was thrown into the river. About noon, he began 
 to march back. The hills on each side were now covered with 
 rebels — "there could not be less than 5000; so that they kept 
 the road always lined, and a very hot fire on us without inter- 
 mission ; we at first kept our order and returned their fire as hot 
 as we received it, but when we arrived within a mile of Lexington, 
 our ammunition began to fail, and the light companies were so 
 fatigued with flanking, they were scarce able to act, and a great 
 number of wounded scarce able to get forward, made a great 
 confusion ; Colonel Smith (our commanding officer) had received 
 a wound through his leg, a number of officers were also wounded, 
 so that we began to run rather than retreat in order." D' Bernicre, 
 who gives this, the only thoroughly intelligible account, adds, 
 " The whole behaved with amazing bravery, but little order ; 
 we attempted to stop the men and form them two deep, but to 
 
 ^ It is said that the British troops drew up on the village green, fired a 
 volley, and huzzaed thrice, by way of triumph. — Bancroft. 
 
LEXINGTON AND CONCORD 359 
 
 no purpose; the confusion increased rather than lessened.^ At 
 last, after we got through Lexington, the officers got to the front, 
 and presented their bayonets, and told the men, if they advanced, 
 they should die; but at that instant, the first brigade joined us, 
 consisting of the 4th, 23d, and 47th regiments, and two divisions 
 of marines, under the command of Brigadier-General Lord Percy ; 
 he brought two field-pieces with him, which were immediately 
 brought to bear upon the rebels, and soon silenced their fire." 2 
 Percy's arrival prevented a disaster. Smith had sent back twice 
 for more support — luckily for him, Gage had despatched Percy, 
 as soon as the sound of firing warned him that the troops were 
 meeting with resistance. 
 
 Percy (who marched out to the tune of "Yankee Doodle") 
 had met no one on the way to give him any information — every 
 house was deserted. He came up just in time — it is said that 
 when he formed square to receive Pitcairn's detachment, the men 
 lay down on the ground, "their tongues hanging out of their 
 mouths," like dogs returning from a chase. The waggons with 
 refreshments, sent by Gage, had been captured by Parsons, the 
 minister of Chelsea. The whole force halted to rest. At last 
 they started again — Percy's men forming the rear -guard. The 
 minute-men were swarming all around, and the march was a 
 succession of small skirmishes. D' Bernicre says the fire was 
 "very light" till they came to Menotomy, "a village with a 
 number of houses in little groups, extending about half a mile, 
 out of these houses they kept a very heavy fire, but our troops 
 broke into them and killed vast numbers; the soldiers showed 
 great bravery in this place." There were probably never more 
 than four hundred Americans together at any one time ; but as 
 soon as some grew tired, fresh men took their place. They hung 
 on the British rear ; they were good marksmen, and they availed 
 themselves of every wall and tree for cover, and " kept up a 
 scattering fire during their whole march of 15 miles." ^ 
 
 At last, at about seven in the evening, they reached Charles- 
 
 '"The troops," says the official account (in the Loiidoii Gazette), "were 
 very much annoyed, and had several men killed and wounded by the rebels firing 
 firom behind walls, ditches, trees, and other ambushes." There was a sharp 
 skirmish on Fiske's Hill, to the west of Lexington — here, " Deacon Hayward, 
 of Acton," and a regular, firing simultaneously, killed each other. 
 
 ^ Lord Percy must have brought up over looo men. One regiment was 
 the Welsh FusiUers. He had marched 30 miles in ten hours. Smith had 
 retreated 20 miles in six hours. The whole British force was probably about 
 1800. 
 
 3 London Gazette. 
 
36o ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 town Neck, and " took possession of a hill that commanded the 
 town." 1 The Selectmen sent word to Percy, that if he would not 
 attack the town, they would take care that the troops were not 
 molested in crossing to Boston. And so it was agreed ; the 
 Somerset man-of-war sent her boats for the wounded, then the 
 rest were ferried over.^ D' Bernicre concludes his account : " The 
 rebels shut up the Neck, placed sentinels there, and took prisoner 
 an oflScer of the 64th regiment that was going to join his regiment 
 in Castle-William.— So that in the course of two days, from a 
 plentiful town, we were reduced to the disagreeable necessity of 
 living on salt provisions, and fairly blocked up in Boston." 
 
 Thus this affair, which seemed to begin like a farce, ended in 
 something like a tragedy. The British owned to a heutenant, a 
 sergeant, a drummer, and 62 rank and file killed; and 2 lieu- 
 tenant-colonels, 2 captains, 9 lieutenants, 2 ensigns, 7 sergeants, 
 and 157 rank and file wounded. About 25 more were returned 
 as " missing." 
 
 It was immediately put about that the rebels had treated the 
 British wounded with great inhumanity — had even scalped 
 prisoners, and cut off their ears. No proof of this was ever 
 offered. On the contrary, a great number of affidavits were 
 taken, contradicting the charge — the most important being that 
 of Lieutenant Gould, King's Own (4th), wounded and made 
 prisoner at the bridge at Concord, "and am now treated with 
 the greatest humanity, and taken all possible care of, by the 
 Provincials, at Medford." 
 
 "The Provincials" was now to be the name for the rebels. 
 They on their side accused the King's troops of killing " the old, 
 the infirm, the unarmed, and the wounded " ; with " burning 
 houses, and plundering everything that came in their way.'' The 
 plundering was done in the early part of the day, when the 
 troops, incensed at the resistance of the Provincials, were not as 
 yet aware of their own danger.' 
 
 A great deal of ink has been expended on both sides in the 
 
 1 This hill was Bunker's Hill. 
 
 " " The rebels were very numerous and behaved far beyond any idea I could 
 ever have formed of them." — George Clerk to Robert Clerk, Edinburgh. Hist. 
 MSS. Comm. Report XI, App. 5, MSS. of the F.arl of Dartmouth, p. 337. 
 
 Percy's retreat was "deemed a piece of masterly officership in bringing off 
 his men with so little loss." See a letter quoted by Lord Drummond, Hist. 
 AfSS. Comm. Report XI, App, 10, p. 312. 
 
 ''See "Address of the Provincial Congress of Massachusetts to the In- 
 habitants of Great Britain " ; and many depositions. Also Gentleman'' s Maga- 
 zine, 1775, p. 293. 
 
LEXINGTON AND CONCORD 361 
 
 attempt to prove which side fired the first shot. If the Colonies 
 had taken up arms before exhausting all constitutional means of 
 obtaining redress, it would have been worth while to ask whose 
 finger at the last moment rendered inevitable the appeal to arms. 
 But that appeal was not rendered inevitable at any one given 
 moment — it was due to no unhappy chance, it was the outcome 
 of the "steady plan" of the British Government to exploit the 
 Colonies more and more for the benefit of Great Britain, and 
 of the equally "steady" determination of the Colonies not to be 
 thus exploited. The question is not, Could the Colonies have 
 maintained their rights by respectful petitions and representations, 
 and did they choose rather to take up arms ? The question is. 
 Ought they to have submitted to whatever a Government three 
 thousand miles away chose to enact ? The choice lay, not between 
 two methods of resistance, but between resistance and submission. 
 For eight years, they had tried petitions and representations — and 
 as in the days of King Charles, petitioning had been denounced as 
 in itself a species of rebellion. At a very early period of the dispute 
 an antiquated Statute (originally passed for the protection of the 
 accused) had been revived for kidnapping the leaders of the people, 
 and bringing them to England to be tried for high treason, where 
 they would be sure to be convicted. The contemptuous rejection 
 of every petition, and every representation made by the Colonial 
 Agents ; the reluctant repeal of one obnoxious measure, only to 
 pass another on the first opportunity; the sending of regiment 
 after regiment to occupy Boston, as if it had been the capital of a 
 conquered country ; the shutting up of Boston Harbour by the 
 Port Bill; the establishing of military authority above the civil 
 power, by the Act for the Better Administration of Justice ; the 
 alteration of the Charter, by the Massachusetts Government Act ; 
 the taking away of the New England Fishery by the Fisheries Bill ; 
 and lastly, the despatch of Smith and Pitcairn to seize the province's 
 means of defence — all these were acts of war so overt, that it 
 matters nothing whether Jonas Parker or a British officer fired the 
 first shot on Lexington Green. 
 
 Note. — The account of Lexington is taken almost entirely from the London 
 Gazette, and from Lieutenant D' Bernicre's report, which appears to have been 
 drawn up for General Gage. Other details are from American accounts, chiefly 
 those printed in Almon's Remenibrancer. 
 
CHAPTER XLIIl 
 AFTER LEXINGTON 
 
 "I called upon General Harvey, where I found Grant and Dalrymple. Harvey 
 swore, and reproached them — chiefly Dalrymple, because he wanted more force 
 — ' How often have I heard you American colonels boast that with four bat- 
 talions you would march through America ; and now you think Gage, with 3000 
 men and 40 pieces of cannon, may not venture out of Boston ! ' " — Hutchinson, 
 Diary, May 31, 1775. 
 
 "You who riot in pleasure in London, know nothing of the distress in Boston 
 ... we are in the rotations of salt beef and salt pork one day, and the next, 
 chewing upon salt pork and salt beef. The very rats are grown so familiar that 
 they ask you to eat them, for they say that they have ate up the sills already, and 
 they must now go upon the clapboards. Indeed, now and then a hog swims 
 across the water, and thinks it more honourable to be cut up in town, and ate 
 at a shilling, L.M. (lawful money) here per pound, than wasted out of town at 
 4 pence per pound. ... It is said that the Navy Orders are generally, not to 
 return their fire till you are killed, or at least wounded." — Chief Justice Oliver 
 to Elisha Hutchinson, Boston, June 10, 1775. 
 
 "The pulpits of the Established Church at this time resounded with exhorta- 
 tions to the people to smite the rebels." — Fonblanque. 
 
 As the Fiery Cross used to be sent through Scotland, so now the 
 news of Lexington was sent through New England. The province 
 rose. Six or seven hundred militia encamped on Boston Neck. 
 For nine days, Colonel Robinson, their commander, was almost the 
 only officer — all the other officers, and most of the men, had gone 
 home, to settle up their affairs, make their wills, and place their 
 families in safety. For nine nights and days, Robinson never 
 changed his clothes, nor slept in a bed. 
 
 By Sunday, the news was known in New York. The people shut 
 the Custom House, unladed two sloops full of stores for Gage, and 
 armed. In twenty days, the news was known from Quebec to 
 Savannah. Lexington was fought on Wednesday. On Thursday 
 morning, old Major Israel Putnam, ploughing in the field at 
 Pomfret, heard a drum, and saw a horseman. It was the messenger 
 with the news. Putnam was at Ticonderoga, and young Lord Howe 
 fell at his side. He had known Indian warfare, too — had been 
 tied to a tree while tomahawks were flung at him for sport, and 
 
 .362 
 
AFTER LEXINGTON 363 
 
 French officers looked on. He had been stripped and tied to a 
 stake, to be roasted ahve, and, after the fire was Hghted, was saved 
 by a Frenchman nobler than the rest. Once at Pomfret, he had 
 crawled into a she-wolf's den, to dislodge her. There was not 
 much that old Israel Putnam feared. When he saw the messenger, 
 he unyoked the plough horses, got on one, just as he was — leathern 
 frock and apron, check shirt and all, and so rode 100 miles to 
 Cambridge, and reached it at sunrise. 
 
 Others were there by that time — John Starke, of the Indian 
 War, with his New Hampshire men ; and Ethan Allen of Benning- 
 ton, Colonel of the Green Mountain Boys — a wild figure, just 
 proclaimed outlaw for his doings about the New Hampshire Grants. 
 On the 26th, Captain Benedict Arnold of New Haven came in at 
 the head of his company. Soon there were twenty thousand men 
 encamped between Roxbury and Cambridge — a line thirty miles 
 long. Artemus Ward was their General. He, too, like Putnam, 
 had fought in Canada under Abercrombie. There was also 
 General Thomas, who fought in the war of '56. 
 
 The first thing Gage did, after Lexington, was to offer passes to 
 all who chose to leave Boston, and take their goods with them. 
 For the first few days, the road to Roxbury was crowded with 
 waggons, carrying household goods and fugitives. The Provincial 
 Congress had to provide for these persons — soon 5000 of them 
 were distributed in the villages. Those were wise who went at 
 once. The Loyalists of Boston had immediately formed them- 
 selves into a Volunteer Corps 200 strong ; and when they saw the 
 rebels flocking out of the town, they went to the Governor, and 
 insisted on their being detained — their presence might be all that 
 stood between the town and a bombardment ! Gage hesitated. 
 They threatened to go themselves — to New York, by sea. Gage 
 temporised — first, he prohibited the carrying out of merchandise, 
 then of provisions, then of bedding and trunks, and by the 22nd 
 passes were refused altogether. Gage especially tried to detain the 
 women — the rebels would not bombard them. The same day, he 
 sent for the Selectmen, and struck a bargain — to use no violence, 
 if they did not. A town-meeting next day ("although the Sabbath, 
 a thing never known here before ") ratified this compact ; and the 
 inhabitants agreed to deposit all arms in Faneuil Hall, under 
 the charge of the Selectmen — each musket to be marked with 
 the owner's name, and returned, when things are quiet once 
 more. 
 
 Charlestown was nearly deserted. A few people went now and 
 then "to look after their effects,'' dig their gardens, or mow their 
 
364 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 grass. It was reported that Charlestown was to be burned — fire- 
 stages were to be floated down the river. 
 
 Boston was already on salt provisions, and it was " even affirmed 
 that pork and peas are eaten at the General's own table." 
 
 There were not as many rebels encamped round Boston as the 
 British supposed; but the Provincials were constantly relieved, 
 which came to almost the same thing. Once, General Thomas, 
 on an alarm of a sally, marched his 700 men round and round 
 Prospect Hill, till they looked like an army. And, undisciplined as 
 were the rank and file, there was a good sprinkling of old soldiers 
 trained in the war of '56. Most of them "were with Braddock.'' 
 Gage, watching the Provincials through his glass, could recognise 
 more than one old comrade. One day, he made out Putnam, and 
 got a message to him, to come and speak with him. Putnam 
 came in, and Gage showed him his fortifications, and advised his 
 old comrade to lay down his arms ; but Putnam only returned the 
 kind advice. 
 
 On May 25, a fire broke out in the town — occasioned by a 
 cartridge catching fire. Great damage was done. By an unhappy 
 augury, the same day arrived the three Generals, Howe, Clinton, 
 and Burgoyne — to find they had come to a beleaguered town. 
 Burgoyne was much disgusted to think that " ten thousand 
 peasants should keep five thousand King's troops shut up,'' but 
 hoped he should "soon find elbow-room" — an unfortunate remark, 
 with which he was twitted later on. It was asserted that the 
 British officers so httle expected anything serious, that they brought 
 out "angling rods," to pass the time. 
 
 The Provincial Council, sitting at Watertown,i voted that Gage 
 was no longer Governor of the province of Massachusetts Bay. 
 It merely stated a fact. Gage was Commander-in-Chief of the 
 forces, and military governor of the town of Boston, but there 
 his authority ended. The Provincial Congress appointed a post- 
 master; empowered their Receiver-General to borrow _^ioo,ooo 
 "in lawful money" on Colonial securities, at 6 per cent., repayable 
 in two years ; and drew up an address " to their Friends and 
 Fellow-subjects, the Inhabitants of Great Britain.'' 
 
 On the 3rd of May, Benedict Arnold — with the Provincial 
 Committee of Safety's commission as Colonel — set off to take 
 Ticonderoga with one man, intending to raise volunteers on the 
 way. He came up with Colonel Ethan Allen, and went on with 
 him. That day week, this little force of 100 Green Mountain Boys, 
 and 50 Massachusetts Militia, walked into Ticonderoga, forced the 
 
 ' April 25, or a few days earlier. 
 
AFTER LEXINGTON 365 
 
 guards, and rushed into the fort. Delaplace, the Commandant, who 
 was dressing — it was about sunrise — ran out in his shirt to know 
 what was the matter. Allen summoned him to surrender. " In 
 whose name?" asked the Commandant. "In the name of the 
 Great Jehovah and the Continental Congress," replied Allen. And 
 so Ticonderoga, which had cost the British Government eight 
 millions sterling, and many campaigns, was taken in ten minutes, 
 almost without a blow. The same day, Seth Warner, Allen's 
 lieutenant, surprised Crown Point. 
 
 In the interval between Lexington and Bunker's Hill, the 
 Second Continental Congress met at Philadelphia. It did not 
 assume to be an Executive, or even a Legislative Body ; but only 
 the assembled Committees of Twelve Colonies, met to consult on 
 the state of public affairs, and endeavour to agree on the measures 
 most likely to obtain redress of American grievances, and to restore 
 harmony between Great Britain and her Colonies. 
 
 The People of America, represented in the Second General 
 Congress, had not departed from their original contention — that 
 they owed allegiance, and were ready to maintain that allegiance, 
 to the King, but not to the Parliament. This has very often 
 been misunderstood ; and because it was misunderstood, it has 
 been ridiculed as illogical and denounced as hypocritical. It was 
 neither. It meant that the Colonies demanded to be upon precisely 
 the same footing as the people of Great Britain. This was what 
 they meant, when they professed loyalty to the King, while defying 
 the Parliament. The people of Great Britain were governed by 
 laws passed by the representatives they themselves had chosen. 
 The Charters of the American provinces acknowledged their right 
 to be governed in all internal affairs by laws passed by their pro- 
 vincial Assemblies — that is, by representatives chosen by the people 
 of the Colonies. They had, in fact, been granted Home Rule. 
 The colonists maintained that the provincial Assemblies were 
 sister-parliaments to the Parliament at Westminster, and stood in 
 the same relation to the King as the Parliament of Westminster. 
 As regarded all internal questions, they governed themselves, with 
 the exception that their Governors were appointed — though not 
 paid — by the Crown, and that in international questions, affecting 
 peace and war, and international trade, the British Government had 
 a claim to their obedience. 
 
 The Congress met on the sth of May. On the loth, Franklin— 
 who arrived the night before, and had been elected a delegate to 
 Congress that morning— took his seat. "He has been received 
 with the greatest respect by all ranks of people." On the 13th, 
 
366 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 John Jay moved for a second Petition to the King. Congress 
 were discussing this, when, on the i8th, came the news of 
 Ticonderoga. Their victory threw Congress into great perturba- 
 tion — they were half inclined to give the Fort back — they had not 
 thought of anything so daring as an invasion of Canada. Ethan 
 Allen ought to have said, " In the name of the Committee of Safety 
 of Connecticut " — a more reckless body by far. At last it was agreed 
 to withdraw the captured artillery to the head of Lake George — 
 to be scrupulously returned when the troubles are over. 
 
 A plan, said to have been placed before the First Continental 
 Congress, was submitted to the Second — by whom, or with how 
 much of authority, seems to be 'doubtful. It seems to have been 
 a revival of one of Governor Shirley's schemes. It was for "a 
 British and American Legislature, for regulating the administra- 
 tion of the general affairs of America " — to be administered by a 
 President-General, appointed by the King, and a Grand Council, 
 chosen by the Colonies. This Grand Council was to meet more or 
 less often than once a year, as might be necessary, and to have all 
 the privileges exercised by the House of Commons ; it was to be 
 " an inferior and distinct branch of the British Legislature." Any 
 of the Regulations might originate with either body, and must be 
 transmitted to the other for assent, the assent of both being required 
 to make it law — except that, in time of war, the Grand Council's 
 Bills for granting aid to the Crown, need not wait for the assent of 
 Parliament. 
 
 On June i, the House of Burgesses of Virginia was convened 
 for the last time under British rule. It met anxious and displeased. 
 The finances of the province were much embarrassed by the Indian 
 Frontier War of last year — which has not been mentioned, as it had 
 no immediate bearing on the general situation. ^ But the Indian 
 trouble helped to intensify the indignation at Dunmore's threat to 
 emancipate the slaves, " if he was pressed " to give up the powder 
 of Williamsburg, which he had seized in the night of April 20. 
 Dunmore had had to " fortify himself in his palace,'' when Patrick 
 Henry appeared to demand it. He paid for the powder,^ rather 
 than give it up; but this did not help him much, for Peyton 
 Randolph, Speaker of the House of Burgesses, rode over from 
 Congress with "an escort of independent companies of horse and 
 foot" — in fact, a little army. Some of the Burgesses came in the 
 new uniform — a hunting-shirt of coarse homespun, and a wood- 
 man's axe. 
 
 Dunmore now made a conciliatory speech, full of the "gracious 
 ' See Note at end of chapter. - He paid ;^350. 
 
AFTER LEXINGTON 367 
 
 declaration of King and Parliament," to redress their " well-founded 
 grievances." No specific sum was demanded of the Colonies — 
 their gift, if they offered any, was to be free. It was never intended 
 to require them to tax themselves, without Parliament taxing the 
 subjects of Great Britain on the same occasion in a far greater 
 proportion. Dunmore apologised for taking the powder — he had 
 had "the best of motives" — thought it was in a dangerous place 
 where it was — and reminded them how he had ventured his life 
 against the Indians in the service of the province. But he could 
 not deny his threat to arm the slaves. 
 
 The Burgesses received these professions with polite incredulity, 
 and passed a Bill for defraying the cost of the Indian War, and 
 providing for the widows and orphans. To do this, it placed a 
 duty of _j^5 (equal to about 10 per cent.) on the head of every slave 
 imported from the West Indies. Dunmore refused assent, on the 
 ground that this duty would injure the British traffic in negroes. 
 Thus the last exercise of the power of veto, by a British Governor 
 of Virginia, was for the protection of the British slave-trade. 
 
 In the middle of this business, Dunmore received a letter from 
 Gage, informing him that he was about to issue a Proclamation of 
 pardon to all except Hancock and Adams. It occurred to Dunmore 
 that if Gage seized these gentlemen, Randolph's little army might 
 arrest himself for a hostage, so he left Williamsburg suddenly in 
 the night, and went with his family on board the Fowey man-of-war. 
 He explained his flight by saying he was afraid of "falling a 
 sacrifice" to the "Wind and unreasoning fury which had so un- 
 accountably seized upon great numbers of people " ; and he invited 
 the House to come to him "at his present residence." The House 
 voted that it was a high breach of privilege to require it to attend 
 his lordship on board of his Majesty's man-of-war. He had now 
 given up the key of the powder magazine. Three days before he 
 did so, the Burgesses of Virginia had formally rejected North's 
 propositions. They said they " contended not merely for the mode 
 of raising their money, but for the freedom of granting it." The 
 Acts had not been repealed — Acts restraining trade, altering the 
 government of Massachusetts and Quebec, enlarging the Admiralty 
 jurisdiction, taking away trial by jury, and establishing standing 
 armies. . The Colonies had been invaded by large armaments by 
 sea and land — this is a style of asking gifts not reconcilable with 
 freedom. They therefore committed their injuries " to the justice 
 of the evenhanded Being Who doth no wrong." 
 
 They further resolved that a well-regulated militia of gentlemen 
 and yeomen was necessary, and " is the natural strength and only 
 
368 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 security of a free government." And till this unhappy dispute is 
 settled, there should be as little going to law as possible ^ — those 
 that cannot wait, should refer their differences to "judicious 
 neighbours " ; creditors should be " as indulgent as may be," and 
 " debtors should pay as far as they are able." 
 
 For many months — indeed, almost ever since the punitive Acts 
 had come into operation — the King's Government in Massachusetts 
 had been virtually dissolved. When, a few days after Lexington, 
 the Provincial Congress voted that Gage was no more Governor of 
 the province, "he having, by his conduct, forfeited all right to it," 
 the fact had long been obvious to all. General Gage was better 
 aware of it than anybody, and had said long since that it might 
 be well to leave the Provincials to "anarchy and repentance." 
 But the dissolution of Government had not produced the kind of 
 anarchy for which members of the British Parliament hoped. As 
 one Royal Governor after another lost control of his province, one 
 Provincial Congress after another sprang into being, and took on 
 itself all the functions of the old Assemblies and Councils combined. 
 And each Provincial Congress, as soon as it met, began to consider 
 North's proposals — that the British Government should call for 
 what revenue it pleased, and the Colonies should raise it as they 
 pleased. Each province decided that this was unjust, and while re- 
 affirming its loyalty to the King, also re-affirmed its entire rejection 
 of the authority of Parliament. Governor Franklin, the Loyalist son 
 of the valiant old philosopher, summoned the Assembly of New 
 Jersey, hoping it would pronounce for North's offer ; but it only 
 voted its intention to abide by " the united voice of the Continental 
 Congress." Governor Martin of North Carolina made his Assembly 
 a conciliatory speech, but could not persuade it not to send delegates 
 to Congress. At the beginning of April, the Provincial Congress 
 of Massachusetts had drawn up " Rules " for the Army. They are 
 curious reading, these " rules " for a citizen Army, and the penalties 
 for ill-behaviour are left in what was no doubt believed to be a 
 judicious vagueness. Congress had sent off an address to our 
 " Friends and Fellow-subjects, the Inhabitants of Great Britain." 
 Now, in May, Massachusetts appointed a Postmaster, and wrote to 
 Congress desiring it to assume the regulation of the Army, "now 
 collecting from different Colonies for the defence of America." 
 
 It had long been apparent that the Army must have a 
 Commander;in-Chief. The difficulty was to conciliate provincial 
 susceptibilities. Old General Artemus Ward, now in command 
 outside Boston, was too infirm — scarcely able to mount a horse. 
 
 ' The Courts were shut. 
 
AFTER LEXINGTON 369 
 
 But he was a Massachusetts man, and it would not do to offend 
 Massachusetts. Mr. Hancock was known to think of himself for 
 the post ; but he had seen no service, and his health was delicate. 
 There were many officers who had seen service — at Cape Breton, 
 at the two Sieges of Louisburg, and with Wolfe. But the Army 
 was to a great extent a Northern Army — the South might be 
 jealous if there were a Northern General too. Colonel Charles Lee 
 had been spoken of — but he was an Englishman, in itself almost 
 a sufficient reason against him. Then came news that the three 
 British Generals, Howe, Clinton, and Burgoyne, were actually in 
 Boston ; and the need for a Provincial General became imperative. 
 It was a relief to everyone when one morning in June Mr. John 
 Adams — now looked on as the leading man of Massachusetts — 
 rose and moved that Congress should appoint a General, adding 
 that he had no hesitation to declare he had but one gentleman 
 in his mind for that command, — "a gentleman of Virginia, now 
 among us, and very well known to us all," — a gentleman, whose 
 skill and experience, whose independent fortune, great talents and 
 excellent universal character, would command the approbation of 
 all America. 
 
 Colonel Washington was sitting near the door of the "library- 
 room," and slipped away while Adams was speaking. There was 
 a little opposition — chiefly on the score that Ward was already in 
 command, and was holding the British imprisoned, which was 
 all that could be expected or desired. But when, on the 15th, 
 Mr. Johnson of Maryland formally nominated Mr. Washington 
 to be Generalissimo of the Continental Forces, the ballot was 
 unanimous. 
 
 Washington was now forty-three — over six feet in height, broad, 
 and well-proportioned, with a constitution of iron. He had been 
 his own teacher ever since, at sixteen, he went out into the wilder- 
 ness to survey Lord Fairfax's vast estates beyond the Blue Ridge — 
 never surveyed till then, though granted to Fairfax's ancestor by 
 Charles 11. At nineteen he was an Adjutant-General with a Major's 
 commission, on the western frontier. At twenty-one he was sent 
 as Envoy of Virginia to the Council of Indian Chiefs on the Ohio, 
 and to the French on Lake Erie. He led the first military expedi- 
 tion from Virginia that ever crossed the Alleghanies. Two years 
 later Braddock chose him for his aide-de-camp, in the disastrous 
 attempt on Fort Duquesne. On the terrible day by the 
 Monongahela, when Braddock's force, marching carelessly, was set 
 upon and utterly routed by a handful of French and six hundred 
 Indians, Washington escaped as by miracle — he had two horses 
 
370 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 shot under him, and four balls passed through his coat.' It was 
 Washington and Gage who rallied the shattered remnants of 
 Braddock's men, and saved the dying General from falling into the 
 hands of the Indians. Next year, when he was still but twenty-four, 
 Washington was chosen by the Lieutenant-Governor of Maryland 
 as second in command of the army for the Ohio, of which Governor 
 Shirley was Commander-in-Chief. Again, in 1758, he served under 
 Forbes. Since then, he had lived at Mount Vernon the life of a 
 country gentleman and planter of Virginia — the life he loved best.^ 
 His character need not be described — it is a part of the history of 
 the country he saved. 
 
 Washington's first act as Generalissimo was to refuse all pay 
 except his expenses — of which he promised Congress to keep a 
 strict account. His last was to hand back his commission to 
 Congress, the day after the last British soldier embarked at New 
 York. 
 
 Washington knew well what was the task before him. The 
 day he was appointed, he said to Patrick Henry, " This day will be 
 the commencement of the decline of my reputation." He knew 
 that he had to create an army out of a fortuitous concourse of 
 farmers, lawyers, traders, merchants, and artificers; he knew that 
 Congress could give him no authority, for it possessed none, and 
 could not pay his army, for it had no revenue. He knew that, 
 besides the ordinary jealousies, which assail every man in a great 
 station, he would have the conflicting interests and meannesses of 
 thirteen colonies to reckon with. Lastly, he knew that with his 
 little experience of border warfare, he must pit himself against 
 British Generals trained in great wars, with the resources of a 
 mighty empire behind them. 
 
 Four Major-Generals were appointed — Lee, Ward, Schuyler, 
 and Putnam ; and eight Brigadier-Generals. 
 
 Philip Schuyler came of a great Dutch family of New York — a 
 
 1 " We have been most scandalously beaten by a trifling body of men." — 
 Washington's Letter to his Mother^ 1756. 
 
 Braddock, who had five horses shot under him, was mortally wounded. He 
 died at Great Meadows, four days after the battle. As the chaplain was wounded, 
 Major Washington read the Burial Service. 
 
 ^ In 1770, Washington, having established the rights of the soldiers and 
 officers who had served with him in the French war to 200,000 acres in the 
 western valley, undertook to select their tracts for them, and went down to the 
 Great Kanawha. He floated down the Ohio in a canoe — innumerable wild-fowl, 
 turkeys, etc., deer browsing on the banks — and chose the good land, setting hi? 
 mark on a maple or elm, a hoop-wood or ash, as the corner of a soldier's survey. 
 The red-men received him with public honours. So Tennessee was founded. 
 
AFTER LEXINGTON 371 
 
 man greatly respected, a good mathematician and engineer, and 
 something of a martinet. Charles Lee was a very curious person — 
 an English soldier of fortune, a vain, restless, disappointed man, 
 affecting eccentricity. Both he and Schuyler had fought in Canada 
 under Abercrombie (now in Boston). Since then, he had fought 
 in Portugal and Turkey, and been aide-de-camp to King Stanislaus 
 of Poland. In England he had fought a duel, and killed his man ; 
 and had written a political pamphlet which made the Ministry 
 think him dangerous. Lee was a friend of Burke ; but of human 
 beings he professed to prefer the Mohawks, whom he had learned 
 to know in Canada. They adopted him, and gave him the name 
 of " Boiling Water." He also admired the Cossacks of the Don. 
 But on the whole, he affected misanthropy, disliked women without 
 loving men, and considered horses and dogs more worthy of regard 
 than humankind. He was strongly of opinion that Charles Lee 
 was the man to command the Continental Armies. He had offered 
 to teach the Americans military tactics, and had written long letters 
 to Lord Percy and General Burgoyne,' — his old comrade in Portugal, 
 — remonstrating with them for engaging in so bad a cause. 
 
 Washington, Lee, and Schuyler set out on June 21 for the 
 Camp at Cambridge. They had not ridden six miles out of 
 Philadelphia when they met an express riding post to Congress, 
 with news that a great battle was fought at Boston on Saturday, and 
 Dr. Warren was killed. 
 
CHAPTER XLIV 
 BUNKER'S HILL 
 
 "Mr. Gibbon called. He says many who were strong for the measures of 
 Parliament are much discouraged by the news from America, they having been 
 made to believe there would be no action." — Hutchinson's Diary, June 19, 1775. 
 
 " I am sure I never wrote anything I did not believe to be true. I am sure I 
 never wrote anything that I thought would hurt the interest of my country." — 
 Hutchinson to Mr. Sewall, Attorney-General of Massachusetts, July 8, 1775. 
 
 " In short, it is as preposterous to recur to Athens and Sparta for comparisons 
 to their courage, as it is to suppose their spring of action in this revolt analogous 
 to the genuine spirit of liberty that guided those states. " 
 
 On the 12th of June Gage issued his Proclamation beginning, 
 " Whereas the infatuated multitudes," and going on to offer pardon 
 to all who would lay down their arms — always excepting Samuel 
 Adams and John Hancock. It expatiated on " the infringements 
 of the sacred rights of the Crown and people of Great Britain " (to 
 make foolish and anti-commercial laws) ; and on the conduct of " a 
 number of armed persons," who on April 19, "from behind walls 
 and lurking holes, attacked a detachment of the King's troops," 
 who, not expecting " so consummate an act of phrenzy," and un- 
 prepared and unwilling for vengeance, only used their arms in self- 
 defence. Since then these rebels "have added insult to injury," 
 have fired on the King's ships, and " with a preposterous parade of 
 military arrangement, affect to hold the army besieged." Finally, 
 it proclaimed martial law.^ The same day Gage wrote to Dart- 
 mouth, that the town continued surrounded by a large body of 
 Provincials, and that all communication with the country was cut 
 off. A few days before this, Dr. Peter Oliver (son of the Chief 
 Justice) had written to Elisha Hutchinson : " we are besieged this 
 moment with 10 or 15,000 men, from Roxbury to Cambridge; 
 their rebel sentrys within call of the troops' sentry on the Neck. 
 . . . You seem in England to be entirely ignorant of the temper 
 of our people. They are as much determined from Florida to 
 Halifax to oppose you at home, do what you will, as I hear the 
 
 ' Burgoyne wrote this Proclamation, and many others. 
 372 
 
BUNKER'S HILL 373 
 
 Ministry are determined to pursue their plan. I am in no doubt 
 but you will be able to conquer America at last, but a horrid 
 bloody scene will be opened here, as never was in New England 
 before. What comfort or satisfaction do you think we take now, or 
 can take, when the dreadful scene opens ? " 1 , 
 
 And now the dreadful scene opened. 
 
 The "persons in arms," who were "affecting" to besiege 
 Boston, became more formidable every day. About the 1st of 
 June twelve pieces of "battering cannon"— 18- and 24-pounders — ■ 
 had been sent from Providence to the Camp at Cambridge. The 
 Camp was rough enough — canvas and sails, given by the seaport 
 towns, formed the tents. Nobody had any experience, and there 
 was no discipline — the private was as good a man as the captain. 
 Worse still, there was very little ammunition; and, worst of all, 
 there were quarrels and discontents. It was not even quite certain 
 who was in command, and whether Ward was General-in-Chief or 
 only commanded the New Hampshire regiments. There was 
 difference of opinion — Ward, sick and timid, was for retiring from 
 Cambridge and fortifying the heights of Brookline. Putnam not 
 only insisted that Cambridge must be held, but could hardly be 
 prevented from advancing the lines of the Connecticut men to 
 Prospect Hill. 
 
 The peculiar situation of Boston, at the head of the deep bay 
 of Massachusetts, must be realised in order to understand the 
 extraordinary battle of Bunker's Hill. The town stands on a 
 peninsula, connected with the mainland by a very low and narrow 
 isthmus — called Boston Neck — about 50 yards broad, and so low 
 that the spring-tides sometimes washed the road. In 1775 
 Boston was about two miles long, and contained about 4000 
 houses, mostly brick, with 18,000 inhabitants. The streets were 
 broad and regular, the houses of the richest merchants were 
 "very stately, well-built and convenient." There were so many 
 wharves and warehouses, that more than fifty vessels could unlade 
 at one time "with great conveniency." To north of Boston, 
 divided from it by a large navigable river, lay Charlestown, on 
 another peninsula, between the Mystic and the Charles rivers. 
 Charlestown was abo^t half as large as Boston, but less con- 
 veniently situated for sea-going trade. To the north of the 
 peninsula of Charlestown rose Bunker's Hill, a round smooth 
 mound, about no feet high. It commanded both peninsulas. 
 The rising ground fell away gradually for about 700 yards, and just 
 north of Charlestown rose again to Breed's Hill, about 75 feet 
 ^ Letter of June i, 1775. — Hutchinson's Diary, i. 
 
374 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 high. Dorchester Neck — another peninsula— was to the south. 
 Close round lay the smaller towns of Roxbury, Dorchester, and 
 Cambridge. 
 
 Towards the middle of May the Committee of Safety and 
 a Council of War had resolved to fortify Bunker's Hill — they were 
 only waiting for a supply of powder. About the 14th of June they 
 heard that Gage was preparing to post troops there himself, and 
 that the i8th was the day fixed for the attempt, so on the isth 
 a Council of War determined to take possession of Bunker's Hill 
 at once. The command was given to Prescott, who had had 
 considerable experience in French and Indian warfare; and on 
 the evening of the i6th, after prayers by the President of Harvard, 
 1000 men marched from Cambridge. By some mistake, never 
 explained, and httle noticed, Prescott had been ordered, to fortify 
 Breed's Hill — the summit nearer Boston. At midnight the works 
 were begun by the light of dark-lanterns. ^ As day broke the 
 watch on board the Lively (lying in the ferry between Boston and 
 Charlestown) saw what the Provincials were about, and gave the 
 alarm. By that time a small redoubt about 8 rods square had 
 been thrown up, and the entrenchments were 6 feet high.^ At 
 once the Lively fired her great gun, the Falcon and the Somerset 
 followed, until a heavy fire from the ships, the floating batteries, 
 and the fort on Copps' Hill — in Boston itself — was directed on 
 the new works. 
 
 The Provincials worked on — now fortifying the marshy, grassy 
 ground at the foot of the hill. When the fire grew too heavy, 
 Prescott returned to the redoubt, and walked up and down on 
 the parapet. Gage, on Copps' Hill, only 1200 yards away as the 
 crow flies, watched this tall figure, the only one in uniform that 
 day — saw him take off cocked-hat and tie-wig, and walk bare- 
 headed in the blazing sun, the bald patch on his head distinctly 
 seen. " Who is the person who appears to command ? Will he 
 fight?" asked Gage. And Councillor Willard (a "Mandamus 
 Councillor") replied, "He is my brother-in-law ; and he will fight 
 while there is a drop of blood in his body." 
 
 Meanwhile the Provincials were alternately asking in despair, 
 Why Ward did not send them reinforcements? and in astonish- 
 
 ' The work was performed so quietly, that Prescott, who went down twice 
 in the night to the water's edge to listen, could hear the sentinels on the men- 
 of-war cry, "All's Well !" 
 
 ^ Colonel Gridley was their engineer. It was he who fired the shot into 
 the Citadel, at the First Siege of Louisburg, which brought about the 
 capitulation. 
 
BUNKER'S HILL 375 
 
 ment, Why Gage did not send the soldiers ? But Ward was afraid 
 of weakening his camp; and Gage hoped to dislodge the rebels 
 with his artillery — the fire was now so heavy, that the smoke hung 
 upon the hills. But the works were being made stronger every 
 hour, and Gage saw that he must fight. So at high -water 
 the Glasgow and the two floating batteries were moored where 
 their guns would rake Charlestown Neck, and about noon the 
 Provincials in the redoubt saw the red-coats swarming out on 
 Long Wharf. Under the protection of the ships, 28 barges were 
 rowed across to Moulton's Point, carrying the sth, 38th, 43rd, and 
 52nd infantry, ten companies of grenadiers, ten of light infantry, 
 and "a proportion" of field-artillery, under Generals Howe and 
 Pigot. With them went Abercrombie, Pitcairn, and a great 
 number of other officers. No sooner had Howe landed and 
 formed his troops in order of march, than he perceived that " the 
 rebels on the heights " were " in great force and strongly posted." 
 The redoubt was full of men, and defended with cannon; and 
 "a large body, posted in the houses in Charlestown, covered their 
 right flank, the left being covered by a breastwork, part of it 
 cannon-proof." Howe also discovered that "Mr. Lovell of the 
 Ordnance" had sent the wrong shot — 12-pounders, when the 
 cannon were only six. He sent back for reinforcements, and for 
 the right shot, and meanwhile he made the men sit down in the 
 long grass and refresh themselves. 
 
 Perhaps no battle ever had so many spectators. All Boston 
 was looking on — the roofs and steeples were crowded, and many 
 of the watchers feared that their families might be in Charlestown. 
 The distance was so short that they could distinctly see the white 
 houses and green gardens when the smoke of the cannonade 
 lifted for a moment. 
 
 The Provincials, though they made so formidable an appear- 
 ance, were but ill-prepared to resist such an attack. The day 
 was intensely hot, it was hours before any refreshments arrived for 
 the men who had been toiling all night, reinforcements were slow 
 in coming, and even now nobody knew exactly who was command- 
 ing — Prescott or Putnam. But just as the troops disembarked, 
 John Starke brought up 2000 of the New Hampshire men. 
 
 Howe, too, had been reinforced — some more companies of 
 Grenadiers and Light Infantry and the ist battalion of Marines 
 had now arrived, making his force in all over 2000. He sent his 
 left, under Pigot, to attack Charlestown, and advanced slowly with 
 his right, the lines frequently halting to give the artillery time to 
 fire. Presently the people in the steeples saw that Charlestown 
 
176 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 was on fire, but the Provincials succeeded in withdrawing. Those 
 in the redoubt awaited the attaclc. Putnam had ordered them 
 not to fire till they could see the whites of the enemies' eyes. 
 Accordingly they reserved their fire till the British were within 
 " ten or twelve rods." " Then began a furious discharge of small 
 arms." The British halted — then fell back in disorder to the 
 landing-place. The Provincial account says that officers were 
 "seen, with passionate gestures, pushing the men forward with 
 their swords." Two of Howe's aides were shot down at his side. 
 Three times he was left alone, standing unmoved amidst a rain 
 of bullets. At last he rallied the men, and led them up the hill 
 again. A second time the Americans reserved their fire — till the 
 British were within " five or six rods " ; and a second time the 
 regulars gave way, and "ran in great confusion towards their 
 boats." Then Howe brought the cannon to bear, and raked the 
 breastwork, while the fire from the ships was redoubled, and at 
 last the Provincials retreated to the redoubt. A British account 
 says word was brought to Howe that the rebels had been heard 
 to say their powder was all gone. At the same moment General 
 Clinton brought up two regiments he had found in confusion on 
 the shore, and had re-formed. American accounts say that an 
 order given by Pomeroy was mistaken for an order to retreat. 
 It appears, however, that at this moment Prescott did give the 
 word to retreat. It was almost too late — the British had advanced 
 for the third time, and the redoubt was half full of them ; and if 
 a flanking-party of the Provincials had not made a determined 
 stand none would have escaped. The retreat across the Neck 
 was terrible — the Provincials fighting their way inch by inch in 
 a hand-to-hand encounter, for it was true that they had fired 
 their last round of powder. Charlestown Neck was being raked 
 by the fire from the ships, — the Glasgow and the two floating 
 batteries, — it was this fire which had prevented the Provincial 
 reinforcements from coming up. Here Dr. Warren, gallantly 
 trying to rally the retreat, was mortally wounded by a British 
 officer who recognised him. 
 
 The Provincials expected that Howe would pursue and march 
 to Cambridge — only two miles distant, and undefended. But 
 Bunker's Hill was one of those victories which are only less 
 terrible than a defeat. Half the British force engaged was killed 
 or wounded. Howe's own escape was miraculous — one wonders 
 whether in those awful moments he remembered the kind wish 
 of his Nottingham friends. All his staff-officers were killed or 
 wounded. Burgoyne, who watched the battle from Brattle church- 
 
BUNKER'S HILL 377 
 
 steeple, wrote, "The whole was for complication, for horror and 
 importance beyond anything it ever came to my lot to witness. 
 It was a sight for a young soldier that the longest service may 
 not occur again." To Rochford he wrote, "The retreat was no 
 flight: it was even covered with bravery and military skill . . . 
 let it not pass even in a whisper from your lordship to more than 
 one person . . . discipline not to say courage was wanting. In 
 the critical moment of carrying the redoubt, the officers of some 
 corps were almost alone; and what was the worst part of the 
 confusion of these corps — all the wounds of the officers were 
 not received from the enemy." He explains that he does not 
 charge the men with "backwardness in the cause of Govern- 
 ment," as little would he "imply any dislike or ill-will to their 
 officers. ... I only 'mean to represent that the men in the defective 
 corps being ill-grounded in the great points of discipline, and the 
 men in all the corps having twice felt their enemy to be more 
 formidable than they expected, it will require some training under 
 - such Generals as Howe and Clinton before they may prudently 
 be entrusted in many exploits against such odds. . . . Look, my 
 Lord, upon the country near Boston — it is all fortification." 1 
 
 So soon had Burgoyne changed his first opinion of the peasants 
 who held the King's troops beleaguered. 
 
 The British loss was enormous; 92 officers were killed or 
 wounded — a number out of all proportion to that of the rank and 
 file, and telling its own tale. Among the slain were Abercrombie ^ 
 and Pitcairn. It was reported that Howe had said the death of 
 Warren was equal to the loss of 500 Provincials. But the British 
 casualties at Bunker's Hill were more than at Minden, or Quebec.^ 
 Howe never got over it — his hesitation on several future occasions 
 was believed to be prompted by dread of exposing his troops in 
 attacks on works behind which were American marksmen. 
 
 ^"Our expectations have all along been that, on the arrival of the 
 Irish troops, something decisive would be effected ; but if every small hill or 
 rising ground about Boston is to be recovered in the same way, I see no 
 prospect of an end to the war." — Elisha Hutchinson to his Wife, August I, 
 1775. (From England.) 
 
 Eden said, eight more such victories, and there would be no one left to 
 bring the news of them. (Auckland MSS.) 
 
 "^ As Colonel Abercrombie was carried off the field, mortally vi^ounded, he 
 said, "If you take Major Putnam alive, don't hang him, for he's a brave 
 man." 
 
 ^ The casualties were: I Lieut.-Col., 2 Majors, 8 Captains, I o Lieutenants, 
 IS Sergeants, I Drummer, 191 rank and file, killed. Wounded — 3 Majors, 26 
 Captains, 31 Lieutenants, 8 Ensigns, 40 Sergeants, 12 Drummers, 706 rank 
 and file. 
 
CHAPTER XLV 
 THE BLOCKADE OF BOSTON 
 
 "In point of numbers they ('the rebels') so far surpass us, that we are like 
 a few children in the midst of a large crowd. . . . They know our situation as 
 well as we do ourselves, from the villains that are left in town, who acquaint 
 them with all our proceedings, making signals at night with gunpowder, and 
 at day out of the church steeples. About three weeks ago, three fellows were 
 taken out of one of the latter, who confess they had been employed so for seven 
 days. . . . Another was caught last week, swimming over to the rebels with 
 one of their General's passes in his pocket ; he will be hanged in a day or two." 
 — Extract of a genuine Letter from Boston, July 25, 1775. Given in The 
 Remembrancer. 
 
 "Friends, Countrymen, and Brethren, — By these, and by every other 
 appellation that may designate the ties which bind us to each other, we entreat 
 your serious attention to this our second attempt to prevent their dissolution. 
 Remembrance of former friendships, pride in the glorious achievements of our 
 common ancestors, and affection for the heirs of their virtues, have hitherto 
 preserved our mutual connection. — The Twelve United Colonies, by their 
 Delegates in Congress, to the Inhabitants of Great Britain, Philadelphia, 
 July 8, 1775." 
 
 " ' Now,' said he, ' my boys, we will aim at the damn'd Presbyterian church. 
 Well, my brave fellows, one shot more, and the House of God will fall before 
 you.'" — Extract from a Letter from Gloucester, t^u^nsi 13, I'JT^, describing the 
 Attack on Captain Lindsey, ^^ Falcon" ma7t-ofwar, on the 9th. 
 
 ' ' The detested town of Norfolk is no more ! ... It burnt fiercely all night 
 and the next day ; nor are the flames yet extinguished ; but no more of 
 Norfolk remains than about 12 houses that have escaped the flames." — 
 Letter "dated ^ Otter, ^ off the ruins of Norfolk, Jan. 9, 1776-" (Given by 
 Almon. ) 
 
 Parties were so evenly balanced in the New York Assembly,^ 
 that a very curious situation had arisen. The Dutch, Huguenot, 
 and Scottish elements were strongly Whig; the great influence 
 of the De Lanceys was Tory. On the 25th of January, 1775, a 
 motion to consider the proceedings of the Continental Congress 
 was lost by one vote ; on February 17a proposal to send delegates 
 to Congress was rejected by 1 7 to 9. But in April, " a poll through 
 
 ' New York and North Carolina were considered so loyal that they were 
 
 exempted from the operation of the Restraining Acts. 
 
 378 
 
THE BLOCKADE OF BOSTON 379 
 
 the city" reversed this by 5 to i, and on the 21st delegates were 
 elected. 
 
 Governor Tryon had been called home to give the Ministry 
 an account of affairs, but had returned, and was in harbour, 
 hourly expected to land, when Washington drew near. The 
 Provincial Congress had, in a manner, been governing for him 
 during his absence. At the same time it professed loyalty. 
 Respect must be shown the Governor on his return— but what 
 was to be done about General Washington ? A singular way of 
 escape was devised — a militia regiment was called out, and ordered 
 to pay military honours to whichever arrived first — the Governor 
 or the General. Washington was the first, and received the 
 honours. Hardly less curious was the address presented to him 
 by the Committee of the Provincial Congress, which met him at 
 Newark. The good Whigs of New York had been thinking about 
 Oliver Cromwell, who was also elected Generalissimo of a patriot 
 army, and felt a little uneasiness lest Washington, like Cromwell, 
 should " make himself master of the Government." So Peter 
 Van Burgh I^ivingston, President of the Congress, in receiving 
 Washington, took care to express "the fullest assurance that as 
 soon as this important contest shall be decided by that fondest 
 wish of every American soul, an accommodation with our Mother 
 Country, you will chearfully resign the important deposit committed 
 into your hands, and reassume the character of our worthiest 
 citizen." To this Washington replied that he and the other 
 Generals would most sincerely rejoice when the establishment of 
 American liberty should enable them to return to their private 
 station. 
 
 On the 2nd of July the British in Boston heard the firing 
 of salutes, and a great noise of shouting from the Camp at 
 Cambridge — General Washington had arrived. Next day he took 
 formal command. An ancient elm on Cambridge Common was 
 long pointed out as the tree under which Washington wheeled his 
 horse, and drew his sword, as Generalissimo of the Continental 
 Armies. And as soon as his army had done shouting, he began 
 to get it into shape.^ 
 
 ' It was said the Americans had bought up all the powder on the coast 
 of Africa — for rum. The whole country was preparing for war. In Reading 
 (Berks Co. Pa.) there was an Old Man's Company, of about eighty Germans, 
 all aged 40 and upwards. ' ' The Person who at their first assembling led 
 them to the field is 97 — has been 40 years in regular service, in 17 pitched 
 battles. The Drummer is 84. Instead of a cockade they wear a black crape, 
 for sorrow at events, and at being too old to fight. Travel where you will, 
 you see the inhabitants training, making fire-locks, casting mortars, shells 
 
38o ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Such an army as it was! The British called it "a rustic rout 
 with calico frocks and fowling-pieces." It was totally deficient 
 in gold-lace, had no uniform, and no discipHne to speak of. It 
 wanted clothes, tents, hospitals, and skilled engineers. Above 
 all, it wanted arms — especially artillery, and powder — an official 
 list of warlike stores in Massachusetts gives little more than half 
 a pound of powder to a man. Nobody ever knew how it was fed, 
 yet fed it was somehow. Every householder contributed some- 
 thing ; everybody who had anything to spare sent it to the Camp, 
 in somebody's waggon lent for the occasion. For a long while 
 the troops of Massachusetts and New Hampshire were fed without 
 so much as a barrel of flour from Congress. And Washington 
 made them all work at the entrenchments from eleven to four every 
 day, got rid of a good many incompetent officers, and kept up 
 the siege of Boston. But the men of Connecticut and Rhode 
 Island were only engaged till December i, those of Massachusetts 
 only to the end of the year; the Paymaster had not a dollar in 
 hand. Soon winter would be upon them, and they wanted 
 blankets, shelter, and fuel. The most shipshape camp was Greene's 
 — as neat as the British ; and his Rhode Islanders were the best 
 drilled.' Greene had followed the plough and worked at the forge ; 
 he had also read Csesar's Commentaries, and studied the art of war. 
 Putnam had had a fine banner sent him — on one side it bore the 
 words, " An Appeal to Heaven," on the other, " Qui Transtulit 
 SusTiNET." On July 2 1 this standard was set up on Prospect Hill, 
 amidst great shouting and cheering — after a striking address from 
 the Connecticut Chaplain. 
 
 Meanwhile the country was waiting to hear that the army had 
 dislodged Gage from Boston, and wondering why it so seldom 
 fired a cannon. It was because it had no powder — it could 
 not afford to fire — the army had not five rounds of powder a 
 man ! 
 
 For six months Washington maintained a post within musket- 
 shot of the British army in Boston, without cannon, without 
 
 and shot, and making saltpetre to keep the gun-powder mills at work next 
 autumn and winter." — Extract of a Letter from Philadelphia, July 10, from 
 a Gentlevia7i of consideration and fortune. 
 
 ^ "It is very diverting to vfalk among the camps. They are as different in 
 their forms, as the owners are in their dress ; and every tent is n portraiture 
 of the temper and taste of the persons who encamp in it. Some are made of 
 boards, and some are made of sail-cloth ; some are partly of one, and partly 
 of the other. Again, some are made of stone and turf, brick and brush. Some 
 are thrown up in a hurry, others curiously wrought with wreathes and withes." — 
 Rev. William Emerson. 
 
THE BLOCKADE OF BOSTON 381 
 
 powder,! without money. As he lay awake at night, devising how 
 to feed his army, how to clothe it, and how to arm it, he thought 
 how much happier he would have been if he had enlisted as a 
 private. He had done all he could— all that did not cost hard 
 money, but only hard labour. He had strengthened his works. 
 He had established discipline. There was now "the strictest 
 government." There were prayers every morning, and after 
 prayers the Orders of the Day were read. " Everybody was made 
 to know his place, and keep it," or be tied up and receive thirty 
 lashes. Lee was credited with this severity. Ward commanded 
 the right wing, Lee the left, Putnam the centre. One day 
 1400 riflemen marched in from Pennsylvania, Virginia, and 
 Maryland — bush-fighters and sharpshooters, many of them over 
 six feet in height — giants in fringed frocks and round hats. One 
 company was led by Dan Morgan, who had been a waggoner 
 in Braddock's expedition. 
 
 To the British in Boston, the Provincials appeared "very 
 audacious"; but on the 4th of August, while Washington was 
 thinking of trying to force a general action, he discovered that 
 he had just nine cartridges a man ! The Committee of Supplies 
 had forgotten to allow for what had been expended ; so instead 
 of 300 barrels of powder there were only 32. Washington sent 
 everywhere for powder. For a fortnight he hardly dared breathe. 
 Even when a supply came from the Jerseys, it would only have 
 served for one day of a general action. Congress was always 
 writing to know why he was so inactive — why he did not drive 
 the British out of Boston, and he dared not tell them why, lest 
 a bird of the air should carry the truth to Boston. One morning 
 he looked from the window of his quarters, and saw General 
 Putnam riding up with a stout woman en croupe behind him. 
 For the only time in the campaign Washington laughed. But 
 it was no laughing matter — the woman had been detected playing 
 go-between from someone in Camp to Major Kane in Boston. 
 She had a letter written in cypher. Threats and persuasion drew 
 from her that it was from Dr. Benjamin Church, one of the " Sons 
 of Liberty," a member of the House of Representatives, now 
 Surgeon-General to the Camp. He was arrested, but a friend 
 had had time to get at his papers — nothing was found, and he 
 
 ^ Franklin thought bows and arrows might be reintroduced with good effect. 
 "1st. because a man may shoot as truly with a bow as with a common gun. 
 2ndly. He can discharge four arrows in the time of charging and discharging 
 one bullet." With other reasons perfectly valid in the then state of fire-arms. — 
 Franklin to General Lee, Philadelphia, February li, 1776. 
 
382 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 tried to excuse the letter (which proved to be a description of 
 the Provincial army) by saying he wished to exaggerate its 
 numbers to prevent the British from attacking.^ 
 
 The little seaport towns had fitted out cruisers to check the 
 marauding of Captain Wallace and other British officers. One of 
 these cruisers belonged to the small town of Falmouth (now 
 Portland) in Maine. On the nth of October Lieutenant Mowatt 
 appeared before the town with several armed vessels, and gave 
 the inhabitants two hours "to remove the human species" — 
 after which a red pennon from the main-top-gallant would give 
 the signal for destruction. To a deputation of the inhabitants he 
 said that Admiral Graves had ordered the burning of every town 
 from Boston to Halifax — adding that he expected New York was 
 by that time in ashes. Next day the people of Falmouth stood 
 on the heights while the ships opened fire. The bombardment 
 went on all day ; then the vessels in harbour were destroyed or 
 carried off, and Mowatt left the people to go back to the smoking 
 ruins of their horhes. After this Washington posted 700 men 
 in the towns and villages along the coasts, to prevent such 
 depredations as far as possible. 
 
 On the last day of the year the last enlistments expired. 
 " The desire of retiring to a chimney-corner seized them " — they 
 could not be persuaded to stay. 
 
 Early in January, 1776, a great stir was observed in Boston 
 Harbour — it was evidently a preparation for embarking troops. 
 A squadron set sail. Washington guessed what it all meant. 
 Last October letters from London had been laid before Congress, 
 detailing a ministerial plan for cutting the rebellion in two by 
 seizing New York and Albany. If this could be done, com- 
 munications would be cut off between North and South ; the 
 rebel garrisons in Canada would be starved out; Johnson and 
 the Indians could swoop down on New England, and the result 
 must be the raising of the siege of Boston. The plan was to 
 be accomplished by the aid of the Tories of New York and 
 Long Island — already banded together in arms, and in close 
 correspondence with Governor Tryon, still on board the Duchess 
 of Gordon. 
 
 Washington naturally thought the movement at Boston was 
 connected with this design. General Lee was eager to under- 
 
 ' Church was imprisoned, but as his health was delicate he was soon allowed 
 to leave the country. He sailed for the West Indies, but the ship was never 
 heard of again. Paul Revere had had suspicions of the Doctor — he knew that 
 someone was betraying what passed at the meetings of the "Sons of Liberty." 
 
THE BLOCKADE OF BOSTON 383 
 
 take the securing of New York, but Congress — much better at 
 drawing up remonstrances and framing constitutions than at 
 making war— could not make up its mind. Washington was not 
 sure his authority extended so far. John Adams thought it did, 
 and at length Lee was sent. Congress ordered the enlistment 
 of troops for the security of New York, and then — ^just as the 
 attack on the Tories of Long Island was about to be made — 
 ordered disbandment. At last, on the 4th of February, Lee arrived 
 in New York, and the same day Sir Peter Parker's squadron, 
 which the besiegers had seen leaving Boston, put into harbour, 
 with Sir Henry Clinton on board.^ The city had been thrown 
 into a terrible panic when the loyalists were to be attacked; it 
 was now more terrified still, and many removed their goods into 
 the country.^ But Clinton's errand was not with New York — he 
 was going south. He had merely looked in, he said, on a short 
 visit to his friend the Governor, and to see how matters stood — 
 he would not stay — he had no troops with him, and he pledged 
 his honour that none were coming. Lee was vowing that if 
 Clinton set a single house on fire he would chain a hundred 
 loyalists by the neck, "and make that house their funeral pyre." 
 The unhappy New Yorkers did not know which General to be 
 more afraid of. But Lee was one of those whose bark is worse 
 than their bite. 
 
 Clinton went on to South Carolina ; and the rebels set about 
 the defences of the Hudson. There is a grand defile, fifteen miles 
 long, where the river winds between "forest-clad mountains and 
 rocky promontories." Two forts, Washington and Montgomery, 
 about six miles apart, had been begun there last autumn, as soon 
 as the letter from London was known. 
 
 Lee now made a strong redoubt at Horen's Rock, opposite 
 Hell Gate, to prevent an enemy from passing between the main- 
 land and Long Island. "What to do with this city," he wrote, 
 "puzzles me. It is so encircled with deep navigable water, that 
 whoever commands the sea, commands the town." It was so 
 indeed, and the town lived in terror of a bombardment. Mean- 
 while Lee freely " weeded out " Tories, until a British officer said 
 he had driven out "all the well-affected people. ... To see the 
 vast number of houses shut up, one would think the city almost 
 
 1 Clinton was related to the Duke of Newcastle. His father had been 
 Governor of New York. 
 
 2 "All that day and all that night were there carts going and boats loading, 
 and women and children crying, and distressed voices heard in the roads in 
 the dead of the night." —Le/ier quoted by Irving, "Life of Washinglon." 
 
384 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 evacuated. Women and children are scarcely to be seen in the 
 streets." The troops took possession of any house for quarters 
 that they found shut up. Lee did a great deal to strengthen this 
 indefensible place, but early in March he was sent to South 
 Carolina to take the command against Clinton. 
 
 On the ist of January, 1776, the new flag was unfurled — it had 
 thirteen stripes — one for each colony. By now Washington had 
 not 10,000 men. Next day, however, a piece of fortune befell 
 him — a large brigantine, the Nancy, full of arms and ammunition, 
 was taken, and the stores were brought into camp — 2000 Tower 
 muskets, 100,000 flints, 30,000 round shots, and 30 tons of bullets, 
 together with a monster mortar, which Putnam christened " The 
 Congress." But she split the third time she was fired. And on 
 the 1 6th came news from Schuyler — the assault on Quebec had 
 failed, Montgomery was killed and Arnold wounded. 
 
 At last, in February, Washington had organised his army — 
 recruiting it amidst all the difficulties that attend a citizen army 
 which will serve only under officers of its own choice. He drew 
 his lines closer and closer. Putnam — always crying out for 
 powder — -powder ! — was entrenched on Cobble Hill, and was 
 mounting the huge brass mortar taken in the brigantine, ready 
 to bombard Boston. The marshes were frozen over. Washington 
 was only waiting for Knox to bring the cannon from Ticonderoga. 
 At last, far in February, it came — 43 cannon, dragged through the 
 frozen forests and over the lakes of Canada, on " strong sleds,'' by 
 eighty oxen. 
 
 Washington meant to take Dorchester Heights first, and then 
 Nook Hill, close to the town — the familiar names bring the un- 
 natural character of the conflict into terrible relief ! The day was 
 to be the anniversary of the " massacre." Minute-men came in 
 from all the countryside ; and to divert the attention of the besieged 
 a heavy cannonade was kept up for two nights. The wife of John 
 Adams has left a record of how the awful sounds struck on the 
 hearts of non-combatants. 
 
 Harassed by small-pox,^ and sickly from the want of fresh 
 provisions, the British in Boston thought England had forgotten 
 them. "We are shamefully neglected," wrote Dr. Oliver. "If 
 10,000 troops had been sent last fall, the matter would have been 
 over." The besieged relieved their ennui by theatrical representa- 
 tions. One of these — said to be written by General Burgoyne — 
 was called " The Blockade of Boston." It made great fun of the 
 
 ' Howe forbade inoculation because it spread the disease. He had been 
 advised to cease firing upon the rebels, as it only inured them to danger ! 
 
THE BLOCKADE OF BOSTON 385 
 
 Provincials— Washington was represented as a "hedge-general" 
 in ragged regimentals, with a huge wig, and a long rusty sword: 
 Just as this personage came on the stage, a sergeant rushed on 
 behind him, exclaiming, " The Yankees are attacking our works on 
 Bunker's Hill ! " It was the beginning of Washington's attack, and 
 the guard at Charlestown had been surprised. 
 
 The regular bombardment began on the 2nd of March. On 
 the evening of the 4th, General Thomas began to entrench a line 
 along Dorchester Neck. As on that other March night, the moon 
 was shining, but there was a slight haze, and the cannonade of the 
 Provincials so engaged the attention of the garrison, that even those 
 who were watching the flight of the shells did not suspect what was 
 going on, till the dawn showed two strong redoubts crowning the 
 two hills. Howe said they " must have been the work of at least 
 12,000 men"; and to his officers they seemed almost the effect of 
 enchantment.! He called a Council of War. It was resolved to 
 try to dislodge the enemy, and Percy was sent with 2400 men to 
 attack Dorchester Heights. But he got no farther than the Castle 
 — then a great gale sprang up from the south, and, raging all night, 
 drove some of his transports ashore. The Americans had floating 
 batteries, and boats ready to carry 4000 men into Boston. On 
 the morning of the 6th — the storm had scarcely abated — a second 
 Council advised instant evacuation. There was no time to make 
 special terms for the refugees, but the Selectmen were allowed to 
 go to the enemy's outposts, and come to what informal arrange- 
 ment they could. Before they went, Howe told them he saw that 
 Mr. Washington was determined to have the town ; and as Boston 
 was of no consequence to the King's service, he would abandon it, 
 if Mr. Washington would not disturb his embarkation — it was a 
 pity so fine a town should be burnt. And he showed them the 
 combustibles he had laid ready for firing it. Washington would 
 make no promises whatever ; but the arrangement suited him very 
 well — the truth being that his great cannonade had again almost 
 exhausted his powder. It was understood that if the British did 
 not attempt to fire the town, they might embark unmolested. So 
 all Howe's army — according to his orderly book, which fell into 
 the hands of the Provincials, it was 7575 strong, exclusive of the 
 staff, the marines, and the sailors — began to embark at 3 o'clock 
 on the morning of the 8th. All the iron ordnance on the Neck 
 and Bunker's Hill had to be left — also all the artillery horses, 
 " which General Howe had not time to put on board ship." He 
 
 ' "They were all raised during the night, with an expedition equal to that 
 of the genii belonging to Aladm's wonderful lamp. " 
 VOL. I. — 25 
 
386 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 threw into the sea two bombs for the same reason. "The con- 
 fusion was very great." " The people of the town, who were friends 
 to Government, took care of nothing but their merchandise," says 
 a letter written on board H.M.S. Chatham, on March 24; and not 
 only made the men belonging to the transports embark their goods, 
 but filled several of these vessels with private property, instead of 
 with the King's stores. " It was not like breaking up a camp . . . 
 it was like departing your country, with your wives, your servants, 
 your household furniture, and all your encumbrances." With great 
 difficulty the soldiers, " who thought they were exchanging for the 
 better," were kept from plunder and drink. The 1500 refugees 
 had to be crowded into the transports, and were embarked first. 
 Thirty-seven of them were huddled together on the floor of 
 Hallowell's cabin. Hasty and unsuccessful attempts were made 
 to "burst" the mortars and heavy artillery, and to destroy the 
 small-arms belonging to the town (the arms of which Gage had 
 cheated the people) ; and while this was going on, a Provincial 
 deserter came in and told Howe that Washington was preparing 
 for "a general storm," whereupon all the troops were hurriedly 
 embarked, and even the hospital stores were left behind. Howe 
 blew up Castle William, as he fell down to Nantasket Roads with 
 his 160 transports and the three men-of-war. "The terms of 
 agreement between the two Generals were secret," says another 
 letter with great frankness ; " but it is supposed that nothing was 
 to have been destroyed, and that this breach of it determined 
 the Provincials to enter the town sooner than was intended." 
 Washington entered Boston with drums beating and colours 
 flying, as Howe quitted it. The "colours" were the flag bearing 
 the wprds, " An Appeal to Heaven." 
 
 The army which had cost Great Britain a million sterling 
 thought itself happy to have embarked in safety. On April 8, 
 after a miserable, though luckily short, voyage — for their clothes 
 were all worn out, and it was bitterly cold — the troops reached 
 Halifax, and found it "a cursed cold, wintry place, even yet. 
 Nothing to eat, and less to drink." 
 
CHAPTER XLVl 
 CANADA 
 
 " Sir, — I have already in my letter to you of the 5th inst. , hinted that the time 
 might possibly come when the King, relying upon the attachment of his faithful 
 allies, the Six Nations of Indians, might be under the necessity of calling upon 
 them for their aid and assistance in the present state of America. ... It is 
 therefore, his Majesty's pleasure, that you do lose no time in taking such steps 
 as may induce them to take up the hatchet against his Majesty's rebellious 
 subjects in North America, and to engage them in his IVTajesty's service, upon 
 such a plan as shall be suggested to you by Gen. Gage, to whom this letter is 
 sent, accompanied with a large assortment of goods for presents to them, upon 
 this important occasion." — Lord Dartmouth to Colonel Johnson, his Majesty's 
 Indian Agent, July 24, 1775. 
 
 "Quebec, Aug. 10, 1775. — About three weeks ago Col. Guy Johnson, his 
 Majesty's Superintendent of Indian affairs, arrived at Montreal, accompanied by 
 a considerable number of Chiefs and Warriors of the Six Nations ; after which 
 he held a General Congress with the Chiefs and Warriors of the Canada Con- 
 federacy, to the amount of 1700, who, in presence of his Excellency Gen. 
 Carleton, unanimously resolved to support their engagements with his Majesty, 
 and remove all intruders on the several communications. " 
 
 "The people of South Carolina, in turning rebels to their king, have lost all 
 faith ; when opportunity offers, make the Indians take arms against his Majesty's 
 enemies, and distress them all in their power. Supply them with what they 
 want, be the expense what it will, as every exertion must now be made on the 
 side of Government." — General Gage to Stuart, Indian Agent for the Solithern 
 Department, July, 1775." 
 
 Richard Montgomery, one of the eight Brigadier-Generals ap- 
 pointed by Congress, was an Irishman, of the Montgomerys of 
 BeauHeu. He entered the British Army in 1756, was at the Siege of 
 Louisburg, Cape Breton, and the posts on Lake Champlain. He 
 was also at the capture of Martinique and the Havana. At the 
 Peace, he went to New York, but returned home (with his regiment) 
 in 1765. Then he made the acquaintance of Barrd, Burke, and 
 Fox. In 1772 he sold out, and bought a farm at King's Bridge. 
 Soon after he married. He bought an estate on the Hudson, and 
 was settled in America. In 1775 he was a delegate to the First 
 Provincial Congress at New York ; and in June he " sadly and 
 reluctantly " consented to be made a Brigadier-General. Now he 
 
388 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 came to Canada as second in command. He was in his thirty- 
 ninth year. 
 
 On June i, 1775, Congress had disclaimed the intention of in- 
 vading Canada, and a French translation of their resolution had 
 been circulated. But on June 9 General Carleton proclaimed 
 the American borderers to be rebellious traitors, summoned the 
 French peasantry to serve against them, and engaged as many 
 Indians as he could get.^ His new commission gave him extra- 
 ordinary powers. It authorised him to arm the Canadians and 
 march them out of the country, for the subjugation of the other 
 Colonies. He had even the power to execute all, in all places, 
 whom he should deem rebels. Thus threatened, the Americans 
 thought they might as well attack as wait to be attacked. The 
 result was the expedition of Montgomery, and Arnold's wonderful 
 march. 
 
 In the beginning of September 3000 Provincials under Schuyler 
 marched into Canada. There were other incursions, and there 
 was great independence of the central authority. Ethan Allen 
 thought he could surprise Montreal as he had surprised Ticonderoga, 
 but was himself surprised near Long Point by " a mixed party of 
 regulars, EngHsh residents of Montreal, Canadians and Indians." 
 They were 500, he counted scarcely 100, and after a fight of 
 nearly two hours he and 38 of his men surrendered. General 
 Prescott put him in irons, and sent him to England, where he was 
 imprisoned in Pendennis Castle. 
 
 As was everywhere the case at the beginning of the war, 
 
 1 At the Conference at Montreal, in the summer of 1775, Carleton gave each 
 of the Canadian tribes a hatchet and war-belt. They were afterwards invited to 
 "feast on a Bostonian, and drink his blood." General Schuyler's letter to 
 Congress, firom which the expression is quoted, says that "an ox was roasted 
 for the purpose, a pipe of wine given to drink, and the war-song was sung." 
 " One of the Chiefs of the Six Nations who attended at that Conference accepted 
 a very large black war-belt with a hatchet pictured on it, but would neither eat 
 nor drink, nor sing the war-song." He adds that this belt has now been deUvered 
 up, "by which it is proved that the servants of the Crown have attempted to 
 engage the savages." The ox was jestingly named " Bostonian " — a jest nothing 
 short of a crime, when we remember that the white men who indulged in it 
 knew the customs in war of the red-men with whom they jested. The chief 
 who refused to eat or drink at that unholy feast put the civilised race to shame. 
 
 Great promises were held out. "Quebec, Aug. 3, 1775.— Cap. William 
 Dunbar's company of the Royal Highland Emigrants are promised 2C«3 acres in 
 any province of N. Amer. he shall think proper, the K. to pay the patent 
 fees, Secretary's fees, and Surveyor General ; besides 20 years free of quit- 
 rent, each married man gets 50 acres for his wife, and 50 for each child on same 
 terms, and one guinea levy money as a gratuity." — Remembrancer. 
 
CANADA 389 
 
 Montgomery was hampered for want of powder. But the little Fort 
 of Chambl^e — surrendered to him on October 20, after a siege of a 
 day and a half — supplied him with seventeen cannon and six tons 
 of powder. He defeated Carleton at Longeuil, and on November 2 
 took St Johns, "the key to Montreal." Immediately after Montreal 
 capitulated. Canada seemed to be lost, and the capture of 
 Carleton himself inevitable, deserted as he now was by all except the 
 English immigrants. He wrote to Gage, " I had hopes of holding 
 out for this year, had the savages remained firm ; but now we are on 
 the eve of being overrun and subdued." His despatch home of the 
 26th October was suppressed, and the Gazette informed the public 
 that no news had been received later than the 12th, when Gage 
 left Boston. 
 
 Meanwhile two battalions, led by Colonel Benedict Arnold of 
 Newhaven, — sent by Washington to reinforce Montgomery, — had 
 come up from New England by an untried route, suffering terrible 
 hardships on the way — now rowing painfully against the fierce 
 stream of the Kenebec ; now, at the " carrying-places," unloading 
 the boats and carrying them and their contents on their shoulders, 
 through forest and morass, till they again reached a navigable part 
 and took to the river once more. The "Great Carrying-place" 
 was twelve miles across. On land they were torn by thorns and 
 drenched by the early winter rains. So they went on, through bogs 
 and swamps, by lakes and craggy ravines, up stony mountain-sides, 
 the air growing ever keener, and the snow falling thicker every day, 
 till it seemed as though they would never see the waters of the great 
 Chaudibre Pond. But Arnold had foreseen everything, planned 
 everything ; and at last — when they had come to half a square-inch 
 of raw pork for dinner, and had eaten the dogs and the barber's 
 powder-bag — they came out at Sartigan, twenty-five leagues from 
 Quebec, and saw a human habitation — the first for thirty-one 
 days. They also saw a party of French Canadians bringing the 
 supplies which Arnold had hurried forward to seek. It was time — 
 the invaders were brought so low that they wept for joy. 
 
 This was the 2nd of November — the day Montreal was taken. 
 On the 9th Arnold began to embark his men in canoes, and before 
 daybreak on the 1 5th he had landed them undiscovered at Wolfe's 
 Cove. Unopposed, they cUmbed Wolfe's path to the Plains of 
 Abraham, and summoned Quebec. No reply was given. In 
 Carleton's absence, Cramah^, the Lieutenant-Governor, had put the 
 walls into a good state of defence, and as he had intercepted some 
 of Arnold's letters to Montgomery, he knew pretty well the numbers 
 of his enemy. But the same day Prescott surrendered his flotilla 
 
390 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 of eleven armed vessels, with all the troops and volunteers who 
 had taken refuge with him on hearing of Montgomery's approach. 
 
 The night before, ^ Carleton, disguised as a peasant, and rowing 
 with muffled oars, had slipped past Arnold's guard, where the Sorel 
 falls into the St. Lawrence, and got safe into Quebec. He found 
 the town so disaffected that his first act was to turn out all those 
 who declined to volunteer for its defence. Nothing but the fear of 
 being pillaged by the Provincials caused any of the inhabitants to 
 rally to the Governor. 
 
 Montgomery came up on the 3rd of December ; but the system of 
 short enlistments operated with effects almost as fatal as the want of 
 powder. Many of his men had gone home already, and the engage- 
 ments of the New Englanders expired on the last day of the year. 
 He had only 600 all told, and had been compelled to leave some of 
 these as garrisons. Arnold's 1000 were reduced to 675 by the terrible 
 march. But Quebec was provisioned for eight months — long before 
 that, succour would be sent from England. There was nothing 
 for it, therefore, but to storm, and there was no time to be lost. 
 But a dark night must be waited for, and it did not come till the 
 30th, and then it came with a snowstorm from the north-east. As 
 the Provincials scrambled up the rocks, covered by two feet of snow, 
 they often slipped and fell. All went wrong. A deserter had 
 betrayed the plan to Carleton, all the garrison were sleeping in their 
 clothes, and two-thirds were under arms. The signal for the assault 
 was given half an hour too soon, and served to warn Carleton. 
 Dearborn's company were too late — they had to cross the Charles at 
 high-tide. Another company lost its way in the snow. A young 
 Irishman, who afterwards joined Burgoyne's army as a volunteer, 
 has left us a description of the causeway by which Montgomery 
 made his attack. It was not more than 24 feet wide ; on one side 
 a lofty perpendicular rock, and on the other a steep precipice, 
 without any fence, down to the river. This causeway was defended 
 by two strong barriers — the first was immediately abandoned by 
 the British, and, flushed with success, the Americans rushed on to 
 the second, where two pieces of cannon were concealed, and were 
 fired on their approach. Great numbers were killed and wounded, 
 and many fell down the precipice — the British had orders not to 
 fire till the enemy was close at hand, and as the Americans 
 advanced many abreast they were mown down. Montgomery, 
 leading the way, fell at the first discharge ; the attack was repulsed 
 with loss, and Aaron Burr was one of the few officers not wounded. 
 On the north-west side of the town, Arnold, leading the assault, 
 
 ' November 16-17. 
 
CANADA 391 
 
 was almost immediately wounded. Morgan cut his way into the 
 town, but only to find himself outnumbered, and after a long and 
 stubborn resistance he was compelled to surrender. 
 
 The British loss was small ; that of the Americans about sixty 
 killed and wounded, and three or four hundred prisoners. Carleton 
 used them kindly, and even allowed Morgan to go home on parole. 
 Bitter was the grief for the gallant Montgomery. Even his enemies 
 lamented him. Carleton buried him honourably in Quebec ; 
 Burke and Fox pronounced his eulogy in the House of Commons ; 
 and even North admitted that he was a brave, able, humane, and 
 generous — rebel. 
 
 The assault on Quebec had failed, but Arnold maintained the 
 blockade till spring. His wound, which was in the leg, was very 
 severe, and healed slowly. Like Washington, he was in sore need 
 of men and money — at one time sickness had reduced his force 
 to 500 men. The small-pox raged, and there were neither barracks 
 nor medicines. Arnold did what he could, by intercepting 
 Carleton's supplies and harassing him with alarms. But the 
 Canadians were not now so friendly — they looked on the Americans 
 as intruders, who might spoil them with their new masters. 
 Carleton was a very different Governor from Bernard and Hutchinson 
 — he did not drive his province into rebellion by treating it as if 
 it was just going to rebel. But, sure of reinforcements in spring, 
 he would not hazard a sortie. 
 
 In April, General Wooster came from Montreal with reinforce- 
 ments. Arnold thought Wooster — a very much older man — 
 did not consult him enough on military affairs, and asked leave 
 of absence. He went to Montreal and took command there. 
 Soon General Thomas came to Quebec. The men were in a 
 wretched state, but as soon as the river was clear of ice Thomas 
 devised a scheme for another attack — he would send up a fire-ship 
 with flood-tide, and make the assault when the shipping in harbour 
 was in flames. It was tried on the night of the 3rd of May. The 
 ship came up, and was not observed till close on the shipping. 
 Her crew applied the match to the train and rowed away. But 
 the flames caught her own sails, she did not fetch up, and drifted 
 harmlessly away with the ebb. 
 
 There was now nothing for it but to raise the siege before the 
 British reinforcements arrived. The Provincials were embarking 
 when, on May 6, the Surprise, the Isis, and the Martin came into 
 the Bason, bringing the 29th and the Marines. Carleton called 
 his besiegers " these mighty boasters," but his own despatch shows 
 that they had prevented any supplies coming in, had burnt the 
 
392 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 suburbs, and had kept him in constant expectation of an assault 
 for three months. He did not pursue them on their retreat. 
 
 Now came the affair of the Cedars — in itself unimportant, 
 except for the light it throws on the manner of warfare when 
 Indians were enlisted, and also because it affected the exchange of 
 prisoners throughout the war. 
 
 There was no longer any pretence that Indians were not 
 employed — every effort to enlist them had been ordered by 
 Germaine, and every British force marched accompanied by its 
 bands of Ottawas, Chippeways, Wyandots, Shawnees, and Senecas. 
 
 The Cedars was a small fort on the St. Lawrence, forty miles 
 from Montreal. On the 12th of May, 1776, Captain Forster 
 marched to attack it, with a mixed force of English, Canadians, and 
 " savages " (we did not even shrink from the word) ; wishing " to 
 relieve the citizens of Montreal from the oppressive tyranny of the 
 rebels." Major Butterfield commanded at the fort. Forster sum- 
 moned him to surrender, " while it was yet in his power to save their 
 lives," as, if they delayed, "the savages "could not be restrained. 
 Butterfield refusing, and Forster hearing that a Major Sherburne 
 was advancing with a small force to relieve the post, sent a letter 
 in which he told Butterfield that he had, " by entreaty, overcome the 
 resolution formed by the savages, of allowing no quarters, on your 
 refusing my offer to you." He again invited Butterfield to surrender 
 at discretion, but promised the garrison personal safety ; but " as 
 the disposition of the savages is not very certain,'' advised him to 
 " take advantage of the present favourable terms." ^ Cowed by these 
 threats, and not knowing that relief was coming, Butterfield 
 surrendered. "The savages" had to be allowed "to take the 
 plunder." Being "dissatisfied with the capitulation," they also 
 stripped the prisoners of " some watches and money, and perhaps 
 of a laced hat or two ; but of nothing else, nor did they receive 
 any other insult." At this moment news was brought that " 80 
 savages, aided by 18 Canadians, under the command of M. Maurer, 
 had attacked Sherburne's party, killed 5 or 6 and made 97 
 prisoners." Forster had sent M. de Montigny to harass Sherburne, 
 but the latter was already defeated before the Frenchman could 
 arrive. It is impossible that Sherburne could have been over- 
 whelmed by equal numbers. The Provincial account gives the force 
 which attacked as 500, and says that he was " surrounded." The 
 English Officer continues, apropos of Sherburne : " It is here 
 to be remarked, that they were made prisoners without any 
 stipulation, and that savages ever deem their prisoners as private 
 
 ' " English Officer's Narration," Gentleman s Magazine, 1777; ?■ 68. 
 
CANADA 393 
 
 property, and have, generally, in former wars, sacrificed their 
 prisoners to the manes of their deceased friends." 
 
 "The savages who remained at the Cedars," continues the 
 Ofificer, "had been very unruly, and notwithstanding every effort 
 to prevent them, did strip some of the prisoners." They also 
 " threatened to revenge on them the loss which their friends, then 
 engaged with Sherburne, might sustain ; which happening to be 
 a principal chief of the Senecas, killed, with others of different 
 nations wounded, they became still more violently enraged." "To 
 appease them, individuals were bought from them at high prices," 
 and presents to a considerable amount were given to the friends 
 of the killed and wounded Indians. " All endeavours proved 
 ineffectual with some of the savages, who would not relinquish their 
 prisoners, yet they were but few. The whole number of our 
 prisoners amounted to 487, who, being all lodged together, and 
 the savages insisting on their right to pillage the prisoners taken 
 at Quinchien [Quinze Chene], they could not be prevented from 
 entering the barracks for that purpose, and we do fear they pillaged 
 the prisoners indiscriminately; but they did not otherwise injure 
 them." 
 
 This is the defence — the best story that can be made out for 
 Forster and his " savages." The American account says that " two 
 of the prisoners were put to death " the evening they were taken 
 (perhaps these were the prisoners whom the "savages" would not 
 "relinquish" ), and "four or five others at different times afterwards." 
 One, who was included in the capitulation, was killed on the eighth 
 day after the surrender. "That one was first shot, and while 
 retaining life and sensation was roasted, as related by his 
 companion ; and that several others were left exposed on an island, 
 naked and perishing with cold and hunger." 
 
 This account was published by Congress in the following July, 
 together with the "Narration" of an Officer in the Royal army, 
 quoted above. It is to be observed that Congress was furious 
 with Butterfield for surrendering, and takes care to say that 
 Forster's force consisted of 40 regulars, 100 Canadians, and 500 
 Indians, " and had no cannon," and that the garrison of the Cedars 
 had ammunition and victuals enough to have held out for twenty 
 or thirty days. 
 
 The story had a sequel. The Officer's Narration continues 
 — The prisoners were taken to an island, when it was dis- 
 covered that Arnold was coming to the rescue, and preparing 
 to attack, and in the evening he made a descent on the post, 
 but was repulsed. "Now the savages seemed determined to 
 
394 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 disencumber themselves of their prisoners." To frustrate this 
 inhuman purpose, a flag was sent to Mr. Arnold, "with a cartel for 
 an exchange of prisoners." The American version is that Forster 
 threatened that if Arnold attacked every prisoner should instantly 
 be killed. (The English version — " disencumbering themselves " 
 is not incompatible with this.) After much hesitation, Arnold 
 agreed to the cartel, with an amendment of the article restraining 
 the Americans from again taking arms. Arnold gave four hostages 
 — who were immediately, says the American account, plundered 
 and stripped by the savages ; and Forster gave up his prisoners — 
 except a few Canadians, "as they were to be considered even in a 
 worse light than deserters from his Majesty's army." These were 
 afterwards released. The English Officer admits that while the 
 prisoners were embarking "the savages amusing themselves by the 
 waterside, did fire several muskets," but they did not hurt anybody, 
 nor mean to hurt. He adds that the prisoners who remained with 
 " the savages " were bought from them, at a considerable expense, 
 but were treated by the Indians during their captivity " more like 
 children than prisoners," and if they remain, "do so by choice." 
 The hostages also have been sent home, and are very indignant 
 with their leaders. Thus, from being a set of unmanageable 
 savages at the commencement of the " Narrative," at the end the 
 Indians have become paternal hosts of their involuntary guests.^ 
 
 Congress was so angry with Butterfield for his hasty surrender, 
 that it was only induced even partially to ratify Arnold's agree- 
 ment by the consideration that Sherburne had fought bravely at 
 great odds. For the rest, it resolved that Arnold had ex- 
 ceeded his powers in promising an unconditional exchange, and 
 it refused to give up the British prisoners until the " authors, 
 abettors and perpetrators of the horrid murder committed on the 
 prisoners " were delivered up, and indemnity made for the plunder, 
 — these acts being contrary to the laws of Nations, — with a threat 
 of retaliation in kind if the enemy ill-treat the prisoners remaining 
 with them. For nearly five years Congress persisted in its refusal 
 to reckon the prisoners taken at the Cedars as returned prisoners, 
 and only gave in at last when it was desirable to consent to 
 exchange General Burgoyne. 
 
 After these disasters, Schuyler's position became almost 
 intolerable. Everything was laid to him — he had not got up 
 reinforcements and supplies ; he had let Sir John Johnson go when 
 
 ' This Narrative is attested by Andrew Parke, Capt. in tlie King's 8th 
 Regiment, J. Maurer, and Hugh Mackay. "The truth confirmed by Capt. 
 Forster." 
 
CANADA 395 
 
 he had him in his power. It was even hinted that he was a 
 traitor, and he heard that some of the people in the Hampshire 
 Grants had thought of seizing him as a Tory. The Hampshire 
 Grants were at the bottom of the prejudice against this most 
 respectable and honourable man. He had been one of the 
 Commissioners, and had defended the rights of the New York 
 grantees against the New Englanders — and was never forgiven. 
 Washington, however, stood by him ; and on calmer reflection the 
 Committee of Berkshire County admitted that they had been hasty. 
 But all these heart-burnings did not improve American chances 
 of success. 
 
 Little by little the invaders were being driven out. General 
 Thomas was dead of the small-pox. Sullivan came to take command, 
 and for a moment it seemed as though the Canadians would rally 
 to the Americans after all. Sullivan wrote glowing accounts — he 
 did not know that Burgoyne had arrived with a new army. 
 
CHAPTER XLVIl 
 IN ENGLAND 
 
 " I cannot help thinking these, an oppressed people, asked for nothing more 
 than their legal rights, and that in the most modest and inoffensive manner that 
 the nature of the thing would allow. But, waiving this, I ask : Is it common 
 sense to use force toward the Americans? . . . these men will not be frightened, 
 and they will not be conquered easily. Some of our valiant officers say, ' Two 
 thousand men will clear America of these rebels.' No : nor twenty thousand 
 . . . nor perhaps treble that number. They are strong, they are valiant ; 
 they are one and all enthusiasts ; enthusiasts for liberty ; calm, deliberate 
 enthusiasts. In a short time they will understand discipline as well as their 
 assailants. 
 
 " But you are informed, 'they are divided among themselves.' So was poor 
 Rehoboam informed concerning the ten tribes ; so was Philip informed concern- 
 ing the people of the Netherlands. No : they are terribly united ; they think 
 they are contending for their wives, children, and liberty. "-^i)/4» Wesley to Lord 
 Dartmouth, June, I775' 
 
 " It is with the utmost astonishment that I find any of my subjects capable of 
 encouraging the rebellious disposition which unhappily exists in some of my 
 colonies in North America." — His Majesty's Answer to the Humble Petition 
 presented to him from the City of London, deprecating the War with America, 
 April 10, 1775. 
 
 ' ' We have already expressed to your Majesty our abhorrence of the tyrannical 
 measures pursued against our fellow-subjects in America. ... As we would not 
 suffer any man, or body of men, to establish arbitrary power over us, we cannot 
 acquiesce in any attempt to force it upon any part of our fellow-subjects." — The 
 Humble Address, Remonstrance, and Petition of the Lord Mayor, Aldermen, 
 and Livery of the City of London, agreed to in Common Hall, June 24, 
 I77S- 
 
 Governor Hutchinson was in the confidence of Ministers, 
 and his Diary of this date is particularly interesting for the glimpses 
 it affords us behind the scenes. All the alternations of public 
 feeling are there recorded. Thus in February, 1775, he writes, 
 "Administration is tender, doubting, and undermined. Opposi- 
 tion — or rather Lord Chatham — resolute and determined." 
 Hillsborough complains to him of "the langour about America," — 
 all owing, says the ex-Colonial Secretary, to North's aversion to 
 
 396 
 
IN ENGLAND 397 
 
 business.1 The Punitive Bills scared Hutchinson. Of the Port 
 Bill he writes, "I had rather no Bill had passed than such a 
 one as this ; as soon as I knew of it, I gave my opinion that 
 it would distress more of the friends than of the enemies to 
 Government." He begged that Boston might be opened, though 
 the other ports were closed. But even this small favour was 
 denied him — "it looks like concession." The "langour" was 
 passing. On May 23 Jenkinson tells him "the kingdom would 
 raise twenty millions a year, rather than concede American 
 claims." Hutchinson hears "one and another of the King's 
 Ministers say there is no receding. And yet to think of going on, 
 makes me shudder." 2 
 
 The first news of Lexington came by Captain Darby on 
 the 28th of May. He had sailed from Marblehead on the 29th 
 of April, and brought the account prepared by Congress. The 
 first governmental news came on June 10, by "a young lieuten- 
 ant who commanded the first party at Lexington." It was a 
 great shock. On the 19th Gibbon told Hutchinson that many 
 who had been strong for the late measures "were much dis- 
 couraged, they having been made to believe there would be no 
 action." Doubtless owing to this " discouragement," a singular 
 rumour presently spread of a second action, in which the 
 Americans had lost 2500 men. Secretary Pownall told Hutchinson 
 of this rumour on the 19th of June — it was a "report from 
 Bristol." On the 24th came the news of Ticonderoga; and 
 now a veritable panic set in. There was a scare of a Spanish 
 fleet. A stranger stopped Hutchinson in the Park, and told him 
 the War Office had heard Gibraltar was taken! On July 18 
 Jenkinson came to ask Hutchinson about the report of a second 
 action — "on June 16" — this time, a letter from Bristol had 
 mentioned the arrival of a lieutenant at Waterford with the 
 news. On the 21st a rumour ran through the town that the 
 Cerberus was arrived — she was known to have sailed on the i8th 
 of June — and had brought news of a great battle — "the regulars 
 lost 2000, the provincials 5000." But the Cerberus did not come 
 till the 25th, and these premature rumours remain unexplained.^ 
 
 ' "Nothing kept him from resigning but the love of money, and his father's 
 desire that he would keep in till all his connexions were provided for, and they 
 are numerous. " — Diary, February, 1775. 
 
 ^ Three years after this, Hillsborough told Hutchinson that North was ' ' a 
 good man, but apt to resolve suddenly, and then repent when he finds it more 
 difficult than he expected. " 
 
 ^ " On — or before — the 19th of July a rumour spread— traced to a vessel just 
 come from New England — of an action on June 23, more bloody than that 
 
398 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 " It was a dear victory," says Hutchinson in recording 
 it.i 
 
 The New York Remonstrance had already (May 15) been 
 censured by the House, and left with no answer. The King 
 now recalled Gage, and appointed General Howe in his room — 
 the last Royal Governor of Massachusetts Bay. He next set 
 about raising troops — Scotch Highlanders, Irish Papists, Canadians, 
 Indians, all were to be employed. By the 4th of August he had 
 got five battalions from his Electorate — he explains to North 
 that this will be cheaper than raising them at home; above all, 
 there will be no half-pay afterwards ! 
 
 The immediate effect of the resistance of the Colonies was 
 a lightening of the oppression under which Ireland had groaned 
 ever since William the Deliverer "restored" liberty to England, 
 and riveted Ireland's chains. Ireland was still classed with 
 the Colonies — Congress invited her to join in their protest. 
 The British Government had so far learned a lesson from 
 America as to perceive that this was not a favourable moment 
 for keeping its foot down on Ireland. The repeal of the 
 Penal Laws began to be considered, and in July Congress 
 sent a message to Ireland expressing " inalterable sympathy," 
 and joy that the trials of America had extorted some mitigation 
 of Ireland's wrongs.^ Those who resist oppression anywhere, 
 aid the cause of the oppressed everywhere. 
 
 On the 6th of July Congress adopted a very remarkable 
 
 of the 17th. On July 20 'a letter received at a capital house in the city,' con- 
 tained an imperfect account of the engagement near Boston, in which it was 
 said, that 5000 of the provincials were either killed or wounded, with a consider- 
 able loss on the part of the regulars. This account was reported to have come 
 by a ship arrived at Whitehaven. Another account was received about the same 
 time, which differs but little from the former in ascertaining the loss of the pro- 
 vincials ; that of the regulars was said to be 3000. Whether these letters were 
 real or imaginary, they came from two different quarters of the kingdom ; and 
 one of them fixes the very day on which the battle was fought. " — Remembrancer, 
 
 P- 349- 
 
 ^ A story went that when the news of Bunker's Hill came, the King sum- 
 moned a private council of Jenkinson, Lord Barrington, and another. "His 
 Majesty seemed highly displeased when it was over; supped on a potato and 
 a glass of water, his usual food when things go wrong." The King was so 
 impressed by seeing his Uncle of Cumberland die at forty-four of a com- 
 plication of diseases brought on by corpulence, that he was very sparing in 
 his diet. 
 
 ^ The Bishop of Derry wrote to Dartmouth that he believed the rebellious 
 spirit of America was due to "the exportation from Ireland of nearly 33,000 
 fanatical and hungry republicans in the course of a few years." — May 23, 
 1775- 
 
IN ENGLAND 399 
 
 document — a Declaration of the Causes of their taking up 
 Arms.i They then drew up Appeals to the Inhabitants of Great 
 Britab, and to the People of Ireland. They had before appealed 
 to Canada. Lastly, they adopted the Petition to the King — to 
 be the last. They called it "an Olive Branch." On July 12 
 Richard Penn, a former Governor of Pennsylvania, and Dr. 
 Arthur Lee, embarked with it for England. 
 
 When Penn arrived, on August 11, not a single Minister sent 
 for him, or asked him a single question. The King would not 
 see him. "The King and his Cabinet," said Suffolk, when 
 approached to hear Penn, "are determined to listen to nothing 
 from the illegal Congress." They will only treat with the Colonies 
 "one by one." A Proclamation was getting ready, and the 
 King was blaming North for delay. On August 29 this Proclam- 
 ation was read in Palace Yard and at Temple Bar by the Heralds ; 
 and at the Exchange by one of the Lord Mayor's ofificers, attended 
 only by the Common Crier — for Lord Mayor Wilkes would not 
 have the horses out, nor allow the mace to be carried. The 
 Proclamation prohibited all intercourse with the Colonies — it was, 
 in fact, a Declaration of War. After it was read "there was a 
 general hiss."^ When at last — on September i — Penn was 
 "permitted" to hand "the Olive Branch" to Dartmouth, he 
 was told there would be no answer. 
 
 Chatham was ill again — the mysterious cloud had descended 
 once more, and his voice was silent. But during the session 
 of 1775-6, witnesses to justice and common-sense were not 
 wanting. The strangest was the Duke of Grafton, who had 
 reluctantly remained in the Cabinet till now. Before Parliament 
 met he had a long interview with the King, and assured his 
 Majesty that he was being deluded by Ministers who were them- 
 selves deluded. The King condescended to tell him that a 
 large body of German troops would join the British force. " Your 
 Majesty," replied Grafton, "will find too late that twice the 
 number will only increase the disgrace, and never effect the 
 purpose." 
 
 The Recorder of London put on mourning for the Provincials 
 slain at Lexington. 
 
 1 The Petition, and the "Causes of Taking up Arms," were written by 
 Dickinson, of the Farmer s Letters. See end of Chapter. 
 
 ^ The Public Advertiser of June 9, 1775, mentions "a collection of ;^ I CO 
 by some of the Constitutional Society, 'for the widows, orphans, etc., of the 
 brave Americans inhumanly murdered by the King's troops at Lexington, April 
 19th, 1775, because they preferred death to slavery.' " 
 
400 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Nothing was spared to silence Opposition. Administration set 
 about whispers of treason — directed against particular persons in 
 both Houses. Probably the scare of the 23rd of October 
 suggested to some informer the extraordinary charge against 
 Sayre the banker — a story which by its insensate folly recalls the 
 Meal-Tub Plot.i 
 
 Terrible things were said in the course of the Debates. 
 Lyttleton, a former Governor of South Carolina, said "the 
 Southern Colonies were weak, on account of the number of 
 negroes in them." He intimated that, if a few regiments were 
 sent there,2 "the negroes would rise, and embrue their hands in 
 the blood of their masters." He was against "any concihatory 
 offers . . . the colonists ought to be conquered, and then to have 
 mercy shown them. Parcere subjectis.'' Rigby said he would 
 vote for the Address, " because it sanctified coercive measures. 
 America must be conquered." In vain Adair urged that the 
 colonists should be taken at their word, and put back to 
 the footing of 1763. The Address was carried by 278 to no in 
 the Commons — in the Lords, by two to one. The same day the 
 University of Oxford addressed the King, and spoke of the 
 Americans as "a people who had forfeited their Hves and 
 fortunes." On November 10 Richard Penn was examined at 
 the Bar of the House of Lords, on the wish of America for a 
 peaceful settlement.^ Richmond moved that the Petition be 
 
 ^ On October 23, three days before Parliament met, "thousands of 
 incendiary papers were dispersed, inciting the people to rise and prevent the 
 meeting of Parliament." (Walpole, Last Journals.) The guard was trebled, 
 and the Justices of Westminster distributed papers to let the people know the 
 Court was prepared for any attempt. The same day Stephen Sayre, a London 
 banker, an American born, was arrested and sent to the Tower for high 
 treason. People at first supposed he had been sending money to the insurgents — 
 but the charge was that he designed to seize the King, as he went to the House 
 of Lords, hurry him to the Tower, and thence out of the kingdom ! Only one 
 witness spoke to this story, and no shadow of proof of any preparation was 
 ever offered — it was alleged that a few sergeants had been bribed. The story 
 spread through the kingdom like wildfire ; but in a few days Sayre was 
 brought up before the Lord Chief Justice, who let him be bailed in three 
 recognisances of only ^^500 each ! Sayre afterwards recovered p^iooo damages 
 in an action against Lord Rochford for false imprisonment. 
 
 ^ On the i6th of October, 1775, the King wrote to Lord North that when 
 two regiments should be sent to Ireland in December, there would remain but 
 four battalions in Britain. 
 
 ^ "Such scandalous jobs have prevailed, as on repetition would put common 
 honesty to the blush. Scarcely a day has passed wherein I have not received 
 several letters, some from private soldiers, others from officers, all of which 
 have unfolded scenes of singular iniquity. ... A most chimerical design was 
 
IN ENGLAND 401 
 
 accepted as a ground for conciliation. Two to one voted against 
 him. 
 
 On November i Lord George Germaine was made Colonial 
 Secretary. This man had been cashiered by a court-martial for 
 cowardice at Minden. His friends said he had only erred through 
 temper, and ill-will to Prince Ferdinand. George 11 had scratched 
 him off the list of Privy Councillors with his own hand. It was 
 almost the first act of George iii and Bute to reinstate him ; and 
 no one action of the Favourite had more deeply disgusted Pitt. 
 He would never sit with Sackville at the Council-Board. If 
 there was a worse Colonial Secretary than Weymouth, Germaine 
 was that worse. His rancorous dislikes were a serious hindrance 
 to public business. He pursued Carleton with his resentment, and 
 did his best to thwart the great efforts that general made to save 
 Canada. It was Germaine's way to demand the impossible, and 
 then to throw the blame of the inevitable failure on his sub- 
 ordinates. With an irritating love for minutis, he was not even 
 methodical — we shall see that he was guilty of the most astound- 
 ing piece of neglect known in all our history. He did all the 
 more harm because he often spoke well, had some ability, and 
 a lack of sympathy which shallow minds mistook for firmness.^ 
 
 Somehow or other he seemed to put spirit into Ministers, 
 while Opposition seemed to lose heart. Even the coming over 
 of the Duke of Grafton did them no good. Horace Walpole has 
 left a bitter description of the North Ministry as it was in 1776. 
 He was a harsh critic, but the main features of his criticism 
 cannot be denied.^ 
 
 some time since on the tapis. It was proposed to send light horse to America. 
 I had the curiosity to enquire. ... I was told there was a. precedent. ... I 
 was referred to Lord Oxford's letter to Queen Anne. In that curious piece 
 the noble lord ascribes his misfortunes to a job of this nature. The sum of 
 ;^20,ooo was charged in an account for an ideal project of this kind. Lord 
 Oxford exclaimed against the measure, but he was over-ruled by the Lord 
 Chancellor, who roundly asserted, 'that no government was worth serving, 
 that would not let them make those advantages, and get such jobs.'" — 
 Lord Shelbwne in the House of Lords, on the Petition of the American Congress, 
 November lo, 1775. (When Mr. Richard Penn was examined at the Bar.) 
 
 1 He was a son of the Duke of Dorset (Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland), and was 
 Lord George Sackville until Lady Betty Germaine left him her fortune and her 
 name. 
 
 * " Lord North was a pliant tool, without system or principle ; Lord George 
 Germaine of desperate ambition and character ; Wedderburn a thorough knave ; 
 Lord Sandwich a more profligate knave ; Lord Gower a villain capable of any 
 crime ; Elliot, Jenkinson, Cornwall, mutes that would have fixed the bowstring 
 round the throat of the Constitution. The subordinate crew to name is to 
 
402 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 The King's Speech had spoken of small forces to be sent to 
 America. But it presently leaked out that he had written with 
 his own hand to Catherine ii, for any number of Cossacks, from 
 five to twenty thousand, and carte blanche for the terms. Also 
 that " Sister Kitty," as Gibbon called her, had refused, with some- 
 thing less than the civility usual between Sovereigns.^ Fierce were 
 the Opposition speeches against the employment of foreign troops 
 — the bad precedent, the danger to liberty, and the enormous 
 cost. Opposition were but a little band, and their ranks were 
 every now and then thinned, as North succeeded in buying over 
 one more to support Administration, but they made a stubborn 
 fight, and disputed every inch of the poHtical battlefield. Bill 
 
 stigmatise ; they were Dr. Johnson, the pilloried Shebbeare, Sir John Dalrymple, 
 and Macpherson ! The pious though unconscientious Dartmouth had been laid 
 aside . . . Lord Barrington remained to lie officially ; Lord Weymouth had acceded 
 with all his insensibility to honour, and by acceding had given new edge to 
 Thurlow, who was fit to execute whatever was to be done. Almost every Scot 
 was ready to put his sickle to the harvest, and every Jacobite country gentleman 
 exulted in the prospect of reversing on the Whigs and Dissenters all their 
 disappointments since the Revolution ; and they saw a prince of the House of 
 Brunswick ready to atone for all the negative hurt his family had done to their 
 ancestors. . . . There was still another body ready to profit by the restoration 
 of Stuart views — the bishops and clergy. How deeply and joyfully they waded 
 into a civil war on the Constitution and on Dissenters, let their votes, addresses, 
 and zeal for the war declare ! " — Walpole, Last Journals, ii. 5. 
 
 " Lord George Germaine, as was foreseen, set out with spirit, seizing two 
 chests of letters that were going out by a common ship to America." — Ibid. 
 
 Germaine was a tall, large-made man, with a powerful voice. He sometimes 
 spoke well. He had a great advantage over North, in that his sight was very 
 good, whereas North could hardly see clearly across the table. By this means, 
 Germaine could judge of the temper of the House — see who was there, and know 
 when to let a debate "drag," and when to close it. But his temper was very 
 bad, and when he was angry he blurted out Government secrets. It was 
 therefore the object of Opposition, when they wished to know what North would 
 not tell, to insult Germaine, until he fell into a rage, and made indiscreet 
 admissions. Even the King complained of his rancours and enmities, often 
 harboured against the best officers. 
 
 Shelburne says that "a Mr. Carter, a shrewd old man, once observed young 
 George Sackville at table, when a dispute occurred, and on his return to Ireland 
 (Carter was Master of the Rolls for Ireland), advised the Duke of Dorset — then 
 Lord-Lieutenant — whatever he did with his son, not to put him in the army." 
 Shelburne thinks if the Duke had acted on this advice, Sackville would certainly 
 have come to be Prime Minister, and have ruined the empire. — Shelburne's 
 A utobiography. 
 
 ' " The letter of the Empress is a clear refusal, and not in so genteel a manner 
 as I should have thought might have been expected from her. She has not 
 had the civility to answer in her own hand, and has thrown out some expres- 
 sions that may be civil to a Russian ear, but certainly not to more civilized ones. " 
 — The King to Lord North, November 3, 1775. 
 
IN ENGLAND 403 
 
 after Bill of " Propositions for Conciliation " was moved and lost. 
 On November 16 Burke's "Composing Bill" was debated.' 
 Governor Pownall took a strange line. " If we are to repeal all 
 Acts which grant duties as revenue, in 1696, not in 1764, was 
 the system changed." In King William's time a tax of 6d. a 
 month was laid on American seamen, for augmenting the 
 revenues of Greenwich Hospital. By the loth Anne, the Post 
 Office granted duties in America to enable her Majesty to 
 carry on the war with France. Let gentlemen who doubt 
 whether before 1764 duties were ever appropriated to revenue, 
 refer to the Civil List Act, ist George i, — there they will find that 
 the plantation duties granted by the 25th Car. 11 to the King 
 and his heirs, are to be paid into the Exchequer, to form a fund 
 for the Civil List. It is therefore of no use to repeal only Acts 
 since 1764! They should ask for the repeal of everything since 
 1672. 
 
 On the 20th of November North brought in his " Prohibitory 
 Bill" — usually called "the Capture Bill,'' because one clause 
 authorised the seizure of every species of American property 
 found floating on the sea, or in ports or harbours, and the sharing 
 of the spoil among the captors. This the Duke of Manchester 
 declared was "a direct violation of that yet sacred palladium of 
 our liberties, the Bill of Rights." It was also objected that the 
 Bill would ruin the West Indian planters — whose goods were 
 already embarked, and could not be recalled. A member who 
 had much at stake insisted on being heard on this — the House 
 trying to shout him down. Under this Act, also, prisoners taken 
 in American ships could be compelled to fight against their 
 countrymen. 
 
 Recruiting was not brisk — to the credit of the Englishmen of 
 that day, the American service was not popular. It was even 
 said that at Bunker's Hill the regulars had with difficulty been 
 got to fire on men who spoke their own language. Nor were 
 the Irish eager to enlist. The King was compelled to try 
 Germany — the only country which sold its people for soldiers. 
 Besides his own 2355 Hanoverians, he bought 4636 Brunswickers 
 of the "most serene Duke," at thirty crowns Banco per head levy 
 money, the crown to be reckoned at 4s. gfd. ; pay to be the same 
 as for the royal troops; every man killed to be paid for at the 
 rate of levy money, and three wounded men to reckon as one 
 
 ' "No Englishmen, except the members, were admitted during this debate ; 
 the only strangers in the gallery were four women of quality, and a few 
 foreigners." — Mdrning Chronicle, quoted in Pari. Hist. XV 11 I, p. 963. 
 
404 ENGLATSfD AND AMERICA 
 
 killed. Sick and wounded to be taken care of in British 
 hospitals. Besides the levy money, the King was to grant his 
 " most serene Highness " an annual subsidy, to commence from the 
 day the Treaty was signed — 64,500 German crowns a year, as 
 long as the troops "enjoyed" the pay, and double that amount 
 when the pay ceased — this double subsidy to continue for two 
 years after the troops should return to Brunswick. 
 
 His Most Serene Highness, the terrible Landgrave of Hesse 
 Cassel, demanded higher terms, and was so violent that he fright- 
 ened Faucitt, the King's Agent, into accepting them. The double 
 subsidy was to be paid from the day the Treaty was signed till 
 it expired. For his 12,000 men the Landgrave asked 450,000 
 crowns per annum,' and a year's notice, the notice not to be given 
 till the troops actually arrived within his dominions. He would 
 not even let the British Government do the clothing of these 
 levies. Another Most Serene Highness, the Reigning Count of 
 Hanau, sold 668 of his subjects at the same rate per head, and a 
 subsidy of 25,000 crowns, with the year's notice as before. Then 
 there were the Waldeckers and the Anspachers. All these petty 
 sovereigns were to be guaranteed against attack while their armies 
 were away bringing America to reason. Frederick the Great 
 heartily detested the business, said he was glad he had no 
 
 1 Thirty crowns were about £■], 43. 4d., so 450,000 crowns were equal 
 to ;fio8,250. The Landgrave's treaty was in force about ten years, so he 
 made ;^ 1,200,000 on the transaction. These high terms were paid that the 
 troops might be ready by February. They were ready by the 15th, but they 
 came in private ships, that interested people might levy a commission on 
 the contractors, so the first detachment of Brunswickers did not sail from 
 England till April 4 — and yet reached Quebec before the first of the Hessians 
 were out of the Channel. More tragic incidents are commemorated in 
 Schiller's Kabak mid Liebe. 
 
 "Lady Milford. What did these jewels cost ? 
 
 " Valet. Nothing. 
 
 " Lady M. Did you say these precious jewels cost nothing ? 
 
 " Valet. Yesterday, seven thousand children of the land left their homes 
 for America — they pay for all. 
 
 '■'Lady M. What distresses you, old man? you are weeping? 
 
 " Valet. Yes ; for those jewels — my two sons are among the number. 
 
 " Lady M. But they went not on compulsion ? 
 
 " Valet. Oh dear no ! they were all volunteers. There were certainly 
 some few forward lads who pushed to the front of the ranks and inquired 
 at what price the Prince sold his subjects per yoke. Upon which our 
 gracious ruler ordered the regiments to be marshalled on parade, and the 
 malcontents to be shot. We heard the report of the muskets, and saw 
 brains and blood spirting about while the whole band shouted — 'Hurrah for 
 America I ' " 
 
IN ENGLAND 405 
 
 colonies, and swore he would make the levies pay toll as cattle 
 if they came through his dominions — and he did. Some of 
 these human cattle tried to escape. Many deserted on the 
 road — especially in Prussia. The Brunswickers fled to Hanover. 
 The Anspachers refused to march, and their Prince was obliged 
 to disarm and fetter them, and drive them himself with a whip 
 to the seaside ! On his return from this unpleasant duty he was 
 hooted in every Dutch town he had to pass through. The 
 Hessians, on the contrary, were eager for the unlimited loot pro- 
 mised them by their hirers. Most of the treaties contain a clause 
 that the men shall not be allowed to settle in America without 
 their sovereign's permission. They were too valuable to be lost. 
 
 Great was the misery in England that winter. The weather 
 was uncommonly severe — flocks of sheep were buried in the snow, 
 coaches were overturned or detained on the roads, the mails were 
 late, post-boys and travellers were frozen to death, intercourse 
 between towns was interrupted, and the sufferings of the poor were 
 so great that circular letters were sent to every county and all 
 Justices of the Peace recommending — the carrying out the Act 1 7 
 Geo. II against rogues and vagabonds. 
 
 In January came a report of the capture of Quebec, and certain 
 news, that if not taken, the town was besieged by the Provincials, 
 and the whole province almost lost. When Admiral Graves 
 arrived, he brought news — obtained no one knew exactly how — 
 that the attack had failed, and Montgomery was killed ; but 
 Ministers feared this was too good to be true. As soon as Parlia- 
 ment reassembled, Fox moved for an enquiry into the causes of 
 our ill-success, but the good news was soon confirmed. On March 
 II, on the terrible subject of the Army Extraordinaries, Burke told 
 the House that the 40,000 men who conquered Canada for England 
 cost less than the 8000 now cooped up, starved and disgraced, in 
 the town of Boston. 1 Then he referred to Montgomery, " who had 
 conquered two-thirds of Canada in one campaign." Fox also 
 praised Montgomery. North called them both to order for praising 
 a rebel — a brave, able, humane, and generous rebel, it is true, but 
 still only a brave, able, humane, and generous rebel, and that verse 
 from " Cato " might be applied to him — 
 
 "Curse on his virtues, they've undone his country!" 
 
 ^ Barre said so small a body of troops had never cost the nation so much 
 money ; and it was ludicrous to compare Bunker's Hill with Marlborough's 
 victories — the "forcing the lines thrown up by a mob in a summer's night" 
 compared with Blenheim and Schellenburgh ! 
 
406 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Fox said it was not always a disgrace to be called a rebel — all 
 the great saviours of their country in all ages were called rebels ; 
 and they all sat in that House by virtue of a Constitution which 
 they owed to a rebellion — 
 
 "Sunt hie etiam sua prteinia laudi, 
 Sunt lachrymte rerum " 
 
 Then they fell to wrangling as to who proposed the tea-tax, and 
 North said it was not he — he found it when he came — he interrupted 
 Johnstone, and lost his temper. The House carried the Extra- 
 ordinaries by three to one. 
 
 On the 27th of March, 1776, Burke proposed one of those 
 motions which will keep his memory green in the annals of 
 humanity. That day he asked leave to bring in a Bill to prevent 
 the plundering of shipwrecked vessels.^ Incredible as it may 
 appear, as the law then stood all flotsam and jetsam was the 
 property of the first-comers. Such a law produced its inevitable 
 effect — it not merely completed the pecuniary ruin of the owner 
 whose vessel had the misfortune to run ashore in a fog or a tempest 
 • — it created one of the worst forms of crime, by making a ship- 
 wreck a piece of good fortune for the neighbourhood. It was but 
 one step from this to the temptation to make so fortunate a 
 misfortune happen, and so we had towns and villages where 
 " wrecking " was a science. It was not only in Scilly and Cornwall 
 that wrecks were piously spoken of as God-sends, nor were those 
 the only places where Providence was helped to send such blessings, 
 by means of a lantern attached to a cow's tail — by which simple 
 expedient many an ill-starred mariner was deluded into imagining 
 he saw the light of a vessel riding safely at anchor in deep water, 
 and so was lured to his doom. And, to men capable of such an 
 enormity, it was but a final step to knock any survivors on the 
 head. Burke does not seem to have referred to the darker aspects 
 of the question- — he confined himself to the undeniable practice of 
 plundering. Scarcely a winter passed, he said, but our public 
 prints contained accounts that were a disgrace to any civilised 
 people. " Commercial countries — especially this, which prides 
 itself so much on its national honour — ought to do all in its power 
 to discourage such practices.'' He proposed that when a ship was 
 plundered, the Hundred should make good the damage. 
 
 ^ "To prevent the inhuman practice of plundering ships wrecked on the 
 coast of Great Britain, and for the further relief of ships in distress on the said 
 coast." 
 
IN ENGLAND 407 
 
 Instantly the country gentlemen — who would have to pay — 
 were up in arms. Not a word was said about our honour as a 
 commercial nation. Some said, indeed, that the country gentlemen 
 in a neighbourhood could prevent plundering if they tried, and so 
 there was no need of a new law ; and others said that the country 
 gentlemen often exerted themselves to the utmost already — in vain 
 — and so a new law would be in vain too, and very cruel besides. 
 Leave would have been refused even to bring in the Bill, but Sir 
 Grey Cooper, with a fine instinct for public opinion, said he should 
 vote for leave — not that he meant to support the Bill, but because 
 it would have " a very strange appearance in the votes " if leave 
 were refused. So the Bill was " ordered in by 56 to 13," this not 
 being a question which much interested the House. 
 
 Decency having been thus provided for, on April 30, when the 
 Bill was read a second time, members felt free to speak their 
 minds. " The Bill was more abused than the American measures." ^ 
 It was called a cruel, a profligate Bill. Van, the bloodthirsty 
 Welshman, called it "a Black Bill." Mr. Rice said the remedy 
 was worse than the evil — meaning for the country gentlemen. 
 Give us time to consider — let us try to make a plan — we will 
 never consent that the County or the Hundred shall pay. Lord 
 Mulgrave — answering those who protested that the Bill would be 
 quite useless — said every man in the district where a ship was 
 wrecked would have an interest in protecting the wreck — this was 
 why, in old time, the Hundred had to make good losses by robbery 
 on the highway. Other members said this was the only civilised 
 country under heaven where such outrages were suffered. 
 Henniker told the House how he had had a ship wrecked on the 
 northern coast of England, where the gentlemen did their utmost, 
 but to very little purpose. He had another wrecked on the coast 
 of the Mediterranean — there, everything that was saved was 
 returned to him, and when he offered a gratuity, the answer was, 
 "No. You have lost enough in the loss of your ship — we will 
 take nothing." 
 
 Wallace entreated the House to maintain at least "the ap- 
 pearance of public virtue." This is the only country in Europe 
 where such things are done. Then Burke spoke for his Bill, 
 showed them how well the French law worked, and reminded 
 them of the severity of our other laws on stealing — we have laws 
 against pulling a stake out of a hedge, or touching a paling — even 
 against " disturbing a thorn." The House seems to have thought 
 these laws would do — anyway, the country gentlemen, already 
 
 ' Macknight, Life of Burke. 
 
4o8 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 crushed under the land-tax, were determined not to pay for ships 
 plundered by their tenants. The Bill was lost by 43 to 55.^ 
 
 None of the American measures prospered. The Fishery Bill 
 was passed so late that the fishing fleet had already started. Nor 
 was it so easy to transfer the advantages of the fishery to Great 
 Britain. The deficiency in men was not supplied, and all who 
 were employed by sea or land were thrown into such distress that 
 ships had to be loaded with food instead of with the fish. On 
 the whole it was computed that by this stroke of Administration, 
 half a million sterling " was left in the bowels of the deep, and for 
 ever lost to mankind, by the first operation of the Fishery Bill." 
 {Annual Register.) This was believed to be a judgment ; and so were 
 the calamities which fell on the British fishery, in a dreadful storm, 
 whose worst fury was spent on the coasts of Newfoundland. The 
 sea is said to have " risen thirty feet almost instantaneously." 
 More than 700 boats perished with their crews, and the fishing-nets 
 were hauled up laden with drowned men. 
 
 The expense of victualling Boston was appalling. Want of fresh 
 provisions had caused great sickness there ; so 5000 oxen and 
 14,000 "of the largest and fattest sheep," with " a vast number of 
 hogs," were sent out alive. " Incredible quantities " of vegetables 
 were "cured" in new ways. Five thousand chauldrons of coal 
 were shipped in the Thames. Even faggots were sent out. The 
 vegetables, casks, and vinegar came to near ;,^22,ooo; and oats, 
 hay and beans for the single cavalry regiment in Boston to nearly 
 as much. Then there were corn, flour, and salted provisions. 
 " The expense swelled in everything " — tonnage went up one- 
 fourth.2 But contractors flourished, and were patriotically zealous 
 for this profitable war. Misfortune completed what extravagance 
 had begun — the transports were so late in starting that the bad 
 weather set in ; they were detained by contrary winds — some even 
 put back. The others were overtaken by tempests, till the greater 
 part of the unhappy beasts perished uselessly, and the Channel 
 was strewn with their carcasses. Most of the vegetables 
 "fermented." When at last the transports neared the American 
 coasts, the periodical winds drove them back — some to the West 
 Indies — some, " entangled with the American coasts," were taken. 
 The few that ever reached Boston had " beat the seas " for between 
 three and four months. Very little of that vast provision ever 
 
 ' No one seems to have remembered Defoe's indignant complaints of the 
 practice. 
 
 ^ The Government were paying lis. 6d. a ton for transport of troops and 
 stores to America. 
 
IN ENGLAND 409 
 
 arrived in Boston, and very little that did arrive was fit to use. 
 Subscriptions were got up in England for the relief of the soldiers 
 in Boston, and for the widows and children. Ships came back 
 with wretched cargoes of maimed and wounded soldiers. Even 
 before the war could fairly be said to have begun the suffering and 
 waste were terrible. 
 
 Revolutions and rebellions are always represented by the 
 Governments which provoke them as the work of a few incen- 
 diaries — it is always "a few." Never was this stock assertion 
 made with more persistence than by the British Government in 
 the American quarrel. But if it had been so — if Samuel Adams, 
 Hancock, and the other early leaders of the agitation, had indeed 
 been nothing more than ambitious demagogues, who sought to 
 raise themselves to power by persuading the Americans that they 
 were oppressed when they were not — how could Government have 
 played into their hands more effectually than it did ? In order to 
 prove that Adams lied when he called Parliament an oppressor. 
 Parliament became an oppressor — piling up one savage measure 
 on another, as though determined to let the colonists know what 
 sort of a "mother-country" they had. So now, when this last 
 " Olive Branch " was sent, and those who, like Adams, saw that 
 Independence was the only way, and those who, like Washington, 
 still hoped for a reconciliation which should retain America within 
 the British Empire, were alike eagerly waiting to know the result, 
 they heard that the King had refused to see Penn, that Dartmouth 
 had said there would be no answer to the Petition, and that 
 Parliament, by an enormous majority, had declined to look at it. 
 Dartmouth had said there would be no answer — but there was an 
 answer — the answer was the Proclamation which was a declaration 
 of war, and the Prohibitory Bill, which struck madly at friend and 
 foe — at rebellious Massachusetts and South Carolina, and at 
 unoffending Barbadoes and Bermuda. 
 
 The fact is, as many an indiscreet speech in both Houses 
 proves, the British Government knew full well that they had to 
 deal with a people, not with a few demagogues. As soon as 
 America made a show of armed resistance, the fiction of the "few 
 incendiaries " was abandoned, and now it was a rebellious people 
 — always rebellious, "since the times of Charles the First" — a 
 people always secretly republican, though they showed themselves 
 also rebellious to " the Commonwealth and Protectorate Parliaments." 
 One statement was as false as the other. It is not in the power of a 
 few demagogues to persuade a nation to rebel, unless that nation 
 is itself galled by the yoke it is invited to throw off. And, strange 
 
4IO ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 as it may appear to those who study the Statute Books, and read 
 the abominable restrictions on the trade and development of the 
 inhabitants of a vast continent, up to the last moment the colonists 
 had the strongest attachment to the British Crown, and were proud 
 to feel themselves a part of the British Empire. Only when they 
 found that that Empire meant to make them its helots did they 
 resist, and even then it was some time before they were sufSciently 
 disenchanted to face separation. 
 
 The London Gazette of May 3, 1776, gravely informed the 
 public that General Howe, "having taken a resolution, on the 7th 
 of March, to remove from Boston to Halifax . . . the embarkation 
 was effected on the 17th of that month, with the greatest order and 
 regularity, and without the least interruption from the rebels." It 
 at once excited surprise that the General should resolve to move 
 so early in the season, " from a tolerable climate to one much 
 worse." It also seemed odd that the Provincials "could all of a 
 sudden be rendered motionless." After which people outside 
 Parliament seem to have almost forgotten Boston altogether. 
 
 But on May 10 the Duke of Manchester moved in the Lords 
 for General Howe's Instructions. He commented severely on the 
 manner in which the abandonment of Boston was mentioned in the 
 GayMte — as indifferently as the march of a regiment from one 
 country town to another. It was an insult to the public — instead 
 of conveying information, it only served to mislead. Was Boston 
 evacuated voluntarily by General Howe, or was he forced by the 
 batteries of the Provincials to make a precipitate retreat ? Letters 
 have been received very different from the Gazette — it is even said 
 that General Howe had to make a convention with General 
 Washington, to save the troops by abandoning the town ! The 
 Earl of Suffolk said that the letters in question contained such a 
 mixture of matter, that it would be highly improper to make them 
 public. 1 The fact was, Howe had been told long ago to get the 
 troops out of Boston as soon as he could — he had done it on the 
 17th of March, as the Gazette mentioned — and quite safely — and 
 as Opposition had always said the possession of Boston was so 
 disgraceful, he wondered they thought it a disgrace to give it up. 
 Weymouth said it was greatly to Howe's credit if the embarkation 
 was, as a noble lord had said, as easy as the removal of a regiment 
 from a country town. Sandwich explained the loss of the brigantine, 
 with the mortar which had been so useful to the rebels — she was 
 parted from her convoy in a storm. He begged that Admiral 
 Shuldam might be remembered for his share in embarking the 
 ' See comments in Gentleman' s Magazine for 1776, p. 232. 
 
IN ENGLAND 411 
 
 troops safely. The House then rejected the motion for Howe's 
 Instructions. In the Commons, Opposition asked for Lord Howe's 
 Instructions. He was to be sent out as one of a Commission of 
 Peace — what was he to offer the rebels? Lord Hillsborough by 
 his letter made us promise to give up taxation. Were we going 
 to keep our word ? Lord North said we did not promise — taxation 
 was to be enforced, but whether now or hereafter was a point of 
 policy left to the Commissioners. The motion for Howe's Instruc- 
 tions was lost by 171 to 85, and Hartley's motion, to address the 
 King not to prorogue, was not even divided upon. 
 
 NOTE. 
 
 " Declaration by the Representatives of the United Colonies of North 
 America, now met in General Congress at Philadelphia, setting 
 forth the Causes and Necessity of their taking up Arms. (Signed by all the 
 Delegates, July 6, 1775.) 
 
 " We for ten years incessantly and ineffectually besieged the Throne as 
 supplicants. 
 
 ' ' We have pursued every temperate, every respectful measure ; we have even 
 proceeded to break off our commercial intercourse with our fellow-subjects, as 
 the last peaceable admonition, that our attachment to no nation upon earth 
 should supplant our attachment to liberty. . . . Fruitless were all the entreaties, 
 arguments and eloquence of an illustrious band of the most distinguished Peers 
 and Commoners. . . . Equally fruitless was the interference of the City of 
 London, of Bristol, and many other respectable towns, in our favour. . . . We 
 have received certain intelligence that General Carleton, the Governor of 
 Canada, is instigating the people of that province and the Indians to fall upon 
 us. . . . We are reduced to the alternative of chusing an unconditional sub- 
 mission to the tyranny of irritated Ministers, or resistance by force. . . . We 
 have counted the cost of this contest, and find nothing so dreadful as voluntary 
 slavery." 
 
CHAPTER XLVIII 
 INDEPENDENCE 
 
 ' ' When in the course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to 
 dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to 
 assume among the powers of the earth the separate and equal station to which 
 the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the 
 opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel 
 them to the separation. 
 
 ' ' We hold these truths to be self-evident ; that all men are created equal ; that 
 they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights ; that among 
 these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness ... to secure these rights, 
 governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the 
 consent of the governed ; and, whenever any form of government becomes 
 destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it, and 
 to institute a new government. . . . 
 
 "We, therefore, the Representatives of the United States of America, in 
 General Congress assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for 
 the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the name and by the authority of the good 
 people of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, that these United 
 Colonies are, and of right ought to be, Free and Independent States, 
 and that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British crown." — The 
 Declaration of Independence. 
 
 " He who talks thus either never knew himself, or now wishes to deceive 
 others. He sets up the name of Englishman against the principles of right ; he 
 justifies the measures which he had long opposed, and adopts those reasons and 
 that detestable policy, which he had stigmatised as infamous and destructive. . . . 
 If a man will act consistently, he must pursue his principles in all their conse- 
 quences. . . . Fiat justilia, raat calum, ist\itTnoiXooiirA&gxi\.y." — Observations 
 on the change of Political Opinion in England, on the Declaration of American 
 Indefendency, (Almon, 1776, p. 197') 
 
 Early in March, 1776, Congress received the "Capture Bill." 
 Their reply was to commission privateers to cruise against ships 
 belonging to Great Britain — but not to Ireland or the West Indies. 
 And on one day in this month it was resolved " that no slaves be 
 imported into any of the thirteen united colonies.'' It was then 
 hoped, especially in Virginia, that emancipation would soon follow.^ 
 
 1 Bancroft, iv. 328. "The Virginians could plead, and did plead, that 
 ' their assemblies had repeatedly attempted to prevent the horrid traffic in 
 
INDEPENDENCE 413 
 
 And on the 6th of April the Thirteen Colonies threw open their 
 commerce to all the world, "not subject to the king of Great 
 Britain." 
 
 It was known that Commissioners were coming from England 
 with offers of some kind. But every day made separation more 
 inevitable. Samuel Adams had said in April, "Is not America 
 already independent? Then why not declare it?" But still 
 Congress hesitated, although they were every day passing Acts 
 which implied that the Colonies were already sovereign States. It 
 was resolved that each colony where no sufficient government was 
 established should adopt such government as the representatives of 
 the people thought most conducive to their happiness and safety. 
 This was the proposal of John Adams. While they were discussing 
 it, he said, "There is no good government, but what is republican ; 
 for a republic is an empire of laws, not of men." 
 
 Yet it was neither the litigious province of Massachusetts, nor 
 the mixed race of New Yorkers, nor the proud Virginians, that first 
 declared for Independence. It was the wild, unsettled border 
 colony of North Carolina, whose Provincial Congress on the 12th 
 of April, 1776, unanimously desired its delegates to Philadelphia to 
 concur with the other Colonial delegates in declaring Independency. 
 Georgia, the last to join, had even before this ordered her delegates 
 to concur "in all measures calculated for the common good." On 
 the 26th of March, five days after it received the Capture Act, the 
 South Carolina Convention had established a Constitution ; and on 
 April 23, the Chief Justice, in opening the Court at Charlestown, 
 charged the Grand Jury thus : " The law of the land authorises me 
 to declare that George in, King of Great Britain, has abdicated the 
 government, he has no authority over us, and we owe no obedience 
 to him." The new Government at once began to fortify Charles- 
 town, ready to resist the fleet and army coming with Clinton and 
 Cornwallis ; and General Lee was on his way to take command of 
 the Continental Army in the South. On May 6 the Burgesses of 
 Virginia dissolved their House, " as the ancient institution had 
 been subverted by the King and Parliament of Great Britain." 
 The same day the Convention of Virginia met, and on the 15th 
 a resolution was adopted to instruct delegates to the General 
 Congress to declare the United Colonies "Free and Independent 
 States." The bells were rung, cannon were fired, and the British 
 flag was pulled down from Williamsburg State House. 
 
 slaves, and had been frustrated by the cruelty and covetousness of Eng- 
 lish merchants, who prevailed on the king to repeal their merciful 
 acts.'" 
 
414 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Then George Mason prepared a Declaration of Rights. One 
 clause enjoined the fullest religious toleration. But young James 
 Madison, a Presbyterian (Mason was "a devoted member of the 
 Church of England ") said toleration was not the word — it endured 
 Dissent as a condescension — it must be " the free exercise of 
 religion " ; and the amendment passed. 
 
 Washington himself was now convinced that "nothing but 
 independence will save us." Maryland shrank from the final 
 resolve, but she had driven out her last Royal Governor and set 
 up a Convention. A town-meeting of 4000 men, in the yard of 
 the State House at Philadelphia, appealed from the Provincial 
 Assembly to the General Congress, and refused oaths of allegiance 
 to the Crown. All the forces were converging towards Inde- 
 pendence. On June 13 a Board of War was appointed, with 
 John Adams at its head — Washington had long been entreat- 
 ing for such a Board. On the 24th Congress resolved that 
 it was treason to give aid and comfort to the King of Great 
 Britain. 
 
 Colony after colony sent in its adherence to "independency," 
 and its conviction that there could be no abiding union without it. 
 New York had the most to lose by war, and the strongest body 
 of loyalists; so to make sure what was the general trend of 
 opinion, the electors of the colony were called on to confer full 
 powers on their deputies. Committees had long been at work 
 preparing a Declaration of Independence, but it was not till the 
 ist of July that Congress formally considered it. There were about 
 fifty members present. It has been remarked, as a proof of their 
 calm and temperate characters, that a very large number of them 
 survived to great ages.^ Every colony was represented, and the 
 delegates of all but one had received full powers. 
 
 Before the great business began a letter from Washington was 
 read. He returned his whole number at 7754 — nearly 1400 had 
 bad firelocks, 800 had none at all, more than half had no bayonets. 
 Only 1000 of the militia called for had joined. With this force he 
 was to defend New York against 30,000 veteran troops. A letter 
 from Lee informed Congress that Clinton, with fifty-three ships, had 
 arrived before Charlestown. 
 
 Of the great speech of John Adams this day no record is 
 preserved. It is only remembered that in passionate words he set 
 forth the necessity of separation, the King's refusal to receive their 
 petitions, and his turning German troops upon them. 
 
 Dickinson was for waiting — at least till they had gained a battle. 
 ■ Sabine, 
 
INDEPENDENCE 415 
 
 There was no precedent for a people, before they had fought, 
 breaking their connection with a warhke empire. 
 
 During the debate of this day another letter came from 
 Washington — Lord Howe with forty-five ships had arrived off 
 Sandy Hook. 
 
 Next day Twelve Colonies voted " That these united colonies 
 are, and of right ought to be, free and independent states, and are 
 absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown." 
 
 Thomas Jefferson was chosen to draft the Declaration. It was 
 signed on the evening of the 4th of July, by the Twelve States, 
 New York still abstaining.^ In the long list of indictments against 
 the King, which this document contained, was one which 
 reproached him with keeping up the slave trade. " He has waged 
 cruel war against human nature itself. . . . Determined to keep open 
 a market where men should be bought and sold, he has prostituted 
 his negative for suppressing every legislative attempt to prohibit 
 or to restrain this execrable commerce . . . and he is now exciting 
 those very people to rise in arms among us, and to purchase that 
 liberty of which he has deprived them, by murdering the people 
 on whom he also obtruded them . . . thus paying off the crimes 
 against the lihftrties of one people with crimes against the lives of 
 another." 
 
 But the Colonies had not always been blameless as to that 
 commerce, and "some southern gentlemen . . . were not yet 
 matured to the full abhorrence of that traffic " ; and so the clause 
 was struck out. 
 
 On the 8th the Declaration was read at the State House to the 
 battalions of volunteers and the inhabitants. Then the emblems 
 of royalty were burnt amid the acclamations of the crowd. ^ 
 
 On the 9th it was read at the head of each brigade of the 
 Continental Army.^ 
 
 ' New- York could not vote till her delegates had received their powers. 
 
 - The Declaration was signed on August 2, and then New York signed with 
 the rest. 
 
 ' " All who called themselves Whigs were not necessarily and on that account 
 disinterested and virtuous . . . and the Tories were not, to a man, selfish and 
 violent. . . . Virtuous men, whatever their errors and mistakes, are to be respected ; 
 and with regard to others, it is well to remember the beautiful sentiment of Gold- 
 smith, that ' we should never strike an unnecessary blow at a victim over whom 
 Providence holds the scourge of its resentment.' . . . I may be permitted to say; 
 in conclusion . . . that, of all men of whom I have obtained any knowledge, the 
 Whigs of the American Revolution have impressed me with the greatest respect 
 and reverence, both on account of their personal virtues, and the objects which 
 they sought to accomplish for themselves, their posterity, and mankind." — Sabine, 
 TAe American Loyalists. 
 
4i6 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 The Pennsylvania Journal had a " Memento to the Americans." 
 "Remember" the Stamp Act, the Declaratory Act, the promise 
 made by Lord Hillsborough never to tax you again ; " remember " 
 how they made you pay treble duties if you traded with the 
 countries you " helped them to conquer '' ; " remember " their old 
 restrictions on your woollen manufactures, your hat-making, your 
 iron and steel forges and furnaces ; " remember the long, habitual, 
 base venality of British Parliaments " ; " remember " the rejection of 
 all your numerous humble petitions, and the contempt with which 
 they spoke of you in both Houses ; the treatment of Franklin and 
 Temple, the rejecting of Chatham's, Hartley's, and Burke's plans of 
 conciliation, the broken Charters, the hiring of foreign troops and 
 savages, the bribing negro slaves to murder you ; lastly, remember 
 that an honourable death is better than an ignominious life. 
 
CHAPTER XLIX 
 THE BATTLE OF LONG ISLAND 
 
 " The unprincipled, and unfeeling and unnatural inhabitants of Staten Island 
 are cordially receiving the enemy."— John Adams to his Wife, Philadelphia, July 
 II, 1776. 
 
 " Upon the whole, it did not appear to your Committee, that his Lordship's 
 commission contained any other authority of importance than what is expressed 
 in the Act of Parliament, viz., that of granting pardons with such exceptions as 
 the commissioners shall think proper to make, and of declaring America, or any 
 part of it, to be in the King's peace, upon submission. 
 
 "We gave it as our opinion to his Lordship, that a return to the domination 
 of Great Britain was not now to be expected. We mentioned the repeated 
 humble petitions of the colonies to the King and Parliament, which had been 
 treated with contempt, and answered only by additional injuries . . . and that 
 it was not until the last Act of Parliament which il enounced war against us, and 
 put us out of the King's protection, that we declared our independence . . . 
 that all (the colonies) now considered themselves as independent states, and were 
 settling or had settled their governments accordingly, and that it was not now in 
 the power of Congress to agree for them that they should return to their former 
 dependent state. " — Report of the Committee appointed by Congress to wait upon 
 Lord Howe, Sept. 6, 1776. 
 
 It was no longer the Thirteen rebellious Colonies, but the Thirteen 
 United States, with whom Great Britain had now to deal. It 
 seemed at first that the reckoning would be short. 
 
 As soon as Washington found that General Howe was not 
 going to New York, he had sent five more regiments there — on 
 which the British men-of-war had dropped down the bay. It was 
 an extraordinary situation — a Royal Governor skulking on board a 
 man-of-war and issuing proclamations against the rebels on shore. 
 It was admitted that the New England soldiers behaved well in 
 New York. " I do believe there are very few instances of so great 
 a number of men together, with so little mischief done by them," 
 writes someone in the city. " They have all the simplicity of 
 ploughmen in their manners, and seem quite strangers to the vices 
 of older soldiers." 
 
 Washington did not come to New York till April. Then he 
 gave the command at Brooklyn to Nathaniel Greene of Connecticut 
 
41 8 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 — one of the best officers the Americans ever had. Washington 
 had no more than 10,000 men distributed in New York city, 
 Long and Staten Islands, and on the Jersey shore ; and of these 
 only about 8000 fit for duty. And the Provincial forces in 
 Canada were in crying need of reinforcements, and Congress was 
 asking Washington if he could not spare some. A few days after 
 this the news came that the King was sending out Hessians 
 and Hanoverians, and Congress ordered Washington to come and 
 confer with it. He told it plainly that no accommodation was 
 possible — for the news of Lord Howe's Commission had also 
 come — Ministers were resolved to have complete submission, and 
 the bringing over of these troops proved it. A protracted war was 
 inevitable, and to carry it on there must be longer terms of enlist- 
 ment. So at last Congress (always haunted by the memory of 
 Cromwell) permitted three years' engagements ; gondolas and fire- 
 rafts were to be made, and a Flying Camp of 10,000 militia 
 was to be furnished by Pennsylvania. There is something pathetic 
 in the way in which these essentially civilian legislators advance 
 tremblingly step by step to face the grim necessities of war. Their 
 forte was constitutional resistance, remonstrances and declarations 
 — these they drew up admirably, but they failed miserably when 
 they meddled with arms. 
 
 On Washington's return to New York, a terrible discovery was 
 made — nothing less than a loyalist plot to seize, perhaps murder 
 him, and to take possession of the city for Howe, now hourly 
 expected. Two or three of Washington's own bodyguard were in 
 this plot. It is certain that if it had succeeded Washington and his 
 principal officers would have been delivered up to the British, and 
 it is almost certain that, in that case, they would have been hanged. 
 The plot was traced up through " several publicans of the city," to 
 David Mathews the Mayor, and from him to Governor Tryon, who 
 was still issuing his proclamations about " doors of mercy " for the 
 penitent, and " rods " for the disobedient.^ The wonder is that it 
 did not succeed. Only one man was hanged for this attempt to 
 betray the defenders of a people's liberties — one Hickey, a trooper 
 in the bodyguard. The rest were handed over to the civil power. 
 The fact is, the old Government of New York was a " feudal 
 aristocracy," rather than a pure democracy like that of Massachusetts. 
 
 ^ It is even said that Washington's housekeeper was in the plot. A woman 
 warned Washington, who told a few friends. A watch was kept night and day, 
 until one night forty Tories were seized, and put in the City Hall — among them 
 the Mayor, who admitted that attempts had been made to corrupt Washington's 
 guard. 
 
THE BATTLE OF LONG ISLAND 419 
 
 " The soil was held by a few. The masses were mere retainers or 
 tenants, as in the monarchies of Europe." Such a system does not 
 produce men like those of Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and 
 Connecticut. 
 
 This happened in the last ten days of June. On the 29th the 
 look-out on Staten Island reported forty sail in sight. It was the 
 fleet from Halifax, with General Howe and nine or ten thousand 
 of the troops withdrawn from Boston in March, and six transports 
 full of Highlanders, which had joined Howe at sea. 
 
 It had been discovered that the late conspiracy extended up to 
 Hudson, and it was thought at first that the British would go up 
 that river. But Howe anchored off Staten Island, and soon the 
 hills were white with his tents. Washington perceived that his aim 
 was New York. He wrote to Congress for the Massachusetts 
 contingent, and issued a general order to his troops to prepare 
 for the great struggle now imminent — with a word of advice to 
 cowards to go home and stay there. 
 
 On July 9 the New York Convention met at White Plains, 
 when the Declaration of Independence was read with beat of drum. 
 That evening a New York mob pulled down the King's leaden 
 statue on the Bowling Green. 
 
 On July 12 Lord Howe arrived at Staten Island. He was 
 reported to have said that peace would be made ten days after 
 he came — his honest sailor's mind did not yet realise the futile 
 nature of his "powers.'' They allowed him to grant pardons to 
 persons and communities, on their laying down their arms, and 
 dissolving their new governments, and returning to their allegiance. 
 They also permitted him to talk matters over with "private 
 persons." But he could make no promises of redress, nor must 
 he recognise Congress nor any of its officers. It was uncon- 
 ditional submission, with the certainty of more and not less 
 interference by Parliament hereafter. 
 
 He opened negotiations by writing a letter to "George 
 Washington, Esquire," and sending it in with a flag. Colonel Reed, 
 the American Adjutant-General, told the lieutenant who brought it 
 that it could not be received with that address. The lieutenant was 
 much distressed at this, and explained that the letter was more of 
 a civil than a military nature — Lord Howe wished he had come 
 sooner — he had great powers — it was a great pity the letter could 
 not be received. Reed politely repeated that his duty did not allow 
 him to receive it. The lieutenant sorrowfully departed — putting 
 back to ask how General — Mr. — Washington would choose to be 
 addressed. Reed replied that the General's station in the army 
 
420 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 was well known — this matter had already been discussed last 
 summer. 
 
 On the 19th more ceremony was observed. An aide-de-camp 
 came to ask whether Colonel Paterson, the British Adjutant-General, 
 could be admitted to an interview with — General — Washington. 
 Paterson came, and was politely received. He returned the civility 
 by addressing Washington as " your Excellency," produced a letter 
 addressed " George Washington, Esquire, etc., etc.," and expressed 
 a hope that the "etceteras, which implied everything," would make 
 things all right. Washington replied that the etceteras implied 
 everything — or anything. He had had such a letter the previous 
 summer. A letter to a person acting in a public character must 
 have an inscription to show it is not a mere private letter. Paterson 
 was obliged to evade the difficulty by giving " his Excellency " 
 a verbal account of the contents. It appeared that Paterson's 
 ostensible errand was to reply to a letter written by Congress to 
 General Howe, on the affair of the Cedars — where American 
 prisoners who had capitulated had been murdered in cold blood — 
 one of them, it was alleged, roasted while half-alive — by the Indian 
 allies of his Majesty. Only after this had been discussed, and 
 Paterson had assured his Excellency that cruelty was not the British 
 characteristic, and had given Howe's pledge that the laws of war 
 should be observed, did he come to the peace proposals. Paterson 
 said Lord Howe and his brother had been chosen as a mark of 
 favour to America — they had great powers, and most sincerely 
 wished to effect an accommodation. Washington replied that, 
 judging from the circular just issued by Lord Howe, the powers 
 seemed no more than a granting of pardons. Those who had com- 
 mitted no fault required no pardon. Paterson said this opened a 
 very wide field, and so the interview ended. His Excellency pressed 
 the Colonel to partake of "a small collation" which had been pro- 
 vided, but Paterson declined, as he had made a late breakfast. And 
 he very handsomely acknowledged the courtesy shown him in not 
 blindfolding him as usual. 
 
 While Lord Howe was waiting to forgive the Americans, two 
 British cruisers had gone up the Hudson, and anchored at Tarry- 
 town, and the New York Convention was calling out the militia and 
 yeomanry to guard the entrance to the Highlands. And two days 
 after, Washington heard from Lee that Sir Henry Clinton had been 
 repulsed with loss at Charlestown, and that the British fleet had put 
 to sea. It was the last good news for many a long day. 
 
 Finding that Lord Howe could not treat with Congress, Congress 
 ordered Washington to defend New York. 
 
THE BATTLE OF LONG ISLAND 421 
 
 It was a great mistake, and it cost them dear. The situation of 
 the city between two islands rendered it tenable only by a superior 
 force. Washington had but 10,000 men, none of whom had seen 
 more than a year's service. The 7000 hastily-raised militia,i fresh 
 from the plough, were badly armed, and so deplorably undisciplined 
 that a silly squabble between the Marylanders and the Connecticut 
 light-horse, ended in the Horse going off in a huff, and leaving 
 Washington without videttes. His artillery was mostly "old and 
 honey-combed." He had to distribute his forces over posts divided 
 by water, and sometimes fifteen miles apart. He wanted doctors, 
 medicines, hospitals, tents. His men were sleeping in the open, 
 exposed to the heavy dews, and a fourth of his army was sick. At 
 the beginning of August he had only 10,500 fit for duty. 
 
 On the I St Sir Peter Parker's squadron arrived in the bay from 
 the South, with Sir Henry Clinton, Lord Cornwallis, and 3000 
 troops on board. The Admiral had picked up three fugitive 
 Governors on his way — Martin and Lord William Campbell, of 
 North and South Carolina, and Dunmore of Virginia — and now 
 Tryon of New York joined his colleagues. 
 
 Washington sent for 2000 men from the Flying Camp at Paulus 
 Hook ^ — commanded by Brigadier-General Mercer, once surgeon to 
 Prince Charlie, and afterwards with Braddock at the Monongahela. 
 On the 1 2th, 2500 fresh British troops and 8500 Hessians arrived. 
 But Congress would not hear of retreat — its one military idea was 
 never to give up a foot of territory. 
 
 So desperate seemed the prospect, that John Jay was for laying 
 Long Island waste, burning New York city, and retiring into the 
 Highlands. 
 
 Brooklyn is immediately opposite New York — the East River, 
 three quarters of a mile wide, lies between. The village was on a 
 kind of peninsula, formed by the inlets of Wallabout Bay and 
 Gowanus Creek. Two miles and a half farther away the wooded 
 range of the Bedford Hills stretches across Long Island. Three 
 roads crossed this range — the road to Bedford, to Jamaica, and to 
 Flatbush. Lines of entrenchment had been drawn across the 
 peninsula of Brooklyn ; but Greene, who had planned these defences, 
 fell ill of a fever at the last moment, and Washington had to give 
 his command to Putnam, who knew nothing about them — especi- 
 ally did not understand the importance of the Bedford Hills, 
 
 ' " The men turn out of their harvest fields to defend their country with 
 surprising alacrity . . . their harvests are perishing for want of the sickle." — 
 Letter of General George Clinton to Washington, July 14, 1776. 
 
 '•^ On the Jersey shore. 
 
422 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 which were held by Lord Stirling i with the Marylanders and 
 Delawares. 
 
 On the 2 1 St Washington received information that the British 
 were crossing from Staten to Long Island — 20,000 men had 
 embarked. Next morning cannon was heard — Howe was marching 
 towards Flatbush, and the farmers were flocking in, wearing badges 
 of loyalty, " eager to show him the roads.'' 
 
 Washington was in a cruel dilemma — if he did not send 
 reinforcements, the lines of Brooklyn must be forced, and then 
 New York was lost; if he did send them, he left New York 
 defenceless against Sir Peter Parker and the fleet. On the 24th he 
 crossed over to Brooklyn. There were skirmishes that day and the 
 next, and the Americans gained some slight advantages. The foes 
 were sometimes so near that on one of these days the Americans 
 saw with their glasses the Hessians slay and devour an escaped 
 horse. 2 
 
 On the night of Monday, the 26th, Howe formed his army in 
 three divisions — he had now more than 24,000 men — to march on 
 Brooklyn by the three roads. Clinton, with the vanguard, was to 
 go by Jamaica to Bedford, and seize the pass in the hills — so turning 
 the American left. Grant (the same who once told the House of 
 Commons that all Americans were cowards) was to take them on 
 the right. The Hessians, under their own General de Heister, were 
 to attack the centre, as soon as they heard Clinton's guns. Howe 
 himself went with Clinton's column, with Percy leading the 
 grenadiers, and Cornwallis bringing up the rear with the heavy 
 artillery. A Long Island Tory showed them the way through the 
 pass in the Bedford Hills — " a route we never dreamed of," said 
 one of Stirling's men, who almost ran into their arms before he saw 
 who they were. Stirling had been attacked at sunrise, and had 
 fought on till about 8 o'clock, when he suddenly found himself sur- 
 rounded by Howe's column. He formed on the side of the hill, 
 and held out till Cornwallis came up — then he retreated in good 
 
 ^ William Alexander was descended from a member of the Stirling family, 
 who settled in America. He came to England, and claimed the earldom. An 
 Edinburgh Jury decided in his favour, and he was proclaimed Earl of Stirling at 
 the Market Cross, but a Committee of the House of Lords set the judgment 
 aside. In person Lord Stirling was considered very like the Marquess of Granby 
 — a likeness which helped to recommend him to the Americans. 
 
 ^ " The Jacobites used to complain that a species of rat never before seen in 
 England came over with the Hanoverian dynasty. In like manner the 
 American loyalists speak of a new fly that first made its appearance on 
 the introduction of German troops into their country." — Albemarle, Life of 
 Rocldngliam, ii. 330. 
 
THE BATTLE OF LONG ISLAND 423 
 
 order towards the Creek. Washington saw that his flank was 
 turned — but Parker with five ships of the line was trying to fetch 
 up to the city. The wind shifted — New York was safe for the 
 moment — Washington crossed to Long Island, to find Sullivan in the 
 redoubt caught between the British and Hessians. Nearer Gowanus 
 Bay, Stirling with half the Maryland regiment was holding Cornwallis 
 in check, while the rest and the Delawares waded the ford. All 
 but nine of these gallant defenders were taken or slain. Stirling 
 gave up his sword to General Heister. Washington, who saw it all 
 from the lines of Brooklyn, wrung his hands, crying, " My God ! 
 what brave men must I lose this day ! " 
 
 All that stormy night, and next day, Washington rode round his 
 lines and considered his position. All Long Island, except those 
 lines, was in the possession of the British. He was surrounded by 
 an army double his number, and supported by a fleet. He had lost 
 looo of his best men ; 1 the rest were worn out with two battles, and 
 forty-eight hours' watching, were ill-fed, and many were sick. Two 
 days and nights of rain had spoiled much ammunition. At any 
 moment the wind might change, and the British Fleet run up and cut 
 off his retreat. He did not even confide his intention to his General 
 officers. With the utmost secrecy he made his preparations. He 
 ordered down from King's Bridge every kind of water-craft, with 
 either sails or oars — all to be in the East River by dark. It was 
 evening before he held his Council of War, at Philip Livingston's 
 house on Brooklyn Heights. He laid the situation before them. 
 Orders were issued to prepare to attack the enemy. The embarka- 
 tion began at eight o'clock.^ The rawest troops went first. 
 Washington, at the ferry, watched every man embark. When the 
 tide turned at nine, the rain came down, and a chill north-easter 
 beat them back. For three hours the sailing boats could make no 
 headway. By an aide-de-camp's blunder Mifflin's Pennsylvanians 
 moved too soon — he came down with his covering party, leaving his 
 lines empty for three-quarters of an hour. Thanks to the thick fog, 
 which came on as the wind fell, he got back unperceived. In the 
 stillness of the night a cannon went off in the American camp — no 
 one ever knew how. Regiment after regiment withdrew silently 
 from its station, and moved silently towards the water. The wind 
 dropped so completely that the boats could be loaded to the gun- 
 
 ' Three-fourths of these were prisoners. Stirling was immediately exchanged, 
 and Sullivan released on parole. The British lost 5 officers killed and 56 
 wounded, and about 260 rank and file were wounded. 
 
 2 The retreating Americans could hear the British busy " with pickaxe 
 and shovel." 
 
424 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 wales ; and the fog, so thick over Long Island, left the New York 
 side dear. The last to go were the Pennsylvanians, the Marylanders, 
 and the Delawares. Last of all Washington stepped into the last boat. 
 
 By daybreak they were all safe in New York — troops, artillery, 
 stores, cattle, horses, and carts. But the situation was desperate. 
 The troops, dispirited by the defeat of the 27th, were full of "appre- 
 hension and despair." Great numbers of them went off — some by 
 whole companies, some by whole regimen.ts. Washington was com- 
 pelled to admit to Congress his " want of confidence in the generality 
 of my troops. With such troops, it is impossible to hold New York." 
 And if we go, shall we burn the town, that it may not be winter 
 quarters for the enemy? There were strange rumours in the 
 British camp of affrays between New Englanders and New Yorkers 
 on this question. On September 2 a ship-of-war got up to Turtle 
 Bay — others followed, and Washington saw that he must go at once. 
 In a few days the militia had dwindled from six to two thousand. 
 " The impulse for going home was so irresistible, that it answered 
 no purpose to oppose it." Washington understood and forgave, 
 and prepared to evacuate the town. 
 
 Meanwhile Lord Howe, who did in truth most earnestly wish 
 for a pacification, made another attempt, and sent Sullivan on 
 parole to Congress. He offered to compromise — he would treat 
 with a few members of Congress, and when the accommodation was 
 agreed on would acknowledge the authority of Congress to make 
 the compact. After much debate Congress agreed to send a 
 Committee to hear what terms he had to offer. Franklin, John 
 Adams, and Edward Rutledge of South Carolina, conferred with 
 the Admiral on September 11, at a house on Staten Island. When 
 they reached Amboy, they found an English officer in the boat sent 
 for them, with an intimation that he might be retained as a hostage 
 for their return. After a moment's conference the Commissioners 
 desired the officer to return with them. Lord Howe came down 
 to the water's edge to meet them, and seeing the officer, said, 
 " Gentlemen, you make me a very high compliment, and you may 
 depend upon it I will consider it as the most sacred of things." 
 So they walked to the house between files of grenadiers. Howe 
 still said he could treat with them only " as private gentlemen of 
 influence in the colonies." They replied that as their business was 
 only to hear, this did not matter. Lord Howe's earnest desire to 
 make peace was visible enough, but there was little to hear — 
 there were really no terms. Howe could make no promises, except 
 on condition that the Colonies returned to their old allegiance. 
 They said this could no longer be expected — all their humble 
 
THE BATTLE OF LONG ISLAND 425 
 
 petitions had been thrown aside with contempt, fresh injuries had 
 been heaped upon them, war had been declared against them.i 
 It was not in the power of Congress to promise that the Colonies 
 should return to their former dependent state. The tears came 
 into the stern eyes of " Black Dick " (who never smiled but before a 
 sea-fight) when his old friend Dr. Franklin made him understand 
 that it was now too late. The terms went no farther than the 
 granting of pardons — and even this with such exceptions as the 
 Peace Commission might choose to make, and, with some excep- 
 tions, which it must make. John Adams was one. It was, in fact, 
 " unconditional submission." 
 
 Meanwhile the situation in New York was becoming more 
 critical every hour. More ships were coming up the East River, 
 and a shot from one of them struck within six feet of Washington 
 as he rode into the fort. At sunset of the 14th of September it 
 seemed as though the British were about to land at Harlem — if 
 they did, Washington's army would be enclosed. Next morning 
 the bombardment began on the breastworks between Turtle 
 Island and the city ; and Sir Henry Clinton with Donop and the 
 Hessians were landing at Kip's Bay. The Massachusetts Militia 
 stationed there fled, and the Connecticut men followed their 
 example. It was a panic. Washington galloped up, trying in 
 vain to stop them. It was one of the rare occasions on which he 
 lost his self-control. He rushed forward, dashed his hat on the 
 ground, and cried, " Are these the men with whom I am to defend 
 America ? " He snapped his pistols at some, threatened others 
 with his sword. He would have been taken — the British were by 
 this time not eighty yards off— but an aide-de-camp seized his 
 bridle and forced him away. He was soon himself again, and while 
 the British and Hessians rested on their arms, Putnam retreated 
 along the Bloomingdale Road — " a forced march, on a sultry day, 
 under a burning sun, and amid clouds of dust, his army encumbered 
 with women, children, and all kinds of baggage. Yet all the loss 
 was about 15 killed, and 300 prisoners." ^ 
 
 ' " Long did I endeavor, with unfeigned and unwearied zeal, to preserve from 
 breaking that fine and noble china vase, the British empire." — Franklin to Lord 
 Howe, Philadelphia, July 20, 1776. 
 
 2 It was said that Mrs. Lindley Murray, the wife of Murray of the Grammar, 
 saved Putnam's division. The British generals passed her house and halted for 
 refreshment. Mrs. Murray set cake and wine before them, and they lingered, 
 talking and jesting and laughing, and bantering their hostess on the discomfiture 
 of her countrymen. Meanwhile Putnam in his retreat passed within a mile of 
 the house. The Murrays, though members of the Society of Friends, were 
 "patriots." 
 
426 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 New York was evacuated on the 14th of September. On the 
 1 6th Connecticut retrieved her character in the fierce skirmish near 
 Manhattanville, in which Knowlton fell. It was at the beginning 
 of this action that Leslie's men, full of contempt for their enemy, 
 sounded the view-halloo as in a fox-chase. But the rebels did not 
 run this time. General Howe never owned his full loss on this 
 occasion. 
 
 On the night of the 20th Washington's army saw a great light 
 in the direction of New York. It was a fire — there was a strong 
 wind blowing, and that night four hundred houses were destroyed. 
 Several persons said to have been detected in firing houses were 
 killed on the spot by the enraged British troops.^ The Americans 
 always denied all knowledge of this fire — Congress had expressly 
 forbidden the burning of the city. 
 
 Washington fortified himself in a camp on the long and narrow 
 neck of land which forms the northern end of Manhattan or New 
 York Island. It is a chain of rocky heights, a long, craggy ridge 
 between the Hudson and the Harlem. On the crest of one of 
 these — the highest, overlooking the Hudson — was Fort Washing- 
 ton, Two miles to the north was King's Bridge, the only pass 
 from Manhattan to the mainland. A mile and a half south of the 
 fort a double line of fortification extended across the neck to 
 Harlem River. Alexander Hamilton, a young captain of artillery, 
 a West-Indian by birth, scarcely out of his boyhood, had super- 
 intended the construction of these works. It was a strong position, 
 and it kept Washington's communications open with Connecticut. 
 Howe determined that he must be dislodged. 
 
 Washington, meanwhile, was imploring Congress to put the army 
 on a permanent footing — these short enlistments were fatal. On the 
 16th of September Congress made an order for eighty-eight bat- 
 talions to be enlisted for three years or till the end of the war — to be 
 furnished by each State in proportion to its ability. The men who 
 enlisted for the whole war to receive 100 acres of land — all to have 
 a bounty of 20 dollars, and a yearly suit of clothes. Then Congress 
 thought it had created an army. 
 
 It was time something was done. The loyalists were enlisting 
 wholesale — already there were 1500 of them in arms. Oliver de 
 Lancey was raising a brigade at Jamaica — to receive British pay.^ 
 All Long Island had submitted. In the Jerseys Tory enUstments 
 were brisk ; and many of the loyalists were highly respectable 
 persons, who conscientiously believed that the true interests of 
 
 ' Probably only one man — a violent loyalist, who had taken to drink. 
 - Sabine's American Loyalists. 
 
THE BATTLE OF LONG ISLAND 
 
 427 
 
 their countrymen lay in maintaining the British connection. Others 
 were like Robert Rodgers — called " Rodgers the Renegade." His 
 career gives us a glimpse of old Colonial history. He was a good 
 soldier in the French Wars ; later, was suspected of a plot to 
 plunder his own fort,i and join the French. When the Revolu- 
 tionary War began, he acted as spy for Carleton in Canada. 
 Washington had had him arrested, but he had managed to persuade 
 Congress that he was on his way to offer it his secret services. 
 He was released on giving a written promise, " on the honour of a 
 gentleman," not to bear arms against the United Colonies. He 
 was hardly liberated when he offered his services to the British, 
 received a colonel's commission, and raised a Tory corps of 
 light-horse, the famous Queen's Rangers. They were promised 
 confiscated lands, and privileges equal to those of the regular 
 army. 
 
 ^ Michilimackinac. 
 
 NOTE. 
 
 The eighty-eight battalions 
 New Hampshire 
 Massachusetts Bay . 
 Rhode Island 
 Connecticut 
 New York 
 New Jersey 
 Pennsylvania 
 Delaware 
 Maryland 
 Virginia 
 North Carolina 
 South Carolina 
 Georgia 
 
 The list of Ships and Vessels taken by American Privateers, is given in 
 Almon as 342 taken, 44 retaken, 18 released, 5 burnt. 
 
 The whole number of regulars enlisted for the Continental Army from begin- 
 ning to end was 231,950, from all colonies. Of these 67,907 were from 
 Massachusetts. All the States south of Pennsylvania, taken together, provided 
 only 59,493 — more than 8000 fewer than the single State of Massachusetts. 
 New England equipped and maintained above half of the whole number placed 
 at the disposal of Congress throughout the war. When the Middle and South 
 States became the seat of war, their men had to be kept at home to defend them- 
 selves. 
 
 3 batta 
 
 ions 
 
 IS 
 2 
 8 
 
 
 ' 
 
 4 
 
 
 J 
 
 4 
 12 
 
 
 ' 
 
 I 
 8 
 
 
 ■ 
 
 15 
 9 
 6 
 
 
 
 I 
 
 
 ■ 
 
 88 batta 
 
 ions 
 
 
 (Sei 
 
 )t. 16, 1776) 
 
428 
 
 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 ^ Table of the Number of Troops. 
 
 (From the Report of General Knox, 
 
 Secretary of War, to Congi 
 
 ess, 1790.) 
 
 States. 
 
 Quotas fixed 
 
 Troops Furnished. 
 
 by Congress. 
 
 Continentals. 
 
 Militia. 
 
 New Hampshire 
 
 . 10,194 
 
 12,496 
 
 2,093 
 
 Massachusetts 
 
 . 52,698 
 
 67,907 
 
 15.145 
 
 Rhode Island 
 
 ■ 5.694 
 
 5.908 
 
 4,284 
 
 Connecticut 
 
 28,336 . 
 
 32,039 
 
 7,238 
 
 New York 
 
 • 15.734 
 
 17,781 . 
 
 3,866 
 
 New Jersey 
 
 . 11.396 
 
 10,727 
 
 6.055 
 
 Pennsylvania 
 
 . 40,416 
 
 25,608 . 
 
 7.357 
 
 Delaware . 
 
 ■ 3.974 
 
 2,387 
 
 376 
 
 Maryland . 
 
 . 26,608 
 
 13,832 
 
 3,929 
 
 Virginia . 
 
 . 48,522 
 
 26,672 
 
 4,429 
 
 North Carolina 
 
 • 23,994 
 
 7.263 
 
 3,975 
 
 South Carolina 
 
 • 16,932 
 
 6,660 
 
 none 
 
 Georgia 
 
 • 3.974 
 288,472 
 
 2,679 
 231,959 
 
 none 
 
 
 58,747 
 
 These details and the Table are given in Sabine's American Loyalists. 
 
CHAPTER L 
 
 THE FALL OF FORT WASHINGTON AND THE 
 RETREAT THROUGH THE JERSEYS 
 
 "The Switzers fought 60 battles in defending their liberties, and finally drove 
 all the murdering tyrants out of their country." — To the Independent Sons in 
 Massachusetts State, Boston, Nov. 14, 1776. 
 
 " This retreat was censured by some as pusillanimous and disgraceful ; but, did 
 they know that our army was at one time less than a thousand effective men, 
 and never more than 4000 — that the number of the enemy was at least 8000, 
 exclusive of their artillery and light horse — that this handful of Americans 
 retreated slowly above 80 miles without losing a dozen men — and that suffering 
 themselves to be forced to an action would have been their entire destruction — 
 did they know this, they would never have censured it at all — they would have 
 called it prudent — posterity will call it glorious — and the names of Washington 
 and Fabius will run parallel to eternity." — Thomas Paine, Journal of the 
 Ame7-ican Army. Published in the Pennsylvania Journal. (Given in Almon, 
 1777. P- 28.) 
 
 For nearly a month Washington maintained himself on Harlem 
 Heights. Howe speaks of the "incredible labour" with which the 
 Americans fortified themselves here. He resolved to get upon 
 their principal line of communication to the north — towards 
 Connecticut. In accordance with reiterated orders from Congress, 
 great efforts had been made to block the Hudson near this spot, 
 but on October 11, the Roebuck, Phmnix and Tartar, men-of-war, 
 easily broke through all the obstructions, and got up to Tarrytown. 
 Washington saw at once that his position was no longer tenable, 
 and prepared to retire. Next day Howe embarked Donop's 
 brigade of Hessians, the guards, and the light infantry, passed 
 through Hell Gate in a very thick fog, and landed on the mainland 
 at Throg's Neck, near West Chester. The same day General Lee 
 arrived in Washington's camp — flushed with his success at Charles- 
 town,i and more sure than ever that he ought to command the 
 Provincial armies. In matters political he was not so bold — he 
 had come by way of Philadelphia, and there had recommended 
 
 1 Colonel Moultrie must, however, have the greater part of the honour of 
 repulsing the British at Charlestown. 
 
430 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Congress to listen to Lord Howe's "offers." He was eagerly 
 welcomed in camp — these untried levies, dispirited by defeat, had 
 an unmeasured belief in Lee's military genius. Lee agreed with 
 them, and soon began to find fault with everything, particularly 
 with Washington's obedience to Congress — he was always taking 
 the Commander-in-Chief to task for not threatening to resign as 
 often as he did not approve of its instructions. 
 
 The British at Throg's Neck were reinforced by the second 
 brigade of Hessians, and Washington broke up his camp. Before 
 he did so he formed his army into four divisions, under Lee, 
 Sullivan, Heath, and Lincoln — these divisions were to hold a chain 
 of fortified posts along a ridge of hills, on the west side of the 
 Bronx River, from King's Bridge to White Plains. 
 
 Now began three months of retreat and skirmish, skirmish and 
 retreat, all on the east side of the Hudson — the fighting done for 
 the most part "with spade and mattock." At White Plains, on 
 the 28th of October, there was a sharp engagement between 
 Washington's right flank — posted on Chatterton's Hill — and Rahl's 
 brigade of Hessians. The action was stubborn, although some of 
 the militia broke and ran from the British cavalry (which seems to 
 have been much dreaded at the beginning of the war). After it 
 the armies lay looking at each other, "at long cannon-shot." 
 Howe intended to renew the attack next morning ; but in the 
 night Washington so strengthened his already strong position — 
 entrenching himself behind "maize-stalks and clods of earth"— 
 that Howe sent for Lord Percy from Harlem before attempting 
 to storm. 
 
 It was while the armies lay thus that a British officer wrote 
 to his friend in London : " The rebel army are in so wretched a 
 condition as to clothing and accoutrements, that I believe no 
 nation ever saw such a set of tatterdemalions. There are few 
 coats among them but what are out at elbow, and in a whole 
 regiment there is scarce a pair of breeches. Judge, then, how they 
 must be pinched by a winter's campaign. We, who are warmly 
 clothed and well-equipped, already feel it severely ; for it is even 
 now much colder than I ever felt it in England." 
 
 Before Howe could make up his mind to storm, Washington 
 had moved his whole position to one five miles off, in the high 
 rocky hills by Northcastle. On this position Howe had actually 
 ordered an assault when a heavy rain came on. At last, on 
 November 4, the British camp was seen to be breaking up, 
 and in three days their whole force had disappeared. Whither? 
 Washington thought their aim was Fort Washington, and after that 
 
THE FALL OF FORT WASHINGTON 431 
 
 the Jerseys — and Philadelphia. And presently he heard that they 
 were investing Fort Washington. 
 
 He would have withdrawn the garrison as soon as it was 
 proved that the British could get up the Hudson, but Congress 
 wished it to be held, and Greene believed it to be impregnable, 
 and urged that it would keep a considerable body of British 
 employed in investing it. A "grudging discretion" had been given 
 to Washington, but he hesitated to avail himself of it — for he feared 
 a feint to cover an advance on the Delaware ; and accordingly, 
 on the 7th, he heard that the British were about to enter Jersey, 
 and at once began to move his army. He left Lee at Northcastle, 
 with one division ; Heath, with another, was to guard the posts on 
 both sides of Hudson. 
 
 Washington crossed the river on the 12 th of November. His 
 anxiety for Fort Washington was intense. Scarcely had he reached 
 Hackensack when he heard that Howe was pressing the siege. 
 He instantly returned to Peekskill. It was still possible to 
 communicate with the garrison — they might have been withdrawn 
 at this eleventh hour ; but they, with Greene and Putnam, were 
 confident of making a good defence. They did not know that 
 Captain William Demont, who lately deserted from the fort to 
 the British, had given Howe the plans of the fort and its 
 approaches. 
 
 The assault was made next morning (November 16) from four 
 sides at once, by Percy and Cornwallis, Rahl and Knyphausen. 
 Washington, from the opposite side of Hudson, could hear the 
 cannonade, and see the smoke ascending from the trees. With 
 a telescope he could even see Cadwallader and the Pennsylvanians 
 taken in flank by Rahl, cut down and bayoneted. It is said that 
 he wept like a child. Even then he sent a message to tell the 
 Commandant that if he could but hold out till nightfall he would 
 try to bring him off The messenger got in — but it was too late — 
 the British were already in the redoubts. Washington saw the 
 American flag go down, and the British hoisted in its stead. Two 
 thousand seven hundred Americans were prisoners of war.i 
 
 It was a terrible blow; and it happened just before the 
 enlistments expired. Washington wrote to his brother : " This 
 post, after the last ships went by, was held contrary to my wishes 
 and opinion. ... In ten days from this- date, there will not be 
 above two thousand men, if that number, of the fixed established 
 regiments on this side of Hudson River, to oppose Howe's whole 
 army. ... I solemnly protest that a pecuniary reward of twenty 
 ' This is the number given by Sir W. Howe, "including officers." 
 
432 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 thousand pounds a year would not induce me to undergo what I 
 do, and after all, perhaps to lose my character." 
 
 Now came the retreat through the Jerseys ; Washington, with 
 a dispirited and ever-diminishing army, pursued by Cornwallis with 
 5000 men — two battaUons of Hessians, a company of "yagers," and 
 the eight battalions of the reserve. His chance was in delay. 
 Until he was reinforced he could not fight. He had now but 
 3000 men, and the time of many of these would expire on the 30th 
 of November. Already on the 17th he had sent orders to Lee to 
 join him at once. Lee sent word that his men had no shoes, that 
 he had no boats for crossing at Dobbs' Ferry, and to go round by 
 King's would be to arrive too late. Finally, that he had heard 
 that Rodgers the Ranger was near, with his Rangers, and wanted 
 to catch them. This though an order had come for him to move 
 at once, as Philadelphia was in danger. Order after order came, 
 but he did not stir. Washington sent to Congress for reinforce- 
 ments — but he dared not tell them how weak his army was, and 
 why he did not fight. Again he wrote to Lee. And now Lee 
 had no carriages, and his men had no stockings (Washington's men 
 had none either), and there was still Rodgers to be caught, but he 
 had ordered Heath to detach 2000 men. (This was contrary to 
 Washington's express orders, and might endanger the posts on the 
 Hudson, and Heath declined to obey.) Washington replied that 
 it was not Heath he wanted, but Lee — Heath must remain ; and 
 he implored Lee to come by a safe route — he had heard the enemy 
 meant to intercept him. Delay might mean the loss of Philadelphia. 
 Lee replied that he did not believe there were as many Tories in 
 West Chester County as Washington supposed— he himself had 
 been clearing it of them. Nor did he think Philadelphia was 
 threatened. 
 
 There was a strong party which for various reasons wished to 
 see Lee in Washington's place. There were also many simple persons 
 who took Lee at his own valuation, and did not consider how much 
 of the success at Charlestown was really due to Colonel Moultrie. 
 Lee's slashing criticisms and boasts of what he would do impressed 
 them more than Washington's quiet steadfastness, and Lee spared 
 no pains to keep up this impression. He had long been writing 
 to Bowdoin in Boston, to Gates in Canada, even to Joseph Reed, 
 the Adjutant-General, Washington's trusted friend and secretary, 
 about the dreadful consequences of " an undecided mind," as 
 shown by " the cursed job of Fort Washington." To Bowdoin he 
 wrote that the eastern and western armies ought to stand each on 
 its own bottom, and that the orders of Congress should not be 
 
THE FALL OF FORT WASHINGTON 433 
 
 "too nicely'' weighed at so important a crisis. "We must save 
 the community in spite of the ordinances of the legislature. There 
 are times when we must commit treason against the State for the 
 salvation of the State. The present crisis demands this brave, this 
 virtuous kind of treason." 
 
 On the 28th of November Washington marched out of Newark 
 at one end, as Cornwallis' vanguard marched in at the other. He 
 hoped to make a stand at New Brunswick, and he sent Mifflin to 
 Congress, and Reed to the Jersey legislature, for help. But the 
 legislature was shifting — not to say fleeing — from place to place, 
 and on the eve of dissolution. On the 30th the enlistments fell 
 in ; the Marylanders and New Jersey men went home, and the 
 Pennsylvanians deserted in such numbers that sentinels were 
 posted at the ferries to stop them. The same day Howe issued 
 his Proclamation, offering a free pardon to all who should come 
 in within sixty days. 
 
 At once many hastened to make their peace. New Jersey was 
 unused to war — there, the Indian did not trouble, and the loyalists 
 were strong. Two thousand seven hundred and three Jerseymen, 
 85 1 Rhode Islanders, and 1282 New Yorkers subscribed a Declaration 
 of Loyalty, and were worrying Lord Howe to let them fit out privateers. 
 But that honest sea-dog did not encourage them — he was disgusted 
 at their readiness to set off to kill their old neighbours. Besides 
 these, there were many sober respectable men who looked on the 
 war as rebellion, and many more who looked on it as insanity. 
 
 Still Washington did not despair. He had been promised a 
 reinforcement from Schuyler's northern army — and there was Lee. 
 It would be a great thing to prevent the British from advancing on 
 Philadelphia before spring. In such a war as this delay was every- 
 thing. As Cornwallis approached, Washington ordered the Pro- 
 vincial Governor of New Jersey to remove to the western bank all 
 boats and river-craft of every kind, for seventy miles up and down 
 the Delaware. 
 
 It was at New Brunswick that he received a new blow — worse 
 than those the British dealt him. As was the rule in Reed's 
 absence, he opened the despatches. There was one from Lee to 
 the Secretary. It began : " I received your most obliging, flattering 
 letter ; lament with you that fatal indecision of mind, which in war 
 is a much greater disqualification than stupidity, or even want of 
 personal courage." Lee added that the General's " pressing orders " 
 to bring over the troops under his command "threw him into the 
 greatest dilemma " — an odd expression in one who had just been so 
 severe on indecision. There was Rodgers, lying in so exposed a 
 VOL. I. — 28 
 
434 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 situation that his capture would be easy — would have been 
 attempted last night but for the rain. Only waited to finish this 
 business of Rodgers and company — " I shall then fly to you ; for to 
 confess a truth, I really think our chief will do better with me than 
 without me.'' 
 
 Washington sent this letter on to Reed, merely explaining how 
 he came to open it. 
 
 He had hoped to make a stand here, at the river Raritan — he 
 counted on the Jersey Militia turning out to support him, but they 
 did not. He must continue that disheartening retreat. He waited 
 till Cornwallis' vanguard appeared in sight beyond the Raritan ; 
 then he broke down the bridge and fell back on Trenton, reaching 
 it on the 2nd of December, and at once began to move his stores 
 and baggage across the Delaware. Cornwallis came marching 
 down, "with all the pomp of war," thinking to find boats and 
 pursue — Washington's last boats were still in sight. But Washington 
 had been beforehand with him — there were no boats. He returned 
 to Brunswick, to wait till he could cross on the ice, and Howe 
 marched into Princeton.^ 
 
 At this time a field-officer in New York wrote, "The rebels 
 continue flying before our army. . . . Mr. Washington had orders 
 from the Congress to rally and defend Brunswick, but he sent them 
 word he could not. He was seen retreating with two brigades to 
 Trenton, where they talk of resisting ; but such a panic has seized 
 the rebels, that no part of Jersey will hold them. . . . The Congress 
 have lost their authority. . . . They are in such consternation that 
 they know not what to do." ^ 
 
 On one of these dark days, Washington, talking with Mercer, 
 asked him whether, if they retreated to the back parts of 
 
 1 When Howe took possession of Princeton, on December 7, the soldiers gutted 
 the Library of the College, Museum, and Lecture Rooms, and broke up the 
 philosophical instruments for the brass fittings. A famous orrery, by Ritten- 
 house, said to be the finest in the world, perished here. The house of 
 Dr. Witherspoon, the President, called " Tusculum," and full of the 
 Doctor's collections in Germany and Italy, was pillaged. Every volume of 
 the library was carried off (to be sold in New York for the price of a 
 drink) or destroyed. (See Annual Register for 1777, and Judge Jones' History 
 of New York. ) 
 
 ^American Archives, 5th Series, iii. The writer continues: "The two 
 Adamses are in New England ; Franklin gone to France ; Lynch has lost his 
 senses ; Rutledge has gone home disgusted ; Dana is persecuting at Albany, and 
 Jay's in the country playing as bad a part ; so that the fools have lost the assist- 
 ance of the knaves. However, should they embrace the enclosed proclamation, 
 they may yet escape the halter. . . . Honest David Matthew, the mayor, has 
 made his escape from them, and arrived here this day." 
 
THE FALL OF FORT WASHINGTON 435 
 
 Pennsylvania, the Pennsylvanians would support them ? Mercer 
 said if the lower counties gave up the back counties would do 
 the same. " Then we must retire to Augusta County in Virginia," 
 replied Washington, " and try a predatory war. If overpowered, 
 we must cross the Alleghanies." 
 
CHAPTER LI 
 THE HOUSE OF RODRIQUE HORTALEZ 
 
 " En France, la partie eclairee de la nation s'enflamma a I'idee de la liberte, 
 et le gouvernement suivit 1' elan universel. II n'allait point a Taveugle ; car il 
 prevoyait avec une remarquable nettete le resultat d'une intervention victorieuse. 
 . . . M. de Vergennes . . . disait a I'ambassadeur anglais : ' Bien loin de nous 
 rejouir des evenements, nous les voyons avec quelque peine. Ce que vous 
 arrive en Amerique n'est a la convenance de personne. Je vois la suite de cette 
 independance a laquelle aspirent vos colonies ; elles voudront avoir des flottes 
 . . . elles seront en etat de conqu^rir nos iles . . . elles ne laisseront pas les 
 puissances europeennes occuper unepouce de terre en Amerique.' "—J. de Crozals, 
 Histoire de la Civilisation. 
 
 They say the pen is mightier than the sword. A mighty pen had 
 
 come to the aid of America. One Thomas Paine, son of a very 
 
 small farmer at Thetford, in Norfolk, brought up a Quaker, ex- 
 
 staymaker, ex-exciseman, wrote a pamphlet setting forth the 
 
 wrongs of excisemen. He went to London about this, and so 
 
 became acquainted with Dr. Franklin, who advised him to try his 
 
 fortune in America, where clever men were welcomed. So Paine 
 
 made over all he had to his creditors, renounced all rights in the 
 
 little property his wife had brought him,i and arrived in America 
 
 in November, 1774. He began to write at once — at first against 
 
 slavery. Soon he was editing the Pennsylvania Magazine. This 
 
 magazine avoided politics and religion; which did not prevent 
 
 Paine from writing Reflections on the death of Lord Clive, and 
 
 defending the Rights of Woman. Little by little the Pennsylvania 
 
 Magazine began to comment on more burning questions — as in a 
 
 dialogue which made the shade of Wolfe meet with Gage "in a 
 
 wood near Boston," and conjure him to resign his commission, 
 
 rather than go down to posterity with Jeffries and the other "royal 
 
 executioners." Then came Lexington. In the autumn of the year 
 
 Paine wrote a pamphlet called Common Sense, in which he tried to 
 
 show the Americans that Independence was the only way out. He 
 
 told them it was idle to talk of going back to 1763. It was not in 
 
 ' They had agreed to separate — neither of them ever told the reason. 
 
 436 
 
THE HOUSE OF RODRIQUE HORTALEZ 437 
 
 the power of Great Britain to do their continent justice, even if she 
 wished it. They had it in their power to begin the world again. 
 You are surely not enduring all this misery merely for the removal 
 of Lord North ? " The object contended for ought always to bear 
 some just proportion to the expense." One hundred thousand copies 
 of Common Sense were sold in less than three months, but Paine made 
 nothing by it — he had given away the copyright to the State. His 
 reward was to have made a nation. His words went straight home 
 when, on New Year's Day, 1776, Lord Dunmore wrote his arguments 
 for him in letters of fire, in the flames of Norfolk. 
 
 Independence was a great plunge — few were prepared for it. 
 But the British Government did its best to prove that Paine was 
 right when he said the day of reconciliation was past. It persisted 
 in refusing to acknowledge Congress, or even to treat with the 
 Colonies separately until they had laid down their arms. And the 
 whole experience of the past ten years showed that as soon as they 
 laid down their arms, Britain would begin again with her anti-com- 
 mercial laws. "Unconditional submission" had been the policy 
 put forward by Ministers in the Debates of the last winter. And 
 now a new factor was to be introduced into the calculation. 
 
 Already in July, 1774, Rochford, then Secretary of State for the 
 Southern Department, had had the incredible folly to tell de Guines, 
 the French Ambassador, that many in England thought a war with 
 France the surest way to end the American business — for then 
 America, afraid lest France should recover Canada, would make up 
 her quarrel with the Mother Country. De Guines told de Vergennes, 
 and advised him to find out how things were in America. Means 
 were found of assuring the Americans that France considered her- 
 self well rid of Canada, and sympathised with the Americans in 
 their struggle ; and next spring Silas Deane was sent to Paris as 
 Commercial Commissioner and Agent from the Thirteen United 
 Colonies. He was to tell the French Government that if it did 
 come to separation, France would be the first Power whose friend- 
 ship America would seek. Thus the British Government, not 
 satisfied with the old grudge France and Spain might be supposed 
 to have against England for the Seven Years' War, supplied them 
 with the new motive of fear of a new war ! 
 
 Almost immediately after the Declaration of Independence, 
 Congress had named Franklin, Silas Deane, and Arthur Lee as 
 Commissioners to Europe. Deane was a Connecticut merchant. 
 Lee was a Virginian of good family — an M.D. of Edinburgh. 
 When hostilities broke out he was Agent for Massachusetts. 
 
 All the intellectual forces of France were for America. The 
 
438 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Encyclopsedists had brought liberty into fashion ; and along with 
 a not unnatural willingness to pay off the old Canadian score, there 
 mingled a nobler feeling, which politicians of the North school 
 have never been able to understand — a genuine sympathy for a 
 people struggling to be free. De Vergennes, who was a far-seeing 
 statesman, perceived that the gain to France from American 
 independence was doubtful. He even foresaw the Monroe Doctrine. 
 " We are far from rejoicing at what is happening to you," he said 
 to Lord Stormont. " It will do us no good. The end of the 
 independence of your colonies will be that they will not permit 
 any European power to occupy an inch of ground in America." 
 For all this he was ready to help them ; and probably only three 
 persons in France were really averse to war with England — the 
 King, the Queen, and Turgot. 
 
 Congress wanted money and arms — had also proposed a 
 Commercial Treaty, but a Treaty would necessarily imply the 
 recognition of the United States; and Louis xvi shrank from 
 this admission of the principle of rebellion, as much as from the 
 war which England would certainly declare next day. 
 
 At last he was prevailed on for a loan — but the Government 
 must not appear — it must be a private transaction. So de 
 Vergennes sent for Caron de Beaumarchais, once a watchmaker, 
 now author of the Marriage of Figaro, man of letters, courtier, 
 and secret agent. Beaumarchais had gone to London in 1775, 
 "on business for the King of France "^the business being to 
 ferret out the truth as to the dispute with the Colonies ; and had 
 made the acquaintance of Arthur Lee.^ De Vergennes told 
 Beaumarchais that the King would give Congress a million livres, 
 and would try to persuade Spain to give another million — but — 
 but it must appear as an individual speculation. Beaumarchais 
 must open a great commercial establishment, and at his own risk 
 furnish arms to America. The arsenals would deliver him arms 
 and munitions — but he must pay for them, and America, though 
 she could not repay him in money, could do so in tobacco — to 
 be handed over at Cape Frangais in Hayti. So Beaumarchais 
 set up the House of Rodrique Hortalez et Cie., in the Rue du 
 Temple, with himself as managing partner. This was in the spring 
 and early summer of 1776. Then Deane arrived, accredited from 
 Congress for this special purpose of the French Loan and a 
 treaty of Commerce. Beaumarchais broke off negotiations with 
 Arthur Lee, and addressed himself to Deane; and Lee never 
 
 ^ Long before this Beaumarchais had been mixed up with that mysterious 
 personage the Chevalier d'Eon, in the matter of the Peace of 1763' 
 
THE HOUSE OF RODRIQUE HORTALEZ 439 
 
 forgave him. Lee is described as an honest man, but almost 
 miraculously little and mean. His petty jealousies sometimes 
 made him act like a madman, and Franklin thought he was not 
 always responsible for his actions. The worst of it was that Lee 
 had supposed the money was a free gift, and had told Congress 
 so, and that the tobacco was only asked for as a blind. He 
 knew that the House of Rodrique Hortalez was a blind to Lord 
 Stormont, "set up without an idea of doing its work on business 
 principles." Lee accused Deane of having negotiated a gift into 
 a loan, in collusion with Beaumarchais, to enrich themselves at 
 the expense of Congress. As Franklin wrote afterwards to 
 Congress : "At present, all in that transaction is in darkness; and 
 we know not whether the whole, or a part, or no part of the 
 supplies were at the expense of Government, nor if we are in 
 debt, whether to the King or M. de Beaumarchais." The affair 
 had painful results, and implicated the good faith both of Silas 
 Deane 1 and Beaumarchais. 
 
 On the loth of June, 1776, Beaumarchais received 
 de Vergennes' order for one million livres on the French 
 Treasury; two months afterwards he received another million 
 from the Court of Spain, and some time after that a second 
 million from France. First and last, he collected about two 
 millions more from his friends, so that Rodrique Hortalez et Cie. 
 had a capital of about five millions in all. As soon as Deane 
 arrived, he saw de Vergennes, and proposed a commercial treaty, 
 at the same time asking for 200 pieces of cannon,^ and arms, 
 munitions, clothing, etc., for 25,000 men. De Vergennes told 
 him he must go to Beaumarchais — " he is a merchant." Deane 
 agreed to pay in tobacco, and after a good deal of difficulty the 
 stores were got off — and with them a great number of French 
 officers, eager to teach the Americans how to use them. Of 
 course Stormont heard of it, and complained, and talked of 
 treaties. Stormont was angry, de Vergennes very polite. He 
 always protested that France was most anxious to conform to 
 the treaties, if Lord Stormont would only mention which treaties 
 were to be considered still in force. This, for various reasons, 
 it was not convenient to do just then, so the British Government 
 
 ^ As Deane became later a secret agent of King George ni (see the Kings 
 Correspondence with Lord North), his word ought not to be taken as evidence. 
 This treachery was not known for many years. 
 
 2 Cannon were cast in the royal foundries which had not the arms o. 
 France impressed upon them, so the workmen knew they were intended for 
 America. 
 
440 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 had to put up with a great deal — till it should have subdued 
 America. To quiet the British Ambassador, every now and then 
 a ship for America would be stopped and searched, and if 
 warlike stores were found, would be ordered to unload them. 
 But a cargo can be reloaded — at any rate, the ship always sailed, 
 and from this time there was a constant stream of supplies from 
 France. Ministers made up for having to be civil to France 
 by bullying Holland, and searching Dutch ships, until Holland 
 began to get her own fleet ready. 
 
 In December Franklin arrived,^ and received an enthusiastic 
 welcome, which again excited the jealousy of Arthur Lee — his 
 own attempts at negotiation had been very unsuccessful. 
 Franklin informed Congress of the true nature of the loan, but 
 it is doubtful whether he ever knew anything about the affair. 
 It was begun long before he arrived, and he left it to Deane. 
 
 Franklin brought over with him a plan for peace — England 
 to renounce all claim to govern any of the United States, and to 
 cede her North American possessions, Bermuda, etc., and in return 
 the United States to pay the British Government _;^ioo,ooo for 
 one hundred years. It would have been worth our while to accept 
 this proposal. But a nation whose judgment was calm enough to 
 see this would never have got itself into the situation which produced 
 the offer. 
 
 It was given out in England that Franklin had run away from 
 America ; but there was a terrible secret fear that he was gone to 
 persuade Louis xvi to acknowledge the United States. Lord 
 Stormont had remonstrated on " the chief of the American rebels " 
 being allowed to land in France. De Vergennes sent a messenger 
 to forbid him to come to Paris, but it happened that the messenger 
 took one road and Dr. Franklin another ; and once arrived in Paris, 
 de Vergennes said it would have been a violation of hospitality to 
 turn him out. " The old man, with gray hair appearing under a 
 martin fur cap,'' greatly impressed Parisian society. It was said by 
 
 1 When Franklin went from America to France, Rockingham wrote : "In 
 regard to this event, I cannot refrain from paying my tribute of admiration 
 to the vigour, magnanimity, and determined resolution of the Old Man. The 
 horrid scene at a Privy Council is in my memory, though perhaps not in 
 his. It may not excite his conduct. It certainly deters him not. He boldly 
 ventures to cross the Atlantic in an American little frigate, and risks the dangers 
 of being taken, and being once more brought before an implacable tribunal. 
 The sight of Banquo's ghost could not more offend the eyes of Macbeth, than 
 the knowledge of this old man being at Versailles, should affect the minds of 
 those who were principals in that horrid scene." — The Marquis of Rockingham 
 to , December, 1776. 
 
THE HOUSE OF RODRIQUE HORTALEZ 441 
 
 ministerialists that he appeared at Versailles, and ran against 
 Stormont in the ante-chamber — but this was not the case. De 
 Vergennes and Franklin were very cautious, and Franklin was 
 given plainly to understand that France could not recognise the 
 States until some signal military advantage had been gained over the 
 British. Of this there seemed little chance at present, 
 
 Franklin came over in the Reprisal, Captain Wickes. Wickes 
 took several prizes on his way, among them two brigantines. 
 Perhaps the taking of the brigantines put the idea into Frank- 
 lin's head, perhaps Beaumarchais suggested it — but very soon 
 afterwards the American Envoys bought " a trim-built cutter,'' at 
 an English port, sent her over to Dunkirk to be fitted out as a 
 privateer, christened her the Surprise, and appointed Captain 
 Conyngham to command her. And presently she began to surprise 
 with such effect that one fine morning the Captain of the Prince of 
 Orange mail-packet from England to Holland was waited on by 
 Captain Conyngham as he sat at breakfast in his cabin. That day 
 the English mail-bags were forwarded to Paris instead of to the 
 Hague. Lord Stormont thereupon asked for his passports ; so 
 Conyngham and his crew were locked up in Dunkirk gaol, the 
 Prince of Orange was restored, the Surprise confiscated, and two 
 French men-of-war went to Dunkirk to try Conyngham as a pirate. 
 But unfortunately there were not good locks to the prison, and so 
 the pirates escaped — as de Vergennes explained to Lord Stormont 
 with deep regret. 
 
CHAPTER LIl 
 GENERAL LEE 
 
 " Give me leave to say your affairs are in a more unpromising way than 
 you seem to apprehend ; your army is on the eve of dissolution . . . there is a 
 material difference between voting battalions, and raising men." — Washington 
 to Congress, Sept. or Oct., 1776. 
 
 Howe's first idea had been merely to take possession of New 
 Jersey, but Cornwallis' successes suggested the possibility of taking 
 Philadelphia at once, by a coup-de-main. 
 
 Of his retreat Washington wrote to Congress : " Nothing but 
 necessity obliged me to retire before the enemy. ... If the 
 militia of this State had stepped forth in season, and timely notice 
 they had, we might have prevented the enemy's crossing the 
 Hackensack. We might, with equal possibility of success, have 
 made a stand at Brunswick, on the Raritan. But, as both these 
 rivers were fordable in a variety of places — being only knee-deep — 
 it required many men to guard the passes, and these we had not." 
 
 When Cornwallis was stopped at the Delaware, he was only 
 sixty miles from Philadelphia. Congress had thought it advisable 
 to adjourn to Baltimore. 
 
 The weather was becoming severe — Howe ordered the army 
 into winter quarters, and returned to New York. He had just 
 committed a great mistake. Believing that further resistance was 
 impossible — for he was aware that all the American enlistments 
 would expire at the end of the year — he had divided his forces, 
 sending Parker's squadron, with Clinton and Percy's divisions, 
 and two Enghsh and two Hessian brigades, to Rhode Island. 
 Clinton took possession without resistance, but for the next three 
 years this considerable body of troops was uselessly employed in 
 occupying the smallest State in the Union. ^ 
 
 Cornwallis had asked for leave — his wife was dying of grief 
 
 and anxiety at his absence. Howe appointed Grant in his place, 
 
 and left Donop with two Hessian brigades, the "yagers" and 
 
 42nd Highlanders, to hold the line from Trenton to Burlington. 
 
 ' Clinton sailed on the 1st of December. 
 
 442 
 
GENERAL LEE 443 
 
 Three Hessian regiments were at Trenton. The chain of British 
 posts extended from Fort Lee, on the Jersey shore, to Trenton — 
 from the Hackensack to the Delaware. Howe was aware it was 
 too long a line, but gives as his reason the wish to cover the 
 County of Monmouth, where there were many loyalists. Donop 
 had orders to hang on the nearest tree any inhabitants who, in 
 bands or separately, fired on any of the army. All provisions 
 exceeding the wants of an ordinary family were to be seized — from 
 Whig and Tory alike. It was impossible to prevent the Hessians 
 from plundering — they came to America to do it, and they did 
 not desert only as long as they were allowed to plunder.^ 
 
 In this division of force, and long-extended line, Washington 
 saw an opportunity for "a stroke" which should restore the 
 confidence of the people. He only waited for the Canadian 
 reinforcements, and for Lee — when on December 13 he learned 
 that Lee had been taken prisoner by the British ! 
 
 Lee did not cross the Hudson till the 2nd of December. His 
 plan for catching Rodgers had failed. But he wrote to Washington 
 that the delay had done good service — it had augmented his army. 
 He expected to enter Jersey with 4000 men, who would "make 
 a very important diversion." He hoped Washington would " bind 
 him as little as possible — detached generals cannot have too great 
 latitude, unless they are very incompetent indeed." He made 
 another attempt to make Heath part with 2000 of his men. 
 Heath, who had written to the Commander-in-Chief on occasion 
 of Lee's former demand, produced the reply, ordering him to 
 remove no men from his post. Lee said he knew best what was 
 necessary — Washington was at a distance. Heath, a plain, simple 
 soldier, refused unless Lee chose to give his written order, as 
 commanding at that fast. Lee did so— but even his effrontery 
 seems to have quailed on reflection, for next morning he said he 
 would not take the regiments. He was receiving message after 
 message to come, for Philadelphia was in danger; but his march 
 was most dilatory. At Chatham, on the 9th, he heard from Heath 
 that three of the four regiments sent to Washington's aid from 
 Schuyler's army had arrived at Peekskill. He immediately ordered 
 Heath to send them on. " I am in hopes to reconquer the 
 Jerseys.'' From Morristown he wrote to the Committee of 
 Congress that he did not intend "to join the army with 
 Washington." On the 12th he marched eight miles to Vealtown. 
 
 ^ "They were led to believe, before they left Hesse-Cassel, that they were to 
 come to America to establish their private fortunes, and they have acted on that 
 principle." — Evidence of Major-General Robertson, June 8, 1779. 
 
444 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 He had now about 4000 men with him. The British were only 
 eighteen miles off, but Lee left General Sullivan with the troops, 
 and went to Baskingridge, three miles off, to pass the night at a 
 tavern. He took only a small guard with him. About four next 
 morning he was aroused by Major Wilkinson, sent by Gates to 
 ask what should be done with the other four regiments from 
 Canada. Lee told Wilkinson to take some sleep. At eight, he 
 appeared "in slippers and blanket-coat.'' Even then he frittered 
 away several hours, talking to Wilkinson, and bullying the Con- 
 necticut light-horse, who came with complaints.^ Sullivan sent 
 for orders, and Lee told him the route to take — he would soon 
 follow. Wilkinson thought it showed he meant to attack the 
 British at Princeton. They did not breakfast till ten, and after 
 breakfast Lee sat down to write to Gates. " This ingenious 
 manoeuvre of Fort Washington " had unhinged the goodly fabric 
 
 " we " had been building. " There never was so d d a stroke ; 
 
 entre nous, a certain great man is most damnably deficient." Lee 
 had just signed this letter, when Wilkinson, who was looking out 
 of the window, saw a party of British dragoons running up the 
 lane which led to the house — they were led by a young cornet — 
 Banastre Tartleton — who was to play a very considerable part in 
 the later years of the war. By a singular coincidence the dragoons 
 belonged to the identical regiment which Lee led into Villa Velha, 
 when he surprised it in 1762.^ 
 
 Resistance was impossible — Lee's guard had stacked their arms, 
 and were warming themselves in the sun on the side of a house 
 opposite. All that can be said for Lee is that he refused to hide 
 under a bed. It would not have saved him — a Tory who had 
 recognised him at the tavern the night before had ridden hard to 
 Pennington and given information. The British threatened to 
 fire the house. Lee surrendered. No time was lost, for fear 
 of a rescue. The "heaven-born general" was put on Wilkinson's 
 horse — which was standing saddled at the door— and hurried away, 
 still in the blanket-coat and slippers. A feu-de-joie was fired when 
 he arrived in the British camp — for they too believed that Lee was 
 the "most scientific and experienced" of the rebel generals. 
 
 ' Some of them must have been odd figures — they wore full-bottomed 
 perukes, in the fashion of George the First. "One wanted forage, another 
 his horse shod, another his pay, a fourth provisions," etc., to which the General 
 replied, "Your wants are numerous; but you have not mentioned the last, — 
 
 you want to go home, and shall be indulged ; for d you, you do no good 
 
 here." [Memoirs of General Wilkinson.) The pious and decorous Connecticut 
 men were not used to such language, and retired offended. 
 
 - Fonblanque's Life of General Burgoyne. 
 
CHAPTER LIII 
 TRENTON 
 
 "Your imagination can scarce extend to a situation more distressing than 
 mine. Our only dependence now is upon the speedy enlistment of a new 
 army. If this fails, I think the game will be pretty well up, as from 
 disaffection and want of spirit and fortitude, the inhabitants, instead of 
 resistance, are offering submission and taking protection from Gen. Howe in 
 Jersey." — Washington to Lund Washington, December 17, 1776. 
 
 "These are the times that try men's souls." — Thomas Paine, The American 
 Crisis, December, 1776. 
 
 " Paine wrote by the camp-fires ; the winter storms, the Delaware's waves, 
 were mingled with his ink ; the half-naked soldiers in their troubled sleep dream- 
 ing of their distant homes, the skulking deserter creeping off in the dusk, the 
 _pallid face of the heavy-hearted commander, made the awful shadows beneath 
 which was written that leaflet which went to the Philadelphia printer along with 
 Washington's last foreboding letters to his relatives in Virginia. " — Moncure D. 
 Conway, Life of Thomas Paine. 
 
 Washington had now been reinforced by 1500 volunteers from 
 Philadelphia. He was entreating Congress to raise and officer some 
 battalions for the United States, without the intervention of each 
 several State. Its first act on arriving at Baltimore was to give 
 him full powers to direct all the operations of the war. He at once 
 ordered three battalions of artillery to be recruited. "Ten days 
 more," he wrote, " will put an end to the existence of this army." ^ 
 On the 20th SuUivan brought up Lee's men — they were in a 
 miserable plight, destitute of everything, and many only fit for 
 the hospital. The same day Gates arrived with 500 effectives — 
 all that remained of four New England regiments. Washington's 
 army was now somewhere about 5000, but on January i he would 
 have only about 1400 — all miserably provided. None the less he 
 had made up his mind to attack Rahl at Trenton. His camp at 
 Trenton Falls was nearly opposite to Trenton. The outrages 
 
 ' " I saw him in that gloomy period ; dined with him, and attentively marked 
 his aspect ; always grave and thoughtful, he appeared at that time pensive and 
 
 solemn in the extreme." — Wilkinson. 
 
 445 
 
446 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 committed by these German hirelings had turned terror into 
 hatred — moreover, the Hessians had grown careless, intent only 
 on plunder. The three regiments were commanded by Rahl, 
 Knyphausen, and Lossberg. Rahl had asked, and obtained, the 
 chief command for his services at Chatterton Hill and Fort 
 Washington. Some of his men kept diaries, from which we learn 
 that the Colonel was a martinet when sober, but was frequently 
 drunk. He harassed his men with purposeless duty. He had 
 the cannon dragged about the town every day; and he was 
 distractingly fond of music. He did not mind what his men did 
 when off duty if only he had enough of the hautboys. He made 
 the guard march round and round the churchyard palings to 
 music; he would make merry till late at night, and rise late 
 of a morning, and was not ready when the officers came to 
 parade. On parade he thought of little but how the music went. 
 When it was suggested to him that a few outworks might as well 
 be thrown up, he scorned the idea — if the rebels came, at them 
 with the bayonet! When Major von Dechow urged that works 
 would cost nothing, the Colonel only laughed, and made unseemly 
 jests. But he was a good-natured, rollicking man, of great personal 
 bravery, and in spite of his fancy for dragging cannon about, his 
 men liked him. 
 
 Once more, at this terrible juncture, the pen came to the help 
 of the sword. 
 
 Thomas Paine had given up writing in the Pennsylvania 
 Magazine, and had enlisted instead in the Pennsylvania division 
 of the Flying Camp — ten thousand men, engaged to go wherever 
 they were needed. Paine did not go home when his time was 
 up — he re-enlisted. He was in the retreat from Fort Lee, when 
 the Provincials had to leave their dinners behind in the camp 
 ovens. When Washington tried to make a stand at Newark, 
 Paine began to write the first number of the American Crisis ; 
 but half Washington's army left him at Newark, and the Crisis 
 was not printed till December 19, when it appeared in the 
 Pennsylvania Journal. Copies came into the camp above Trenton 
 Falls, and men who knew that the General was planning an 
 attack on the enemy, gathered round the camp-fires of nights 
 to hear a comrade read it. It began, "These are the times 
 that try men's souls." The words rang in their ears as they 
 tossed among the icefloes of the Delaware, that " Christmas day 
 at night," when Washington set off to surprise the Hessians at 
 Trenton. 
 
 By this time there was more reason than even the raising the 
 
TRENTON 447 
 
 spirits of his army; by an intercepted letter i Washington had 
 definitely learned that Howe was only waiting till the Delaware 
 should be completely frozen over to advance on Philadelphia. At 
 all hazards something must be attempted before that. "Our 
 numbers," wrote Washington, "are less than I had any conception 
 of; but necessity, dire necessity, will, nay, must, justify an attack." 
 There was no time to be lost. In a few days the Delaware would 
 be so blocked with ice that boats could not cross; a few more 
 days still, and an army could. And on New Year's Day most of 
 his own army would go home. He chose the night of Christmas 
 Day, rather because it was the first moment at which he could 
 move than because he hoped that the season's carousal would 
 relax vigilance. He intended to cross at McKonkey's Ferry, 
 nine miles above Trenton, and march down. Ewing, with the 
 Pennsylvanians, was to cross a mile below Trenton, and march 
 up ; and Putnam was to bring down the troops from Philadelphia, 
 cross below Burlington, and attack the lower posts under Donop. 
 Washington wished Gates to lead a party, but Gates shuffled out 
 of it — he too loved a separate command, and was intriguing 
 to get Schuyler's. He wanted Washington to retire behind the 
 Susquehannah, and told Wilkinson he was going to Congress to 
 propose it ! 
 
 At the instant of starting, Washington received a letter from 
 Reed to tell him that a loyalist insurrection seemed to threaten 
 in Philadelphia, and Putnam could not leave. The 600 men he 
 sent instead tried to cross at Dunk's Ferry, but the rising tide 
 threw back the ice on the Jersey shore in such heaps that neither 
 horse nor artillery could cross. Ewing, opposite Trenton, did not 
 even try to get over, convinced that Washington would not make 
 the attempt in such a storm. It was one of the worst nights of 
 December. 
 
 As soon as it was dark Washington marched to McKonkey's 
 
 ' Washington had plenty of spies in Jersey, and always kept a httle "hard 
 money " for them, doling it out to his officers by 20 or 25 guineas at a time. He 
 also sent them phials of invisible ink, and instructions how to use it. John 
 Honeyman, one of his spies, was in Wolfe's Body-guard at Quebec. He was 
 now a butcher and cattle-dealer, and it was natural for him to be often in and 
 near Trenton, buying beasts. When he had something to tell, he got himself 
 captured by some American scouts, who strapped him to his horse, and took him 
 to head-quarters at Newtown. The Commander-in-Chief examined him in private 
 for half an hour, and ordered him to be court-martialled next day. But next day 
 Honeyman was not to be found. This conversation decided Washington to risk 
 the attempt on Trenton, — See Stryker, and Washington's Letters to the President of 
 Congress, of August and September, 1778. 
 
448 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Ferry with his 2400 — all he had fit for such a service. He knew 
 by this time that Ewing could not join him. At the Ferry 
 Wilkinson overtook him with a letter from Gates, to say he was on 
 his way to Congress — Wilkinson had traced the march by the 
 blood on the snow; most of Washington's men, like Lee's, had 
 broken shoes. He left Washington to make the great attempt 
 without him, and hurried back to overtake Gates, whose fortunes 
 he thought were bound up with his own. 
 
 The troops began to cross about sunset. "The weather was 
 intensely cold, the wind was high, the current strong, and the river 
 full of floating ice." The Marblehead fishermen went first — they 
 were nearly as amphibious as seals. Washington crossed early, 
 and waited on the Jersey bank. These are the times that try 
 men's souls. It was terrible work getting the artillery over, but 
 Knox's " stentorian lungs " enabled his voice to be heard above the 
 storm. It was three in the morning before the last gun was 
 landed — four, before the line of march could be formed, and they 
 set out in the teeth of the north-easter that blew the snow and 
 sleet in their faces. Nine miles they went, the ground slipping 
 from under their ill-shod feet — now climbing a steep hill, now 
 marching through wooded defiles and forests of oak and hickory. 
 At Birmingham Washington divided his force — Sullivan was to 
 march by the river, he himself by the Pennington road. Just 
 before they got to Trenton Sullivan sent to say the men's muskets 
 were wet. "Then tell your general to use the bayonet,'' said 
 Washington ; " the town must be taken." 
 
 Rahl had been warned. Washington's camp was surrounded 
 by loyalist spies, and word had been carried to General Grant 
 (in command at Princeton, after Cornwallis got leave of absence) 
 that Lord Stirling meant to attack the posts. Grant did 
 not believe the rebels could do so in any force. "Washington's 
 men," he wrote, "have neither shoes nor stockings nor blankets, 
 are almost naked, and dying of cold and want of food." But he 
 warned Donop, who laughed, but sent on the warning to Rahl. 
 That brave though drunken commander also laughed. And, most 
 fortunately for Washington, it happened that on Christmas night — 
 the very hour of the attack had been named by the spy — an 
 American patrol came out of the woods at the Trenton outpost 
 and fired upon the picket. The alarm was given. Rahl himself 
 turned out, and marched with a field-piece through the woods, 
 but found nothing, and returned to quarters believing this was 
 the attack foretold. He laughed again. And in the morning 
 Washington came. 
 
TRENTON 449 
 
 But at daybreak he was still two miles from Trenton, and it 
 was 8 o'clock before he reached the village. The weather was 
 so bad that everyone was indoors ; the snow deadened the rumble 
 of the artillery. At the entrance to the village a man was 
 chopping wood. " Which way to the Hessian picket ? " said 
 Washington. " Don't know," said the man. " You may tell," 
 said a captain of artillery; "that's General Washington." "God 
 prosper you ! " cried the man. " The picket is in that house, 
 and the sentry is by that tree." 
 
 In the guard-house was the lieutenant who kept the diary — 
 he was just quick enough to make a stand — thinking this was 
 only a marauding-party ; but he fell back on seeing the 
 artillery. At the same moment the sound of firing from the 
 river told that Sullivan had fallen upon the river outpost. 
 The surprise was complete. The Hessians beat to arms — 
 some of them fired from windows, others rushed out and tried 
 to form in the main street. But the artillery had already 
 been unlimbered, and a battery of six guns was opened 
 down the street; Washington advancing with the guns, and 
 directing the fire. The Hessians were trying to get out a 
 couple of cannon, but the pieces were taken before they could 
 be fired. Meanwhile Sullivan was approaching from the west, 
 with the British Light-Horse and five hundred Hessians in 
 headlong flight before him. Poor Rahl completely lost his 
 head. He got on horseback, and tried to rally his men, and 
 did get them out of the town and into an orchard — he might 
 perhaps have got them off by the Princeton road; but he 
 could not bear to run away, nor could his men bear to leave 
 the twenty-two waggons full of plunder which they had collected 
 at Trenton. So he went back "hke a storm on the town," says 
 one of his corporals. The lieutenant of the diary saw that it 
 was madness — "A town of no use to us — full of five or six 
 thousand enemies, and a battery of six guns on the main street. 
 And he to think of retaking it with his six or seven thousand 
 men with their bayonets ! " 
 
 There was one furious charge — and Rahl fell, mortally 
 wounded. In thirty-five minutes after the first shot was fired 
 over 900 men had surrendered, and Rahl, supported by two 
 corporals, was delivering up his sword. He was carried to his 
 quarters — the house of a Quaker family. Here Washington went 
 to see him. Rahl begged that nothing should be taken from his 
 grenadiers but their arms, and Washington promised. The 
 unlucky Commander died that evening— his lieutenant pays him 
 
4SO ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 the tribute of saying that if he had not been wounded the 
 Hessians would never have surrendered.^ 
 
 Panic had given Washington the victory — panic, which magni- 
 fied his 2400 men to 6000 — even to 15,000. But he dared 
 not stay. He had nearly 1000 prisoners. If Ewing had been 
 there, he could have fallen upon Donop ; even as it was he had 
 turned the tide of fortune. The terrible Hessians, the man-eating 
 Hessians, who breakfasted on babies, had surrendered to a Pro- 
 vincial army ! 
 
 The effect of Trenton was out of all proportion to the actual 
 loss, though that was heavy. The British army had made sure 
 that America was conquered. Canada was recovered. All that 
 remained was to take quiet possession of Philadelphia as soon 
 as the weather allowed. Howe had just gone into winter 
 quarters in New York — where, report said, he was playing faro 
 every night with the younger officers, while his mistress spent 
 his money for him, and his officers got up theatrical entertain- 
 ments for the benefit of the soldiers' widows and orphans — and 
 to celebrate the General's being made a K.C.B. for Long Island. 
 Cornwallis was at Amboy, his luggage already embarked for 
 England, when he was called back to dislodge Washington from 
 Trenton. 
 
 Washington formed his plan the day after Trenton — he 
 meant to recover the Jerseys. Nearly half his army was ineffec- 
 tive from fatigue, but on December 29 he recrossed the Delaware, 
 and was once more at Trenton by the night of the 30th, writing 
 urgent letters to Gouverneur Morris in Philadelphia, to send him 
 money — on the personal security of himself and his officers. 
 Washington had about ^^5000 a year — a good fortune for those 
 days, but not enough to pay an army with. Morris had sent 
 him five hundred dollars, " in hard money," a little before, but 
 it had all gone in obtaining intelligence. On December 31 the 
 time of the Pennsylvanians expired, but Washington succeeded 
 in persuading them to serve six weeks longer. And on New 
 Year's Day, 1777, Morris rose betimes, and went from house 
 to house in Philadelphia to borrow money of people before 
 they were out of their beds ; so he scraped together some S0i°oo 
 dollars to send off that day, with promise of more. And volun- 
 teers were coming in fast, and Washington had nearly 5000 men 
 with whom to meet Cornwallis. 
 
 On the 27th of December Congress had invested Washington 
 with full military powers. Ministerialists represented this as a 
 ' Journal of Lieutenant Piel. 
 
TRENTON 451 
 
 "Military Dictatorship," but Washington did not so understand 
 it. He wrote back to Congress, " Instead of thinking myself 
 freed from all civil obligations by this mark of your confidence, 
 I shall constantly bear in mind that, as the sword was the last 
 resort for the preservation of our liberties, so it ought to be the 
 first thing laid aside when those liberties are firmly established." 
 
 Cornwallis reached Trenton on January 2. That night the 
 armies were in sight of each other, on either side the Assanpink 
 River. Some of the British officers were for forcing the passage 
 that night, but the Americans had cannon ; Cornwallis said he 
 would wait and bag the fox in the morning. The American 
 camp-fires burned on steadily all night, and the Americans 
 could be heard working at their entrenchment ; but when morning 
 broke, behold the fox was " gone away " ; and before Cornwallis 
 could get over his astonishment he heard the booming of cannon 
 at Princeton, and knew that Washington was trying for Brunswick. 
 
 Washington, after he " stole away," 1 marched by the new 
 Quaker Road — a loop which enabled the Americans to avoid 
 Leslie and the British rear-guard on the mainroad. The new 
 road was rough, the stumps of the trees broke the waggon-wheels, 
 and it was near sunrise on a frosty morning before he reached 
 Stony Brook bridge, three miles from Princeton. He crossed, 
 and led his main body to the edge of a wood, where a short 
 cut led to Princeton, leaving Mercer's brigade to continue along 
 the brook, and destroy a bridge. Early that morning Colonel 
 Mawhood, with three regiments, had started from Princeton to 
 join Cornwallis at Trenton. Mawhood had crossed Stony Brook, 
 and gained a hill, before he saw the glitter of arms, as Mercer's 
 men filed along the Quaker Road towards the other bridge. 
 There was a short, sharp action, but the British had bayonets 
 and the American riflemen had none. They were beaten back, 
 and thrown into confusion, and Mercer fell covered with wounds. 
 Mawhood was pursuing, when the Pennsylvania Militia, detached 
 by Washington, who had heard the firing, came up, and at the 
 same moment Washington himself arrived. Sword in hand, he led 
 the Pennsylvanians, and rallied Mercer's men. The 7th Virginians 
 emerged from the wood, and the American artillery opened fire. 
 Mawhood now found himself in a critical position. " For a short 
 
 ^ "A Council of War was held that night at Mercer's quarters, before the 
 army moved. The chief objection to the plan was the state of the roads — 
 almost impassable from the thaw. But that evening the wind changed to 
 north, and in two hours the roads were frozen hard." — Irving's Life of 
 Washington. 
 
45 2 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 time, the action was desperate." Washington adventured himself 
 so far forward that he was in equal danger from friends and foes, 
 and a young Irishman, his aide-de-camp, gave him up for lost, 
 and drew his hat over his eyes that he might not see his Com- 
 mander's fall. 
 
 Mawhood was now in retreat towards Trenton, but his advance- 
 guard (the 55 th) fell in with St. Clair and the American advance- 
 guard. There was another brief action, in which about a hundred 
 and fifty British were killed, and nearly three hundred taken prisoner. 
 The Americans' loss was twenty-five or thirty men and several 
 officers. The great loss was Mercer.^ Cornwallis claimed the 
 engagement as a victory — acknowledging that it was bought very 
 dear— because Washington drew off into the higher ground by 
 Somerset Courthouse. Cornwallis came up just in time to see 
 the Americans march away in good order, with their three hundred 
 prisoners. 
 
 The tables were turned — the hunted became the hunter. 
 Washington swept the Jerseys, and by January 18 — on which 
 day Sir William Howe was formally invested with the Order of 
 the Bath — only Amboy, Brunswick, and Paulus Hook were held 
 by the King's troops, in all Jersey. 
 
 ^ Mercer lingered till January 12. 
 
 Note. — The exact number of Hessians who surrendered at Trenton was 
 946. They were taken into Pennsylvania, thence into Virginia. Wherever they 
 came, the people thronged to look at them, and were astonished to find them 
 so much like other men. At first they were hooted and reviled for hiring 
 themselves out to kill people who had never injured them — the old women 
 being particularly uncivil. But Washington had notices put up, to say that 
 the Hessians had not come of their free-will, but by compulsion, and ought 
 therefore to be treated as friends, and from that day, says a corporal of 
 Hessians, "things went better with us. Every day many came out of the 
 towns, old and young, rich and poor, and brought us provisions, and treated 
 us with kindness and humanity." 
 
CHAPTER LIV 
 
 THE KING'S DEBTS: THE EXPENSES OF 
 THE WAR 
 
 " The debts of the civil list are to be paid. Seven hundred thousand pounds 
 are to be granted for this purpose, and two hundred thousand pounds per annum 
 to be added to the civil list, in order to make it a permanent yearly income of 
 One Million, clear of all deduction. The King desires it. Lord North vifas 
 to have done it when he had his riband. That was understood to be the 
 bargain ; but his Lordship, having got the riband, shuffled about the civil list. 
 However, his Lordship is obliged to do it now, or the Bedfords will supersede 
 him. The Bedford faction and the Buckingham-house faction are the violent 
 parties against America. If these blood-thirsty men were removed, peace would 
 be restored. . . . The addresses set on foot by the Bedford and Buckingham 
 House factions, from Jacobite towns, venal traders, hungry contractors, and 
 ignorant Justices, to flatter the King, and keep them in office, do not contain the 
 voice of the nation, but may be very proper to accelerate the ruin of the kingdom. 
 . . . The empire is dismembered. Great Britain is not half herself. Her 
 colonies are lost for ever I A diminished trade ; an increased taxation. , . . 
 This war of infamy will, on our side, miscarry in every part." — Part of a 
 Genuine Letter from a Gentleman in Town to his Friend in the Country, 
 dated Oct. lo, 1775. 
 
 " I never said that I had nearly subdued America. What I said, and what 
 I again repeat, was, that under God his Majesty's arms had met with many 
 signal successes, and that I thought we were in a fair way of subduing America, 
 not that we had nearly subdued it." — Lord North on the Bill for Suspending 
 Habeas Corpus, Feb. 10, 1777. 
 
 In England we had made equally sure that the war was over. 
 Howe's last despatches had been full of Cornwallis' triumphant 
 progress, and the " confusion " of Washington's retreat. The 
 rebellion was breaking up everywhere — whole bodies of people 
 tendering submission ; Congress run away, its authority gone ; 
 Cornwallis coming home. The next despatch (dated December 29) 
 gave the news that Rahl's and Knyphausen's divisions had been 
 taken prisoners by the defeated General ! And on the heels of this 
 came news of several other actions, all with considerable loss to 
 ourselves. And now the American army was called "a superior 
 force " ! The anger at home was so great that Ministers thought 
 
454 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 it prudent to divert some of it to the heads of Opposition — who 
 brought all this upon us, by their encouragement of the Americans 
 — even if (as was hinted) they had not actually sent them money. 
 But for the vigorous resistance to the Bill for Suspending Habeas 
 Corpus, Rockingham— and perhaps Chatham — might have been 
 sent to the Tower, in spite of the ridicule Administration had just 
 incurred by sending Mr. Sayre there. 
 
 For, of course, as soon as anything went wrong ,a Bill was 
 brought in to suspend Habeas Corpus (February 6). It was 
 drawn in a very odd and suspicious manner — the preamble 
 said one thing, and the body of the Bill another. The preamble 
 seemed to be directed only against treasons committed in 
 America, or on the high seas ; but the body of the Bill could 
 easily have been construed to allow the detention without trial of 
 any persons " suspected " of high treason — of, for instance, any 
 too officious member of Opposition, especially if it could be shown 
 that he had lately received letters from America. For several years 
 it had been openly avowed that all letters to or from America were 
 liable to be opened. After a hard fight Opposition succeeded in 
 inserting a clause limiting the Bill to the terms of the preamble. 
 The treason must have been committed in America, and the 
 person " suspected " must have been in America at the time. 
 
 Wilkes, in a long and very able speech, had given the case 
 of Ebenezer Piatt, an American merchant, who had been tried 
 at Kingston, Jamaica, on a charge of treason committed at 
 Savannah, and acquitted. In spite of his acquittal he was 
 confined on board the Antelope for three months, then removed to 
 the Boreas for four weeks, then carried to the Pallas, and brought 
 in irons to England. Arrived at Portsmouth, he had been kept 
 on board the Centaur for three weeks, and then taken to the 
 Barfleiir. A Habeas Corpus was obtained, directed to the 
 captain of the Barfleiir \ but before it could be served, an express 
 arrived from the Treasury, and Piatt was taken back to the Centaur. 
 Thus the writ of Habeas Corpus was eluded. Piatt's friends 
 showing they meant to take out another writ, he was brought to 
 London, and committed to Newgate by Justice Addington, and not 
 allowed to see any of the witnesses against him, or even to hear 
 their affidavits read. He was charged generally with high treason 
 — whereas Blackstone and every other authority are agreed that some 
 specific act of treason must be mentioned — such as compassing 
 the King's death, or levying war against him. The Bill would 
 have legalised all these illegal proceedings.^ Rigby, in his usual 
 
 ' See Note at end of Chapter. 
 
THE KING'S DEBTS 455 
 
 brutal way, said he wished Habeas Corpus could be entirely 
 suspended — it was as necessary to do this now as in 1745. Then 
 the rebels avowed their principles— now they skulk behind legal 
 quibbles, and aid the Americans covertly. It was in this debate 
 that Fox first warned Ministers of a projected treaty between France 
 and America. 
 
 And now the burden of the war became patent to all. We 
 learn what the country was paying for its whistle. The Debate of 
 February 21, on the Army Extraordinaries, gave Opposition the 
 opportunity of asking a number of very inconvenient questions about 
 " the extraordinary services, incurred and paid by Mr. Rigby ; also 
 an account of the distribution of ^^970,000, and likewise the in- 
 vestment of ;^799,973, i8s. sd. in the purchase of Spanish and 
 Portuguese coin, for the use of his Majesty's forces in America." 
 Lord Newhaven wanted to know about the purchase of baggage- 
 horses; Barr^ asked what was the ^^44,000 "issued to Colonel 
 Fawcit, unaccompanied by any explanation." And how about the 
 unwholesome provisions sent to America from Great Britain and 
 Ireland, and the sickness and mortality they had occasioned among 
 the troops — the bad flour, first imported from America, then 
 exported thither at a most exorbitant price — flour that would not 
 bear a second voyage, but got heated, and spoiled ? So that the 
 contractors were paid the very best price for the very worst stores 
 — in fact, they worked off on the Army their unsaleable flour ! 
 Then the meat — Barre himself, being in Ireland last summer, in 
 the very heat of the dog days, saw great droves of hogs going to 
 slaughter, killed, immediately salted, and packed for the army in 
 America. He had the curiosity to ask the coopers whether this 
 meat would keep — they said it might, for the voyage ; but must be 
 opened and consumed at once on arrival — and even then would be 
 barely eatable. ^ 
 
 1 "The peculation in every profitable branch of the service is represented to be 
 enormous ; and, as is usual, it is attended with a shocking neglect of every com- 
 fort to the troops. The hospitals are pest-houses, and the provisions served out 
 are poison ; those that are to be bought, are sold at the highest prices of a 
 monopoly." — Letter of Solicitor- General Wedderburn to William Eden, ITIT. 
 
 There is a letter from Gordon, a specially notorious contractor, to John 
 Robinson. It was written from Cork, August 20, 1776, and was sent by Robinson 
 to General Howe. Gordon says he is " shocked to death almost at the thoughts 
 of the bread in the Howe, Minerva, Lonsdale and Lord Lewisham being bad, 
 unfit for use, mouldy and shipped in bags short of weight, and I am obliged to 
 you. Sir, for the very early information, but if my life was at stake and could be 
 saved with more care I could not take it in everything I have to do relative to 
 the provisions. Never less than three people besides himself examine every- 
 thing. It leaves me in good order, and except it be made of bad materials. 
 
4S6 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 North explained that the ^^44,000 was levy-money for the 
 Landgrave of Hesse — to say the truth, Administration had not 
 expected to pay it, as it was not in the treaty. As for the provisions, 
 some were as good as could be wished — some indifferent, as was 
 always the case. They were sent out in haste — we shall do better 
 next time — we have now arranged that if provisions are "damaged 
 or unmerchantable," the loss shall fall on the contractor. Contracts 
 were not given by preference to such as had a seat in Parliament. 
 Some of the bread he allowed was bad — but these were accidents. 
 
 And now at last the dreaded question of the Arrears of the 
 Civil List, staved off for eight years, could be staved off no longer. 
 North, scarcely recovered from his severe illness, was really to be 
 pitied the day he had to deliver the King's gracious Message (April 
 9), that his debts were more than ;^6oo,ooo, and that he relied on 
 his Faithful Commons to pay them. 
 
 The balance-sheet was appalling ; the accounts were glaringly 
 defective — Lord John Cavendish said, because the items would 
 not bear the light. Where had the money gone ? The King and 
 Queen are frugal ; the King has no vices ; the death of the 
 Princess Dowager, five years ago, augmented the royal income very 
 considerably. He compared the sixteen years of his present Majesty 
 with sixteen years of the late reign — making every allowance, the 
 present outlay ought to be somewhat less — indeed, since the death 
 of the Princess there ought to have been a saving instead of a 
 deficiency. Many of the tradesmen have not been paid for years, 
 and are reduced to great straits for want of their money. ;^6ooo 
 
 what will not keep, which I cannot discover by ray taste or smell, or by 
 soaking in water, it should keep twelve months ... all my assistants are perfect 
 judges of bread, and I have eat a great deal of bread myself in the service and 
 know very well what it should be. ... If I mistake not the Minerva's bread 
 came from the same person as that in the Tartar which I condemned, and which 
 is yet in store. I have condemned this day 573 barrels of flour ... I have also 
 condemned some town bread here at the baker's and prevented the delivery of 
 it in Cork to the agents who complained to me of it." In his own letter, 
 Robinson complains of Mr. Apthorpe, who had had what North called "the 
 enormous sum" of £,'ii,o,']']b, 6s. for supplying the Army. Robinson says that 
 Apthorpe "seems to wish to confound the business by his observations about 
 the exchange. " Robinson finds his observations far from satisfactory. A later 
 letter of Robinson's says that Apthorpe continues to draw bills wiihout explain- 
 ing whether for subsistence or extraordinaries, though repeatedly directed to make 
 such distinction. {Hist. MSS. Report I, pp. 54 and 83.) The blame seems to 
 have been laid upon the flour — perhaps justly, for there is no trace of denial. 
 The only defence set up is that the provisions were left exposed to the weather 
 on arrival. This, however, does not explain complaints made before the provisions 
 left Great Britain. 
 
THE KING'S DEBTS 457 
 
 is owing to the coal-merchant. There is ;^io,ooo a year for wax- 
 candles. The menial servants are six quarters in arrears ! There 
 are no vouchers, and beyond certain fixed salaries to public func- 
 tionaries, Parliament has no knowledge of where the money has 
 gone, or how the grant we are asked to make will go ! It was boldly 
 said that neither waste in the Household — twenty-three separate tables 
 — nor needless and frivolous places at Court, nor alms to American 
 Tories could account for the expenditure. Secret Service was the 
 key to the enigma — or, to put it more plainly. Bribes. ^ Nearly 
 ;^6oo,ooo had been expended in Secret Service since 1769 — of this 
 sum ;^2 85,000 had been expended by the Secretary of the Treasury, 
 and at the same time the Pension List had increased enormously. 
 Now we are asked to grant more — not only to discharge the 
 debts, but to grant more ! The Crown is already much too power- 
 ful, and we are depraved enough already ! When the Minister 
 applied for a grant in aid, in 1769, he promised never to come 
 again ! 
 
 The unhappy Minister replied that he did not want to come — 
 the task was a disagreeable one — he little thought he should ever 
 have to come again — he thought he should be out of Administration. 
 But now, so stable is government, an Administration can live eight 
 years ! And he never promised to prevent any future excess. 
 Then there are new expenses — the loyalists have been stripped 
 of their property, and driven here, without means of subsistence. 
 We must relieve them — and they have been relieved to the amount 
 of ;^27,ooo. And if the power of the Crown has increased (which 
 he denied) it was because of the wisdom and rectitude of his 
 Majesty's councils. 
 
 Wilkes went into an exhaustive examination of the Civil List 
 Act, and of the manner in which it had been stretched. He 
 compared the expenses of George 11 with those of George iii. We 
 are trustees for the people, and we ought to prevent money being 
 squandered like this — we are being fleeced just at the moment 
 of a most expensive war ! " Are the people really nothing in 
 the scale of Government?" The principal of the National 
 
 1 " It came out that ;^300,ooo had been privately issued at the Treasury for 
 secret services in . . . 1772. A large part of this large sum had probably been 
 employed for the safety and maintenance of the Queen of Denmark ; but there 
 could be no doubt neither but a large portion had been expended to carry the 
 Royal Marriage Act — a bill so unpopular that almost all the ministers had 
 expressed dislike and repugnance to it. Lord North had been the most averse 
 of all ; but it was now whispered that his assent and support had been purchased 
 at a very dear rate indeed— that is, by a grant of the Savoy, or part of it, for 
 the sale of which a bill had passed." — Horace Walpole, Last Journals, i. 280. 
 
458 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Debt was stated at Midsummer, 1775, to amount to the astonishing 
 sum of ;^i3S, 943,05 1, and the interest to ;^4,44o,ooo. Is this 
 a time to ask for more, when the greatest sources of our commerce 
 are destroyed by the folly and wickedness of Administration ; when 
 we have already spent above ;^i 9,000,000 in this unjust war, 
 and above half our empire is lost? Queen Anne never asked 
 for another ;^ioo,ooo — she gave the Civil List unasked ^^100,000 
 yearly towards the expenses of the French War ! George i and 
 George 11 had each the great expenses of a rebellion — the cost 
 of the '45 was enormous. Then Wilkes showed how the King's 
 revenue had been increasing — partly by the increase in the 
 Post Office, " since the death of Mr. Allen " threw the " cross 
 posts " into the hands of Government. 
 
 Next he came to the accounts. The Deputy Auditor of the 
 Exchequer, the Treasurer of the Chamber, and the Master of the 
 Horse said they had no materials for accounts ! This, said 
 Wilkes, is an insult to the House, and such accounts as have been 
 sent in are so "loose, perplexed and unintelligible," they are ''a 
 solemn mockery." Many gentlemen said last week they could 
 make nothing of them. It was not intended they should. There 
 is ,3^41,000 to Samuel Martin, "for secret and special service," 
 between October 1762 and October 1763. Here is "a single line 
 of ;^i7i)Ooo Secret and Special Service," issued to Sir Grey 
 Cooper. Under the same article, ^114,000 to John Robinson.^ 
 _;^ioo a week to Lord Howe and Sir William, as Commissioners 
 for restoring peace in America. Is this to go on for ten years, 
 like the siege of Troy ? 
 
 Again and again he asked for what these debts were contracted. 
 There is no trace of any debts of the King's Brothers, and yet 
 their incomes are so scanty that the Duke of Gloster can't afford 
 to live in England. There is no outward magnificence — " we 
 have scarcely the appearance of a Court." His Majesty has not 
 had a Scottish rebellion to quell — the revenues have been spent 
 on the Scots, not against them ! So Wilkes lashed himself up, 
 until he declared roundly that the money had been spent in buying 
 " the regular ministerial majorities in parliament." " The Crown 
 has made a purchase of this House with the money of the people." ^ 
 
 ^ Secretaries of the Treasury. 
 
 " "The extraordinary revenues of the Crown are, the revenue of Ireland, the 
 duchy of Cornwall, the land revenue within the principality of Wales, the 
 revenue of Gibraltar, American quit-rents, ' now generally lost,' the plantation 
 duties of 4 J per cent., from the Leeu-ard Islands, fines, forfeitures, and many 
 other particulars, which certainly carry the royal income to much above one 
 million a year." 
 
THE KING'S DEBTS 459 
 
 Hence the "ready, tame and servile compliance with every royal 
 edict issued by the Minister. Inward corruption is the canker." 
 This House is allowed to be the most corrupt assembly in Europe. 
 In 1769 it granted ;^'5i3,Sii to pay the King's debts— were the 
 tradesmen's bills then paid, or was the money diverted another 
 way ? How about Hine's patent place in the Customs at Exeter, 
 publicly sold, and the money given to General Burgoyne to reim- 
 burse him for the expense of the Preston Election ? Wilkes moved 
 to consider the causes of the Debt.^ 
 
 North's reply was feebleness itself. He talked about the increased 
 cost of the necessaries of life — ^^900,000 now not equal to ^800,000 
 in 1742. He was sure Mr. Wilkes did not mean that each 
 individual of the majority was bribed. Could not one have "a 
 temporary pension" and yet "act upon principle"? As for the 
 vouchers not being laid before the House, his "predecessors in 
 office " had taken away all the papers — so " the charge of the 
 accounts being defective, mutilated, or imperfect, must fall to the 
 ground." They had looked everywhere for every document that 
 seemed to be necessary to explain the account — if any were want- 
 ing, no blame lay on the Treasury Board — they had given the 
 best account they could. 
 
 So the unhappy Minister fumbled on, having in truth nothing 
 to say. 
 
 The gentlemen with the temporary pensions and the 
 consciences voted against Lord John Cavendish's motion to 
 refuse to pay, and the House went into Committee of Supply to 
 consider payment of the King's debts and the extra ;^ioo,ooo a 
 year which the King had asked for. Barre made a savage attack on 
 "a certain race of animals, daily increasing in this country, called 
 Contractors." He said that North encouraged the propagation of 
 this species of the " canine and carnivorous " — he not only tamed 
 and domesticated them — he hunted and sought them. If the 
 contractors for supplying his Majesty's Household did it in the way 
 the American contracts were executed, he wondered the debt was 
 not treble what it was ; he was assured that in every single 
 contract since the American war, the public had paid 40 per cent, 
 above the market price. There was great confusion when 
 Sawbridge said the debt had been contracted in corrupting both 
 Houses, some crying to take down his vcords, others, " Hear 
 him ! " Sawbridge repeated his words, and turning upon North 
 charged him with having hired a rufBan (Dignam) to impeach him. 
 
 1 Wilkes referred to Johnson and Shebbeare as ' ' pensioned advocates of 
 desDOtism." 
 
46o ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 North's reply was very lame — no money had been paid to 
 Dignam — they were bound to listen to him — his narrative was 
 plausible — he was soon found to be a liar, villain, and im- 
 postor. "He assured the worthy alderman that Dignam had no 
 money.'' 
 
 Fox said Walpole was called the Father of Corruption— North 
 was his equal, if not in abilities, in the art of managing parliaments. 
 Rigby's speech was a phenomenon of indecency. He said no 
 accounts ever were given, or ought to be given. He wondered 
 the noble lord wasted his time answering trifling questions — were 
 he Minister he would never answer a private member. Then he 
 turned on Johnstone, who had asked for explanations — that might 
 be the way in the parliament in Leadenhall Street. The conduct 
 of the Company did not encourage imitation of their example — the 
 Company would have been ruined long ago but for the interference 
 of Parliament ; it was bankrupt, and on the verge of destruction, 
 till the legislature saved it. Now it had got a little the better of 
 its difficulties, it was relapsing, and would be calling for aid. He 
 hoped Parliament would not be imposed on any longer, to trust 
 the affairs of the East to a set of men who had neither ability 
 nor honesty. 
 
 To this outrageous attack Johnstone replied warmly that the 
 Company's affairs were managed at least as well before Government 
 interfered — not Parliament ; Parliament being only an engine used 
 by Ministers to create a new source of patronage and increase 
 the influence of the Crown. The Company, before it was meddled 
 with, got a great empire — it would be well if the new pohcy did 
 not lose it. Then he twitted Rigby for talking about the parlia- 
 ment in Leadenhall Street — he should be the last to mention it. 
 Johnstone had seen him attending regularly at all the Courts, with 
 his long train of dependants, clerks, and partisans — so if the Com- 
 pany mismanaged their business, the honourable gentleman should 
 have remembered he was one of the prime instruments ! ^ 
 
 In the Lords, Rockingham, in a careful speech, showed that 
 the idea of an hereditary revenue was entirely ill-founded. The 
 King had lost nothing by taking a specific sum — it was more 
 convenient, that was all. The pretended claim set up by Ministers 
 
 ' Wraxall says of Johnstone : " Nature had cast his person in a coarse but 
 vigorous mould, and had endowed him with corresponding or analogous 
 faculties of mind. He possessed a species of ardent, impetuous, half-savage 
 eloquence, restrained by no delicacy of language, yet capable of powerfully 
 affecting his hearers by the display of information, by his energetic appeals to their 
 passions, and even by his gesticulations, which came in aid of his oratory." 
 
THE KING'S DEBTS 461 
 
 had no foundation in truth. He, too, asked where the money had 
 gone, and showed how great were the revenues enjoyed by the King. 
 Then Suffolk rose in a fury to charge Opposition with "detest- 
 able, dangerous and unconstitutional conduct." Never had 
 economy been more constantly practised. Rockingham asked 
 if it was unconstitutional to differ from Administration — and 
 brought up Dignam. Spies and informers were paid to forge 
 plots. Suffolk denied he had said " detestable," though in his con- 
 science and soul he believed the conduct of Opposition was 
 detestable; and though Dignam was an impostor, he had other 
 proofs that Opposition deserved the public detestation they were 
 notoriously known to be held in. 
 
 North had another bad quarter of an hour on May 8, when he 
 was obliged to ask for more money for the insatiate Landgrave of 
 Hesse. That rapacious Prince, not content with the extortionate 
 bargain he had lately made, now had the effrontery to demand 
 ^41,820 more, "to make good the Expences of Foreign Hospitals" 
 in the Seven Years' War. Well might North say, as he did when 
 the Budget came on, that "the expences of the war were great.'' 
 The very recapitulation of them is enough — " Army in America, 
 etc. ;£64S,oog. Hanoverians in Gibraltar, etc. ;!^5 6,074. Hanau 
 troops, _;^i8,ooo. Ditto Waldeck, ;^i 7,000. Do. Brunswick, 
 ;^93,ooo. Hessians, ^^336,000. Provisions for foreign troops, 
 ;^4 1,000. Deficiencies ditto, ;^7ooo. Artillery do. ^^48,000. 
 American Extraordinaries, ;^i, 200,000. Hessian chasseurs, 
 _;^36,ooo. Hanau ditto, ;^i6,ooo. Anspach troops, ^39,000. 
 Deficiency, Hessian chasseurs, ;^3ooo. Total expence of army, 
 _;^3,773,ooo. Sufferers in America, ;^33, 000. Commons AddresseSj 
 ;^i3,ooo."i 
 
 To meet this, and all other charges, — Exchequer Bills, vote of 
 credit, lottery prizes, the ;^6 18,000 arrears of the Civil List, and 
 all other expenses of a great Empire, — Administration had as total 
 supplies, ;!£'i2,592,534. It would not be enough, so North 
 proposed a tax on all deeds "and paper writings sealed"; on 
 male servants, and sales by auction, and a prohibitive duty on 
 foreign glass. North explained that the duties laid on the materials 
 used in the making of glass tended to encourage foreign manu- 
 facture, and discourage our own. He therefore proposed to take 
 off these duties, but to put a duty, "nearly equal to a prohibition," 
 on foreign glass — this would give us the whole of the manufacture 
 
 ^ This curious item referred to the Addresses which the Americans said 
 showed that the whole people of England were now turned against them. Fox 
 told the House that no King ever had so many Addresses as James ii. 
 
462 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 — it was sixteen pence a pound on glass, and four shillings a 
 dozen on imported bottles. Thus we shall lower the price of 
 materials, and keep the whole glass manufactory within the 
 kingdom. 1 
 
 North was still optimistic. He scouted the warnings as to 
 France — she is very friendly, and the pirate who took the Harwich 
 packet is laid by the heels at Dunkirk. Fox reminded them that 
 the object of the war was to get a revenue out of America. Were 
 we not sick of it by this time ? Who but contractors will benefit ? 
 Why not now repeal the tax on tea? We shall never get a 
 shilling. He commented severely on the inhuman conduct 
 of the Hessians, and said that our own troops were almost as 
 culpable. 
 
 In the middle of the Debate on the Budget, Hartley proposed 
 an Address to the King entreating him to order a suspension 
 of hostilities. It was not moved, but the allusions to America 
 caused Lord George Germaine to explain to the House why he 
 had said the day before that there was a prospect of a successful 
 end to the war.^ He thought so, because General Howe's army 
 was now in good order, and more numerous than in the last 
 campaign, while the rebel army was in much worse order and less 
 numerous. Then the fleet was reinforced, and the Americans 
 had changed their minds, from their experience of the misery of 
 anarchy, confusion and despotism, instead of the happiness they 
 used to enjoy — so that hundreds of deserters were coming in 
 daily to Howe. Then Congress had given up, and made Mr. 
 Washington Dictator — which would cause divisions. Then, again, 
 they were disappointed of assistance from France and Spain — 
 not that he denied they had received underhand assistance. 
 They had offered to pay for the protection of France — they had 
 offered France our West India Islands ! " There is a love of 
 freedom. Sir ! " Then we have great expectations from the army 
 in Canada — it has destroyed the enemy's fleet, and will be able 
 to advance early in the spring, and unite with General Howe's 
 army, adding 12,000 men to it, besides Canadians. And 
 Washington can't keep his army together, even with a £^0 
 bounty — they desert as fast as they are forced to enlist; while 
 
 1 7s. a hundred on all " spread glass," 14s. on all other window glass, and 
 3s. 6d. per cwt. on materials used in making common bottles. He computed 
 this tax would bring in about ;£'45,ooo a year. 
 
 2 " Lord Shuldham thinks all will go well in America, though the war may be 
 protracted by the little successes of the Americans in the Jerseys."— Hutchinson, 
 Diaiy, March 6, 1777. 
 
THE KING'S DEBTS 463 
 
 Howe has 6000 armed New Yorkers in his army. So that the 
 next campaign is sure to be favourable. 
 
 This is the first parliamentary allusion to Burgoyne's un- 
 fortunate expedition. 
 
 On May 21 the King sent for a vote of credit, and was 
 granted a million to carry on with. The same day the East 
 India Company came once more before the House. It was again 
 in trouble. A very odd situation had arisen— the Council ot 
 Madras had arrested Lord Pigot, the Governor, and were keeping 
 him imprisoned. It appeared that the Nabob of Arcot had got 
 Mr. Hastings on his side, and had formed a very strong party in 
 the Council, and a plan to dispossess the Rajah of Tanjore, on 
 pretence that he was in arrears with his tribute. In this debate 
 Fox defended Pigot so ably that the whole House broke into 
 applause. 
 
 But the debate which threw all others into the shade was that 
 in the Lords, on May 30, when Chatham appeared — the wreck of 
 his former self, " pale, and grown much older, and had one crutch. 
 His voice was so low that it could not be heard to the end of the 
 House, and little remained of his former fire, though his second 
 speech was more spirited." 
 
 Yet his speech reads as though it had been spoken with all the 
 old irresistible energy. It is perhaps more direct, less oratorical than 
 most of his great speeches. It opens with a rush, as though the 
 speaker feared the storm he spoke of might descend within that 
 very hour. 
 
 " My lords," he said, " this is a flying moment ; perhaps but 
 six weeks to arrest the dangers that surround us. The gathering 
 cloud may break ; it has already opened ... if an end is not put 
 to this war, there is an end to this country. I do not trust my 
 judgment in my present state of health ; this is the judgment of 
 my better days ; the result of forty years' attention to America. . . . 
 I state to you the importance of America ... a double market, 
 the market of consumption and the market of supply. . . . America 
 has carried you through four wars, and will now carry you to your 
 death, if you don't take things in time. In the sportsman's phrase, 
 when you have found yourselves at fault, you must try back. You 
 have ransacked every corner of Lower Saxony ; but 40,000 German 
 boors never can conquer ten times the number of British freemen; 
 they may ravage, they cannot conquer. . . . You have got nothing 
 in America but stations. You have been three years teach- 
 ing them the art of war. They are apt scholars. . . . We have 
 tried for unconditional submission; try what can be gained by 
 
464 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 unconditional redress ! Now is the crisis, before France is a party 
 to the Treaty. . . . Whenever France or Spain enters into a treaty 
 of any sort with America, Great Britain must immediately declare 
 war against them. America is contending with us under a masked 
 battery of France. There is still a moment left — France must be 
 as self-destroying as England, to make a treaty while you are giving 
 her America at the expense to yourselves of 12 millions a year." 
 He moved an humble Address to his Majesty for a speedy stop 
 to the war, " on the only just and solid foundation, the removal of 
 grievances." ' 
 
 All the old things were said on both sides. Gower said 
 numbers were coming in — the majority of the rebels wished to 
 shake off the yoke of Congress. Grafton and the Bishop of 
 Peterborough attributed our misfortunes to the rejection of 
 Penn's petition, in the autumn of 1775, and Peterborough said 
 the Addresses did great harm by making America think we were 
 implacable. Camden reminded them how at first a file of 
 musketeers was to do it — then four regiments — then 10,000 
 men — now it is 70,000. There was a wrangle as to whether 
 Franklin and Deane were officially received at Versailles. 
 Weymouth declared France had never been more friendly than 
 now. Mansfield said the Americans must feel the superiority of 
 our arms before we could treat — wait till after the next campaign. 
 Then the House divided. Contents (two proxies) 28. Non- 
 Contents (23 proxies) 99. 
 
 So they were prorogued, and before they met again the next 
 campaign had been fought, and Burgoyne and all his army were 
 prisoners of war. 
 
 ^ Of this speech the King said, " Like most of the other productions of that 
 extraordinary brain, it contains nothing but specious words and malevolence. . . . 
 But, thank God ! the nation does not see the unhappy contest through his 
 mirour." — The King to Lord North, on Chatham's Motion of May 30, 1777. 
 
 In 1775, the King had written : " His political conduct the last winter 
 was so abandoned, that he must, in the eyes of the dispassionate, have 
 totally undone the merit of his former services." — To Lord North, August 9, 
 1775- 
 
 EBENEZER PLATT. 
 
 Piatt was one of eight or ten men who sailed in a schooner from Georgia, by 
 order of the Provincial Congress, to stop Captain Maitland's ship, bound for 
 St. Augustine, in Florida, and take out of her powder and arms. Piatt was 
 afterwards, by authority of Congress, engaged in a contraband trade with some 
 of the French or Dutch Islands. Here he was taken, and carried to Jamaica, 
 
THE KING'S DEBTS 465 
 
 where his ship was condemned, and he was sent to prison, on a charge of 
 "corresponding with his Majesty's enemies," several letters having been found 
 in his possession, directed to the Congress "at Georgia and Charlestown." 
 " Nothing material was found against him ; but as the carrying on such business 
 with Congresses was a new offence, it was judged proper to send him home to 
 England, with all the letters and papers in question." At Portsmouth the 
 matter was enquired into, " and nothing appearing that would affect either 
 his life or liberty, he was discharged, with an offer of his passage back 
 to America. This he refused ; and being (as there are reasons to suspect) 
 properly tutored by the present race of patriots, he attempted to procure 
 a copy of his commitment, in order to proceed against those who had a 
 hand in confining him. Upon his application for this, it was judged proper 
 to commit him to prison, on the evidence of two of Captain Maitland's men, 
 to answer for the charge of treason and piracy committed on board his ship 
 off Georgia-bar, in North America, as the ver)' words of his mittimus set 
 forth." — Gentleman's Magasine, 1777, pp. 146-7. 
 
 VOL. I. — 30 
 
CHAPTER LV 
 
 JOHN THE PAINTER: OUR CRIMINAL CODE IN 
 THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY 
 
 "I am confident that every new sanguinary law operates as an encouragement 
 to commit capital offences ; for it is not the mode, but the certainty of punish- 
 ment, that creates terror. What men know they must endure, they fear ; what 
 they think they can escape, they despise. . . . Let us reflect a little on this 
 woman's fate.'' ... It was for no injury ; but for a mere attempt to clothe two 
 naked children by unlawful means. Compare this, with what the state did, and 
 with what the law did. The state bereaved the woman of her husband, and the 
 children of a father, who was all their support ; the law deprived the woman of 
 her life, and the children of their remaining parent. . . .Take all the circumstances 
 together, I do not believe that a fouler murder was ever committed against law, 
 than the murder of this woman by law." — Sir William Meredith on the Bill for 
 the Better Securing of Private Dockyards, May 13, 1777- 
 
 At this nervous moment, other terrors and dangers shook the nation. 
 Arson vpas added to our national calamities. 
 
 On December 7, 1776, a fire broke out in the upper loft of 
 the rope-house in Portsmouth Dock, and entirely consumed 
 the building. As it was supposed to be an accident, no enquiry 
 was made. But on January 15, 1777, an under-clerk of the 
 dockyard, having occasion to move some hemp, discovered a 
 strange-looking object, "about the size of a half-pound tea can- 
 ister, but resembling a candlestick." On each side of the candle 
 was a place for matches, and the bottom was a cavity full of spirits 
 of wine. The thing was so contrived that the matches would have 
 burnt down to the spirits in four channels. The bottom was of 
 wood. The matches had been lighted, and were nearly burnt low 
 enough to set the spirits on fire ; but they had gone out too soon 
 — probably because too much hemp had been piled above the 
 "machine," and there was not enough air. If the fire had caught, 
 the stores in the store-house close by were enough to have rigged 
 fifty ships. 
 
 It became obvious that foul play was at work. "The whole 
 
 dockyard was alarmed. Some hundreds of workmen were instantly 
 
 ' Mary Jones, see p. 470. 
 466 
 
JOHN THE PAINTER 467 
 
 drawn together, and everyone looked at his neighbour," convinced 
 that whoever put the thing there had caused the fire of the 7th. 
 Everybody set to work recollecting, and presently it occurred to 
 one of them that a fellow had been locked into the rope-house 
 the night before the fire ; another remembered that an unknown 
 man had been seen loitering about the yard on the very day. 
 Others said he was a painter, and had worked in the neighbour- 
 hood, and as he had never been seen since the fire, he was 
 suspected, and advertisements were issued, describing one "John 
 the Painter" — the only name by which he was known, and offering 
 _;£5o if he would come forward to be examined, and the same sum 
 to any who should apprehend him. 
 
 Meanwhile other fires broke out — particularly at Bristol — 
 where the ships Savannah La Mar and Fame, lying at the quay, 
 were wilfully set on fire in the night (apparently of the very day 
 when the " machine " was discovered at Portsmouth), and all the 
 other ships, and all that part of the town, were in great danger. 
 There was also an attempt to fire the Hibernia ; and a box of 
 combustibles had been planted in a warehouse in Crane Lane — 
 broken into for the purpose. The town offered ;!^5oo and his 
 Majesty's pardon for the discovery of the incendiaries. On 
 Sunday the 19th there was another great fire, in the warehouse 
 of " Mr. A. Brown, bookseller," in which the warehouses on one 
 side of Bell Lane were entirely consumed. About the same time 
 a quantity of combustibles was found on the quay, among a 
 number of oil-barrels — here, too, the fire had burnt out with no 
 damage. Bristol began to think itself marked out for destruction 
 — the damage already amounted to ;^i 5,000. The citizens took 
 to patrolling the streets — after which there were no further 
 attempts. The King promised his free pardon and ;^iooo to 
 any person who would discover his accomplice, and the town 
 offered ;£5oo more. There was now ;£i5oo on the head of John 
 the Painter. It began to be believed that " American Agents " 
 were being employed " to spread fire and devastation throughout 
 the kingdom." 
 
 Meanwhile Sir John Fielding had found means to trace John 
 the Painter, and at the beginning of February he was arrested at 
 Odiham, for a burglary, and brought to London. It was reported 
 that he had been in America, and had worked there as a painter, 
 and Lord Temple sent " one Baldwin, a painter, who had likewise 
 been in America," to attend his examination before Fielding. But 
 Baldwin said he had never seen the man before in his life. As 
 other witnesses had sworn falsely against John, he expressed a wish 
 
468 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 to see Baldwin again, and Baldwin was encouraged to visit him as 
 often as possible, to bring him to confession. After seeing Baldwin 
 once a day — and sometimes twice — for a fortnight, John began to 
 trust him and to speak openly. He told him he had been in 
 France, and had seen Silas Deane, and Deane had given him 
 money to set fire to the British dockyards — especially at Ports- 
 mouth, Plymouth, and Woolwich — as the best means of distressing 
 Great Britain. As " an earnest of what should follow," Deane 
 gave him a recommendation to and bills upon a merchant in 
 London for ;^3oo, but these John had found it necessary to burn 
 to prevent discovery. He said he had procured a passport " from 
 the French King," which passport "he lamented he had left at 
 Portsmouth, with other things, in a bundle." From France he 
 went to Canterbury, and there devised the machine found in the 
 hemp-house. Here he had a quarrel with a dragoon. From 
 Canterbury he went to Portsmouth, and prepared his combustibles. 
 He disclosed to Baldwin the secret of the composition, and the 
 ■way to apply it ; told how he had been locked into the rope-house ; 
 how he had quarrelled with his landlady for interrupting him in his 
 operations, how she forcibly turned him out of her house ; how he 
 took another lodging; how he could not light his matches, and 
 bought others; how he fled from Portsmouth in a woman's cart. 
 These particulars were confirmed at his trial. The boy who made 
 the canister, the dragoon, the landlady at Portsmouth, the man 
 who let him out of the rope-house, the persons who saw him in the 
 yard, the woman who sold him the matches, and the woman who 
 took him up in her cart, all testified ; last of all, the bundle actually 
 contained the passport from France. He was tried at Winchester, 
 and was hanged at the gate of Portsmouth Dockyard, " on a 
 gallows 60 feet high." 
 
 Before he was taken from Winchester, he made a confession. 
 His real name was James Aitken. He was born at Edinburgh in 
 1 75 1, the son of a blacksmith. He became a painter. " Curiosity " 
 led him to Virginia in 1772; he left America in 1775, and 
 enhsted in the 32nd Regiment — deserted, re-enlisted in the 13th, 
 and again deserted. Then he followed his trade of painter in Bir- 
 mingham and other towns. At Tichfield, in Hants, he " conceived 
 the first idea of setting fire to the dockyards." He went to France, 
 and applied to Deane, who told him " when the work was done, 
 he should be rewarded." After firing the rope-yard, he went to 
 London, and saw Dr. Bancroft, to whom he had a verbal recom- 
 mendation from Deane, " but the Doctor gave him no countenance." 
 By his own account he told Bancroft he would do all the harm he 
 
JOHN THE PAINTER 469 
 
 could to this kingdom, but the Doctor not approving, John said 
 he hoped that he would not inform against him. After this he 
 took to robbery in the intervals of arson. He had no accomplices 
 — his villanies were his own. Silas Deane's promise to reward him 
 did not prevent George in from bribing Deane himself. 
 
 John the Painter was hanged because it was death to fire a 
 royal dockyard. On the 13th of May a Bill was brought in "for 
 the better securing and preserving" of all dockyards, whether 
 public or private. They were to be secured by making firing 
 them a hanging matter too. The debate is worthy of notice. Mr. 
 Combe said that many crimes far less heinous were punished with 
 death ; and if John the Painter had burnt all the warehouses and 
 ships of Bristol, he would not have been hanged. To this Sir 
 William Meredith replied in a speech which may perhaps have 
 influenced Romilly in his efforts at reforming our Criminal Code. 
 Meredith did not think the punishment of death " at all useful in 
 the prevention of crimes." He doubted whether hanging " ever 
 did, or can, answer any good purpose." " The cruel exhibition of 
 every execution-day is a proof that hanging carries no terror with 
 it.'' What men think they can escape, they despise. "The 
 multiplicity of our hanging laws has produced two things : frequency 
 of condemnation, and frequent pardons." As our laws are actually 
 administered, " not one in twenty is executed," so each man thinks 
 he will be the one to get off. And what an example the executions 
 give ! The hardened villain is looked on " with envy and admira- 
 tion " ; 1 while a penitent thief makes " a sober villain," oppressed 
 with want, think that at the worst he too can die penitent, " the 
 punishment will be short, and the reward eternal." Even in crimes 
 that are never pardoned, death is no prevention — house-breakers, 
 forgers, and coiners, are sure to be hanged, yet these are the very 
 crimes that are oftenest committed. Strange it is, that in the case 
 of blood, where we ought to be most tender, we still go against 
 reason and experience. "A recent event has proved, that poUcy 
 will do what blood cannot do. I mean the late regulation of the 
 coinage. Thirty years together men were continually hanged for 
 coining, still it went on, but on the new regulation of the gold coin, 
 it ceased." 
 
 ' " Wednesday, April 2, 1777. James Frankling, for robbing Mrs. Harvey and 
 two other ladies was executed at Maidstone. This was the highwayman who, 
 after having robbed the ladies, returned, and, putting his body into the coach to 
 kiss them, was seized by the coachman, and apprehended. He behaved in a 
 most undaunted manner at the gallows, placed the rope about his neck, and threw 
 himself off the ladder with a force as if to pull his head off." 
 
470 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Since then an Act has passed making it treason to coin silver 
 — but we hear of it more than ever! By this "nickname of 
 treason," there hes in Newgate at this moment, under sentence to 
 be burnt ahve, a girl just turned of fourteen ; at her master's bidding 
 she hid some white-washed farthings behind her stays, on which 
 the jury found her an accomplice in the treason. " The master was 
 hanged last Wednesday, and the faggots all lay ready for her ; no 
 reprieve came till just as the cart was setting out — the girl would 
 have been burnt alive on the same day, had it not been for the 
 humane but casual interference of Lord Weymouth." Good God ! 
 Sir, we are taught to execrate the fires of Smithfield — are we 
 lighting them now to burn a poor harmless child for hiding a white- 
 washed farthing ? And yet this barbarous sentence is brought as 
 a reason for more hanging and burning ! I was asked the other 
 day to bring in a Bill to make it treason to coin copper ! 
 
 Meredith then told a terrible story about the Shop-lifting Act — 
 passed to protect bankers' and silversmiths', and other shops 
 where there are commonly goods of great value. (" When a member 
 of parliament brings in a new hanging law, he begins with 
 mentioning some injury to private property, for which a man is 
 not yet liable to be hanged, and then proposes the gallows as the 
 infallible cure.") The Shop-lifting Act made it death to lift any- 
 thing off a counter with intent to steal. Under this Act, one Mary 
 Jones was executed. It was at the time when press-warrants were 
 issued on the alarm about the Falkland Islands. " The woman's 
 husband was pressed, their goods seized for some small debts of 
 his, and she, with two small children, turned into the streets 
 a-begging. It is a circumstance not to be forgotten that she was 
 very young (under nineteen), and most remarkably handsome. 
 She went to a linen-draper's shop, took some coarse linen off the 
 counter, and slipped it under her cloak ; the shopman saw her, 
 and she laid it down : for this she was hanged. Her defence was 
 (I have the trial in my pocket), that she ' lived in credit and 
 wanted for nothing, till a press-gang came and stole her husband 
 from her ; but since then she had had no bed to he on ; nothing 
 to give her children to eat, and they were almost naked, and she 
 hardly knew what she did.' " The parish officers testified to the 
 truth of her story ; and her neighbours gave her a good character, 
 and signed a petition on her behalf. But there had been a good 
 deal of shop-lifting about Ludgate — an example was thought 
 necessary — " this woman was hanged for the comfort and satis- 
 faction of some shopkeepers in Ludgate-street.'' When she 
 received sentence "she behaved in such a frantic manner, as 
 
JOHN THE PAINTER 471 
 
 proved her mind to be distracted ; tlie child was sucking at her 
 breast when she set out for Tyburn." 1 
 
 Some, said Meredith, are perhaps blaming the Judges, the jury, 
 and the hangman — but they are only ministerial agents — " the true 
 hangman is the member of parliament " — he " who frames the 
 bloody law is answerable for all the blood that is shed under it." 
 
 Then he showed how the Mosaic Law ordered restitution — four 
 and fivefold, but only if the thief came by night was it lawful to 
 kill him. If he came by day, he was to make restitution, and if he 
 had nothing he was to be sold. " This is all that God required in 
 felonies.'' Only the Draconian code can be compared with ours. 
 Draco said that petty crimes deserved death, and he knew " nothing 
 worse for the greatest." But Solon repealed all except death for 
 murder. 
 
 " A few years ago a friend of mine tried to repeal some of the 
 most absurd and cruel of our capital laws." The Bill passed this 
 House, but was rejected by the Lords, " as an innovation." But 
 " these hanging laws are themselves innovations." No fewer than 
 three and thirty of them passed during the last reign. Treason, 
 murder, rape, and burning a dwelling-house were all the capital 
 crimes by our good old common law, Even in case of murder, if 
 compensation could be made, the next of kin could discharge the 
 prosecution, and it could never be revived. If the ravished woman 
 chose to marry the man, she could save him, even from under the 
 gallows. But so have we deviated from the benignity of our 
 ancient laws, that "there is now under sentence of death an 
 unfortunate clergyman (Dr. Dodd) who made satisfaction for the 
 injury he attempted — the satisfaction was accepted — but the 
 acceptance and the prosecution bear the same date." 
 
 The Bill was eventually dropped. 
 
 1 There are some inaccuracies of detail in Meredith's account, but they do 
 not affect his argument. His speech was thought so important that it was 
 reprinted by the Society for studying Criminal Law. 
 
CHAPTER LVI 
 
 IN NEW YORK 
 
 " Among other mischiefs, we are pestered with stories of the wisdom and 
 virtue of the rebels." — Letter from an Officer at New York, Feb. 14, 1777. 
 (Almon.) 
 
 "Our army moulders away amazingly. Many die by the sword, many by 
 sickness brought on by the bad provisions we have had from Ireland, others by 
 the inclemency of the weather. ... I wish Government would look after the 
 contractors, for without we are supplied with wholesome necessaries of life, it 
 cannot be expected we shall long fight their battles." — Letter from New York, 
 Dec. 3, I776- {Given in Almon's Remembrancer.) 
 
 ' ' We are contending in the noblest cause that can enlarge and exalt the 
 human heart. Let the magnanimity of our conduct be proportioned to the 
 nobleness of our pursuits. . . . We are forming a national character. . . . Hoc 
 idein providendum est, patres conscripti, , . . neu magis ir(E quam famtz con- 
 sulatis." — Speech of an unnamed member of Congress, against a motion to treat 
 Scotch prisoners ' ' with the utmost severity, as the rancorous abettors of this 
 inhuman war." 
 
 By the spring of 1777 Washington was inundated with French 
 officers, who seldom brought more than a commission and a 
 passport, and who all expected to be instantly made field-officers. 
 Washington did not know what on earth to do with them. He 
 did not wish to offend them, but neither could he offend his own 
 officers by putting the Frenchmen over their heads. One of them 
 had calmly asked for the command of the artillery — no doubt 
 considering himself more competent than an ex-bookseller. Deane 
 seems to have sent out many of these people. Among them was a 
 Colonel Conway, an Irishman, who said he had been thirty years 
 in the French service, and was a Chevalier of St. Louis. 
 
 There were others, whose names America has never let die — 
 Kosciusko, Pulaski, Steuben, Kalb, and the very young Marquis 
 de Lafayette, a boy of nineteen, who left his girl-wife to come and 
 fight for liberty. Washington was so charmed with him, that he 
 took him into his "family," as aide-de-camp.^ 
 
 ' With a want of delicacy only excusable on the score of extreme youth, 
 Lafayette had had himself presented to George in just before he went to fight 
 
 m 
 
IN NEW YORK 473 
 
 Louis XVI still " broke into a passion " when he heard of help 
 given to American rebels; but he could not restrain the nation. 
 Lafayette went off in direct disobedience to an order of the King 
 — sailing in a transport he bought himself, when the American 
 Commissioners told him American credit was too low to do it. 
 With him came the veteran de Kalb — who in 1775 was sent by 
 de Choiseul to America to see how the land lay. This time, too, 
 de Kalb's errand was partly political. He was a sort of emissary 
 from the Count de Broglie, who had thoughts of offering himself 
 to the Americans, in case they wanted a temporary Stadtholder (after 
 the pattern of William of Orange), to set things going for them till 
 they could manage for themselves. But America was poor, and the 
 Count's terms were high, and in addition he asked a princely 
 annuity for the rest of his life. 
 
 From the heights of Morristown, Washington so far dominated the 
 country that Cornwallis had to write to General Washington, to ask 
 permission to send money and stores to the Hessians captured at 
 Trenton, and a surgeon and medicines to the wounded at Princeton. 
 Washington replied that no molestation would be offered to the 
 convoy by the regular army under his command, " but he could not 
 answer for the militia, who were resorting to arms in most parts of 
 the State, and were excessively exasperated at the treatment they 
 had met with from both Hessian and British troops." 
 
 The last words refer to circumstances which had changed the 
 whole tone of public opinion in New Jersey. It is beyond doubt 
 that both the Howe brothers were not merely not rancorous — they 
 were kindly disposed towards the Americans, and had publicly 
 avowed this kindness before hostihties commenced. We have 
 seen that Howe's constituents charged him with violating his 
 conscience and his pledges in accepting the American command. 
 Sir William was self-indulgent, and loose in his morality, but he was 
 not cruel. The Admiral was a man of far higher type — stern, just, 
 incapable of fear or littleness. His sailors called him " Black 
 Dick," for his sombre looks. He was deeply attached to Franklin, 
 and continued to address him as " My worthy Friend," even when 
 in arms against him. He had shed some iron tears when he found 
 there was no hope of reconciliation. He was in no way responsible 
 for the policy which turned friends into foes in Jersey — the blame 
 of it must lie with the savage instructions of Germaine, and Sir 
 WiUiam Howe's criminal weakness. Ministerialists in England 
 and loyalists in America freely charged both brothers with treachery, 
 
 against him ! The unsuspecting King offered to let him inspect the dockyards, 
 hut Lafayette had sufBcient sense of propriety to dechne this ! 
 
474 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 for not crushing the rebels when they might have done so. It is 
 true that there were occasions, especially in 1776, when General 
 Howe, if he had pushed his advantage, could have destroyed 
 Washington. But the same thing could be said of many other 
 wars; and it must be remembered that war depends almost 
 entirely upon knowledge of the enemy's movements. Washington 
 was almost always far better informed than Howe — one has but to 
 read the despatches to see this. And if Washington's army was 
 weak, his positions were always strong — except at New York, 
 where he obeyed the civil Government against his own better 
 judgment. 
 
 The behaviour of the British in New York — a city on the 
 whole favourable to them — was outrageous. The arms on carriages 
 were defaced, and the arms of the plunderers substituted. Even 
 the King's pardon was not respected. An officer of high rank 
 took forcible possession of the carriage and horses of a gentleman 
 who had been pardoned. The Hessians, said this witness, thought 
 that all Americans had forfeited all. General de Heister offered 
 to sell the house lent him for his quarters by a loyalist ! The 
 furniture of loyalists suffering imprisonment among the rebels was 
 sold by auction in New York ! 1 
 
 Howe proclaimed that all stores of provisions should be 
 considered as magazines of the enemy. The amount of provisions 
 a family might have in the house was so restricted that people 
 must have been put to great straits in providing themselves. But 
 all this was as nothing. It was the conduct of the army on its 
 march which cured Jersey of her British sympathies. It could 
 not have been better contrived if it had been expressly intended 
 to prevent all possibility of the reconciliation we were always 
 talking about. 
 
 Howe's Proclamation promised protection to all who took the 
 Oath of Allegiance, and stayed quietly at home. On this the loyal 
 inhabitants raised two brigades, and thousands took the oath. 
 Howe immediately published their names, to show how many 
 adherents the King had — thus pointing them out to the vengeance 
 of the Whigs, already exasperated by outrages committed by the 
 loyalists in arms. He refused to arm them unless they would 
 
 ' Judge Jones, a staunch loyalist, tells how the British behaved to their friends 
 in Long Island. A loyalist gentleman of fortune and character had a horse, a 
 descendant of the famous Wildair. An English cavalry officer saw and fancied 
 the animal, told its owner to dismount in the middle of the road, and hand over 
 the horse to his own orderly, bidding him thank his stars that he was allowed to 
 keep his saddle. — Jones, vol. i. chap. vi. 
 
IN NEW YORK 475 
 
 actually enrol themselves. Then he marched on, and they were 
 plundered by the King's troops. He had issued a proclamation 
 that "all salted and meal provisions, which may be judged to 
 exceed the quantity necessary for the subsistence of an ordinary 
 family, shall be considered as a magazine of the enemy, and seized 
 for the King, and given the troops as a saving for the public." 
 No wonder the Hessians thought that all America was forfeit. 
 They plundered Whig and Tory alike. They stripped man, 
 woman, and child, carried off every horse, cow, pig or fowl they 
 could find ; and when the maddened people began to form bands 
 to waylay the marauders, an order was issued to Count Donop to 
 hang to the nearest tree any civilian who fired on the army. Nor 
 was this the worst. 
 
 Dreadful things were done by the troops under Cornwallis. 
 At Pennytown, sixteen young women, who had fled to the woods, 
 were followed and caught and carried off. One man saw his 
 wife and only daughter ravished — the daughter a child of ten.i 
 Another girl of eighteen was taken from her father's house and 
 carried to a barn, where five of these brutes were waiting. The 
 Tories themselves were not spared — every American who fell in 
 with the soldiers — men, old women, infants — all were stripped 
 to their shirts. Farmhouses were burned, windows and doors 
 smashed, and everything carried off. A blind old gentleman near 
 Pennytown was stripped of everything. " Yesterday," says one wit- 
 ness, " they burned the elegant house of Daniel Cox, Esq., at Trenton 
 Ferry." Cox was a loyalist and supporter of Toryism ! The people 
 became so exasperated that "they are flying to arms." "One of 
 the most respectable gentlemen of Woodbridge heard his most 
 lovely daughter shrieking,'' and found a British officer outraging her. 
 The infuriated father instantly killed the ravisher, when two other 
 officers rushed in and fired two balls at the father, " who is now 
 languishing under his wounds." 
 
 Such is a contemporaneous account; and it is borne out by 
 the evidence of Major-General Robertson before the House of 
 Commons, in 1779. There was, he says, "much plundering, which 
 lost us friends, and gained us enemies." Howe forbade it, but it 
 went on. Robertson says he first saw the bad effect of plundering 
 in Long Island — it must therefore have begun at once. The 
 Hessians had been promised they should make their fortunes in 
 America, and " they acted on that principle." " Nothing was left 
 
 1 "This he, choaked with grief, told his friend, who told me." — Account given 
 by an Officer of distinction in the American Army, printed at Philadelphia, by 
 order of the Council of Safety, January 4, 1777. 
 
476 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 alive on farms." He had heard about the twenty-two waggons full of 
 plunder, restored to their owners by Washington, after Trenton. 
 Asked if it was possible to prevent plundering, Robertson said that 
 he himself had found it was. At Rhode Island he hanged a man 
 for it, and there was no more. "I always considered the great 
 object of the war to be the regaining of the people, and to accom- 
 plish this by proving to them that we were their friends." There 
 is something very ironical in the methods taken by the King and 
 Lord George Germaine to prove to the Americans that we were 
 their friends. On those two men must lie the original guilt and 
 disgrace of these enormities. Their own letters are there to prove 
 it. By the time Washington marched back from Trenton, the 
 Jersey brigades were disbanding, and the whole population had 
 turned against the British. 
 
 Having so many officers among his prisoners (fourteen British 
 officers were taken at Princeton, besides the Hessians at Trenton), 
 Washington tried to exchange some of them for Lee — offering 
 five Hessians for him, and even proposing that Lee should only 
 be exchanged on parole not to take active service. But Howe 
 refused, and talked of trying Lee as a deserter — whereupon 
 Washington sternly replied that if this were done he would 
 retaliate upon the British and Hessian officers in his hands. He 
 refused to consider any exchanges till Lee was recognised as 
 prisoner of war. Howe then remembered that Lee had publicly 
 resigned his half-pay — and therefore quitted the British service — 
 before enlisting with the rebels. Strange to say, Lee was never ill- 
 used, as were so many American officers ; he was even allowed 
 to communicate with his rebel friends. His tone to Washington 
 was now very different, and he was begging to be exchanged. 
 
 Washington's first care, after recovering the Jerseys, was to 
 strengthen the Northern army, lest Carleton should try to re-take 
 Ticonderoga, as soon as he could cross Lake Champlain on the 
 ice. He was sorely in need of men. He wrote in these days 
 that Congress thought "it is but to say, presto begone, and 
 everything is done." The situation in the North was rendered 
 more acute by jealousies and enmities. Schuyler was unpopular 
 with New England, because as a Commissioner for the New 
 Hampshire Grants he had stood out for the rights of the New 
 Yorkers. So Massachusetts held back from supporting him, and 
 then, when Canada was lost, laid the whole blame upon him. 
 Schuyler, a proud and sensitive man, demanded an enquiry, and 
 wished to resign, but Congress insisted on his remaining. The 
 whole story, with Gates' intrigues to supplant him, is discreditable 
 
IN NEW YORK 477 
 
 to all concerned, except to Schuyler himself, and to Washington, 
 who always stood by him. 
 
 Throughout all the early part of 1777 efforts continued to be 
 made for an exchange of prisoners. In February Franklin and 
 Deane wrote to Lord Stormont, proposing to exchange one hundred 
 British seamen taken by an American privateer for one hundred 
 American prisoners in England. Stormont did not reply, so in 
 April the envoys wrote again ; then Stormont answered only — 
 
 "The King's Ambassador receives no applications from rebels, 
 unless they come to implore his Majesty's mercy." 
 
 The state of the prisoners in New York was frightful. The 
 horrors of the Sugar House, the Jersey Prison Ship, the brutalities 
 of Provost Marshal Cunningham, have passed into American 
 history, as the Black Hole of Calcutta has into ours. All the 
 denials of Lord and General Howe cannot outweigh the testimony 
 of Washington, and the dreadful proof afforded by the mortality. 
 It was never even pretended that there was any conspicuous 
 mortality among British prisoners of war ; nor did any British 
 commander ever assert that he received his men back in evil case. 
 To Sir William Howe's insolent letter, twitting Washington with 
 the sickness in his own army, Washington might have replied that 
 they too were suffering from cold and hunger. But there was no 
 such mortality among the Americans in arms, severe as were their 
 sufferings. While in the four months after the fall of Fort Washing- 
 ton, 1500 American prisoners of war died in New York. 
 
 It is not from the despatches of Howe that we get any idea of 
 the true state of affairs. Howe writes that New York was "almost 
 without inhabitants " when he entered — now, such is the people's 
 eagerness to return to his Majesty's government, that there are 
 ir,ooo. The ships have remained at sea during the whole winter, 
 and have taken 200 prizes. Lord Cornwallis has surprised and 
 defeated the enemy at Boundbrook. Very different is the impres- 
 sion produced by private letters ^ of the same date — the end of 
 April ! Private letters are full of the " disagreements and factions " 
 in the army, and of hints that Sir William Howe had lost the 
 confidence of his best officers. Through the winter he had played 
 heavily with the younger ones. Other scandals there were, con- 
 nected with ladies who had better have been left at home. Howe 
 was accused of extreme indolence and inattention to business, and 
 many said that supreme command had spoiled him. 
 
 From these accounts we also learn that the troops at New 
 
 ' Very many of these letters are given by Almon. Others are preserved in 
 the American Archives. 
 
478 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 York and Amboy are very ill of dysentery, " which carries off numbers 
 of them daily.i The country round Amboy is a perfect desart for 
 several miles, owing to a proclamation issued by General Washing- 
 ton, in March, ordering all the provisions and forage in Jersey to 
 be removed out of the province, and all that was not, to be 
 destroyed. Had this been done at the beginning of winter, 
 General Howe would not have had a horse alive. General Howe 
 cannot take the field till the end of May. Very few Americans 
 have joined General Howe ; at the utmost they are not five hundred ; 
 the people who have joined him are refugees from Boston, people 
 who have been driven out of Virginia, etc., chiefly Scotch and Irish, 
 and some English. They are formed into 1 3 regiments of 300 each. 
 During the months of March and April, the King's army are 
 reckoned to have lost near three thousand men in Jersey." (Of 
 course this includes those lost by sickness.) 
 
 The writer of this letter is evidently one of the discontented 
 officers. He complains of Howe's partiality for Cornwallis — 
 this is " what gives disgust.'' This and this only occasioned 
 Lord Percy to leave the army — "he saw himself given the post 
 of a brigadier-general," while CornwaUis had the post of a 
 lieutenant - general. The writer goes on : " Lord Cornwallis 
 surprised a little post at Boundbrook, but did not think proper 
 to stay ; he returned as fast as he could to Brunswick. And 
 the provincials in turn surprised his post at Bonum town. These 
 circumstances afford a very unpromising prospect of conquest ; 
 as they shew, that whenever any parties of the King's troops 
 are sent out, they can stay but a few minutes . . . lest the country 
 should be alarmed, and their retreat be cut off." 
 
 A "letter said to be written at New York," is given in the 
 Gentleman's Magazine for April, 1777, as "if not true, plausible.'' 
 It is chiefly about the Hessians, and must have been written by 
 someone well informed about them. At first there was little 
 communication between them and the English. The English 
 " rather affected to despise the thriftiness of the Hessian prudence, 
 as a something, base and sordid." The Hessian, "naturally 
 fierce," returned the disdain, and called our men unsoldierly for 
 going to war in so "volatile a spirit.'' They talked as though 
 they were going to do it all. Howe let them — Knyphausen in 
 particular putting them forward ; and then they began to complain 
 that everything was put upon them. "They had, indeed, from 
 the beginning, considered themselves pretty much at free quarters 
 in an enemy's country, and it is not easy for you to conceive 
 
 ' " Other particulars brought by a transport," etc. — Remembrancer, S, 152-4. 
 
IN NEW YORK 479 
 
 the quantity of plunder they had collected : their very men 
 were, some of them, as it were, rich, and they took excellent care 
 of what they had got; the unthrifty manner of our people left 
 them exposed to a thousand inconveniences that the Hessians 
 were strangers to." The Hessians thought they "were to have ■ 
 allotments of land in the very first province that was conquered "— 
 the writer does not know whether this was "a recruiting tale," 
 or whether (as some say) it was really suggested to Heister — 
 anyway, it made the Hessians eager to get into the Jerseys. When 
 they were disappointed of an immediate settlement,^ they revenged 
 themselves upon the country. It " was certainly ravaged at a 
 high rate." The rebellion seemed crushed — the Americans 
 "trembled at the very name of a Hessian." The terror they 
 raised " is inconceivable." The loyalists " lived in our quarters 
 hated by us as rebels, and despised by their countrymen as 
 traitors." "Here you see us in triumph, without an enemy, 
 masters of a delightful country." But now " the general antipathy 
 between us and the foreigners appeared without a mask. . . . 
 They considered the country as their right. The increase of 
 their plunder was their only care; they would not move without 
 it." In vain Howe "exhausted his temper in reasoning" — as 
 ill-luck would have it, they were just then in arrears of pay, 
 and "want of pay and good discipline are incompatible." And 
 the ill example spread to the English. Moreover, Howe soon 
 found that the submission of the rebels " was all feigned." Many 
 who had sworn allegiance deserted, and those who remained 
 were only waiting to go. But the Hessians were paid somehow, 
 and reduced "to a proper temper." Firmer discipline, too, was 
 established among our own people— though as to this, "opinions 
 differed widely; it was thought unreasonable to be over exact 
 in an enemy's country." And then suddenly Washington came, 
 and after this "all our evil humours grew into rank disorders." 
 " My surprise is rather that we keep what we do, than that we 
 have had some losses." Not that the writer will admit any 
 "wisdom" in the rebels. "His first attempt with a handful of 
 men, was, I own, a spirited thing; he happened to succeed; he 
 came into a country of friends, and one success led to another." 
 It was the wealth of Philadelphia that created the army, "not 
 the wisdom of Washington." And, after all, if we could now 
 act with our whole force, they could not stand against us, but 
 
 ^The Americans also made offers. Addresses in German were wrapped 
 round the tobacco the Hessians got, offering them tracts of land if they would 
 abandon the ignominious service to which their Sovereign had sold them. 
 
48o ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 the experiment would be just now too dangerous. The whole 
 gist of this letter is that the Hessians had better be got rid of. 
 " Would to God we were all British, and spoke the same language, 
 and had the same heart, the Rebels would soon Hsten to reason." 
 
 Every letter and account mentions plunder. The whole 
 army is alleged to have caught the thirst from the Hessians. One 
 letter says, "there is nothing so common as to see the soldiers' 
 wives, and other women, who follow the army, carrying three or 
 four silk gowns, fine linen, etc., taken from the houses on the 
 march, or where they last slept. Many of the soldiers have got 
 watches, which they have stolen in the same manner." ^ The 
 writer even accuses some of the officers — "the considerable 
 remittances which they have made to England," are urged as 
 proofs of the gain they have made by plunder. After charging 
 the army with "innumerable ravishments" of wives and daughters 
 of farmers, the writer continues : " These cruelties and robberies 
 have irritated the Americans beyond the possibility of expression, 
 and have put peace totally out of sight. And as to conquest, 
 it is ridiculous, unless the army was at least three times larger 
 than it is, to be stationed in every place it conquers." 
 
 Provisions in New York were dearer than ever — beef, i4d. 
 a lb. "by the quarter"; mutton and veal, i8d. ; butter, 4s. id. 
 "a scant two-pound roll"; milk, yd. a quart; bread "very dear"; 
 small cabbages, yd. to lod. each; five eggs for yd.; wood, 45s. 
 the cord ; coals, three guineas and a half per chauldron, and 
 "before got in, half a guinea for carting, etc., more." 
 
 Rumours from the Northern army had begun to reach them, 
 and the same writer exults in the knowledge that the Six Nations 
 are assembUng, "to cure the New Englanders, who have caught 
 the itch of rambling towards their country." 
 
 Just at this time — before the great misfortunes and the great 
 victory which were so soon to attend the American cause — one 
 of these private letters gives a terrible description of the condition 
 of American prisoners of war in New York. The writer says he 
 had it from "a person of veracity" just come out of the city. 
 "They are allowed but 3 ounces of salt pork per day, which 
 they are frequently obliged to eat raw ; and three pounds of bread 
 per week. The humane and compassionate (for such it seems 
 there are even among Tories) are debarred from affording them 
 the least assistance ; and they are insulted and abused in the 
 grossest and most illiberal manner." This was to force them to 
 enlist in the British service. 
 
 ' " Other Particulars," etc. 
 
IN NEW YORK 481 
 
 An account printed about this time in the New London Gazette 
 gives the prisoners' own story of their treatment after being taken 
 at Long Island. "They were robbed of all their baggage, and 
 of whatever money they had, though it were paper, and could be 
 of no advantage to the enemy, of their silver buckles, knee-buckles, 
 etc., and many were stripped almost naked of cloaths, especially 
 those who had good cloaths were stripped at once, being told, 
 that such cloaths were too good for rebels. . . . They were unable 
 to shift even their linen, and were obliged to wear the same 
 shirts for three or four months together, whereby they became 
 extremely nasty and lousy. . . . They were in the first place put 
 on board the ships, and thrust down into the hold, where not a 
 breath of fresh air could be obtained, and they were nearly 
 suffocated for want of air; particularly some who were taken at 
 Fort Washington ... in such numbers that even at the cold 
 season of November, they could scarcely bear any cloaths on 
 them, being kept in a constant sweat. Yet these same persons 
 . . . were of a sudden taken out, and put into some of the churches 
 in New York, without covering or a spark of fire . . . the con- 
 sequence was, that they took such colds as brought on the 
 most fatal diseases, and swept them off almost beyond con- 
 ception. 
 
 " Besides these things, they suffered extremely for want of 
 provisions, and even water. The Commissary pretended to 
 allow them half a pound of bread, and four ounces of pork, per 
 day ; but of this pittance they were much cut short. What was 
 given them for three days, was not enough for one day, and in 
 some instances they went for three days without a single mouthful 
 of food of any kind. They were pinched to that degree, that 
 some on board the ships would pick up and eat the salt which 
 happened to be scattered there; others gathered up the bran 
 which the light horse wasted, and eat that mixed with dirt and 
 filth as it was. Nor was this all, both the bread and pork which 
 they did allow them, was extremely bad; for the bread, some 
 of it was made out of the bran which they brought over to feed 
 their light horse, and the rest of it was so mouldy, and the pork 
 was so damnified, being soaked in bilge water, in the transportation 
 from Europe, that they were not fit to be eaten by human 
 creatures, and when they were eaten were very unwholesome. 
 Such bread and pork as they would not pretend to give to their 
 own men, they gave to our poor, sick, dying prisoners." 
 
 We doubtless see here the sequel to the voyage of Colonel 
 Barry's hogs, and to the unsaleable flour worked off by enterpris- 
 
482 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 ing contractors on the British Army — these provisions now found 
 their legitimate use in poisoning the enemy. 
 
 " Nor were they in this doleful situation allowed a sufficiency 
 of water. One would have thought that water is so plenty and 
 cheap an element, that they would not have grudged them that. . . , 
 The water allowed them was so brackish, and withal nasty, that 
 they could not drink it until reduced to extremity. Nor did they 
 let them have a sufficiency even of such water as this. 
 
 " When winter came on, our poor people suffered extremely 
 for want of fire and cloaths to keep them warm. They were 
 confined in churches, where there were no fireplaces. . . . Wood 
 was allowed them only for cooking their pittance of victuals ; and 
 for that purpose very sparingly. They had none to keep them 
 warm even in the extremest of the weather, although they were 
 almost naked, and the few cloaths they had left were thin summer 
 cloaths. Nor had they a single blanket, nor any bedding, not 
 even straw, allowed them, till a little before Christmas. . . . 
 
 "At the time that these were taken on Long Island, a con- 
 siderable part were sick of the dysentry, and with this distemper 
 on them were crouded first on board of the ships, afterwards into 
 the churches in New York, three, four, or five hundred together, 
 without any blankets, or anything for even the sick to lie upon, 
 but the bare floors or pavements. In this situation, that contagious 
 distemper soon communicated from the sick to the well. ... Of 
 this distemper numbers died daily, and many others . . . contracted 
 fevers and died of them. During their sickness with these and 
 other diseases, they had no medecine, nothing soothing or com- 
 fortable for sick people, and were not so much as once visited by 
 any physician by the month together. 
 
 "Nor ought we to omit the insults which the humane Britons 
 offered to our people, nor the artifices which they used to induce 
 them to enlist into their service, and fight against their country. . . . 
 It seems that one end of their starving our people, was to bring 
 them by dint of necessity to turn rebels to their own country, 
 their conscience, and their God ; for while thus famishing, they 
 would come and say to them, 'This is the just punishment for 
 your rebellion, — nay, you are treated too well for rebels, — you 
 have not received half you deserve, nor half you shall receive ; but 
 if you will inlist into his Majesty's service, you shall have victuals 
 and cloaths enough.' 
 
 "As to insults, the British officers, besides continually cursing 
 and threatening at them as rebels, often threatened to hang them 
 all ; and at a particular time ordered a number to chpose each 
 
IN NEW YORK 483 
 
 man his halter, out of a parcel offered, wherewith to be hanged ; 
 and even went so far as to cause a gallows to be erected before 
 the prison, as if they were immediately to be executed. They 
 further threatened to send them all to the East Indies, and sell 
 them there for slaves. . . . 
 
 " In this situation ... no wonder that they all became sickly . . . 
 no wonder they died by scores in a night. And those who were 
 so far gone as to be unable to help themselves, the workings of 
 their distemper passing through them, as they lay, could not be 
 cleansed for want of cloaths ; so that many lay for six, seven, or 
 eight days in all the filth of nature and of the distemper, till death, 
 more kind than Britons, put an end to their misery. 
 
 "By these means, and in this way, above fifteen hundred 
 Americans, who had nobly gone forth to the defence of their 
 injured oppressed country . . . died in New York : many of them 
 were very amiable promising youths, of good families, the flower 
 of our land. And of those who lived to come out of prison, the 
 greatest part, so far as I can learn, are either dead or dying : 
 their constitutions are broken, their stamina of nature worn out, 
 they cannot recover, they die. . . . 
 
 " I shall subjoin the manner in which they buried those of our 
 people who died. — They dragged them out of their prison by one 
 leg, or one arm ; piled them up without doors ; there let them be, 
 till a sufficient number were dead to make a cart-load ; then 
 loaded them up in a cart ; drove the cart thus loaded out to the 
 ditches made by our people when fortifying New York, there they 
 would tip the cart, tumble the corpses together into the ditch, 
 and afterwards lightly cover them with dirt. 
 
 " By these things, we learn the temper of our enemies. . . . 
 Where, in all history, can we find an instance of more horrid 
 treatment of prisoners ? Even the famous instance of Calcutta is 
 not to be compared with this: that respected a few, only 140; 
 this, more than 3000 ; that was finished in one night ; this was 
 continued for four or five months ; that appears to have 
 been either inconsideration or sudden heat of passion; this 
 must have been the effect of cool reflection and a preconcerted 
 system. . . . 
 
 "The prisoners we have taken, have enjoyed Uberty to walk 
 and ride about within large limits, at their pleasure; have been 
 fully supplied with every necessary, and have ever lived on the 
 fat of the land. . . . And this generous treatment, it is said, they 
 could not but remember; for when they were returned in the 
 exchange of prisoners, and saw the miserable, famished, dying 
 
484 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 state of our prisoners, conscious of the treatment they had received, 
 they could not refrain from tears." ^ 
 
 Those who lived to come out were such wrecks that when 
 Washington saw them he refused to give an equal number of his 
 own well-fed prisoners for them. He wrote to General Howe to 
 remonstrate on this treatment of prisoners. The reply excites 
 wonder at Howe's reputation for humanity. " To what cause a 
 speedy death of a large part of them is to be attributed, I cannot 
 determine. How is the cause of debility in prisoners to be 
 ascertained ? " ^ 
 
 Towards the end of April an exchange was effected, but Howe 
 still would not give up Lee ; and only by reiterated threats of 
 retaliation did Washington prevent his being sent to England. 
 Germaine, at the King's instance, was always writing to demand him. 
 
 It was just now that Congress gave deadly offence to Brigadier- 
 General Arnold by not including him in a new batch of Major- 
 Generals. Washington thought it must be an oversight, and 
 entreated Arnold to wait patiently till he could get it remedied. 
 Arnold demanded an enquiry^when it appeared that no slight 
 was intended, but as Connecticut already had the two Major- 
 Generals, to which her contribution entitled her, he had been 
 passed over. Washington observed that this was "a strange 
 mode of reasoning." Presently happened Tryon's expedition to 
 Danbury, when Wooster and Arnold led the militia, and made so 
 gallant a resistance that Tryon was glad to get back to his ships 
 as soon as possible. After this Congress gave Arnold his step, 
 but he had lost his seniority, and the thought rankled in his 
 breast, although Congress voted him a horse to replace the one 
 shot under him at Danbury. 
 
 ' The prisoners, about a thousand in number, who were imprisoned in 
 England, suffered greatly, though not as these. They too were often given 
 the choice of being hanged or enlisting in the British Army. It does not appear 
 that many of them enlisted, nor that any of those who refused were hanged — 
 a wholesome dread of reprisals had been instilled by Washington into the 
 British mind, and as these reprisals would of a surety fall partly on the German 
 troops, and Frederick and Maria Theresa were already talking of permitting 
 no more Germans to be sent to America, it was necessary to be careful. 
 
 ^ Letter of Sir William Howe to General George Washington, New York, 
 April 21, 1777. 
 
CHAPTER LVII 
 « MR. LEE'S PLAN " 
 
 " If they can't act offensively, but want to keep a footing, there are strong 
 reasons to thinli they won't shut themselves up in towns, but take some tract 
 of country, which will afford them elbow-room. I HAVE particular reasons 
 to think they may cast their eyes on the lower counties of Delaware and 
 Maryland." — General Lee to General Washington, June 1778.' (Given in 
 Moore's Treason of Charles Lee. ) 
 
 The military operations of 1 7 7 7 decided the issue of the struggle. 
 Before Saratoga the Americans were rebels engaged in an 
 insurrection whose fate often seemed to hang on a thread; after 
 Saratoga they were Independent Belligerents, acknowledged by 
 two great European Powers as Sovereign States. These operations 
 are therefore of extreme interest and importance ; and the interest 
 is increased by the mystery which hangs over them. 
 
 Who was to blame for Burgoyne's fiasco? When that 
 unfortunate general was to be made the scapegoat for the disaster, 
 there remained the awkward question : Why did not Sir William 
 Howe meet him at Albany? The idea of a junction between the 
 Northern army and Howe's was no secret — it was known in 
 America as soon as it was known in England. It was indeed so 
 obvious a movement that neither Sir Henry Clinton nor Washington 
 could bring themselves to believe it was not the real intention. 
 
 Most certainly it was the first intention. Howe's own plan 
 was for a march up and down the Hudson, ending in the junction 
 at Albany, and the sweep of the whole country from Canada to 
 New York. "This," wrote Howe in the winter of 1776-7, 
 " would put those Independent Hypocrites between two fires, and 
 open the door wide for the Canadian army." But suddenly, in 
 a secret despatch of April 2, Howe totally relinquishes the idea 
 of any serious offensive movement, except to southward. He tells 
 Germaine that the Jerseys must be abandoned, and Pennsylvania 
 invaded by sea. His letter to Carleton of April 15, written in a 
 ' Just before the evacuation of Philadelphia. 
 
486 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 very confident tone, says that he has entrusted to a special 
 messenger "information of too delicate a nature to commit to 
 paper, and of the utmost importance in favour of the Northern 
 army advancing to Albany." 
 
 All who were capable of judging condemned the Southern 
 Expedition — "absurd," "fatal," are words freely used of it, and 
 this not after the event but before the Expedition started. A 
 copy of Stedman's History contains some marginal notes believed 
 to be in the hand of Sir Henry Clinton. One of these says, "I 
 do not think a man in the army except Cornwallis and Grant did 
 not reprobate the movement to the south, and see the necessity 
 of co-operating with Burgoyne." And when we consider that the 
 Northern Expedition was an old idea — older than the war — 
 suggested by Carleton, as soon as an appeal to arms became 
 probable — the sudden abandonment of it — and of the unhappy 
 Burgoyne — is inexplicable. The extraordinary story of the forgotten 
 despatch fully explains why Burgoyne carried out his part of the 
 original plan, and Howe did not carry out his ; but it leaves it as 
 great a mystery as ever why Howe ever thought of doing anything 
 but meet Burgoyne. 
 
 Howe's despatches show that a great deal was left to his own 
 discretion. It is also certain that the Pennsylvanian plan was Howe's 
 and not Germaine's. In his despatch of June 3, speaking of his 
 intention to open the campaign by a movement in the Jerseys, 
 " where the enemy's principal strength still remains,'' he adds : 
 "and I shall proceed, as occurrences may arise, according to the 
 plan made known to your Lordship in my former despatches.'' This 
 shows that it was Howe who made known the plan to Germaine, 
 and not Germaine who sent the plan to Howe. At the same time 
 Germaine must have known that Howe would not be able to 
 co-operate with Burgoyne if he went south. On July 15 Howe 
 writes that he has heard Burgoyne is before Ticonderoga; and 
 " later intelligence " leaves no doubt the fort has fallen ; but not a 
 single word in this despatch betrays that he supposes his own 
 movements are now to be in any way dependent on those of 
 Burgoyne. 
 
 Howe had a reason for the change of plan. When his conduct 
 was enquired into, in 1779, he rested his defence on two grounds — 
 one, that he was given a full discretion as to what movements were 
 advisable; and that he never received any despatch from Lord 
 George Germaine, suspending this discretion, and explicitly ordering 
 him to go north to meet Burgoyne ; the other reason was that he 
 had received certain information during the last winter, from a 
 
"MR. LEE'S PLAN" 4S7 
 
 provincial officer, which led him to suppose that the whole State of 
 Pennsylvania was ready to rise for the King. This officer was said 
 to have been in Philadelphia, but his name was never known. Is 
 it necessary to suppose he really was in Philadelphia ? What if he 
 were in New York, a prisoner ? The mention of New York would 
 then become extremely unadvisable — suspicion would infallibly be 
 directed to General Charles Lee, and there were the strongest 
 reasons for not allowing the Americans to suspect he was betray- 
 ing them. Whether, however, there were two traitors or only one, 
 during this winter, while Washington was straining every nerve to 
 obtain Lee's release, Lee was planning the ruin of the American 
 cause. 
 
 In all probability Washington saved Lee's life, by refusing to 
 exchange any prisoners until Lee was recognised as a prisoner of 
 war, and by threatening that if Lee was sent to England the 
 British and Hessian officers in his possession should go into close 
 confinement. By Germaine's order, Lee was three times put on 
 a ship for England, but Washington's letter arrived and he was 
 relanded. It would not do to offend the Germans ! 
 
 In his captivity Lee was "usually writing," and on the 29th of 
 March, 1777, he laid before the Howes a "plan of reconciliation." 
 
 This plan still exists in Lee's own handwriting, and is endorsed 
 " Mr. Lee's plan." It begins with an apology. Lee believes that 
 America has no chance of success — and success, if she obtained 
 it, would be her ruin. But she must give in in the end; and if 
 Great Britain has sufffered very heavily in making her submit, it 
 will be the worse for her. So being convinced that Lord and Sir 
 William Howe will be as moderate as their powers allow — and also 
 convinced that these ,powers are more ample than they may as 
 yet make known — he feels bound in conscience to furnish "all the 
 lights he can." 
 
 Sir William Howe had asked for 15,000 more men, to "finish 
 the war in a year " ; and the chief part of the small reinforcement 
 given in answer had been sent with Burgoyne to Canada, where- 
 upon Howe had written to the Secretary of State that his force 
 was insufficient, and that "the northern expedition must expect 
 little assistance from him." It is therefore rather a curious co- 
 incidence that "Mr. Lee's plan" is formed for the force which 
 Howe actually had with him. "I will suppose," says Lee, "that 
 besides the troops in Rhode Island, General Howe has 20,000 
 men fit for service." Here he digresses to express his belief that 
 the taking of Philadelphia will have no decisive consequences — 
 Congress will adjourn, and meet somewhere else ; he adds 
 
488 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 significantly, " they look to Europe." The thing to be done is to 
 " unhinge or dissolve the whole system or machine of resistance, 
 or, in other terms, Congress government.'' This system depends 
 on the disposition of the provinces of Maryland, Virginia, and 
 Pennsylvania. If Maryland is reduced, and Virginia prevented 
 from marching to help Pennsylvania, "the whole machine is 
 dissolved." The difficulty of passing and repassing the North 
 River will keep the New Englanders at home — it is not worth 
 while to meddle with them ; it is enough to protect Rhode Island 
 and New York from their incursions. Fourteen thousand men will 
 be more than enough to clear the Jerseys, and take Philadelphia. 
 Let four thousand more go, half of them up the Potomac and 
 take Alexandria, and the other half up Chesapeak Bay and take 
 Annapolis. These two posts are easy to take, and once taken 
 can easily be made very strong ; and they are only an easy day's 
 march apart. The Germans will come in rather than "see their 
 fine farms ravaged." (Frederick County in Maryland, and York 
 County in Pennsylvania were all German.) Then proclaim 
 pardons. 
 
 Thus Lee's plan was to paralyse the heart of the Middle 
 States. 
 
 It is not surprising that Howe contented himself with talking 
 vaguely of the "provincial officer" who misled him with regard to 
 Pennsylvania. The immediate result of the southern expedition 
 was the utter ruin of the northern, and the capture of an army ; 
 the final result was the evacuation of Philadelphia, and the 
 abandonment of whatever had been gained by two pitched 
 battles and a score of skirmishes. By 1779 it was obvious to 
 every man in England that Howe had gone south on a fool's 
 errand. He had given up a good plan for a foolish one. He 
 would not have made matters better by confessing that he had 
 listened to Charles Lee against the judgment of every officer in 
 the British army. 
 
CHAPTER LVIII 
 GENERAL BURGOYNE 
 
 " It may be asked in England, 'What is the Admiral' doing?' . . . That 
 he is not supplying us with sheep and oxen, the dinners of the best of us bear 
 meagre testimony. . . . He is «o/ employing his ships to keep up communication 
 and intelligence with the King's servants ... for I do not believe General 
 Gage has received a letter from any correspondent out of Boston these six 
 weeks. He is intent upon greater objects, you will think ... he is doubtless 
 . . . laying the towns in ashes that refuse his terms ? Alas ! he is not. British 
 thunder is diverted or controlled by pitiful attentions and mere Quaker-like 
 scruples." — General Burgoyiu to Lord George Germaine, Boston, Aug. 20, 1775' 
 
 "Accustomed to felling of timber and to grubbing up trees, they are very 
 ready at earthworks and palisading." — Reflections upon the War in America, 
 Burgoyne (summer of 1775). 
 
 Meanwhile much had happened in Canada. 
 
 General Burgoyne was sent to Quebec in the early summer of 
 1776 — going from England, whither he had returned in the autumn 
 of 1775 — to act as second in command under Governor Carleton, 
 in driving the American invaders out of Canada. So gloomy 
 seemed the prospect of affairs, that in a pamphlet, written just 
 before leaving England, Burgoyne speaks as though he supposed 
 it quite possible that Quebec had fallen. He found the town 
 very much knocked about. Anburey says that many houses had 
 been destroyed for fuel, or to prevent their harbouring the besiegers ; 
 others were damaged by shot and shell ; while the lower town had 
 been set fire to and almost destroyed by the Americans, when 
 they found they could not hold it. The inhabitants had been 
 compelled to live in the cellars of their houses during the siege — 
 "the only place that could afford them the least shelter." All 
 agreed that only the extraordinary exertions of General Carleton 
 had saved the town. 
 
 With the troops sent out with Burgoyne, the British army in 
 
 Canada numbered 12,000 men, of whom about a third were 
 
 Hessians or Brunswickers. Burgoyne's record as a soldier was 
 
 not important, but it was very romantic. He entered the army 
 
 1 " The Admiral " was Samuel Graves. He was soon recalled. 
 
490 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 early — then ran away with the Earl of Derby's daughter, and lived 
 for some years on the Continent, as he was too poor to live in 
 England in the style befitting his wife's rank.^ When the Seven 
 Years' War began, he re-entered the service, took part in the 
 attack on Cherbourg in 1758, and in the unfortunate expedition 
 against St. Malo in the same year. In 1759 he was selected to 
 form the two regiments of light dragoons, which were the first light 
 cavalry introduced into British armies, and the corps was spoken 
 of as " Burgoyne's Light-Horse." He took part in both the expedi- 
 tions against Belle Isle in 1760. In 1762 he went to Portugal 
 with the contingent sent by England to defend that country from 
 Spain and France, who wished to force her to give up her neutrality, 
 and enter into their alliance against England. In this campaign 
 Burgoyne took the town of Valentia d'Alcantara by a very bold 
 coup-de-main, riding into the square at sunrise before the garrison 
 dreamed that an enemy was near. 
 
 In civil life Burgoyne had also distinguished himself, had 
 written one or two tolerable plays — one of which was rather 
 successful — and had made some figure in the House of Commons. 
 On a few occasions he had voted with Opposition, but was a 
 supporter of Administration on the question of America. He 
 spoke and voted against repealing the tea-duty. He had taken 
 a very great part in the enquiry into the affairs of the East India 
 Company, and had done his best to expose the iniquities of Clive's 
 administration. He was vain, and somewhat frivolous, but he had 
 the instincts of a soldier and a gentleman, and showed a disregard 
 of worldly advantage where honour was concerned, which goes far 
 to atone for many of his weaknesses. He perhaps owed his 
 present appointment as much to Germaine's hatred of Carleton 
 as to favour to himself. Carleton had offended Germaine — 
 who never forgot or forgave — by declining to take upon his staff 
 an incompetent prot'eg'e of the Minister's, and only the favour of 
 the King prevented Carleton's immediate recall. Burgoyne him- 
 self was not very eager for a military appointment in America. 
 He considered negotiation to be his forte, and had tried hard to 
 get the Ministry to make him Tryon's successor at New York- — 
 he was convinced that he could have "united that province in 
 loyalty and obedience," if he might have gone there as Governor 
 in 1775 with but three or four regiments. 
 
 He had with him a large staff of distinguished officers. Seldom 
 has a General had one more brilliant. He had several English 
 
 ' In France Burgoyne formed a lasting friendship with the Duke and 
 Duchess de Choiseul. 
 
GENERAL BURGOYNE 491 
 
 and Scottish lords, four members of Parliament, and more than 
 thirty of his British officers afterwards became general officers. 
 Phillips, his second in command, commanded the British artillery 
 at Minden, and was thanked in Prince Ferdinand's General Orders 
 next day. Brigadier-General Fraser— of the Lovat family, but not, 
 as has been supposed, a son of old Simon Lovat — was one of the 
 rising officers in the army. Major Acland, the hot-headed Somerset- 
 shire Squire, who used to make violent speeches in Parliament 
 against the rebels, was a brave and generous man, adored by his 
 young wife, who had followed him to the war. Kingston, once of 
 Burgoyne's Light-Horse in Portugal, was now his Adjutant-General ; 
 and not the least excellent of the officers was Lieutenant Schank, a 
 Scot, already the inventor of the centre-board, who had come to 
 make the floating bridges which would be wanted if the army was 
 ever to get to Albany. Of the German officers, the chief was 
 General Baron von Riedesel, a trusted officer of Prince Ferdinand ; 
 and under him, Colonel Baum and Colonel Breymann. 
 
 There were soon to be others — stranger figures— the strangest 
 La Come St. Luc, the old Auvergnat frontier-fighter, who began 
 his career by leading the Iroquois against the English — scalping 
 them as opportunity offered. He was now in the English service, 
 a Legislative Councillor, strongly opposed to the Quebec Act. 
 He was in command of the Ottawas. (It is odd that English 
 accounts always call them " Savages," while the Americans usually 
 say "Indians.") Second under St. Luc was another strange 
 figure — Charles de Langlade, the same who led these very same 
 nations against poor Braddock on the dreadful day by the 
 Monongahela. 
 
 The regiments were even more distinguished than the officers — 
 they were among the most famous in the British Army. The 
 2ist (Royal North British Fusileers) fought its first battle at 
 Bothwell Brig, in 1679, and had been in nearly every important 
 action since. The 20th began service at the Boyne, and several 
 others went back to Queen Anne. 
 
 At first all went well. Thompson's daring attack on Three 
 Rivers — on the 8th of June — failed ignominiously ; Fraser defeated 
 and took him prisoner. Arnold was obliged to abandon the camp 
 at Sorel, and all that he and Sullivan could do at St. John's and 
 Chamblde was to destroy what they could not carry away. The 
 camp at Isle-aux-Noix was so unhealthy that sickness broke out, 
 and Sullivan crossed Lake Champlain to gain Crown Point. The 
 battle must now be by water. Both British and Americans set about 
 getting ready a flotilla to dispute the mastery of Lake Champlain. 
 
492 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Lieutenant Schank built the Inflexible at Quebec. Then she 
 was taken apart and carried to Chambl^e, then on to St. John's,^ 
 and there put together again. Her keel was laid the second time 
 on September 2, and by sunset of that day she was as far advanced 
 as she had been at Quebec. Three hundred carpenters had been 
 sent for to New York, and though only half the number came, 
 they worked at such a rate that sometimes trees that in the 
 morning were growing were forming part of a ship at night. 
 Carleton had parts of vessels sent from England. Other boats 
 were dragged overland, or up the rapids of the Sorel, and the 
 Canadian farmers were compelled to help. If a British fleet 
 could get the command of Lakes George and Champlain, the 
 north of New York State would be at their mercy. Before winter 
 the army might be at Albany, and the rebellion would be cut 
 in two. But first, Ticonderoga and Crown Point must be taken, 
 and the utmost exertions could not get the fleet ready before the 
 end of September. When it was ready there were from twenty 
 to thirty sail in all. Carleton's flag-ship, the Inflexible, mounted 
 eighteen 12-pounders — the rest were gun-boats, a gondola and a 
 flat-bottomed vessel, called a "radeau," and named the Thunderer, 
 with a battery of six 24-pounders, and twelve 6-pounders, besides 
 howitzers. He had with him 700 seamen. Burgoyne, as yet 
 only second in command, went with him. Captain Pringle 
 superintended the naval operations. 
 
 Arnold had stationed his little fleet under cover of Valcour 
 Island, in the upper part of a deep channel, between the island 
 and the mainland. He had three schooners, two sloops, three 
 galleys, and eight gondolas — carrying in all 70 guns, many of them 
 i8-pounders. On October 11 the British ships, sweeping on with 
 fair wind, had passed the island before they saw him — anchored 
 across the strait. Pringle hauled close to the wind, and tried to 
 beat up the channel, but the wind was against him and the 
 largest ship could not enter. Arnold was on board his own 
 largest galley, the Congress. Leaving his line, he advanced 
 with the other two galleys, and the schooner Royal Savage^ 
 hoping to deal with the smaller British vessels before the larger 
 could come up. About noon the British opened a brisk fire, 
 which was returned. In trying to return to the line the Royal 
 Savage ran aground. The crew set her on fire and abandoned 
 her. In about an hour Pringle brought all his gun-boats in a 
 line across the channel. The ships were now within musket-shot. 
 
 ' St. John's, on the Richelieu, 27 miles south-east of Montreal. 
 ' She wais a captured British ship. 
 
GENERAL BURGOYNE 493 
 
 A large body of Indians had been landed on the island to gall 
 the Americans from shore — their fire did not prove very formidable, 
 but their war-whoops added to the fury of the fight. It was a 
 desperate one, and Arnold was in the hottest of it — encouraging 
 his men, and often pointing the guns himself. So they fought 
 till evening, when Pringle called off the smaller vessels, and 
 anchored his squadron across the channel as near as possible to 
 the Americans, to prevent their escape. But the night was dark 
 and cloudy — Arnold slipped out through the British line, each 
 vessel following a light in the stern of the one ahead. By day- 
 light the flotilla was out of sight. But Arnold was compelled 
 to anchor off Schuyler's Island — ten miles up the lake — to repair 
 damages. Here he sunk two gondolas, damaged past patching. 
 About noon he resumed his retreat, but the wind was now 
 adverse, his sails were shattered, and his galley and others fell 
 astern in the course of the next night. So in the morning, when 
 the sun dispersed the fog that lay on the Lake, they saw the 
 British fleet in full chase, only a few miles behind — and their 
 own consorts nearly out of sight, making for Crown Point. 
 
 Arnold managed to get within a few leagues of Crown Point 
 before he was overtaken by the Inflexible, the Carleion, and the 
 Maria. They poured in a tremendous fire. The Washington — 
 already shattered in the battle of yesterday — was obliged to 
 strike. Arnold fought on, till one-third of his men were killed. 
 Then he ran his five shattered ships on shore, and set fire to them — 
 remaining on board the Congress till he was sure the British would 
 not get her colours — when he took to the woods with the remnant 
 of his men. They reached Crown Point that night — narrowly 
 escaping an Indian ambush. Arnold's other vessels were there, 
 but, seeing that it was impossible to hold Crown Point, he burned 
 all the stores and set sail for Ticonderoga. 
 
 Carleton took possession of the ruined fort, but it was too 
 late now to cross Lake George before winter — his plans had to 
 wait till next year. 
 
CHAPTER LIX 
 THE EVACUATION OF THE JERSEYS 
 
 "They, in plain English, are turning me into a kidnapper." — The King to 
 Lord North, Nov. 14, 1775. 
 
 "We have undertaken a war against farmers and farm-houses, scattered 
 through a wild waste of continent." — A. B. (Quoted by Almon.) Written 
 before the American account of Trenton arrived. 
 
 " What a. dreadful thing it is for such a wicked little imp as man to have 
 absolute power." — Waif oh to Conway, June, 1776. 
 
 When, early in the spring, General Howe had asked for 15,000 
 more men " to finish the war in a year," Germaine thought this 
 too many — "persons well-informed on the spot" had told him so. 
 He promised 4000 more Germans, and told Howe this would make 
 him 35,000 strong, so his army "would still be equal to his wishes.'' 
 Howe was very angry — especially as Germaine sent these reinforce- 
 ments by way of Canada. He wrote that the army would be too 
 weak for rapid success, that the campaign could not begin as early 
 as his lordship expected, and that the Northern army must expect 
 little help from him. All the private letters agree in saying that no 
 one knew where Howe's army was going — for once a secret was 
 kept. At the end of May, Washington's spies informed him that a 
 fleet of one hundred sail had left New York and stood out to sea — 
 also that eighteen fresh transports had arrived with troops in a 
 foreign uniform. They were the Anspachers. Howe had been wait- 
 ing for them, and for remounts, and tents, and for the grass to grow. 
 A reinforcement of British troops came with the Anspachers. 
 The German levies were falling off, both in quality and quantity — 
 the Duke of Brunswick's last consignment was so bad that Faucit 
 would only take 222 of them. He wrote, "I hardly remember to 
 have ever seen such a parcel of miserable, ill-looking fellows 
 collected together." The terrible Landgrave found 1449 men to 
 replace those taken at Trenton, and 300 who had died at New 
 Brunswick at the end of winter, of "a putrid epidemic." The 
 Prince of Waldeck got together a scratch collection, picked up in 
 
 his own domain or kidnapped from his neighbours — 20 Waldeckers, 
 
 494 
 
THE EVACUATION OF THE JERSEYS 495 
 
 23 Suabians, 91 from Cassel, and so on; and kept them locked 
 up in the Schloss of Hamelin lest they should desert. Germany 
 was getting tired of the grenadier-market, and several Princes 
 were refusing passage, and even claiming the recruits as their own. 
 The Anspachers had so little stomach to the fight that they could 
 not be trusted to carry their own weapons — they had to be driven 
 by armed jagers ; and at Ochsenfurt-am-Main, where they were to 
 embark, they tried to bolt, and several were shot down in an 
 orchard by the jagers. Some of the details of the infamous affair 
 would be incredible if they did not rest on the testimony of the 
 contrivers of the business. The Catholic Princes in particular 
 discouraged the service ; and the two most powerful Sovereigns of 
 Germany, Frederick the Great and Maria Theresa, were resolving 
 to put a stop to it. There could be no stronger proof that Great 
 Britain was exhausting her own resources than this desperate 
 attempt to buy up fighting-men from anywhere and everywhere. 
 
 But the King had allies more fatal than these. He was now 
 sending detailed orders for the enlistment of Indians in Canada 
 — by their help operations were to be "extended." The only 
 difficulty was that the Indians wanted their own leaders. They 
 preferred fighting without any white men looking on, and raising 
 objections to their methods of practising the art of war. Germaine, 
 by the King's command, was urging greater severity ; the King 
 wanted Boston and the other ports of New England to be 
 destroyed by the fleet. But "Black Dick" did not care for this 
 sort of fighting.^ 
 
 Towards the end of May "a great stir among the shipping" 
 was reported to Washington. It was evident that some important 
 movement was preparing — but what? No one knew where the 
 British were going. It looked like an expedition by water. 
 Washington, who had been planning "a stroke" for Putnam — 
 the surprise of Fort Independence — was obliged to give up all 
 idea of it, and concentrate his whole attention on the Jerseys. 
 Was Howe going up the Hudson to co-operate with Carleton and 
 Burgoyne ? This seemed to Washington so obviously the thing to 
 do, that he could not bring himself to believe Howe meant 
 anything else. Or would he at last try for Philadelphia? For 
 
 ' When Lord Howe was plagued by Englishmen settled in the Southern 
 Colonies who had been stripped, and applied for letters of marque to cruise 
 against the rebels, he sternly replied, " Will you never have done with oppressing 
 these poor people ? Will you never give them an opportunity of seeing their 
 error?" He gave great offence by this. Eventually letters of marque were 
 granted, 
 
496 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 this, too, Washington must be prepared. So far as he could, he 
 strengthened all his posts, and ordered all his General officers to be 
 on the alert. Already he had sent Greene, Knox, and Wayne to 
 examine the fortifications of the posts in the Highlands. These 
 generals were all for a boom, or chain — to go across the Hudson 
 from Fort Montgomery to Antony's Nose, and be protected by 
 two ships and two row-galleys. ^^jPutnam also had a great fancy 
 for booms and obstructions. Washington did not much believe 
 in them — he was rather for looking to the passes. In particular, 
 to one pass which he had noticed last year — " a wild and rugged 
 pass on the west side of Hudson, round Bull Hill, a rocky, forest- 
 clad mountain at the entrance of Peekskill Bay." He thought it 
 most important to see that the enemy could not take possession of 
 this pass, before the garrison of Fort Montgomery could assemble 
 to oppose them. That Fort was so important — a Major-General's 
 post — that Washington had offered it to Arnold ; but Arnold 
 declined — he must be in Philadelphia to settle his accounts, for 
 his enemies had put about reports touching his integrity. So 
 Washington gave him a letter to the President of Congress, 
 bearing witness to his military character, and countenancing his 
 complaints.i He appointed Brigadier-Generals George Clinton 
 and McDougall to the command of the Forts, and towards the 
 end of May removed his own camp to Middlebrook, ten miles 
 from Brunswick,^ to a strong position among the hills behind the 
 village. It commanded a wide view of the country — the road to 
 Philadelphia, and the course of the Raritan. Howe could not 
 move without his knowing it. Washington's whole force was now 
 about 7500 men, from all States south of Hudson, formed into 
 48 regiments and 10 brigades. 
 
 It was believed in New York that Howe was going to bring off 
 Cornwallis, " who begins to be closely pressed by Mr. Washington 
 on all sides." The writer of a private letter says that Howe was 
 greatly chagrined at being obliged to leave Jersey; "it was the 
 darling wish of his heart to march through Jersey to Philadelphia " 
 — no doubt to wipe out the memory of his disappointment in 
 1776. The writer adds, "No one can tell where General Howe 
 intends to go." He is not sanguine, though he does not think 
 Washington can do anything. Howe "may ravage, and desolate 
 the country for a little while, with impunity ; plunder farms, burn 
 villages, etc., but all this is no permanent advantage. The country 
 
 1 The Board of War found the charges against Arnold false and slanderous ; 
 but his seniority was not restored. 
 
 2 Cornwallis had his headquarters at Brunswick. 
 
THE EVACUATION OF THE JERSEYS 497 
 
 force will be collected, and he will be again driven to his ships." 
 All which happened exactly as the writer describes. He concludes, 
 " There is not a sensible man in the army in America, who does 
 not reprobate all the notions and nonsense of conquering that 
 immense country.^'' 1 
 
 The army was furious when it found that Jersey was to be 
 evacuated. That "arch-plunderer," de Heister, asked for leave, 
 and was going home — in such a huff that he asked to be excused 
 coming to London. With him went several other Hessian officers. 
 Another private letter says that Howe left New York "full of 
 anxiety, grief, and vexation." The Scots in his army had formed 
 a faction; they professed to be offended because Howe did not 
 fight Mr. Washington ; but what they meant was that they were 
 disappointed of the plunder they had reckoned on in marching 
 through Jersey. " Their example has infected the English 
 soldiery," says the writer; "the army in general is become a 
 banditti of robbers." " Howe is daily abused in the several prints 
 under ministerial direction by the different Court writers, who are 
 kept in constant pay for this and other dirty purposes." Every- 
 body remembers how Gage used to be abused by the papers here 
 when he was in Boston. " The Scotch in America and the Scotch 
 in England perfectly understand each other." This writer says 
 Howe wanted to wait for the return of General Robertson ^ — who 
 took to England his despatch of February 1 2. " But the Scotch 
 were clamorous. He was afraid to disoblige them." 
 
 A later letter throws more light on the "Scotchmen." "For 
 some time past," says a writer, who dates "New York, Aug. 8," 
 " the demand for goods of all sorts, and the high prices given for 
 them, has made the fortunes of those who brought out cargoes with 
 them. This lucrative trafific has been confined to a few favourites, 
 chiefly Scotchmen. It was thought the British prohibitory Act 
 would have prevented the arrival, in America, of all British goods ; 
 but so far from it, that Act has thrown the whole trade into the 
 hands of a few, who make a monopoly of it. But the departure 
 of the fleet and army, which has carried off 24,000 people, soldiers, 
 sailors, and attendants, together with a proclamation issued out, 
 prohibiting all intercourse with the Jerseys, has made trade very 
 dull of late." By this time beef was " is. gd. sterling" a pound, 
 and other articles in proportion. 
 
 ^ Remembrancer, vol. v. pp. 363-4. 
 
 ' "By whom he expected orders, or at least very interesting advices." This 
 statement appears to have reached England on September g, 1777. — 
 Remembrancer, v. 364 and 366. 
 
498 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Howe had made up his mind to give up the Jerseys, and go 
 to Philadelphia by the long sea-route, but he did not mean to 
 leave Washington behind. He must draw him into a general 
 action, and crush him. By June 6 he was moving most of his 
 troops into Jersey. " We shall have warm work of it," writes some- 
 one from Amboy. On the 12th, he was at Brunswick. The next 
 night he went out in force — as though pushing for the Delaware — 
 but halted near Somerset Court House. Washington reconnoitred 
 — he feared this was to lure him out of his camp, but he meant 
 to hang heavily on Howe's rear. Meanwhile he sent word to 
 Arnold, now commanding in Philadelphia, to be ready to oppose 
 an enemy's force to westward. 
 
 Four days the armies looked at each other, each waiting to be 
 attacked. Washington had been reinforced by the New Jersey 
 Militia, but Howe was still two to one. He made several feints, 
 as if to pass the camp and go on to the Delaware, but Washington 
 was not deceived — he was sure Howe would not go there until he 
 had struck a blow at the Provincial Army, and he remained on his 
 heights. On the igth Howe suddenly returned to Brunswick, 
 burning several "good houses " on his way. Next day Washington 
 heard from Schuyler that he had caught a British spy, and learned 
 that Burgoyne was arrived at Quebec to lead an invasion from 
 Canada. A force of British, Canadians, and Indians was to march 
 to the Mohawk and take up a post between Fort Edward and Fort 
 Stanwix. If this was true, Ticonderoga would soon be attacked, 
 and Schuyler asked for reinforcements. Washington sent word to 
 Putnam at Peekskill to hold four New England regiments ready. 
 
 On the 2 2nd Howe marched out again, but this time he went 
 towards Amboy — burning as he went, and Greene and Morgan 
 harassing his rear. When Washington found he had really sent 
 his heavy baggage and some of his troops over the bridge of boats 
 to Staten Island, he came down to Quibbletown — six or seven miles 
 on the road to Amboy — to be nearer his advanced parties. 
 Stirling, with his division, was at Matouchin Church, nearer the 
 British lines. Howe now thought he had gained his object— a 
 general action at great odds. He formed in two columns— 
 Cornwallis leading one, and he himself the other, and marched 
 back by two different routes towards Quibbletown. But in Jersey 
 Washington always had timely information of any movement of 
 the British — in itself a proof of the disposition of the province. 
 When Howe came up, Washington was already again in his 
 fortified camp on the heights above Middlebrook, and had secured 
 the passes. There was a smart skirmish between Cornwallis and 
 
THE EVACUATION OF THE JERSEYS 499 
 
 Stirling, near Quibbletown — it is noteworthy that Howe's despatch 
 says Stirling's artillery was "well-disposed," and "the enemy 
 inclined to resist " ; but the Provincials lost three field-pieces, and 
 the affair is represented as a victory. But Howe had learned by 
 experience what it was to advance through a hostile country with 
 Washington hanging on his rear. He returned to Amboy, broke 
 up his camp, and crossed the floating bridge to Staten Island, and 
 so to the old camping-ground in New York Bay. The ships 
 moved down round the Island. The British had evacuated the 
 Jerseys. 
 
 They seemed determined to be remembered. A letter written 
 by one of Washington's general officers, and printed at the time, 
 says, "Their cruelty to the inhabitants is beyond the powers of 
 human utterance to express; not content with plundering, they 
 ruined and defaced every public edifice, particularly those which 
 were erected and dedicated to Almighty God." This letter says 
 the British ran from Brunswick, at one in the morning, " leaving their 
 blankets, camp-kettles, waggons, etc.," and " we took possession of 
 the town in less than 15 minutes." ^ 
 
 And now preparations were pushed on with all speed for the 
 great expedition. By the 5th of July Howe had begun to embark 
 his men — the army furious at the abandonment of Jersey, and 
 everyone who knew where they were going dead against the plan. 
 On the loth. General Prescot (the same who put Ethan Allen in 
 irons at Quebec) was surprised in his bed, at his headquarters in 
 Rhode Island, by a small party of Rhode Islanders — much as Lee 
 had been captured six months before. Having now caught an 
 undoubted general, Washington immediately offered to exchange 
 him for Lee, whom the British still persisted in regarding as a sham 
 one. A little before Prescot had set a price on Arnold's head, as 
 though he had been a highwayman, and Arnold had retaliated by 
 setting a lower price on Prescot's head. Now Prescot was captured 
 ignominiously, and it became more inconvenient still to retain 
 Lee. 
 
 Howe did not entirely ignore Burgoyne — he had written to both 
 Germaine and Carleton that the army which was to advance from 
 Canada "would meet with very little assistance from him." He 
 had proposed to leave Sir Henry Clinton only 3000 men, but 
 Clinton had said that if the Provincials knew what they ought to 
 do, they would attack New York as soon as Howe was gone ; so 
 Howe sent him back 6000 more — for they were already embarked. 
 Howe sailed on the 24th July, for no one knew where — not even 
 ^ Given by Almoii. 
 
500 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 all his own officers. Just before he started he received a despatch 
 from Burgoyne to say he had taken Ticonderoga, and was coming 
 down to Albany. Howe replied that he had ordered Sir Henry 
 Clinton to make a diversion ; and set sail. 
 
 Howe had spared no pains to keep up Washington's fears to 
 the last — as late as July 22 he sent a floating battery and some 
 transports up the North River, " but they came down again time 
 enough to sail at the tail of the fleet." They had attained their 
 object, for Washington detached a large body of his own army over 
 the North River. 
 
 The last British sail had hardly disappeared round Staten 
 Island, on the 24th of July, when Washington heard from General 
 St. Clair — now in command at Ticonderoga — that a British fleet 
 was on Lake Champlain, and Burgoyne, with the whole Canadian 
 army, was advancing up the lake to Ticonderoga. 
 
 Washington was now in a terrible dilemma. He knew but too 
 well the importance of Ticonderoga, and had sent Kosciusko to 
 superintend the improvement of the fortifications. St. Clair — a 
 Scotsman who had seen service in the Old French War — was 
 confident. There was a general belief that with anything like a 
 garrison Ticonderoga was impregnable — and St. Clair had 3000 
 men. This movement of Howe's might be a feint to engage 
 Washington's attention, while the main army got round by sea. 
 Or if Burgoyne really meant to break through by Ticonderoga, 
 Howe must be co-operating with him; then all the puzzling 
 movements in Jersey had only been to give time for Burgoyne to 
 arrive, and by moving nearer Philadelphia Washington would leave 
 Howe free to go up the Hudson, and seize the passes of the 
 Highlands — so opening the way for Burgoyne. On the other 
 hand, if Washington went to Peekskill to guard the passes, he 
 opened Howe's way to Philadelphia. And Washington's own 
 conviction now was that Philadelphia was the point aimed at. 
 Deserters from Howe brought word that the transports were 
 taking in three weeks' provisions, and were being fitted up with 
 stalls over their main-decks for the reception of horses. This 
 looked as if a longer voyage were intended than up the North 
 River. 
 
 Washington wrote all this to Congress, and did his best to 
 be prepared for either contingency— ordering two more brigades 
 to Peekskill, calling out the militia, and sending word to Schuyler 
 to remove all cattle and vehicles from the districts through which 
 Burgoyne might pass. He also sent warnings to the Eastern 
 States, and even to South Carolina, that Howe was at sea with 
 
THE EVACUATION OF THE JERSEYS 501 
 
 his army. He himself removed to Morristown, to be half-way 
 between the two points he must guard. Then he gave the Jersey 
 Militia leave of absence to get in their harvest. 
 
 Hardly was the British fleet well out of sight the second 
 time, when he received fresh news from Canada — St. Clair had 
 evacuated Ticonderoga, and disappeared into the woods with his 
 whole army ! 
 
 Many a Commander would have despaired. But Washington 
 was of the old Roman temper, which thought despair a sin 
 against one's country. He did not pretend that the calamity 
 was not great — incomprehensible — but he refused to condemn 
 St. Clair till he knew more. Meanwhile he said, " We should 
 never despair. Our situation before has been unpromising, and 
 has changed for the better, as I trust it will again. If new 
 difficulties arise, we must only put forth new exertions." 
 
 Of course Schuyler was blamed — it was even said he had 
 ordered the evacuation. The disasters of the invasion were raked 
 up, and everything was laid to Schuyler's charge. It was almost 
 hinted that he was a traitor. Schuyler demanded an enquiry. 
 Then it was said that, whether he was to blame or not, he was 
 unpopular in the Eastern States — and this reason influenced 
 many who were not otherwise his enemies. After long debates, 
 Congress sent for both Schuyler and St. Clair to go to Head- 
 quarters to account for the disasters in the North, and Washington 
 was requested to appoint a general to the Northern army. The 
 Adamses entreated him to appoint Gates, as likely to restore 
 order and discipline; but Washington excused himself — the 
 Northern command was separate ; Congress ought to make the 
 appointment. Congress thereupon appointed Gates. 
 
 And now Washington had his own case to think of. He 
 was convinced Howe meant Philadelphia, but all his doubts 
 vanished when a young man brought him an intercepted letter 
 from Howe to Burgoyne, saying he was going to Boston. 
 Washington at once marched to the Delaware, and on July 30 
 was only thirty miles from Philadelphia. He was still puzzled. 
 Howe's abandonment of Burgoyne appeared to him so un- 
 accountable, "that I cannot help casting my eyes continually 
 behind me." Next day, however, it was certain. He heard 
 that the British fleet of 228 sail had been seen off the Capes 
 of Delaware, and instantly sent word to Schuyler that he would 
 have only Burgoyne to deal with. He himself moved to 
 Germantown, six miles from Philadelphia — and next day again 
 he heard the British Fleet had sailed out of the Delaware, and 
 
S03 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 seemed to be going east. Now once more he feared it must be 
 the Hudson. 
 
 Washington waited for days at Germantown, in the utmost 
 anxiety. The heat was intense, his army was harassed with march- 
 ings and countermarchings. Just as he thought that Howe must 
 really be gone east, and had begun his march to recross the 
 Delaware, an express overtook him, on August loth, with the news 
 that three days before the British Fleet was seen sixteen leagues 
 south of the Capes of Delaware. Always dreading a feint, 
 Washington sent to Putnam, bidding him send spies to ascertain 
 whether Clinton really was in New York, and what troops he had. 
 He also sent Morgan and 500 riflemen to the Northern army 
 — to deal with the Indians in their own way. Thus he was 
 trying to keep back Burgoyne with one hand and Howe with 
 the other. 
 
 He was again so long without hearing more of Howe that he 
 thought the British must be gone to Charlestown. He had just 
 determined to try "a stroke" on New York (having first asked 
 for the approval of Congress), when intelligence came that the 
 British Fleet had entered the Chesapeak, and anchored at Swan 
 Point, at least two hundred miles within the Capes of Virginia. 
 It was a strange route to go to Philadelphia, but Howe had heard 
 that the navigation of the Delaware had been obstructed, so had 
 come up the Chesapeak, that great arm of the Atlantic which runs 
 through the heart of Maryland. 
 
 Now, at last, Philadelphia must be defended. All the divisions 
 of the army were summoned, the militia of Pennsylvania, Delaware, 
 and North Virginia were called out. As there had been much 
 disaffection — or loyalty — in Philadelphia, and the popular cause 
 had been represented as hopeless, and Washington's army as a 
 mere handful, he marched them all through the city — "down 
 Front Street and up Chestnut Street." Great pains were taken 
 to make this an imposing display. The army marched to military 
 music, and, "to give them something of a uniform appearance," 
 they had sprigs of green in their hats. Lafayette describes them 
 as, "eleven thousand men but tolerably armed, and still worse 
 clad ... in this party-coloured and halfnaked state, the best 
 dresses were hunting shirts of brown linen. . . . They were 
 arranged without regard to size, except that the smallest men were 
 the front rank ; with all this, there were good-looking soldiers 
 conducted by zealous officers." John Adams criticised them more 
 severely — he thought they did not step quite in time, or hold their 
 heads quite erect, nor turn out their toes quite as much as they 
 
THE EVACUATION OF THE JERSEYS 503 
 
 ought. This brisk Httle lawyer had the soul of a martinet ; he had 
 a large mind, but a narrow heart, full of little jealousies. He 
 wavered between involuntary tributes to the greatness of Wash- 
 ington's character, and something which bordered on detraction. 
 His idea of war was a series of brilliant actions. " Washington 
 is very prudent," he wrote peevishly. " I should put more to 
 risk, were I in his shoes ; I am sick of Fabian systems. My toast 
 is, a short and violent war." But as Chairman of the War Board, 
 he did not see to it that Washington had the means for shortness 
 and violence. He was much too fond of raising regiments on 
 paper — he thought that the instant Congress had voted eighty-eight 
 battalions, they would spring full-armed out of the furrows. 
 
 In spite of the rags, and the sprigs of green by way of uniform, 
 the Philadelphians were surprised to see how like a real army it 
 looked — the pioneers with their axes, the trains of artillery, the 
 trumpets, and the fifes and drums. The army marched on to 
 Wilmington, where the Brandywine falls into Christiana Creek. 
 And now came a piece of good news — Stark had totally routed 
 the Hessians and Indians at Bennington, and — though of course 
 this was not yet known — Burgoyne's fortune had turned. 
 
CHAPTER LX 
 THE BATTLE OF THE BRANDYWINE 
 
 "Because you lived in a little country, where an army might run over the 
 whole in a few days, and where a single company of soldiers might put a 
 multitude to the rout, you expected to find it the same here. . . . Were you 
 to garrison the places you might march over . . . your army would be like 
 a stream of water running to nothing. . . . Suppose our armies . . . were 
 immediately to disperse, and engage to reassemble on a certain future day ; 
 it is clear that you would then have no army to contend with, yet you would 
 be as much at a loss in that case as you are now : you would be afraid to 
 send your troops in parties . . . and while you kept them together, you 
 could not call it a conquest . . . when we returned at the appointed time, 
 you would have the same work to do that you had at first." — Paine (The 
 American Crisis, iii. to Lord Howe). 
 
 "Their principal dependence is not upon their arms, I believe, so much 
 as upon the failure of our revenue. They think they have taken such measures, 
 by circulating counterfeit bills, to depreciate the currency, that it cannot hold 
 its credit longer than this campaign. . . . We must disappoint them by 
 renouncing all luxuries. . . . General Washington sets a fine example. He 
 has banished wine from his table, and entertains his friends with rum and 
 water. . . . The example must be followed by banishing sugar and all 
 imported articles from our families. "—_/s/4» Adams to his Wife, Philadelphia, 
 Sept. I, 1777. 
 
 Calms and contrary winds kept Sir William Howe long at 
 sea. It was the 30th before he arrived off the Capes of Delaware 
 — to find that both horses and men were unfit for active service. 
 If he could have marched at once, he might have taken Phila- 
 delphia then and there — Congress, in a panic, was preparing to 
 fly a second time. But he was obliged to rest his army, and in 
 the meanwhile he received information which made him decide 
 on going farther round still — by Chesapeak Bay. He heard that 
 the navigation of the Delaware was blocked. He put to sea again, 
 and the winds being still contrary, it was the 14th of August before 
 the fleet was off the Capes of Virginia, the i6th before they entered 
 the Bay, and the 22 nd before Howe landed at Elk Ferry, on 
 the Pennsylvania side. Men and horses had now been cooped 
 
 604 
 
THE BATTLE OF THE BRANDYWINE 505 
 
 up miserably in unhealthy holds for nearly two months/ on salt 
 meat and pease, and not always water enough. He was again 
 obliged to rest his army, and to recruit the horses which were still 
 alive. He lost another fortnight. He was now ten miles farther 
 from Philadelphia than he had been at Brunswick. 
 
 He issued a Proclamation,^ promising protection to all who 
 stayed quietly at home, and pardon to all in arms who promptly 
 returned to obedience. He also promised the " strictest regularity 
 and discipline " on the part of his army — none of " his Majesty's 
 well-disposed subjects " need fear its " depredations.'' 
 
 He left General Grant to protect communications with the 
 fleet, and on September 8 marched with his main body, by Newark 
 (Pa.), and encamped that evening on the Lancaster road ; Wash- 
 ington's army being about four miles off, at Hokessen. Early in 
 the night Washington moved, and at ten next morning crossed 
 the Brandywine at Chad's Ford, and took post on the heights of 
 its eastern side. 
 
 The seventy miles which lay between Howe and Philadelphia 
 presented great natural difficulties to an invader. The country 
 was cut by deep streams, and was very thickly wooded. At the 
 Enquiry, CornwaUis said he "never saw a stronger country." But 
 Howe expected an easy victory. Had not his secret informant, 
 the unnamed "provincial officer," assured him that all Pennsylvania 
 would rise for the King the moment a British army appeared to 
 protect the loyal from the vengeance of the disloyal ? And this was 
 so far true, that he was now in the land of passive obedience, and 
 that the Quakers were mostly loyalists. 
 
 But already he had met with resistance. Greene and Stephen 
 had been in time to remove most of the stores at Head of Elk 
 before he landed. There was a severe skirmish on the 3rd, at 
 White Clay Creek, between Howe's vanguard and Maxwell with 
 the light troops, but Maxwell had no artillery and was obliged to 
 fall back. 
 
 Howe's lack of horses made his march slow — Greene and 
 Stephen harassed him with skirmishes, and Henry Lee of Virginia 
 (" Light Horse Harry ") cut off his stragglers. 
 
 All this time Washington almost lived in the saddle. For the 
 
 ^ From Lord Howe's despatches of July 9 and August 28 we learn that 
 the whole force intended for this service was embarked by the gth of July. 
 The embarkment began on the 5th. 
 
 2 Aug. 27. No time was fixed for submission — the day of grace extended 
 to "the day on which it shall be notified that the said indulgence is to be 
 discontinued," 
 
So6 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 first time information failed him. He was always reconnoitring — 
 even running great risk of capture, in his eagerness to discover how 
 many the enemy were. He sorely missed Morgan, and formed a 
 company of light-horse to supply the place of the 500 picked rifles 
 he had sent north. In this company served Count Pulaski, who 
 came over recommended by Franklin as a man who had been 
 engaged in defending the liberty and independence of his own 
 country. Sullivan had come in with 3000 men, but even now 
 Washington only numbered about 14,000, poorly equipped, and 
 still worse disciplined — every man that could be spared had been 
 sent to the Northern army, to check Burgoyne's advance. With 
 these men Washington fought his first battles which could be called 
 general actions. 
 
 The battle which decided the fate of Philadelphia was fought at 
 the passages of the Brandy wine, on the nth of September. The 
 Brandywine Creek commences with two branches — East and 
 West — which unite in one stream, that after twenty-two miles falls 
 into the Delaware about twenty-five miles below Philadelphia. It 
 was impossible to get sure information as to which of the three 
 fords the British army was taking, but Chad's Ford was the most 
 practicable, and was in the direct route to Philadelphia. ^ Wash- 
 ington made it his centre. His right wing (under Sullivan) 
 extended two miles up the Brandywine, as far as the Forks. The 
 Brandywine was now the only obstacle between the two armies. 
 
 Howe advanced in two columns — one, under Knyphausen, 
 consisted of four Hessian battalions under Stem; the ist and 2nd 
 British Brigades, three battalions of the 71st, the Queen's American 
 Rangers, and one squadron of the i6th Dragoons, under Grant. 
 They had with them six 12-pounders, four howitzers, and the light 
 artillery. This column marched to Chad's Ford, and arrived in 
 front of the enemy about ten in the morning — " skirmishing most 
 part of the march." 
 
 On the 5 th Washington had made a stirring appeal to his army 
 to save Philadelphia, and when Knyphausen was seen emerging 
 from the skirt of the wood, he rode up and down the line amidst 
 the acclamations of his army. Maxwell, with the Light Infantry, was 
 already engaged, and a heavy cannonade began. There was much 
 skirmishing — crossing and re-crossing the Brandywine — but 
 Knyphausen made no real attack. At noon an express came from 
 Sullivan to say that Howe, with a large force and a park of artillery, 
 
 ' " Unfortunately the intelligence received of the enemy's advancing up the 
 Brandywine . . . was uncertain and contradictory, notwithstanding all my 
 pains to get the best." — Washington's Despatch of September 11. 
 
THE BATTLE OF THE BRANDYWINE 507 
 
 was pushing up the Lancaster road— intending, no doubt, to cross 
 at the upper fords. Washington resolved to cross at Chad's and 
 attack Knyphausen before the other division could arrive ; but at 
 that moment a man of the neighbourhood — Cheyney by name — 
 came spurring up to tell Washington that he must retreat instantly, 
 or he would be surrounded ! Cheyney had come on the British 
 unawares, and had narrowly escaped capture — they were marching 
 down-stream, and were close at hand ; an officer sent by Washing- 
 ton to make sure, saw them two miles behind Sullivan's right, 
 coming on fast. Howe had tried the same tactics as at Long 
 Island — ^Knyphausen had "amused" the Americans at the ford, 
 while Cornwallis, Grey, Matthew and Agnew, with the mounted 
 and dismounted Hessian and Anspach Chasseurs, two battalions of 
 British Grenadiers and three of Hessians, two squadrons of the 
 Dragoons, and the 3rd and 4th Brigades and artillery, made a detour 
 of about twelve miles to the Forks of the Brandywine, crossed the 
 first at Trimbles', and the second at Jeffery's Ford, about two in the 
 afternoon, and were marching down the Dilworth road to take the 
 Americans at Chad's Ford in the rear. There was not a moment 
 to be lost — Washington sent orders to Sullivan to oppose Cornwallis 
 with the whole right wing. Howe calls it 10,000 men, but the 
 whole Provincial Army was but 14,000. Each brigade was to 
 attack as it arrived. 
 
 Sullivan took "a strong position on the commanding ground 
 above Birmingham Church," with his left near the Brandywine, 
 both flanks covered by very thick woods, and his artillery advan- 
 tageously disposed.! Meanwhile Wayne was to keep Knyphausen 
 at bay at Chad's Ford, and Greene to hold the reserve in readiness. 
 Cornwallis advanced in three columns, the Hessians and An- 
 spachers in the centre. It was now four o'clock. Lafayette was 
 with Sullivan, and has left an account of the action which followed. 
 Sullivan advanced, and began to form his line in front of an open 
 piece of wood. Here an unfortunate delay took place on a point 
 of etiquette — Stirling had accidentally formed to right of Sullivan ; 
 this was taking rank of him, and had to be changed. The change 
 was actually making when Cornwallis advanced with his own troops 
 in perfect order, and opened a brisk fire. The Americans made an 
 obstinate resistance, but Cornwallis' onslaught was "impetuous," 
 and they were taken at a disadvantage owing to the mistake. Both 
 wings broke, and were driven into the woods. The centre stood 
 firm for some time, but at length it too gave way. Lafayette was 
 shot through the leg endeavouring to rally the centre. The British, 
 
 ^ Howe's Despatch. 
 
5o8 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 in pursuing, became entangled in the wood,^ and the Americans 
 rallied on a height to north of Dilworth, — still in a wood, — but after 
 a spirited resistance were again dislodged with heavy loss. Night 
 coming on, and the fatigue of the British, saved them from further 
 pursuit ; but the flight continued to Chester, twelve miles from the 
 field of battle. 
 
 While this was going on, Knyphausen had made a push to cross 
 Chad's Ford. He was vigorously opposed by Wayne, and Greene 
 was about to second him when he was called by Washington to 
 support the right wing. It was said that Greene's men covered five 
 miles in less than fifty minutes, but they arrived too late to prevent 
 the rout of the right wing. They did, however, save the left — 
 Greene opening his ranks from time to time to receive the fugitives, 
 and closing as soon as they had passed. At one point in this part 
 of the action both sides charged again and again with the bayonet. 
 But it was a defeat, though Knyphausen's Hessians were too tired 
 to pursue. The road to Chester was crowded with fugitives, cannon, 
 baggage, all hurrying along, with the artillery thundering, and 
 muskets volleying amidst the dust and uproar. Not till Chester 
 was reached could Lafayette stay the flight. 
 
 Every discharge of cannon had been heard in Philadelphia, 
 twenty-six miles off. Groups of Whigs and Tories stood in the 
 streets and squares, waiting for a messenger. About noon there 
 was a violent thunderstorm, all the more terrifying, because Christ 
 Church steeple had been struck only three months before. It was 
 evening before a horseman galloped into the city — "down Chestnut 
 Street and round Fourth Street," never drawing rein till he came to 
 the Indian Qiieen. He told the excited crowd that there had been 
 fighting all day, and General Washington was driven back, the 
 French Marquess was wounded, and many others — Birmingham 
 Meeting-House was full of them, and the Quakers were attend- 
 ing on them, and the roads were crowded with people taking away 
 their goods. 
 
 Congress sat all night, and in the morning removed to Lan- 
 caster. 
 
 Howe halted at Dilworth, and did nothing for two days — he 
 might have utterly destroyed the discomfited army if he had 
 pursued. Washington made good use of the delay— retreating on 
 Germantown. Strange to say, his army was in good spirits — it 
 had been defeated, but it had made a good fight, and it was not 
 
 ^ "The 1st British grenadiers, the Hessian grenadiers, and guards, having in 
 the pursuit got entangled in very thick woods, were no further engaged that 
 day." — Howe's Despatch, 
 
THE BATTLE OF THE BRANDYWINE 509 
 
 discouraged.! Washington resolved to fight again. On the i6th 
 he advanced along the Lancaster road, hoping to turn the British 
 flank. The two armies were drawn up in order of battle near 
 Goshen Meeting-House (twenty-three miles from Philadelphia), 
 and were just about to engage, when so violent a storm of rain 
 came on, and continued for twenty-four hours, that both sides saw 
 it was impossible to fight. But as usual the Americans suffered 
 most — their cartouche-boxes were not of seasoned leather, and so 
 their cartridges got wet, and Washington was compelled to draw 
 up into the country till he had a fresh supply. Bad weather was 
 very distressing to the Americans, poorly clad, with no blankets, 
 and separated from their tents, the rain spoiling their small 
 ammunition and rusting the locks of their muskets. Nearly 
 one thousand were actually barefooted. But Washington marched 
 them all night to Yellow Springs, and on the i8th to Warwick, 
 hoping to dispute the passage of the Schuylkill. He crossed that 
 river and encamped on the farther bank, after detaching troops to 
 all the fords. And now another misfortune befell him — Wayne, 
 who was about to surprise Howe, was himself surprised by General 
 Grey,2 and though he made a valiant defence he lost 400 
 men. The British had in truth many friends in Pennsylvania, 
 when Howe first came, and information was brought by them. 
 
 In these last days, before the fall of Philadelphia, Thomas 
 Paine tried to rouse the spirit of the city. At one in the morning 
 of the 1 9th news came that Howe was crossing the Schuylkill, and 
 the panic and confusion were very great. It was a beautiful, still 
 moonlight night, and the streets were as full of men, women, and 
 children " as on a market-day." The night before Paine had gone 
 to Colonel Bayard, Speaker of the House of Representatives, and 
 reasoned with him. Washington was thirty miles up the Schuylkill 
 with an army, only waiting for ammunition to supply that spoiled 
 by the rain ; and a reinforcement of 1500 men was marching from 
 the North River to join him. Paine represented that "even the 
 appearance of defence," by throwing up works at the heads of 
 streets, would "make the enemy very suspicious" how they 
 ventured themselves between the city and Washington, and between 
 two rivers. Paine had observed that "military gentlemen" were 
 exceedingly cautious on new ground, and suspicious of towns and 
 villages, and " more afraid of little things they don't know than of 
 
 ^ Washington's losses at the Brandywine, in killed, wounded, and prisoners, 
 were about looo. The British loss was 579, of whom 58 were officers. 
 
 ''"No-Flint Grey," first Earl Grey, and father of the Minister who passed 
 the Reform Bill of 1832. 
 
Sio ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 great things they do." He thought Philadelphia might hold out 
 a day or two, till Washington could come down — the city had 
 better assess itself at 50,000 dollars for defence than let the British 
 come in. Bayard agreed, but there was no one ready to take the 
 lead, and nothing was done. 
 
 On one of these nights of listening and suspense, there was 
 " the most awfully grand display of the Aurora ever seen." At 
 first it was thought that the crimson-stained streamers which flashed 
 over the city were occasioned by the fires of the British ; but soon 
 they found that the spectacle was too vast for human agency, and 
 began to think of the Siege of Jerusalem, and the dreadful signs 
 then seen in the heavens. 
 
 On the 22 nd Howe made a rapid march up the Schuylkill, 
 towards Reading — Washington keeping pace with him on the other 
 bank as far as Pott's Grove. Then Howe turned, and by a rapid 
 countermarch reached the ford below, and crossed. Washington 
 learned this also too late to oppose him, and Howe went on to 
 Germantown, and sent Cornwallis forward to take formal possession 
 of Philadelphia in the King's name. 
 
 Cornwallis marched in about noon of the 26th of September, 
 with a brilliant staff, " splendid legions of British and Hessian 
 grenadiers," long trains of artillery, squadrons of light dragoons, 
 and bands playing " God Save the King ! " — a very different 
 spectacle from the regiments in hunting-frocks, with sprigs of 
 green by way of uniform ! The windows were full of people 
 dressed in their best — they had been advised to be dressed well, 
 and to keep their doors shut. But it was an unspeakable relief 
 that the British marched in so quietly — and in the morning. A 
 T017 lady (then a child) says they showed no signs of exultation. 
 "Well-fed, clean, and well-clad — how unlike our poor fellows, 
 bare-footed and ragged ! " There were loyal addresses and demon 
 strations, and a little boy ran up to shake hands with one of the 
 grenadiers. 
 
 Cornwallis, who came to this lady's mother's to look for quarters, 
 was very polite. Lord Rawdon "and the other aids looked 
 haughty." But the ofificers were usually polite — " they felt uneasy 
 at acting as enemies to people who spoke the same language." 
 Many had buried their plate and money — and some their papers, 
 " which of course mouldered away." There was nothing in the 
 shops, and the paper money had depreciated to nothing. A little 
 before the British came, two pieces of silk had been offered at 
 100 dollars a yard, and tea was 50 or 60 dollars a pound.^ 
 
 ^ Recollections of Deborah Logan. 
 
THE BATTLE OF THE BRANDYWINE 511 
 
 Two years after, when giving evidence at the Enquiry into the 
 Conduct of the War, Howe denied that he was received with 
 gladness in Philadelphia — only 4500 of the male inhabitants from 
 18 to 60 years of age remained there. It was true they gave the 
 British support, and refused to help the rebel General — but that 
 was because they had no opinion of the value of Congress paper 
 money.i "We paid in hard cash" — also, they could buy things 
 of us. As for its being at the risk of their lives that they took our 
 money, that is nonsense — Washington connived at it — he was very 
 glad silver and gold should come in. And " thousands " did not 
 join us — at no time did men in numbers come over, — though 
 there was a prospect of this in the spring of 1778. Of men in 
 our Provincial corps, only a small proportion were American. 
 This confirms some of the private letters, and is in flat contradiction 
 to Galloway. 
 
 ^ There were enormous frauds. A band of villains counterfeited the New 
 Hampshire currency to a great amount. Mrs. Adams had £^ of it — everybody 
 had some. Worse still, one Col. Farrington, taken sick, confessed not only to 
 counterfeiting, but to enlisting near 2000 men, to fall on the people when the 
 troops came to Boston, and make havoc. — Lelter of John Adams, May, 1777. 
 
CHAPTER LXI 
 GERMANTOWN 
 
 " The people of this country are chiefly Germans, who have schools in their 
 own language ... so that multitudes are born, grow up, and die here, without 
 ever learning English. In politics they are a breed of mongrels or neutrals, 
 and benumbed with a general torpor." — -John Adams to his Wife, Yorktown, 
 Oct. 28, 1777. 
 
 " If our cause is just, it will be best supported by justice and righteousness." 
 — Abigail Adams to her Husband, Braintree, May l8, 1777. 
 
 Washington sent to Putnam for still more men, and wrote to 
 Gates to send him back Morgan. Undaunted by defeat, he 
 believed that with a sufficient force he could compel Howe to 
 evacuate Philadelphia — perhaps to capitulate — before winter. 
 
 Lord Howe meanwhile was trying to destroy the three chevaux- 
 de-frise which had been made across the Delaware. He thought 
 it would be easy, but a large American frigate (the Delawai'e) and 
 other vessels got within 500 yards of the new batteries — begun the 
 very day that Cornwallis entered — and brought a heavy cannonade 
 to bear on town and battery; but the tide falling, the Delaware 
 grounded and was taken, and most of the smaller vessels were 
 disabled. Five miles lower down there was a redoubt on the 
 Jersey shore, at Billingsport. On the ist of October Captain 
 Hammond, in the Roebuck man-of-war, took Billingsport, and 
 removed part of the chevaux-de-frise there. 
 
 By this time Washington had been reinforced by the 1500 
 men from Peekskill and 1000 from Virginia; and knowing that 
 Howe at Germantown was weakened by detaching Cornwallis and 
 the battalions sent to Billingsport, he resolved to attack him. 
 
 Howe's main body lay encamped about a mile from the head 
 of the main street of Germantown — "one continued street for 
 two miles."' Market Square was the centre of his line. His 
 
 •" Germantown was first settled in 1683, by colonists from the Lower Rhine 
 (near the borders of Holland). It was really a German town — the people spoke 
 German. There were many manufactures, and many linen weavers. They 
 
 also made stockings from the famous Germantown wool; and since 1760 had 
 
 612 
 
GERMANTOWN 513 
 
 headquarters were at Stenton. His right — the Grenadier Guards 
 and six battalions of the hne under Grant and Matthews — extended 
 along Mill Street to Luken's Mill; his left — the 3rd and 4th 
 Brigades under Grey and Agnew, and the Hessians under 
 Knyphausen — stretched along School House Lane to Ridge 
 Avenue,! (-^g Hessians being at the extreme left. Knyphausen 
 commanded the whole. There were two battalions of the Guards 
 to rear of the town, and two more were posted in advance of the 
 centre on the Main Street. Colonel Musgrave with the 40th was 
 stationed near Chew's House.^ 
 
 On the night of the 2nd of October, the whole American 
 army moved along the Shippack road to a point eighteen miles 
 from Germantown, and made as though they intended to form a 
 permanent camp there. That night they marched on at 7 o'clock 
 to Bethlehem Turnpike, and there separated into four columns, 
 each of which was to go by a different route. At 7 next evening 
 they marched again. Smallwood, with the New Jersey and 
 Maryland Militia, went by the York road, to get to the rear of 
 the British right. Greene, with his own and Stephen's divisions, 
 and McDougall's brigade, marched by the Limekiln road to attack 
 the British right. The rest marched by Bethlehem Turnpike 
 down to Chestnut Hill, to near the place where General Armstrong 
 and the Pennsylvanians got into Ridge road. They were guided 
 by a German, and were to take the British left in rear. Sullivan's 
 and Wayne's divisions, and the reserve under Lord Stirling, with 
 the Commander-in-Chief in person and all his staff, marched by 
 the mainroad down Chestnut Hill to the village of Germantown, 
 to attack Howe's left. It was a very extended plan of attack, and 
 it was of the utmost importance that all should carry out their 
 orders precisely. 
 
 The days preceding had been fair, but the mornings foggy. 
 When Sullivan reached the Mermaid Tavern to north of Mount 
 Airy (where the 52nd Light Infantry, with a picket, were stationed 
 on the property of Chief Justice Allen), the sun was just rising 
 above the hills. But " it was soon buried in a bank of cloud " — a 
 dense fog settled down, till men could not see 100 yards before 
 them — some said not 100 feet. The Americans had been ordered 
 to put white papers in their hats, that they might know each other 
 many being in red, like the British ; but this was not effective, 
 
 turned out as many as 60,000 dozen pairs of thread stockings a year, "at a 
 dollar a pair." 
 
 ' Howe says ICnyphausen's division ejttended to the Schuylkill. 
 
 2 Historic Gennantown. 
 
514 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 and as the fog thickened they became suspicious of each other. 
 And soon the smoke of battle, and of the burning stubble-fields, 
 was added to the mirky gloom of the mist, till no man could dis- 
 tinguish friend from foe. 
 
 Sullivan formed to the west, and Wayne to the east. Sullivan 
 came first into action, surprising the picket at the Allen House. 
 The sentries were killed — Sullivan carried all before him. Howe, 
 whose headquarters were at Stenton,i is said to have been awakened 
 by the noise. He rode up just in time to see the Light Infantry 
 running away, and cried, " For shame, light infantry ! I never saw 
 you retreat before ! Form ! This is only a scouting party ! " 
 Reinforcements came up, and the infantry rallying made a stand on 
 both sides of the main street of Germantown, "at the Maronite 
 Church." Here Dr. William Shippen's house soon became the 
 centre of fierce skirmish. Here Agnew fell. 
 
 Greene pushed on to east of the road, passing the Chew House 
 — a strong stone building, erected the year the King came to 
 the throne, the country seat of Benjamin Chew, Chief Justice of 
 Pennsylvania before the Revolution. It stood in an open space 
 at the head of the village.^ It was to decide the issue of the 
 coming battle. 
 
 When Washington came up with the reserve, it was discovered 
 that Musgrave and six companies of the 40th had thrown them- 
 selves into the Chew House, closed the lower shutters, and were 
 keeping up a steady fire from the second-floor windows and from 
 the roof. Both Greene and Sullivan had passed without noticing 
 this. A hasty Council of War was held " near the Billmyer House." 
 Washington ordered Maxwell's brigade to attack (some accounts 
 say only to watch) the Chew House, sent Nash's reserve brigade to 
 strengthen Sullivan, and passed on. 
 
 Meanwhile Greene was fighting on the Limekiln road ; but both 
 Stephen and McDougall mistook their way in the fog, and thus 
 time was lost. Greene himself came up three-quarters of an hour 
 late, advancing through marshes, thickets, and " post-and-rail 
 fences." By the time he attacked the British right it was waiting 
 for him. 
 
 By this time the battle was general all along the line, except on 
 the York road, where Smallwood was approaching Branchtown. 
 Armstrong was skirmishing with the Hessians, and cannonading 
 them from the heights above the Wissahickon. Sullivan, reinforced 
 by Nash, was pushing the British back on the centre of the town. 
 
 1 "In Dr. George Logan's house." The doctor was in England. 
 - Historic Germaniown.—Cat^s. F. Jenkins. 
 
GERMANTOWN 5 i s 
 
 It seemed as though the day was lost — orders were actually given 
 for the corps to rendezvous at Chester — when a panic arose in 
 Wayne's division. One of Stephen's brigades, acting without orders 
 — in fact neglecting its orders — had turned aside to Chew's House, 
 and was playing on the walls with its field-pieces. Wayne's men 
 took this for a British cannonade, and at the same critical moment 
 a brigade of Greene's, which had lost its way in the fog, appeared in 
 the rear and was taken for the enemy, while a drum heard beating 
 at Chew's was thought to be the signal for retreat. Someone 
 called out that they were surrounded, and Wayne's men retired in 
 disorder, uncovering Sullivan's left. Sullivan's ammunition was 
 exhausted — he too was compelled to retreat. Washington, fearing 
 a general rout, recalled Smallwood and Greene — who was success- 
 fully engaged. Greene fell back, stubbornly contesting every inch 
 of ground, and giving time for the other divisions to withdraw. 
 
 There had been a fierce fight at the Chew House. The first 
 shot of the Provincial artillery burst open the front door — it had "a 
 portico and two doric pillars," and afforded cover. The Provincials 
 piled up tables and chairs, everything combustible they could find, 
 while others advanced " under the cover of the cherry-trees in the 
 lane," and crouched behind the marble statues, which were broken 
 by the balls. They could not fire the house, though Major White, 
 of Sullivan's staff, laid a bundle of straw against the cellar window. 
 There was fighting on the wide stair, which led up from " the stately 
 hall " ; but Musgrave had posted his men with the greatest skill — 
 it was said he had but one man killed, while 46 officers and men fell 
 of Maxwell's brigade alone. They had better have left Musgrave 
 alone — the panic caused by their cannonade lost the battle.^ 
 
 The retreat was orderly — but everyone was determined to go. 
 Washington wrote to Congress, " In the midst of the most promis- 
 
 1 " So sudden and unexpected was the retreat, that the 9th Virginia Regiment 
 — which had driven everything before it — thought the battle was won, and got so 
 far in advance that it could not rejoin the main army, and was surrounded and 
 obliged to surrender. It had taken more prisoners than its own number."— 
 Historic Germantown, 
 
 " A gentleman of distinction in Philadelphia," who was with the main body on 
 the day of the Brandywine, writes to " his friend" in Boston : " I shall follow 
 the usual custom of the drama, by introducing the greatest hero first. The 
 character of our worthy General needs no eulogium. He is at all times great, 
 but on that day he surpassed himself. . . . Description would fail me were I to 
 attempt to represent how much the men seemed animated by his presence. 
 . . Never were men in better spirits." The letter concludes with eager 
 anticipations of "the next battle," which the writer thinks will be "a very 
 bloody one." This gentleman writes from Hancock's house. — See the Letter in 
 Almon, V. 433. 
 
Si6 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 ing appearances, when everything gave the most flattering hopes of 
 a victory, the troops suddenly began to retreat, and entirely left the 
 field, in spite of every effort that could be made to rally them. 
 . . . We sustained no material loss of men . . . the enemy are 
 nothing the better by the event, and our troops, who are not in the 
 least dispirited by it, have gained what all young corps gain by 
 being in action.'' 
 
 Paine has also given an account of this extraordinary battle. 
 No one ever understood why Germantown was lost — Washington 
 himself said he did not. In the retreat, " nobody hurried them- 
 selves." Everyone marched at his own pace. The troops were 
 young and raw, " unused to breaking and rallying " — they had not 
 learned to fight, and Washington dared not risk them. The fog, 
 and the difficulty of distinguishing each other from the enemy, 
 were no doubt the first reasons, and to these were added a drunken 
 general. General Stephen, who had served with credit in the old 
 French War, had unfortunately fallen into habits of intemperance, 
 and to this was doubtless owing the unfortunate attack on the 
 Chew House.i 
 
 Immediately after Germantown, General Howe sent orders to 
 Sir Henry Clinton to abandon Fort Clinton on the Hudson, and 
 send him 6000 of the 9000 men he had given him ; and on October 
 19 he removed his army to Philadelphia — little imagining that at 
 that very hour Burgoyne was signing a Capitulation at Saratoga, 
 and that the blame of it would be cast upon himself. 
 
 The opening of the Delaware was a more difficult task than 
 had been expected. It was the middle of October before Lord 
 Howe could open a narrow channel through the first obstruction. 
 The rebels (now called " the enemy ") had entrenched about 800 
 men at Red Bank (Fort Mercer), on the Jersey shore, close by 
 Mud Island, where was the upper cheval-de-frise.^ On the 22nd 
 Howe sent Count Donop and three battalions of Hessian Grenadiers 
 to attack this post. The Hessians were repulsed with loss, and 
 Donop was mortally wounded. Next day Lord Howe lost two 
 ships by their running aground near the same fort.^ 
 
 Meanwhile Sir Henry Clinton had made his cattle-raid in 
 
 ^ Stephen was dismissed for misconduct at Germantown. 
 
 2 Lord Howe's Despatch of October 25, " on board his Majesty's ship Eagle,'' 
 shows that the obstruction at Mud Island was very formidable, and also that 
 the Americans made very vigorous attempts with "fire-rafts, gallies, and other 
 armed craft," to frustrate his efforts. 
 
 s In his despatch about the repulse at Mud Island, Sir William asks for 
 "additional cloathing for 5000 Provincials," including "the new levies expected 
 to be raised." 
 
GERMANTOWN 51; 
 
 Jersey, and Brigadier-General Campbell's force on Staten Island 
 had had two of his loyalist battalions surprised, but the rebels were 
 themselves surprised by Colonel Dongan, as they were crossing 
 back to Jersey, and the affair ended in considerable loss to the 
 Americans. 
 
 Washington's raw levies were no match for the British regulars ; 
 but the chief reason for the ill-success of the Americans was the 
 fact that, owing to the number of British sympathisers in Phila- 
 delphia, he was not supplied with timely intelligence of Howe's 
 movements. This is the sure test of public sentiment in the 
 province. In Jersey Washington knew everything, although there 
 sentiment was so much divided that the British also got a great 
 deal of information — as we learn from Howe's despatches. But 
 when Howe arrived in Pennsylvania, there was a great body of 
 waverers, and the Quakers in particular were, passively at least, on 
 the King's side. At Germantown the case was different — there 
 the fog saved Howe from a disaster ; it not only delayed the march 
 of the converging columns (which, however, did not prevent the 
 surprise), but it confused friend with foe, until the Americans 
 were so nervous that they fired on their friends, and mistook their 
 own cannonade for that of the enemy. Panic did the rest. Panic 
 is at all times unreasoning — the ancients recognised how little it 
 can be either accounted for or controlled. 
 
CHAPTER LXIl 
 THE RETAKING OF TICONDEROGA 
 
 "This Array must not retreat." — General Burgoyne's General Orders, Crown 
 Point, June 30, 1777. 
 
 "Were the Indians left to themselves, enormities too horrid to think of 
 would ensue ; guilty and innocent, women and infants, would be a common 
 prey." — General Burgoyne to Lord George Gcrmaine. 
 
 " The chief of the tribes, who went by the name of King Last-night, because 
 his tribe had sold their lands, had seen some English men-of-war in some of the 
 waters of Canada, and was impressed with the power of these great canoes ; 
 but he saw that the English made no progress against us by land. . . . ' The 
 King of England,' he said, 'is like a fish. When he is in the water he can 
 wag his tail ; when he comes on land he lays down on his side. ' " — Letter of 
 Thomas Paine, on the Aleeting ofLndians with the Commission sent from Congress 
 to treat with them at Eaton, Pa., on Jan. 21, 1777- 
 
 The expedition of Burgoyne had been planned in the winter, 
 between the King, Burgoyne, — then again in England, — -and 
 Germaine. Long ago Carleton had pointed out that the best 
 way to secure New York would be to establish military communica- 
 tion between it and the St. Lawrence. The plan was, to sweep 
 Canada of the rebel invaders, and then work down to Albany, and 
 so by the Hudson to New York. This, it was confidently believed, 
 would kill the rebellion by cutting it in two. The plan was to be 
 completed, and its success made certain, by Howe co-operating, 
 and coming up the Hudson to meet Burgoyne at Albany. Incred- 
 ible as it must appear, Howe had received no positive instructions, 
 had been allowed to form another, and incompatible plan, and was 
 gone off to take Philadelphia. 
 
 As the original author of the plan, Carleton had expected the 
 command. To his astonishment and disgust it was given to 
 Burgoyne. Instead of meeting with any recognition of his 
 tremendous exertions in saving Canada in 1775-6, Carleton had 
 been abused for not taking Ticonderoga last October, and Germaine 
 was trying to get him superseded. He had one of his many 
 grudges against Carleton, who had declined to give a staff 
 appointment to one of Germaine's incompetent protegh. 
 
THE RETAKING OF TICONDEROGA 519 
 
 Germaine would have recalled him, but the King stood Carleton's 
 friend, and was annoyed at Germaine's persistent persecution of 
 this brave soldier. Probably Germaine had yet another grudge 
 against the man thanks to whom we did not lose Canada — 
 Carleton was humane and generous, and had been very kind to 
 his prisoners. Instead of putting them in irons, he gave them 
 food, shoes, and warm waistcoats, and told them to go home, and 
 not let him catch them again. This was not the way to win 
 Germaine's favour, and he did not rest till he had got rid of 
 Carleton. 
 
 Burgoyne returned from England on the 6th of May — appointed 
 to the chief command in Canada. Carleton was ordered to 
 defend his province with the 3000 men to be left with him as 
 Governor. The slight was not to be misunderstood — Carleton 
 wrote to resign the Governorship, and the King said he did not 
 wonder at it. Meanwhile Carleton abated nothing of his zeal in 
 supplying Burgoyne with all he needed. 
 
 Burgoyne was delayed waiting for some of his troop-ships. 
 He had better have spent the time in getting his boats and 
 transport together; but it was the 7th of June before he made 
 a formal requisition to Carleton for 400 artillery horses, and 500 
 carts to carry the stores and ammunition. 
 
 On the 13th of June, 1777, the Standard of England was hoisted 
 on board the radeau, and Burgoyne began his march to his 
 doom. On the 20th, being then in camp at Bouquet Ferry, he 
 issued a Proclamation. It was all about " the power, the justice, 
 and when properly sought, the mercy of the King." It called " the 
 present unnatural rebellion the foundation for the compleatest 
 system of Tyranny that ever God in his displeasure suffer'd for a 
 time to be executed over a froward and stubborn generation " ; 
 and wound up with dreadful threats of " giving a stretch " to the 
 Indians under his direction — " they amount to thousands '' — to 
 "overtake the harden'd Enemies of Great Britain and America." 
 A few days later he issued a Standing Order on the methods of 
 entrenching and fortification — " so necessary in little Wars.'' 
 
 On the 2 1 St he made his famous speech to the Indians — 
 the speech over which Burke made so merry.^ It began, " Chiefs 
 and Warriors ! " talked about " the great King, our common 
 father," complimented them on not having joined the rebels ; and 
 
 1 "Figure to yourself an English General, surrounded by his suite, receiving 
 from the hands of an Indian chief, besmeared with blood, the scalps of an 
 hundred defenceless women and children." — Letter from New York, July i, I777' 
 (Almon.) 
 
5 2D ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 then came to the point. His "friends" must be good boys. 
 In former wars they had held themselves justified in destroying 
 everything they came across. This must not be now. The King 
 has many faithful subjects in this province — your brothers there- 
 fore. " Your magnanimity of character,'' and your affection for 
 the King, will induce you to obey me. You must kill no one in 
 cold blood. " Aged men, women, children, and prisoners, must 
 be held sacred from the knife or hatchet, even in the time of 
 actual conflict." You shall be compensated for your prisoners, 
 and you must account for scalps. As you have always been used 
 to it, you may sc^lp the dead, whom you have killed in fair fight, 
 but on no pretence may you scalp the wounded, "or even dying" 
 — it would be still worse to kill them on purpose, in order to evade 
 my prohibition to scalp the hving. "Base lurking assassins, 
 incendiaries, ravagers, and plunderers of the country, to whatever 
 army they belong, shall be treated with less reserve ; " but I must 
 be the judge. If the enemy commit acts of barbarity, you may 
 retaliate. Finally, remember that the King will examine and 
 jndge you on " the test only of your steady and uniform adher- 
 ance to orders." 
 
 They all cried " Etow ! Etow ! " and after a consultation, an 
 old Chief of the Iroquois rose and made a short speech. " We 
 have been tried and tempted by the Bostonians," he said ; " but 
 we have loved our father, and our hatchets have been sharpened 
 upon our affection." Then he promised obedience and sat down, 
 and again they all cried " Etow ! " 
 
 But in spite of his grandiloquent language, Burgoyne must 
 have felt uneasy. During the advance of the year before, 
 Lieutenant Hadden heard him say that a thousand savages 
 brought into the field cost more than 20,000 regular troops.^ 
 Perhaps this referred only to the presents which had to be made 
 to the savages — silver bracelets, gold-laced hats and coats, feathers, 
 paint— and arms. They had found out the difference between 
 gold and tinsel, and if they accepted a brooch to wear in their 
 shirts, it must at least be sterling silver. 
 
 By the 30th of June the army was at Three Mile Point, 
 and Burgoyne issued his General Order with the ill-omened 
 expression, "This army must not retreat." Why mention retreat? 
 The words were unfortunate, and the remembrance of them 
 influenced Burgoyne's decision to advance from Fort Edward, 
 instead of retracing his steps to Lake George. Next morning 
 the army embarked, and sailed up the three miles of river 
 
 ' li3.AAsn, Journal in Canada. 
 
THE RETAKING OF TICONDEROGA 521 
 
 which connect Ticonderoga and Crown Point — the Indians, 
 who had lately been getting drunk, going first in their birch 
 canoes. 
 
 Montcalm said once of Ticonderoga that it was " une poste pour 
 un honnete homme de se dishonorer." And so Schuyler and St. 
 Clair proved it. Enormous pains had been spent on the defences of 
 Ticonderoga by the Americans, but unfortunately they had fortified 
 the wrong hill. All their pains had been bestowed on Mount Inde- 
 pendence, on the eastern side of Champlain, instead of on Sugar Hill, 
 a rugged height, the terminus of the ridge between Lake Champlain 
 and Lake George. It was about 66 feet high — to south of the 
 Fort, beyond the narrow channel connecting the two lakes. They 
 thought it out of range, though Trumbull had proved to them that 
 it was not, by firing a shot the year before. Then they said 
 it was inaccessible — but Trumbull and Arnold climbed it. In 
 vain Trumbull insisted that the fort ought to be on Sugar Hill, as 
 it dominated everything — so much attention was being given to 
 the question whether Schuyler or Gates was to command in the 
 North, that the question of Sugar Hill was allowed to slide. This 
 incredible blunder caused the loss of Ticonderoga, and, but for 
 Germaine's still more incredible blunder about the despatch, might 
 have caused the triumph of the British arms in the Northern and 
 Central States. 
 
 No sooner did Phillips see Sugar Hill than he under- 
 stood what he had to do. He advanced with Eraser's corps 
 and took it without opposition. It was re-christened Mount 
 Hope, because it gave such good hope of taking Ticonderoga. 
 Next he set about cutting a road up it for his artillery. 
 The Americans, now convinced that Mount Hope was within 
 range, were playing upon it with their artillery, and wondered 
 that they got no reply — Phillips was cutting his road behind 
 among trees and rocks. In the night of July 4, everything was 
 carried up 1 — the cannon were hauled from tree to tree, and in the 
 morning the garrison were astounded to see red-coats on the 
 Sugar Hill, evidently working at a battery. Then St. Clair also 
 understood. He called a Council of War. It was resolved to 
 evacuate that very night, and retreat to Skenesborough, thirty 
 miles off, on the east side of Lake George. The provisions and 
 military stores, the tents, the wounded, and the women, were 
 embarked on two hundred bateaux, guarded by 600 men, with 
 200 more in five armed galleys. All was done so silently that the 
 
 1 Anburey says that Phillips split fifteen canes in beating the horses, " such 
 was his anxiousness in expediting the artillery." 
 
522 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 flotilla got off undiscovered, though it was a moonlight night.^ 
 St. Clair and the main body crossed to the Vermont side of the 
 lake at three in the morning, and set forward for Hubbardtown ; 
 and no alarm would have been given if, by some never explained 
 mistake as to Colonel Francis' orders, the rear-guard had not set 
 fire to a house near Mount Independence. The house blazed, 
 the sentries on Mount Hope saw it and fired the alarm-gun ; the 
 drums beat to arms; Eraser dashed into the Fort and found it 
 deserted. By daybreak the British flag floated once more on 
 Ticonderoga, and Fraser was in full pursuit. 
 
 Burgoyne, on the Royal George, woke to find the Fort taken, and 
 to see Fraser disappearing on the Vermont shore. He instantly 
 sent Riedesel to support him, put a garrison in Ticonderoga, and 
 by 8 o'clock the troops were embarked and a passage broken 
 through the great boom which the Americans had been six months 
 making. 
 
 The fleet set out to pursue the flotilla. The lake is so narrow 
 above Ticonderoga that it used to be called South River — 
 (" beautiful waters wind among mountains and primeval forests "). 
 The American vanguard did not know the alarm was given, and 
 fondly believed the floating bridge would be a great hindrance to 
 Burgoyne. They are described as making merry, and drinking 
 derisive toasts to the British Commander, forgetful of the good old 
 adage which] bids us not shout till we are out of the wood. They 
 reached Skenesborough about three in the afternoon, and had 
 hardly begun to disembark when they heard artillery from below. 
 It came from the British gun-boats, which had pushed on and were 
 firing on the galleys. After some defence, at least two struck and 
 three blew up. The fugitives brought word that the British ships 
 could not get up, and so the British and Indians were landing and 
 scrambling up the hills, to take the Fort of Skenesborough in rear 
 and cut off all retreat. There was consternation and confusion. 
 Colonel Long, who commanded this division, had everything set 
 on fire — batteaux, storehouses, fort, mill,^ and then there was a 
 general flight to Fort Anne, twelve miles farther on. Some got up 
 Wood Creek in boats, but Long and the main body retreated by 
 
 ' St. Clair had broken down the bridge as he crossed, and.left four men to 
 fire off the cannon of a large battery — but the men got at a cask of Madeira, and 
 were lying by it dead drunk. An Indian, "very curious in examining every- 
 thing," dropped a spark on the priming of a cannon, and nearly raked the gth, 
 who were crossing. — Anburey. 
 
 ^ "The trees all up the side of the hanging rock had caught fire, as well 
 as at the top of a very lofty hill. The element appeared to threaten universal 
 destruction. " — Ibid. 
 
THE RETAKING OF TICONDEROGA 523 
 
 the narrow defile cut through the woods — harassed all night by 
 alarms that the Indians were upon them, and expecting every 
 moment to hear the war-whoop. Both parties reached Fort Anne 
 at daybreak. They were now sixteen miles from Fort Edward. 
 Schuyler reached Fort Edward next day, and hearing of Long's 
 plight, sent him a small reinforcement, urging him to hold out. 
 The same day Long's scouts told him the red-coats were coming. 
 It was Lieutenant-Colonel Hill, whom Burgoyne had despatched in 
 pursuit. There was a sharp skirmish on Wood Creek, the British 
 being besieged on a hill for two hours. Just as their ammuni- 
 tion was failing, Captain Money, Burgoyne's D.Q.M.G., sounded 
 the Indian war-whoop in the wood. He actually had a party of 
 Indians behind him, but they had refused to advance. But the 
 war-whoop had almost the same effect. The British on the hill 
 gave three cheers. Long's own ammunition was nearly exhausted. 
 He set fire to Fort Anne, and continued his flight to Fort Edward. 
 St. Clair, meanwhile, had retreated through the woods all night, 
 till he reached Castleton, nearly half-way to Skenesborough. His 
 rear-guard was halted at Hubbardtown, six miles behind, to wait for 
 stragglers. It was composed of three regiments — those of Colonels 
 Seth Warner, Francis, and Hale — about 1300 in all. They were 
 tired and dispirited. Very early on the morning of 7th — "a sultry 
 July day" — they were ordered to be ready to march, and were 
 taking some hasty refreshment, when, just as the sun rose, there 
 was a cry — " The enemy are upon us ! " The sentries had dis- 
 charged "their muskets and were running in from the thickets. It 
 was Fraser with his advance-guard of 850, who had pressed on in 
 the very early hours of the morning, and now fell on the Americans. 
 As one of them wrote to Starke, "Some behaved and some did 
 not." Hale's regiment of mihtia fled in a body — it was first 
 attacked, and was not formed. This reduced the Provincials to 
 700. The regiments of Francis and Warner made a stand, " every 
 man trying to secure himself behind girdled trees,'' in backwoods 
 fashion. A British account admits that for a time the issue was " at 
 least doubtful," the Provincials having turned Eraser's flank, when 
 Riedesel came up — his men singing a psalm as they came — and 
 charged with the bayonet.^ Francis and 200 were killed, the rest 
 
 ' Riedesel arrived on the field some time before his men, and "poured forth 
 every imprecation " on them for not coming in time to share in the glory. Their 
 incessant firing decided the fate of the day. " In this action I found all manual 
 exercise is but an ornament, and the only object of importance . . . was loading, 
 firing, and charging with bayonets. . . . Here I cannot help observing to you, 
 whether it proceeded from an idea of self-preservation, or natural instinct, but 
 the soldiers greatlv_iTnprove d the mode thev were taucrht in, as to expedition." 
 
5 24 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 broke and fled. So demoralised were some of them, that seventy 
 Americans surrendered to fifteen British/ whose ofiScer, sent out to 
 bring in cattle, made them believe he had a large party concealed 
 close by. 
 
 St. Clair at Castleton heard the firing, and ordered two militia 
 regiments — which were only two miles from Hubbardtown — to go 
 back and assist Francis; but they refused, and at this moment 
 St. Clair heard that Burgoyne had reached Skenesborough. So, 
 fearing to be intercepted at Fort Anne, he struck into the woods on 
 his left, and for five days no one knew what had become of him. 
 Then the shattered remains of the httle army assembled at Fort 
 Edward (July 12), having lost an immense quantity of stores and 
 artillery, and all the forts which had been relied on to delay the 
 British advance. 
 
 The panic spread to Albany — " people were running about as if 
 distracted, sending off their goods and furniture." ^ The British 
 thought the campaign was over, and nothing remained but a some- 
 what toilsome march to Albany. On Sunday, a thanksgiving 
 sermon was preached, " for the success of our arms, after which there 
 was 2. feu dejoie fired by the whole army, with artillery and small 
 arms." 2 The British also were shouting before they were out of the 
 wood. 
 
 When the news reached England, the King rushed into the 
 Queen's apartments, crying, " I have beat them, I have beat all the 
 Americans ! " He offered Burgoyne the Bath,^ but Burgoyne 
 declined it — until he had deserved it by the complete success of 
 his expedition. 
 
 (Anburey, i. 293-5.) Anburey accuses the Americans of treachery. About 
 60 came across a field, " with their arms clubbed, which is always considered 
 to be a surrender," The Grenadiers were accordingly ordered to cease firing. 
 The Americans came within ten yards, and then fired and fled to the woods, 
 having killed and wounded a. great number. Those who escaped the fire 
 pursued, and gave no quarter. 
 
 ^ " A proof of what may be done against Beaten Battalions while their fears 
 are strong upon them." — Hadden. 
 
 '^ Letter of Richard Varick to General Schuyler. 
 
 2 He adds, " the sermon was ... an exceeding good one, for a parish church, 
 but not in the least applicable to the occasion." — Anburey. 
 
 ^ This offer caused the very common error of calling Burgoyne "Sir John 
 Burgoyne. " — Horace Walpole, Last Papers. 
 
THE RETAKING OF TICONDEROGA 525 
 
 NOTE. 
 
 In March, 1777, a Cabinet Council decided that Burgoyne should command the 
 expeditionj^ and Germaine wrote to Carleton. After explaining that his letter 
 of August 22, 1776, was entrusted to Captain le Maitre, one of Burgoyne's aides, 
 but that le Maitre, unable to get up the St. Lawrence to Quebec, had brought the 
 letter back to England, Germaine now transmits it, " though it was prevented by 
 that accident from reaching your hands in due time " ; he continues— 
 
 " You will be informed by the contents thereof, that as soon as you should 
 have driven the rebel forces from the frontiers of Canada . . . you should return 
 to Quebec,'' with such part of your army as you think necessary to defend 
 the province; "that you should detach Lieut. -General Burgoyne, or such 
 officer as you think most proper, with the remainder of the troops, and direct 
 the Officer so detached to proceed with all possible expedition to join General 
 Howe, and to put himself under his command. With a view of quelling the 
 rebellion as soon as possible, it is become highly necessary that the most speedy 
 junctionof the two armies should be effected ; and therefore . . . it is the King's 
 determination to leave about 3000 men under your command, . . . and to 
 employ the remainder of your army on two expeditions, the one under the command 
 of Lieutenant-General Burgoyne, WHO IS TO FORCE HIS WAY TO Albany, and 
 the other under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel St. Leger, who is to make 
 a diversion on the Mohawk River. As this plan cannot be advantageously 
 executed without the assistance of Canadians and Indians, his Majesty strongly 
 recommends it to your care to furnish both expeditions with good and sufficient 
 bodies of these men." 
 
 Then follow minute directions as to the description and number of the troops 
 to be given to General Burgoyne, ending with the words, " together with as many 
 Canadians and Indians as may be thought necessary for this service." Burgoyne 
 is to be furnished "in the fullest and completest manner with artillery, stores, 
 provisions, and every other article necessary for his expedition. . . . You are 
 TO GIVE HIM ORDERS TO PASS LAKE ChAMPLAIN, AND FROM THENCE, BY 
 THE MOST VIGOROUS EXERTION OF THE FORCE UNDER HIS COMMAND, TO 
 PROCEED WITH ALL EXPEDITION TO ALBANY, AND PUT HIMSELF UNDER 
 THE COMMAND OF SiR WiLLiAM HowE." " From the King's knowledge of 
 the great preparations made by you last year, to secure the command of the 
 Lakes," his Majesty is led to believe that everything will be ready for General 
 Burgoyne to pass the Lakes. Then come directions about St. Leger's force — he 
 too is to have "a sufficient number of Canadians and Indians," and all else that 
 is necessary, and " you are to give him orders to proceed forthwith to and down 
 the Mohawk River TO Albany, and put himself under the command 
 OF Sir Wm. Howe. I shall write to Sir William Howe from hence 
 BY the first packet ; but you are nevertheless to give him the earliest intelli- 
 gence of this measure ; and also direct Lieutenant-General Burgoyne and 
 Lieutenant-Colonel St. Leger, to neglect no opportunity of doing the same, that 
 THEY may receive INSTRUCTIONS FROM SiR WiLLIAM HoWE. You will 
 
 at the same time inform them, that, until they shall have received orders from Sir 
 
 ' " Lord George Germaine will to-morrow propose General Clinton for Canada, 
 and Burgoyne to join Howe. I thoroughly approve of this ; he wants [Carleton (?)] 
 to be recalled, but I have thrown cold water on that." — The King to North, 
 February 24, 1777, 50 min. pt. 5 p.m. 
 
5 26 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Wm. Howe, it is his Majesty's pleasure that they act as exigencies may 
 REQUIRE ... for making an impression on the Rebels . . . but that in so 
 doing, they must never lose sight of their intended junction with 
 Sir Wm. Howe, as their principal objects." 
 
 So anxious is the Government for this scheme, that "in case Lieut. - 
 General Burgoyne, or Lieut. -Colonel St. Leger, should happen to die," or be 
 incapacitated through illness, "you are to nominate such Officers as you shall 
 think best qualified " to supply their place. 
 
 This despatch is dated, Whitehall, March 26, 1777. 
 
 Sir William Howe declared unwaveringly that he never received the letter 
 which was to come " by the first packet " ; nor did Germaine ever produce the 
 copy of such despatch, nor any evidence that it was actually sent. 
 
CHAPTER LXIII 
 THE INDIANS 
 
 " Brothers, we again repeat, that we have no quarrel with you, and we do 
 expect that you will not interfere in this family contest, but stand by as 
 indifferent spectators, agreeable to the engagement of the Six Nations made 
 last summer, at their own request." — Speech of General Philip Schuyler to a 
 Deputation from the Mohaivk Indians, at Schenectady, Tuesday evening, 
 Jan. 1 6, 1776. 
 
 " The United States are now one people ; suffer not any evil spirit to lead 
 you into war. Brothers of the Mohawks, you will be no more a people from 
 the time you quit your ancient habitations. Brothers of the Six Nations, the 
 Americans well know your great fame and power as warriors ; the only reason 
 why they did not ask your help against the cruelty of the King was, that 
 they thought it ungenerous to desire you to suffer in a quarrel in which you 
 had no concern." — Speech of General Horatio Gates to the Six Nations, assembled 
 in Council of War, May, 1777. 
 
 "Warriors, you are free — Go forth in the might of your valour and your 
 cause ; strike at the common enemies of Great Britain and America — dis- 
 turbers of public order, peace and happiness — destroyers of commerce, 
 parricides of the state. The circle round you, the Chiefs of his Majesty's 
 European forces, and of the Princes his allies, esteem you as brothers in the 
 war. ... I positively forbid bloodshed, when you are not opposed in arms. 
 Aged men, women, children, and prisoners, must be held sacred from the 
 knife or hatchet, even in the time of actual conflict. ... In conformity and 
 indulgence to your customs, which have affixed an idea of honour to such 
 badges of victory, you shall be allowed to take the scalps of the dead, when 
 killed b)' your fire in fair opposition ; but on no account, or pretence, or 
 subtlety, or prevarication, are they to be taken from the wounded, or even 
 dying. . . . Should the enemy . . . dare to countenance acts of barbarit)' 
 towards those who may fall into their hands, it shall be yours to retaliate." — 
 Speech of Lieutcnant-General Burgoyne to Warriors of the Iroquois, Algonkin, 
 and Ottawa Indians, assembled in Congress at the Camp upon the River 
 Bouquet, June 21, 1777- 
 
 Burgoyne's difficulties now began. 
 
 The long delay at Skenesborough, for which he was soon to 
 be so severely blamed, was caused by the want of transport, and 
 by the excessive difficulties of the advance. Already by July 1 1 
 he had discovered that he had " to clear roads and make bridges," 
 if he would get to Fort Edward. All military movements were 
 
528 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 crippled by the numbers of men employed night and day in 
 dragging bateaux over the carrying-places. On July ii he writes 
 that his men had been without provisions for two days. He had 
 neither tents nor baggage — there was plenty of everything in the 
 ships on the Lake, but neither horses nor carts to convey it to the 
 army. He had counted on the Canadians as carriers, but they 
 did not come. In private letters he says that about one hundred 
 Provincials had joined him. And the Indians already gave him 
 great anxiety.^ In spite of his dreadful speeches and threats, no 
 more humane officer ever wore a British uniform. He abhorred 
 the practice of flogging, and would do anything rather than order 
 a soldier to be flogged — rather would he invent some other 
 ingenious but not cruel punishment. He had his reward. The 
 troops he led to defeat and surrender never turned on their 
 General. They loved him as an unfortunate Commander is 
 seldom loved. His kindness of heart, and his personal 
 gallantry, atoned for all his weaknesses. 
 
 The toil of clearing a road was incredible. Sometimes the 
 men marched up to their knees in water. Schuyler had had trees 
 cut down everywhere, and their branches interlaced. " Every 
 ten or twelve yards,'' says Anburey, "great trees are laid across 
 the road, exclusive of smaller ones. . . . You would think it 
 almost impossible, especially when it is considered what a hasty 
 retreat they made of it." The road from Skenesborough was 
 " a continuation of woods and creeks," and besides these, the 
 "watery grounds and marshes" were so numerous, that the 
 army constructed forty bridges to pass them — one, over a great 
 morass, was nearly two miles long. As for the " savages," their 
 assistance "is little more than a name." They could not be got 
 away from the plunder of Ticonderoga. They had to be indulged 
 in all their caprices, and, "like spoiled children," are more 
 unreasonable the more they are indulged. Burgoyne had said, 
 " were they left to themselves, they would be guilty of enormities 
 too horrid to think of" Anburey was hoping better things from 
 the Ottawas, now coming up under St. Luc and Langlade. They 
 were said to be braver and more tractable, and "to profess war 
 and not pillage." A good many Provincials had come in at 
 Skenesborough, "professing themselves loyalists," says Anburey 
 dubiously. On the march the enemy gave little trouble — a few 
 straggling parties were easily repulsed. 
 
 ^ In commenting on the Conduct of the War in Canada, the King had 
 written "Indians must be employed, and this measure must be avowed 
 directly." — Albemarle's Life of Lord Rockingham. 
 
THE INDIANS 529 
 
 Burgoyne's army was of excellent material, but far too small 
 for the work required of it — and yet a larger army would have 
 required more provisions still. He had been most reluctantly 
 compelled to "drain the life-blood of my force," by leaving 
 behind General Powell and two regiments to garrison Ticonderoga, 
 and to occupy a line of posts fifteen miles long, from Lake 
 George to Pulteney. He tried to get more men from Carleton, 
 but Carleton had only 3000, and his orders to keep them all 
 were peremptory. With real magnanimity, Burgoyne recognises 
 Carleton's inability to help him. He had another and still 
 greater reason for anxiety — he had heard nothing from 
 Howe. 
 
 At the rate of about a mile a day, he advanced to Fort 
 Edward. A part of his army crossed Lake George, and 
 encamped on Mile Island (where they saw and killed a great 
 number of rattlesnakes).^ The Americans had abandoned Fort 
 George. On July 31 this division reached Fort Edward, and 
 saw the Hudson, with loud shouts of joy. Here St. Luc's 
 Indians joined, and caused the army a pleasant surprise by 
 bringing in a wounded Provincial officer, alive. But their joy 
 was of short duration. In a day or two these much belauded 
 savages did a deed which was a greater misfortune to Burgoyne 
 than the loss of a battle. 
 
 Jennie McCrea was the daughter of a loyalist clergyman near 
 Fort Edward. She was betrothed to a young Provincial officer, 
 named Jones, now serving with Burgoyne. It was long believed 
 that Jones sent some Indians to bring her safely into camp, 
 knowing that her brother was about to take her to Albany. But 
 this was not the fact— Miss McCrea and a Mrs. Campbell, also 
 a staunch loyalist, a cousin of General Eraser, were seized by the 
 Indians in their own house, just as they were about to start for 
 Albany. There is no doubt whatever that the Indians intended 
 to bring her in as a prisoner, and obtain the money paid for 
 prisoners. Unfortunately, near Fort Edward, a party of loyal 
 Provincials came out to the rescue. 
 
 The Indians hurried the ladies off in different directions. 
 Mrs. Campbell was brought into camp unhurt, but Miss McCrea 
 was never seen alive again, and presently another party of 
 Indians brought in her scalp. The details were never certainly 
 known — some said that a quarrel arose between the two parties 
 of Indians for the possession of the prisoner, and that the 
 disappointed party shot her in a rage; others said she was shot 
 
 ' Anburey. 
 
S30 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 by accident in the scrimmage. The only consolation was the 
 hope that she was dead before she was scalped.^ 
 
 The dreadful story spread like wildfire. These were the 
 creatures with whose vengeance the British General was always 
 threatening the rebels in his proclamations — creatures who 
 scalped the King's friends and his enemies alike ! Every man, 
 woman, and child who heard the story became the fierce enemy 
 of Burgoyne and his army. 
 
 That unhappy General was furious. By this time he loathed 
 the " savages " from his very soul. He demanded the murderers — 
 they must be given up to justice. But St. Luc promptly inter- 
 vened, and told him the Indians would not stand it. They were 
 already heartily sick of the General's sermons on humanity, and 
 of his restrictions on their hereditary privilege of plundering — they 
 would desert in a body if he laid a finger on one of them, and 
 would massacre everybody, friend and foe, whom they came across as 
 they went. Burgoyne said he would rather lose every Indian in 
 his army than connive at their enormities ; but he dared not drive 
 them to desperation — he was obliged to preserve appearances by 
 saying he left the murderers to be punished by their own tribe. 
 
 "The General," says Anburey, "showed great resentment 
 to the Indians upon this occasion, and laid restraints upon 
 their dispositions to commit other enormities." Burgoyne was 
 the more exasperated, because the Indians guilty of this 
 offence were the very Indians of the remoter tribes, whom he 
 had been taught to look upon as "more warlike," and less 
 barbarous. "I beheve, however," observes Anburey, "he has 
 found equal depravity reigns through the whole of them." The 
 Indians were no less offended, and from this time their tempers 
 changed, and when they found plunder was really to be con- 
 trolled they lost patience altogether. On the 4th of August 
 they announced their intention of going home, and though the 
 General remonstrated with them, they went next day, " by scores, 
 loaded with such plunder as they had collected," The desertion 
 went on till hardly one of them was left. 
 
 The army was now encamped on the heights above the river. 
 A large quantity of stores and provisions had arrived from 
 Ticonderoga, but the General had still to wait for bateaux. 
 
 But for the look of a retreat, he would even now have gone 
 
 1 Poor Lieutenant Jones never recovered the shock. He left the army, 
 and wandered about, carrying with him the scalp of his betrothed— adorned 
 with long and beautiful black hair. He fell into "a melancholy," and died 
 in a year or two. 
 
THE INDIANS 531 
 
 back and taken the route by Lake George, and bitterly was he 
 reproached afterwards for not doing so — but only by the arm-chair 
 critics. His army better understood his dilemma. The crossing 
 of Lake George by the army would have absorbed all his bateaux ; 
 and how were his provisions to be carried? At Fort George 
 communication by water ceased ; thence everything must still have 
 been carried for sixteen miles. And those sixteen miles might well 
 have meant sixteen days.^ With a heavy heart he sent back all 
 superfluous baggage to Ticonderoga (there was a great deal of it, 
 and in a General Order he reminded the army that " in the last 
 war in America " officers did with a knapsack for a month together). 
 When it had gone, '' many had only a little tent or a valise." He 
 wrote to Carleton that he thought the enemy would fall back on 
 Saratoga, " where I mean to attack them if they stand. / have no 
 news of Sir William Howe." 
 
 This is the first mention of Saratoga. Already Schuyler and 
 Arnold were collecting an army there. 
 
 Burgoyne had sent no fewer than ten messengers to Howe, with 
 promises of great rewards if they brought back news ; but not one 
 of them had ever returned. Burgoyne knew absolutely nothing 
 of Howe's position or intentions. Little did he dream that the 
 Commander-in-Chief had gone off to take Philadelphia, and was at 
 that very moment tossing at sea off the Capes of Virginia ! 
 
 He was beginning to be most seriously uneasy about provision- 
 ing his army. Schuyler drove off nearly all the cattle — this 
 retarded him, but he thought it could not " finally injure " him. 
 But he was obliged to request Riedesel not to let his men keep the 
 cattle they seized, but give them up to the Commissary, as do the 
 British troops with all they take, and they complain of having to 
 eat salt meat when they see herds of cattle in the hands of the 
 Germans. There was some friction between British and Germans 
 over this. 
 
 Burgoyne had still two great rivers to pass — the Hudson and 
 the Mohawk — or, if the Mohawk should prove impassable, then to 
 ford the Schenectady — fordable except after heavy rains. Almost 
 the least the soldiers must carry was 60 lbs., what with knapsack, 
 provisions, hatchet, arms, and accoutrements. The Germans went 
 heavier still — in addition, they had a cap " with a very heavy brass 
 front," an enormous sword, a canteen " that cannot hold less than 
 a gallon, their coats very long-skirted. Picture to yourself a man 
 
 1 Fort George was at the head of Lake George. Fort Edward was sixteen 
 miles from it, near the angle formed by the Hudson, which there first becomes 
 navigable. 
 
532 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 in this situation," says Anburey, "and how extremely well 
 calculated he is for a long march." No wonder that the men 
 could hardly be induced to carry their own provisions, and, when 
 they thought they should get fresh at the next encampment, some- 
 times emptied their haversacks "into the mire." Anburey had 
 often heard them exclaim, " Damn the provisions ! we shall get more 
 at the next encampment ; the General won't let his soldiers starve ! " 
 
 More provisions must now be brought forward — but how can 
 this be done without carts ? And there is only one carriage road 
 to Albany, and that goes over "deep and wide gullies," where the 
 bridges are broken, and the river is on one side, and a " perpen- 
 dicular" wooded precipice on the other, from which the enemy 
 can throw things down on us. There can nothing go but what the 
 men can carry on their backs, nor can " the smallest ammunition 
 tumbril " be carried with the army. It is with the greatest difficulty 
 that it can be victualled from day to day. " For one hour that the 
 General can devote in contemplating how to fight his army, he 
 must allot twenty to contrive how to feed it ! " 
 
 There were a few ladies with the army. The names of two of 
 them will be remembered as long as the campaign. The Baroness 
 von Riedesel had braved the horrors (and horrors they were) of a 
 voyage to Canada with her three young daughters — the eldest only 
 five years old, and had esteemed herself only too happy to be 
 permitted to join her husband. When Burgoyne moved down on 
 the Hudson, she feared she would be left behind, but as Lady 
 Harriet Ackland was allowed to go, she also obtained permission. 
 There were two other wives of officers, and there was a considerable 
 number of the women, honest and otherwise, who follow an army. 
 The Baroness' account of the march enables us to understand what 
 it really was like. At first victory seemed certain, but gradually 
 disquieting doubts arose — above all, the Baroness was disturbed 
 to find that everything was known. The officers' wives knew all 
 about every expedition beforehand. She was the more surprised, 
 because she had noticed in the army of Prince Ferdinand, in the 
 Seven Years' War, that "all was kept so secret.'' But here, the 
 Americans knew everything too, "and were always ready where we 
 came." ^ 
 
 ^ " I had the surprise and mortification to find a paper handed about at Montreal 
 publishing the whole design of the campaign almost as accurately as if it had 
 been copied from the Secretary of State's letter. My own caution has been such, 
 that not a man in my family has been let into the secret. Sir Guy Carleton, I 
 am confident, has been equally discreet." — Burgoyne to General Hervey, 
 May 19, 1777. Fonblanque suggests that Germaine, "who never could keep 
 council," had talked. 
 
THE INDIANS 533 
 
 The Baroness travelled in a large caliche, with her three children 
 and her two women, one of whom was always bemoaning her fate 
 in coming to this terrible country, while the other trembled in 
 silence. For weeks, when on the march, Riedesel never slept in a 
 bed or undressed — a laborious, conscientious man, prudent and 
 secret, as became an officer of Prince Ferdinand. 
 
CHAPTER LXIV 
 THE TURN OF THE TIDE 
 
 "At this time I knew nothing of his engagement being over (Baum's). If 
 Colonel Skeene knew it, I cannot conceive what his reasons were for concealing 
 it from me. If I had known it, I should certainly not have engaged the enemy. 
 I had scarce passed the bridge 1 000 yards when I perceived a considerable 
 number of armed people, some in jackets, some in shirts, who were endeavouring 
 to gain a height which was on my left flank. I shewed these people to Colonel 
 Skeene, who assured me they were royalists, and rode up towards them, and 
 called out, but received no other answer than a discharge of fire-arms. . . . 
 The troops did their duty ... all the ammunition was expended . . . the 
 horses were all killed, and if even one had been left alive, it would not have 
 been possible to have moved him. In order not to risque everything, as I could 
 not return the enemy's fire, as soon as it was dark I retired over the bridge, 
 which I broke down, brought off as many of the wounded as I could, and in 
 company with Colonel Skeene, arrived about 12 o'clock at Cambridge. . . . 
 This is the best account I can give of this whole affair. The loss of my cannon 
 gives me the greatest concern . . . could I have saved my cannon, I would with 
 pleasure have sacrificed my life." — Lieutenant-Colonel Breymans Account of 
 Bennington. 
 
 "... scouts came in with the account of the first number swelled to 2000 ; 
 immediately after a third, that General Burgoyne's army was cut to pieces, and 
 that Arnold was advancing by forced marches with 3000 men. ... I begun to 
 suspect cowardice in some and treason in others. ... I learned that 200 
 (Indians) were already decamped ; in about an hour they insisted that I should 
 retreat, or they would be obliged to abandon me. I had no other part to take. 
 . . . On my arrival at the Onondago Falls, I received an answer to my letter 
 from General Burgoyne, which shewed . . . the treachery that had been practised 
 upon me . . . there was not an enemy within 40 miles of Fort Stanwix." — 
 Colonel St. Leger to Sir Guy Carlelon, Oswego, Aug. 27, I'm. 
 
 And now Burgoyne was to experience the fortune of war. To clear 
 the way to the Mohawk, he sent St. Leger to take Fort Stanwix, 
 and having heard that there were great numbers of waggons and 
 oxen, and quantities of stores, at Bennington, twenty-five miles off, 
 on the Connecticut River, he resolved to surprise it. Colonel 
 Baum, of Riedesel's division, was sent with 550 men, mostly 
 Germans, but a few Indians.^ Riedesel seems to have been the 
 
 ' A few Indians seem to have remained with the army ; they are mentioned 
 
 534 
 
THE TURN OF THE TIDE 535 
 
 first to suggest this attempt, but was against it when he found so 
 few were going. Riedesel says that he was never consulted, nor 
 informed of plans — as no doubt he considered the due of the 
 trusted officer of so great a General as Prince Ferdinand. Burgoyne 
 called few or no Councils of War during his march — as he after- 
 wards alleged, because he considered his orders to advance to 
 Albany so peremptory as to admit of no discussion. Riedesel 
 drew up instructions for Baum — all on the side of extreme caution. 
 Bennington was the great depot of corn, flour, and cattle for the 
 American army in the north. It was guarded by militia, who were 
 changed every day. Burgoyne had been assured by " those who 
 knew the country " that there were many loyalists. He sent one 
 British corps — the select light corps of the army, commanded by 
 Captain Fraser, the General's nephew. And that "famous 
 marplot," Colonel Skeene, went to help Baum distinguish between 
 loyalists and rebels. 
 
 Baum started, and on the loth of August yet another regiment 
 was sent back to garrison Ticonderoga. Meanwhile the army 
 had moved on to "Duer's House" ;i and there, on the isth, 
 Burgoyne heard that Baum had been attacked near Bennington 
 by a superior force, and was hard pressed. Breyman was at 
 once sent to support him. But the heavy cap-pieces and huge 
 swords of the Germans kept them back — they were from eight one 
 morning to four the next afternoon marching twenty-four miles, and 
 arrived too late.^ 
 
 Quite by chance it happened that the redoubtable John Starke, 
 with 900 of the Connecticut Militia, were at Bennington that day. 
 Reinforced by Warner, and by the Berkshire Militia, Starke stormed 
 Baum's entrenchment, before Colonel Skeene could make up his 
 mind that they were not an army of Provincials coming over to the 
 King. The battle began at 3 p.m. and lasted two hours. It was 
 
 occasionally, but, after the murder of Miss McCrea, seldom as taking part, in 
 military operations. 
 
 ^ Mr. Duer had married one of Lord Stirling's daughters. 
 
 ^ Had my instructions been followed, or could Mr. Breyman have marched at 
 the rate of two miles an hour any given twelve hours out of the two and thirty, 
 success would probably have ensued — misfortune would certainly have been 
 avoided." — Burgoyne, State of the Expedition. 
 
 "Yet those poor devils did you pitch on for a flying expedition through the 
 woods. . . . The command of this expedition was given to Colonel Baum, a 
 brave man and good officer in his way, but just as nmch qualified for this service 
 as an Indian Chief for the command of an army in Flanders." — Matter of 
 Fact. (A tract published at the time of the Enquiry into the Conduct of the 
 War.) 
 
536 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 a hard fight. Starke's men charged up the hill, and pressed within 
 eight feet of Baum's artillery to shoot down the gunners. Baum fell 
 sword in hand, and every man of his force was killed or taken. 
 " The Indians to a man, and most of the Canadians, ran away, St. 
 Luc and Langlade among the first, and, scarce stopping at the army, 
 fled on to Canada." Just as the action was over, Breyman came 
 up. The militia were in confusion, and Breyman might have 
 avenged Baum, but Warner came up with fresh troops, and a second 
 action began, and continued till night, when Starke was obliged to 
 cease pursuing, lest his men should fire on each other in the dark. 
 Breyman lost all his cannon ; there were over 500 prisoners ; 
 and 900 of the famous swords, and 1000 stand of arms, 
 became the prey of Starke. Burgoyne was awakened at daybreak 
 of the 1 6th by the news that Baum had surrendered — later, word 
 came that Breyman too was hard pressed. The whole army 
 prepared to move to his aid, and was at Batten Kill when a message 
 came that Breyman was returning, but Burgoyne had already 
 forded the stream with the 47th, and he pushed on till he met 
 the defeated force. It was a great disaster. The whole loss in 
 killed, wounded, and taken was not much less than 1000 men. 
 And he had not even obtained any stores. And on the heels of 
 this came news of St. Leger's ignominious failure before Fort 
 Stanwix. 
 
 Fort Stanwix — called, of late, Fort Schuyler — was built on the 
 site of an old French fort. It was on the right bank of the 
 Mohawk, where that river becomes navigable, and commanded the 
 carrying-place between Upper Canada and the Mohawk Valley.^ 
 It was garrisoned by about 750 New York and Connecticut troops, 
 under Colonel Gansevoort, a Dutch New Yorker, who had served 
 under Montgomery. St. Leger had with him 100 men of 
 the 34th, 200 of Sir John Johnson's loyalist corps, the Greens, 
 and 300 or 400 Germans, and was to be joined by 500 Indians. 
 He started on the ist of August, and on the 3rd appeared 
 before Fort Stanwix and summoned it to surrender. On the 5th 
 he invested it. The same day General Herkimer, the veteran 
 commander of the militia of Tryon County, sent word to the 
 garrison that he was eight miles off, with about a thousand militia, 
 waiting to relieve them. The messengers were delayed in getting 
 into the Fort, and Herkimer waited in vain for the signal he was to 
 receive. His officers became impatient, even insubordinate. A 
 brother of Herkimer's was with St. Leger, and one of the oflScers 
 exclaimed that the General was either a Tory or a coward. " I am 
 ' Evidence of Colonel Kingston before the House of Commons, 1779. 
 
THE TURN OF THE TIDE 537 
 
 neither," said the old General. " I feel towards you all as a father, 
 and will not lead you into a scrape from which I cannot extricate 
 you." But he gave way, and they marched without the signal which 
 was to assure them that the garrison knew they were coming. 
 Herkimer was offended, and refused to take the precautions 
 suggested by his officers. At ten in the morning they came to a 
 place where the road descended into a ravine. Here the Indians 
 fell upon them, together with some of Johnson's Greens, and a 
 company of Rangers under the ruffian Colonel Butler. Brant led 
 the Indians.! It was a well-planned ambuscade — the Greens were 
 to attack in front, and the Indians in rear, at the moment when 
 half Herkimer's force should have crossed the bottom of the 
 ravine. 
 
 But the Indians could not wait, with horrid cries they fired at 
 the same moment as the troops, and rushed on, flourishing their 
 tomahawks. Herkimer's rear-guard — not yet in the ravine — retreated. 
 His main body, though taken by surprise, fought gallantly, each 
 side taking post behind trees — an Indian battle. Herkimer was 
 wounded early — a ball killed his horse and shattered his leg. He 
 made his men place him with his back to a tree, and continued 
 to give orders. The regulars tried to charge with the bayonet, but 
 the Americans repulsed them — forming in circles back to back. In 
 the midst of it a violent storm came on, with thunder and lightning. 
 The Americans used the lull in the other storm to change their 
 ground, standing in pairs behind trees — for the Indians' way 
 was to wait till a man had fired, and then rush in and toma- 
 hawk him before he could re-load. It was a fierce fight. Old 
 neighbours met there in mortal combat — men were found 
 afterwards still grappled in death, with their knives in each 
 other's hearts. The savages were seized with blind fury when 
 they saw their Chiefs fall, and many of Johnson's Greens were killed 
 by his own allies. 
 
 At last the Indians gave the signal for retreat — " Oonah ! 
 Oonah ! " and fled into the woods. The Greens heard firing in the 
 direction of the Fort, and hurried back, and the Americans retreated, 
 carrying their wounded with them, to Oriskany, whence they had 
 started. They had lost 200 killed — St. Leger perhaps more 
 still.2 
 
 Herkimer's messengers had reached the Fort between ten and 
 eleven o'clock, and Gansevoort had instantly fired the three guns 
 
 ' Brant's sister, widow of old Sir William Johnson, had sent word to Brant of 
 Herkimer's coming. 
 
 ^ Herkimer died a day or two after the battle. 
 
538 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 which were to be the signal, while Colonel Willett with 250 men 
 went out to make a diversion. He fell upon Johnson's encamp- 
 ment, and drove him and the Indians to the river. He sacked 
 their camp, and loaded waggons with all he found — including 
 Johnson's papers — and re-entered the Fort safely, just as St. Leger 
 came up with a reinforcement. 
 
 St. Leger next tried to frighten the garrison. He made his 
 prisoners write letters about the late affair, and the impossibility of 
 succour for the Fort — Burgoyne was probably already at Albany. 
 With this letter St. Leger sent the usual threat — the garrison had 
 better surrender — if compelled to storm, he could not control the 
 Indians, who had sworn fearful reprisals for their Chiefs slain at 
 Oriskany. They had sworn to slaughter the garrison, and lay waste 
 the whole valley of the Mohawk. This failing, St. Leger next sent 
 an appeal to the inhabitants of Tryon County, signed by Johnson, 
 Butler, and others, advising them to send a deputation to the 
 garrison to overcome its " mulish obstinacy " — otherwise the whole 
 district would be ravaged. But the garrison was neither to be 
 frightened nor persuaded into surrender, it was too strong to be 
 taken by assault, the ramparts were of earth, and St. Leger's artillery 
 was light. He began to make regular approaches. Then Major 
 Willett volunteered to go to Schuyler for help. On the loth, after 
 dark, he slipped out at a sallyport, crossed the Mohawk on a log, 
 and on the 12th reached Schuyler's camp at Stillwater. A Council 
 of War was called. Most of the officers thought the army too 
 weak — some even hinted that Schuyler had a treacherous motive 
 in proposing to send away a reinforcement to Fort Stanwix. 
 Schuyler, stung to the quick, said he took the responsibility on 
 himself, and asked who would lead the relieving force? "I 
 will ! " said Arnold, and he set off next day with 900 volunteers, 
 and caused a rumour to go before him that he was coming with 
 2000 men. 
 
 St. Leger's Indians were growing dissatisfied — they did not 
 understand fighting with spades, they had had no plunder, and had 
 lost several of their best Chiefs. Now came a report that Burgoyne 
 had been defeated — one of Arnold's spies, with his coat carefully 
 riddled by shots, brought this news, and told the Indians that as 
 many Americans were coming as the trees had leaves. " Savages " 
 never stand by a losing cause — the Indians began to desert, first, 
 however, plundering the British officers. Most of them made off 
 that same afternoon. Those who stayed threatened to go unless 
 St. Leger retired — he must go that very night. And they seized the 
 officers' liquor and made themselves very drunk. St. Leger did not 
 
THE TURN OF THE TIDE 539 
 
 wait for night — he started at once, leaving behind his tents, artillery, 
 and baggage. The garrison made a sortie, and pursued him ; but 
 his own Indians were the worst — they plundered such baggage as 
 he had saved, murdered stragglers, and amused themselves by 
 giving false alarms that Arnold was upon them. The soldiers, by 
 this time in a panic, would throw down muskets and knapsacks 
 and take to flight — on which the Indians acquired what they had 
 flung away.i St. Leger had got to Onondaga Falls before a letter 
 from Burgoyne informed him he had run when no man pursued, for 
 when he raised the siege in such a hurry Arnold was still forty 
 miles off! St. Leger could not even rejoin Burgoyne. He went 
 back to Montreal, and thence to Ticonderoga, hoping to work 
 round into Burgoyne's line of march, but he never got farther 
 south than Ticonderoga. The remorseless St. Leger — the terror 
 of the Americans, as his namesake of a century before had 
 been of the Irish — ended his career of devastation by a ludicrous 
 fiasco. 
 
 The Indians were a total failure. They had suffered severely 
 in the fight with Herkimer, and they highly resented the restraints 
 placed by Burgoyne on their immemorial right to torture their 
 prisoners. They were in a dangerous temper, more terrible to 
 friend than to foe. For this had Burgoyne endured the humiliation 
 of being publicly presented with a hundred scalps ! 
 
 In his General Orders after Bennington, Burgoyne attributes 
 that disaster in part to the "credulity of those who managed 
 the department of intelligence." This refers to Colonel Skeene, 
 who had shown his papers to every man who pretended to 
 be friendly, and thus, as Hadden says, allowed the rebels to 
 know his numbers and all about the expedition. There was 
 general recrimination — Breyman was charged with purposely arriving 
 too late, on an old grudge against Baum, but there seems to 
 
 ' " A Letter from a Gentleman in Quebec,'' dated September 6, 1777, gives an 
 account of the "savages " in St. Leger's ambuscade, and of the fighting around 
 Fort Stanwix, which conclusively condemns their employment. St. Leger was 
 four days without food or drink on his flight ! The savages had taken everything 
 — casks of liquor, etc. , and as they were double the number of the British, these 
 dared not oppose them. A day or two afterwards, some of these Indians went 
 to a house where were a woman and her daughter, aged eighteen, and ' ' butchered 
 them. " Burgoyne condemned them to death by a court-martial, but the Chiefs 
 "remonstrated," and he pardoned them on promise of amendment ! In a day 
 or two, however, all but 50 went home. This writer says 1000 savages went 
 with Baum. 
 
 " It is reported that the Indians have begun scalping on the Ohio, and that 
 the Commanding Officer at Detroit offers 20/. a scalp." — Gentleman's Magazine, 
 1776, p. 234. 
 
540 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 be no real foundation for this charge — it rests on hearsay 
 reports of words perhaps never uttered, or if uttered, merely the 
 result of momentary irritation. It is not necessary to suppose 
 malignity — • fatigue is an ample explanation. Those enormous 
 swords, and the whole martinetish system of the Germans, more 
 than account for the slowness of Breyman's advance — it was 
 seriously asserted that his men halted ten times an hour to 
 re-dress their ranks. Riedesel was against sending Breyman after 
 Baum. 
 
 Besides all the other disastrous consequences of Bennington, 
 it caused further delay. On the 20th of August Burgoyne wrote 
 the despatch which caused so much surprise and disappointment 
 in England — setting forth his troubles — bad weather, bad roads, 
 the horses not arrived, scarcity of provisions, which had led him 
 to make the unfortunate attempt on Bennington. Then the 
 failure of that attempt, the death of Baum, the capture of nearly 
 200 of the Brunswick dragoons, and four pieces of cannon ; he was, 
 however, assured that the enemy's losses were double his own — 
 prisoners and deserters who had witnessed the burial of the dead 
 had given him this comforting information. But Burgoyne owns 
 that he does not trust " the professing loyalists " — most were only 
 trimmers. "The great bulk of the country is undoubtedly with 
 the Congress." "The Hampshire Grants, in particular . . . now 
 abounds in the most active and most rebellious race of the contin- 
 ent, and hangs like a gathering storm upon my left. . . . Another 
 most embarrassing circumstance is the want of communication with 
 Sir William Howe.'' 
 
 By this time Burgoyne knew that two of his messengers had 
 been caught and hanged. Only one letter had come to hand, no 
 operation had been undertaken in his favour, and Gates, "with 
 an army superior to mine," was strongly posted near the mouth of 
 the Mohawk River. Burgoyne wished he " had a latitude in his 
 orders " — he would then wait where he was, or get back to Fort 
 Edward, where his communication with Fort George would be 
 secure. But his orders were positive, " to force a junction with Sir 
 William Howe." The " orders " were the orders of Germaine 
 himself. It is impossible that Burgoyne could have written thus to 
 Germaine, if this statement had been untrue. 
 
 The same mail (an armed transport from Quebec) brought also 
 St. Leger's letter, describing his " complete " victory over Herkimer.^ 
 The next mail brought news of his equally complete failure. The 
 
 ^ " . . . over whom the Indians had obtained the compleatest victory, laying 
 above 400 dead on the field, among whom were almost all the principal movers 
 
THE TURN OF THE TIDE 541 
 
 British public could not understand it. Why were the victories 
 never followed up? People began to write to the Magazines, 
 blaming and excusing Burgoyne. 
 
 Burgoyne dreaded the moment of passing the Hudson, because 
 from that hour "all safety of communication ceases. I must 
 expect a large body of the enemy from my left will take post 
 behind me." " I little foresaw that I was to be left to pursue 
 my way through such a tract of country, and hosts of foes, without 
 any co-operation from New Yor^." Could he but reach Albany ! 
 He found himself in a cruel dilemma; whether he went on, or 
 went back, he might lose an army — his own, if he went forward, 
 Howe's, if he retreated and Howe came up to Albany ! 
 
 Meanwhile he was collecting supplies, and at last, on the 1 3th ^ 
 of September he crossed the Hudson near Batten Kill, by a 
 "bridge of bateaux," and encamped at Saratoga. His General 
 Orders warned the troops that they might be required to fight 
 at any moment. The army had provisions for thirty days. The 
 place where they encamped was a plain, where stood a fine 
 house belonging to General Schuyler. On the 15th they moved 
 on to Dovecot, and on the 17th they encamped "on advantageous 
 ground " about four miles from the enemy, who were strongly 
 posted at Stillwater, nearer to Albany. 
 
 Everyone knew that an action was imminent. Phillips had 
 called the artillery officers together, and exhorted them not to 
 waste their ammunition by aimless firing. Even should the 
 commanding officer of a battalion give them orders, they must 
 not carry them out to the wasting of ammunition, for they could 
 not possibly get any more. 
 
 On the 1 8th the enemy appeared in force, to obstruct the 
 men who were repairing bridges. The British were now at Sword's 
 Farm, two miles nearer the Americans. All their marches of 
 late had been very difficult, all roads and bridges had to be 
 mended, and very careful reconnoitring was now necessary. 
 To make things worse, here the Hudson winds so much that 
 the mountains are now near, now far from the stream, and so 
 the columns were obliged to march both on the plains and the 
 
 of rebellion in that county ; that he had nothing to apprehend that could retard 
 his progress in joining the General but a rumour of a reinforcement of what they 
 call their regular troops by the Mohawk river, and therefore praying a diversion 
 . . ." — "Thus far all goes well with Col. St. Leger ; but the next news we hear 
 of that commander is . . . that finding Fort Stanwix too strong for him ... he 
 had given over the attempt," etc. — American News, Centlemati's Magasine, 
 November, 1777. 
 
 1 Hadden's Journal gives the 13th. The 14th is the day most often given. 
 
542 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 heights, and were always half an hour's march from each other, 
 and often unable to close up — while the woods were so thick 
 that in the battle which followed parties had sometimes been 
 engaged for an hour, unaware that other parties of their friends 
 were engaged close by. 
 
CHAPTER LXV 
 FREEMAN'S FARM 
 
 " I think it a duty of justice ... to take upon myself the measure of having 
 passed the Hudson's River, in order to force a passage to Albany. I did not 
 think myself authorised to call any men into council, when the peremptory 
 tenor of my orders and the season of the year admitted no alternative. . . . The 
 General officers, from the mode of fighting, have been more exposed than in 
 other services. Among the rest I have had my escapes. It depends upon 
 the sentence his Majesty shall pass upon myjconduct ; upon the judgment of my 
 profession, and of the impartial and respectable parts of my country, whether I 
 am to esteem them blessings or misfortunes. " — Burgoyne to Lord George Cermaine, 
 Albany, Oct. 20, 1777. 
 
 Gates was now in command of the Provincial Army, which 
 by the beginning of September numbered about 10,000 men. 
 Morgan had arrived, and Washington had also sent artillery. 
 Schuyler, after assuring Gates that no personal feeling should 
 prevent his giving all the aid in his power, had gone to Albany, 
 and was exerting his influence to prevent the Oneida Indians 
 from joining the British. Arnold commanded Gates' left wing, and 
 Gates and Arnold soon quarrelled. Their tempers were incom- 
 patible — Gates was slow and cautious, Arnold was daring ; he 
 thought Gates had no enterprise, and Gates thought Arnold had 
 no prudence. Arnold did not conceal his contempt for the new 
 Commander-in-Chief; and Gates, a fussy martinet, made no 
 allowance for Arnold's impetuosity. 
 
 Gates intended to await Burgoyne's attack. After Bennington 
 the whole country rose. Men came in daily, till there was not 
 an able-bodied man left in New England — they were all gone to 
 repulse Burgoyne. 
 
 As every day's delay increased the danger of supplies failing, 
 Burgoyne resolved to force an action. 
 
 The American army lay on the ridge of hills called Beniis' 
 Heights. In ancient days, the only tavern between Fort 
 Edward and Albany stood there. Kosciusko had fortified it 
 with entrenchments three-quarters of a mile long, and redoubts 
 
544 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 and batteries which commanded the valley of the Hudson, and 
 even the hills across the river, here comparatively narrow. Gates 
 had formed his army in two lines — the right commanded by 
 himself, and the left by Arnold. The right wing occupied the 
 ridge next the river ; the left was on a high ground intersected 
 by a deep ravine, with a saw-mill in the middle. Both positions 
 were covered by dense forest. 
 
 Between nine and ten on the morning of Friday, the 19th 
 of September, 1777, the British army advanced in three columns. 
 The left was in two divisions — four German regiments, under 
 Riedesel, and the 47th and the artillery and baggage under 
 Phillips. 
 
 It marched through the meadows by the river. The centre, 
 led by Burgoyne in person, marched parallel with the left, 
 through woods, towards the great ravine ; while Fraser, with 
 the right, supported by Breyman, made a circuit, so as to pass 
 the ravine without quitting the heights. The Canadians, loyalists, 
 and Indians went in front and on the flanks. With something 
 less than 200 Provincials, about 80 Canadians, and the remaining 
 50 savages — all that had remained — the army reckoned about 
 6000 men. 
 
 Riedesel's advance by the river was very slow — every moment 
 bridges must be made and trees cleared out of the way. About 
 one o'clock he heard firing, which seemed to come from the 
 direction of Burgoyne's column. At half-past two the firing 
 was renewed, far stronger. As he had received no message from 
 the Commander-in-Chief, Riedesel sent an aide to ask for orders. 
 In about three-quarters of an hour the aide returned with the 
 order to make the best arrangement he could to cover the 
 bateaux, and then to come to the aid of the centre, by falling on 
 the enemy's flank. 
 
 The centre, meanwhile, had marched for about an hour, 
 when it reached the great ravine with the saw-mill. This was 
 passed without opposition, and the opposite height was gained. 
 Plere Burgoyne halted for nearly an hour, to give Fraser time 
 to come up. During this halt, the advanced sentries exchanged 
 shots. Between one and two the signal for advance was given, 
 and Major Forbes advanced with the pickets and the 9th, but 
 was repulsed with loss by Morgan, and the Canadians and 
 Indians were dispersed. Some of the rest firing wildly and 
 killing some of the fugitives. Major Kingston, to stop it, ordered 
 up Lieutenant Hadden, who was serving two guns on the 
 left of the 62nd — "by which accident I fired the first shot 
 
FREEMAN'S FARM 545 
 
 from the main body of this Army." About 2 o'clock the centre 
 reached the open space opposite Freeman's Farm, and the rest 
 of the action was a furious struggle to retain or to regain this 
 position. 
 
 Fraser, coming up, took possession of an advantageous height 
 on the right. The centre now passed a small bridge, and took 
 post in the outskirts of a wood held by the Americans, who 
 immediately attacked with great vigour, and for three hours 
 the fight was sustained by the 20th, 21st, and 62nd; Fraser also 
 being attacked, and the centre hard pressed. 
 
 As soon as Phillips heard the firing, he broke up through 
 the wood with four pieces of artillery. By this time Hadden 
 had lost in killed and wounded 19 of his 22 artillerymen. He 
 was asking General Hamilton for a supply of infantry, to go on 
 working the guns, when his cap was shot through. Hamilton 
 referred him to Phillips, who sent Captain Jones with a reinforce- 
 ment. But in a few minutes all these were wounded — Jones 
 mortally. The 62 nd had suffered terribly, and lost nearly half 
 its men. It now tried to charge, but lost 25 prisoners, and 
 began to get into confusion. Hadden tried to save his guns, 
 but he and the remnant of the 62 nd were swept off the hill. 
 At this moment Riedesel came up with seven companies, and 
 charged the enemy; the British rallied, and the hill and guns 
 were recovered. Phillips and Riedesel charged again, and Riedesel 
 believed that if night had not come on it would have been easy 
 to rush the American camp. Just as the light closed the British 
 were left masters of the field. 
 
 This is the British account. Burgoyne does not mention his 
 losses — they were heavy, especially in officers, whom Morgan's 
 rifles picked off with fatal precision. The 62nd, who left Canada 
 500 strong, had only 60 men and four or five officers remaining 
 under arms. Of three officers of the 20th who were buried in 
 one grave, the eldest was only seventeen years old. The dread; 
 ful business of picking up the wounded and burying the dead 
 is vividly described by Anburey. The night after the battle, 
 besides all the other alarms, the camp was disturbed by a great 
 noise like the howling of dogs, to the right of the encampment. 
 It was supposed to be a feint of the enemy, to draw off attention 
 from some other attack. Next night the noise was heard again, 
 and General Fraser thought it was the officers' dogs, and ordered 
 them to be confined to tents — the Provost to hang up any he 
 found running loose. But on the third night the noise was 
 louder than ever, and a detachment of Canadians and Provincials 
 
546 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 was sent to reconnoitre — who found that the noise was the 
 howling of wolves as they scratched up the corpses. 
 
 The day after the battle Burgoyne took a position nearly 
 within cannon-shot of the enemy, and fortified his right, extend- 
 ing his left to cover the meadows, " through which the great river 
 runs,'' and where the bateaux, hospitals, and magazines were. 
 The 47th guarded them, and strong redoubts were being erected 
 for their protection. Burgoyne found he had gained nothing 
 but honour by his victory; "the enemy working with redoubled 
 ardour to strengthen their left; their right was unattack- 
 able already." He had now for some days been obliged 
 to send out whole regiments to protect his workmen and 
 pioneers. 
 
 At last, on the 21st, a messenger arrived with a letter in cypher 
 from Clinton. It was dated the loth, and said that the writer 
 would start in about ten days to attack Fort Montgomery. This 
 was the only messenger who had reached the camp since the 
 beginning of August. He was sent back the same night, with 
 a letter in a hollow silver bullet, to tell Clinton of the situation 
 of the army, and the necessity of a diversion to oblige Gates 
 to detach part of his force — Burgoyne promising to " wait favour- 
 able events,'' if possible, till the 12th of October. The messenger 
 set off, and got to Fort Montgomery — where Burgoyne had made 
 sure that Clinton would be, and asking for " General Clinton," 
 was brought to him. But it was the wrong General Clinton — ■ 
 the rebel General, late Provincial Governor of New York. The 
 unhappy messenger swallowed his bullet, but an emetic was 
 administered to him, the despatch was recovered, and the bearer 
 was hanged as a spy. 
 
 In the course of the two following days two officers 
 in disguise, and other confidential persons, were sent by 
 different routes with verbal messages to Clinton, and Burgoyne 
 continued fortifying his camp, and watching the enemy, whose 
 numbers increased daily. Stronger and stronger parties had to 
 be sent out foraging — and there was very little forage. Detach- 
 ments often reconnoitred the enemy's right flank, but could 
 never learn anything. On crossing the Hudson Burgoyne had 
 broken off all his communications, but he received a small piece 
 of bad news from Skenesborough— four companies of the S3rd 
 had been captured. His provisions began to give in. On 
 October 3 he issued his last General Order. It began : 
 "There is reason to be assured that other powerful Armies 
 of the King are actually in co-operation with these Troops " ; but 
 
FREEMAN'S FARM S47 
 
 as it is desirable to be prepared for continuance in the field, 
 "without the delay of bringing forward further Stores, the ration 
 of Bread or Flour is for the present fixed at one Pound." And 
 to keep up their spirits, the same Order announced that the 
 Deputy Paymaster-General would issue one hundred and sixty- 
 five days' forage money to officers. The soldiers submitted very 
 cheerfully to the short commons. Whatever were Burgoyne's 
 faults, his troops loved him,^ and never turned against him ; and 
 if neither Riedesel nor Phillips liked him, for this there was a 
 reason. Both these distinguished officers had served in greater 
 wars, and it was doubtless irksome to them to be subordinated 
 to a General whose reputation was based rather on personal 
 gallantry than on experience of large operations. 
 
 Riedesel was against hazarding another engagement.^ He 
 was for immediate retreat. The position was daily becoming 
 more critical. Burgoyne was counting the hours till an unwonted 
 movement in the American camp should tell him that news had 
 come of Clinton's advance. He never doubted that an attempt 
 would be made to co-operate with him — in that assurance alone 
 he had risked his army. Could he have known that Germaine's 
 orders to Howe were lying at that moment in a pigeon-hole at 
 the Colonial Office ! 
 
 Hitherto Burgoyne had called no Council of War, but on 
 the 4th of October he sent for Fraser, Phillips, and Riedesel, 
 and laid before them a plan— to leave about 800 men in one 
 of the entrenchments, to guard the provisions and boats, and 
 with the rest of his force to attack the enemy's rear. But the 
 Council decided that, as they knew neither the roads, nor the 
 real position of the enemy's left wing, it must be three or four 
 days before they could come to an action, and the danger of 
 leaving their depots so long was too great. On the evening of 
 the 5th there was another Council. Riedesel now declared 
 plainly that the situation was such that it was impossible to 
 march on the enemy, attack, and decide the affair, all in one 
 day. His advice, therefore, was to retreat to Batten Kill, and 
 repass the Hudson — there the army would once more be in 
 communication with Fort George, and could afford to wait for 
 whatever Sir Henry Clinton might do. 
 
 It is very doubtful whether Riedesel's plan would have re- 
 opened communications with Fort George. Lincoln's army was 
 now besieging Ticonderoga, there was another large body of 
 
 ^ See the Testimony of Sergeant Lamb. 
 " See his Memoirs. 
 
548 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 the enemy on the heights opposite the ford of Saratoga, and 
 2000 more were already assembled on the west side to prevent 
 a retreat to Fort Edward. The terrible difficulty about pro- 
 visions was alone sufficient to make Burgoyne's situation 
 desperate. It had been the real key to the position all along 
 — he could never get many days' rations in hand, and in order 
 to collect his thirty days' provisions for the thirty days that were 
 to take him to Albany, he had been obliged to wait a month at 
 Fort Miller and Saratoga. Moreover, since the battle of the 
 19th Gates had been reinforced. One day the British heard 
 loud shouting in the American hnes, and learned that it was 
 for General Lincoln, who had come in with 2000 of the Massa- 
 chusetts Militia. 
 
 Fraser agreed with Riedesel. Phillips declined to give an 
 opinion. The unfortunate Commander, to whom the thought 
 of retreat was hateful, said he would make " a reconnaissance 
 in force," as near the enemy as possible, and see if the position 
 could be taken. If it could, he would attack on the 8th, and 
 hope to finish with the enemy in one day. If it could not, 
 he would leave his position at Freeman's Farm, and retreat at 
 once behind the Batten Kill. Riedesel says he did not approve, 
 but there was nothing for it but to obey. On the 6th, foraging 
 parties went out, and provisions for four days were issued. The 
 die was cast, the decisive moment was at hand. 
 
 Before the eventful day, Arnold had quarrelled with Gates 
 so violently that he had demanded and received his passport to 
 go to Philadelphia. Gates had not mentioned him in his despatch 
 about the battle of the 19th, and had followed up this unpardon- 
 able slight by letting Wilkinson — his satellite — take Morgan's rifles 
 and Dearborn's Light Infantry from the left wing. Arnold went to 
 Headquarters to remonstrate. There were high words. Gates said 
 he did not consider Arnold a Major-General — he had sent in 
 his resignation. Lincoln would arrive in a day or two, and then he 
 would have no further occasion for the services of Brigadier-General 
 Arnold, and would give him a pass for Philadelphia as soon as he 
 liked. Arnold returned to his own quarters in a rage, and wrote to 
 Gates for the pass, but by the time it came he had reflected that 
 there was sure to be another battle presently, and resolved to stay 
 for it. Now Lincoln arrived with 2000 of his force, the rest were 
 still besieging Ticonderoga. It was already all but impossible for 
 Burgoyne to retreat. Some of the General officers wanted to get 
 up an address to Arnold to thank him for his services in the late 
 action, but others, among whom was Lincoln — a sober, prudent 
 
FREEMAN'S FARM 549 
 
 man — wished rather to reconcile the Generals. So it went on to 
 the 7 th. 
 
 Ever since the 19th of September Freeman's Farm — gained that 
 day at so tremendous a cost — had been held by Fraser with the 
 Grenadiers, and Balcarres with the Light Infantry. Balcarres had 
 fortified his camp without waiting for orders, and had made it very 
 strong, warning his men that their lives might depend one day on 
 how they had done that small work. And so it proved, for but 
 for the stand which Balcarres was able to make at that redoubt, 
 Arnold would have carried the whole British camp by assault on 
 the 7th of October.! 
 
 Burgoyne's intention, that day, was to find out what the 
 American left was like, and whether he could possibly turn it, and 
 so get away to Albany — his only chance, for the right was impreg- 
 nable. He left Hamilton to guard the camp at Freeman's Farm, 
 and Gall with the 2nd Brigade of Hessians to cover the redoubts 
 by the river, the magazines, the hospital, and the bateaux, and with 
 1500 men — all he could spare from holding his other positions— he 
 moved forward with Phillips, Fraser, and Riedesel. It was already 
 past eleven. One of his officers says that he did not mean to 
 begin too soon, as " in case we should not prove victorious, he had 
 the night to favour his retreat." A secondary object was to get 
 forage — of which the army stood in such urgent need ; and soon 
 the foragers were cutting straw in a wheat-field, half a mile from 
 Neilson's house — the Americans could see them with their tele- 
 scopes. At about three-quarters of a mile from the enemy's line, 
 Burgoyne formed his troops, and sent forward Captain Fraser's 
 Rangers ^ " to go by secret paths in the woods, and gain the 
 enemy's rear, to hold him in check while the great attack was 
 made.'' 
 
 But that attack was never made.^ Before Burgoyne could 
 advance "a very sudden and rapid attack" was made upon his 
 own left, where Ackland was posted with the Grenadiers. As the 
 enemy's column — Poore and Learned's brigades — came out of the 
 
 ^ Lives of the Lindsays. 
 
 ^ He was a nephew of General Fraser. His corps of sharpshooters was " the 
 select light corps of the army, composed of chosen men from all regiments." 
 (Burgoyne on the affair of Bennington, where the Rangers were the only 
 British corps engaged. ) 
 
 ' Riedesel's account (which was signed by all the German officers) says, 
 " While we were deliberating how we should push the reconnoissance, the enemy 
 seized the left wing of our commando, where the English grenadiers stood in the 
 wood, with great force, and routed it." The evidence of Captain Bloomfield 
 at the Enquiry in 1779 shows that the action was lost in twenty minutes. 
 
550 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 woods in front and left, they were received with a very heavy fire 
 of grape-shot from the 12-pounders planted on a small eminence 
 in the middle of a cleared space in the wood. But the Americans 
 pressed on — fell back behind the skirt of trees, re-formed, and came 
 on again, driving in the Germans, and throwing the whole Hanau 
 regiment into confusion. In a few minutes the attack extended all 
 along Riedesel's front — no corps could be detached to strengthen 
 any other. Presently a large body of the enemy was observed on 
 the right, marching round Eraser's flank to cut off retreat. It 
 was Morgan. His onset drove back even Fraser for a moment, 
 but Fraser rallied his men, and at once the Light Infantry and part 
 of the 24th were formed in a second line, " to secure the return 
 of the troops to camp " — for to that it had come already. Fraser 
 on his iron-grey charger, in the showy uniform of a British general, 
 was a conspicuous figure — too conspicuous, thought his aides, but 
 he would not listen to them. Burgoyne, too, was in the thickest of 
 the fight. Poore's men were charging among the cannon, with a 
 disregard of grape-shot which astonished the British. One gun was 
 taken and retaken four times. The last time Colonel Cilley leaped 
 on it, and waving his sword above it, dedicated it " to the patriot 
 cause." 
 
 The centre as yet held firm, though Specht and the ist 
 German Brigade were hard pressed. A little beyond the enemy's 
 left there was an entrenched high ground, commanding their whole 
 camp and lines. Could Burgoyne have taken it, and mounted his 
 heavy artillery upon it, the rebels could not have remained in their 
 camp an hour. Arnold knew this, and urged Gates to send a 
 stronger force— in spite of his injured dignity, he had been unable 
 to refrain from presenting himself that morning at Headquarters, 
 and he stayed until Gates told him bluntly he had no business 
 there. Arnold flung away with his aides, and fumed in his tent for 
 an hour or two, scenting the battle from afar, and every now 
 and then sending his aides to bring him word how the day was 
 going. At last, seeing how the British centre held, and well aware 
 of the danger of that high entrenched ground being occupied, 
 he called for his horse, declared he would fight in the ranks, and 
 set off at a gallop towards the front. Gates saw him go, and 
 despatched Major Armstrong, one of his aides, to fetch him back — 
 "lest he should do something rash." 
 
 As soon as the Americans saw Arnold, there was a great shout 
 all along their line of " Arnold ! Arnold ! " He put himself at the 
 head of Learned's brigade, and charged the British centre. At 
 the second charge the Hessians broke — the whole British left gave 
 
FREEMAN'S FARM 551 
 
 way, and the Light Infantry and the 24th only saved the entire right 
 from being carried by a quick movement. Fraser was still desper- 
 ately trying to rally his battalions— Morgan feared he would 
 succeed, and told some of his best marksmen that that gallant 
 officer on the grey horse must die. A few minutes later Fraser 
 fell mortally wounded. 
 
 But still Arnold's berserker fury was not spent — he thundered 
 all along the line, on the great black horse, urging the Americans to 
 charge once more. 
 
 Both the British flanks had now been turned — Burgoyne saw 
 that all which remained was to save his camp itself from being 
 stormed. He sent word to Hamilton to man the works in his rear 
 with every soldier he could spare from the front; and ordered 
 Phillips and Riedesel to cover the retreat, while he himself pre- 
 pared to defend the camp. Sir Francis Gierke was mortally 
 wounded before he could give the order for the artillery to return, 
 and the six guns were lost. All the horses had been killed, and 
 most of the men killed or wounded. When Armstrong, who had 
 been for two hours trying to overtake Arnold, came up to the 
 clearing where the guns were, a terrible sight met him. " In the 
 square space of fifteen or twenty yards, lay eighteen grenadiers in the 
 agonies of death, and three officers propped against stumps of trees, 
 two of them mortally wounded, bleeding, and almost speechless." 
 The officer not mortally wounded was Major Ackland. 
 
 It was now after sunset, but the battle was not yet over. Bur- 
 goyne had not been a moment too soon. Hardly had the troops 
 reached the camp, when Arnold was upon them again — storming 
 the lines " with great fury, under a severe fire of grape-shot and 
 small-arms." And now Balcarres' words to his men came true — 
 with his Light Infantry and such troops as could throw themselves 
 into the redoubt, he received the attack of what seemed to him to 
 be the whole American army. His redoubt was stormed again and 
 again, but not taken, as all the other works were. The entrench- 
 ments of the German reserve were carried at the point of the bayonet ; 
 Breyman fell fighting bravely at the head of his battalion. A 
 strong abatis had been first carried. At the sally-port of Breyman's 
 works there was another furious hand-to-hand struggle, and Arnold 
 ordered a general assault, and dashed in at the sally-port. The 
 Hessians broke and fled, discharging a final volley as they retreated. 
 The great black horse lay dead inside the sally-port, and as he 
 went down a wounded German fired from the ground point-blank 
 at Arnold, and struck him above the left knee. An American was 
 going to bayonet the German, but Arnold called not to hurt him — 
 
SS2 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 he had only done his duty. It was at this moment that Armstrong 
 came up with Gates' order to Arnold to retire. 
 
 Night came down. Burgoyne had drawn off to the heights 
 above the hospital, that the enemy might at least have to form new 
 dispositions before they attacked him again. 
 
CHAPTER LXVI 
 THE NIGHT AFTER A DEFEAT 
 
 "I cannot sufficiently commend the activity, zeal, and spirit of the officers." 
 — Major-General Phillips to Lords Townshend and Amherst, Albany, Oct. 22, 
 1777- 
 
 The Baroness von Riedesel has left an account of this awful day, 
 and of the night and days which followed. 
 
 For once, there was secrecy. The Baroness, who had invited 
 Fraser and Phillips to dine with her that day, perceived at break- 
 fast that something was afoot — there was much movement among 
 the troops. " My husband told me it was a reconnoissance, 
 which I did not like, because it happened so often now." As 
 she went to the block-house that had been built for her, she 
 was met by "the wildmen," in war-dress, and when she asked 
 where they were going, they cried " War ! war ! " Then the 
 poor lady knew there was to be another battle ; and very soon 
 she heard firing. It grew louder and louder — it became a terrible 
 cannonade, till she was more dead than alive. About three in 
 the afternoon, instead of her guests coming to ■ dinner, poor 
 General Fraser was brought in on a stretcher, mortally wounded. 
 The dinner-table was taken away, and a bed put in its place. 
 The poor woman sat in a corner, "shaking and praying." The 
 noise got louder — every moment she expected to see her husband 
 brought in like the General. She heard the General sigh, 
 " Cursed ambition ! poor General Burgoyne ! my poor wife ! " 
 They prayed with him, and he gave them a message — to ask 
 Burgoyne to bury him next day "on a hill which was a sort 
 of redoubt." The whole floor, the whole house, was full of 
 men sick of the "camp-sickness." At last, towards evening, 
 Riedesel came — unhurt — and the Baroness forgot all her sufferings. 
 He ate in haste, and was off again. The women had been told 
 that the British had the advantage, but the faces they saw told 
 another tale. And before Riedesel went he whispered to his 
 wife that all had gone very badly, and she must hold herself 
 
 663 
 
554 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 ready to start at any moment — but must let no one know this. 
 Suddenly someone came to tell Lady Harriet Ackland that 
 her husband was mortally wounded and taken. Night came 
 on — Fraser was dying; the children — wrapped in blankets 
 and sleeping in the entry — woke and cried, and poor Eraser 
 kept begging the Baroness' pardon for giving her so much 
 trouble. At eight in the morning he died. They wrapped 
 his body in a sheet, and laid it on a bedstead, and there it was 
 all day, while every moment wounded officers came in, and 
 the cannonade was always going on. Retreat was talked of. 
 At four in the afternoon the enemy was close on them. At 
 six, Burgoyne, Riedesel, Phillips, and the staff gathered on the 
 hill, to hear Chaplain Brudenel read the funeral service over 
 Fraser; while the cannon-balls flew around that sad company. 
 After a while Gates found out what was going on, and exchanged 
 the cannonade for minute guns. 
 
 The order had been given that the army was to march 
 immediately after the funeral. Those of the wounded who 
 could not move were to be left in the "Lazareth," which was 
 covered by a white flag. But all who could dragged themselves 
 from their beds to go with the army, and Major Harnich, shot 
 through the body the day before, persuaded the Baroness, for 
 the children's sake, to get into the caliche with them, and not 
 risk stopping to see what became of her husband. Perfect 
 silence was ordered — fires were lighted, and left burning, as 
 if the camp was still there. They marched the whole night. 
 Fritzchen was frightened and wanted to cry, and her mother had 
 to stop her mouth with a handkerchief. 
 
 At six in the morning they halted, and the General had the 
 cannons arranged and counted — at which everyone wondered, 
 as it lost time. Riedesel was so exhausted that he sat in the 
 caliche — the women making room for him, and slept three 
 hours with his head on his wife's shoulder. Other officers 
 brought her their valuables to take care of. At last the army 
 set out again, but had hardly marched an hour when there was 
 another halt — the enemy had been seen. But it was only a 
 party of about 200, reconnoitring. It rained — poured. Lady 
 Harriet had her tent pitched. She was in despair about the 
 Major; the Baroness advised her to go to him in the enemy's 
 lines. With some difficulty Burgoyne consented. Brudenel 
 went with her in the boat. They crossed the Hudson in wind 
 and rain, but at last Lady Harriet reached her husband, and 
 found his wound was not mortal. 
 
THE NIGHT AFTER A DEFEAT 555 
 
 The army spent the whole of the 9th in pouring rain, always 
 ready to march. The "savages" — -such as were left — were 
 deserting, as rats leave a sinking ship. One of the Baroness' 
 women tore her hat off, let her hair stream all over her face, 
 and cried to her mistress, " It is all very well for you ! You have 
 your man — we have nothing but the prospect of perishing, or 
 losing all we have ! " Towards evening they came to Saratoga — 
 only half an hour from the place where they had waited a whole 
 day. They were drenched with the rain. The Baroness sat 
 by a fire, and then lay down with her children on some straw. 
 Phillips came to see her. She asked him why they did not 
 continue the retreat, while there was still time, for her husband 
 had pledged himself to cover it and bring back the army. 
 " Poor woman ! " said Phillips, " I admire you ! Wet through 
 as you are, you have still courage to wish to go farther in 
 this weather ! If only you had been our Commander ! Ours 
 thinks he is tired, and will stay the night, and give us supper." 
 The Baroness roundly asserts that Burgoyne made merry 
 that night, spending it in singing and drinking, and amusing 
 himself with the Commissary's wife, whose relations with him 
 were notorious, and who was further said not to be averse to 
 champagne. Next morning, to cover his retreat across the 
 Fish Kill, he ordered the burning of all "the beautiful houses 
 and villas" at Saratoga (the property of General Schuyler). 
 "The greatest misery and the utmost disorder reigned in the 
 army," says the Baroness. The Commissaries had forgotten 
 to give out rations to the troops ! There were cattle enough, 
 but not one was slaughtered. Many officers were starving. 
 The Baroness, who kept a store of provisions in the calkhe, 
 divided her tea, coffee, and provisions among about thirty wounded 
 officers, who "could not hold out for hunger any longer." The 
 Riedesels had a cook, who was "an arch-rascal," and finished 
 by robbing them of everything at Albany, but he knew what 
 to do in emergencies, and in the present emergency he used 
 to slip across the streams by night and steal chickens, sheep, 
 and pigs, which he sold to his masters at a good price. The 
 Baroness exhausted her stores on these unfortunate gentlemen, 
 but happening to see Paterson — the Adjutant-General — come 
 by, she could not refrain from calling to him, "Come and see 
 these officers, wounded for the common cause — in want of 
 everything — it is your duty to tell the General!" Paterson 
 did so, and Burgoyne came himself, and "thanked me very 
 pathetically for reminding him of his duty. He added, 'A 
 
556 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Chief was much to be pitied who was not obeyed.' " Then he 
 asked the officers why they had not come to his kitchen for 
 what they needed. They replied that English officers were not 
 accustomed to go to their General's kitchen. Burgoyne ordered 
 rations to be given out — which caused another delay. It is evident 
 that after the disaster of the 7th Burgoyne was paralysed. 
 
 The army crossed the Fish Kill; and at two o'clock 
 that afternoon the cannonade began again — cannon and 
 musket-shot rattling about their ears. Riedesel made his 
 wife take refuge in a house — against which the fire was pres- 
 ently turned, as the Americans mistook it for the British 
 Headquarters ! The women and children now found refuge 
 in the cellars. There, crowded together, not daring to stir 
 out for any purpose whatever, a great number of helpless and 
 wounded persons lay for six days and nights. The Baroness, 
 who kept her head throughout, got the cellars to some extent 
 cleansed on the second day, "or we should all have been 
 ill " ; the officers most dangerously wounded were put into 
 one of the three great vaulted cellars, and the women in another. 
 Just as these arrangements were being made "a new and 
 dreadful cannonade" threw all into fresh alarm. There was 
 an ugly rush for the cellars, by people "who had no right to 
 come." The children might have been crushed, but God gave 
 her strength to stand before the door with outstretched arms 
 and keep them out. Eleven cannon-balls passed through the 
 house — those in the cellars could hear them rolling overhead. 
 Dreadful things happened — the surgeons had one poor fellow 
 on a table, ready to take off his leg, when a ball came through 
 and took off the other ! The assistants scattered for a moment, 
 and returning, found the poor wretch had flung himself off 
 the table in his agony, and dragged himself into a corner. In 
 this awful situation the faithful Riedesel contrived to send 
 his wife word that he was unhurt. Now that Lady Harriet 
 was with her husband, there were only five officers' wives — 
 Madame von Riedesel, Mrs. Harnich (her husband badly 
 wounded), a Mrs. Rennels, whose husband was killed; the 
 wife of the Commissary, and the wife of a lieutenant who had 
 shared his soup with the Baroness the day before. These poor 
 women sat together, lamenting. Somebody came in — " they 
 whispered together and looked sad. A glance was thrown 
 at me." The Baroness thought, "My man is killed! "and cried 
 out. But they made signs to her that it was the good lieutenant 
 of the soup. A ball had taken off his arm above the shoulder. 
 
THE NIGHT AFTER A DEFEAT 557 
 
 That night they heard his moans re-echoing through the vaults. 
 Towards morning he died. 
 
 Three Enghsh officers, wounded, but resolved not to stay 
 behind, promised the Baroness that each should take a child 
 on his horse in case of a hasty retreat. 
 
 One of Riedesel's horses always stood ready at the door. 
 Riedesel often thought of sending his wife and children to the 
 American lines, but she could not bear the thought. Often 
 that night she thought that perhaps he had marched. Once she 
 stepped out to see, — she saw the soldiers lying round the fires 
 in the cold night. She was troubled about the valuables 
 entrusted to her— she had got them all sewn in her stays ! 
 
 At last, on the morning of the 12 th, she was able to change 
 her linen. The three officers made a corner and kept watch. 
 One of them could imitate the mooing of a cow and the 
 bleating of a calf; and when Fritzchen woke in the night and 
 cried, he quieted her thus, and made the poor woman laugh 
 for a moment. The " arch-rascal " cook got them food, but 
 there was so little water that the Baroness had to give the 
 children wine. The little water they had was brought them 
 by a kind woman, at the risk of her life. 
 
 They were not all heroes in the cellars — some there were 
 who deserved no compassion — they were cowards, skulking 
 among the women. But afterwards, " when we were in captivity, 
 they strutted about." 
 
 Early on the morning of the loth, the army repassed the 
 fords of the Fish Kill,i they found a detachment of the 
 enemy busily throwing up entrenchments on the heights. 
 Burgoyne took up a position at Saratoga — strong on the left, 
 towards the Fish Kill, but on the centre and right quite 
 indefensible. All the army was in favour of retreat, and at 
 last Burgoyne brought himself to think of renouncing his 
 lingering hope of a junction with Howe. He sent Lieutenant- 
 Colonel Sutheriand with two regiments (Captain Eraser's 
 marksmen and Mackoy's Provincials) to reconnoitre the road 
 to Fort Edward, with a view to a night march. At the first 
 bridge the Provincials — left to cover the workmen — ran from 
 a very slight attack of a small party of the enemy, and left 
 the workmen to escape as they could. Sutherland got to 
 
 ^ The Fish Kill and the Batten Kill are two small tributaries of the Hudson, 
 and fall into that river from opposite sides, very near to Saratoga— the Fish 
 Kill being on the west and the Batten Kill on the east bank— almost opposite 
 each other. The British army crossed very near the confluence. 
 
558 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 within an hour of Fort Edward, and was beginning to repair 
 the chief bridge, when he was recalled. The enemy had 
 appeared on the heights of the Fish Kill in great force, and 
 showed a disposition to give battle. Gates did not mean to 
 wait till Burgoyne could make up his mind — and perhaps 
 till succour might arrive. At two in the afternoon of the 
 loth he began a terrible cannonade from the opposite side 
 of the river — directed chiefly on the boats with the provisions. 
 The attack was continued on the nth, several boats were 
 taken and retaken ; and as they were now much nearer the 
 main force of the enemy than ours, the only way to save the 
 provisions was to land them, and carry them up the hill to 
 camp. This was done, under fire, on the nth, with great 
 difficulty, and the loss of an officer and thirty men, a great part 
 of the sailors (made prisoners), of the boats, and of a consider- 
 able part of the provisions. The cannonade continued that 
 whole day, in front and rear, the outposts firing constantly 
 on each other ; and though the British fire drove the Americans 
 back over the Fish Kill, it was only to entrench themselves 
 opposite the fords. 
 
 That evening Burgoyne sent for Phillips and Riedesel. 
 He himself decided that it was equally impossible to attack 
 the enemy or to remain in their present insecure position. 
 Riedesel proposed to retire at once — that very night — taking 
 nothing with them but the provisions they could carry on 
 their backs, and to go, not to Fort Edward, but to a ford four 
 miles below, and there to ford the Hudson, and go on without 
 halting to Fort George — this, he said, was still practicable, 
 because the enemy had not yet occupied this road — on the 
 west side of the Hudson. But Burgoyne could not make up 
 his mind to this, and next day he still hesitated. Meanwhile 
 the Americans occupied all the posts as far as Fort Edward, 
 and extended their army across the British front. At three 
 in the afternoon of that day there was another Council, to 
 which Hamilton and Gall were admitted. Riedesel emphatic- 
 ally urged instant retreat — the least movement of the enemy 
 would make it impossible. Burgoyne agreed — and then it was 
 found that provisions for six days, which ought to have been 
 given out, had not been given. The order was repeated, and 
 it was arranged that the army should start between ten and 
 eleven that night. Exactly at ten Riedesel sent word to Burgoyne 
 that all was ready, but received the reply that it was too late 
 — the army must remain. 
 
THE NIGHT AFTER A DEFEAT 559 
 
 The situation was entirely changed. The scouts had 
 brought word that the enemy was strongly entrenched opposite 
 the ford, had a camp in force on the heights between Fort 
 Edward and Fort George, and parties along the whole shore — 
 "some so near us, and on our side of the water, that the 
 slightest movement must be instantly discovered." And every 
 hour reinforcements were pouring in to Gates, till he had at 
 least 16,000 men. By the morning of the 13th the army 
 was completely surrounded, and to attack the enemy must 
 cross a swampy ravine and a steep ascent, and "get so far from 
 the water, that he could have taken us in rear." The moment 
 for retreat was lost — perhaps it was never really possible, 
 especially as provisions were already running short — there was 
 enough for five days only ! 
 
 There was another Council that day— all the commanders 
 of battalions were called to it, down even to captains. Burgoyne 
 admitted the impossibility of a successful attack- — and even 
 if it did succeed, it would be impossible to reach Fort George 
 for want of provisions. The only chance for retreat was for 
 each man to cut his own way out, as best he could, through 
 the pathless forest ! But the army could still hold out the 
 five days ; only, as the centre and right of our position could 
 not be defended, the rout and utter destruction of the army was 
 not only probable but certain. 
 
 When Burgoyne had laid their terrible situation before the 
 Council, he showed the finest side of his character — the side 
 which ought to atone for many faults. In the most solemn 
 manner, he said that he alone was answerable for the condition 
 in which the army found itself, because he had never called a 
 Council — conceiving himself not at liberty to depart from his 
 orders. Riedesel heard this declaration with thankfulness — he 
 had feared that the blame of all would be laid upon himself, 
 and he begged the English officers to bear him witness if he 
 was ever called to account. 
 
 Then Burgoyne put these questions to the Council — 
 
 1. Was there, in the history of war, any example of an army 
 in such a position capitulating? 
 
 2. Could a capitulation be avoided in such a situation? 
 
 3. Was it certain that the situation was as bad as it looked ? 
 
 To the first question all answered that the situations of 
 the Saxon army at Pirna, of General Fink at Maxen, and of 
 Prince Maurice of Saxony were less hopeless, yet no one had 
 ever blamed those generals, who capitulated to save their 
 
S6o ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 armies — for if the King of Prussia cashiered Fink, it was from 
 personal dislike. To the second question, they answered that 
 a capitulation could not be avoided. To the third, they all 
 declared that if General Burgoyne thought an attack possible, 
 they were ready to offer their blood and their life. But if not, 
 they thought it better to save the army by an honourable 
 capitulation, while longer resistance was possible, than to wait 
 till their provisions were exhausted — when they must surrender 
 at discretion, or, by inviting an attack in that position, be 
 stormed and then singly destroyed. 
 
 Then Burgoyne produced the sketch for a capitulation, 
 and on its being approved by the Council, sent a flag to Gates 
 to ask for a parley. A conference was appointed for the 
 morning, Major Kingston was sent with Burgoyne's proposals, 
 and there was a cessation of arms. The proposals were for 
 surrender with the honours of war, the army not to serve 
 against America in the present war, or till exchanged. 
 
 Gates replied, demanding that the army should ground 
 arms within the encampment. Burgoyne replied that sooner 
 than submit to this humiliation the army would proceed to 
 any act of desperation. It seemed as though the treaty was 
 off — hostilities were resumed that night. But — possibly because 
 he had heard news of Sir Henry Clinton's advance — Gates 
 sent next morning (October 15) to say that the troops might 
 march out with the honours of war, and pile arms and leave 
 their artillery on the verge of the river — arras to be piled by 
 word of command from their own officers. He yielded several 
 minor points, but said that the army must leave the camp 
 that very day at 2 o'clock. 
 
 This sudden change, and the fixing of the hour, " set them 
 thinking." A Council was called, and the amendment was 
 accepted, but it was resolved that the time was too short, as this 
 was only a preliminary, and there were many other articles to be 
 settled before General Burgoyne could sign the Convention. A 
 Commission of staff-officers of both sides was proposed, and Suther- 
 land and Craig were named. The Commission remained together 
 till eleven that night, and separated, the Englishmen giving General 
 Burgoyne's word of honour — which they were empowered to do 
 — that the Convention should come back signed in the morning. 
 
 That night — the first for many a day — Riedesel slept in a bed. 
 About one in the morning he was aroused — someone wanted to 
 speak to him. His wife watched him reading the message, and 
 saw that he was annoyed. He sent the man to Headquarters, 
 
THE NIGHT AFTER A DEFEAT 561 
 
 and lay down again. Soon there came a message from the 
 Commander-in-Chief, for a Council very early in the morning. 
 
 The messenger had brought news — Sir Henry Clinton had not 
 only taken all the fortifications of the Highlands, but a week ago had 
 come as far up the river as Esopus, with his troops and the fleet, 
 and would probably soon be at Albany. On this Burgoyne and 
 several of his officers were so encouraged that they wanted to 
 break off negotiations, and the Council was called to see whether 
 they could do so with honour. A new set of questions was laid 
 before them — 
 
 1. Can a treaty which has been finally arranged by Commis- 
 saries with full powers, and after the promise of the General to 
 sign, as soon as the Commissaries make all plain, be broken off 
 with honour? 
 
 2. Is the news received certain enough to be the ground of 
 breaking off an agreement so favourable to us ? 
 
 3. Has the army spirit left in it, to defend itself in the present 
 position to the last man ? 
 
 To the first question, fourteen to eight were of opinion that 
 the treaty was already concluded, the enemy had granted all that 
 was asked, and it could not be broken off without dishonour. 
 
 On the second, votes were divided. The news was only 
 hearsay — at third hand. And even if the messenger himself had 
 seen Clinton's army at Esopus, the distance was so great that he 
 could not help us in time. 
 
 To the third, all the officers of the left wing said " Yes." Those 
 of the centre and right wing said that though their men would 
 show the greatest courage, if attacked, they all knew their position 
 was untenable, and it was to be feared they could not sustain an 
 attack. Riedesel declined to answer for his men in an enterprise 
 which had no hope of success. 
 
 There was, however, one last chance of gaining time. Burgoyne 
 had heard that Gates had detached a considerable part of his 
 army to Albany, while negotiations were going on. This would 
 be contrary to good faith, and Burgoyne was determined not to 
 capitulate unless assured that the enemy's force was at least from 
 three to four times larger than his own. He wrote to Gates to 
 this effect, and asked that a staff-officer might be allowed to see 
 his army, and judge if the superiority was as great as mentioned 
 — if so, he would at once sign. Gates replied on his word of 
 honour that his army was still of the same strength as when it 
 advanced before Saratoga — since that time he had received a 
 reinforcement of one brigade, and during the negotiations it had 
 
562 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 not been lessened by so much as a picket. To show his army 
 was out of the question. General Burgoyne had better think 
 well what he did if he broke his pledged word. Meanwhile he 
 pledged his own honour that his army was more than four times 
 as large, not counting the troops on the other side of Hudson. 
 But he could not wait more than an hour for the answer. 
 
 Again the Council assembled. The eight who were for breaking 
 off had changed their minds. Burgoyne drew Phillips and Riedesel 
 aside, and begged their friendly advice. After a silence, Riedesel 
 said that if General Burgoyne was called to account in England, it 
 would be for having got his army into this position, and because 
 he had not retreated in time to save his communications with Fort 
 George. But now to break off on such uncertain intelligence 
 was the most dangerous thing he could do. Hamilton said the 
 same, when asked. Phillips declined to offer an opinion in such a 
 situation. 
 
 All this time Wilkinson — who was one of the American Commis- 
 saries — was waiting by the ruins of Schuyler's house, and Gates was 
 sending every now and then to know if the matter was not settled. 
 The one hour had become two, and Gates had just sent word that 
 Wilkinson must break off the treaty if the Convention was not 
 signed in half an hour, when Sutherland and Craig returned with 
 it. It was the 17th of October, 1777. 
 
 The same afternoon the army marched out, and piled arms 
 by the river. With extraordinary delicacy General Gates ordered 
 his army to remain within their lines, that their presence might 
 not add to the humiliation of a brave enemy. 
 
 Then Burgoyne and all his officers rode to the camp to give 
 themselves up. 
 
 Burgoyne drew his sword, and presented it to Gates, who 
 instantly returned it. And now the American army was counted — 
 it was nearly 24,000. The British and German troops who sur- 
 rendered that day were reduced by battle, sickness, and desertion 
 
 to 5752. 
 
 Soon after this the Baroness received a message from her 
 husband that she might now rejoin him. As she drove through 
 the American camp in the caliche, she made the comforting 
 reflection that the Americans did not seem to regard her with ill- 
 will — they greeted her, and "showed pity to see a woman with 
 little children." As she approached the lines "a handsome man 
 came towards me, took the children from the carriage, kissed 
 them, and with tears in his eyes helped me to get down. ' You 
 tremble,' he said, ' don't be afraid ! '" He took her into Gates' 
 
THE NIGHT AFTER A DEFEAT 563 
 
 tent, where Gates was with Burgoyne and Phillips, "who were 
 quite friendly with him." The Generals were to dine with Gates. 
 The gentleman who had received her, came again and said, "It 
 would embarrass you to dine with all these gentlemen — come to 
 my tent." It was General Schuyler. 
 
 Note. — The terms finally agreed upon were that the army should march out of 
 camp with the honours of war, and all their artillery, to the verge of the river, 
 there to leave arms and artillery — the arms to be piled by word of command 
 from their own officers. A free passage to be granted to the army to Great 
 Britain, on condition of not serving again in the present war — to sail from the 
 port of Boston. The troops to be supplied on their march with provisions, at 
 the usual rates. Officers to retain carriages, horses, and baggage ; no baggage 
 to be searched, Lieut. -General Burgoyne giving his honour that no public 
 stores are secreted therein. All corps whatever of General Burgoyne's army to 
 be treated as British subjects. Canadians to be allowed to return, by the 
 shortest route, to the first British post on Lake George, and to be supplied 
 with provisions. Passports to be granted to three officers, not exceeding the 
 rank of Captain, to carry despatches from General Burgoyne to Sir William 
 Howe, Sir Guy Carleton, and to Great Britain (by way of New York) ; Major- 
 General Gates engaging the public faith that these despatches shall not be 
 opened. Officers when at Boston to wear their side-arms. The army to be 
 permitted to send to Canada for their clothing and baggage. 
 
CHAPTER LXVII 
 SIR HENRY CLINTON'S DIVERSION 
 
 "... had I known General Howe's situation or his intentions, I might, 
 instead of looking after cattle, have made my arrangements so as to have 
 pushed a little farther ... let his successes be ever so great to the south- 
 ward, the principal object still appears to me to have been a communication 
 with Burgoyne, and the establishing him at Albany. ... In short, with about 
 4000 Regulars, half foreigners, 3000 Provincials (who are eternally surprised), 
 little artillery, few officers and men, no chasseurs, no light infantry nor corps 
 (Vilite, nor no cavalry that I am at liberty to use, what can I do ? A great 
 extent of country to cover, and a most important place. This is my hard 
 fate, while others, my juniors, have most brilliant commands. I cannot, nor will 
 I submit to it, let the consequence be what it will." — Sir Henry Clititon to 
 General Hervey, from King's Bridge, Sept. 16, 1777. 
 
 As Burgoyne's whole plan supposed the co-operation of an army 
 from Nevp York, he naturally believed that Clinton had been 
 instructed by Howe to make it his own grand object. Clinton 
 does indeed explain that the silly incursion into the Jerseys, early 
 in September, was intended "to assist both armies, particularly 
 his" — meaning Burgoyne's. That expedition resulted in "a 
 little skirmishing with the enemy," and the collecting of about 
 400 head of cattle, "including 20 milch cows for the use of the 
 hospital," some sheep, and a few horses. It took place while 
 Burgoyne was crossing Hudson the first time. Clinton's letter 
 to Howe, of October 9, speaks only of his intention to attack 
 Forts Montgomery and Clinton, etc., "with the small force that 
 could be spared from the important post you had left under my 
 command." To General Hervey, at the War Office, he writes 
 of this as " a desperate attempt on a desperate occasion." ^ 
 (Poor Burgoyne was looking for him with a victorious army !) 
 Even before he could venture to detach this "small force" 
 Clinton was obliged to wait the arrival of the reinforcements, now 
 at sea " in Dutch bottoms." They arrived, after a three months' 
 voyage, on the 25th of September, and Clinton at once "called 
 in his guides," and ordered "hard bread" to be baked — all 
 ' These letters are given in Albemarle's Life of Lord Rockingham. 
 
 661 
 
SIR HENRY CLINTON'S DIVERSION 565 
 
 which was known to Putnam by the 29th of September, and word 
 sent to the American General George Clinton, who hastened to 
 Fort Montgomery with such force as he could collect. His 
 brother James commanded at Fort Clinton, within rifle-shot. 
 
 The American frigates and galleys stationed to protect the 
 (entirely futile) obstructions in the Hudson, slipped their cables 
 and tried to escape up river. But the wind was adverse, so their 
 crews set them on fire. They are described as making a magnifi- 
 cent spectacle — " pyramids of fire," lighting up river and mountains 
 with the glare of their conflagration. They were at a part famous 
 for echoes, and when the loaded cannon went off as the fire 
 reached them, the echoes reverberated along the rocky shore. 
 
 Sir Henry Clinton had made his plan with extreme skill ; but 
 even when the reinforcements came he had to wait for a wind. 
 With the galleys under Commodore Wallace, he stood up the 
 Hudson in the first days of October. Late on the night of the 
 4th, a letter from Putnam told Governor Clinton that the ships of 
 war were coming up the river, and had got as far as Tarrytown and 
 landed troops. Putnam had drawn back to the hills, and now sent 
 to the Governor for all the force he could spare — all the defences 
 of the Highlands were weak at this moment, for everyone who 
 could fight was gone to help Washington at Philadelphia or Gates in 
 the north. 
 
 The landing at Tarrytown was a feint. The British marched a 
 few miles into the country — then turned back, re-embarked quickly, 
 and went on to Verplanck's Point. There, on October 5, Sir 
 Henry landed 3000 men, eight miles below Peekskill ; and early 
 next morning, under cover of the fog, he crossed with 2000 of them 
 to Stoney Point, on the western shore of Haverstraw Bay. He 
 left the other thousand (chiefly loyalists) to seem to threaten 
 Peekskill. The simple old soldier Putnam had never been able 
 to understand Washington's marchings and counter-marchings — Sir 
 Henry was about to show him the use of such manoeuvres. 
 
 The troops landed at Stoney Point at daybreak of the 6th, and, 
 led by a Tory, made a detour of seven miles through the forest, 
 round the base of Thunder Hill.i Lieut.-Colonel Campbell com- 
 manded the regulars, and Colonel Beverley Robinson of New York 
 the New York Volunteers. General Vaughan, with the Grenadiers, 
 Dragoons, and Hessians, was to attack Fort Clinton. The 
 Grenadiers were led by young Lord Rawdon, who was afterwards to 
 make himself a name — he had with him as aide-de-camp his friend 
 the Polish Count Grabousky. 
 
 ' The Donderberg, 
 
566 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Governor Clinton's scouts brought him word in time for a 
 party with a brass field-piece to give Campbell a warm reception 
 in Bear Hill defile. Sir Henry, too, was opposed. The march 
 was difficult, and it was five in the afternoon before he was 
 at Fort Montgomery. Then the two Forts were attacked 
 simultaneously. The Americans made a desperate defence — 
 Governor CHnton hoped for reinforcements from Putnam, but his 
 messenger betrayed him, and Putnam did not know of his straits 
 until he heard the firing. Then he despatched 500 men; but they 
 had six miles to go and the river to cross, and before they arrived 
 all was over. Not, however, without a stubborn defence. The 
 Americans would not surrender — they were driven from redoubt to 
 redoubt at the point of the bayonet, and " fought their way out as 
 many as could." Governor Clinton himself leaped down the rocks, 
 and his brother James slid down a precipice into the ravine. The 
 British loss was considerable — about 250 killed and wounded, 
 Campbell, Grabousky, and Grant of the New York Volunteers 
 being among the killed. On this affair Sir Henry Clinton says 
 grimly : "As the soldiers were much irritated, as well by the 
 fatigue they had undergone and the opposition they met, as by 
 the loss of some brave and favourite officers, the slaughter of the 
 enemy was considerable." 
 
 It is worth noting that the pass by which Sir Henry Clinton 
 marched was the one which Washington had always said should be 
 looked to, as possible for a surprise ; but both Greene and Knox 
 thought it impracticable — and so it would have been if but a small 
 force had been there to hold it. 
 
 Governor George Clinton, meanwhile, was at New Windsor, not 
 far off, calling out the militia to prevent assistance being sent to 
 Burgoyne. On October 9 two persons coming from Fort 
 Montgomery were caught by Governor Clinton's guards and 
 brought before him. One was much agitated, and was seen to put 
 something into his mouth and swallow it. An emetic was ad- 
 ministered — whereupon he brought up a silver bullet. Before he 
 could be prevented he had swallowed it again, but on his refusing 
 a second emetic, George Clinton threatened to hang him and cut 
 open his body. So he submitted.^ The bullet reappeared — it 
 was small and oval, and unscrewed. It contained a thin slip of 
 paper, on which was written, " Oct. 8. Fort Montgomery. Nous y 
 void, and nothing between us and Gates. I sincerely hope this 
 little success of ours will facilitate your operations." 
 
 Poor Burgoyne never received this comforting message, and if he 
 
 ' This messenger, too, was hanged as a spy. 
 
SIR HENRY CLINTON'S DIVERSION 567 
 
 had it could not have saved him, for Sir Henry could do no more, 
 and what he had done was not enough. 
 
 On October 13 and 14 Sir Henry wrote two long letters to 
 General Hervey. They are highly confidential, and enable us to 
 follow the developments of the situation as no other account does. 
 They begin with jubilation — Sir Henry did not really think his a 
 "little success." Rewrote to Hervey, " this is the severest stroke 
 that has ever been struck ; all their forts between New York and 
 Albany destroyed; all their ships and vessels for 150 miles taken or 
 burnt ... at the instant I write this, our little fleet and army are 
 possibly within 30 miles of Albany. In short, if Burgoyne holds 
 there, or even is able to make a good retreat to Canada, I think 
 these people will sue for peace." He encloses an intercepted letter 
 from " the rebel Governor of this State," and adds, " you see the 
 consequence of this stroke." He sends "the letters between 
 Burgoyne and me, before I attempted it . . . my letters, wrote in 
 cyphers, describe the defenceless state I have been left in," and 
 how little help I can give. " Not a line from the Commander-in- 
 Chief these 6 weeks." The attempt in Jersey was meant "to 
 assist both armies, particularly his" (Burgoyne's). The day I 
 landed there (September 12), sent him three lines in cypher. 
 " You know my poverty, but if with 2000 men, which is all I can 
 spare from this important post, I can do anything to facilitate your 
 operations, I will make an attack upon Fort Montgomery, if you 
 will let me know your wishes." On the 30th he got an answer by 
 the same messenger. " I have lost the old cypher. . . . An attack, 
 or even the menace of an attack, on Fort Montgomery will be of 
 use ; it will stir them from before me, and I will follow them close. 
 Do it, my dear friend, directly." A second letter said that even 
 keeping the Fort besieged would help. " Lose no time." It was 
 now that Clinton resolved on the " desperate attempt in a desperate 
 situation"- — he had no hope of taking the Forts. He complains 
 that Burgoyne never made him acquainted with his real situation, 
 "till I was entering upon action." On the night of October 5, 
 when he was already at Verplanck's Point, waiting to cross the 
 Hudson, " a confidential messenger " arrived from Burgoyne, with a 
 verbal account of the situation — he had lost his communications 
 with Canada, but had provisions to the 20th — was in a very strong 
 post, but so were the rebels. Did not doubt he could face them 
 and get to Albany, but doubted whether he could subsist when 
 there — the country there being drained; so would not go unless 
 Clinton could open communications between New York and 
 Albany. Awaited Clinton's orders whether he should attack the 
 
568 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 rebels, or retire across the Lakes, while they are clear from ice. If he 
 did not hear from Chnton by the 12th of October, would retire. 
 Clinton's remarks on this letter prove his (and therefore Howe's) 
 complete ignorance of the "plan." He is " astonished "—and 
 indignant — first, even a menace would do all that is wanted — 
 " Now he expects me with a thousand men (or what I could spare 
 after taking the posts) to penetrate to Albany, which he with 7000 
 could not do.'' 
 
 Clinton sent this messenger back to say that, "not having 
 received instructions from Sir William Howe relative to the operations 
 of the northerii army, ignorant of the General's intentions respecting 
 it (except his wish that it should get to Albany), he could not 
 presume to order or advise," but " if my unexpected success (as the 
 river is now open) decides him (Burgoyne) to attack the rebels and 
 he can get to Albany, I will do my utmost to communicate with him 
 and give him a supply of provisions." He has not heard from 
 General Howe for six weeks (hears of his victories, " but not 
 confirmed"), and does not know where Washington is; has left a 
 small force in New York, and has a communication of 140 miles 
 between New York and Albany to keep open, and this important 
 post we have now taken to garrison. " It was rather too greatly 
 daring,'' but he determined to venture 1700 men under Vaughan up 
 the river, under convoy of Sir James Wallace and the galleys, " to 
 feel for General Burgoyne " ; and he had got ready provisions for 
 Burgoyne's army for six months, in vessels small enough to go 
 within a few miles of Albany, when a letter reached him from Howe, 
 to say that his victories were by no means decisive, " and even if I 
 had started up the river, unless my object was of the greatest 
 importance, and could be accomplished in a few days, I was to give 
 it up, and send him full 6000 men." 
 
 Even now, however, Clinton does not seem afraid for Burgoyne 
 — he thinks he has probably retreated across the Lakes. His chief 
 complaint is the being ordered to reinforce Howe. It is a 
 " mortifying service," " mortifying commands." He is sick of it. 
 " I will do all I can for this campaign, but I will close with it." If 
 he regrets his useless incursion into Jersey, it is not, however, 
 because he had better have helped Burgoyne, but because he had 
 better have helped Howe ! " Had I known Howe's situation or 
 intentions, I might have pushed on, instead of looking for cattle '' 
 — but must be careful with Putnam and four brigades, and 
 numerous militia so near me. ..." We have no certain accounts 
 from Burgoyne, but by all I hear, he has not $000 men opposed to 
 him," 
 
SIR HENRY CLINTON'S DIVERSION 569 
 
 It is strange that he still thought this. For on the loth Captain 
 Scott of the 53rd had reached him with despatches from Burgoyne. 
 Scott had been thirteen days on the way, and a dozen times had 
 most narrowly escaped the fate of the unhappy bearer of the silver 
 bullet. He had been compelled to waste whole days lying hidden 
 in woods, to avoid the rebel patrols — sometimes actually hearing 
 the voices of those who were searching for him. He could not 
 learn where Sir Henry was, and was going on to New York, when 
 he heard he was at Fort Montgomery — and there at last he found 
 him, three days after Burgoyne had fought his second battle. 
 Clinton sent back Scott instantly — not even now fully realising the 
 imminence of the peril. But Scott never reached Burgoyne. He 
 could find no one to guide him. He was assured by every Tory he 
 met that the British had already capitulated ; very lucky he thought 
 himself to get safe into New York with the evil tidings. 
 
CHAPTER LXVIIl 
 HOW THE NEWS CAME TO LONDON AND PARIS 
 
 " All Europe is on our side of the question, as far as applause and good 
 wishes can carry them. ... It is a common observation here (in Paris) that 
 our cause is the cause of allimankind." — Franklin to Dr. Samuel Cooper, May I, 
 1777. 
 
 " For my part, I cannot think the condition of the British empire bettered by 
 one part of its forces having lost several thousand men in butchering as many 
 more of those we vainly wish to call our subjects ; nor can I think that any 
 victories, or any submission, can secure to us the possession of a country we 
 have so unpardonably injured." — The Duke of Richmond to the Marquis of 
 Rockingham, Nov. 2, 1777-^ 
 
 "It does not become your lordships . . . to retire to your country seats for six 
 weeks, in quest of joy and merriment, while the real state of public affairs calls 
 for grief, mourning, and lamentation. ... A remonstrance, my lords, should 
 be carried to the Throne. The King has been deluded by his Ministers." — 
 Chatham, Dec. 11, 1777. 
 
 " Lord Amherst ... is clear that after the disaster of Burgoyne not less than 
 an additional army ... of 40,000 men can carry on with any eifect an offensive 
 land war."— 7%£ King to North, Jan. 13, 1778. 
 
 For twelve months the American Commissioners in Paris had 
 received no instructions from home. Their chief reason for 
 hoping their cause was not going very ill was their knowledge 
 that the rate of insurance in London against capture by American 
 privateers had been as high as 60 per cent. 
 
 Franklin had occupied himself much in attempts to alleviate 
 the sufferings of American prisoners. Through his friend David 
 Hartley he had, from his own resources, relieved many of those 
 imprisoned in England. In February, 1777, he and Deane wrote 
 to Lord Stormont on the subject of exchanging, but the Ambassador 
 returned no answer. In April they wrote again, remonstrating 
 more particularly on " the compelling men by chains, stripes, and 
 famine, to fight against their friends and relations," and the 
 "sending American prisoners of war to Africa and Asia, remote 
 
 ^ Before the news of Saratoga came. 
 670 
 
HOW THE NEWS CAME TO LONDON 571 
 
 from all probability of exchange, and where they can scarce hope 
 ever to hear from their families, even if the unwholesomeness of 
 the climate does not put an end to their lives." Such conduct, 
 said Franklin, had no precedent to justify it, unless that of the 
 " black savages of Guinea. " To this Stormont had replied 
 rudely: "The King's Ambassador receives no applications 
 from rebels, unless they come to implore his Majesty's 
 mercy.'' 
 
 Franklin sent this reply back to Stormont, with a note in 
 which he called it "the enclosed indecent paper," which they 
 had received "as coming from your Lordship," and now return, 
 "for your Lordship's more mature consideration." 
 
 Franklin drew up a statement of the usage the prisoners had 
 received. He sent a copy to Hartley, with a letter in which he 
 said that in revising he had " found too much warmth in it," and 
 had been about to strike out some parts. "Yet I let them go, 
 as they will afford you this one reflection : ' If a man, naturally 
 cool, and rendered still cooler by old age, is so warmed by our 
 treatment of his country, how much more must those people in 
 general be exasperated against us? And why are we making 
 inveterate enemies by our barbarity, not only of the present 
 inhabitants of a great country, but of their infinitely more 
 numerous posterity, who will in future ages detest the name of 
 'Englishman, as much as the children in Holland now do those 
 of Alva and Spaniard!' " 
 
 In a letter of about the same date to Priestley, Franklin says, 
 " It is now impossible to persuade our people, as I long endeavoured, 
 that the war was purely ministerial." An endeavour branded in 
 England as the very climax of rebel hypocrisy. 
 
 Franklin established a little printing-press at his house in 
 Passy, and occasionally printed a tract or handbill. From this 
 press was issued the Independent Chronicle, with an account of the 
 scalps sent to the British authorities in Canada. This account 
 was long taken for a genuine document. Franklin, however, 
 admitted that he wrote it, but declared that although taken as a 
 whole it was fictitious, everything stated in it had actually occurred 
 in the course of the war. 
 
 In October the Envoys were privately told that they asked 
 too much in asking for the recognition of Independence— it might 
 embroil Europe. In November de Vergennes told them that 
 perhaps the King would lend Congress a million livres, and try 
 to persuade his good brother of Spain to do the same. And 
 perhaps he would take that ship off their hands, which they were 
 
572 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 building in Holland, and could neither pay for nor get safely to a 
 French port. But more than this was impossible, unless the 
 Americans gained some important military success. 
 
 The dearth of news caused them, therefore, all the more acute 
 anxiety, and on November 27, when the Envoys met at Passy, 
 Lee was very despondent, but Franklin said America could go on 
 even without help — and perhaps the less help from Europe the 
 better. But the danger of Philadelphia and the early successes of 
 Burgoyne were known, and Franklin's anxiety became terrible as 
 autumn wore on to winter. 
 
 On the 1st of December Jonathan Loring Austin, Secretary 
 to the Massachusetts Board of War, landed at Nantes, thirty-one 
 days from Boston. The news of his coming flew up to Paris before 
 him, and on the 4th all the American Agents hurried out to 
 Passy — -the two Lees, Izard, Silas Deane, Dr. Bancroft, 
 Beaumarchais ; and when they heard the chaise drive into the 
 courtyard they all went out, and before Austin could alight, 
 Franklin cried, " Sir, is Philadelphia taken ? " " Yes, Sir." Then 
 Franklin clasped his hands, and turned back to the house. " But, 
 Sir," cried Austin, "I have greater news than that — General 
 Burgoyne and his whole army are prisoners of war ! " 
 
 Deane said this news was like a cordial to the dying. An 
 express was sent to Vergennes at Versailles, Dr. Bancroft set out 
 for London (where no doubt he reported all he knew to the 
 Government) ; and Beaumarchais drove to Paris at such a rate 
 that the chaise upset and his arm was dislocated. In a few 
 days all Europe had the news, and almost all Europe rejoiced 
 at it. England had held her head very high since the Seven 
 Years' War, and her defeated enemies were not sorry to hear 
 that the tailors and cobblers of America were avenging 
 them. 
 
 All was now changed for the American Envoys. The 
 Secretary of the Council called upon them, de Vergennes 
 congratulated them. They were asked now to renew their 
 proposals for a commercial alliance. Soon Gibbon wrote, "The 
 two greatest nations in Europe are fairly running a race for the 
 favour of America." Marie-Antoinette received Franklin privately. 
 Wherever he went he had an ovation. At the Academy, 
 d'Alembert told him he had wrenched the thunderbolt from the 
 cloud, and the sceptre from tyrants. Voltaire and Franklin were 
 presented to each other — amidst great applause they took each 
 other by the hand; it was insisted that they should embrace in 
 French fashion, and the two great old men solemnly kissed each 
 
HOW THE NEWS CAME TO LONDON 573 
 
 other, to the enthusiasm of the Academicians, who cried that it 
 was Solon and Sophocles. Through it all, Franklin's head was 
 not turned — his simple, shrewd, Quaker nature remained undazzled 
 by all this outward show. As he had been the most calm and 
 hopeful in adversity, so he was the least puffed up in prosperity— a 
 venerable and dignified figure, humorously aware of the contrast 
 he presented to the gay gold-fish of the Court, whom he, for his 
 part, regarded with genial kindness — the same Dr. Franklin in 
 Paris as in Philadelphia, the wise and kindly philosopher of 
 Commonsense — the wonderful, indomitable old man, who at 
 seventy-five helped to found a nation, and never grew too old to 
 laugh. 
 
 In England there had been a growing anxiety about Burgoyne, 
 ever since his dismal despatch of August 20, from "the camp 
 nearly opposite Saratoga'' — full of bad news — bad weather, bad 
 roads, scarcity of provisions through the scarcity of horses and 
 oxen — fifteen days' heavy work giving only four days' provision in 
 hand ; the failure at Bennington, the death of Baum, and the 
 unfortunate affair of Fort Stanwix. After this had come a long 
 silence. There was an uneasy feeling that he was a long while 
 getting to Albany.i But in November came a report that Arnold 
 had surrendered with 12,000 men; and two days later came news 
 of the fall of Philadelphia. 
 
 Parliament met November 18. Chatham was well enough 
 to move an Amendment to the Address — supplicating his Majesty 
 to restore peace to America, by the immediate cessation of 
 hostilities, and the opening of a treaty. He denounced the 
 employment of Indians — on which Suffolk said "it was perfectly 
 justifiable to use all the means that God and Nature put into our 
 hands." This brought up Chatham again in a fury, to ask whether 
 we were to say God put the scalping-knife into our hands? 
 Ministers said that if they had not secured the Indians, the rebels 
 would have done so — a statement notoriously contrary to fact, 
 as the American Leaders had done their utmost to persuade 
 the Indians to remain neutral; and both Schuyler and Gates 
 had solemnly warned the Six Nations in particular to keep 
 out of this quarrel. Ministerialists then accused Chatham of 
 having used Indians himself in the Seven Years' War. But he 
 showed that they were only used as scouts, and to assist the troops 
 
 ' In November, 1777, "Capability" Brown wrote to Lady Chatham that he 
 thought we were " in great distress "—the bad news was well authenticated, the 
 good had no confirmation. Amherst was cheering the Court with the total 
 annihilation of Washington's army, etc. 
 
S74 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 in laborious duties — never for military purposes. And Lord 
 Townshend — who succeeded to the command when Wolfe fell — 
 said the same, and added that they never stained the British 
 arms by any crime. 
 
 Of course the Amendments were lost by large majorities. 
 On December 2 Fox demanded an Enquiry into the State 
 of the Nation, the expenses of the War, the resources we 
 possess to continue it, and what the Howes had actually done 
 as Commissioners for Peace. North was obliged to say he 
 agreed — enquiry would show how flourishing we were. But in- 
 convenient papers must not be asked for. Fox enumerated 
 the papers he wanted, and North said he must object to the 
 motion — the production of these papers would lead to dis- 
 coveries prejudicial to the country. Sergeant Adair suggested 
 that the Minister meant prejudicial to Administration, and then 
 the whole of Opposition fell upon the unhappy Minister, who 
 knew that to-morrow the news about Burgoyne must be 
 known. Fox said that ever since a certain noble lord (Germaine) 
 had presided over American affairs, scalping, tomahawk measures 
 had been pursued — bleeding has been his only prescription ! 
 By the great majority of 178 to 89 the House rejected the 
 Motion for Enquiry. That night the news of Saratoga reached 
 London. 
 
 Next day, Barr^ insisting on knowing the number of troops 
 in America, Barrington gave it as 55,096 — 14,000 under 
 Carleton, 20,000 under Howe, and the rest — some of them 
 Provincials — in different places. On this Byng asked why 
 General Howe always attacked General Washington with an 
 inferior force — yesterday Howe had only 13,000, now he has 
 20,000. Why did he attack with only 15,000? 
 
 Germaine replied that 20,000 was counting the sick and 
 wounded — and the artillery officers. He was floundering on 
 about "effective men with arms on their shoulders" when 
 Barre rose again, and called on him to declare, " upon his honour," 
 what was become of General Burgoyne, and whether he had or 
 had not received despatches from Quebec to say that Burgoyne 
 had surrendered himself and his whole army prisoners of war ? 
 
 There was no escape — it was a worse moment than Minden. 
 The wretched Colonial Secretary protested his constant readi- 
 ness to tell all he knew, and now he knew it was his duty 
 to tell the House that he had received a piece of very unhappy 
 intelligence — not yet authenticated, to be sure — he hoped the 
 House would suspend judgment — he was willing to submit 
 
rtUW THE NEWS CAME TO LONDON 575 
 
 his conduct in planning this most unfortunate affair — a Minister 
 ought always to be ready to have his conduct scrutinised. 
 Then he sat down, and Opposition poured forth the vials of 
 its wrath upon him — Barrd telling him that the plan was too 
 absurd for an Indian Chief — " I foretold the event from the 
 first." And now the men you used to call cowards have 
 compelled a British General — and a very brave man, too — 
 to surrender a whole army ! The House was very angry, but 
 it would have been more angry still if it had known about the 
 despatch which was never signed or sent.^ 
 
 In the first moment of dismay there was a general cry for 
 peace. Then the country thought better of it, and cried 
 instead for more troops. On the 5th Hartley made a motion 
 on the Enormous Expenses of the American War — 20 millions 
 spent already, and perhaps 20,000 lives. By the end of the next 
 campaign it will be 30 to 40 millions. "I told you, three years 
 ago, America would turn out an army of 50,000 men, and 
 you laughed at me. Franklin warned you — you would not 
 believe him." The motion was lost without a division, and on 
 the nth Parliament went home for six weeks' holiday. 
 Chatham protested in vain.^ The Lords felt they had done 
 their duty — they had suspended Habeas Corpus. In the 
 Commons, North said he was sure France and Spain did not 
 mean to molest us, and he could not see the most distant 
 motive for not adjourning— nothing will happen, and by the 
 time you come back we will have thought out a plan for 
 conciliation. 
 
 In vain Opposition warned him of the ugly reports from 
 France. They went off to keep Christmas. Stocks had fallen 
 from 141 to 120, and everybody was abusing the Howes. 
 
 At the end of 1777 the complaints of the treatment of 
 American prisoners in England had spread to France — in 
 particular the charge that some of them had been forced, under 
 threats of death, to enter for life into the service of the East 
 India Company. Those in England were starving. The 
 persons who had the contracts for feeding them, "considered 
 their offices only as lucrative jobs." On the nth of December 
 
 ^ In the debate, Wedderburn expatiated on his own honesty. Burlce laughed 
 aloud. The House was silent. Wedderburn said he would teach Burke manners. 
 Burke walked out, and Wedderburn thought he was gone to send him a 
 challenge ! He wrote an apology, and afterwards sent Fox with a verbal one. 
 
 * Suffolk brutally told Chatham he only wanted the House to sit, because he 
 would not be allowed to give his advice anywhere else. (December ii, 1777.) 
 
576 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Lord Abingdon brought the case of these poor prisoners 
 before the Lords. Some of his statements are almost incred- 
 ible. It seems that most Americans had "religious objections" 
 to inoculating for the small-pox. "In one of the prisons, 
 a prisoner was inoculated ; and after the eruption appeared, 
 the patient was put into a cell with five Americans who had 
 never had the disorder." He moved for all Instructions to 
 gaolers concerned with the prisoners of war, and reminded 
 their lordships — in case humanity did not move them — that 
 there was such a thing as retaliation. " You are taking them 
 by fifties and hundreds — they are taking you by whole 
 armies." If Howe does not shift his position, Burgoyne's fate 
 will be his. After a little wriggling, Suffolk pledged his honour 
 to give the returns. Abingdon's motion was agreed to, and 
 the House proceeded to debate on Lord Oxford's motion 
 for adjournment to the 20th of January, 1778. In vain 
 Chatham protested against adjournment, " at a time when the 
 affairs of this country present prospects full of awe, terror, 
 and impending danger." The only army you have in America 
 may by this time be no more. Most critical events may 
 take place before our next meeting. The King has been 
 deluded by his Ministers. The nation has been betrayed into an 
 American war " by the arts of imposition, by their own credulity, 
 by false hopes, false pride, promised advantages." At least, 
 consider the state of our home defence ! Suppose we have thirty- 
 five ships of the line fit for actual service ? Would that give us 
 the command of the Channel ? I am certain, if it did, every other 
 part of our possessions must be left naked and defenceless. 
 
 " Here, and in many other parts of his speech, his lord- 
 ship broadly hinted that the House of Bourbon was meditating 
 some decisive and important blow near home." Where shall 
 we procure men? Recruits are not to be had here, and 
 Germany will give us no more. " Ministers have, I hear, 
 applied to the Swiss Cantons. The idea is proposterous ! 
 The Swiss never permit their troops to go beyond sea.'' 
 
 Then he came to America. " My lords, we have not, nor can 
 procure, any force sufficient to subdue America. It is monstrous 
 to think of it. I call upon any noble lord, who is conversant with 
 military affairs, to say that the military force now in the kingdom 
 is adequate for defence, or that any force to be procured from 
 Germany, Switzerland, or elsewhere will be equal to the conquest 
 of America ! You talk of conciliation — and the men who are 
 to treat are the very men who are the authors of our misfortunes t 
 
HOW THE NEWS CAME TO LONDON 577 
 
 They have used the German bayonet and the Indian tomahawk, 
 and now they propose to conciHate ! " 
 
 Then he praised the conduct of the Americans in the moment 
 of victory. They have set Ministers an example of moderation 
 and magnanimity which they would do well to imitate ! And now 
 you propose to adjourn — I believe that before the day to which 
 you adjourn the noble lord will have cause to regret his motion ! 
 
 Shelburne in the most pitiless manner showed up the absurd 
 conduct of the war. Howe was sent into Jersey " to look Mr. 
 Washington in the face, and then turn his back upon him." 
 Burgoyne was ordered to march to New York and effect a junction 
 with Howe. Howe goes aboard his ships, and "gets on the other 
 side of Philadelphia." Meanwhile General Burgoyne is surrounded, 
 and applies for succour to General Clinton. General Clinton is 
 in the act of complying, when Mr. Howe orders him to send him 
 a reinforcement of 4000 men. If I do not hear full and sufficient 
 reasons for all this, " I protest I think Mr. Howe would deserve 
 to be brought home in chains ! " 
 
 It was all of no use — the Lords, by more than three to one, 
 voted for adjournment to the 20th of January. And so the last 
 chance was lost. 
 
 Out of Parliament, something was done for the prisoners. On 
 December 24 a meeting was held in London to raise a subscrip- 
 tion for blankets, shoes, coats, linen, etc., for the American 
 prisoners — then stated to be in all about five or six hundred. 
 ^4657 was collected in a few weeks, when the subscription 
 was rather suddenly closed. The prisoners of Plymouth, in 
 a petition to "certain noble lords," say they are 140 — "all 
 of us in want of warm clothing, as well as of almost every 
 other comfort ; and many are actually without a shoe or stocking 
 to their feet. A brutal overseer detains every charitable supply 
 sent by humane neighbours, or sells it and retails the money 
 at his pleasure — in so parsimonious a manner as to render it of 
 little or no use." This scoundrel had cut off their supply of 
 milk, and allowed them neither fire nor candle. Five commanders 
 or masters of ships, a surgeon, and several sailors signed this 
 petition. 
 
 As soon as Parliament rose, great private efforts were made to 
 raise troops. The gentlemen of Manchester and Liverpool joined 
 in subscribing for two regiments of 500 men each.i In all, 15,000 
 men were added to the forces by private means, and the Court 
 
 ' The more Jacobite the towns had been, the more zealous they were now 
 for the war. 
 
 VOL. I. — 37 
 
578 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 talked big of sending out 26,000 in April. But for three years 
 there had been a dearth of recruits. Not a man more was to be 
 had from Germany — Frederick had refused passage to the last 
 consignment of Anspachers, and he and the Emperor ^ had 
 determined that no more Germans should be sent to America. 
 George in was delighted with the pubhc spirit of his people, until 
 he found that the Manchester gentlemen wanted to have a voice 
 in the appointment of officers and in promotions. This, he wrote 
 to North, would give such a general disgust to the army that it 
 would be "more disserviceable than advantageous." ^ 
 
 ^ Joseph 11, son of Maria-Theresa. 
 
 ^ " I hope Lord North will do his utmost to prevent the forming any more 
 offers of new corps ; they will . . . only perplex and totally anihilate all 
 chance of compleating the regular forces, which alone in time of need can be 
 depended on." — The King to Lord North, January 15, 1778. 
 
CHAPTER LXIX 
 THE FRENCH TREATY 
 
 "The infinite number of addresses printed in your gazette, all approving the 
 conduct of your government towards us . . . the great majority in Parliament 
 . . . and the rejoicings on occasion of any news of the slaughter of an innocent 
 and virtuous people ... all join in convincing us, that you are no longer the 
 magnanimous, enlightened nation we once esteemed you." — Franklin to David 
 Hartley, Oct. 14, 1777. 
 
 "You will never find any occasion of providing for your children that I shall 
 not be more happy if possible than yourself to provide for them. It has not 
 been my fate in general to be well served ; by you I have, and therefore cannot 
 forget it." — The King to Lord North, March 31, 1776. 
 
 " I should have been greatly hurt at the inclination expressed by you to 
 retire, had I not known that, however you may be now and then inclined to 
 despond, yet that you have too much personal affection for me, and sense of 
 honour, to allow such a thought to take any hold on your mind." — The King 
 to Lord North, Jan. 31, 1778, 25 min. pt. i p.m. 
 
 There is abundant evidence, from the letters of George iii, that 
 as affairs in America assumed a more serious aspect North's 
 courage failed him. How could it be otherwise? He was not, 
 like his master, buoyed up by false hopes — the denunciations 
 and prophecies of Opposition awakened terrible echoes in his 
 heart. But in the mass of public and private correspondence 
 preserved among the papers of those who took part in these 
 affairs, it is easy to see why North consented to remain. We 
 may allow something for the influence of a strong will over a 
 weak one ; but North had more solid reasons for not breaking 
 with the King. Among the Abergavenny Papers there is a letter 
 from Robinson — Manager of the Bribes — to the King, which 
 throws light on North's private affairs. Robinson represents North 
 as much embarrassed — does not think his whole estate, including 
 Lady North's, is "near so much nett" as ^^2500 a year; and 
 " from situation Lord North can't minutely attend to the economy 
 of it, so his expenses, he has told Mr. R. repeatedly, have every 
 year since he was First Lord of the Treasury very largely exceeded 
 
 his income." All this "without any extravagance," but he has 
 
 579 
 
58o ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 so large a family. What with money borrowed, and debts to 
 tradesmen, he owes near ^^10,000. At least he has told Mr. 
 Robinson frequently that that sum would set him clear. Robinson 
 gently hints that these anxieties, and " the perplexities of his 
 public situation," are too much for him to bear — though otherwise 
 he does not feel unequal in any respect to the business of 
 Parliament. With a final hint that Lord North's delicacy and 
 natural reservedness prevent his stating his situation to his 
 Majesty, and " depending on your royal munificence." ^ 
 
 Robinson's letter is dated September 19, 1777; and the very 
 same day the King wrote to North — ■ 
 
 "Kew, September 19th, 1777, 46 min. pt. II a.m. 
 
 " Lord North, — I have now signed the last warrant for paying 
 up the arrears due on my Civil List, and therefore seize with 
 pleasure this instant to insist on doing the same for you, my dear 
 Lord. You have at times droped to me that you had been in 
 debt ever since your first settling in life ... if 12 or 15,000 will 
 set your affairs in order, nay, if ^"20,000 is necessary, I am resolved 
 you shall have no other person concerned in freeing them but 
 myself . . . You know me very ill if you do not think that of 
 all the letters I have ever wrote to you this one gives me most 
 pleasure. . . . Your conduct at a critical minute I never can 
 forget, and am glad that by your ability and the kindness of 
 Parliament I am enabled to give you this mark of my affection, 
 which is the only one I have ever yet been able to perform, but 
 trust some of the employments for life will in time become vacant, 
 that I may reward your family." ^ 
 
 From this time Parliament was almost wholly occupied with 
 the situation. Opposition made motion after motion — " On the 
 State of the Nation," " On Clothing the New Levies raised without 
 Consent of Parliament," ^ "On the Navy Estimates," "On the 
 State of the Army" — moved by the Duke of Richmond in the 
 Lords, and by Fox in the Commons, where it merged into a 
 motion, "That no more of the Old Corps be sent out of the 
 Kingdom." This debate* excited so much interest that "a vast 
 multitude assembled in the lobby and environs of the House," 
 and not being able to get in " by intreaty or interest," forced their 
 
 ^ Abergavenny Papers^ p. 18. 
 
 ^ Correspondence of George III with Lord North. 
 
 * In the Debate on the Levies, Burke told North that he might as well expect 
 his garter to save him from the gout, as his talking about the Constitution to 
 save him from enquiry. 
 
 * February 2, 1778. 
 
THE FRENCH TREATY 581 
 
 way to the gallery in spite of the doorkeepers. The House 
 "considered the intrusion in a heinous light," and ordered the 
 gallery to be cleared. The gentlemen withdrew, but the ladies 
 were allowed to remain ; till Governor Johnstone said, if the motive 
 for excluding strangers was secrecy, the ladies were no more capable 
 of keeping secrets than the men — whereupon the ladies were 
 turned out too.i 
 
 Then Fox recapitulated the Government measures since 1774, 
 when that "most unfortunate agreement with the East India 
 Company" became "the immediate source of all the troubles 
 that have since followed." Ministers had committed the capital 
 mistake of thinking that Massachusetts Bay was "the American 
 empire." They forgot Virginia — they did not think it possible 
 any other colony would join Massachusetts — they thought they 
 were fighting one province, when they were fighting thirteen. 
 The Punitive Acts made the Americans abhor our injustice, 
 while the Quebec Act seemed intended to show them what sort 
 of government we meant to set up instead of their own. " From 
 the moment the Quebec Act passed, there was only one party 
 in America; it stopt the mouths of the moderate party." 
 Another silly idea of Ministers was, that these Acts would execute 
 themselves. Then they discovered that the cause of Boston was 
 the cause of America, so they passed more laws, and sent out 
 a large reinforcement with three able generals. The Americans 
 thereupon became still more united; and the armies that were 
 sent out did more harm to our friends the Tories than to our 
 enemies the Whigs. Next, Ministers rejected the last effort of 
 the moderate party — the New York Petition. Then he described 
 the military operations — the result of the first campaign was that 
 General Howe was driven out of Boston. He took New York, 
 gained two or three battles — and then came Trenton. In our 
 last campaign we have got three towns instead of one — and we 
 have had the affair of Burgoyne. The question now is. Can we 
 go on? Our credit is already more shaken than it was at the 
 
 ' They came to hear Fox. When the gentlemen had been turned out, 
 Johnstone, whose friends had been banished, shouted that "AH must go." 
 "A scene of great agitation followed. Amid the unusual flutter of lace, silk 
 and spangles, demonstrations of resistance were not imperceptible. But at last 
 the ladies, amounting to more than sixty in number, and including Lady Norton, 
 the wife of the Speaker, and the young and beautiful Georgiana, Duchess of 
 Devonshire, were obliged to xtiue."— {Public Advertiser of February 3, 1778, 
 and Ilatsell's Precedents, ii. 172.) After Burke's great speech, Johnstone 
 congratulated Ministers on having turned out strangers— if they had heard 
 the speech they might have torn Ministers to pieces ! 
 
582 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 end of a six years' war with France. The papers on the table 
 show that it will be very imprudent to send any more troops 
 out of the kingdom. The peace establishment of Great Britain 
 has been 17,000. "I think it too high; but such it has been 
 of late years; 17,000 for Great Britain, 12,000 for Ireland; 3500 
 for Gibraltar, and 2300 for Minorca. This makes altogether 
 34,800." This is for peace. But various reasons make us fear 
 war. Fox then showed from the papers on the table that the 
 whole number of troops now in Great Britain did not exceed 
 15,000, and in Ireland 8000. "I think, Sir, it would be madness 
 to part with any more of our army." 
 
 " To the great surprise of everybody out of doors," no one 
 made the smallest reply to Fox, but his motion was lost by 
 165 to 259. 
 
 On the 6th the Lords examined witnesses as to the Com- 
 mercial Losses occasioned by the American War. Alderman 
 Woolbridge gave the number of ships taken or destroyed by 
 American privateers at 559 — their value, on a very moderate 
 calculation, at p^i, 800,633, i8s. Of these ships, 247 traded 
 to the West Indies. He had made his calculation with the help 
 of " Mr. Hake, secretary to the subscribers to Lloyd's Coffee-house, 
 where a book, containing a faithful register of all the ships that 
 sailed outward, or were entered inward," from all parts of Great 
 Britain and Ireland, is kept "with the most minute correctness." 
 Insurance used to be 2 per cent, to America ; is now more than 
 double, even with convoy; and without convoy is 15 per cent. 
 Seamen's wages have gone up from 25 and 28 to 55 and 
 65 shillings a month. There have been upon the seas 173 sail 
 of American privateers, with at least 13,000 seamen and 2000 
 guns. The American War has caused many bankruptcies — 
 when the Prohibitory Act passed, there was about two millions 
 sterling due to British merchants from America. In the six 
 months' grace allowed by the Act, the Americans transmitted 
 about _;^5oo,ooo worth of goods, in part-payment — these goods, 
 were they now on hand, would be worth two millions from 
 the increased prices. There was still due _;^i, 500,000, which 
 debt was not worth 5 s. in the pound — less where due from 
 provinces which had been destroyed by sword and fire. 
 ;£'j 2,000 was due to the house in which Woolbridge had 
 lately been a partner — he would gladly sell the debt for 10s. 
 in the pound. 
 
 William Crighton put the losses of merchants at two millions 
 sterling up to last October — by now they must be two hundred 
 
THE FRENCH TREATY 583 
 
 thousand pounds more. The Islands had been pillaged by the 
 privateers— especially Tobago. Much of this loss had been 
 incurred because the merchants were not allowed to take a 
 single pound of powder on board, lest the rebels should be 
 supplied. 
 
 Mr. Olive showed the damage to Newfoundland traders— fifty 
 of their ships had been taken, worth about ^^2000 each, and 
 many small vessels; trade had improved of late, as we sent 
 more fish to Bilbao ; but the fishermen's wages had gone up from 
 ;^8 to ;^i4 a month. 
 
 James Shoolbred, of Mark Lane, an African merchant and 
 under-writer, said the African trade did not now send out one- 
 fourth of the former number of ships (200 a year). Fifteen 
 had been taken — average value, ^^7000 outwards, and homeward 
 (with freight of slaves) ;^9ooo. "Each slave was worth at 
 least ;^35." The value of the ships lost was ;^i4o,ooo. 
 
 Sandwich said trade had been diverted, not lost, and the 
 continuance of the war "was in many respects advantageous to 
 this country, and will be more so."' 
 
 All Richmond's Resolutions were negatived without a division. 
 
 The same day Burke spoke for three hours and a half on 
 the Military Employment of Indians. Ministers had made three 
 excuses — first, they had said that the rebels would have used 
 the Indians if we had not. Of this no proof had been even 
 attempted, while it was certain the Americans had made a treaty 
 of neutrality with the Five Nations, which we had bribed them 
 to violate. Secondly, that the Indians were always accompanied 
 by troops, to prevent their "irregularities." If this had been true, 
 the services of the savages would have been a jest — their only 
 real use was the cruelties we were to restrain. But it was 
 impossible to restrain them ; both in Burgoyne's and St. Leger's 
 expeditions — though no pains were spared to check them — they 
 indiscriminately murdered men, women and children, friends and 
 foes — indeed, the slaughter fell mostly on our friends, who had 
 been disarmed by the Provincials. As for being accompanied by 
 troops — whole nations of savages had been bribed to take up 
 the hatchet, without a single regular officer or soldier among 
 them ; in particular, the Cherokees were bribed to invade Carolina, 
 and were promised the support of a large regular force, but for 
 
 ^ "There never was a speech like that of Lord Sandwich's, to prove the 
 benefits arising from the American war, in ignorance, folly and impudence, in 
 parliament assembled." — Lord Mahon to the Earl of Chatham, February 
 II, 1778. 
 
5 84 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 want of that force were nearly exterminated. Moreover, on the 
 least appearance of ill -success they not only abandoned their 
 friends, but often turned their arms upon them. And the expense 
 was monstrous — one Indian cost as much as five of the best 
 European regulars. They had cost not less than ;^i 50,000, and 
 yet there had never been more than seven or eight hundred of 
 them in the field at once, and that only for a very short time. 
 In this speech Burke spoke of the various attempts to excite 
 negro insurrections in Virginia and Maryland. Suppose the 
 negroes had revolted and massacred their masters? Then we 
 must have had another war to massacre them I 
 
 Ministerialists made a shameful exhibition of themselves, and 
 the House divided against Burke's motion. 1 
 
 On the nth Fox presented Twelve Resolutions on the Number 
 of Troops in America, as shown by the Returns. In 1774 so 
 many were sent, in 1775 so many — and so on. In 1777 there 
 ought to have been a few over 48,000, whereas by all the last 
 returns the whole number of British and Foreign troops was only 
 28,000 — whence he concluded we had lost 20,000. And from 
 this, again, that America could not be subdued by arms. 
 
 George Granville — eldest son of the late Minister — now made 
 "an animated speech," in which he explained that he had 
 supported the war with but one object — revenue. Principles 
 were become "merely matter of speculation — expediency must 
 now be considered." He did not believe the plan for conciliation 
 would succeed. The men who offered it were execrated from one 
 end of America to the other; their best intentions would be 
 interpreted as " lures to ensnare and betray." There was one 
 way, perhaps — if a man who has served this nation with honour 
 to himself and glory to the country — a man of whom the House 
 of Bourbon stands peculiarly in awe — a man who unites the 
 confidence of England and America — were to treat with 
 America. "There is not one present who is ignorant of the 
 person I mean. You all know that I mean a noble and near 
 relation. He is the man whom his Majesty ought to call to his 
 counsels." 
 
 The Debate of February 13, on the Navy Estimates, gives us 
 a glimpse of how the North Administration did the nation's 
 business. Temple Luttrell showed that Sandwich's requisitions 
 far exceeded those of any of his predecessors. Including the 
 present Estimates (;^78i,9ii) the House of Commons had given 
 
 ' Barre offered to go himself, and nail up Burke's speech on every church 
 door beside the Royal Proclamation ordering a General Fast for February 27. 
 
THE FRENCH TREATY 585 
 
 him about ;^2, 100,000 for building, rebuilding, and repairing 
 the ships and vessels of his Majesty's Navy — that is, for the mere 
 hulls, masts, and yards ; for besides this there was near ;^8oo,ooo 
 for keeping them up when out of commission; and above 
 ;^6oo,ooo more for extra stores. All this exclusive of what was 
 allowed to replace the stores lost in the fire at Portsmouth 
 dockyard, and of considerable demands for timber.^ More money 
 had therefore been voted the noble lord on the Extraordinary 
 estimate alone than would have built 100 men-of-war, and 
 equipped them for sea. And even this did not include ordnance. 
 And what is there to show for it ? Fifty ships of the line fit for 
 sea in case of a foreign war. When Lord Hawke left the 
 Admiralty, there were 80 in good condition, and 59 fully manned 
 for war. Then Luttrell went into the details of the money spent 
 on repairs — more than would have built new ships ! The Namur, 
 .;^39i335 in the last four years; the Defence, ;^29,5oo. Then 
 the Dragon (a 74) — in 1771 the Admiralty came to Parliament 
 for ji^sooo to repair her; in 1772 for ^7000 more; in 1773 
 ;^4ooo more; 1774 ;!^4ooo more; 1775 ;^7ooo more — in all, 
 ;^27,ooo, besides ;!^io,273 for her stores. But the last sentence 
 of his speech was the most startling. He asked, Does, or does 
 not, that very ship still remain untouched, " in a most rotten state, 
 above Portsmouth harbour," and nothing done to her to this day? 
 
 Lord Mulgrave ^ admitted it ! " Not one shilling had been 
 laid out in repairing those ships." But the money had been 
 spent for naval purposes — not "put into a bag by the First Lord, 
 or into his own pocket." The estimate was the usual mode of 
 raising money, but was never meant to state the purpose, and 
 if this was a crime, it had been done ever since the reign of 
 James 11 ! 
 
 Luttrell retorted that in 171 1 the House addressed Queen 
 Anne on abuses exactly similar — they were then called atrocious 
 
 ^ Welbore Ellis interrupted Luttrell to explain that the expense was caused 
 by the badness of the timber "imported from abroad." Luttrell asked why 
 they bought so much if it was bad? In a former speech (November 26, 1777) 
 he had commented very disadvantageously on the " Staten oak" — he had been 
 told that the Mars, repaired with this timber, found it "so spongy and 
 unserviceable,'' that she bad to "quoin" or wedge her guns, to prevent the 
 bolts from drawing out ; and used as planks for decks, the rain penetrated 
 "through its pores" even to the hammocks. To-day Luttrell said that "if 
 the last fire in the dockyards had made a providential sweep of all your oak 
 from Stettin," he believed it would have more than compensated for the other 
 damage ! 
 
 ' Constantine Phipps. 
 
586 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 crimes in Ministers — and the Queen promised ample redress. 
 Burke exclaimed that it was an insult to present the House " with 
 a fine gilt book of estimates, calculated to a farthing," for purposes 
 to which the money was never meant to be applied. " In the 
 warmth of his indignation," he threw the book of estimates at the 
 Treasury Bench, " which, taking the candle in its way, had nearly 
 struck Mr. Ellis' shins." The ^^781, 911 was then agreed to. 
 
 On the 1 6th the Earl of Thanet communicated to the Lords 
 a letter he had received from General Gates.^ Viscount Town- 
 shend said it ought not to be read — it was from a person at the 
 head of a rebel army — although he had been very humane to 
 General Burgoyne, he was a very unfit person for that House to 
 correspond with. Gower feared it might contain things " very 
 improper for their lordships to hear." Richmond thought it 
 ridiculous to refuse information ; and as Thanet was very hoarse, 
 Lord Rockingham read the letter. It was written from Albany, 
 and was a request that Lord Chatham and Lord Camden (" who 
 never bowed their heads to Baal") should be allowed to arrange 
 terms. By withdrawing her fleet and army, England could yet 
 secure the friendship and the commerce of America. Let England 
 seek her greatness and happiness in a commercial alliance, "for 
 there only you must expect to find it." It is a curious touch, 
 that Suffolk impudently complimented Rockingham " on his 
 candour, for having read, with so much distinctness and firmness 
 of voice, that part of the letter which speaks so highly of Lord 
 Chatham." Rockingham replied coldly that he read the letter 
 because he was anxious to give the House information, which 
 the King's servants, on every occasion, wilfully withheld ; and 
 he wished to attend to General Gates' proposals, "because he 
 was determined to serve his country by making peace at any 
 rate." In spite of Grafton, Richmond, Manchester, and Bristol, 
 the Lords refused even to let the letter lie on the table. Then 
 they went into Committee on the State of the Nation, and of 
 the forces in America ; and Weymouth called war with France 
 "a subject so foreign from the question" that he wondered the 
 noble Duke (Grafton) introduced it. "Nothing could be more 
 pacific than the professions of the Court of Versailles ; he would 
 not, however, hold himself answerable to be called upon, should 
 a war happen to break out shortly." He admitted that France 
 "was arming herself." Camden reproached the Lords with their 
 long adjournment — "a recess of six weeks, at so awful and 
 important a crisis," and now, when it is too late, they come with 
 ' The Earl of Thanet and Gates had been friends. 
 
THE FRENCH TREATY 587 
 
 a proposal to Parliament ! He had lately seen an extract of a 
 letter from Dr. Franklin, which said that a proposition tending 
 to peace would then have been accepted; but that now it was 
 too late. Camden had received many intimations of a treaty 
 between France and America. If the Minister knew this — and 
 knew that the inevitable consequence must be war with France — 
 what a mockery of the nation will be his proposition ! 
 
 Richmond went minutely into the number of men in America. 
 He showed that there were now 36,731 (including officers). 
 The whole number sent out, with the small force there already 
 in 1774, was 61,648. From this he estimated our total loss, 
 by death, desertion, captivity or sickness, at 24,917.1 It would 
 take a reinforcement of 11,885 men, of old troops, to make the 
 present army in America equal to what it was during the last 
 campaign. He moved Resolutions confirming these undeniable 
 statements — but they were all negatived. 
 
 The air was thick with rumours of a French Treaty when, 
 on February 19, Lord North proposed his new Conciliatory Bill, 
 in what was perhaps the silliest speech ever made" by a Minister. 
 His appearance was pitiable. " He spoke with deep dejection 
 in his countenance, and tears in his eyes.^ He protested he was 
 from the beginning disposed to peace, but the coercive Acts 
 he made seemed necessary at the time — though in the event they 
 produced effects he never intended. As soon as he found this, 
 he tried conciliation " — but his proposal was made to appear 
 obscure, "by a variety of discussions," so it "got damned to 
 America " ; and Congress represented it as a scheme for sowing 
 division, and "introducing a worse form of taxation than the 
 former." He always knew "American taxation could never pro- 
 duce a beneficial revenue." "The Stamp Act was the most 
 judicious that could be chosen" — but he did not believe it 
 would have produced much — nothing at all if they had chosen 
 to go on without stamps. But he never proposed any tax on 
 America — he found them taxed when he unfortunately came 
 into Administration. But as he did not lay it, he did not think 
 it advisable for him to repeal the Tea-tax — "nor did he ever 
 think of any particular means of enforcing it." He could not 
 see why the Americans complained of it — "it was a relief to 
 
 ' In a former debate Barrington had said that only 1200 had been killed 
 in the three years' war. But he was obliged to add that this did not include 
 those who died "natural deaths," or were disabled by wounds or sickness 
 from further service, or deserted, or were captured. 
 
 2 Albemarle's Life of Rockingham. 
 
588 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 them, instead of an oppression" — but the ill-affected represented 
 it as a monopoly. One of the present Bills was meant to quiet 
 America on the subject of taxation ; but he could not repeal all 
 Acts since 1763, because some passed in 1769 were beneficial. 
 The Charter Bill, and the Fisheries and Prohibitory Acts should 
 cease, and Commissioners should go out to talk over the rest. 
 To remove the difficulty of there being nobody to treat with, 
 he would give these Commissioners power to treat with the 
 Congress as if it were a legal body ; and they should treat with 
 any of the Provincial Assemblies in the present civil capacities, 
 or military commands — with General Washington, or any other 
 officer. If he was asked why he did not do this before — it was 
 because he was waiting for a victory. He thought Sir William 
 Howe's victories had been more decisive. When he found they 
 were not, the first thing that occurred to him was to raise more 
 men ; but he had since reflected that events are uncertain — he 
 had been so much disappointed — and, "in the case of the 
 utmost success,'' the terms now proposed must still be offered 
 — so he would offer them at once. The war had turned out 
 very differently from his expectation — not that he meant to call 
 in question the conduct of our commanders. Sir William Howe 
 was always much superior to the American army opposed to 
 him ; and until the affair at Bennington, General Burgoyne's 
 army was near twice as strong as General Gates'. All these 
 things had happened in a manner very contrary to his expectations. 
 But he had never made a promise that he did not perform — 
 he said a great fleet and a great army should be sent out— 
 and they were ; there were upwards of 60,000 men. He said 
 they should be provided with supplies — and they had been, and 
 might be for years to come; and "if the House was deceived, 
 they had deceived themselves." We could go on much longer 
 — we had many more men to send, and the navy never was 
 stronger, and the revenue very little sunk, and he could raise 
 the supplies for next year; and he submitted the whole, and his 
 own conduct, to the judgment of the House. 
 
 This deplorable, appalling exhibition was listened to with 
 "profound attention but without a single mark of approbation 
 from any man in the House " ; and when he sat down, there 
 was " a dull, melancholy silence for some time.'' 
 
 "Astonishment, dejection, and fear overclouded the whole 
 assembly." 1 What did his hints at resignation mean? What 
 had happened? Was the French Treaty signed? 
 
 ' Parliamentary History. 
 
THE FRENCH TREATY 589 
 
 At length Fox rose. He would not refuse assent to the 
 propositions — they did not differ materially from those of his 
 friend Mr. Burke, three years ago — the minority then used the 
 same arguments and almost the same words as the noble lord 
 had just used. But if these concessions came too late, what 
 punishment would be sufficient for those who adjourned Parlia- 
 ment, and waited till France had concluded a treaty with the 
 independent States of America? He had sure information of 
 this. Did Ministers know it? Was there a treaty which would 
 make this Bill as useless as it was humiliating ? 
 
 It was long before North replied. When he did, he could 
 only say that he did not know from authority that the treaty 
 was signed. " It was possible, nay, too probable ; but not 
 authenticated by the Ambassador." 
 
 Leave to bring in the Conciliation Bill was granted without 
 a division. 
 
 On the 2nd of March, in moving the Third Reading of the 
 Bill to appoint Commissioners, Sir Grey Cooper expressed his 
 certainty that these offers would bring to our side every moderate 
 man, and every man of property, "who is not too far embarked." 
 " Now that the terror of taxation by the Parliament of Great 
 Britain is removed," and "they compare our mild and equal 
 government" with what they have now, "the affections and 
 charities of former relation" will be revived. The French 
 Alliance is most unnatural — " and can only be dictated by 
 despair." It is the alliance of "a high-spirited free people with 
 a despotic government; the religion of the severest Protestants, 
 with a great, powerful, and ambitious Catholic state; the plain 
 and simple manners of the Americans, with the fashions of a 
 high-polished and luxurious nation." After paying the Americans 
 these compUments, Cooper went on to describe the miseries we 
 had inflicted on them as marks of our esteem — he lamented 
 them as much as anybody, but their leaders brought it on 
 them. 
 
 This day Wilkes brought a frightful indictment against 
 Ministers for their use of Indians. He contrasted our conduct 
 with that of the Americans. After the capitulation at Saratoga, 
 General Gates had shown "a refined sense of honour, unparalleled 
 in European armies." 1 Burgoyne had been treated with respect — 
 he " had dined with the American hero " ; nothing unkind was said 
 to him, except asking, "how he could find it in his heart to burn 
 
 1 This referred to his not allowing his own troops to be present while the 
 British piled arms. 
 
590 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 the poor country people's houses wherever he passed?" And 
 Burgoyne had answered, "It was the King's orders." All 
 Burgoyne's letters showed that the Canadian campaign " originated 
 from the closet of the King " ; and the employment of Indians 
 was "among the primary ideas." Colonel Butler was directed to 
 distribute the King's bounty among the savages who joined the 
 army — and after he had given the presents he asked for _;^4oii 
 " York currency " more. Wilkes read from Butler's letters ^ — on 
 the table of the House. In one, he says, " I flatter myself you 
 will not think the expense, however high, to be useless." In 
 another — of July 28, from Ontario — "The Indians made a shock- 
 ing slaughter with their spears and hatchets. The success of this 
 day will show the utility of my endeavours to conciliate so service- 
 able a body of allies." Wilkes declared that in some parts nearly 
 as many women and children "expired under the torture of the 
 tomahawk and the scalping-knife " as men were slain in fight. He 
 read Burgoyne's letter of June 22, 1777, in which the General said 
 he " met the Indians yesterday in congress, and gave them a 
 war-feast according to their custom "• — of which war-feast, said 
 Wilkes, we know the most solemn ceremony to be the " drinking 
 human blood from the skulls of their enemies." And Bur- 
 goyne consented at that conference to their taking the scalps of 
 the dead ! 
 
 To all this there was no reply. 
 
 Ministers reckoned on these Conciliatory Bills being lost — 
 Opposition would reject them because they gave too little, and 
 their own extremists because they gave too much. But they 
 were disappointed. No one could endure the Conciliatory Bills ; 
 but when the Speaker said, " The Ayes have it," though three- 
 fourths of the House were against, no one dared say " The Noes 
 have it." So the Bills passed the Commons on the 2nd of March, 
 and the Lords on the 9th, without a division, though to them, too, 
 " it was the cup of humiliation." 
 
 That day the Duke of Grafton told them that Mr. Fox had 
 private information that the French Treaty was signed — and he 
 himself was as sure of it as though the whole Cabinet told him. 
 Weymouth confessed he had heard " an out-door report," but he 
 knew nothing ; and he asked their lordships to remember that 
 
 1 " Colonel Butler's letter to Sir Guy Carleton of July 28th says, ' Many of 
 the prisoners were, conformable to Indian custom, afterwards killed.' Has 
 the Secretary at War (Lord Harrington) yet thanked the savages in the King's 
 name for their alacrity ? " — Mr. Wilkes on Lord North's Conciliatory Bills, 
 March 2, 1778. 
 
THE FRENCH TREATY 591 
 
 on the 5th he had stood up in his place, and declared he knew 
 nothing of any such treaty being either in contemplation or ex- 
 istence ! Appealed to by Grafton, he again declared he knew 
 nothing. That day, too, Rockingham commented strongly on 
 the language adopted " since the commencement of the present 
 reign," about such and such being " the King's measures." Now 
 the King's friends venture a step farther — instead of calling the 
 war the war of Parliament, or of the people, it is "the King's 
 war," "his Majesty's favourite war." This is most insolent and 
 unconstitutional. "The King can have no interests, no dignity, 
 no views whatever, distinct from those of his people." 
 
 On the nth the Lords enquired into the Transport Service, 
 and why the Treasury paid so much more for freight than the 
 Navy Board — Effingham said the difference amounted to ;^i 78,000. 
 Atkinson was examined as to this. He explained that so many 
 transports were wanted, he had had to send to every ship-builder 
 in the kingdom, and even to Holland. The ship-owners preferred 
 a contract with the Navy Board — they said that in the Board's 
 service ships lay in port, and were not wearing out their tackle, 
 etc., as they did when employed by the Treasury in continual 
 voyages to America ! Questioned by Richmond, Atkinson owned 
 his commission used to be 2 per cent, but last July the Lords 
 of the Treasury sent for him, and asked if he could not do it for 
 less, and since then had only given him i^ per cent. Effingham 
 exclaimed that on the lowest computation ;!£'i 50,000 of public 
 money had been wasted — the transaction was a job — a contract 
 made in the dark with a favourite contractor ! And Shelburne 
 pointed out that Atkinson only agreed to take less when he knew 
 his contract was being looked into. 
 
 And now all the denials and subterfuges of Ministers were 
 swept away at a stroke. On March 13 de Noailles, French 
 Ambassador in London, informed Lord Weymouth that his 
 Government had signed a Treaty of Amity and Commerce vi^ith 
 THE United States of North America; and on the 17th the 
 King informed both Houses that he had recalled Lord Stormont. 
 
 Hutchinson now notes in his Diary : " Everybody where I go 
 is out of temper." Welbore Ellis had even advised him to keep 
 out of sight as much as he could — "there is scarce a day but 
 someone has a fling at you in the House." 
 
 On the 2ist Franklin and the other Envoys were presented 
 to Louis XVI at Versailles. Louis did not like it — after all, the 
 Americans were rebels. But all his people were for them, and his 
 Ministers told him that now was the time to avenge the Seven 
 
592 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Years' War. The Lees and Silas Deane ^ decked themselves out 
 in lace and powder, but Franklin only wore the suit of Manchester 
 velvet which he had on the day, five years ago, when Wedderburn 
 held him up to the execration of the Privy Council for publishing 
 Hutchinson's Letters. 
 
 Next day the King sent down a Message on the Treaty, so 
 angry that it was almost equivalent to a declaration of war.^ In 
 the Lords, Effingham made a remarkable speech, which recalls 
 the days of the Grenville Administration. Ministers, he said, 
 were totally incapable. He knew not who had better succeed 
 them, but there should be one rule — they must be men who would 
 not be subservient "to an invisible power." This was the root 
 of all the evils which had poured in upon us since the commence- 
 ment of the present reign. Whoever resisted "this secret, con- 
 cealed impulse," was proscribed, however able ; whoever obeyed 
 it, was patronised, however weak, ignorant, or incapable. To 
 drag this secret, undermining power into the face of day ought 
 to be the first great object. Till that is done, a change of men 
 will avail nothing — the same measures will continue. The only 
 way to detect this influence is to destroy the distinction between 
 "an ostensive and efficient" Cabinet. He had heard a noble 
 and learned lord (Mansfield) acknowledge he was once a member 
 of that " efficient " Cabinet. 
 
 Nobody seems to have dared ask Effingham what he meant. 
 
 The debate was really to decide whether we should go to 
 war with France for acknowledging the United States. Abingdon 
 exclaimed, "This is madness! it is desperation, it is folly! No, 
 my lords, it is neither — it is wickedness!" Twelve days ago, 
 Ministers assured us there was no treaty, and there would be 
 peace — now they tell us there is a treaty, and a message from his 
 Majesty calls on us to go to war ! 
 
 A bellicose reply to the King's Message was carried by 68 
 to 25. 
 
 In the Commons the Debate on the Message occasioned a 
 very important statement by Governor Pownall. Sir George 
 Yonge had said that the treaty was two years negotiating. 
 
 ' Even before the Conciliation Bills passed, Paul Wentworth, Agent of the 
 British Government, had privately promised Deane everything but Independence. 
 
 2 On the same 21st of March, 1778, Lord George Germaine writes to Sir 
 Henry Clinton — "Most Secret" — expressing the King's indignation at the 
 " offensive proceedings of the French Court," and his intention of an immediate 
 attack on the French possessions in the West Indies, for which instructions are 
 given, though no place is mentioned. — Hist. MSS. Report XIV, App. 10,, 
 p. 461. 
 
THE FRENCH TREATY 593 
 
 townall denied this — it was only about six months. He pro- 
 duced a Memorial which the American Commissioners in Paris 
 had handed to the French Ministry last August. He read it to 
 the House. It urged the French Government to secure the 
 friendship and commerce of America, before Great Britain offered 
 terms— it was certain that Britain would soon make a great effort 
 at reconciliation. "The first resistance of the Colonies," said 
 the Memorial, " was not to obtain independency, but a redress 
 of their grievances.'' A majority have now " put in for the prize 
 of independency," but they did so in confidence that France 
 would support them. If they find themselves disappointed, they 
 may be inclined to accept such terms as Britain may offer. Lord 
 George Germaine had lately said that his hope of ending the 
 war this year rested on this disappointment of aid from France. 
 The Memorialists reminded the French Government of the 
 humiliations of the Seven Years' War — this was the most favour- 
 able opportunity ever offered of humbling "a powerful, arrogant, 
 and hereditary enemy." Moreover, Britain is already incensed 
 at the help already given, and most likely, when peace comes, 
 she will seize the sugar-islands to make up for her losses, and to 
 punish France. 
 
 The Memorial, continued Pownall, had no effect. On the 
 contrary, seeing that America began to be hard pressed — news 
 had arrived that Burgoyne had re-taken Ticonderoga — the French 
 Ministry tried to drive her to despair, that she might surrender 
 her interests to France without conditions. There was almost 
 an open breach; and the Commissioners wrote to Congress, 
 setting forth the situation. Here, said Pownall, was the moment 
 for Great Britain to step in and offer terms, and though independ- 
 ence was to be a sine qua non, the Americans promised that 
 everything should be so done as to save Britain's honour. "I 
 betray no confidences — I am authorised for all I say." He 
 received a letter from Paris last September, which represented 
 that the French Government were keeping the Commissioners 
 in "a very perplexing state of uncertainty," and seemed more 
 anxious than ever to avoid a war with England. If the English 
 Ministry had the wisdom immediately to acknowledge independ- 
 ence, a treaty might be made which would put Britain in a 
 "happier and more flourishing situation" than she could arrive 
 at by any other way. Pownall had at once communicated this 
 letter to Ministers. The reply was, "that the ground was 
 inadmissible in the first instance." "There the matter dropped 
 this one opportunity was lost for ever." 
 
S$4 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 In a remarkable passage Pownall told the House that the 
 Americans "are, and must be, independent." Every step 
 we take to put them back from it, only convinces them of 
 the necessity of going forward. He bade them look into 
 their " four great acts of State " — the Declaration of Rights, 
 in 1774; the "Manifesto to all the world"; the Declaration 
 of Independence, and the Act of Confederation. By these 
 they had established "a great republican empire." And now 
 France has acknowledged them — and Spain and Holland will 
 follow. To suppose they will now give up all this — pull 
 down their own new governments to receive our provincial 
 ones, " is nonsense, not even to be listened to ! " We must 
 treat with them now as independent States. But the French 
 Treaty is not yet ratified by Congress — "we may yet be in 
 America with our propositions before it is ratified." He 
 proposed a federal treaty, "offensive, defensive, and com- 
 mercial." If less than this is to be offered, our Commissioners 
 had better not go. The French Treaty is not exclusive — the 
 ground is open to us, if we are not too proud to tread upon 
 it. Whether we do so first or last, we must acknowledge 
 their independence. 
 
 The words of wisdom fell on deaf ears. The debate went 
 off into defiance of France. Again North talked of standing 
 by the ship "untill he should have brought her safe into port." 
 He saw no foundation for alarm — the dread of invasion was 
 a bugbear — and even if it happened, there was very little reason 
 to fear the consequences ! Our navy was never so flourishing ; 
 and when the new Levies are completed, we shall have 30,000 
 men for the defence of the kingdom. And his Majesty is 
 resolved to call out the militia.^ So the Commons rejected 
 the Amendment (calling for the removal of Ministers) by 113 
 to 263, and went into Committee on the State of the Nation. 
 
 On the 19th of March came on the Debate on the Failure 
 of Burgoyne's Expedition. Fox said the sole design in sending 
 Burgoyne to Canada was that he might force his way to Albany, 
 and there make a junction with Sir William Howe. " But orders 
 were given only to one party — the other party was left ignorant 
 of the design." This appears from the Minister's letters to 
 the Commanders, and the Commanders' letters to each other. 
 Two men were to meet at one place, but only one was told to go 
 
 ' The panic was great enough for indirect overtures to be made to 
 Rockingham, through Coutts the Banker. But Rockingham steadily refused 
 any sort of coalition. — Albemarle. 
 
THE FRENCH TREATY 595 
 
 there. Thus thirteen provinces were lost. He announced his 
 intention of moving a Resolution of Censure upon Lord George 
 Germaine. 
 
 Ministerialists were sorely put to it — Germaine must be saved, 
 but they did not know on which General they had better throw 
 the blame. North protested that Germaine had done nothing 
 without the concurrence of the Cabinet. Germaine, for all 
 defence, repeated this statement. Dunning retorted that he 
 had promised to send General Howe the same orders as General 
 Burgoyne, "but never did send them." Dunning positively 
 asserted this, and Germaine made no reply. 
 
 After a long debate the Committee divided. For the 
 Resolutions, 44; against 164.1 Then Fox rose in wrath, 
 declared he would not make another motion, took the Resolution 
 of Censure from his pocket, tore it up, and left the House. 
 
 On the 23rd Burke objected to the charge for Scalping- 
 knives in the Army Estimates. He moved to disallow the 
 sum of ;£^i6o,837 in Sir Guy Carleton's account — which seemed 
 to have been spent "to carry on a Savage War, contrary to 
 the usage of civilised nations." Also the sum of ;^i6,ooo 
 spent for the same purpose in the south; and the sum of 
 ;!^5ooo spent on a war of insurgent negroes against the 
 inhabitants of Virginia; and whatever was paid for "100 
 Crosses, and five gross of Scalping-knives, the said expenditure 
 being disgraceful to religion and humanity." There seems to 
 have been no discussion. The Amendment was lost by 21 to 
 56 j and the House passed to Colonel Barry's Motion for 
 an enquiry into Public Expenditure. 
 
 Barr^ began by commenting on the enormous sums granted 
 for Army Extraordinaries during the last three years. He read out 
 the sums, the particular services, the names of the contractors. He 
 compared the expenses of "the late glorious war" with those 
 of the present disgraceful, ruinous, and inglorious one. When 
 we had near half Europe to contend with, our expenses were 
 not near so great. " Here he took a particular view of agents, 
 contractors, splitting of profits, etc., particularly of the contracts 
 and agencies of Harley and Drummond, on the Spanish, 
 Portugal, and British gold coin; and the self-denying Mr. 
 Atkinson, relative to his rum contract, and agency for the 
 
 ' Fox moved three other Resolutions — That the Expedition was ill- 
 concerted ; That, from the measures adopted, it could not have succeeded : 
 and That the instructions sent to General Howe were not such as to ensure 
 General Burgoyne's success. 
 
596 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 transports.'' In Harley and Drummond's account there were 
 no vouchers for ;!^8o,ooo. For three years now we have 
 been promised the vouchers next year — they always tell us 
 they have not clerks enough. Better make Mr. Atkinson, 
 "the precious agent and contractor," auditor — he could be in 
 his own person, all the clerks, surveyors and commissioners 
 that are wanted. He made us pay full 50 per cent, too much 
 for the rum, and on the transports we have lost 20 per cent. 
 And even the waste is not all — the money is permitted to lie 
 for fifteen or twenty years in the hands of favourite place-men, 
 favourite agents, favourite contractors, while " this ruined, 
 distressed nation" is borrowing at more than 5 per cent. 
 There is Mr. Gordon, inspector of provisions at Cork, on 
 ;^ 1 0,000 a year ! And the noble lord in the blue ribbon 
 is so criminally ignorant as not to know currency from sterling ! 
 Here North rose "in great warmth," and said he was pretty 
 sure the price for the rum was sterling. He was so angry 
 that he was called to order by the Speaker. Then Barr^ 
 went on about the items of the Extraordinaries — ;^io8,ooo 
 for sheep and cabbages; and ;^4o,ooo paid to Lord Cornwallis 
 without account — doubtless spent in bribing Tories ! 
 
 At last, for very shame. North was obliged to say he had 
 no objection to a Committee — " but not upstairs "■ — he wanted 
 a Select Committee. 
 
 Then came more debates on the State of the Navy, till 
 Sandwich said he heartily wished the enquiry had never begun 
 — it was telling France where she might attack us. The Duke 
 of Bolton said he was convinced France had the most minute 
 account of our navy — it was from Parliament that the noble lord 
 wished to conceal its condition ! He brought up a disgraceful 
 business at Greenwich Hospital. The debate became exceed- 
 ingly angry, and at last — while Effingham was saying that if 
 Ministers would not tell the public how their money was spent, 
 he would — the Lord Chancellor left the woolsack, declaring 
 he must support the honour of the House. Effingham had 
 spoken of " a servile majority " — the Chancellor had never 
 heard so indecent a charge ! As for himself — would any lord 
 venture to say he was under influence? Ministers knew his 
 place was no tie upon him ! 
 
 Poor Ireland's voice was now heard. On April 2 Earl 
 Nugent told the House that the present situation made it 
 necessary to revise the trade laws — " as impolitic as unjust." 
 The concession he asked was that Irish manufactures might 
 
THE FRENCH TREATY 597 
 
 be exported direct — in British ships — to any British plantation, 
 or any settlement on the coast of Africa. It was, in fact, an 
 attempt at free trade within the Empire. Several members — 
 all of whom "wished well" to Ireland — expressed fears that 
 England's trade would be ruined. Ireland would undersell us — 
 taxes being so low and labour so cheap in Ireland. Lancashire 
 would lose ;!^ioo,ooo a year " by the article of checks alone," 
 if Ireland were thus "indulged." Lord Beauchamp replied 
 that Irish taxes were "many and high," and that kingdom was 
 reduced by oppressive laws to "a wretched situation." Thomas 
 Townshend said he would do more — he would grant such 
 " indulgencies " to Irish Catholics as should attach them to 
 our government. North, in one of those flashes of his true 
 self, which show what he might have been as a Minister in 
 better times, supported Nugent's proposal. Let the House do 
 what is in its power — relax the trade laws, but let the Irish 
 Parliament grant indulgence to the Catholics — he was sure 
 they would, "for there was not anywhere a people of more 
 liberal sentiments than the Irish." The Penal Laws were passed 
 under the influence of fear — " which, however groundless, 
 always adopted the most cruel and severe policy. The Irish 
 complained, and complained with justice." 
 
 But though the Bill had far more supporters than opposers, 
 it was so much petitioned against that most of its provisions 
 were dropped "for the present," though the House was warned 
 that it was dangerous to excite hopes and disappoint them. 
 A curious incident shows how much foundation there was 
 for the cry that justice to Ireland meant ruin to England. 
 By a mistake, Burke brought in a Bill to allow the importa- 
 tion of Irish sail-cloths. It raised a storm of petitions 
 — it would ruin English sail-makers. But when everyone had 
 been duly frightened, it was discovered that this ruinous liberty 
 of importing Irish sail-cloth had long been established by law ! 
 
CHAPTER LXX 
 CHATHAM'S LAST SPEECH 
 
 " I solemnly declare nothing shall bring me to treat personally with Lord 
 Chatham." — The King to Lord North, Queen's House, March i6, 1778, 
 28 min. pt. 8 a.m. 
 
 "Lord North, I am grieved at your continually recurring to a subject on 
 which we can never agree. Your letter is certainly personally affectionate to 
 me, and shows no signs of personal fear ; but, my dear Lord, no consideration 
 in life shall make me stoop to opposition. I am still ready to accept any part 
 of them that will come to the assistance of my present efficient Ministers ; but 
 whilst any ten men in the kingdom will stand by me, I will not give myself up 
 into bondage." — The King to Lord North, Queen's House, March 17, 1778, 
 25 min. pt. II a.m. 
 
 " I thought it my duty to represent to his Majesty the general dismay which 
 prevailed among all ranks and conditions, arising, as I apprehended, from an 
 opinion that the Administration was not equal to the times ; an opinion so 
 universal, that it prevailed among those who were most dependent on and 
 attached to his Ministers, and even among the Ministers themselves." — Lord 
 Harrington, Life, p. 186. 
 
 " May not the political exit of Lord Chatham incline you to continue at the 
 head of my affairs ? " — The King to Lord North, April 8, 1778. 
 
 The thoughts of many beside George Grenville the Younger 
 turned to Chatham, the one man who might save the country 
 even yet. North, quailing before approaching disaster, was 
 imploring permission to resign, and the King was alternately 
 commanding and entreating him to remain — not to "desert" 
 him, as Grafton did — to stay if only to the end of this session. 
 Some doubt hangs over the details of the attempted negotiation 
 with Chatham. The statement of Dr. Addington ^ and the denials 
 of Sir James Wright and Lord Bute will be received according 
 to the degree of credit we may be disposed to give to each, 
 
 ' " I have read the narrative of what past between Sir James Wright and Dr. 
 Addington, and am fully convinced of what I suspected before, that the two old 
 Earls, like old coachmen, still loved the smack of the whip, and that Sir James 
 Wright, to appear a man of consequence, has gone beyond his instructions; 
 certainly it would have been wiser if no messenger had been sent." — The King 
 to Lord North, July 12, 1778. 
 
CHATHAM'S LAST SPEECH 599 
 
 and the degree of ambiguity we may think lurks in the 
 language. Addington says the proposals came from Wright — 
 Wright says they came from Addington ; but no one has attempted 
 to deny that Chatham, if he really was asked to form a Cabinet 
 with North, or with Bute, gave a peremptory refusal. The 
 King's angry references to "that perfidious roan," to "Lord 
 Chatham and his crew," his protests that he will "sooner risk 
 his crown than become a slave — they shall have another King" 
 — show that whatever was the truth as between the two physicians, 
 the King could make nothing of Chatham. The Rockinghams 
 did actually try for Chatham's alliance, but Chatham would never 
 yield on Independence. 
 
 The 7th of April, 1778, is a day that will never be forgotten 
 in the history of Parliament. That day Chatham spoke for the 
 last time in the House he had so much better never have 
 entered. The debate was on the Duke of Richmond's motion 
 for an Address to the King on the State of the Nation. The 
 Address itself was a terrible indictment. It told the King — ■ 
 
 That in 1774, the land forces in America were 6884 men; 
 in 1775, they were 11,219; in 1776, 45,865; in 1777, 48,616. 
 These forces had the assistance of a very great and well- 
 appointed train of artillery. Besides these, 83 men-of-war and 
 armed vessels had been employed, with a complement of 22,337 
 men.i 
 
 After three years, we have only got two open towns, difficult 
 to be maintained, and a few islands on the coast. All the 
 continental parts of Rhode Island, New York, Pennsylvania, 
 and the whole provinces of New Hampshire, Massachusetts, 
 Connecticut, the three Counties of the Delaware, Maryland, 
 Virginia, North and South Carolina, and Georgia, still remain 
 to be subdued. 
 
 The loss of men by death, desertion, or otherwise, amounts 
 to 19,381, besides 5336 prisoners. The loss in the navy is 
 about 4314; so in all there have been lost, by these returns, 
 about 29,031 men, exclusive of 4639 sick. 
 
 The value of the captures made by the American privateers 
 from the merchants of Great Britain amounts to upwards of 
 ;^2, 000,000. 
 
 The African trade is almost annihilated — diminished by 
 ;^i,4oo,ooo per annum. 
 
 The West India Islands are much distressed. The expenses 
 
 ' Richmond said that in all 60,000 land forces had been sent from Great 
 Britain. 
 
600 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 of the war will be ^^24,000,000, if peace is instantly concluded — 
 even one more campaign will probably cost another 9 millions. 
 
 The state of public credit is truly alarming — hardly 10 
 millions of the National Debt paid off in fifteen years of peace ! 
 It has increased by 100 millions within the memory of many of 
 us. The want of public confidence appears from the low state 
 of the Funds, and the discredit of the new loan, which sells 
 considerably under par, though the terms given this year for 6 
 millions are higher than those given for 12 millions in 1761, in 
 the seventh year of a war with the House of Bourbon. 
 
 Under all these circumstances, " we can give his Majesty no 
 better advice than instantly to withdraw his fleets and armies 
 from the thirteen revolted provinces," and to effect conciliation 
 with the Colonies on such terms as may preserve their goodwill. 
 
 After a foolish speech from Weymouth, Chatham rose. He 
 had been ailing since the end of January, and he came to the 
 House that day, "leaning upon two friends,^ lapped in flannel, 
 pale and emaciated. The peers stood to receive him. Within 
 his large wig, little more was to be seen than his aquiline nose 
 and his penetrating eye. He looked like a dying man; yet 
 never was seen a figure of more dignity ; he appeared like a 
 being of a superior species." 
 
 He rose from his seat with slowness and diflSculty, leaning 
 on his crutches, and supported under each arm by his two 
 friends. " He took one hand from his crutch, and raising it, 
 cast his eyes towards heaven, and thanked God he was able to 
 come there that day, to perform his duty. ' I am old and 
 infirm ; have more than one foot in the grave.' Perhaps I shall 
 never again speak in this House ! 
 
 "At first, he spoke in a very low and feeble tone; but as he 
 grew warm, his voice rose, and was as harmonious as ever ; 
 oratorical and affecting, perhaps more than at any former period ; 
 both from his own situation, and from the importance of the 
 subject. He gave the whole history of the American war ; of all 
 the measures to which he had objected ; and all the evils which 
 he had prophesied, in consequence of them ; adding at the end 
 of each, ' And so it proved ! ' " ^ 
 
 The rest of his speech was a passionate protest against giving 
 
 ' His son-in-law, Lord Mafion, and his son James. 
 
 ^ See the "Account, taken by memory from the conversation of a Friend, 
 who was in the House at the time, and saw the whole transaction." — Seward's 
 Anecdotes of Distinguished Persons, vol. ii. p. 383. (Quoted in the Parlia- 
 mentary History, vol. xix. ) 
 
CHATHAM'S LAST SPEECH 60 1 
 
 up the struggle. He would never consent to resign American 
 dependency. He would rather be in his grave than see the 
 lustre of the British throne tarnished, the dignity of the Empire 
 disgraced, the glory of the nation sunk, as it must be when the 
 dependency of America was given up. Then he spoke of France. 
 The great war-minister of the Seven Years' War, like an old 
 war-horse scenting the battle from afar, recalled the days— only 
 fifteen years ago, when we were "the envy and admiration of 
 all the world" — when England dictated to all Europe. Now, 
 we are afraid of a French invasion ! What, are we changed ? 
 Are we not Englishmen? Does not the same blood run in our 
 veins? How many invasions have we stood — how low have we 
 been brought, and risen again ! The Danish invasion, the 
 Scottish inroads, the Norman Conquest, the Spanish Armada, 
 the Dutch invasion — and some Lords (here he looked at 
 Mansfield) may remember a Scotch invasion ! And shall we 
 now sit down in ignominious tameness, and say, " Take from 
 us what you will, but in God's Name let us be at peace ! " 
 Shall we give up all without a blow? If France and Spain 
 are for war, why not try an issue with them? Any state is 
 better than despair. If we must fall, let us fall decently, like 
 men! 
 
 As he spoke, "the reverence — the attention — the stillness of 
 the House was most affecting : if anyone had dropped a hand- 
 kerchief, the noise would have been heard." 
 
 When he sat down. Temple said to him, " You forgot to 
 mention what we talked of — shall I get up?" Chatham replied, 
 " No, no, I will do it by and bye." Then Richmond spoke 
 again ^ — beginning by answering Weymouth. When he came to 
 Chatham, he said with the deepest respect: "The name of 
 Chatham will ever be dear to Englishmen " ; but even the name 
 of Chatham cannot perform impossibihties — the present state 
 of the country is not what it was when he directed our councils ; 
 "the influence of the Crown had not yet got to the alarming 
 height it has since arrived at." And we were then for the 
 most part only contending with France — for by the time Spain 
 came in, " France was exhausted to the lowest ebb," her navy 
 almost annihilated, and her principal colonies in the New World 
 wrested from her. Above all, we had America for us; now, 
 America is against us. "Instead of Great Britain and America 
 against France and Spain, it will now be France, Spain, and 
 America against Great Britain." No one present wishes more 
 1 Chatham had told Richmond he should oppose his motion, 
 
602 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 than I that America should continue dependent on this country. 
 But as I am convinced that this is now totally impracticable, I 
 want to retain them as allies, because if they are not our friends, 
 they will necessarily throw themselves into the arms of France. 
 What prospect of success have we ? We lost i i,ooo men in the 
 last campaign. Our peace estabhshment is nearly 6000 short. 
 After all, are we compelled to resent the action of France? 
 Queen Elizabeth for a series of years openly abetted the revolt 
 of the Spanish Netherlands with both men and money, but 
 Philip of Spain scarcely seemed to take the slightest notice of 
 it. His hands were already sufficiently full. Yet he was then 
 the most powerful prince in Europe. 
 
 While Richmond was speaking, Chatham had looked at him 
 " with attention and composure." He now rose to reply, but 
 his strength failed him — he fell backwards. He was instantly 
 supported by those near him — especially by his youngest son, 
 James. The Duke of Cumberland, Temple, and other lords 
 carried him out to the Prince's Chamber, where a physician 
 attended him. Then he was carried to " Mr. Sergent's house in 
 Downing Street, where he was accommodated with every kind 
 and friendly attention, both at this time and on a preceeding day 
 some weeks before." Thence he was taken home to Hayes.i 
 
 When the confusion had a little subsided, the Duke of 
 Richmond — after giving a warm testimony to the great political 
 abilities and integrity of Lord Chatham — assured the House that 
 though the Earl's illness was violent, he had reason to hope it 
 was but temporary — occasioned by weakness and "the excessive 
 heat of the House.'' It would be better to adjourn. So the 
 House adjourned, without another word. But Chatham never 
 replied to Richmond. 
 
 Chatham's life since 1766 was a tragedy, and a tragedy ended 
 it. Was it not a tragedy that the Minister who had brought the 
 country through the great Seven Years' War should end by 
 imploring his countrymen to continue ruining themselves in a 
 miserable quarrel with their own children across the sea? It 
 was all the more tragic, because if Chatham's counsels had been 
 heeded the country would never have come to this pass. Those 
 who are able to perceive that Richmond's was the better way, 
 should remember the double bitterness with which Chatham 
 must have seen all his work undone — the great edifice of empire, 
 
 ' It was observed that Lord Mansfield sat still, and showed no feeling on 
 this occasion. 
 
CHATHAM'S LAST SPEECH 603 
 
 which he had reared, shattered by folly ; the hearts of Englishmen 
 failing them before enemies they had wantonly raised up to 
 themselves. There was no man in England to whom this could 
 be so bitter; there was no man in England who had done more 
 to avert such a catastrophe. His despair was no unworthy anger 
 at loss of dominion — he asked for reconciliation, not submission ; 
 the union of freemen in a free empire, not the subjection of 
 Englishmen beyond the sea to Englishmen at home. If, at the 
 last, the old fighting spirit awoke in him, and he would not see 
 that it was too late, what wonder? He who said with his dying 
 lips that he would never consent to American independence, was 
 the man whose single influence had held America united to 
 England for years after the quarrel began — the man for whose 
 sake America had refused to believe that the British people were 
 consenting to the policy of the British Government. 
 
 There was for a generation a disposition to speak of Chatham 
 as merely a great orator; but a great orator could not have 
 conducted the Seven Years' War, and it takes more than oratory 
 to influence the destinies of two nations, as Chatham did. His 
 work was spoiled, and his career cut short, by a faction which 
 gathered up into itself all the worst features of the system which 
 it had cost civil war and revolution to put down in England — the 
 system of secret juntos carrying out the will of a King, of Ministers 
 of State responsible to the King alone, of open resort to the 
 cupidity of men, of gigantic peculations winked at by a Sovereign 
 who rated subserviency to his will above all other virtues in a 
 subject. It is a terrible consideration that faction and George in 
 were able to destroy the great statesman who first conceived the 
 idea of a British Empire. He conceived it nobly. With him 
 there was no base scheme for exploiting natives. The thought 
 of mankind was never far from him — his views were not bounded 
 by the empire he had made — he could thank God, in the name 
 of mankind, that America had resisted. His last speech is no 
 shriek for vengeance on the colonists — it is a defiance to France. 
 
 If we think Chatham's last words his least wise ones, we 
 must remember that he asked no slavish submission of America. 
 He thought that if we acknowledged we had been in the wrong, 
 and renounced the right to tax, America would return to us. He 
 would not believe it was too late. And if it is of the essence 
 of tragedy to show us the hero overcome by circumstance, this 
 scene in the House was a great moral tragedy — when the great 
 statesman and patriot, who had seen the danger from afar, and 
 had warned, counselled, implored, denounced, all in vain, now 
 
604 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 at this twelfth hour spent his last breath in one last despairing 
 effort to avert the catastrophe he had foretold. Here is deeper 
 tragedy than when the hero falls on the lost field of an actual battle. 
 
 In the adjourned debate next day, Shelburne reiterated 
 Chatham's views in the most unworthy speech he ever made. 
 Long after it was remembered against him. He said that 
 " England's sun was set " if she acknowledged the independence 
 of America. After some weak allusions to the private interests 
 that would suffer — those of the heirs of Penn and of Lord 
 Baltimore, of the loyalists, and the merchants of London — he 
 adverted to the fears entertained by some that even Independence 
 would not satisfy America. Perhaps they will demand St. John's 
 and Cape Breton. Then "away goes the fishery and 20,000 
 seamen." And the West Indies will follow, and perhaps Ireland, 
 till nothing will be left us but this island. The Duke wants us 
 to grant independence in order to avoid war with France — he 
 asks. Where are the men, where is the money to resist France? 
 " I answer, I see the bar full of men — there are three or four 
 hundred now in this House. The streets of London are full of 
 men. I see men every day pass in crowds on the Bath road — 
 which was one continued street almost, till the late distress 
 thinned it. Look round on every side, and see what a scene of 
 population and opulence presents itself Look into Hyde Park, 
 St. James' Street. Look into the City — there is money enough 
 there." Only let the present blundering Ministry resign, and we 
 shall be able to raise any loan we require. And suppose war 
 ensues? The French are much degenerated from what they 
 were — in6nitely more degenerated than we are — I believe our 
 women would suffice to drive out the French if they invaded us ! 
 If other men were at the helm, France would not dare to act in 
 this way — I have it on good authority that de Vergennes has 
 said as much. Moreover, " I know France and Spain both to 
 be vulnerable in many places. Four years ago, a revolt might 
 have been easily fomented in Brittany ; the inhabitants were ripe 
 for insurrection.'' Spain is equally vulnerable. " I know a particular 
 part of that kingdom. . . ." 
 
 Not content with these abominable suggestions, Shelburne 
 compared the acknowledgment of American Independence to a 
 scene in a comedy between a duke and a sharper — ^" the Duke 
 gives the sharper 20 guineas — the sharper returns 21 — this kind 
 of exchange goes on till at length the sharper runs away with 
 the whole." And as to forbearing to resent the insult offered us 
 by France — if Spain did not declare war with us, the assistance 
 
CHATHAM'S LAST SPEECH 60S 
 
 given to revolted subjects was equal on both sides — for Spain 
 was fomenting disturbances in Ireland. 
 
 Shelburne did better when he rebuked the "confidence and 
 insolence" of the First Lord of the Admiralty. It was the duty 
 of the other House to call such men to account. But what is 
 the other House? Can public justice ever be procured through 
 so foul and polluted a channel ? Can impeachments be expected 
 from pensioners, contractors, and needy dependants? The other 
 day, on the enquiry about the transports, Ministers sent the very 
 contractors, clerks, and dependants, whose conduct was being 
 called in question, to insult this House with made-up tales to 
 cover their own iniquities. " Before the country recovers, that 
 corrupt House must be new modelled. It is at present the 
 source of all corruptions and misfortunes." 
 
 After the division had been taken, and Richmond's Address 
 to the King had been rejected by 50 to 33, the Earl of Abingdon 
 got up and said, "These dead majorities will be the ruin of the 
 nation. Be the question what it will — though the salvation of 
 the country may depend upon it, if it is moved by the minority 
 it is sure of a negative." We are told this is the only way in 
 which his Majesty will receive our counsel — but it is not the 
 only way in which we have a right to give it. "We are the 
 hereditary counsellors of the Crown, and have a right to 
 audience of his Majesty at all times." He moved that the 
 Minority wait on his Majesty with the noble duke's Address — 
 "it contains information worthy the royal ear." Twenty -one 
 lords signed a protest against the continued attempt to deceive 
 the Sovereign as to the true state of affairs. 
 
 Next day in the Commons Hartley moved that an end be 
 put to the American War. He recapitulated the dismal story, 
 and urged the folly of going on. " Give us peace with America, 
 and we shall be ourselves again. Give us again the American 
 Family Compact, and I shall be the last to fear the House of 
 Bourbon." If you make peace on fair and equal terms, trade 
 will return, and foreign Powers will stand in awe of us — instead 
 of despising us. Our dishonour comes from those who advised 
 the King not even to give an answer to the petition of all 
 America. The Bills you have just passed unanimously give 
 neither more nor less than what Congress asked in that last 
 petition, three years ago. We cannot have peace on the same 
 terms now — our rule seems to be always to refuse the terms 
 offered, until it is too late. I myself told Administration before 
 Christmas that there was an opening to treat — we might have 
 
6o6 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 prevented the French Treaty. The Americans were disgusted 
 with France. I said then, "Do it before you sleep" — but you 
 adjourned for two months ! And now I know you will not 
 consent ; and I know the time will come when you will think it 
 a good bargain to make peace simply on terms of independence. 
 Seek the alliance and friendship of America — ■ we are derived 
 from the same stock, we have the same religion, the same 
 manners, the same language, the same love of liberty and 
 independence. " Give up an irksome and sterile dominion." 
 
 Abingdon's motion does not seem to have been even put. 
 
 On the loth, supporting Powys' motion. That the Com- 
 missioners be empowered to declare Independency, Fox asked 
 how Britons with their eyes open could wilfully give the 
 executive so great an addition of strength as the power of 
 appointing to offices in America? Had we not appointments, 
 douceurs, sinecures, pensions, titles, baubles, and secret-service 
 money enough already ? Did not the creatures of Government 
 swarm in every department? Must we add to their number? 
 
 The indomitable Opposition next brought forward a Bill to 
 exclude Government Contractors from sitting in the House of 
 Commons.! Sir Philip Jennings Gierke, who moved it, cited 
 many of the instances already noticed. Presently the contractors 
 in the House began to defend themselves. Harley declared he 
 wished for an enquiry — his contracts would bear the closest examina- 
 tion. Baker complained that contractors were treated as if they 
 were monsters, and not fit for human society — his contracts had 
 all been honest. He had often voted against Ministers — had voted 
 for the repeal of the Stamp Act. North wished gentlemen would 
 suspend their opinion till the Select Committee had sat. The 
 contracts he had made he made for the public benefit — if they 
 turned out otherwise it was not his fault. 
 
 That extraordinary personage. Lord George Gordon, spoke for 
 the motion. He uttered some home truths, as usual. He called 
 North "the greatest of all the contractors — he was a contractor 
 for men — a contractor for your flock, Mr. Speaker, a contractor 
 for the representatives of the people ! " He had offered a noble 
 duke a place of ;^io,ooo a year, if the duke would prevail on the 
 most insignificant member of the House to vacate his seat. The 
 noble duke had rejected the villainous proposition. He appealed 
 to North to save his country " and his own life," by " calling off 
 
 ' The Bill merely excluded close contractors — as Mr. Turner said, " for 
 being private plunderers, in a conspiracy with a. corrupt administration to 
 plunder their country. " 
 
CHATHAM'S LAST SPEECH 607 
 
 his butchers " from the Colonies. It will be supposed that North 
 indignantly denied that he had tampered with the Duke of Gordon 
 — but no; he only denied that the proposition was "villainous" — 
 a highly unparliamentary word ! More surprising still, leave was 
 given to bring in the Bill, and on May ist it was read a first time. 
 North opposed no argument — he trusted to the number of the 
 "flock.'' But he was again disappointed, for the Bill passed the 
 Second Reading, though by a smaller majority. On the Third 
 Reading a greater effort was made. In a crowded House, Lord 
 George Gordon called the motion a cleansing of the Augean 
 Stable — " this dunghill of contracts," which had given an ill air to 
 our whole proceedings. " Our constituents begin to smell a rat ; 
 they nose us in the lobby, and call us taylors and shoemakers ; 
 colliers and cabbage-salters, potatoe-forestallers, sour-crout makers, 
 and swine contractors." Our fair name is " sinking in porter and 
 salted cabbage." An hon. member,^ " one of the most ancient con- 
 tractors within these walls," has said that contracting in this House 
 is the very spirit of trade — the noble lord in the blue ribbon may 
 find it so — a day may come when a few of his steady friends may 
 contract for the black cloth and scaffolding for their patron's 
 execution ! There would have been a small majority against the 
 Third Reading, but Pownall warned them how indecent this would 
 look, so the Bill was shelved decently by being referred to a Com- 
 mittee that day two months, and the contractors breathed again. 
 
 Sir George Savile's attempt to get the Quebec Act repealed 
 failed. Germaine had now had his way — Carleton was recalled, 
 and General Haldimand was appointed Governor of Canada. 
 
 On the 5th of May the King's Message for a Vote of Credit 
 brought up the whole question of Supply. As soon as the Vote 
 of Credit (for a million) was moved. Opposition began on the 
 national defences. The militia had been called out, but were with- 
 out arms, and were encamped without tents. A navy neither manned 
 nor victualled lay at Spithead. The French fleet (twelve ships 
 of the line) had sailed from Toulon on the 13th April; Ministers 
 did not know it till the 26th, and nothing had been done to oppose 
 its sailing. Rebel privateers were pillaging our coasts, and Spain 
 had returned the salute of one of them. Fox asked who would 
 vote a single shilling to such an Administration? Germaine 
 owned appearances were against Government, but " a full enquiry " 
 might place their case in a different light. He had called Ministers 
 together as soon as he could. He hoped our affairs would take a 
 happier turn. It was not safe to send the home fleet after d'Estaing 
 
 ' Mr. A. Bacon. 
 
6o8 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 till we knew where he was going. Fox retorted that Ministers had 
 admitted the navy was inadequate to defend the Empire. Now they 
 had let the French go to destroy our army in America ! Burgoyne's 
 disgrace would be followed by Howe's. Had a fleet been sent after 
 d'Estaing even yet ? Germaine replied that he wished orders could 
 have been sent to Spithead quicker; but our navy was formidable, 
 and growing more formidable every day — there were the fairest hopes. 
 At such a time the painful pre-eminence of office was little to be 
 envied, and if any gentleman of talents wished to take his place 
 
 It is refreshing to turn from this exhibition to Sir George 
 Savile's Bill for the Relief of Roman Catholics.^ It was to 
 relieve them from penalties and disabilities under an Act of 
 William iii — for where Catholics are concerned the English people 
 visit the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the tenth 
 generation. Savile truly said that all persecution ought to be wholly 
 adverse to the principles of the Protestant religion — " it ill became 
 us to practise that with which we reproach others." He said he 
 " did not meddle with the vast body of the penal code, but selected 
 that Act on which he found most of the persecutions had been 
 founded, and which gave the greatest scope to informers and 
 interested relations." The Act made it felony in foreign priests, 
 and treason in natives, to teach or officiate in this country; it 
 forfeited to the nearest Protestant heir the estates of Catholics 
 educated abroad ; it allowed a Protestant heir to take away the 
 estate of his Catholic father, and deprived papists of the power of 
 acquiring any legal property by purchase — by which was meant 
 property acquired by any other means than inheritance. A popish 
 priest was liable to imprisonment for life for officiating in the 
 services of his religion. It had not always been put in practice, 
 but it always could be. Savile referred to a late very humble and 
 loyal Address, just presented to the King by the Catholic Peers 
 and Commoners, praying for relief, and assuring his Majesty that 
 they held no opinions adverse to his Government, or repugnant to 
 the duties of good citizens. 
 
 It is some small alleviation of the shame with which every 
 consistent Protestant must remember this Act, to know that the 
 repeal passed both Houses without opposition ; and so the wrongs 
 of ages began to be redressed. 
 
 On the evening of the nth of May, Barr^, with great emotion, 
 informed the House of the death that morning at Hayes of the 
 Earl of Chatham, and moved that the great statesman should have 
 a public funeral. 
 
 ' May 14, 1778. 
 
CHATHAM'S LAST SPEECH 609 
 
 For many a year Chatham's name had hardly been mentioned 
 at Court. A great public demonstration was much dreaded by 
 Ministers, and would have been extremely disagreeable to the King 
 — for though Chatham's last speech pleased him, he never forgave 
 "that trumpet of sedition " — now happily silent for ever. So Rigby 
 suggested that a monument would be better than a funeral — where- 
 upon Opposition declared there must be both, and added the 
 words to the motion. At this moment North arrived — in such 
 haste that he was out of breath. He came to vote for the motion, 
 and to express a hope that it would pass unanimously. 
 
 Five days later Lord John Cavendish moved an Address to 
 the King for an annuity for Chatham's family — ^^4000 a year 
 to go with the Earldom of Chatham for ever, and the late Earl's 
 debts to be paid — ^£'20,000. The Bill passed the Commons 
 without a dissentient voice ; but in the Lords eleven peers voted 
 against it. The Duke of Chandos objected to the perpetuity — the 
 people were so heavily taxed. (Richmond asked if he was serious ? 
 If so, why did he not propose an enquiry into sinecures ? — he had 
 heard Lord North was shortly to have the sinecure of the Cinque 
 Ports — ;£'5ooo a year.) Lord Chancellor Bathurst thought Lord 
 Chatham's services had been sufficiently rewarded. Ravensworth 
 said Chatham's "daring spirit of enterprise" had been a very 
 great misfortune to this country — his military successes were 
 ruinous ; ^ the enormous debt incurred in them was the cause of 
 our present situation. He came into Parliament with him, upwards 
 of forty years ago, and was acquainted with him when in the full 
 possession of all his powers of oratory, and was ready to confess 
 his great abilities as a public speaker. But though he could not 
 deny that they convinced the majority, both within and without 
 doors, they never convinced him that Chatham was properly 
 qualified as a statesman to direct the affairs of this country. " In 
 
 1 " I have been much abused, my lords, for supporting a war, which it has 
 been the fashion to call my German war. But I can affirm, with a. clear 
 conscience, that that abuse has been thrown on me by men, who were either 
 unacquainted with facts, or had an interest in misrepresenting them. That I 
 did in parliament oppose to the utmost of my power, engaging in a German 
 war, is most true. . . . But when I was called upon to take a share in the 
 administration, that measure was already decided ... the first treaty with the 
 King of Prussia was signed, and not only ratified by the Crown, but approved 
 of and confirmed by a resolution of both Houses of Parliament. It was a weight 
 fastened upon my neck . . . the honour of the Crown and the honour of the 
 nation were equally engaged. How could I recede from such an engagement ? 
 What other foreign power would have sought our friendship? What 
 other foreign power would have accepted of an alliance with us ? " — Speech of Lord 
 Chatham, Nov. 22, 1770. (On Richmond's motion on the Falkland Islands.) 
 
6io ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 fine, they came into Parliament together, and sat in the other House 
 for 14 years, and he was persuaded it would have been happy for this 
 country if he had never aspired to a public station — for though 
 not the mediate, he was the immediate cause of all our subsequent 
 misfortunes." So the ministerial cur barked at the dead lion. 
 
 Lyttleton, after reminding the House how often he had opposed 
 Chatham in debate, reminded them also how Chatham "had 
 gone through offices which generally served to enrich his prede- 
 cessors," without making a shilling. There was "the usual per- 
 quisite " on the King of Sardinia's subsidy, amounting to more 
 than p^2o,ooo. Mr. Pitt refused to touch it. The whole sum was 
 found in the bank years afterwards, and again offered to Chatham 
 as his right ; and again he refused it, and the money was applied 
 to the public service. Radnor brought up the Embargo — an 
 infringement of the right of Parliament. Camden said a famine 
 was threatened. Does not Locke say that there are times of 
 emergency when Ministers must act at once, and trust that Parlia- 
 ment will absolve them ? And if there was an error, the error was 
 his— Camden's — he took the responsibility — he gave his legal 
 opinion for it. 
 
 The Annuity Bill passed by 42 to 11. Chandos, Bathurst, 
 Paget, and the Archbishop of York signed a Protest against "the 
 unwarrantable lavishing away of the public money, at a time when 
 the nation groans under a heavy load of debts, and is engaged in a 
 dangerous and expensive war." People said that the Archbishop 
 was taking his revenge for Chatham's having likened Dr. Markham 
 to Dr. Sacheverell. 
 
 On the 9th of June Chatham's body was laid to rest in the 
 Abbey. The City of London wished him buried in St. Paul's, 
 and were so angry that they resolved not to go to the funeral. 
 Gibbon says it was "meanly attended" — few but the Opposition 
 went. Burke, Savile, Dunning, and Thomas Townshend were pall- 
 bearers, and the chief mourner was young William Pitt.^ 
 
 In the Debate " on the Sailing of the French fleet,'' the Duke 
 of Richmond said that accounts of the armaments going on at 
 Toulon reached Lord Weymouth early in January, and regularly 
 afterwards. On April 17 it was public news in the streets of 
 Paris that the Toulon fleet had sailed. But we did not know it 
 
 ' The King expresses himself as ' ' rather surprised " that the Commons voted 
 a public funeral. He told North that he hoped the vote was worded as a 
 testimony of gratitude for what Chatham did in the last war, as ' ' this compli- 
 ment, if paid to his general conduct, is rather offensive to me personally." This 
 explains why the lords did not attend the funeral. 
 
CHATHAM'S LAST SPEECH 6ii 
 
 till the 29th — a space of ten days, during which "a man might 
 have hopped from Paris to London " ! The naval force of France 
 and Spain was 64 or 65 ships of the line, with a proportionate 
 number of frigates. What have we to oppose to this ? The whole 
 of our fleet may be 33 ships. And the excuse is that we have 
 lost the supply of seamen we used to have from America ! 
 
 Sandwich said he was no more answerable than any other 
 member of Administration. He declared we had 49 ships fit 
 for service. Bristol pursued Sandwich from ship to ship, com- 
 paring him with Hawke — who in 177 1 had 81 ships fit for service, 
 14 building, 12 repairing, 7 foreign ships bought. All this, not 
 counting 32 more "in a doubtful state." Sandwich had had three 
 and a half millions sterling and more for building and repairing, 
 and he confesses he has only got 49 fit for service. What is 
 become of the ships, and what is become of the money ? 
 
 The wretched Sandwich was left undefended, until at last 
 Lord Dudley got up to tell how he had gone with the First Lord 
 "in one of his marine excursions,'' and how "one Wells, a builder," 
 refused to have anything to do with the noble earl, because he 
 was so hard in the contracts he made with builders that they lost 
 by him. 
 
 In the Commons James Luttrell asked what was Lord Howe's 
 situation? Would he ever imagine that we had let a French 
 fleet escape from Toulon to attack him? North said, as for the 
 French making a descent on our coasts, a house or village might 
 be burnt — that would be all — he " was sure conquest could never 
 be the consequence of such a descent." As for our depend- 
 encies — they were so scattered it was impossible to defend them 
 all, but he "trusted something might be done." He had reason 
 to believe the French fleet was ill-manned and ill-found, and was 
 gone back to Toulon. Then he talked about continental con- 
 nections. " It was very difficult to understand whether he thought 
 them useful or not. He said they cost Great Britain a vast deal, 
 and the return they made was not adequate to the expense — 
 Great Britain was strong enough without them.''^ With more 
 foolish and contradictory talk about battles won by our allies 
 being won to us. Then the " flock " voted as usual, and Ministers 
 went home to consider whether perhaps they could defend some 
 part of our scattered dependencies. 
 
 Before Chatham was laid in the grave, the unfortunate 
 Burgoyne arrived in England on parole. He waited at once on 
 Germaine, but the King refused to see him, and sent to tell him 
 
 ' Parlimnentarv Historv. 
 
6i2 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 his presence at Court would be dispensed with. Burgoyne 
 demanded an enquiry, and a Board of General Officers was 
 appointed, but they reported that they could not take cognisance 
 of the conduct of a prisoner on parole. A court-martial was 
 refused him on the same ground. It was even suggested that 
 he was incapable of speaking or voting in the House. When he 
 appeared there nobody spoke to him, nor did he venture to 
 speak, till the 23rd of May, when Mr. Vyner moved for a Com- 
 mittee of the Whole House to Inquire into the Convention of 
 Saratoga, and into the Conduct of General Burgoyne. On the 
 26th "a vast concourse of gentlemen assembled in the gallery — 
 whereupon Mr. Gascoyne moved that the House be cleared." ' 
 Burgoyne made a very long speech. He referred to the Indians. 
 He had ever considered " the Indian alliances " a necessary evil 
 — their services were over-valued, " sometimes insignificant, often 
 barbarous, always capricious." He had done his utmost to keep 
 them under control. Except the case of Miss McCrea — which 
 was an accident, not premeditated — the stories told of him were 
 fabricated. The Proclamation, he owned, was penned by himself — 
 it was meant " to speak daggers, but use none." The Americans 
 had shown him respect for it. A gentleman had been in London 
 great part of the winter " who I wish had been called to your 
 bar'' — but only for the sake of truth, "for he is not my friend." 
 It is St. Luc le Corne, a distinguished partisan of the French in 
 the last war, now a leader of Indians in the British service. He 
 owes us something, for he formerly scalped many hundred British 
 soldiers on the very ground where we employed him last year. 
 " He is artful, ambitious, and a courtier." He owes me a grudge 
 for controlling him in the use of the hatchet and scalping-knife. 
 I was near putting that man to an ignominious death, especially 
 on account of the murder of that unhappy lady Miss McCrea. 
 He has often been closeted with a noble lord in my eye 
 (Germaine), and I wish to tell the House what he has presumed 
 to say about my conduct to the Indians. I know he has said 
 they might have done great service, but they were discharged. 
 "Sir, if to restrain them from murder was to discharge them, I 
 take the blame with pride." Otherwise I should say that the 
 Indians, with Mr. St. Luc at the head of them, deserted ! 
 
 As to the burning of the country, I only recollect one accident 
 by fire. There was no fire by my order except at Saratoga ; and 
 
 ' This was done so rigidly that the Speaker excluded his own son — " none but 
 Mr. Garrick escaped, who was afterwards suffered to remain by consent of all 
 parties." 
 
CHATHAM'S LAST SPEECH 613 
 
 General Schuyler, whose house I burned, said that the occasion 
 justified it — it was the rules of war — or to that effect. He gave 
 me hospitality, and presented me to his family at Albany.^ 
 (Burgoyne seemed to feel this as a tribute to himself, instead of 
 an instance of Schuyler's magnanimity.) 
 
 As to the situation of the army at Cambridge, he had made a 
 report " so voluminous " that it took three clerks constantly at 
 work to copy it by last Saturday. The troops are detained by a 
 resolve of Congress, " expressing that there are causes of suspicion 
 that the Convention is designed to be broke on our part " ; and 
 that therefore they are justified in suspending the embarkation 
 till the Convention is ratified by the Court of Great Britain. 
 
 It is asked, how it is I am here ? I asked Congress to allow 
 me to return on parole, to settle my accounts, and to tell the 
 Government important truths, which I cannot communicate by 
 other means. Here he read Washington's letter to himself, in 
 reply to his request for leave to go to England. He next spoke 
 on the delicate subject of desertions. Some have deserted, "in 
 the worst sense of the word" — but they are few — the scum. 
 And now he uttered the unfortunate sentence which probably had 
 as much to do as anything in making Congress doubt our bona 
 fides. "The greater part who have absconded, have had no 
 intention to abandon the service, and if an epithet of honour could 
 at any time be applied to a fault, theirs might be called an honour- 
 able desertion^' Some had left letters to say they would rejoin 
 the army when the time of embarkation was settled ; others tried 
 to get through the woods, to join Sir William Howe or Sir Henry 
 Clinton, and " it is believed some of them succeeded. The whole 
 of the absentees is about five or six hundred." 
 
 He now came to his military conduct. All the papers had not 
 been laid before the House — some were kept back, others were 
 designed to cast suspicion on him, as though he had courted 
 command to the prejudice of Sir Guy Carleton. And a very 
 secret paper has been produced — my "Thoughts on Conducting 
 the War from Canada." So the plan has been laid to me, though 
 it was changed and garbled by the Minister. My plan had only 
 one object — the forcing a passage to Albany. It is pretended 
 that the words which are called "the saving clause" — "you are 
 to act as exigencies may require " — were specially dictated by me. 
 That clause has been understood by Sir William Howe and every- 
 body else to refer to exigencies after the army should have reached 
 
 ^ This passage was "delivered separately upon a second call of Mr. Wilkes," 
 but the Parliamentary History inserts it here. 
 
6 14 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Albany. Burgoyne continued to protest that his orders were 
 "positive, peremptory, and indispensable" — he had no latitude 
 allowed him. Passionately he insisted on this. 
 
 Germaine said the mixing up of the letters was an accident 
 for which he was very sorry. Mr. St. Luc introduced himself as 
 a man who had performed great services "at the head of the 
 savages." He told Germaine that Burgoyne was "a fine ofificer 
 for regulars," but he did not seem to like Indians — "he was a 
 brave man, but as heavy as a German." ^ 
 
 After the motion for papers had been rejected, there was a 
 scene. Temple Luttrell attacked North. Whenever his mis- 
 management is arraigned, the Minister says he is only the 
 instrument of the Privy Council. He only prides himself on one 
 thing — having recommended to his Sovereign, as war-minister, a 
 man who was condemned by a court-martial, and disgraced by 
 King George ii. And now General Burgoyne is arraigned for 
 obeying his orders ! 
 
 Germaine rose "in heat," and appealed to the House. He 
 would not endure this wanton abuse. Old as he was, and young 
 as Luttrell was, he would meet him ! The House " became 
 tumultuous"; some cried, "Chair!" others, "Order!" Fifty 
 members were on their legs at once. Fox vainly tried to speak 
 to order. At last the Speaker rose and took off his hat, and the 
 House sat down. But neither of the gentlemen would apologise. 
 A motion was made to take Luttrell into custody — he seconded 
 it himself, rather than give up his privilege of Parliament, " of 
 delivering his sentiments on a public character in a public trust." 
 At length each made some sort of apology. It was perhaps the 
 pubhcation of this debate which caused the complaints in the 
 House next day. Luttrell said he now understood the reason for 
 excluding strangers — he had suspected it before. The very 
 existence of the Constitution depended on the people knowing the 
 conduct of their representatives. 
 
 Burgoyne spoke again next day on Hartley's motion for 
 stopping the war, and against prorogation. Hartley said the 
 House ought to be sitting when the Commissioners (who had already 
 sailed) sent in their report. He was persuaded the terms would 
 be rejected. It must now be independence — "do not deceive 
 
 ' The last speaker in this debate seems to have been Lord George Gordon. 
 He attacked Ministers with his usual violence, and said that the murder of IVIiss 
 McCrea would be an indelible stain on the religion and humanity of Great Britain, 
 when Queen Mary's massacre of Protestants in England, and King Charles' per- 
 secutions of Presbyterians in Scotland were forgotten. 
 
CHATHAM'S LAST SPEECH 615 
 
 yourselves." Burgoyne gave as another reason for not proroguing 
 that Howe and Carleton were expected every day. He urged 
 Government to send Admiral Keppel against the French fleet. 
 For himself, he defied Government to do its worst — he knew he 
 was a marked man, a scapegoat — but he intended to do his duty 
 in Parliament. Thus he announced his intention to go into 
 Opposition. 
 
 This was on the 2nd of June. The same day Sir James 
 Lowther moved for an Address to the King to defer prorogation. 
 Sir J. Gierke, who seconded, said that since he came down to 
 the House he had been informed the Brest fleet had been seen a 
 few leagues off Plymouth. Nugent moved the Orders of the 
 Day. But this did not save Ministers from another most import- 
 ant piece of intelligence being divulged. The Hon. Richard 
 FitzPatrick said, as the Minister had declined information, he 
 would tell the House that ten days before he sailed from 
 Philadephia, copies of the Conciliatory Bills were brought there. 
 The army received them with inexpressible indignation — some of 
 the officers in his presence tore their cockades from their hats 
 and flung them into the street — they had expected 20,000 men, 
 and instead they had the Concihatory Bills ! These were not 
 sent to Congress or to General Washington, but were distributed 
 about the country by individuals, and so found their way into the 
 American army. There they were received still worse than in 
 the British army — they were kicked about, torn, even burnt by 
 the hangman. They were looked on as intended to spread 
 discord — it was even said that Parliament knew nothing of them ; 
 and when FitzPatrick assured them the Bills were genuine, the 
 Americans said if Chatham had offered them they might have 
 received them, but they would never listen to any proposals from 
 the men who had brought on the war. 
 
 Germaine said he would not attempt to contradict what the 
 honourable gentleman said he had seen. But there was no 
 promise of 20,000 men, and if the Americans rejected these 
 terms, it showed they would reject any terms. 
 
 FitzPatrick retorted that reinforcements were promised — and 
 instead the army heard d'Estaing was coming, and General 
 Howe's force was so weak it could only act on the defensive. It 
 was scandalous how Sir William was abused here ! Hereupon 
 Burgoyne asked whether any steps had been taken to release his 
 gallant army — which would be worth twice their number in the 
 field, "having been accustomed to hardships, lying without tents, 
 living on slender meals, and being well used to fire." Officers who 
 
6i6 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 knew all about the expedition had never been examined, while 
 St. Luc was caressed, and a menial discharged servant of his own 
 was heard with attention. Fox ridiculed the notion that the 
 Americans would treat with us, when the King on his birthday 
 had bestowed " cinque ports and blue ribbons " on the men who 
 had plunged the countries in war. 
 
 Lowther's motion was lost, and next day the King prorogued 
 Parliament. So ended one of the most angry sessions of our 
 history. 
 
 Note. — "By the beginning of May, a. considerable force was assembled at 
 Portsmouth. Admiral Keppel had every prospect of being shortly at sea, when he 
 received an order to place nine of his ships of the line under the command of Vice- 
 Admiral Byron, who was then at Plymouth, and about to proceed to Gibraltar, to 
 prevent Monsieur d'Estaing's fleet sailing from Toulon. . . . Admiral Kcppel's 
 fleet, which had been so hastily gathered together to protect this kingdom from 
 invasion, was stripped of men, stores, and provisions, to supply another 
 expedition. Such was the scarcity of stores, that even the tacks and sheets of 
 the Valiant and other cordage rove in that ship and in the liamillies, then 
 under Keppel's command, were unrove and given to Byron's ships." — Life oj 
 Admiral Keppel. 
 
 About six weeks before this borrowing of Peter to pay Paul, Lord North 
 had declared that " the navy was never in greater strength " ; and at the end of 
 April General Conway, having applied to Lord Sandwich for a frigate to guard 
 Jersey and Guernsey (he was Governor of Jersey), was told by the First Lord of 
 the Admiralty that there were but three frigates at disposal, and that he had 
 borrowed one of them to send against Paul Jones. A few days before, Lord 
 Sandwich had assured the House of Lords that there were nineteen frigates at 
 home. — Correspondence of George III with Lord North, vol. ii. 178, note. 
 
CHAPTER LXXI 
 THE ARMY OF THE CONVENTION 
 
 " They are at present detained by a resolve of the Congress, expressing that 
 there are causes of suspicion that the Convention was designed to be broke on 
 our part, and therefore they are justifiable, y^ithout breach of public faith, to 
 suspend the erabarliation of the troops till the Convention is ratified by the Court 
 of Great Britain." — Speech of General Burgoyne on the Alotion for an Enquiry 
 into the Convention of Saratoga, May 26, 1778. 
 
 " Instead of suspending the obnoxious Acts, let us be open, and repeal them. 
 The noble lord avows an intention finally to repeal them, why not do it at first ? 
 America does and will suspect you of designs, if that is not your first measure. 
 We are not in a condition to haggle : we have lost an empire." — Mr. Joliffe on 
 Lord North's Conciliatory Bills, Feb. 23, 1778. 
 
 *' They have no confidence. Sir, in any of our professions or promises." — 
 Mr. Wilkes on Lord Nm-th's Conciliatory Bills, March 2, 1778. 
 
 All went wrong with the Convention. It was found that the 
 number of bayonets did not correspond to that of the muskets, nor 
 of the muskets to that of the men; — at least 1000 short, and 
 all the muskets mere unfit for service. There were only 638 
 cartouch boxes. The quantity of powder and cartridges was 
 very small — "15 barrels grained, and 2 barrels mealed, and the 
 quantity of fixed ammunition very inconsiderable.'' Congress 
 asked for an explanation of all this, and what had become of the 
 colours of the regiments, of the military chest and medicines, the 
 scabbards and belts, of the bayonets and cutlasses? Did any 
 destruction of arms take place between the 1 3th of October, when 
 the first proposal for surrender was made, and the 17th? Gates 
 was to make enquiries. But it was resolved that the embarkation 
 was not to be delayed on account of these queries, if the transports 
 arrived before the answers came. As, however, the important 
 part of the Convention was that the troops should not serve against 
 America during the war. General Heath, who commanded at 
 Boston, was directed to take the names, places of abode, and 
 full description of every private soldier and non-commissioned 
 ofificer, and the name and rank of every officer. Burgoyne refused 
 to allow this, on the score that Carleton had not taken the 
 
6i8 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 descriptions of the prisoners in Canada, in 1776. (But Carleton did 
 take their names and places of abode.) This refusal, however, 
 was not all — although if the British meant to observe the Convention, 
 there was no reason for refusing the identification of the troops. 
 But nine days before his refusal Burgoyne had most imprudently 
 written to Gates, "the public faith is broke" — because the 
 officers had not been as well accommodated as was stipulated. This 
 alarmed Congress. The whole world knew that the British 
 Government — and most of the British people — did not regard this 
 as an ordinary war. It was a rebellion, and the enemy was a 
 belligerent only by courtesy. Tens of thousands of Englishmen, 
 who would have been horrified at a breach of faith with Frenchmen 
 or Spaniards, would have had very little to say about the evasion 
 of a compact made with rebels. It was certain there had already 
 been evasion — arms had been made away with, and it was more 
 than suspected that colours had been withheld. And now 
 Burgoyne's indiscreet expression seemed almost intended to pave 
 the way for an evasion of the vital point. 
 
 The complaint about quarters in Boston was unreasonable — 
 to accommodate an army at a few days' notice is no easy task, 
 especially as it was stipulated that officers should not be parted 
 from their men, and — as the Committee appointed by Congress 
 observed — the British had destroyed so many houses during their 
 occupation, that it was very difficult to find sufficient quarters. 
 The exaggerated terms of the complaint sounded insincere, 
 especially as the Article of the Convention ran, " Agreed to, 
 as far as circumstances will admit." ^ 
 
 It is now beyond dispute that the colours were withheld. 
 How the German colours were smuggled into her baggage, 
 and finally sewn up in a mattress and carried to Halifax, is 
 narrated by Baroness von Riedesel in her Memoirs — she herself 
 superintended the whole business. AVhen, on November 19, 1777, 
 enquiry was made by Congress as to what had become of the 
 standards belonging to the different regiments in General 
 Burgoyne's army, Gates replied (letter of December 3), " Respect- 
 ing the standards. General Burgoyne declared upon his honor, 
 that the colours of the regiments were left in Canada." But 
 on page xvi. of the Appendix to his "State of the Expedition,'' 
 Burgoyne says, speaking of the retreat of the Americans from 
 
 ^ Lieutenant Anburey particularly laments the absence of taverns, " at present " 
 — only two, and those the worst imaginable, except that they provide good 
 dinners ; " the rest of the accommodations would disgrace the meanest public 
 house in London." 
 
THE ARMY OF THE CONVENTION 619 
 
 Ticonderoga, on the sth of July, 1777: "This movement was 
 very discernible, as were the British colours, which the Brigadier 
 [Fraser] had fixed upon the fort of Ticonderoga." The colours, 
 therefore, were not left behind. 
 
 But there is still more conclusive evidence that the colours 
 were still with the army. The Historical Record of tlu Ninth, 
 or East -Norfolk Regiment of Foot, compiled by "Richard 
 Canon, Esq., Adjutant-General's Office, Horse-Guards, London, 
 1848," and published by "Orders from Head-quarters," and "by 
 command of his late Majesty, William the ivth," has this 
 reference to the affair : " Lieutenant-Colonel Hill of the Ninth, 
 being anxious to preserve the colours of the regiment, took them 
 off the staves, and concealed them in his baggage, which he was 
 permitted to retain. The American Government violated the 
 conditions of the convention, and detained the troops until 1781, 
 when the Ninth proceeded to England, and Lieutenant-Colonel 
 Hill producing the colours presented them to King George iii, 
 who rewarded his faithful services with the appointment of aide- 
 de-camp to his Majesty, and the rank of colonel in the army." 
 
 The passionate desire to save the colours will be comprehensible 
 to the least sentimental. It is also true that the terms of the 
 Convention do not contain the word "colours." But the 
 colours would not have been stripped from the poles (which 
 were burned), and smuggled away in a mattress, if it had been 
 supposed they were exempted from the Convention. Madame 
 von Riedesel says that she " made the Americans at Saratoga 
 believe the German colours were burnt," and that they at first 
 took this ill. And Burgoyne's assurance, " upon his honour," that 
 the colours had been left behind in Canada, is not the reply 
 he would have made if he had considered that Congress had 
 no right to enquire for them. 
 
 In these circumstances, it was the height of unwisdom to 
 give the Americans the smallest excuse for detaining the army ; 
 but we seemed determined to go on behaving exactly as a people 
 would behave when preparing to violate an engagement. An 
 attempt was made to change the place of embarkation from 
 Boston to Rhode Island, or the Sound— close to New York— and 
 twenty-six transports were sent. This put the finishing touch to 
 the suspicions of Congress. Twenty-six transports were inadequate 
 to carry 5642 men and the necessary provisions on a winter 
 voyage to Europe. It was suspected that the troops, once 
 permitted to embark, would never get any nearer England than 
 New York. And now came our greatest piece of folly — if indeed 
 
620 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 it was nothing worse. Congress, alleging that there had been 
 "so many instances of former fraud in the conduct of our 
 enemies," resolved to suspend the embarkation till the Convention 
 was ratified by the King. Now, too late, the British officers all 
 signed their paroles. But, alas ! several British ofificers, taken 
 at New York in 1776, had broken their paroles; and although 
 Howe had written to Washington that he disapproved of this, 
 he did not imitate the old Roman honour, and send them back. 
 Had they broken their paroles to a French General, there can 
 be no doubt that he would have done so. But this was not a 
 real war — only a rebellion. 
 
 On the same grounds the British Government refused to 
 ratify the Convention, the reason given being that to do so would 
 be to acknowledge the authority of " the illegal Congress.'' 
 
 It is strange to find English writers charging Congress and 
 Washington with bad faith, and stranger still to find Mr. Moncure 
 Conway agreeing with them. Mr. Conway seems to think the best 
 that can be said for Washington is, that he stuck at nothing which 
 could serve the interests of his country. In other cases Washing- 
 ton showed the most rigid sense of fairness — when, for instance, 
 Congress ordered Lieutenant-Colonel Campbell to be thrown into 
 Concord Gaol, because General Charles Lee was not being treated 
 as a prisoner of war. Campbell appealed to Washington, and 
 Washington .wrote to the Council of Massachusetts Bay, that, 
 as '^exactly tJie same treatment that General Howe shows to 
 General Lee " was ordered by Congress to be shown to Colonel 
 Campbell and the Hessian officers ; and as Lee " is only confined 
 in a commodious house, with genteel accommodations, we have 
 no right or reason to be more severe upon Colonel Campbell." 
 He wrote in a still stronger strain to Congress, and got Campbell 
 enlarged. 
 
 But the case now was entirely different. Several suspicious 
 circumstances had occurred to throw doubt on British good 
 faith, and when the British Government was asked to dispel 
 them by ratifying the Convention, it refused, and the reason 
 alleged for refusal inevitably suggested that the Americans 
 would not be treated as were other Powers at war with Great 
 Britain. The fact that the British Government did not take 
 so simple a means of putting Congress in the wrong before the 
 world, and chose rather to lose the services of its best army for 
 years, is in itself suspicious. No ratification of any kind was 
 ever offered, and this seems explicable only on the supposition 
 that our Government hoped to be able to recapture the Convention 
 
THE ARMY OF THE CONVENTION 621 
 
 army by some coup-de-main, and preferred not to hamper themselves 
 by an official acknowledgment that we were bound not to use 
 it against America. They were, in fact, playing for what is 
 called " the off-chance," and if our own intention had been 
 single, we should have made a very great deal more of the affair. 
 It was, indeed, difficult to do so, when there was the obvious 
 retort, " Why do you refuse to ratify the Convention ? " It was 
 fully believed in America that Sir William Howe was preparing 
 an attack on Boston to release the Army of the Convention. The 
 precedent of Klosterseven was there to show that a convention 
 might be set aside. In refusing to ratify, because there was no 
 legal authority to whom to pledge oicr faith, we reduced the 
 Convention to a private compact. What security had Congress 
 that we might not one day decline to be bound by it ? Congress 
 had solid reasons for fearing this. With incredible indiscretion, 
 Burgoyne had called the escapes of prisoners of war " honourable 
 desertions,'' implying that the men were only trying to join Clinton 
 or Howe. True, Burgoyne had explained that he did not mean 
 Clinton or Howe would connive at this — he "beheved" they 
 would return such men, and " not be behind the old Roman 
 examples of keeping faith with an enemy." But there is no 
 instance of such return ; and Howe had not returned even those 
 officers who broke their paroles in 1776. Burgoyne talked of 
 keeping faith "with an enemy" — but that was the very point. 
 We did not acknowledge the right of rebels to be considered 
 " enemies." 
 
 It was asserted by some that Lafayette was at the bottom of 
 the detention — it was said that, foreseeing war with England, 
 he wished to prevent the best regiments in the British Army 
 being employed against France. There is not the smallest proof 
 of this, nor is it necessary to suppose that Congress required any 
 prompting. The question has always remained unanswered. 
 Why did we not put Congress in the wrong by ratifying in some 
 form or other ? Why did we so carefully and consistently abstain 
 from doing so? In the middle of 1778 we actually gave our 
 Commissioners authority to treat with Congress on the question 
 of submission, as though it were a legal body. Why did we not 
 extend the temporary legal fiction to the question of the 
 Convention? Why, but because we hoped that the chapter 
 of accidents might give us back our captives under an unratified 
 compact? The Army of the Convention did contain the flower 
 of the British regiments. The obvious policy was to instruct 
 the Commissioners to begin by ratifying the Convention, under 
 
622 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 their power to treat with Congress "as if it were a legal body.'' 
 We could then have got our troops back, for use anywhere but 
 in America. The conclusion is irresistible that we preferred to 
 keep them in America, and take our chance of the Fortune of War 
 enabling us to recover them for further service there. 
 
CHAPTER LXXII 
 THE CONWAY CABAL 
 
 "The intelligence from Mr. Thornton of the discontents among the leaders 
 in America, if authentick, will not only greatly facilitate the bringing that 
 deluded country to some reasonable ideas, but will make France reconsider 
 whether she ought to enter into a war when America may leave her in the 
 lurch." — The King to Lord North, St James', March 6, 1778, 53 min. 
 pt. m. 
 
 After Germantown, Washington encamped at first in the woods 
 of Whitemarsh, fourteen miles from Philadelphia, hoping to be 
 able to defend the forts on the Delaware. But Gates was so long 
 in sending back the men lent him, that nothing could be done, 
 and the British obtained command of the river. Washington 
 bitterly contrasted the little support he received with the way 
 in which the New England Militia had turned out against 
 Burgoyne. He wrote to Patrick Henry, " I was left to fight two 
 battles, to save Philadelphia, with less numbers than composed 
 the army of my antagonist, whilst the world has given us at 
 least double." And he was obliged to encourage this mortifying 
 impression, "because, next to being strong, it is best to be 
 thought so by the enemy." He added, " If the cause is 
 advanced, indifferent is it to me where or in what quarter it 
 happens." 
 
 When at last Gates sent 4000 men, they were in rags, and part 
 of Morgan's company could not take the field for want of shoes. 
 Among its other military exploits, Congress had upset the 
 Commissariat, with the result that "hogsheads of shoes, 
 stockings and clothing were lying at different places on the 
 roads and in the woods, perishing for want of teams, or 
 money to pay the teamsters." At the same time Congress 
 and the Press were demanding a " stroke." Several opportunities 
 for "strokes" had been lost by Gates detaining the troops, but 
 in November Cornwallis was detached to Jersey, and Stirling 
 thought an attack might now be made on Philadelphia. But by 
 eleven to four the Council of War decided that it must involve 
 
624 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 a fearful expenditure of life, and might fail.^ Washington well 
 knew how much he personally had to gain by rashness, but 
 he would not sacrifice his men to his military reputation. But 
 if Congress had done its duty by the army, Washington could 
 have rendered Howe's position untenable — and perhaps have 
 made his retreat impossible. As it was, he could do no more 
 than send Greene to harass Cornwallis. There were skirmishes 
 between the outposts. Lafayette, not yet quite recovered from 
 his wound, distinguished himself in a little affair with pickets, and 
 to Washington's great pleasure Congress gave him the command 
 of Stephen's division. 
 
 The Old Congress accomplished a wonderful work in setting 
 going the civil government of a continent, amidst the throes 
 of revolution and war.^ Even though it had in every province 
 the traditions and forms of generations of self-government to 
 help it, this was a mighty task. But there is another side to 
 the picture — of the Old Congress allowing Washington's army 
 to want the necessaries of life, and then reproaching him for not 
 keeping the field in winter ; neglecting his entreaties for regular 
 levies, and then complaining that he did not fight battles ; 
 appointing Boards of War, ostensibly to supply the wants of the 
 army, — which they scandalously neglected to do, — but in reality 
 to watch and hamper its Generals — a business in which they were 
 zealous. Worst of all, caballing against Washington, and waiting 
 for the moment when it could supersede him by the impostor 
 Lee (those less deep in the secret thought it was to be Gates). 
 All this is a spectacle only to be paralleled for baseness and folly 
 by the way in which the Carthaginian Senate abandoned Hannibal. 
 But Hannibal was carrying on a war of aggression on foreign 
 soil — Washington was defending his own country from an 
 invader. The full tale of baseness will never be known — Governor 
 Jay saved the Old Congress from the execration of posterity 
 by putting into the fire the records of its treatment of Washington 
 — he thought it the greatest kindness he could do it. 
 
 John Adams had been appointed Commissioner to Paris, 
 in the room of Deane, and Gates was President of the Board 
 of War. The cabal were overjoyed — they thought they would 
 
 ^ A letter from Reed of this time says, " There has been so great a majority 
 of his officers opposed to every enterprising plan, as fully justifies his conduct." 
 Reed himself was opposed to the attack on the city. 
 
 ^ Civil government was maintained during the Revolution with hardly an 
 interruption anywhere. — Sabine. 
 
THE CONWAY CABAL 625 
 
 soon get rid of Washington, and they sneered at "the American 
 Fabius " more openly than ever. 
 
 Winter had now set in. Washington's men were worn with 
 long and hard service, badly clothed, and without blankets. 
 Winter quarters of some sort were absolutely necessary. 
 Washington could have retired to the towns — Lancaster, 
 York, and Carlisle; but if he did so, he would leave a large 
 and fertile district to be foraged by the enemy, and its 
 inhabitants without protection. He resolved to encamp as 
 near Philadelphia as possible. He selected Valley Forge, 
 in Chester County, on the west side of the Schuylkill, about 
 twenty miles from Philadelphia. It was a desolate spot 
 among the hills. As the half - barefoot army went, the 
 footsteps of some were traced in blood. In despair of 
 getting shoes for them, Washington offered 10 dollars for the 
 best model of a substitute, to be made of raw hide. His 
 troops had to cut down trees to build huts — the huts to be 
 14 feet by 16, with log walls filled in with clay — twelve non- 
 commissioned officers and soldiers to each hut. A General 
 officer was allowed a hut to himself. The soldiers' huts 
 fronted a street — as in a Roman encampment ; the officers' 
 formed a line in the rear; the whole looked like a rude 
 village. The sick found refuge with neighbouring farmers. 
 
 They had hardly been here two days, when before day- 
 break of December 22 word was brought that Howe had 
 made a sortie towards Chester — apparently on a foraging 
 expedition. When Washington ordered two of his Generals 
 to be ready, one replied, "Fighting will be far preferable to 
 starving " ; the other said his men would be very glad to march 
 — they had been without bread for three days together, and 
 without meat for two. In fact, the night before a dangerous 
 mutiny had broken out. Washington wrote instantly to 
 Congress, that unless the Commissariat was managed more 
 vigorously and regularly "the army must dissolve." He 
 had done all in his power by remonstrating, but without 
 effect. The march of the army had been delayed in consequence, 
 "on more than one interesting occasion," and if a body of 
 the enemy had crossed the Schuylkill that morning, the divisions 
 could not have moved. It was now that he heard the Legislature 
 of Pennsylvania had complained to Congress of his not keep- 
 ing the field. It was too much to receive such news, 
 "shivering in the midst of December's snow." He wrote 
 to the President of Congress (December 23) that, though he 
 
 VOL. I. 40 
 
626 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 had been tender of complaining about the change in the 
 Commissariat, it was contrary to his judgment, and the con- 
 sequences were predicted. But now that the inactivity of 
 the army was charged to his account, " not only by the 
 common vulgar, but by those in power, it is time to speak 
 plain in exculpation of myself. With truth, then, I can declare, 
 that no man, in my opinion, ever had his measures more 
 impeded than I have in every department of the army.'' 
 Since last July, he had had no assistance from the Quartermaster- 
 General ; and the Commissary - General charged his own 
 deficiency greatly to this. By a field-return that day, he 
 had 2898 men unfit for duty, "because they are barefoot 
 and otherwise naked." His whole strength in camp was 
 no more than 8200 fit for duty; and since the 4th instant 
 these numbers have decreased near 2000 men, from the 
 hardships and exposures they have undergone, particularly 
 the want of blankets — numbers being obliged to sit up all 
 night by fires, "instead of taking comfortable rest in a natural 
 and common way." Gentlemen reprobate his going into 
 winter-quarters, "as if they thought the soldiers made of 
 stocks or stones, and equally insensible of frost and snow " ; 
 and as if they supposed an inferior army under our disadvantages 
 could confine a superior one, "well appointed and provided," 
 in Philadelphia. "Yet these very gentlemen, who saw the 
 nakedness of the troops for themselves, and thought their own 
 soldiers worse clad than others, and advised me near a month 
 ago to postpone a plan I was about to adopt— under promise 
 of an ample supply (not one article of which I have received) — 
 think a winter campaign so easy. I can assure those gentlemen, 
 that it is a much easier and less distressing thing, to draw 
 remonstrances in a comfortable room by a good fireside, 
 than to occupy a cold, bleak hill, and sleep under frost and 
 snow, without clothes or blankets." And he is obliged to 
 conceal the true state of the army, and expose himself to 
 " detraction and calumny." ^ 
 
 Congress had long suggested that he should supply himself 
 as the British did, by seizing supplies wherever he could 
 find them, paying with certificates redeemable by Congress. 
 
 ' " To keep the field entirely is Impracticable, and so you would think if you 
 saw the plight we were in. . . . If it is not doing what we would, it is doing what 
 we can ; and I must say the general has shown a truly feeling and patriotic 
 respect for us on this occasion, in which you would agree with me, if you knew 
 all the circumstances." — Reed to the President of the Pennsylvania Legislature. 
 
THE CONWAY CABAL 627 
 
 But the man to whom they were so chary of entrusting 
 power detested the exercise of military authority over civilians, 
 and was, moreover, afraid of teaching his soldiers to plunder. 
 Such methods, he wrote to Congress, " never fail, even in 
 the most veteran troops, to raise a disposition to licentiousness, 
 to plunder and robbery, difificult to suppress afterwards." 
 
 Only the history of the Conway Cabal can explain the treat- 
 ment which Washington received at this time. 
 
 Among the officers who came out with Lafayette was the Baron 
 de Kalb, a German by birth, but long in the French service. He 
 was now a hale and hearty veteran of sixty, whose vigour was 
 ascribed to the fact that he drank nothing but water. In September, 
 1777, Congress gave him the commission of a Major-General — to 
 date with Lafayette's. This greatly incensed Brigadier-General 
 Conway, who had had de Kalb under his command in France. 
 He demanded the same rank, and was supported by many in and 
 out of Congress— especially by Mifflin, the Quartermaster-General, 
 once a great friend of Washington, but long engaged in intrigues 
 against him. His scandalous neglect of Washington's army 
 seems something worse than neglect, when his part in the 
 cabal is considered. The workings of the cabal were known to 
 some extent in England, where they were represented as "dis- 
 sentions among the American generals,'' and helped to en- 
 courage the refusal to acknowledge Independence. Ostensibly 
 the cabal aimed at substituting Gates for Washington — Gates 
 was represented as the sole author of Burgoyne's defeat. 
 Washington, who had made it possible by crippling his own 
 army, and Arnold, who had led the victorious charge, were 
 entirely ignored. 
 
 It was Washington's nature to go on doing his utmost for his 
 country, and leave his reputation to take care for itself. But there 
 came a moment when he could no longer ignore what was going 
 on ; and one day early in November Conway had received this 
 note from the Commander-in-Chief — 
 
 "Sir, — A letter which I received last night contained the 
 following paragraph — ' in a letter from General Conway to General 
 Gates, he says " Heaven has determmed to save your country, or a weak 
 general and bad counsellors would have ruined it."'' — I am, Sir, your 
 humble servant, George Washington." 
 
 This letter greatly alarmed Conway. He showed it to his 
 friends of the cabal, who were equally alarmed. He wrote to 
 Washington, trying to palliate the words — it was the careless 
 
628 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 freedom of language allowed in familiar letter-writing. Appar- 
 ently Washington received this explanation coldly, for Conway 
 resigned, alleging as his reason that some members of Congress 
 had spoken of him disparagingly. Washington kept his secret, and 
 Congress persuaded Conway to retract his resignation. Meanwhile 
 Mifflin had informed Gates that an extract from Conway's letter 
 had been procured and sent to Headquarters — the extract was 
 " a collection of just sentiments, but not such as you should have 
 entrusted to any of your family. General Washington enclosed it 
 to Conway without remarks." This threw Gates into consterna- 
 tion. What was the extract ? How had it been obtained ? He 
 wrote piteously, " There is scarcely a man living who takes a 
 greater care of his letters than I do. I never fail to lock them up, 
 and keep the key in my pocket. . . . No punishment is too severe 
 for the wretch who betrayed me.'' He questioned the gentlemen 
 of his staff — no one knew anything. Next, it occurred to him 
 that Alexander Hamilton had had free access to his quarters, 
 during a late mission from the Commander-in Chief He wrote 
 an abject letter to Washington, beseeching him to help him find 
 out who had " stealingly copied " his letters. It would do the United 
 States a very important service if your Excellency would detect 
 the wretch — as he has betrayed me, he might " capitally injure 
 your operations.'' He added that he was sending a copy of his 
 letter to Congress, that Congress might " concert " with Washing- 
 ton how to discover the traitor. Washington replied that he was 
 much surprised to learn that Congress had had a copy of Gates' 
 letter — this laid him under the disagreeable necessity of showing 
 them his answer. He then informed Gates that Wilkinson had 
 disclosed the secret. Last October, Wilkinson, then on his way 
 to Congress, fell in with Lord Stirling at Reading, and, "not in 
 confidence," told Major McWilliams, Stirling's aide-de-camp, that 
 Conway had written the words in question, and Stirling had 
 informed Washington, with this comment, " Such wicked duplicity 
 of conduct I shall always think it my duty to detect." Washington 
 had mentioned the incident to no one except Lafayette, to whom 
 Conway had spoken on the subject — " so desirous was I of con- 
 cealing every matter that could, in its consequences, give the 
 smallest interruption to the tranquillity of this army, or afl'ord a 
 gleam of hope to the enemy by dissentions therein." Till Stirling's 
 letter came Washington did not even know that Conway and 
 Gates corresponded — he supposed them strangers to each other. 
 Far from thinking the safety of the States affected by this dis- 
 covery, he had supposed the information came from Gates himself. 
 
THE CONWAY CABAL 629 
 
 and was intended " to forewarn, and consequently to forearm me, 
 against a secret enemy." 
 
 Gates now wished he had not written as he did to Washington. 
 If this was all Washington knew, the letter could be denied. 
 Gates did deny it — he wrote that the paragraph his Excellency 
 had condescended to transcribe was spurious — fabricated to answer 
 the most selfish and wicked purposes. Conway's letter was 
 perfectly harmless — it made no mention of weak generals or bad 
 counsellors — " particular actions rather than persons were blamed." 
 " I declare that the paragraph submitted to your Excellency was, 
 in words as well as in substance, a wicked forgery.'' All he wanted 
 was to know who had stolen a copy of a letter — and might there- 
 fore betray secrets to the enemy. Brigadier-General Wilkinson 
 had endeavoured to fix his suspicions on Lieut.-Colonel Troup, 
 who "might have incautiously conversed on the subject of 
 General Conway's letter with Colonel Hamilton, whom you had sent 
 not long before to Albany." 
 
 Conway wrote to Washington that Gates had returned his 
 letter, and he found with great satisfaction that "the paragraph 
 so much spoken of did not exist in the said letter, nor anything 
 like it." He had meant to show the letter, but President Laurens 
 had dissuaded him, lest it should inform the enemy of a misunder- 
 standing among the American Generals, so he depended on the 
 justice, candour, and generosity of General Washington to stop 
 " the forgery." 
 
 On February 9 Washington wrote Gates a long letter, in reply 
 to three of his, pointing out how they contradicted each other — 
 and sometimes the same letter contradicted itself! The first 
 letter by implication allowed the reality of the extract; in the 
 second, it was "a wicked forgery." If there were nothing in 
 Conway's letter " too nearly related " to the extract, why not have 
 produced it? "Concealment in an affair which has made so 
 much noise, though not by my means, will naturally lead men to 
 conjecture the worst.'' 
 
 It was now Wilkinson's turn. He denied he ever uttered the 
 words attributed to him. Stirling thereupon wrote, reminding 
 him of the conversation, and asking whether Conway had 
 questioned him. Wilkinson wrote back that he remembered 
 perfectly spending "a social day" with his lordship at Reading, 
 but really did not remember the conversation — with a hint at 
 unguarded moments, and a plainer intimation that in asking him 
 to divulge a private letter Stirling had proposed he should do 
 something dishonourable. Wilkinson then learned that Gates 
 
630 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 had denounced Jmn as the betrayer, and had spoken of him in 
 gross language.^ "I was shocked," writes Wilkinson on this. "I 
 had sacrificed my Hneal rank at General Gates' request, I had 
 served him with zeal and fidehty," and he condemned me for an 
 act of which I was innocent, and against which " my soul revolted 
 with horror." He demanded satisfaction, and a meeting with 
 Gates was arranged. But a few minutes before the hour fixed, as 
 Wilkinson was leaving the house with his second. Gates sent to 
 speak with him. They met in a back street of Yorktown — Gates 
 was unarmed and alone. According to Wilkinson's account, 
 Gates burst into tears, and asked Wilkinson how he could think 
 he meant to injure him? What is certain is that there was no 
 duel ; that Wilkinson was shortly made Secretary to the Board of 
 War, and that he found Gates barely civil. He next thought of 
 challenging Lord Stirling, but on reflection only asked for a 
 written acknowledgment that the conversation published passed 
 in a private company during a convivial hour. Stirling obliged 
 him, but added that there was no injunction of secrecy. 
 
 These miserable intrigues had a purpose — they represent an 
 organised plot to procure Washington's dismissal. The secret of 
 them leaked out, and encouraged George the Third not a little. 
 There can be no doubt that if the plot had succeeded military 
 resistance in America would have collapsed in six months. The 
 anarchy always predicted by ministerialists must have followed — or 
 if not anarchy, such disunion, that the revolution itself must have 
 collapsed for the time being. All that stood between America 
 and such a catastrophe was the patriotism and the patience of 
 Washington. 
 
 The value of his character to the cause was well understood. 
 Some letters were published this winter — first in London, after- 
 wards in New York — with the object of showing that he was 
 secretly opposed to Independence. A loyalist of De Lancey's corps 
 was the alleged source of these letters — he professed to have 
 found them in the possession of Washington's mulatto servant 
 Billy, left behind sick at Fort Washington. They purported to be 
 from various members of Washington's family, and there were 
 rough drafts of his answers. It was never known who forged 
 these letters — it was someone who knew something of Washington's 
 family and circumstances, but there were several entire mistakes. 
 The letters cheered ministerialists, but they deceived no one in 
 
 ' In the first rough draft of this letter, Gates had suggested that Wilkinson 
 invented the whole story. By some means Wilkinson got hold of this draft, 
 and pubHshed it in his Memoirs. 
 
THE CONWAY CABAL 631 
 
 America. Billy was never taken by the British, nor did any of 
 Washington's or of his attendants' baggage ever fall into their 
 hands. 
 
 Meanwhile Washington's old friend, Dr. Craik of Maryland, 
 was writing to warn him that a strong faction in Congress and on 
 the Board of War was crying up Gates, and making people believe 
 that"Washington had three or four times as many troops as those 
 of the enemy, yet had done nothing, and had given up Philadelphia, 
 and lost many opportunities of defeating the enemy. They had 
 their own scheme — a winter expedition to Canada — to go from 
 Albany, cross Champlain on the ice, burn the British shipping at 
 St. John's, and push on for Montreal. Washington was not 
 consulted. With the hope of bringing Lafayette over to the cabal, 
 the command was offered him, with Conway as his second. 
 Lafayette would have declined, but was persuaded by Washington 
 to accept, and went to Yorktown, where he found Gates "very 
 convivial " after dinner. But when Lafayette gave "the Commander- 
 in-Chief of the American armies," the toast was drunk without 
 cheering. 
 
 The Canadian expedition never came off. When Lafayette 
 arrived at Albany, Conway met him with the news that it was 
 impossible — Generals Schuyler, Arnold, and Lincoln had all 
 written to say so. Instead of the 2500 men promised Lafayette, 
 there were not 1200 fit for duty, and they were "naked even for 
 a summer's campaign," and it was already late in the season. 
 Congress had the good sense to forbid the attempt. 
 
 Wilkinson was, however, so uncomfortable at the War Office, 
 that he resigned and went to Washington at Valley Forge, where 
 the whole correspondence was shown him. And now this un- 
 scrupulous and intriguing young man turned on the weak and 
 unstable General in whose hands he would have placed the 
 destinies of America. He wrote to Congress about " the acts of 
 treachery and falsehood in which he had detected Major-General 
 Gates," and declined to serve with him. 
 
CHAPTER LXXIII 
 THE EVACUATION OF PHILADELPHIA 
 
 "July 2. Sir William Howe arrived. . . . He brought an account of the army 
 under Clinton having abandoned Philadelphia for want of provisions, and being 
 suffered to march to New York through the Jerseys without molestation, on 
 a compromise of his not destroying Philadelphia." — H. Walpole, Last Journals, 
 ii. 282. 
 
 " The many marks I have given you of my friendship must convince you that 
 when I decline conferring the Cinque Ports on you but during pleasure that 
 I will never give this office but in that mode." — The King to Lord North, May 
 19, 1778. 
 
 "Lord North, — You cannot be surprised that the degree to which you 
 have pressed to resign during the space of the last three months has given me 
 much uneasiness." — The King to Lord North, May 26, 1778. 
 
 ' ' The King bribed him to stay for two reasons : the first, because he sub- 
 mitted to be only a cypher, and would carry through any measures the King or 
 Junto required ; the second, because the King had nobody to put in his place." — 
 H. Walpole, Last Journals , ii. 305. 
 
 Washington was remodelling his army with the help of a Com- 
 mittee of Arrangement, which he had persuaded Congress to 
 appoint. The army still often wanted for food — there was some- 
 times " little less than a famine " — he himself was astonished that 
 his men did not desert him. But they knew that he was labouring 
 for them night and day, and at last things grew better. The 
 Commissariat was reformed, supplies intended for the British were 
 intercepted ; best of all, Greene was made Quartermaster-General. 
 
 By patient continuance in well-doing Washington not only 
 overcame the malice of his enemies — there came a day when they 
 vied with each other in eagerly denying they had ever thought 
 him less than the greatest and best of men. Towards the end of 
 January a Committee came to the camp from Congress, and John 
 Harvey, one of them, said to Washington, " If you had but explained 
 yourself, these reports would have ceased long "ago." " How could 
 I have thrown off the blame," he replied, " without doing injury 
 to the common cause ? " 
 
 At the end of February a great piece of good fortune befell the 
 
 632 
 
THE EVACUATION OF PHILADELPHIA 633 
 
 American cause, by the arrival of Baron von Steuben, an old 
 soldier of the Seven Years' War, aide-de-camp to Frederick, and 
 covered with honours. The American army sorely needed some- 
 one to drill it, and Steuben was persuaded by the French Minister 
 of War to undertake the task. No promises were made him, 
 but Beaumarchais found him in funds, and he brought letters 
 from Franklin and Deane. Washington was overjoyed. But the 
 difficulties were great — the troops were very raw, the Baron knew 
 no English, and it was of no use to swear at them in French or 
 German. Captain Walker, of a New York regiment, came to his 
 aid — he spoke French. The Baron said he could not have been 
 more rejoiced "had he seen an angel from heaven." Like a 
 patient, conscientious German, von Steuben toiled at the militia, 
 cursing them freely in all the languages he knew, and, assisted by 
 Walker's French, got them into such shape as they had never been 
 in yet. He would be up at daybreak, and in the saddle by sunrise 
 — off to the parade alone if his suite was not ready. And men 
 and officers repaid him by their zeal and obedience. A little more 
 of the Baron's instructions and they would not fear the British 
 regulars.! 
 
 In the spring of 1778, West Point on the Hudson was chosen 
 by the New York State Legislature for fortification. Kosciusko 
 helped to plan the works. Washington now suggested a daring 
 enterprise to the officers there — no less than the capture of Sir 
 Henry Clinton, as Prescot had been captured. Clinton's quarters 
 were near the Battery — near the Hudson. A retired way led from 
 them through a backyard to the river-bank. Washington thought 
 that a party might embark in eight or ten whale-boats at King's 
 Ferry, just below the Highlands, on the first of the ebb, early in 
 the morning. The boats could row with muffled oars, under the 
 shadow of the western shore, and in six or eight hours could be 
 close to New York. The men were to be dressed in red, much 
 in the style of British soldiers. There were no ships of war on that 
 side. It js said that Alexander Hamilton persuaded Washington 
 to give up this idea, on the singular ground that it was a pity to 
 remove Sir Henry Clinton from the command — they now perfectly 
 understood his character, and knew what he would do ; by captur- 
 
 ' In the spring of 1778 the American army was still very ill clad. Captain 
 Graydon, who had been taken at Long Island, but was liberated on parole, paid 
 a visit to the camp at Morristown. Accustomed to see the trim British soldiers, 
 he was scandalised at the rags which did duty for uniforms. Even General 
 Wayne had fallen off, and now " looked dressed in character for Macheath, in 
 a dingey red coat, with a black rusty cravat and tarnished hat." 
 
634 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 ing him they would make way for another, whose character they 
 would have to learn, and who might be abler. 
 
 On March 20 Washington consulted all his General officers 
 in camp as to whether to attempt the recovery of Philadelphia or 
 New York ? or to wait for the British to move first ? Just as he 
 did this, he learned that the cabal was at an end. Conway had 
 shown great insubordination after the Canadian expedition was 
 given up, and had again resigned. This time Congress at once 
 accepted. Conway tried to retract — he had been misunderstood, 
 through some " orthographical or grammatical " mistake — he was an 
 Irishman and had learned his English in France. But Congress 
 would not keep him now on any terms. By this time it was ashamed 
 of the way it had treated Washington. Conway went about abusing 
 the Commander-in-Chief, till he was called to account by General 
 Cadwallader, and was severely wounded in the duel which followed. 
 Believing that his end was near, he wrote to Washington to express 
 his "sincere grief for having done, written, or said anything dis- 
 agreeable to your Excellency. . . . You are in my eyes the great and 
 good man.'' He did not die, but his position had become very 
 disagreeable, as everybody had turned against him, and he soon 
 went back to France. 
 
 One dangerous man was thus removed from American counsels, 
 but another far more dangerous was about to return. General 
 Lee had been liberated last Christmas Day (by the King's express 
 order), on parole not to leave New York. Clinton and Robertson 
 had been lending him horses, and had been extremely friendly. 
 Late in March he was taken to Philadelphia, with an understanding 
 that he would soon be exchanged. On the 5th of April he was 
 allowed to visit the camp at Valley Forge, and on the 9th he 
 went to Congress at Yorktown. He was here when his exchange 
 for General Prescot was finally arranged, and he rejoined the army 
 at Valley Forge on the 20th of May.^ It was afterwards said that 
 he owed his release to a letter which Sir Joseph Yorke — our 
 Ambassador at the Hague — wrote to Eden — that from what he 
 had seen and known of Lee, he was convinced he was the worst 
 present that could be made to any army. "It is impossible but 
 Lee must puzzle everything he meddles in.'' 
 
 Gates was to be sent north, but to do nothing against New 
 York without consulting the Commander-in-Chief! 
 
 The rough drafts of the Conciliatory Bills reached Tryon 
 in New York about the middle of April. FitzPatrick did not 
 
 ' Ethan Allen was exchanged at the same time. He shortly after went 
 home to Vermont, and took no further part in the war. 
 
THE EVACUATION OF PHILADELPHIA 635 
 
 exaggerate the indignation of the army. It had been led to expect 
 20,000 men at least. Instead of this there was to be a general 
 pardon, and everything conceded! And a French fleet setting 
 out from Toulon ! 
 
 The army in Philadelphia was not less angry, especially when 
 it was known that Sir William Howe was going home. Howe 
 had long wished to resign. He had been deeply offended by the 
 cold, dry tone of Germaine's letters after his successes in the 
 autumn, and after Donop's disaster he had asked leave to resign. 
 He now found that he was to be made a scapegoat for Burgoyne's 
 misfortunes, and he insisted on being allowed to come home and 
 defend himself. 
 
 The winter in Philadelphia had been gay. The officers 
 subscribed for a house where they could play faro and give 
 weekly balls. There were private theatricals, and Captain Andr^, 
 an accomplished young gentleman, Swiss by birth, painted a 
 curtain for the stage. Sometimes the limit of decorum was over- 
 passed — as when an English girl, a colonel's mistress, drove 
 down the line at a review dressed in the colours of her protector's 
 regiment. Howe had regained all his old popularity — his kindness 
 of heart and personal bravery more than atoned for his self- 
 indulgence and want of dignity. When the army learned that he 
 had solicited and obtained his recall, they resolved to give him a 
 magnificent farewell. The Tories of Philadelphia vied with the British 
 officers in making it the most splendid entertainment ever given 
 by an army to its General. It was called the Meschianza, because 
 it was a little of everything — a regatta on the Delaware, a proces- 
 sion beneath triumphal arches, a tournament, a display of fireworks, 
 and a ball. The tournament was, as far as Captain Andr^ could 
 make it, a faithful copy of a mediaeval joust — except that the 
 selection of a Queen of Beauty was prudently omitted. But the 
 rest was in order — the White Knights of the Blended Rose 
 challenged all and sundry to show that their ladies were not the 
 fairest and wittiest in the whole world, and the Black Knights of 
 the Burning Mountain took up the challenge on behalf of their 
 own ladies — Captain Andrd appearing in honour of Miss Peggy 
 Chew. They tilted, then fought with swords ; but before any 
 harm was done, the Marshal of the Field stopped them in the 
 Ladies' name, and told them they had done enough for glory. 
 Then all the knights rode under the triumphal arches — one 
 erected to the General, one to the Admiral. The ball followed, 
 and in the middle of the ball the fireworks, with twenty "great 
 set-pieces," the last of which represented military trophies, 
 
636 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Chinese fountains, and on the top the figure of Fame blowing 
 Sir William Howe's great deeds about the world. After this 
 they all went to supper in a magnificent saloon hung with " 56 
 large pier-glasses, ornamented with green silk artificial flowers and 
 ribands," with innumerable lights, and twenty-four black slaves bend- 
 ing to the ground as the General and Admiral approached. The 
 supper consisted of 1200 dishes, the King's health was drunk to 
 a flourish of trumpets, and the ball was kept up till four next 
 morning. It was the grandest spectacle ever seen in Philadelphia, 
 and was given in honour of a General who was, for the second 
 time, about to evacuate a chief town of the enemy.^ 
 
 A fortnight before there had been a " military fete " at Valley 
 Forge, to celebrate the ratification of the French Treaty. There 
 was a solemn Thanksgiving by the chaplains at the head of each 
 brigade ; a parade and a feu de joie, with shouts for the King of 
 France. Washington dined in public with all his officers. When 
 he retired at five in the afternoon, he received an ovation which 
 lasted while he rode a quarter of a mile. 
 
 The Meschianza was on May 18; on the 24th Howe bade 
 his army a sorrowful farewell — Knyphausen was so affected 
 that he could not finish his speech. Howe went down the 
 Delaware in the Admiral's barge, and left Sir Henry Clinton to 
 carry out the evacuation which had been finally arranged that very 
 day by a Council of War. 
 
 The Commissioners were drawing near to the shores of 
 America, after a somewhat anxious voyage.^ They compared 
 
 ^ " I fear it was a very foolish business, though I believe it oweA its birth to our 
 relation Sir John Wrotsley. ... I only know there were triumphal arches, and 
 that General Washinton was within twenty-four miles of them, and that Lord 
 Howe saluted Sir W. Howe, and Sir W. Howe saluted Lord Howe, and that 
 it cost above four thousands, and everybody paid, whether they could afford it 
 or not." — Carlisle to Lady Carlisle, Philadelphia, June 27, 1778. (Historical 
 MSS. Comm. Report XV, Appendix, Pt. vi. p. 341. MSS. of the Earl of 
 Carlisle. ) 
 
 Judge Jones says of the Meschianza: " A triumphal raree show laughed at 
 by one-half of the army, ridiculed by the inhabitants, damned by the loyalists, 
 and made a mockery of by the rebels." 
 
 ^ On the voyage it was discovered one morning that an attempt had been 
 made to cut "two of the most material ropes in the ship. If it had not been 
 found out till the wind began to blow, the consequences would have been 
 that the mainmast would have come down, and when covered with men." 
 ;^ioo was offered in vain for discovery of the offender ; " only the villain must 
 have been an experienced sailor. ... So we had the comfort of sailing with 
 perhaps another John the Painter on board." Carlisle thought, however, that 
 the object was probably merely to delay their arrival. " He could not endanger 
 us without sharing the danger, which always inclined me to think that he did 
 
THE EVACUATION OF PHILADELPHIA 637 
 
 very unfavourably with Lord Howe. The Earl of Carlisle was 
 an unthrifty 1 young man of fashion, who had written a book 
 of polite verses, and moved the Address to the King denounc- 
 ing the Americans as rebels and traitors. Eden, Under Secretary 
 of State to Suffolk, had said a few weeks before in the House 
 of Commons that he would not deign to enquire where a vagrant 
 Congress was to be found. Johnstone, ex-Governor of Florida, 
 was a Captain in the Navy, once a violent opponent of North's 
 India Bills, but lately a strong opponent of independence, and 
 accused of playing for the ;£^ioo per diem which the Commis- 
 sioners were to receive. 
 
 The Trident, with the Commissioners on board, arrived in 
 the Delaware on the 4th of June, and found the army already 
 packing up to be gone.^ Three thousand Tories were embarked 
 on the ships — fleeing from the vengeance of their countrymen ; 
 everything was in confusion, and the city in consternation. The 
 Tories were urging Clinton to go out and fight Washington — 
 10,000 would arm in this province, and 10,000 in the lower 
 counties, the moment the British took the field. Johnstone's 
 anger became furious when he found that Eden had brought 
 out peremptory orders for Philadelphia to be evacuated five 
 days after the Trident should arrive, and his anger rose higher 
 still when he discovered that this order had been signed three 
 weeks before the Trident sailed ! He accused Eden of duplicity. 
 Eden protested he did not know the contents of the packet 
 he carried. Johnstone all but refused to believe that an Under 
 
 not mean so ill as some were of opinion he did." — Lord Carlisle to Lady Carlisle. 
 On board the Trident, June 4, 1778. {Hist. MSS. Comin. MSS. of the Earl 
 of Carlisle, p. 336. ) 
 
 ^ Carlisle's embarrassments, however, were not all his own fault. He was 
 a collateral security for Charles Fox when his father paid his debts, and had 
 signed "joint-bonds," to his own great inconvenience. His private letters 
 give a far more favourable view of him than his public utterances. He was 
 an intimate friend of George Selwyn, who tried in vain to make Fox pay. 
 
 2 They seem to have packed up a good deal more than they brought with 
 them. Dr. Franklin's library had been left in the city. Du Simitiere, who 
 was intimate with Andre, hoped to get him to protect the library and other 
 public institutions. He found Andre in the doctor's library packing up books 
 —in particular a splendid work which had been left in the Doctor's keeping — 
 The Notitia of the Chinese, in 24 vols., edited by the Jesuits in China, and 
 superbly bound. It was a present from Louis xvi to the Philosophical Society 
 of Philadelphia. Du Simitiere said he was confounded at seeing this, and tried 
 to rouse Andre to a sense of the turpitude of his action, by telling him of the 
 honourable conduct of Gen. Knyphausen, who had occupied Gen. Cadwallader's 
 house, and had caused an inventory to be taken, and was now examining it. 
 But he spoke in vain— the books were xemoveA.— Recollections of Deborah Logan. 
 
638 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Secretary of State, "a confidential man, too," had received 
 no inkling of such an intention during three whole weeks.^ He 
 insisted on Eden's signing a declaration of his ignorance. It 
 was no wonder Johnstone was angry — 19,000 men were reduced 
 to such inactivity by less than gooo Americans at Valley Forge, 
 that the British Government thought the best thing they could do 
 was to return to New York ! 
 
 Carlisle was no less astounded. He wrote to his wife : " We 
 begin to look upon our business as desperate." Even when he 
 learned that the evacuation was part of a new plan — for a 
 Southern Expedition — he was but little reassured. "We all 
 look very grave," he wrote, " and perhaps we think we look very 
 wise. I fear nobody will think so when we return." ^ He must 
 have been somewhat conciliatory in his manners, for he expresses 
 his " distress " at coming into the house where he had his 
 quarters without asking the owner's leave. But it was an 
 ill-starred Commission, and any chance it ever had was presently 
 to be destroyed by Johnstone. Meanwhile the preparations for 
 departure were being pushed on — the first thing the Commission 
 had to do was to run away. 
 
 It was not till three in the morning of the i8th that the 
 army marched over the Commons, and crossed the Delaware 
 at Gloucester Point, Admiral Howe protecting their passage. 
 Clinton had not many more than 10,000 men with him — 5000 
 had been sent to the West Indies to take part in a sudden 
 descent on the French islands ; 3000 had gone to Florida, and 
 the cavalry and heavy baggage had been shipped with the 
 provision train to New York. But he was still encumbered by an 
 enormous quantity of officers' baggage, and, warned by Burgoyne's 
 fate, he took with him an immense supply of provisions, and as 
 there was only one road for wheels, the line of his waggons 
 extended nearly twelve miles. He found all the bridges broken 
 down, "in a country much intersected with marshy rivulets"; 
 and the excessive heat made repairing them very laborious. 
 
 ' See Lord Carlisle's letter, and Johnstone's speeches in Parliament on his 
 return. 
 
 * Letter to Lady Carlisle, of June 14. He also wrote to Gower : "When 
 we found that the abandoning this part of the country, and leaving Gen. 
 Washinton [sic) without endeavouring to bring him to action, and the 
 retiring before him through the Jerseys to N[ew] Y[ork], was only to expedite 
 a plan I dare not hint at from motives of prudence, we were not only 
 astounded but extremely alarmed for the fate of our Commission." — Carlish 
 to Lord Gower, Philadelphia, June 1778. (Hist. MSS. Comm. MSS. of the 
 Earl of Carlisle. ) 
 
THE EVACUATION OF PHILADELPHIA 639 
 
 Washington was perfectly aware that the British were pre- 
 paring to evacuate. He beheved that Clinton would take the 
 route through Jersey. Lee tried to persuade him the enemy 
 had quite another plan — perhaps to go into the interior of 
 Pennsylvania, or the lower Susquehanna, so as to be able "to 
 feed the Indian war" now broken out on the western frontier. 
 He did not believe they would shut themselves up in towns any 
 more — he had particular reasons for thinking they might cast 
 their eyes on the lower counties of Delaware and Maryland. 
 This time, however, Washington did not encourage him to air 
 his opinions — mischievous consequences might result from officers 
 reprobating measures which might be found unavoidable. He 
 called a Council of War. Lee was very strong against any 
 attack — " He would make a bridge of gold for the enemy." 
 They were nearly equal in numbers, and far better disciplined 
 — an attack would endanger the cause; we must not run the 
 risk of a defeat at the moment of making a foreign alliance. 
 He was for following and watching the enemy, to prevent their 
 committing any excesses. In fact, he talked precisely as 
 Washington had talked when his force did not warrant his 
 fighting. But in those days Lee had strongly reprobated such 
 prudence as the mark of a vacillating mind— almost more 
 dangerous than cowardice itself. Now the roles were changed 
 — Washington was for fighting, Lee for playing Fabius. It is, 
 however, fair to say that most of the American and foreign 
 officers agreed with Lee. Washington asked for their opinions 
 in writing. Before he could receive them he heard that 
 Philadelphia was evacuated, and instantly sent Arnold— who 
 was still unfit for more active service — to take command of the 
 city. Maxwell's brigade was ordered to harass Clinton's march. 
 And on the 24th Washington crossed the Delaware with his main 
 army. 
 
 Clinton was advancing very slowly. His object was to keep 
 Washington as long as possible in doubt as to his route — 
 whether he was going to the left, through Brunswick, to Staten 
 Island, or to the right, by Freehold and Monmouth, to Sandy 
 Hook. Washington followed him up, and sent Morgan with 
 600 men to reinforce Maxwell. The weather was intensely hot, 
 with heavy rains. 
 
 About five miles from Princeton, while the troops rested, 
 Washington called another Council. Lee was still against a 
 general action— he was not even for sending forward so large 
 a force to harass the enemy. Greene, Lafayette, and Wayne now 
 
640 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 gave their opinion in writing for a strong attack on Clinton's 
 rear, while the main army held itself in readiness for a general 
 engagement if that should seem advisable. As this was Washing- 
 ton's own wish, he acted upon it, and sent 1500 chosen troops, 
 under Scott, to reinforce the others. 
 
 Clinton reached Allen's Town on the 25th. He knew that 
 Washington had crossed the Delaware, and had heard that Gates 
 was advancing to join him at the Raritan. He thought it likely 
 that Washington would attack his vulnerable part — his baggage, 
 if he attempted to pass the Raritan. He therefore turned sud- 
 denly to the right, into the Freehold road. 
 
 As soon as Washington knew this, he sent another thousand 
 men under Wayne towards Monmouth Court House. Lee was 
 to have led the advance, but he was so strongly opposed to an 
 attack that Lafayette entreated to have the command. Washing- 
 ton consented — provided Lee was satisfied. Lee professed to 
 be glad to be freed from all responsibility for a movement which 
 he was sure would fail, and Lafayette set out the same day to 
 join the force already sent forward under Scott. That evening 
 Washington marched from Kingston (where he left his baggage), 
 and reached Cranberry early next morning. The intense heat 
 and a great storm prevented their going farther that day, but the 
 advanced corps took post that evening on the Monmouth road, 
 about five miles from the British rear. 
 
 Lafayette was hardly gone when Lee wrote to Washington, 
 asking for the command back again — he had agreed to the change 
 because he did not know the detachment was to be so strong — he 
 thought it was fitter for " a young volunteering general " than for a 
 veteran. But he now found it would be 6000 men at least — a 
 command next to that of the Commander-in-Chief himself. So, if 
 the detachment marched, he begged to command it — adding that 
 he did not think it ought to march ; with much more unasked 
 advice to his superior officer. Washington was in a dilemma — the 
 command was Lee's by right, but he did not wish to wound La- 
 fayette. Clinton, however, now changed the order of his march, and 
 sent on his waggons under Knyphausen, putting his best troops in 
 the rear with Cornwallis.^ Clinton had sat that day on a stone for 
 an hour, watching his baggage as it passed, and debating with him- 
 self whether he had not better destroy it, so likely did he think it 
 that the Americans would capture it.^ This change in Clinton's 
 
 ' Cornwallis had now returned. 
 
 ^ Anburey says that Clinton told Commissary Clark of Boston this — and 
 desired him to tell Phillips that he fought at Monmouth ''upon velvet — he will 
 
THE EVACUATION OF PHILADELPHIA 641 
 
 dispositions obliged Washington to strengthen his own advance, by 
 despatching Lee with two brigades to support Lafayette. This 
 gave the command of the whole advance (about 5000 men) to Lee, 
 as senior Major-General. Washington wrote to Lafayette to explain 
 the matter, and Lee took over the command on the 27th. That 
 evening CHnton encamped on high ground near Monmouth Court 
 House, with Lee about five miles off. 
 
 Towards sunset Washington reconnoitred his position. 1 It 
 was strong — protected by woods and morasses; but Washington 
 suspected Clinton's design was to decoy him into the lower country, 
 and then by a rapid movement gain the American right, and take 
 the strong ground above. It was better to attack him here — if he 
 once reached Middletown, ten or twelve miles farther on, there would 
 be no hope of success. He resolved to attack the rear early in the 
 morning — the moment the British front should begin to move. He 
 ordered Lee, in the presence of his officers, to make the proper 
 dispositions, and keep his men lying on their arms all night. Before 
 midnight, fearing Clinton might move away before morning, he sent 
 orders to Lee to detach six or seven hundred men to watch the 
 British rear, and hold them in check if they moved. 
 
 About five on the morning of the 28th Washington learned that 
 the British had begun to march. He instantly put his army in 
 motion, and sent orders to Lee to attack — " unless there should be 
 very powerful reasons to the contrary." He let Lee know that the 
 whole army was coming to support him — marching without "packs 
 and blankets," for greater speed. 
 
 After marching about five miles, and hearing a little firing, 
 Washington reached Freehold Meeting House, — here the road 
 forked, and Washington ordered Greene to the right, to flank the 
 British behind Monmouth Court House. He himself advanced by 
 the left. The sound of cannon could now be heard. While he was 
 giving Greene his orders, a countryman rode up and said the 
 Continental troops were retreating. Washington was provoked, 
 but did not believe it. Then a fifer came up breathless with the 
 same tale. Washington had him put under arrest, to prevent his 
 spreading an alarm, and pushed on. Presently he met other 
 fugitives, and a message from Lafayette made him understand 
 something was wrong with Lee. And now he met regiment after 
 
 fully understand me. " See also a curious story of an American officer, who, as 
 Sir Henry erroneously believed, attempted to speak with him on the field. The 
 story shows that Clinton was in imminent danger of capture. — Anbhrey, ii. 341. 
 1 " In the parting of the roads leading to Shrewsbury and Middletowr." — 
 Washington' s Despatch. 
 
642 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 regiment of Lee's division, some in disorder, most of the ofificers 
 bewildered and angry — they had been ordered to retreat, they did 
 not know why — there had been no fighting, only a slight skirmish 
 with the enemy's cavalry, which had been repulsed. A Colonel 
 came up at the head of his regiment. Washington asked him 
 what it meant. The Colonel smiled significantly, and said he 
 retreated by order. It flashed across Washington's mind that Lee 
 meant the battle to be lost. He galloped forward to stop the 
 retreat, meeting more regiments and more angry officers. One said 
 with an oath that they were fleeing from a shadow. Washington 
 galloped on to stop the retreat. At a rising ground, he met Lee 
 himself, with the rest of his force, in full retreat. "What is the 
 meaning of this, sir ? " he said so sternly that Lee quailed and did 
 not answer. Lafayette said that Washington's aspect was terrible. 
 Washington repeated his question. Then Lee said angrily that he 
 was not disposed to beard the whole British army. There was a 
 short, sharp altercation, and then Washington ordered Lee^if he 
 meant to retain the command — to take proper measures to check 
 the enemy, while he himself re-formed the main body on the next 
 height. Lee obeyed, and now held the position with spirit. 
 Washington formed with the British within a quarter of a mile of 
 him ; Stirling brought up cannon, a stand was made, and gave time 
 for the left wing to form a second line. Greene had now taken a 
 very advantageous position on the right. The British now tried to 
 turn the American left, but were repulsed by detached parties of 
 infantry. They then tried to turn the left, without success, as 
 Greene had advanced a body of troops " to a commanding piece of 
 ground." Then Wayne advanced, and kept up so well-directed a 
 fire that the British retired behind the defile where the first stand 
 had been made. The British now had both flanks secured by 
 "thick woods and morasses," and their front could only be 
 approached through a narrow defile. But Washington resolved to 
 attack, and sent Poore to move round the British right, and Wood- 
 ford round their left; but it was dark before they could get 
 round. 
 
 This is Washington's account, given in his letter to Congress. 
 Sir Henry Clinton's may be compared with it. He says that as his 
 rear-guard descended from the heights above Freehold to the long 
 narrow plain,i several columns of the enemy descended also, and 
 began to cannonade his rear. At the same moment he learned the 
 enemy had been discovered marching in force on both his flanks — 
 
 ^ "Near three miles in length, and about one mile in breadth." Clinton 
 says Washington's army was "estimated" at about 20,000. 
 
THE EVACUATION OF PHILADELPHIA 643 
 
 there were two defiles between. Lafayette's cavalry " fell back in 
 confusion on their own infantry, when the Queen's Light Dragoons 
 charged." Thinking a general action might ensue, Clinton sent to 
 Knyphausen for a brigade of British and the 1 7 th Light Dragoons, and 
 posted them to cover his right flank, but " before I could advance, 
 the enemy fell back, and took a strong position on the heights 
 above Freehold Court House." The heat was intense, and his men 
 were already fatigued, " but our circumstances obliged us to make 
 a vigorous exertion." The enemy gave way immediately, the 
 second line stood the attack "with more obstinacy, but were like- 
 wise completely routed. They then took a third position, with a 
 marshy hollow in front, over which it would have been scarcely 
 possible to have attacked them. By this time our men were so 
 overpowered with fatigue, that I could press the affair no 
 farther." 
 
 Both armies lay on the field that night — both equally exhausted 
 by the extreme heat, and the marches through " a deep sandy 
 country," almost destitute of water. Washington intended to renew 
 the action in the morning, but about midnight Clinton "took 
 advantage of the moonlight " to rejoin Knyphausen, who had gone 
 on. He withdrew so quietly that Poore, lying extremely near, did 
 not perceive it. In his despatch Clinton says much of the fatigue 
 of his troops, and claims as "sufficient honour" for them that they 
 "forced a corps of near 12,000 men from two strong positions, 
 under such disadvantages of heat and fatigue, that a great part of 
 those we lost fell dead as they advanced, without a wound." 1 
 
 Before he reached New York, on July 3, he had lost 2000 men 
 in all — killed, wounded, and prisoners, but most of all desertions of 
 the Hessians. 
 
 Lafayette says of this affair, " Washington seemed in a moment 
 to stay the fortune of the day — he was never greater than in this 
 action." 
 
 ' Clinton puts his loss in action at 4 officers, 4 sergeants, 60 rank and file 
 killed; 3 sergeants, 40 rank and file died of fatigue; 15 officers, 7 sergeants, 
 137 rank and file wounded ; 3 sergeants, 61 rank and file missing. One 
 German was killed, and 1 1 rank and file died of fatigue ; 1 1 were wounded. 
 Lieutenant-Colonel Monckton fell as he led the Grenadiers against Wayne. 
 Washington says his men found 4 officers and about 40 privates too badly 
 wounded to be carried off the field ; and buried 4 officers — of whom Colonel 
 Monckton was one — and 245 privates. Washington had 7 officers, I sergeant, 
 52 rank and file killed ; and 23 officers, 2 sergeants, I drummer, and 126 rank 
 and file wounded ; with more than 126 missing — many of the missing had 
 "dropped through fatigue, and have since come in." Besides this, the artillery 
 lost 2 officers killed, and several men killed or wounded. 
 
644 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 Lee tried to take a high tone. In a letter written on June 29, 
 but misdated July i, he said he had been cruelly wronged — the 
 expressions Washington had used to him implied he had been 
 guilty of disobedience to orders, want of conduct, or want of 
 courage. Which was it ? Unless he could obtain some reparation 
 he must retire from the service at the head of which was a man 
 capable of offering such injuries. But he did not think Washington 
 would have acted thus, if he were not instigated by " dirty earwigs." 
 Washington sternly replied that Lee should have an opportunity of 
 justifying himself to Congress, to America, and the world in general 
 — or of convincing them that he had disobeyed orders, and made 
 an unnecessary, disorderly, and shameful retreat, on the 28th. 
 Lee wrote a second and insolent rejoinder, intimating he would 
 retire. A day or two after he demanded a court-martial. The 
 court-martial sat many times, and examined many witnesses, and 
 the case appeared a little less black, inasmuch as the British rear 
 had been largely reinforced by troops from Knyphausen. But the 
 Court found that he had '' disobeyed orders, and made an unneces- 
 sary and in some instances a disorderly retreat " — the word " shame- 
 ful " was omitted. Also that he had been guilty of disrespect to 
 the Commander-in-Chief in two letters.' He was sentenced to be 
 suspended from all command for two years. 
 
 Thus ended the enigmatical career of an enigmatical character. 
 Apart from the document found among the Howe Papers, there is 
 no absolute proof that he was a traitor ; but what honest man ever 
 had the misfortune to seem one so often as Lee ? It is certain that 
 his neglect to obey Washington's orders in November, 1776, was 
 wilful; but it probably proceeded from no deeper treachery than 
 the hope of supplanting Washington in the supreme command — 
 his letters leave no doubt of that intention, and very little of the 
 lengths to which he was prepared to go to compass his end. At 
 first sight his capture looks like a planned thing. It is, however, 
 certain that he was in a state of abject terror at the moment of 
 capture — had he retained his presence of mind he might possibly 
 have escaped. It is also certain that he was for some time in 
 imminent danger of being hanged as a deserter from the British 
 Army. George iii was vindictive where the royal prerogative was 
 concerned, and until the surprise of Trenton placed so many 
 German officers in Washington's power Lee cannot have felt safe. 
 But Washington's stern threat of reprisals made even the King 
 
 ' Lee misdated both these letters — the first, written on June 29, was dated 
 July I ; the second, written in answer to Washington's reply, was dated 
 June 28 ! 
 
THE EVACUATION OF PHILADELPHIA 645 
 
 pause.^ And when German officers were endangered, the case 
 was worse. If a Hessian Colonel had been hanged because King 
 George would not forego vengeance on Lee, not only would there 
 have been an instant end to German levies, but the King would 
 have had to reckon with Frederick. 
 
 It is difficult to measure the loss to America caused by Lee's 
 disobedience in 1776. If, under such enormous disadvantages, 
 Washington was able to accomplish the Surprise of Trenton, what 
 might he not have done if he could have made the stand he 
 intended at Brunswick ? And if the Battle of Freehold was drawn 
 in spite of Lee's failure to carry out Washington's orders, it would 
 almost certainly have been a victory if Lee had done his part. 
 His sudden caution is in itself suspicious — he was always merciless 
 to Washington's enforced caution, and if he had intended to lose 
 the battle he could have done no other than he did — sending La- 
 fayette to cross the plain under fire — then ordering him to retire, 
 then retiring himself and letting Cornwallis attack him. The most 
 curious thing about Lee is the contrast between his words and his 
 deeds. He talked like a fire-eater, but as often as it came to 
 action his nerve invariably failed him. It was fortunate for 
 America that it was so, whether we regard him as a deliberate 
 traitor, or only as a man reckless in planning what he wanted 
 resolution to carry out. 
 
 His temper was so bad that it was described by those who 
 knew him as "insane"; and we might have concluded — as most 
 Americans did conclude at the time— that he was an eccentric, 
 disappointed man, so impatient and quarrelsome as to be im- 
 possible as a leader. But the discovery among the Howe Papers 
 sheds another light on him — although here, too, we find the same 
 curious failure when it comes to action. He never carried out any 
 of his schemes. 
 
 We can better judge of the extreme suspiciousness of Lee's 
 whole conduct if we compare it with that of Gates. Gates' career 
 is far from satisfactory— his intrigues against Washington were to 
 the last degree discreditable. He so entirely forgot self-respect in 
 addressing Congress, that Congress voted he should not be 
 permitted to address it in person a second time. On the 19th of 
 September, by refusing to order an attack earlier in the day, he 
 prevented that action from- being even more decisive than that of 
 the 7th of October. It was Arnold, not Gates, who won the battle 
 of the 7th. Unlike Washington, who was always himself on the 
 
 ' North frankly admitted in the House that nothing but this consideration 
 saved the life of Ethan Allen. 
 
646 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 field, Gates was the whole day at his headquarters. But who ever 
 suspected Gates of not wishing to defeat Burgoyne? Who ever 
 dreamed that his underhand intrigues to supplant Washington 
 covered any deeper design ? "What parallel is there in Gates' many 
 indiscretions to Lee's constant correspondences with British Generals ? 
 Gates was a vain and ambitious man ; Lee was a double-dealer, 
 wavering and unstable even in his double-dealing; and if the 
 incriminating document is genuine, a traitor who, if his nerve had 
 not always failed him at the critical moment, would have come 
 down to posterity as another and more successful Arnold. 
 
CHAPTER LXXIV 
 THE COMMISSIONERS: THE FRENCH FLEET 
 
 " I have lately been told, that one of the governors in America made objection 
 to the Congress because some of Ihem sat in council with woollen caps on. 
 How inadequate, then, must this embassy be, where a noble Lord, bred up in 
 all the softness that European manners make fashionable to rank — I say, how 
 inadequate must such an embassy be to men in woollen nightcaps !" — The Duke 
 of Richmond on Lord Carlisle, March 9, 1778. 
 
 On the 9th of June Clinton had written to General Washington, 
 informing him of the arrival of the Commissioners, and requesting 
 a passport for Dr. Ferguson, their Secretary, who had a letter for 
 Congress. Washington replied that he could not grant a passport 
 until the pleasure of Congress was known. Congress was debating 
 on this when, on the i8th, an express from Washington brought 
 the Letter of the Commissioners. 
 
 The letter was read. It was accompanied by the late Acts — 
 "which, as they passed with singular unanimity, will sufficiently 
 evince the disposition of Great Britain." It was addressed to 
 "His Excellency Henry Laurens, the President, and other the 
 Members of Congress '' — in itself a mighty concession. The terms 
 ofifered were — 
 
 A cessation of hostilities by land and sea. 
 
 The restoration of free intercourse and mutual affection, and the 
 renewal of the common benefits of naturalisation throughout the 
 empire. 
 
 The extension of every freedom to trade that our respective 
 interests can require. 
 
 No military force to be kept up in America without the consent 
 of the general Congress, or of particular Assemblies. 
 
 Measures to be taken to discharge the debts of America, and to 
 raise the credit of the paper circulation. 
 
 "Our Union" to be perpetuated by "a reciprocal deputation" 
 of Agents from the several States, and from Great Britain ; such 
 Agents to have a voice and a seat in the Parliament of Great 
 Britain, and in the different Assemblies, respectively. 
 
648 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 The States were further promised "every privilege that is short 
 of a total separation of interest." 
 
 Then came a paragraph about France. ..." We cannot help 
 taking notice of the insidious interposition of a power, which has, 
 from the first settlement of these Colonies, been actuated with 
 enmity to us both " 
 
 With a hint that "notwithstanding the pretended date, the 
 French Treaty was made in consequence of the plans of accommo- 
 dation previously concerted in Great Britain, and with a view to 
 prevent our reconciliation ; and the hope that the inhabitants of 
 North America will prefer "a firm, free, and perpetual coalition 
 with the parent state, to an insincere and unnatural foreign 
 alliance." 
 
 At the first words about the "insidious interposition of a power," 
 etc.. Congress refused to hear more, "because of the offensive 
 language against his Most Christian Majesty." It was not till the 
 1 6th that it made up its mind to suffer the rest to be read. It 
 merely concerned the place of meeting — to be at New York, 
 Philadelphia, Yorktown, or such other place as Congress might 
 propose — only premising that his Majesty's instructions to the 
 Commissioners to remove from the immediate seat of war "may 
 induce us speedily to remove to New York." The last paragraph 
 ran : " If, after the time that may be necessary to consider of the 
 communication, and transmit your answer, the horrors and de- 
 vastations of war should continue, we call God and the world to 
 witness, that the evils which must follow are not to be imputed to 
 Great Britain." 
 
 Next day, the 17th, Congress replied that nothing but its desire 
 to prevent the further effusion of blood induced it to read a paper 
 containing expressions so disrespectful to his Most Christian 
 Majesty, " the great and good ally of these States," or to consider 
 propositions so derogatory to the honour of an independent nation. 
 The Acts of Parliament,^ the Commission itself, and the Letter, all 
 supposed the people of these States to be subjects of the Crown of 
 Great Britain. Congress, however, informed their Excellencies 
 that it was "inclined to peace, notwithstanding the unjust claims 
 in which this war originated, and the savage manner in which it 
 hath been conducted." It was willing to enter upon a treaty of 
 peace and commerce, "not inconsistent with treaties already 
 subsisting," as soon as the King of Great Britain manifested a 
 sincere desire for that purpose — the only solid proof of such desire 
 
 ' The Acts transmitted were the Act for the Repeal of the Massachusetts 
 Government Act, and the two Conciliatory Bills. 
 
THE COMMISSIONERS 649 
 
 being the acknowledgment of the independence of these States, 
 and the withdrawing his fleet and army. 
 
 On that very same 17th of June the Pennsylvania Gazette 
 printed letters which showed that Johnstone had tried to 
 open a private correspondence with Laurens. In consequence 
 of this, Congress, on the 9th of July, ordered all Members of 
 Congress, or their agents, to produce all letters of a public 
 nature received from any subject of the King of Great Britain. 
 This order produced a number of letters from Johnstone to 
 Francis Dana, General Reed, Robert Morris, and two to Laurens. 
 These letters were to persuade them to throw over the French 
 Treaty, and accept the terms offered by the Commissioners. 
 Johnstone suited his arguments to his man — Dana was assured 
 that Dr. Franklin had approved the present articles, that France 
 had not been honest with them, that Spain had formally dis- 
 approved the conduct of France, and that "the pamphlet wrote 
 by Mr. Pulteney" (Johnstone's brother) had opened the minds 
 of the people of England to the real state of the question. 
 To Reed he hinted that the man who could bring about a 
 reconciliation would deserve more from the King and people 
 " than was ever yet bestowed on human kind." To Morris, 
 he said that Washington and the President had a right to every 
 favour that a grateful nation can bestow if they can once more 
 "unite our interests." Reed, in his place in Congress, said that 
 a few days after the evacuation, a married lady of character, 
 having connections with the British army, sent him a message 
 to come to her on business that could not be committed in 
 writing; that he went to her, and that she told him Johnstone 
 had expressed the most favourable sentiments of himself, and 
 particularly wished to engage him to promote the object of 
 the Commission — viz., a reunion. That he might have ^^i 0,000 
 sterling, and any office in the Colonies. To which Reed said 
 he had answered that he " was not worth purchasing, but, such 
 as he was, the King of Great Britain was not rich enough 
 to do it." 
 
 The Commissioners made a fiasco as complete as Burgoyne's. 
 It was said of them at their coming that three less acceptable 
 persons could not have been selected, except the King, Germaine, 
 and North. Johnstone's letters were fatal. Congress resolved 
 that it was incompatible with its honour to hold any manner 
 of correspondence with George Johnstone, Esq. ; especially to 
 negotiate with him State affairs, in which the cause of liberty 
 and virtue is interested. Johnstone had the humiliation of 
 
6so ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 begging Congress to negotiate with the others, if it would not 
 with him. Carlisle, Eden, and Clinton published a declaration 
 to the effect that they never saw the letters, nor had any 
 knowledge direct or indirect of them, nor of the conversation 
 with Reed, till they learned the facts in the newspapers. Yet 
 those letters had been laid before Clinton, and were sent by his and 
 Galloway's assistance.^ 
 
 The Commissioners went on — as Drayton said — assailing 
 Congress with words; trying to persuade the Americans that 
 it was better to be a province of the British Empire than to 
 be a nation. In one foolish Proclamation after another they 
 tried to convince them that they did not, could not want 
 independence — all they could possibly want was offered by 
 Great Britain. They went into minute details of the history 
 of the French Treaty, and its "pretended date," — as though 
 the Americans did not know more about the treaty than 
 they did; and not perceiving that these frantic efforts to detach 
 America from France — even now, at the price of her good faith 
 — showed that they did not think the friendship of France as 
 worthless as they said it was. This was mere blundering folly — 
 the futile argument of those whose case is incapable of valid 
 defence. They made a greater blunder still, when Congress 
 refused to hear of any terms which did not begin with 
 Independence, for then they denied the authority of Congress 
 to decide on such a point, and demanded that the Provincial 
 Assemblies should be consulted. They seemed determined 
 to show the Americans what was before them if they re- 
 turned to the fold of George iii and Lord North. Congress 
 replied to their Appeal to the People by an Address, which 
 was ordered to be read in the churches of all denominations, 
 immediately after divine service. It briefly recapitulated the 
 years during which redress was refused, and the defenceless 
 condition of the Colonies at the beginning of the war — " without 
 
 ' Galloway was very indignant at Clinton's retreat. A letter from him to 
 Ambrose Serle, July 13, 1778, says, " not less than a thousand men were lost in the 
 battle [Monmouth]." Washington's camp at Valley Forge "might have been 
 stormed and taken mth much less loss. . . . That single stroke would have 
 ended the rebelUon."— ^wi". MSS. Comm. Report XI. (MSS. of the Earl of 
 Dartmouth. ) 
 
 The same letter contains a squib. " To be sold, the British Rights in America, 
 consisting, among other articles, of The Thirteen Provinces in Rebellion ... a 
 respectable body of troops, a considerable part of the Royal Navy, and all the 
 Loyal Subjects in America. The British West Indies will be included if agree- 
 able." — Ibid. p. 419. 
 
THE COMMISSIONERS 651 
 
 arms, without ammunition, without clothing, without ships, without 
 money, without ofificers skilled in war" — nothing but the bravery 
 of our people and the justice of our cause; we were not even 
 entirely united. Then the cruelty with which the war had 
 been carried on — the rapine and devastation, the barbarous 
 treatment of prisoners to force them to fight against their 
 country. A General, "who calls himself a Christian,'' let loose 
 Indians upon us. Yet how wonderfully have we been delivered. 
 And now God, in whom was our trust, has brought us to 
 the threshold of security — it is now morally certain that if we 
 have courage to persevere we shall gain our independence. 
 Is there a man who would wish to continue dependent on 
 those who have deluged our country in our blood? "From 
 the nature of the thing it is evident, that the only security 
 you could obtain would be the justice and moderation of a 
 Parliament who have sold the rights of their own constituents," 
 and think they are not bound to keep faith with rebels. They 
 say we can never pay our debts — but what country has such 
 resources as America? If your money is depreciated, it is 
 because no taxes have been imposed to carry on the war ; 
 because the enemy's fleets have interrupted your commerce, 
 and their armies have desolated part of your country. " Because 
 their agents have villainously counterfeited your bills,'' and 
 extortioners among you have run up prices. Put your money 
 in the Public Funds; let there be but one kind of bills — then 
 we shall have fewer counterfeits. For a little while, buy only 
 absolute necessaries. Above all, " bring forward your armies to 
 the field." With a noble peroration on the future greatness and 
 happiness of the United States, which no man to-day will dare to 
 say has not been fulfilled. 
 
 Then came the dreadful affair of Wyoming, a settlement 
 on the Susquehanna. A large body of Tory refugees, burning 
 for revenge on their neighbours, concocted a scheme with the 
 Indians who, after the relief of Fort Stanwix, retired to Niagara. 
 Their leader was Colonel John Butler, a former follower of 
 the Johnsons. A few of the worst horrors were perhaps the 
 exaggerations which usually accompany such tragedies ; and 
 Brant was not present. Having said this, Butler remains what 
 Sabine calls him and his son — the most entirely infamous men of 
 the Revolution. "He commanded the 1600 incarnate fiends who 
 desolated Wyoming." 
 
 There were eight townships in this beautiful valley — the 
 six lower being pretty full of inhabitants. It was exceedingly 
 
65 2 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 fertile; it had lately supplied the Continental army with 3000 
 bushels of grain, and the ground was loaded with crops. There 
 were a thousand families, "which had furnished our army with 
 a thousand soldiers," besides garrisoning four forts. There were 
 about 400 men in one of these forts, under Colonels Dennison 
 and Zebulon Butler — not related to the other. About the time 
 of Herkimer's battle, last year, the inhabitants found that the 
 Tories had stirred up the Indians; twenty-seven were arrested, 
 eighteen were sent to Connecticut, and the rest set at liberty 
 for want of sufficient evidence. The inhabitants had long 
 suspected that the Indians meditated something ; there had been 
 a few outrages, and in June the wife of a Tory and her five 
 children were murdered by a party of Tories and Indians. The 
 husband of the woman was one of the twenty-seven. Zebulon Butler 
 had sent several letters to Congress and to Washington, stating 
 the danger, and asking for help, but received for answer that 
 they had no cause to fear — the Indians were all for peace?- 
 Quite lately he had learned that his letters had been intercepted, 
 and that the message was bogus. 
 
 On the ist of July the whole body of the enemy came down 
 near the upper Fort— 1600 men, about 300 Indians under 
 their own Chiefs, the rest Tories "painted like them,'' except 
 their officers, who were dressed like regulars. These were Butler's 
 Rangers and Johnson's Royal Greens. During the next two days 
 they took two forts and "killed 'Squire Jenkins and his family, 
 with several others, in a barbarous manner, and made prisoners of 
 most of the women and children." On the 3rd, Zebulon Butler 
 left his Fort (Wilkesborough), and marched to Kingston Fort, where 
 there was a garrison. Here the enemy soon summoned him to 
 surrender. He refused. They sent a second flag, threatening to 
 massacre the garrison if they stormed. Colonel Zebulon pro- 
 posed a parley, and went to the appointed place with his 400 men. 
 By a trick he was induced to advance to the foot of the mountains, 
 where he was suddenly surrounded and set upon by the enemy. 
 Though he was outnumbered four to one, he fought for three- 
 quarters of an hour, and the Tories were beginning to give way 
 under his fire, when one of his own men — by accident or design 
 — called out that the Colonel ordered a retreat. This threw his 
 little force into confusion, and a total rout ensued. The greater 
 part fled to the river, about seventy escaped to Wilkesborough Fort, 
 the rest were lost or killed in the river — the enemy pursuing 
 "with the fury of devils.'' 
 
 '■ See an American account in Almon. 
 
THE COMMISSIONERS 653 
 
 Next day the Tories sent 196 scalps into Fort Kingston, and 
 kept up a continual fire upon it. In the evening Zebulon Butler, 
 with his family, got out and escaped down the river, and Dennison, 
 with a flag, went to Exeter Fort (one of the two first taken) to ask 
 John Butler what terms of surrender he would grant. Butler 
 replied, " The hatchet." Dennison returned, and defended his Fort 
 till the next morning (Sunday, July 5) ; when nearly all his men 
 being killed or wounded he was obliged to surrender at discretion. 
 The American account says that some of the prisoners were shut 
 up in the houses and burned alive — that women and children 
 were burned, and that a son — whose name is given — murdered his 
 father and bathed his hands in his blood. Whether these things 
 happened or not, Butler, with an overwhelming force, fell on this 
 valley, while the men were away fighting for their country, 
 devastated the whole valley, fired the crops, burnt the houses, and 
 drove out 5000 helpless people, who fled in terror to the woods. ^ 
 The memory of it was burnt into the nation's heart, until a Tory 
 was looked on with more abhorrence than a " Britisher." He copied 
 the ways of the savages, fought side by side with them, and added 
 treachery to ferocity. And this destruction of a peaceful valley 
 was mentioned with approval in letters from New York, which 
 were published in English newspapers to make the public believe 
 we should conquer America yet. 
 
 On the nth of July, 1778, "His Excellency Mons. Gdrard, 
 Ambassador from his Most Christian Majesty to the United States," 
 arrived at Philadelphia. A Committee of Congress accompanied 
 him to "an elegant apartment" in Market Street, and a salute was 
 
 ^ " Upwards of 5000 persons fled in the utmost distress and consternation. . . . 
 These proceedings greatly alarm the leaders of rebellion in New York." — 
 Letter in the Gentleman^ s Magazine, 1778, p. 545. 
 
 "I know of no men of the Revolution so entirely infamous as the Butlers, 
 father and son. But though Butler did not permit or directly authorise women to 
 be driven into the forest where they became mothers, and their infants were 
 eaten by wild beasts, and though captive officers may not have been held upon 
 fires with pitchforks, till they were burned to death, sufficient remains, 
 undoubtedly, to stamp his conduct with the deepest, darkest, most damning 
 guilt. The human mind can hardly frame an argument, which shall clear the 
 fame of Butler. . . . To admit even as a solved question, that the Loyalists 
 were in the right . . . will do Butler no good ... he was still bound to 
 observe the laws of civilised warfare. . . . He and he alone will be regarded 
 by posterity as the real and responsible actor in the business and slaughter 
 at Wyoming — the better information of later years transfers the guilt from the 
 savage to the man of Sa.xon blood. There was nothing for which the Mohawk's 
 family labored more earnestly than to show that their renowned head (Brant) 
 was not implicated in this bloody tragedy." — Sabine, American Loyalists. 
 
654 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 fired. He had come in a frigate — one of the twelve ships of the line 
 which sailed from Toulon, under the Count d'Estaing, on the 13th 
 of April. Silas Deane came with him. He brought a message from 
 d'Estaing to Congress that the French fleet would do its utmost 
 to assist all American armaments to make prizes of the common 
 enemy — such prizes to belong entirely to the Americans. 
 
 On the 2ist of August the Sieur Gerard, Minister Pleni- 
 potentiary from the King of France, was received by Congress in 
 audience. Richard Henry Lee and Samuel Adams, representing 
 Virginia and Massachusetts, had waited on him in a coach and 
 six, provided by Congress. Lee sat on Gerard's left, Adams on the 
 front seat, and so, with much observance, he arrived at the State 
 House. The members of Congress sat in their chairs in a semi- 
 circle, on each side of their President, upon a platform raised two 
 steps. The Minister of France was seated opposite — as is carefully 
 noted — " on the same level." Then the door of the Congress 
 Chamber was thrown open, below the bar, and about 200 gentlemen 
 were admitted to the audience — among them the Vice-President 
 of the Supreme Executive Council of Pennsylvania, the Supreme 
 Executive Council itself, the Speaker and members of the House 
 of Assembly, several foreigners of distinction, and some officers of 
 the army. The American account asks who could have imagined 
 such an event four years ago? After this Congress and the 
 Minister dined together, "with a decorum suited to the occasion." 
 
 This, however, was not Gerard's first appearance in that 
 Chamber. On the 6th of August he had been introduced by two 
 members, and "being seated in his chair," his secretary had 
 delivered to the President a letter from his Most Christian Majesty 
 which began — 
 
 " Very dear great Friends and Allies " — 
 
 And entreated Congress to give full credit to all that the Sieur 
 Gerard should say to them — more especially when he should assure 
 them of " our affection and constant friendship." It was signed — 
 
 " Your good Friend and Ally, Louis." 
 
 and countersigned, " Gravier de Vergennes." 
 
 Well might the Americans say, AVho could have imagined it 
 four years ago ? 
 
 The Toulon fleet had been eighty-eight days at sea before 
 it sighted the New World, and by this delay it lost its grand 
 opportunity.! Had it arrived a few days earlier, it would have 
 
 " ' The arrival of this Fleet makes every hope of success in our business 
 ridiculous." — Lord Carlisle to Lady Carlisle, New York, July 21. (MSS. of the 
 Earl of Carlisle.) 
 
THE COMMISSIONERS 655 
 
 intercepted Lord Howe's inferior force, with the Philadelphia 
 refugees on board, — it might even have taken New York, and 
 ended the war. As it was, by the time it appeared off Sandy Hook 
 (July 11) Lord Howe was safe inside the bar, waiting for Byron's 
 squadron. An attack was planned, but the great 80 and go-gun 
 ships could not pass the bar. The next plan was for driving 
 General Pigot from Rhode Island. This must have succeeded 
 if time had not been lost waiting for the New England Militia to 
 reinforce Sullivan's army. The day after they arrived Lord Howe 
 came too (August 9), his fleet strengthened by four of Byron's 
 squadron. That squadron— badly equipped to start with — had 
 been almost disabled in a great storm ; but here again Fortune 
 distributed her favours, for if Byron's ships had come straggling 
 in one by one, while d'Estaing was at the Hook, he would have 
 snapped them up. But they began to arrive a few hours after he 
 had set sail for Newport. Pigot burned or scuttled his own ships, 
 and drew his men into the lines at Newport. Sullivan instantly 
 occupied the abandoned posts — when, at two in the afternoon, a 
 great fleet was seen coming towards Point Judith. And now, if 
 Howe had come up channel at once he would have taken the 
 French between his own fire and Pigot's. But both Admirals 
 wanted "sea-room" to fight. Howe anchored; and that night 
 the wind veered to north-east, and d'Estaing stood out of harbour at 
 eight in the morning, and bore down on Howe. The English ships 
 slipped their cables, and formed in line of battle. Howe, still 
 inferior in numbers and rating, would not fight till he could get 
 the weather-gauge — so for two days they manoeuvred, always 
 standing to southwards, till they disappeared from the eyes of the 
 anxious watchers on Rhode Island. Sullivan was on the point of 
 attacking Pigot without waiting for d'Estaing's return, when one of 
 the most frightful storms of that stormy coast came on, and raged 
 for two nights and days. As ever, the American troops, being most 
 exposed, suffered most, and great part of their ammunition was 
 spoiled. And now, again, had Pigot sallied out the day after the 
 storm he would have had an easy victory. But he did not ; and 
 with that day of rest the Americans were themselves again. So 
 for eleven days they watched each other, till on the evening of 
 the 19th of August they saw the French returning. Both fleets 
 had been caught in the storm, both were shattered, disabled, and 
 scattered. Howe was gone to New York to refit, and d'Estaing 
 pleaded his own orders to go to Boston in case of misfortune. Sullivan 
 said they could carry the place if the French would stay but two 
 days— it would be a disgrace if they gave up. D'Estaing would 
 
6s6 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 have yielded but for his officers. He was a land-officer, and the 
 real sea-dogs were very angry that he had been put over their 
 heads. They were glad to humiliate him, and they insisted on 
 his obeying his instructions literally. So he went to Boston to 
 refit ; and Sullivan, indignant, hinted in General Orders that 
 America had better trust to herself, and not to her allies. La- 
 fayette persuaded him to tone this down in his next Order; but 
 there was a very sore feeling, and the New Englanders went off, 
 till Sullivan's numbers were no larger than Pigot's — between two 
 and three thousand left him in the next twenty-four hours. He 
 fought an indecisive engagement, and then hearing that Howe was 
 coming back, thought it wise to secure his retreat (August 30). 
 He was only just in time — the day after he had drawn off his 
 troops with much skill, Clinton, with a squadron and 4000 men, 
 arrived at Newport, and thus ended an episode in which everybody 
 was a day too late.^ 
 
 But if the Americans were disappointed, the British were 
 hardly less so. If d'Estaing had been prevented from doing 
 anything, so had Lord Howe. Thoroughly disgusted with a 
 Ministry which left its commanders without adequate support, 
 he handed over the command to Admiral Gambler, and returned 
 to England. The British military operations of the last half 
 of 1778 may be very briefly told. The most important was 
 the expedition of "No-flint" Grey^ to destroy the privateers in 
 several small harbours of Plymouth Colony. In about eighteen 
 hours he destroyed seventy sail, burned the magazines, stores, 
 and rope-walks at Bedford and Fair-Haven, and carried off 
 10,000 sheep and 300 oxen from the small island called 
 Martha's Vineyard. On the Newfoundland Station, Admiral 
 Montague took the little islands of St. Pierre and Miquelon, 
 allotted to France in 1763 as harbours of refuge, and places 
 for drying fish. Clinton sent Cornwallis and Knyphausen 
 
 ' The affray at Boston between the Americans and French happened on 
 the night of September 23. Several of the French were wounded, among 
 them an officer of distinction. Both sides kept the matter as quiet as pos- 
 sible. The Council offered 300 dollars for the discovery of any parties engaged 
 in the riot, and it was asserted that it was caused by captured British 
 seamen, and deserters from Burgoyne's army, who had enlisted in American 
 privateers, and demanded bread of the French bakers. D'Estaing "had 
 the address to give in to this idea," and to appear satisfied. No one was dis- 
 covered. 
 
 2 This sobriquet alluded to Grey's orders to his men not to take their flints 
 with them, but to trust entirely to the bayonet, as more silent. By this means 
 he succeeded in several surprises. 
 
THE COMMISSIONERS 657 
 
 into Jersey, to act on both sides of the North River; and as, 
 since Clinton's expedition of the year before, the British 
 commanded all the water-way as far as the Highlands, 
 Washington — now encamped once more at White Plains, watching 
 New York — dared not quit his strong position to meet an 
 enemy who could unite his whole force on one side of the river 
 to-day, and on the other to-morrow — while he could not con- 
 centrate his own force under ten days. Grey surprised and 
 cut to pieces Baylor's Light Horse, who lay at Tappan, and, 
 thinking themselves secure, kept little or no watch. Ferguson 
 — soon to make himself so famous in the South — surprised 
 Pulaski's Legion at Little Egg Harbour on October 14. Here, 
 too, there was the utmost carelessness, and a French Captain 
 who had deserted Pulaski betrayed the fact to Ferguson. On 
 a false report that Pulaski had ordered no quarter to be given, 
 none was given by Ferguson. As a set - off to this, " Light 
 Horse Harry " surprised the Hessian jagers at Dobbs' Ferry. 
 
 The Army of the Convention was still at Boston. Boston 
 had been selected while it was believed that the troops would 
 almost immediately embark for England. It was the worst 
 place that could have been chosen for their prolonged stay. 
 The town had been exasperated by the ten years of civil dis- 
 sensions which preceded the outbreak of hostilities; and during 
 the siege it had suffered much insult and injury. Troops had 
 been quartered in its churches, the library of at least one of it's 
 ministers had been used to light fires; the Old North had -been 
 dismantled, and the fittings taken for firewood. We may safely 
 accept Baroness Riedesel's complaints of the unfriendliness of 
 the people — it was not much to be wondered at if both sides were 
 very sore ; and when this is the case, something is sure to 
 happen sooner or later. 
 
 Before Burgoyne went to England, one Colonel Henley, 
 who was in command under General Heath, offered bad language 
 and personal violence to several privates and non-commissioned 
 officers, and wounded one rather seriously with a bayonet. It 
 is plain that Henley was a coarse and violent man, who ought 
 never to have been entrusted with so difficult a position. It 
 is also plain, from the depositions of the British themselves, 
 that they were often insolent and provoking. The wounded 
 man boasted of having told Henley he hoped soon to be fighting 
 for his King. The story is not creditable to either side; but 
 those who have read the accounts of how the British used 
 their American prisoners, both in America and England, must 
 
658 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 feel that, bad as Henley was, the case of the British prisoners in 
 Boston cannot be compared with that of the Americans in New 
 York. There was no great sickness, much less any great 
 mortality, among the troops of the Convention, from beginning 
 to end of their detention. 
 
 Burgoyne made a vigorous representation; a court-martial 
 was held on Henley, and Burgoyne was allowed to be pro- 
 secutor. He made an eloquent, very long, and very injudicious 
 speech. Henley was acquitted, and reinstated — but only for 
 one day. He was then replaced by Colonel Lee, who had 
 had the command at first. Anburey says, "Affairs are much 
 better regulated ; everything is now in perfect tranquillity, and 
 a good understanding has taken place between our troops and 
 the Americans." But Burgoyne, who was a genial man, went 
 home on parole to defend his character, and left the command 
 of the Convention Troops to Phillips, who was excessively 
 irascible, and was said to be the haughtiest man in the British 
 Army. The forced inactivity began to be intolerably irksome; 
 cock-fighting, to which some of the officers resorted, could 
 not satisfy the craving for excitement. "Very great numbers 
 of privates deserted — some to the American service. The 
 whole band of the 62nd deserted in a body in May — and 
 played in an American regiment in Boston. A private of 
 the 47 th, who had deserted at Lexington, now turned up as 
 a Major in the American service, but was observed to look 
 uncomfortable when he met his old officers. 
 
 The most tragic event which marked the detention of the 
 army was the death of Lieutenant Brown, who was shot by a 
 sentinel on the 17th of June, 1778. Orders had been issued 
 that no " ladies " were to pass the lines. Brown, who was 
 driving in a chaise with two women, was repeatedly ordered 
 by the sentinel to stop. He drove on, and unfortunately for 
 himself put his head out to tell the sentinel he could not stop 
 the horses. At that moment the sentinel (described as "a boy, 
 scarce fourteen") fired, and wounded Brown mortally. None 
 knew better than Phillips, a distinguished officer of long 
 experience in great wars, that by military rules poor Brown 
 had brought his fate on himself by violating the order. But 
 he now completely lost both temper and prudence, and wrote 
 to General Heath, "Murder and death at length have taken 
 place." Heath confined him to his quarters; and Phillips 
 wrote to ask if poor Brown was to be allowed Christian burial. 
 Heath replied in a conciliatory tone — he not only permitted 
 
THE COMMISSIONERS 659 
 
 but requested General Phillips that every mark of respect should 
 be shown to the dead ; he had already ordered every assistance 
 to be given, and had also ordered "decency to be exhibited 
 by our troops during the procession and interment." A court- 
 martial was held ; the sentinel was of course acquitted — he 
 had only obeyed orders. But feeling became worse than ever, 
 and it was wisely determined to remove the troops to Virginia.^ 
 
 The Commissioners had been sent upon a fool's errand — 
 armed with powers just sufficient to enable them to embroil 
 the situation still further. They now demanded that Congress 
 should fulfil the stipulations of the Convention, and allow the 
 troops to embark, offering to renew on the part of Great Britain 
 all the stipulations, and particularly that by which these troops 
 were not to serve against America during the present war. 
 Congress replied that the Court of Great Britain must ratify 
 the Convention with Congress direct. Nothing less would 
 do — no ratification "by construction and implication," which 
 may be set aside by the British Parliament, can be accepted. 
 As the powers of the Commissioners were expressly subject 
 to the approbation of Parliament, the renewal of the Convention 
 would be so too. Every proclamation of the Commissioners 
 denied the authority of Congress ; and if the Convention of 
 Klosterseven could be set aside, why not the Convention of 
 Saratoga ? 
 
 As the weeks went on the Commissioners became more 
 and more hopeless of success. Carlisle had discovered long 
 since how much reliance was to bes, placed upon Galloway's 
 pictures of American loyalty. On July ist he wrote to the 
 Countess : " The common people hate us in their hearts, not- 
 withstanding all that is said of their secret attachment to the 
 mother country. I cannot give you a better proof of their 
 unanimity against us, than in our last march; in the whole 
 country there was not found one single man capable of bearing 
 arms at home; they left their dwellings unprotected, and after 
 having cut all the ropes of the wells, had fled to Washinton." 
 He also says that, " when things went better for us " they came 
 
 ^ On another less serious occasion, in which an American was certainly the 
 aggressor, Phillips allowed himself to write to Major Carter — Schuyler's son-in- 
 law, who had interested himself for the Convention troops — refusing to address 
 Heath, and adding that the aggrieved gentlemen ' ' ought to listen to the abuse 
 of the Americans as to the cackling of geese." The gentlemen were confined 
 for three days in the common gaol. Anburey says they observed, "on quitting 
 their dumps, that they had little more reason to extol the humanity of their own 
 General than they had the justice of the Americans." 
 
66o ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 in for pardons ; " but no sooner our situation was the least 
 altered for the worse, but these friends were the first to fire 
 upon us.'' By September there were grave doubts whether 
 we could hold New York much longer.^ Carlisle threw out 
 as a suggestion, " if we are quite driven to the wall," for a truce 
 for six, eight, or ten years, each side to keep what it has got. 
 But though he saw all this,^ when he wrote to Congress on 
 August 26, he could not refrain from informing them that 
 France was always " an enemy to all civil and religious liberty " ' — 
 no doubt forgetting for the moment our own Penal Laws. 
 
 The last idea of the Commissioners was the most unhappy 
 of all. Provoked by the counter Proclamation of Congress, 
 and encouraged by the disappointment shown by the Americans 
 at the little good effected by the French fleet, they imagined 
 they could " strike terror " by a " Manifesto " which is a monument 
 of wickedness and folly. 
 
 It began with the usual gracious promises of redress and 
 pardon to all who will now submit; and went on to threaten a 
 change "in the whole nature and future conduct of this war, 
 especially when to this position is added the pretended alliance 
 with the Court of France." It seemed as though the agents of 
 Great Britain could never repeat often enough that they did not 
 consider the laws of war or of nations applied to the present 
 contest— they were now denying the validity of the French 
 Treaty ! Every word of the Manifesto made this clearer. Hither- 
 to " the policy as well as the benevolence " of Great Britain had 
 "checked the extremes of war, when they tended to desolate a 
 country shortly to become again a source of mutual advantage " ; 
 but when that country professes " the unnatural design of 
 estranging herself from us, and mortgaging her resources to 
 our enemies," the question is, how far Great Britain may, by 
 every means in her power, destroy, or render useless, a connec- 
 tion contrived for her ruin, and for the aggrandisement of 
 France ... if the British Colonies are to become an accession 
 to France, " self-preservation will dictate " that Great Britain " shall 
 render that accession of as little value as possible to her enemy." 
 
 ^Carlisle wondered how people could exist in New York. "My weekly 
 bills come to as much as the house-account at Castle Howard, when we have 
 the most company." — To Lady Carlisle, September 22, 1778. (Carlisle MSS.) 
 
 ^ When the first reply of Congress came in June, he had written, "Just such 
 a reply as I imagined they would send. Refusal to treat unless we in the most 
 specific terms acknowledge their independency, or send away our armies." — To 
 Lady Carlisle, June 27. 
 
 ' For this insult to France the impetuous Lafayette sent him a challenge. 
 
THE COMMISSIONERS 66i 
 
 This frightful document was dated October 3, 1778, and the 
 offer was to remain open for forty days. 
 
 On the loth Congress issued a warning to all who Hved "in 
 places exposed to the ravages of the enemy," to build huts 
 immediately, at least thirty miles from their present habitations, and 
 to take thither the women, children, and all incapable of bearing 
 arms; to secure their valuables, and send off their catde, for it 
 was evident " their unnatural enemy," finding it impossible to 
 make them break the solemn treaty with France, intended to 
 burn every city and town on this continent they could come at. 
 They also advised that the moment the enemy began to burn 
 their houses, the people should burn the houses and destroy the 
 property of all Tories, and secure their persons — always taking 
 care not to treat them with wanton cruelty, "as we do not wish 
 to copy our enemies." 
 
 This was followed in two or three days by a counter-manifesto, 
 denouncing the manner in which the British had conducted the 
 war. "They have laid waste the open country, burned the 
 defenceless villages, and butchered the citizens of America. 
 Their prisons have been the slaughter-houses of her soldiers; 
 they have tried to bribe our representatives; they have made a 
 mock of humanity, religion, and reason." This Manifesto ended 
 with a solemn declaration, that if " our enemies " persist in their 
 present career of barbarity, we will take such exemplary vengeance 
 as shall deter others from a like conduct. We appeal to God, 
 and declare in His presence that we are not actuated by light 
 and hasty suggestions or anger or revenge, but will adhere to 
 our determination through all change of fortune.^ 
 
 This was what the Commissioners gained by striking terror. 
 
 Washington had never been more anxious. The people, 
 trusting to the French Alliance, relaxed their efforts ; the French 
 were chiefly occupied in wresting from us the West India Islands. 
 Each separate State was full of its local concerns. As soon as 
 the most pressing emergency was over, feuds and jealousies broke 
 out in Congress. Washington said that the American political 
 system was like a clock — it was useless to keep the smaller 
 wheels going if the prime mover of all was neglected. The 
 French Alliance, which filled the unthinking with a dangerous 
 
 ' "Every insidious art will predominate in the British cabinet against us. 
 Their threats of Russians and of great reinforcements are false and impractic- 
 able, and they know them to be so ; but their threats of doing mischief with 
 the forces they have will be verified as far as their povfer."^/ohu Adams to 
 his Wife, Passy, November 6, 1778. 
 
662 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 security, seemed to him rather a reason for fresh exertion. He 
 was against the wild scheme of a French occupation of Canada 
 (which turned out to be also entirely against the wishes of the 
 French Cabinet). He saw that it was fraught with future 
 danger. But his deepest anxieties came from his own country- 
 men. He saw that "idleness, dissipation, and extravagance" 
 had laid hold of most men — speculation, peculation, and an 
 insatiable thirst for riches had, he said, got the better of every 
 other consideration ; party disputes were the great business of 
 the day, and the concerns of an empire but secondary. And 
 what he saw in Philadelphia gave him but too much reason to 
 think this. 
 
 Philadelphia was as much given up to revelry as when the 
 British officers were scandalising it with their faro tables. 
 Washington, coming in that winter from his starving and shiver- 
 ing soldiers, was disgusted to find the Quaker city given up to 
 dinners, concerts, assemblies — any one of which entertainments 
 must cost three or four hundred pounds, while the soldiers' pay 
 was in arrears, officers were quitting the service because they 
 could not afford to remain, and "the virtuous few" who did 
 remain were beggared. Every now and then some regiment 
 would refuse to march — the men saying they could not live on 
 their pay, when they got it, and their families were starving.'- His 
 letter to Colonel Harrison gives a terrible picture of deterioration. 
 It was written after a visit to Philadelphia had shown him the 
 contrast between his starving soldiers and the junketings in the 
 capital. 
 
 Arnold was still in command in Philadelphia, and many of 
 these great entertainments were his. He had a fine house and 
 a splendid establishment. His extravagant and ostentatious way 
 of living, his carriages and horses, scandalised the sober. Worse 
 still, he engaged in financial speculations for which his position 
 gave him facilities ; and his enemies — of whom he had but too 
 many — said he shut up the shops in order that everything might 
 be purchased through himself. Here, however, they were 
 unjust — Joseph Reed had drafted the Proclamation that 
 nothing should be removed till the ownership was ascertained. 
 As his wound still incapacitated him for active service, he 
 thought of taking command of a privateer and making lucrative 
 captures at sea. He was just about to marry the daughter of a 
 loyalist — or semi-loyalist — -pretty Peggy Shippen, the fairest of 
 the Ladies of the Meschianza; and at his entertainments there 
 ' Washington's Letter to the Speaker of the House of Delegates of Virginia. 
 
THE COMMISSIONERS 663 
 
 appeared not only Tories, but proscribed persons. He had 
 quarrelled with the Executive Council of Pennsylvania, — he had 
 a long-standing dispute about the waggons impressed in July, 
 1778, to save the property of some persons obnoxious because 
 they had remained in the city during the British occupation. All 
 these reasons, and fespecially the affair of the waggons, made 
 Arnold unpopular, in spite of his great services and his still 
 unhealed wound. Reed, now President of the Executive 
 Council, was hostile to him. The Council at length drew up 
 a list of eight charges, and sent it to Congress. Arnold demanded 
 a court-martial. 
 
 The Committee of Congress exonerated him from all 
 criminality. He resigned — expecting to be reinstated. But 
 though he had been in a measure absolved, his enemies still 
 pursued him. There were discussions in Congress, and a court- 
 martial was resolved on. Arnold was very angry, and said 
 he was sacrificed to please Pennsylvania. It was now that he 
 married Miss Shippen. There was great delay in holding the 
 court-martial — Congress was waiting for the end of the campaign, 
 that witnesses might attend. The Court sat at Morristown in 
 December of 1779. It only noticed four of the eight charges.^ 
 On two he was acquitted; on the other two, the Court found 
 that his conduct had been irregular and imprudent, and sentenced 
 him to be reprimanded by the Commander-in-Chief Never, 
 perhaps, was a reprimand so delicately given.2 
 
 Washington's camp was now at Middlebrook. His men still 
 wanted food, but, thanks to the French, they were better clad. But 
 they were impatient at not receiving their pay. Spain, dragged in 
 unwillingly to help America, did so surreptitiously, and would not 
 acknowledge the States. She foresaw the loss of Florida, and 
 wanted to confine the Americans within the Alleghanies, so to 
 
 1 One charge was his giving a permit, without Washington's knowledge, 
 for a vessel belonging to disaffected persons ; the other, that he had appro- 
 priated the waggons of the State of Pennsylvania for the transport of private 
 property belonging to disaffected persons. 
 
 2 Washington said : " Our profession is the chastest of all ; even the 
 shadow of a fault tarnishes the lustre of our finest achievements. The least 
 inadvertence may rob us of the public favour, so hard to be acquired. I 
 reprimand you for having forgotten, that in proportion as you had rendered 
 yourself formidable to our enemies, you should have been guarded and 
 temperate in your deportment to your fellow-citizens. Exhibit anew those 
 noble qualities which have placed you on the list of our most valued 
 commanders. I will myself furnish you, as far as it may be in my power, 
 with opportunities of regaining the esteem of your country." 
 
664 ENGLAND AND AMERICA 
 
 preserve her own vast possessions beyond the Mississippi- The 
 little expedition of Colonel Clarke of Virginia, to reduce the French 
 Canadian towns and settlements on the Upper Mississippi,^ may 
 have helped to suggest these fears. Clarke's expedition almost 
 recalls Arnold's march. With about 300 men he traversed 
 1200 miles of uninhabited waste, where everything had to be 
 carried. Fortunately the chief part of the way was by water. 
 Clarke surprised the town of Kashaskias at midnight, after marching 
 two days without food, and made the fort his headquarters. He 
 then took three other towns, from fifteen to seventy miles higher up 
 the Mississippi. The Indians found that Clarke was a better 
 Indian than themselves, and grew cautious and timid; and the 
 scattered Americans in those back settlements gladly raUied to a 
 man who delivered them from their fear of the savages. 
 
 From the beginning of December, 1778, Washington's canton- 
 ments stretched from Long Island Sound to the Delaware. He 
 had a system of signals. Sentinels kept' watch on Bottle Hill 
 night and day ; and on any appearance of the British, an 
 i8-pounder, called the Old Sow, was fired off every half-hour, 
 warning the country round. On clear nights a beacon was lighted 
 — answering fires sprang up from hill to hill, and the militia 
 hastened to the posts assigned them. 
 
 Clinton could do little. Too many troops had been detached from 
 his army. Instead of crushing Washington, he had been obliged to 
 send General Grant and Admiral Hotham to attack Sta. Lucia. 
 And at the end of November the war entered on a new phase — 
 destined to be its last. Sir Hyde Parker and Colonel Campbell, 
 with 3000 more of Clinton's troops, sailed for Savannah, to 
 reduce Georgia. Clinton was very sore at thus being left to 
 maintain "a starved defensive." But he soon had good news 
 from the South. The attempt of d'Estaing and Lincoln to take 
 Savannah by assault on December 29 was repulsed with very 
 heavy loss, and by the middle of January, 1779, all Georgia seemed 
 subdued. 
 
 ' Then called the " Illinois Country." 
 
 END OF VOL. I. 
 
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