The Land We Live In. (continued 2)

Notwithstanding harsh laws and their bitter enforcement, the habits of the people were probably not much better than to-day in well-ordered communities, and considerable depravity existed, especially in the remoter settlements. Comer's Diary, which has never been published, but which the writer of this work has examined in manuscript, shows a condition of society far from exemplary, and it also shows that persons whose position ought to have been respectable, sometimes took Indians either as wives or in a less honorable relation. There is, perhaps, more Indian blood in New England than is generally supposed, and the earlier inhabitants of that section were probably less exclusive toward the aborigines than is assumed in conventional history. Comer's Diary deals, it is true, with the early part of the eighteenth century, but the conditions it minutely and no doubt faithfully describes, must have existed substantially in the seventeenth.[1]

The laws of Rhode Island were founded on the Mosaic system, like those of Massachusetts, but entirely ignored the question of religion. The penalties for immoral conduct were not so merciless as in the Puritan colonies, and the Rhode Island colonial records indicate that the laws, such as they were, were not rigidly enforced. The remnants of the Indian tribes, having first been demoralized by unprincipled whites, became themselves a demoralizing element, and Indian dances were, the records show, a continual source of scandal and of vice, which the authorities sought vainly to suppress. In connection with the principle of entire separation of Church and State, on which Rhode Island was founded, it may be of interest to mention here that I learned, in my examination of Comer's Diary, that an attempt was made to establish a branch of the Anglican Church in Providence, in the colonial period, and that a minister was sent over under authority of the bishop of London. The minister had to depart, and the church was closed on account of some scandal. I wrote to the present bishop of London inquiring if there was any record of the incident in the Episcopal archives, and he answered me to the effect that nothing could be found relating to it.

CHAPTER IX.

New England Prospering—Outbreak of King Philip's War—Causes of the War—White or Indian Had to Go—Philip on the War-path—Settlements Laid in Ashes—The Attack on Hadley—The Great Swamp Fight—Philip Renews the War More Fiercely Than Before—His Allies Desert Him—Betrayed and Killed—The Indians Crushed in New England.

The civil war between Charles I. and the Parliament put an end to Puritan immigration to New England, and some of the settlers went back to England, and gave efficient aid to their fellow Puritans in fighting against the king. The people of New England were, on the whole, prosperous about the middle of the seventeenth century. Nearly every head of a family owned his house and the land which he occupied, and in the coast towns many were engaged in profitable trade and the fisheries. Fishing vessels from abroad were customers for the agricultural products of the colony, and gradually the colonists built their own vessels and absorbed the fisheries themselves. The figure of a codfish in the Massachusetts State House was, until recently, a reminder of the beginning of Massachusett's wealth and prosperity.

King Philip's War was a terrible blow to the colonies, and came near to proving their destruction. The immediate provocation of the conflict was slight enough, but the conflict itself was inevitable. There was no longer room in New England for independent Indian tribes side by side with English colonies. One race or the other had to give way and war meant extermination for one or the other. King Philip, Sachem of the Wampanoags, saw that the further progress of the colonies would involve the extinction of his race. He was a brave man, and possessed of uncommon ability. He did not move hastily, although his tribesmen clamored for bloodshed to avenge three of their fellows whom the English had hanged on a doubtful charge of murder, based on the killing of an Indian traitor. When Philip was prepared to strike he sent his women and children to the Narragansetts for protection, and then started on the warpath against the settlers of Plymouth colony. Major Savage, with horse and foot from Boston, joined the Plymouth forces, and they drove Philip back into a swamp at Pocasset. After a siege of many days Philip made his way from the swamp, was welcomed by the Nipmucks, a tribe in interior Massachusetts, and with fifteen hundred warriors he hurried to attack the white settlements in Connecticut. The colonial army meanwhile hastened to the Narragansett country, and compelled Canonchet, chief of the Narragansetts, upon whom King Philip had relied for aid, to make a treaty of friendship. Philip was disappointed by the loss of this expected ally, but disappointment made him only the more resolute and desperate. Everywhere he excited the New England tribes against the English, and carefully avoiding any general encounter, he waylaid the settlers, destroyed their homes and laid ambuscades for them in field and highway, now and then attacking some important town. The colonists suffered fearfully; numbers were slain; whole settlements were devastated, and the gun had to be kept at hand in church, at home and at daily toil. No one knew when the dusky foe would suddenly spring from the forest; no woman left her doorstep without fear that she might never enter it again, and the settler, whom duty summoned from home, looked anxiously on his return to see if his dwelling was there. Even the churches, with congregations armed as they listened to the Word of God, were assailed and the worshipers sometimes massacred. Deerfield was laid in ashes, and Hadley was saved undoubtedly by the sudden appearance of a venerable man, William Goffe, the regicide, who had been a major-general under Cromwell, was one of the judges who signed the death warrant of Charles I., and had fled to New England from the vengeance of Charles II. He was concealed in Hadley when the Indians attacked the place, and unexpectedly appeared among the inhabitants, most of whom took him for a supernatural being, and animated them to repulse the savages. He then as suddenly disappeared, going back to his place of refuge. Philip, encouraged by his successes, made a bold attack upon Springfield, but was repulsed with serious loss. He then retreated to the Narragansett country, and was hospitably received by Canonchet.

Although Canonchet's sympathies were with Philip, it is not certain that the Narragansett chief had hostile designs against the English. The colonists had determined, however, to make a sweep of possible as well as actual enemies, and they marched upon the Narragansetts. Then occurred the Great Swamp fight, one of the most sanguinary of encounters in the history of Indian warfare. The Narragansetts had their winter camp, or fort, in the heart of a swamp, in what is now Charlestown, Rhode Island. Successive rows of palisades protected a position of considerable extent, accessible during the greater part of the year by a single narrow path. This one access was guarded by a blockhouse, but the cold weather gave a footing to the invaders on the usually impassable morasses. An attempt was made to take the Narragansetts by surprise. The warriors, however, detected the stealthy approach, and seizing their weapons, fired from the security of their palisades upon the advancing enemy. A number of the best men on the colonial side were shot down while urging on the attack. The battle on both sides was fierce and stubborn. Assault followed assault, only to be repulsed, and when the English had fought their way into the fortress, they were at first driven out by an irresistible onset of the Indians. At length the colonists made good their entrance, and the battle continued at closer quarters, the Indians nerved to desperation by the presence of their wives and children, whose fate would be their own, and the colonists inspired to prodigies of valor by the thought that their defeat would certainly involve their own destruction, and perhaps that of New England. The invaders at length set fire to the wigwams. As the flames spread the women and children ran out, hampering their defenders with cries of terror and appeals for protection, and at length the Indians were overpowered. Then followed a pitiless massacre of the defeated Indians and their families, hundreds of whom perished in the flames, while many were taken prisoners to be carried off into slavery. Canonchet was slain, and the power of the Narragansetts was broken forever.[1]

King Philip escaped from the slaughter, found other Indian allies, and renewed the war more fiercely than before. Many towns were laid in ashes, including Providence and Warwick, in Rhode Island; Weymouth, Groton, Medfield, Lancaster and Marlborough, in Massachusetts. About six hundred of the colonists were killed in battle or waylaid and murdered, and the burden of the struggle bore heavily on the survivors. Fortunately dissensions among the savages diminished their power for harm, and Philip's allies deserted him, or surrendered to avoid starvation. Captain Church of Rhode Island went in pursuit of Philip who had taken refuge in the fastnesses of Mount Hope. The wife and little son of the Indian chief were made prisoners, and this was a final blow to him. "My heart breaks," he said; "I am ready to die." An Indian, who claimed to have a grievance against Philip on account of a brother whom the sachem had killed, betrayed the hiding-place of Philip to the English, and shot the fallen chief. Philip's head was cut off and carried on a pole to Plymouth, and his body was quartered. His wife and son were sold into slavery in Bermuda. The Indians of New England were crushed, and they never again attempted to stand against the whites.

CHAPTER X.

Growth of New Netherland—Governor Stuyvesant's Despotic Rule—His Comments on Popular Election—New Amsterdam Becomes New York—The Planting of Maryland—Partial Freedom of Conscience—Civil War in Maryland—The Carolinas—Settlement of North and South Carolina—The Bacon Rebellion in Virginia—Governor Berkeley's Vengeance.

New Amsterdam prospered under methods of government which were mild as compared with those of the Puritans, although the annals of the Dutch colony are unhappily not free from the stain of persecution for conscience' sake. Englishmen as well as Hollanders thronged to New Netherland, and the people, as they grew beyond anxiety for enough to eat and drink, became ambitious for a share in the government. In 1653, after much agitation and resistance on the part of Governor Stuyvesant, New Amsterdam was organized as a municipality, the power of the burghers being, however, very limited.

The smaller Dutch towns possessed the privilege of electing their officers, though their choice was subject to the approval of the director-general. New Amsterdam had not been granted this privilege, although it had been demanded in 1642 and again in 1649. At last, in 1652, Governor Stuyvesant was instructed to have a schout, two burgomasters and five schepens "elected according to the custom of the metropolis of Fatherland." He, however, continued for a long time to appoint municipal officers, and when a protest was made he replied that he had done so "for momentous reason." "For if," he said, "this rule was to become a synocure, if the nomination and election of magistrates were to be left to the populace who were the most interested, then each would vote for some one of his own stamp, the thief for a thief, the rogue, the tippler, the smuggler for a brother in iniquity, that he might enjoy greater latitude in his vices and frauds." The magistrates had not been appointed contrary to the will of the people, because they were "proposed to the commonalty in front of the City Hall by their names and surnames, each in his quality, before they were admitted or sworn to office. The question is then put, 'Does any one object?'" At length, in 1658, Stuyvesant allowed the burgomasters and schepens to nominate their successors, but the city did not have a schout of its own until 1660.

Other troubles besides the demands of the people for self-government, were gathering around the sturdy Dutch governor. The English were pressing him from the east, and in New Netherland itself they were aggressive and defiant in their attitude toward Dutch authority. Charles II. granted New Netherland to his brother, the Duke of York, and an English flotilla under Richard Nicholls appeared in front of New Amsterdam and demanded the surrender of the province. Stuyvesant refused to submit, but the people of New Amsterdam were more than willing to come under English rule, and their doughty governor was made to understand that he would be virtually alone in resisting the invaders. After a week of fuming and raging against the inevitable, Stuyvesant yielded, and the English took possession of New Amsterdam. The place was recaptured and held by the Dutch for a few months in 1673, but with the exception of this brief period the English remained thenceforth masters of the Atlantic coast of North America from the St. Lawrence in the north to the Spanish possessions in the south.

The planting of a Roman Catholic colony in Maryland was almost contemporary with the Puritan settlement of New England. The first steps toward the establishment of the colony had been taken under James I., but it was in the reign of Charles I. that Cecil Calvert, the second Lord Baltimore, obtained the charter which made him almost an independent sovereign over one of the fairest regions of North America. The charter granted civil and religious liberty to Christians who believed in the Trinity. The Ark and the Dove, two vessels fitted out by Lord Baltimore, bore about two hundred Roman Catholic immigrants to the banks of the Potomac, where they landed on March 25, 1634. The cross was planted as the emblem of the new colony, and Governor Leonard Calvert opened negotiations with the Indians for the purchase of their lands. The first assembly met in 1635, and another in 1638. Question having arisen as to whether the lord proprietor or the colonists had the right to propose laws, that right was at length conceded to the colonists. Of course the settlers would not have been allowed to persecute non-Catholics, even had they so desired; but they showed no such desire, and laws were enacted securing freedom of worship to all professing to believe in Jesus Christ; with the important limitation, however, of severe penalties for alleged blasphemy. This limitation clearly made it possible for magistrates to construe an honest expression of religious opinion as blasphemy, and to inflict the cruel punishments provided for that offence. It should be noticed that the Toleration Act of Maryland, passed in 1649, was the work of a General Assembly composed of sixteen Protestants and eight Roman Catholics, the governor (William Stone) himself being a Protestant. Some years later the Puritans, being in a majority in the Maryland General Assembly, passed an act disfranchising Roman Catholics and members of the Church of England. Civil war followed, resulting in a defeat for the Roman Catholics near Providence, now called Annapolis, April, 1655. Lord Baltimore, whose authority was overthrown in the course of the conflict, recovered his rights when the monarchy was restored in England. The government of the Baltimores continued, with some interruptions, until the Revolution, and it is but fair to state that the character which they stamped upon the colony was not effaced even by that event.

The Puritans nearly succeeded in adding North Carolina to their chain of colonies. The first settlers, after the ill-fated Raleigh expeditions of the previous century, were Presbyterian refugees from persecution at Jamestown, who, led by Roger Green, settled on the Chowan, near the site of Edenton. These were joined by other dissenters who had found the religious atmosphere of Virginia uncomfortable, and Puritans from New England landed at the Cape Fear River in 1661, and bought lands from the Indians. The soil and climate were admirably suited for successful colonization, and North Carolina might have proved a southern New England but for the hunger for vast American domains which just then possessed the courtiers of Charles II. In view of the notorious depravity of that merry monarch's surroundings it seems ludicrous to read that the grantees obtained Carolina under the pretence of a "pious zeal for the propagation of the gospel among the heathen." The list included the Earl of Clarendon, General George Monk, to whom Charles owed, in a large degree, his restoration to the throne; Sir Anthony Ashley Cooper, afterward Earl of Shaftesbury; Sir John Colleton, Lord Craven, Sir George Carteret and Lord John Berkeley and his brother, then Governor of Virginia. It is related that, "when the petitioners presented their memorial, so full of pious pretensions, to King Charles in the garden of Hampton Court, the 'merrie monarch,' after looking each in the face a moment, burst into loud laughter, in which his audience joined heartily. Then taking up a little shaggy spaniel, with large, meek eyes, and holding it at arm's length before them, he said, 'Good friends, here is a model of piety and sincerity, which it might be wholesome for you to copy.' Then tossing it to Clarendon, he said, 'There, Hyde, is a worthy prelate; make him archbishop of the domain which I shall give you.' With grim satire Charles introduced into the preamble of the charter a statement that the petitioners, 'excited with a laudable and pious zeal for the propagation of the gospel, have begged a certain country in the parts of America not yet cultivated and planted, and only inhabited by some barbarous people who have no knowledge of God.'"

The Puritans, already settled in North Carolina, had no desire to take part in the propagation of the gospel in the fashion which prevailed among the courtiers of Charles II., and most of those who were from New England abandoned their North Carolina plantations. Governor Berkeley, of Virginia, extended his authority over the remainder, and made William Drummond, a Scotch Presbyterian, who had been settled in Virginia, administrator of the Chowan colony. Emigrants from Barbadoes bought land from the Indians near the site of Wilmington, and founded a prosperous settlement with Sir John Yeamans as governor. Other emigrants from England, led by Sir William Sayle and Joseph West, entered Port Royal Sound, and landed at Beaufort Island in 1671. They soon deserted Beaufort and planted themselves on the Ashley River, a few miles above the site of Charleston. In December, 1671, fifty families and a large number of slaves arrived from the Barbadoes. Carolina, about this time, had a narrow escape from being made the subject of a grotesque feudal constitution conceived by John Locke, the philosopher, and approved by the Earl of Shaftesbury. This constitution proposed to inflict on the infant colony a system of titled aristocracy as elaborate as that of Germany. The good sense of the colonists repelled the absurd scheme, and saved Carolina from being a laughing stock for the nations. In 1680, the settlers on Ashley River moved to Oyster Point, at the junction of the Ashley and Cooper Rivers, and laid the foundation of Charleston.

Meantime Virginia was the scene of a memorable struggle between the aristocrats and the people, the royalists led by the Governor, Sir William Berkeley, and the republicans marshaled by Nathaniel Bacon, a wealthy lawyer, deeply attached to the popular cause. The character of Berkeley can best be judged by a communication which he sent to England in 1665: "I thank God there are no free schools nor printing in Virginia, and I hope we shall not have them these hundred years; for learning has brought heresy and disobedience and sects into the world, and printing hath divulged them and libels against the best government; God keep us from both!" It is not strange that a man who felt like this should have cared but little for the safety and welfare of the common people. He himself reveled in riches, accumulated at the cost of the colony, and he had in sympathy with him the large landholders, who sought to imitate in their Virginia mansions the pomp and circumstance of the English nobility, while they looked down on the mass of poor whites as vassals and inferiors. The immediate provocation for the so-called Bacon Rebellion was the failure of Governor Berkeley to protect the settlers from Indian depredations, the governor having a monopoly of the fur-trade, and being inclined by motives of self-interest to propitiate the savages. An armed force assembled and chose Bacon as their leader. They first repulsed the Indians, and then demanded from the governor a commission for Bacon as commander-in-chief of the Virginia military. Berkeley, although urged by the newly-elected House of Burgesses, which was in sympathy with the people, to grant the commission, for some time hesitated, but at length consented. Bacon marched against the Indians, and Berkeley proclaimed him a traitor. This hostile action of the governor excited Bacon and his followers, in whose numbers were included many of the best men in the colony, to an open and resolute stand for the rights of the people. Berkeley fled to the eastern shore of Chesapeake Bay, and sought to raise an army to maintain his authority. He proclaimed that the slaves of all rebels were to free; he aroused the Indians to join him, and several English ships were placed at his service. With this following the governor went back to Jamestown, and again proclaimed Bacon a traitor.

The popular leader hastened to accept the challenge, and at the head of a considerable force of republicans, he appeared before Jamestown. Berkeley's mercenaries refused to fight, and stole away under cover of night, Berkeley being obliged to accompany them in order to avoid being made a prisoner. Jamestown was burned by the republicans, all the colony, except the eastern shore acknowledged Bacon's authority, and the success of the insurrection seemed assured when the popular leader fell a victim to malignant fever. Without his genius and energy to guide the cause of liberty, it rapidly declined, and Berkeley returned and soon succeeded in re-establishing his authority. He made Williamsburg the capital of the colony, instead of Jamestown, which never rose from its ruins—a fact hardly to be regretted, as the site was decidedly unhealthy. Berkeley had no mercy on the now submissive insurgents. Bacon's chief lieutenant had been the brave Scotch Presbyterian, William Drummond, the first governor of North Carolina. When Drummond was brought before him the governor said: "You are very welcome; I am more glad to see you than any man in Virginia; you shall be hanged in half an hour." Drummond calmly answered: "I expect no mercy from you. I have followed the lead of my conscience, and done what I could to rescue my country from oppression." Drummond was executed about three hours later, and his devoted wife, Sarah, who had taken an active part in urging the people to defend their rights, and who had in her the spirit of the mothers of the Revolution, was banished with her children to the wilderness. A wife who offered herself as a victim in place of her husband, claiming that she had urged him to rebellion, was repulsed with coarse and brutal insult, and the husband was led to the gallows. Twenty-two in all were executed before Berkeley's vengeance was satiated. Charles II. heard with indignation of the sacrifice of life, exclaiming: "The old fool has taken more lives in that naked country than I have taken for the murder of my father." Berkeley was recalled to England in 1677. But for the presence of the fleet and troops of Sir John Berry, sent over by the king to maintain the royal authority, Berkeley might have been subjected to violence by the colonists who fired guns and lighted bonfires to show their joy over his departure. Upon Berkeley's arrival in England he found himself equally an object there of public hatred and contempt on account of his cruelties, and he died in July of the same year of grief and mortification.

CHAPTER XI.

The Colony of New York—New Jersey Given Away to Favorites—Charter of Liberties and Franchises—The Dongan Charter—Beginnings of New York City Government—King James Driven from Power—Leisler Leads a Popular Movement—The Aristocratic Element Gains the Upper Hand—Jacob Leisler and Milborne Executed—Struggle For Liberty Continues.

The colony of New York, so called after James, the Duke of York and brother of King Charles II., came into English hands at a fortunate time, and after a fortunate experience. Owing to Dutch, occupation during half a century of intense agitation, civil war and revolution, New Netherland had escaped being drawn into the maelstrom of English hates and rivalries. Indeed the Dutch settlements, and New Amsterdam in particular, had derived advantage from the troubles of the English colonies, and among the immigrants who sought an asylum from Puritan intolerance within New Netherland jurisdiction were many who proved valuable additions to the population of the province, and who helped to build up its trade and commerce, and to develop agriculture. The Duke of York, therefore, entered upon possession of a colony with the accumulated prosperity of about fifty years as the substantial foundation for future progress, and with a population which, while composed of diverse nationalities, retained the better features of them all. The settlers of New York, both Dutch and English, were, as a rule, attentive to religious duties; but they did not regard religion as the single aim of existence. They were merchants and traders and farmers, liberal for their age in their views of religious freedom, and devoting their best energies to building up their worldly fortunes. New Amsterdam was in no sense Puritan—it was a respectable, thriving, trading and bartering community, with flourishing farms in the outskirts, and a commerce stunted by jealous restrictions, but which gave promise of future development.[1]

The Duke of York at first made poor use of his new possessions. He astonished Colonel Richard Nicolls, who had conquered the territory for him without firing a shot, by giving away to two favorites, Lord Berkeley, brother of the Governor of Virginia, and Sir George Carteret, the rich domain between the Hudson and Delaware, which received the name of New Jersey, and for many years that province was a theatre of dissensions traceable to the autocratic and reckless course of the Duke. The rights of settlers who had preceded the proprietary government were ignored, and an attempt made to reduce freeholders to the position of tenants. A large immigration of Quakers from England a few years after the Dutch surrender added a valuable element to the population, in which the Puritans, apart from the Dutch, had predominated. Puritans and Quakers seemed to get along very well in the Jerseys, and with good government on the part of the proprietors the colony would doubtless have flourished. That for a number of years the Jerseys remained law-abiding and comparatively tranquil without a regular civil government attests the excellent character of the people.

The Duke of York showed more wisdom in the management of his greater province of New York. In 1683 he instructed his governor, Thomas Dongan, to call a representative assembly, which met in the fort at New York. The assembly adopted an act called "The Charter of Liberties and Franchises," which was approved, first by the governor, and afterward by the duke. This charter declared that the power to pass laws should reside in the governor, council and people met in general assembly; that every freeholder and freeman should be allowed to vote for representatives without restraint; that no freeman should suffer but by judgment of his peers; that all trials should be by a jury of twelve men; that no tax should be levied without the consent of the Assembly; that no seaman or soldier should be quartered on the inhabitants against their will; that there should be no martial law, and that no person professing faith in God by Jesus Christ should be disquieted or questioned on account of religion. Two years later James, now become king, virtually abrogated this charter by levying direct taxes on New York without the consent of the people, by prohibiting the introduction of printing, and otherwise assuming arbitrary power. He did not, however, suppress the General Assembly, which became, as years advanced and the colony grew in importance, more and more resolute in asserting the people's rights.

Governor Dongan did all in his power to defend the interests of the province against the aggressions of the crown, and to secure some degree of self-government for those who bore the burdens of government. In 1686 the Dongan charter gave to the lieutenant-governor the power of appointing the mayor and sheriff of New York city, but an alderman, an assistant and a constable were to be chosen for each ward by a majority of the inhabitants of that ward. During his short lease of power Leisler issued warrants for the election of the mayor and sheriff by "all Protestant freeholders." The resulting election was a farce, as only seventy of the inhabitants voted. The illegality of this action in defiance of the provisions of the Dongan charter was one of the chief causes of complaint against Leisler. The Montgomery charter, granted to New York in 1730, authorized the election of one alderman, an assistant, two assessors, one collector and two constables in each ward. The charter of Albany was granted by Governor Dougan in 1686, and it resembled in many respects the instrument under which the city of New York was first organized. It provided that six aldermen, six assistant aldermen, constables and other magistrates, should be chosen annually. The mayor, as well as the sheriff, was appointed by the governor. Governor Dongan's reluctance to fall in with the despotic and reactionary policy of King James led to his being dismissed from office in 1688, when Andros took his place.

The tyrannical conduct of James II. and of his representatives in America, alienated the people of New York from that sovereign, and the news of his downfall was received with delight, especially as nearly all the people were Protestants. The aristocratic element was inclined, notwithstanding the news, to uphold the government established by James, but the common or democratic element resolved to drive out the representatives of the late king, and create a temporary government in sympathy with the revolution. Jacob Leisler, a distinguished Huguenot merchant, and senior captain of the military companies, was induced to lead a revolt. A committee of safety, consisting of ten members, Dutch, Huguenots and English, made Leisler commander-in-chief until orders should arrive from William and Mary, the new sovereigns of England. Sir Francis Nicholson, the acting governor under Sir Edmund Andros, departed for England, and the members of his council to Albany, and denounced Leisler as an arch-rebel. Leisler sent an account of his proceedings to King William, and called an assembly to provide means for carrying on war against the French in Canada. King William paid no attention to Leisler's message, and commissioned Colonel Henry Sloughter governor of New York, and sent a company of regular soldiers, under Captain Ingoldsby, to the province. Leisler proclaimed Sloughter's appointment, but refused to surrender the fort to Ingoldsby. A hostile encounter followed, in which some lives were lost. The aristocratic element succeeded, upon Sloughter's arrival, in obtaining an ascendancy over him, and Leisler and his son-in-law, Milborne, were arrested on charges of treason. They were tried and convicted by a packed court, and Sloughter was induced, while drunk at a banquet given by Leisler's enemies, to sign the death warrants. For fear the governor would repent of his act when sober, both men were torn away from their weeping families to the scaffold. A number of Leisler's enemies were assembled to witness his death, while a crowd of the common people, who regarded him as their champion and a martyr for their cause, looked sullenly on. Milborne saw his bitter foe, Robert Livingston, in the throng, and exclaimed: "Robert Livingston, for this I will implead thee at the bar of God!" The execution of Leisler aroused strong indignation both in America and England, and some years later the attainder placed upon them was removed by act of Parliament, and their estates restored to their families. Leisler's soul, like that of John Brown, marched on while his body was moldering in the grave. The spirit which he infused, and the love of liberty to which he gave expression, could not be eradicated by his tragic death. The people continued the struggle in assembly after assembly for the people's rights, and resolutely upheld freedom of speech and of the press in the legislative hall and the jury box.

CHAPTER XII.

William Penn's Model Colony—Sketch of the Founder of Pennsylvania— Comparative Humanity of Quaker Laws—Modified Freedom of Religion—An Early Liquor Law—Offences Against Morality Severely Punished—White Servitude—Debtors Sold Into Bondage—Georgia Founded as an Asylum for Debtors—Oglethorpe Repulses the Spaniards—Georgia a Royal Province.

Founded on principles of equity by a man who was eminently a lover of his kind, Pennsylvania stood forth as a model colony, an ample and hospitable refuge for the oppressed of every clime. William Penn believed in the Golden Rule, and he sought to establish a state in which that rule would be the fundamental law. Instead of stern justices growing fat on the fees of litigation, he would have peace-makers in every county. He would treat the Indian as of the same flesh and blood as the white, and would live on terms of amity with red men embittered against the invaders of their lands by many years of unjust encroachment and cruel oppression. His object, Penn declared in his advertisement of Pennsylvania, was to establish a just and righteous government in the province that would be an example for others. He proposed that his government should be a government of law, with the people a party to the making of laws. None, he declared, should be molested or prejudiced in matters of faith and worship, and nobody should be compelled at any time to frequent or maintain any religious place of worship or ministry whatsoever. Trial by jury was guaranteed; the person of an Indian was to be as sacred as that of a white man, and in any issue at law in which an Indian should be concerned, one half the jury was to be composed of Indians.

William Penn was well known both in England and on the Continent when he received, in 1681, his grant of Pennsylvania from Charles II. in discharge of a debt of about eighty thousand dollars, due by the crown to Penn's father, Admiral Sir William Penn. The proprietor of Pennsylvania had suffered in the cause of religious liberty and reform. He had been confined in the Tower for writing heretical pamphlets, and been prosecuted for preaching in the streets of London. He had traveled in Holland and Germany as a self-appointed missionary of the Society of Friends, and had not spared his own ease in pleading the cause of persecuted Quakers everywhere. When, therefore, he proposed to found a colony in America, his name alone was enough to attract a host of followers. Many immigrants flocked to Pennsylvania even before Penn himself had arrived there, and the settlers of Delaware, who had been anxious as to their future under the charter of the Duke of York, gladly came under the rule of one whose name was a synonym of equity. Under a spreading elm the Indians met the proprietor of Pennsylvania and made a covenant with him that was equally just to the white man and to the native—a covenant which, it is said, was never forgotten by the aborigines.

Nothing is more significant of the spirit and the motives which guided the early settlers than the humanity of their laws, as compared with the code of England. The humane and enlightened sentiment as expressed in legislation, was not peculiar to Pennsylvania. In Rhode Island, also, that other colony founded on the principle of religious liberty, the first spontaneous code enacted by the exiles was more than a century in advance of European ideas and statutes, and in Rhode Island, as in Pennsylvania, the ideal was compelled to give way to the hard and practical pressure of dominating English influence, and of contact with the rougher sort of mankind, attracted to these shores by the hope of gain or the fear of punishment at home.

The Quakers began by proclaiming a modified freedom of religion. They declared, "That no person now, or at any time hereafter, dwelling or residing within this province, who shall profess faith in God the Father, and in Jesus Christ, His only Son, and in the Holy Spirit, one God blessed for Evermore, and shall acknowledge the Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testament to be given by Divine Inspiration, and, when lawfully required, shall profess and declare that they will live peaceably under the civil government, shall in any case be molested or prejudiced for his or her conscientious persuasion, nor shall he or she be at any time compelled to frequent or maintain any religious worship, place or ministry whatsoever, contrary to his or her mind, but shall freely and fully enjoy his or her Christian liberty in all respects, without molestation or interruption." Of course this manifestly excluded unbelievers in the Trinity, and left a door open for controversy as to what books were included in the Sacred Scriptures. Furthermore, the law against blasphemy might easily have been used as a weapon of persecution, providing, as it did, that whoever should "despitefully blaspheme or speak loosely and profanely of Almighty God, Christ Jesus, the Holy Spirit or the Scriptures of Truth, and is legally convicted thereof, shall forfeit and pay the sum of ten pounds for the use of the poor of the county where such offence shall be committed, or suffer three months imprisonment at hard labor."

Practically, however, entire freedom of worship existed in Pennsylvania. The same liberal spirit breathed through the Quaker code, while at the same time due care was taken to protect the morals of the people.

In view of the severe liquor law now in force in Pennsylvania, it may be of interest to recall an early enactment regulating the traffic. It was provided in 1709, that "For preventing of disorders and the mischiefs that may happen by multiplicity of public houses of entertainment, Be it enacted, That no person or persons whatsoever, within this province, shall hereafter have or keep any public inn, tavern, ale-house, tippling-house or dram shop, victualling or public house of entertainment in any county of this province, or in the City of Philadelphia, unless such person or persons shall first be recommended by the justices in the respective County Courts, and the said city, in their Quarter Sessions or Court of Record for the said counties and cities respectively, to the Lieutenant-Governor for the time being, for his license for so doing, under the penalty of five pounds." Tavern keepers permitting disorder in their places of entertainment were subject to revocation of license.

There was a marked disposition in those days to visit with severity offences against morality, especially when the detected culprits were females; though males were not spared when sufficient proof could be brought of their guilt. A woman concealing the birth of a child, found dead, and evidently born alive, was held to be guilty of murder, unless she could prove that the death was not her doing. This unjust presumption remained in force for many years, until, under the influence of kinder and Christian sentiment, the law was changed, the burden of proof placed upon the prosecution and the presumption of innocence extended to the defendant. The penalty for violating the marriage obligation was the lash; the letter "A" being branded on the forehead for the third offence. A singular provision of law was that a married woman having a child when her husband had been one year absent, should be punished as a criminal, but to be exempt from punishment if she should prove that her husband had been within the period stated "in some of the Queen's colonies or plantations on this continent, between the easternmost parts of New England and the southernmost parts of North Carolina."

The penalties inflicted on servants point in a remarkable manner to the wonderful advance in the condition of menial and common laborers within the past hundred years. Pennsylvania, in the treatment of the laborer, was at least as lenient as any other colony, but the laws of the time appear hideously harsh and oppressive to us of to-day. The early colonial statutes provided that, "For the just encouragement of servants in the discharge of their duty, and the prevention of their deserting their master's or owner's service, be it enacted, that no servant bound to serve his or her time in this province, shall be sold or disposed of to any person residing in any other province or government without the consent of said servant, and two justices of the peace of the county wherein such servant lives or is sold, under the penalty of ten pounds to be forfeited by the seller." What a picture this conjures up of some poor, orphaned and half-starved colonial Oliver Twist, dragged by his master into the presence of pompous justices, and frowned into a hesitating consent to exchange the evils with which he was familiar for a fate whose wretchedness he knew not of!

Ten shillings was to be paid for returning a runaway servant, if captured within ten miles of the servant's abode; if over ten miles, then the sum of twenty shillings was to be paid to the captor on delivery of the fugitive to the sheriff, the master to pay, in addition to the reward, five shillings prison fees, and all other disbursements and charges. The penalty for concealing a runaway servant was twenty shillings, and any one purchasing any goods from a servant without the consent of the master or mistress was fined treble the value of the goods, to the use of the owner, "and the servant, if a white, shall make satisfaction to his or her master or owner by servitude after the expiration of his or her time, to double the value of said goods, and if the servant be a black, he or she shall be severely whipped in the most public place in the township in which such offence was committed."

It may be seen from the above that common labor up to the time of the Revolution was virtually that of serfs, without discrimination of color or nativity. The supply of such labor came largely from Great Britain and Ireland, and to some extent from the other colonies and from Africa. Poor debtors also were sold into servitude, a law of 1705 providing that "debtors should make satisfaction by servitude not exceeding seven years, if a single person and under the age of fifty, and three years or five years if a married man, and under the age of forty-six years." What the family of the married debtor were to do for a living while he was in servitude, legislation failed to suggest. Probably, in many instances, they were glad to accompany the husband and father into serfdom. Warrants could not be served on Sunday, one day of the seven being reserved when the wretched debtor might rest in security, and the hunted criminal forget that he was outlawed.

While other colonies were founded as places of refuge for Christians oppressed on account of their religion, Georgia had its origin in the humane desire of General James Edward Oglethorpe to establish an asylum for poor debtors, with whom the prisons of England were over-crowded, the colony also to be a haven for the Protestants of Germany and other continental States. The proprietors of the Carolinas surrendered their charters to the crown in 1729, and King George II was, therefore, free to grant, June 9, 1732, a charter for a corporation for twenty-one years "in trust for the poor," to found a colony in the disputed territory south of the Savannah, to be called Georgia, in honor of the king. The trustees, appointed by the crown, possessed all the power both of making and executing laws. The people of Charleston, South Carolina, gave welcome to Oglethorpe and his immigrants, for South Carolina had been greatly harassed by the Spaniards to the south, and by the powerful tribes of Indians who occupied a large portion of the proposed colony. General Oglethorpe laid the foundation of the future State on the site of Savannah, and notwithstanding grievous restrictions on the ownership of land, the colony attracted many settlers from England, Scotland and Germany. The Spaniards invaded Georgia in 1742 with a fleet of thirty-five vessels from Cuba and a land force three thousand strong. Oglethorpe had but a small body of troops, chiefly Scotch Highlanders, but by courage and strategy he inflicted a sanguinary defeat on the Spaniards at the place called the "Bloody Marsh." Ten years later, in 1742, Georgia became a royal province, and secured the liberties enjoyed by other American provinces under the crown.

SECOND PERIOD.

The Struggle for Empire.

CHAPTER XIII.

Struggle for Empire in North America—The Vast Region Called Louisiana —War Between England and France—New England Militia Besiege Quebec —Frontenac Strikes the Iroquois—The Capture of Louisburg—The Forks of the Ohio—George Washington's Mission to the French—Braddock's Defeat—Washington Prevents Utter Disaster—Barbarous Treatment of Prisoners.

The closing years of the seventeenth century witnessed the beginning of the struggle between France and England for empire in North America. Marquette, Joliet and La Salle won for France by daring exploration a nominal title to the Mississippi Valley, and La Salle assumed possession of the great river and its country in the name of Louis XIV., after whom he called the region Louisiana. It was a vast dominion indeed that was thus claimed for the House of Bourbon without a settlement and with hardly an outpost to make any real show of sovereignty. Even had the expulsion of James II. from the English throne not hastened an outbreak between England and France, the conflict would have been inevitable. The war began in 1689, and with intervals of peace and sometimes in spite of peace the contest continued, until 1763, with varying fortunes, but ultimately resulting in the complete overthrow of the French. The Iroquois stood firmly by the English, while the French and their Indian allies repeated the scenes of King Philip's War on the frontiers, and often far in the interior of New York and New England. The people of the British colonies did not look only to Great Britain for defence. They defended themselves, and even carried war into the enemy's country. In 1690, two thousand Massachusetts militia, led by Sir William Phipps, sailed up the St. Lawrence and laid siege to Quebec, while another force, composed of New York and Connecticut troops, advanced from Albany upon Montreal. These expeditions were unsuccessful. In 1693, Count Frontenac, Governor of Canada, invaded the country of the Iroquois and inflicted crushing blows upon that once powerful confederacy, whose prowess had been felt before the arrival of the white man, as far as Tennessee in the South and Illinois in the West. Notwithstanding the able generalship of Frontenac the English made steady progress in the annexation of French territory. British and colonial troops conquered Nova Scotia, and the treaty of Utrecht in 1713 recognized England as the owner, not only of Nova Scotia, but also of Newfoundland and the Hudson Bay region. The French, however, strengthened their hold upon the interior of the continent, and established a series of fortified posts connecting the Mississippi Valley with the Great Lakes. Kaskaskia was founded in 1695, Cahokia in 1700, Detroit 1701 and Vincennes 1705. Bienville founded the city of New Orleans in 1718.

The capture of Louisburg, in 1746, was the most important military achievement of the English colonists in America, previous to the Revolution. The French built the fortress soon after the treaty of Utrecht, and spared no expense to make it formidable. The project to drive the French out of the place was entirely of colonial origin. Governor Shirley, of Massachusetts, proposed the expedition to the legislature of the colony, and the members of that body hesitated at first to enter upon an undertaking apparently so hazardous and almost hopeless. After discussion the necessary authority was granted by a majority of one. A circular-letter, asking for assistance, was then sent to all the colonies as far south as Pennsylvania. New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania contributed considerable sums of money, and Governor Clinton, of New York, sent also provisions and cannon. Roger Wolcott led five hundred men from Connecticut and Rhode Island and New Hampshire each sent three hundred men. The remainder of the force of 3250 men was enlisted in Massachusetts, that colony also providing ten armed vessels. William Peperell, of Maine, distinguished alike on the bench and in arms, commanded the expedition, and English vessels of war assisted in the assault. The French surrendered after a siege of forty-eight days, conducted with great vigor by the colonists. The gratification of the British government over the important victory is said to have been mingled with apprehension, due to the signal display of colonial power and energy. Upon peace being made in 1748, after four years' war, Louisburg, much to the indignation of the colonists, was given up to France in exchange for Madras, in India, and had to be reconquered in 1758.

The point of land where the Allegheny and Monongahela meet in turbulent eddies and form the Beautiful River, early engaged the attention of the two nations, rivals for the dominion of the northern continent, while between two of the leading British colonies grave difference existed as to ownership of the coveted territory. Pennsylvania, held in leading-strings by a Quaker policy which endeavored to reconcile the savage realities of an age of iron with theories of a golden millennium, failed to sustain her assertion of right with the energies that her population and resources might well have commanded, and Virginia, more ambitious and militant, boldly pushed an armed expedition into the very heart of the border wilderness, and began with the attack on Jumonville and his party the war that ended on the Plains of Abraham.

In 1750 the Ohio Company, formed for the purpose of colonizing the country on the river of that name, surveyed its banks as far as the site of Louisville. The French, resolved to defend their title to the region west of the mountains, crossed Lake Erie, and established posts at Presque Isle, at Le Boeuf, and at Venango on the Allegheny River. Governor Dinwiddie, of Virginia, sent a messenger to warn the French not to advance. He selected for this task a young man named George Washington, a land surveyor, who, notwithstanding his youth, had made a good impression as a person of capacity and courage, well-fitted for the arduous and delicate undertaking. Washington well performed his task although the French, as might have been expected, paid no heed to his warning. In the spring of 1754, a party of English began to build a fort where Pittsburg now stands. The French drove them off and erected Fort Duquesne. A regiment of Virginia troops was already marching toward the place. Upon the death of its leading officer, George Washington, the lieutenant-colonel, took command. Washington, overwhelmed by the superior numbers of the French, was compelled to surrender, and the French, for the time, were masters of the Ohio.

This reverse did not diminish the esteem in which Washington was held by the Virginians, and by those of the mother country who came in contact with him. When General Edward Braddock, in 1755, started on his ill-fated expedition for the capture of Duquesne with a force of about two thousand men, including the British regulars and the colonial militia, Washington accompanied the British general as one of his staff. Braddock was a gallant soldier, but imperious, and self-willed, and he looked almost with contempt upon the American troops. He made a forced march with twelve hundred men in order to surprise the French at Duquesne before they could receive reinforcements. Colonel Dunbar followed with the remainder of the army and the wagon-train. It was a delightful July morning when the British soldiers and colonists crossed a ford of the Monongahela, and advanced in solid platoons along the southern bank of the stream in the direction of the fort. Washington advised a disposition of the troops more in accordance with forest warfare, but Braddock haughtily rejected the advice of the "provincial colonel," as he called Washington. The army moved on, recrossed the river to the north side, and continued the march to Duquesne. The news of the British advance had been carried to the fort by Indian scouts. The French at first thought of abandoning the post, but they decided to attack the British with the aid of Indian allies. De Beaujeu led the French and Indians. The British were proceeding in fancied security when the forest rang with Indian yells, and a volley of bullets and flying arrows dealt death in their ranks. The regular troops were thrown into confusion, and Braddock tried courageously to rally them. Washington showed the admirable qualities which afterward made him victor in the Revolution. Cool and fearless amid the frantic shouts of the foe and the panic of the British soldiery, he gave Braddock invaluable assistance in endeavoring to retrieve the fortunes of the day. The provincials fought frontier fashion, nearly all losing their lives, but not without picking off many of their enemies. Beaujeu, the French commander, was killed in the opening of the engagement. Of eighty-six English officers sixty-three were killed or wounded; and about one-half the private soldiers fell, while a number were made prisoners. For two hours the battle raged, until Braddock, having had five horses shot under him, went down himself, mortally wounded. Then the regulars that remained took to flight, and Washington, left in command; ordered a retreat, carrying with him his dying general. Braddock died three days after the battle, expressing regret that he had not followed the counsel of Washington. The British prisoners were taken to Duquesne, and that evening the Indians lighted fires on the banks of the Allegheny River, near the fort, and tortured the captives to death. An English boy who was a prisoner at Duquesne, having been previously captured, and who afterward related his experience in a narrative, a copy of which the writer has examined, says that the cries of the victims could be heard in the fort. The boy himself was subjected to closer confinement than usual, apparently for fear that the savages might demand that he be given up to them.

CHAPTER XIV.

Expulsion of the Acadians—A Cruel Deportation—The Marquis De Montcalm —The Fort William Henry Massacre—Defeat of Abercrombie—William Pitt Prosecutes the War Vigorously—Fort Duquesne Reduced—Louisburg Again Captured—Wolfe Attacks Quebec—Battle of the Plains of Abraham —Wolfe and Montcalm Mortally Wounded—Quebec Surrenders—New France a Dream of the Past—Pontiac's War.

American history contains no sadder story than the expulsion of the Acadians, or French settlers of Nova Scotia. The act may have been justifiable on the ground of military necessity; the Acadians were not loyal subjects, and they would have eagerly welcomed the expulsion of the British from North America. Indeed their conduct might have been construed as treasonable, and the English had ground for regarding them as enemies of the British crown. Their dispersion weakened the French cause at a time when that cause seemed in the ascendant, and when Braddock's unavenged defeat had reanimated the French with the hope of driving the English from America. Yet even if the deportation of the Acadians was required by the supreme law of self-preservation, and justifiable on the ground of their more than merely passive disloyalty, the manner of that deportation could not be justified. The separation of families, many of them never reunited, was a crime against humanity; the conversion of an honest, industrious and thrifty peasantry into a host of penniless vagrants, scattered like Ishmaelites through hostile colonies, was a wrong as cruel as it was unnecessary. Colonized in South Carolina or Georgia, the Acadians could hardly have been a menace to the power of Great Britain, while the Huguenot element in those regions, understanding the Acadian tongue, would have kept watch and ward against possible disloyalty. It is a pathetic feature of this most painful episode that the Huguenots, themselves driven out of France by the merciless tyranny of a Roman Catholic king, gave kindly relief to such Roman Catholic exiles from Acadia as were cast among them. They proved their true Christian spirit by returning good for evil. About six thousand of the Acadians were deported from their native land, and scattered the length and breadth of the English colonies. Many made their way to Louisiana, then a French possession, and their descendants still form a distinct class in that State. Some even sought refuge among the Indians, and found the barbarian kinder than their civilized persecutors. Longfellow's poem, "Evangeline," is based on the touching story of Acadia. The French cause was greatly strengthened by the arrival in 1756 of the Marquis de Montcalm, a distinguished soldier, to take command of the French forces in Canada. Montcalm displayed not only courage and skill, but humanity likewise, in the management of his campaigns, and history relieves him of responsibility for the horrid massacre by Indians of the captured English garrison of Fort William Henry, after a safe escort to Fort Edward had been promised to the captives. The facts are that both British and French used the Indians as allies regardless of their savage practices, but that the French, as at Fort Duquesne, showed less ability to restrain the savages after a victory. In the following summer—1758—Montcalm inflicted a most disastrous defeat at Ticonderoga on fifteen thousand British and colonial troops, led by General Abercrombie. The French force numbered only four thousand French and Indians. The English attempted to carry the works by assault, without the aid of artillery, and were mowed down by the fire of the French posted behind insuperable barriers. The English loss was about two thousand, while that of the French was inconsiderable. This was the last important success of the French in America. A master hand had seized the helm in Great Britain.

William Pitt, the "Great Commoner," determined upon a vigorous prosecution of the war in America. General John Forbes was sent, in 1758, with about nine thousand men to reduce Fort Duquesne. The illness which caused his death in the following year may be fairly accepted in excuse and explanation of the incompetent management of the expedition, and its almost fatal delays. Fortunately the French appeared to have lost the vigor and daring which they had displayed in the defeat of Braddock, and the sullen roar of an explosion, when the British troops were within a few miles of Duquesne, gave notice that it had been abandoned without a blow. General Forbes changed the name of the place to Fort Pitt, in honor of that illustrious minister to whose energetic direction of affairs was largely due the expulsion of the French arms from North America. When Westminster Abbey shall have crumbled over the tombs of Britain's heroes, and the House of Hanover shall have joined the misty dynasties of the past, Pittsburg will remain a monument, growing in grandeur with the progress of ages, to England's great statesman of the eighteenth century.

Louisburg also fell in 1758, and in the following year the English prepared to end the struggle by an attack on Quebec. Pitt placed at the head of the expedition a young general, James Wolfe, who had distinguished himself at the capture of Louisburg. Wolfe had about eight thousand troops under a convoy of twenty-two line-of-battleships, and as many frigates and smaller armed vessels. Montcalm defended the city with about seven thousand Frenchmen and Indians. The heights on which the upper town of Quebec was situated, rising almost perpendicularly at one point of three hundred feet above the river, and extending back in a lofty plateau called the Plains of Abraham, seemed to defy successful attack. Wolfe spent the summer in fruitless efforts to reduce Quebec. At length he learned that the precipice fronting on the river and supposed to be impassable, could be scaled at a point a short distance above the town, where a narrow ravine gave access to the plateau. On the evening of September 12, the British vessels, loaded with troops, floated with the inflowing tide some distance up the river. Then past midnight, while the sky was black with clouds, the ships silently and undetected by the French floated down to the designated landing-place. The troops were taken on shore in flat-bottomed boats, with muffled oars. At dawn Lieutenant-Colonel William Howe led the advance up the ravine, drove back the guard at the summit, and protected the ascent of the army. The garrison and people of Quebec awoke to see the redcoats in battle array on the Plains of Abraham. Montcalm soon confronted the British. Both of the heroic commanders knew and felt all that was at stake on the fate of the day, and they both fought with a courage that gave a splendid example to their men. Wolfe, twice wounded, continued to give orders until mortally wounded he fell. Montcalm fell nearly at the same time, mortally wounded, and his troops, already wavering before the irresistible onset of the British, broke and fled. When told that death was near, "So much the better," said Montcalm, "I will not live to see the surrender of Quebec." "Now, God be praised, I will die in peace," said the English commander, on hearing that victory was assured. Quebec was surrendered a few days later. Forts Niagara and Ticonderoga had already fallen.

Spain, having taken side with France, lost Cuba and the Philippine Islands to the English, but in the treaty of Paris of 1763, England gave those islands to Spain and received Florida in exchange. France ceded to Spain, in order to compensate that power for the loss of Florida, the city of New Orleans, and all the vast and indefinite territory known as Louisiana, stretching from the Gulf of Mexico to the unexplored regions of the northwest. New France was a dream of the past.

The French policy in America had one essential and fatal feature. The French came more as a garrison than as colonists. They came to govern, rather than possess the land, to rule, but not to supplant the natives of the soil. This policy insured some immediate strength, because the Indians were naturally less jealous of Europeans who did not threaten their hunting-grounds. On the other hand the ultimate failure of such a course was inevitable, in dealing as rivals and antagonists with a people who had come to possess the land, to drive out the Indian, to make the New World their home and a heritage for their descendants. The English settlers might be driven back for a time; their cabins might be turned into ashes, and the tomahawk and scalping-knife leave dire evidence of savage vengeance and Gallic inhumanity. But the rally was as certain as the raid was sudden. A garrison might be massacred; a colony could not be exterminated, and the defeats of Braddock and Abercrombie only burned into English breasts the resolution to tear down forever on the American continent the flag which floated over the evidence of England's dishonor.

The Algonquin Indians, who had regarded the French as allies and protectors, were now left to defend themselves against the English. Pontiac, chief of the Ottawas, conceived the idea of inducing all the tribes to unite in a general attack upon the English settlements as a last desperate resort to stay the advance of the whites. Pontiac is supposed to have led the Ottawas who assisted the French in defeating Braddock, and he perhaps underrated the power and prowess of his British antagonists. He was an able chieftain, of the same type as King Philip, Tecumseh and Sitting Bull. He saw that the white man and the red man could not possess the land together, and he determined to make a stand in behalf of his race. The struggle lasted for about two years, attended by the usual barbarities of savage warfare, and ended in the death of Pontiac, who, after suing for peace, was murdered by a drunken Indian, bribed by an English trader with a barrel of rum to commit the deed. Instead of preventing, Pontiac's War only hastened the flight of the Indian and the march of the colonists toward the setting sun.

THIRD PERIOD.

The Revolution.

CHAPTER XV.

Causes of the Revolution—The Act of Navigation—Acts of Trade—Odious Customs Laws—English Jealousy of New England—Effect of Restrictions on Colonial Trade—Du Chatelet Foresees Rebellion and Independence—The Revolution a Struggle for More Than Political Freedom.

It was not for the sake of the colonists that England had assisted them in driving the French from America, but with the wholly selfish aim of building up the trade and commerce of Great Britain. European nations looked upon their American colonies simply as resources from which the mother country might become enriched, and in this respect the policy of England was not different from that of Spain, described in the beginning of this volume. As early as 1625 an English author (Hagthorne) wrote that even in time of peace it was the purpose and aim of England to undermine and beat the Dutch and Spaniards out of their trades, "which may not improperly be called a war, for the deprivation and cutting off the trades of a kingdom may be to some prince more loss if his revenues depend thereon than the killing of his armies." The wars against Holland, which resulted in the subjection to the British crown of the colonial possessions of that industrious people, and which compelled the fleets of the United Provinces to acknowledge British supremacy on the high seas, were in the line of commercial aggrandizement, and the Navigation Act transferred to England a large share of the Dutch carrying trade, and enriched English shipowners with an utterly selfish indifference to the welfare of English colonies.

When the colonists, their western bounds no longer threatened by civilized foes, their plantations flourishing and their seaport towns wealthy with the profits of a commerce carried on in contempt of imperial restrictions, began to feel and to assert that they were entitled to all the rights of freeborn Englishmen, and to the same commercial and industrial independence enjoyed by loyal subjects in England, they were surprised to learn that Parliament and the English people regarded them not as freemen, but as tributaries. The colonists were themselves loyal, even up to the hour when they were compelled by stubborn tyranny to assert the right of revolution, for, to quote the language of John Adams, "it is true there always existed in the colonies a desire of independence of Parliament in the articles of internal taxation and internal policy, and a very general, if not universal opinion, that they were constitutionally entitled to it, and as general a determination to maintain and defend it. But there never existed a desire of independence of the Crown, or of general regulations of commerce for the equal and impartial benefit of all parts of the empire." "If any man," said the same great statesman, "wishes to investigate thoroughly the causes, feelings and principles of the Revolution, he must study this Act of Navigation, and the Acts of Trade, as a philosopher, a politician and a philanthropist."

When the Act of Navigation was originally passed, in the Cromwell period, it is probable that the colonies were not seriously in the minds of the people and of Parliament. The act was aimed, as we have before stated, at the Dutch, and was effective for the purposes intended; but within the decade that elapsed before its re-enactment under the Restoration, the colonial trade had grown with a vigor that aroused jealousy and uneasiness at home, and the Act of Navigation was soon followed, in 1663, by the first of the Acts of Trade, which provided that no supplies should be imported into any colony, except what had been actually shipped in an English port, and carried directly thence to the importing colony. This cut the colonies off from direct trade with any foreign country, and made England the depot for all necessaries or luxuries which the colonies desired, and which they could not obtain in America. Nine years later, in 1672, followed another act "for the better securing the plantation trade," which recited that the colonists had, contrary to the express letter of the aforesaid laws, brought into diverse parts of Europe great quantities of their growth, productions and manufactures, sugar, tobacco, cotton, wool and dye woods being particularly enumerated in the list, and that the trade and navigation in those commodities from one plantation to another had been greatly increased, and provided that all colonial commodities should either be shipped to England or Wales before being imported into another colony, or that a customs duty should be paid on such commodities equivalent to the cost of conveying the same to England, and thence to the colony for which they were destined. For instance, if a merchant in Rhode Island desired to sell some product of the colony of Massachusetts in New York, and to forward the same by a vessel, either a bond had to be given that the commodity would be transported to England, or a duty had to be paid, in money or in goods sufficiently onerous to protect the English merchant and shipowner against serious colonial competition in the carrying trade.

The above act was followed up by another providing penalties for attempted violation of the customs laws. In this statute no mention was made of the plantations and its general tenor indicated that it was intended to apply to Great Britain only, providing, as it did, for the searching of houses and dwellings for smuggled goods by virtue of a writ of assistance under the seal of His Majesty's court of exchequer. Under William the Third, who was as arbitrary a monarch toward the colonies as the second James had been, the statute was made directly applicable to the plantation trade, with the provision that "the like assistance shall be given to the said officers in the execution of their office, as by the last-mentioned act is provided for the officers in England." It was on the question of whether such a writ could be issued from a colonial court that James Otis made the famous speech in which he arraigned the commercial policy of England, stripped the veil of reform from the bust of the Stadtholder-King, and awakened the colonists to a throbbing sense of English oppression and of American wrongs—the oration which, in the language of John Adams, who heard it, "breathed into this nation the breath of life."

It is needless to follow the numerous Acts of Trade in their order, for they were all in a line with the accepted and established principle of that age in England that the colonies should minister to the commercial aggrandizement of the mother country, instead of being the centres of an independent traffic, that they should be communities for the consumption of British manufactures and the feeding of British trade. New England was especially the object of English jealousy and restriction, and for reasons, as given by Sir Josiah Child, in his "New Discourse on Trade," written about the year 1677, that are creditable to the founders of those States, for after speaking of the people of Virginia and the Barbadoes as a loose vagrant sort, "vicious and destitute of means to live at home, gathered up about the streets of London or other places, and who, had there been no English foreign plantation in the world, must have come to be hanged or starved or died untimely of those miserable diseases that proceed from want and vice, or have sold themselves as soldiers to be knocked on the head, or at best, by begging or stealing two shillings and sixpence, have made their way to Holland to become servants to the Dutch, who refuse none," he goes on to describe "a people whose frugality, industry and temperance and the happiness of whose laws and institutions, do promise to themselves long life, with a wonderful increase of people, riches and power." But, after paying this probably reluctant tribute to New England virtue and industry, he frankly avows his full sympathy with the restrictive system, and adds that "there is nothing more prejudicial and in prospect more dangerous to any mother kingdom than the increase of shipping in her colonies, plantations and provinces." It is no wonder that John Adams said that he never read these authors without being set on fire, and that at last the same fire spread to every patriotic breast.

The Acts of Navigation and of Trade were not the dead letters that some superficial writers and readers have seen fit to term them. It is true that obedience was reluctant and slow, and that evasion was extensive, and it is also true, that colonial commerce flourished in spite of the restrictions; but it should be remembered that the prolonged wars in which England was engaged gave lucrative opportunities for privateering, and that even the customs duties, though intended to be virtually prohibitory, were not heavy enough to overcome the advantages which the colonists enjoyed. In Rhode Island the General Assembly asserted and maintained the right to regulate the fees of the customs officers, and, as far as was possible, the collection of the dues. The shipping of the colony rapidly increased, and in 1731 included two vessels from England, as many from Holland and the Mediterranean, and ten or twelve from the West Indies, and ten years later numbered one hundred and twenty vessels engaged in the West Indian, African, European and coasting trade. The period preceding the Revolution witnessed New England's greatest commercial prosperity, and it was in that age that Moses Brown and other enterprising merchants and shipowners laid the foundation of fortunes, a liberal share of which has been expended with illustrious munificence in monuments of learning, of art and of charity. As for the restrictions upon domestic industry, they were not severely felt among a people devoted, in the country to agriculture, and in the towns to local traffic and shipping, and the American farmer who wore homespun attire, did not realize the harshness or appreciate the purpose of the statute which prohibited the export of wool, or woolen manufactures. As for the Southern planter, the question of fostering domestic manufactures never entered his thoughts. He raised his tobacco and his cotton, exported them to England, and got what goods he needed there just as his descendants, in a later age, procured the manufactured necessities and luxuries of life from the depots of New England trade.[1]

But even if the British Parliament had never attempted to raise a revenue by taxation in the American colonies, it is probable that in time the restrictions on commerce would have led to revolution, unless rescinded. This was the opinion of the shrewd observer Du Chatelet, who, after France had surrendered her American possessions to Great Britain, said that "they (the chambers of commerce) regard everything in colonial commerce which does not turn exclusively to the benefit of the kingdom as contrary to the end for which colonies were established, and as a theft from the state. To practice on these maxims is impossible. The wants of trade are stronger than the laws of trade. The north of America can alone furnish supplies to its south. This is the only point of view under which the cession of Canada can be regarded as a loss for France; but that cession will one day be amply compensated, if it shall cause in the English colonies the rebellion and the independence which become every day more probable and more near."

America, if not contented, was quiet under restrictive laws not stringently enforced, and but for the measures initiated by Grenville and Townshend, and approved by the king, the Parliament and the people of England, there would, if the leading American minds of that day were sincere, have been no insurrection in that era against British authority. George the Third is called a tyrant on every recurring Fourth of July, but the nation he ruled was as tyrannical as he, and impartial history cannot condemn the monarch without awarding a greater share of odium to his people, who sustained by their pronounced opinion and through their chosen representatives, every measure for the destruction of the liberties of these colonies, and who began to listen to the dictates of reason and of humanity only when America had become the prison of thousands of England's soldiers, and thousands of others, hired Hessian and kidnapped Briton alike, had been welcomed by American freemen to graves in American soil. The measures which led to war, and the war itself, were inspired and incited by the trading classes, as well as the aristocracy of England, who expected, in the destruction of a powerful commercial and menacing industrial rival, an ample return for the blood and treasure expended in the strife. The American people recognized that the struggle was for commercial and industrial as well as for political independence, and the stand in behalf of American industry was taken long before the scattered colonies met an empire in the field of arms.

CHAPTER XVI.

Writs of Assistance Issued—Excitement in Boston—The Stamp Act—Protests Against Taxation Without Representation—Massachusetts Appoints a Committee of Correspondence—Samuel Adams and Patrick Henry—Henry's Celebrated Resolutions—His Warning to King George—Growing Agitation in the Colonies—The Stamp Act Repealed—Parliament Levies Duties on Tea and Other Imports to America—Lord North's Choice of Infamy—Measures Of Resistance in America—The Massachusetts Circular Letter—British Troops in Boston—The Boston Massacre—Burning of the "Gaspee"—North Carolina "Regulators"—The Boston Tea Party—The Boston Port Bill—The First Continental Congress—A Declaration of Rights—"Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death!"

Even before peace had been made with France the king's officers in America began to enforce the revenue laws with a rigor to which the colonists had been unaccustomed. Charles Paxton, commissioner of customs in Boston, applied to the Superior Court for authority to use writs of assistance in searching for smuggled goods. These writs were warrants for the officers to search when and where they pleased and to call upon others to assist them, instead of procuring a special search-warrant for some designated place. Thomas Hutchinson, chief justice, and afterward royalist governor and refugee, favored the application, which was earnestly opposed by the merchants and the people generally.[1] "To my dying day," exclaimed James Otis, in pleading against the measure, "I will oppose with all the power and faculties God has given me, all such instruments of slavery on one hand and of villainy on the other." Parliament had authorized the issue of the writs, however, and the custom house officers therefore had the law on their side. Writs were granted, but their enforcement was attended with so many difficulties that the customs authorities virtually gave up this attempt to encroach upon the rights of the people. The next step in provoking the colonists to revolution was the Stamp Act. The object of this enactment was to raise money for the support of British troops and the payment of salaries to certain public officers in the colonies who had depended upon the colonial treasuries for their compensation. In this there was a threefold invasion of colonial rights. Taxation without representation was contrary to a principle recognized for centuries in England, vindicated in the revolution which cost Charles I his head, and upheld in America from the very beginning of the settlements here. Again, while British troops had been welcome as allies in battling against the French and the Indians, they were not desired as garrisons to overawe the free people of the colonies, and finally the colonial officers whom it was proposed to pay from the royal treasury would become the masters instead of servants of the people—or they would be servants only of the king. The purpose of the Stamp Act obviously was to make America the vassal of Great Britain. The act required that legal documents and commercial instruments should be written, and that newspapers should be printed on stamped paper.

The people everywhere protested against the tyrannical action of Parliament. Samuel Adams drew up the instructions to the newly elected representatives of Boston to use all efforts against the plan of parliamentary taxation. It was resolved "that the imposition of duties and taxes by the Parliament of Great Britain upon a people not represented in the House of Commons is irreconcilable with their rights." A committee of correspondence was appointed in Massachusetts to communicate with other colonial assemblies, and the idea of union for the common defence began to take firm hold on the public mind. Benjamin Franklin, in the Congress held at Albany in 1754 to insure the aid of the Six Nations in the war then breaking out with France, had proposed a plan of union for the colonies, with a grand council having extensive powers and a president to be appointed by the crown. The plan was not adopted. Adams had written about the same time that "the only way to keep us from setting up for ourselves is to disunite us." Everybody now began to perceive the need of union, which the great intellects of Franklin and Adams had discerned long before.

No influence was so powerful in leading the South to stand side by side with the Northern colonies as that of Patrick Henry, the great orator of Virginia. In the House of Burgesses, in 1765, Mr. Henry introduced his celebrated resolutions against the Stamp Act, as follows:

"Resolved, That the first adventurers and settlers of this his majesty's colony and dominion, brought with them, and transmitted to their posterity, and all other his majesty's subjects, since inhabiting in this, his majesty's said colony, all the privileges, franchises and immunities, that have at any time been held, enjoyed and possessed by the people of Great Britain.

"Resolved, That by two royal charters, granted by King James the First, the colonists, aforesaid, are declared entitled to all the privileges, liberties and immunities of denizens and natural born subjects, to all intents and purposes, as if they had been abiding and born within the realm of England.

"Resolved, That the taxation of the people by themselves, or by persons chosen by themselves to represent them, who can only know what taxes the people are able to bear, and the easiest mode of raising them, and are equally affected by such taxes themselves, is the distinguishing characteristic of British freedom, and without which the ancient constitution cannot subsist.

"Resolved, That his majesty's liege people of this most ancient colony have uninterruptedly enjoyed the right of being thus governed by their own assembly in the article of their taxes and internal police, and that the same hath never been forfeited, or any other way given up, but hath been constantly recognized by the king and people of Great Britain.

"Resolved, therefore, That the General Assembly of this colony have the sole right and power to lay taxes and impositions upon the inhabitants of this colony; and that every attempt to vest such power in any person or persons whatsoever, other than the General Assembly aforesaid, has a manifest tendency to destroy British as well as American freedom."

On the back of the paper containing those resolutions, and found among Henry's papers after his death, was the following endorsement in the handwriting of Mr. Henry himself: "The within resolutions passed the House of Burgesses in May, 1765. They formed the first opposition to the Stamp Act, and the scheme of taxing America by the British Parliament. All the colonies, either through fear or want of opportunity to form an opposition, or from influence of some kind or other, had remained silent. I had been for the first time elected a burgess, a few days before; was young, inexperienced, unacquainted with the forms of the House, and the members that composed it. Finding the men of weight averse to opposition, and the commencement of the tax at hand, and that no person was likely to step forth, I determined to venture, and alone, unadvised and unassisted, on a blank leaf of an old law book wrote the within. Upon offering them to the House, violent debates ensued. Many threats were uttered, and much abuse cast upon me by the party for submission. After a long and warm contest, the resolutions passed by a very small majority, perhaps of one or two only. The alarm spread throughout America with astonishing quickness, and the ministerial party were overwhelmed. The great point of resistance to British taxation was universally established in the colonies. This brought on the war, which finally separated the two countries, and gave independence to ours. Whether this will prove a blessing or a curse will depend upon the use our people make of the blessings which a gracious God hath bestowed on us. If they are wise, they will be great and happy. If they are of a contrary character, they will be miserable—Righteousness alone can exalt them as a nation.

"Reader, whoever thou art, remember this; and in thy sphere practice virtue thyself, and encourage it in others.—P. Henry."

Every American realized the truth expressed in Mr. Henry's resolutions; but no man beside himself dared to utter it. All wished for independence; and all hitherto trembled at the thought of asserting it. Randolph, Bland, Pendleton and Wythe, with "all the old members whose influence in the House had, till then, been unbroken," opposed the resolutions, and had not Henry's unrivalled eloquence supported them, they would have been strangled in their birth. "The last and strongest resolution was carried by a single vote;" and Peyton Randolph said, immediately after, "I would have given 500 guineas for a single vote!" From this we may easily imagine how spirited was the opposition, and how energetic the eloquence exerted against Henry. It was in the midst of this magnificent debate, while he was descanting on the tyranny of the obnoxious act, that he exclaimed in a voice of thunder, and with the look of a god, "Caesar had his Brutus—Charles the First his Cromwell—and George the Third—('Treason,' cried the Speaker—'treason, treason,' echoed from every part of the House—it was one of those trying moments which is decisive of character—Henry faltered not for an instant; but rising to a loftier attitude, and fixing on the Speaker an eye of the most determined fire, he finished his sentence with the firmest emphasis) may profit by their example. If this be treason, make the most of it."[2]

On the following day, when Henry was absent, the more timid asserted themselves and the most important of the resolutions was reconsidered and expunged.

A congress held at New York declared against, the Stamp Act, and sent a protest to Parliament. Americans would not buy or use the stamps, and those who undertook agencies for their sale were treated as public enemies. Boxes of stamped paper were burned on arrival in port; the newspapers ignored the act, and legal documents were, by general consent, treated as valid without the stamp. In the following year Parliament, after a prolonged debate, in which William Pitt earnestly supported the American cause, repealed the act. The news of the repeal was received with great rejoicing in America, and the colonists hoped that there would be no more attempts to invade their rights as English subjects.

King George III., however, was bent upon reducing the colonists to abject submission to his will, and the fact that William Pitt, whom the king detested, had championed the Americans, made the monarch all the more obstinate in his purpose to humiliate them. In 1767 Charles Townshend, chancellor of the exchequer, carried through Parliament a bill putting a duty upon tea, glass, paper and other articles entering American ports. In connection with this measure the scheme of the British crown to reduce the colonies to a vassal condition was fully disclosed. Not only were troops to be supported out of the revenue thus raised, but the salaries of governors, judges and crown attorneys were to be paid from it, and any surplus remaining could be used by the king to pension Americans who had gained the royal grace by their subserviency. Townshend suddenly died after these measures had been adopted, and was succeeded by Lord North, who soon afterward became prime minister. North was not personally in favor of dealing harshly with the colonies, but he yielded to the royal will as the price of remaining in office, and shares in history the infamy of his master's course.

The Americans began to concert measures of resistance. They refused to use the dutiable articles, and made it unprofitable to import them. The Massachusetts legislature was dissolved by order of the king, because it had sent a circular-letter to other colonies inviting common action against the aggressions of Parliament. Other colonial assemblies were dissolved by the king's governors because they answered the letter favorably. The people's representatives continued to attend to the people's interests in informal conventions, and had the more time to give to the overshadowing issue of colonial rights, because royal displeasure had relieved them from the ordinary business of law making. Boston and Richmond worked in harmony in the one great cause, and North and South forgot social and religious differences in common effort for the common weal.

King George regarded Massachusetts as the hotbed and centre of colonial discontent, and in the autumn of 1768 he sent two regiments of British regulars to that city to assist in enforcing the Townshend acts. The troops and the citizens had frequent disputes, for the colonists were unused to military arrogance, and refused to be ordered about by martinets in uniform. The Boston Massacre, so-called, in March, 1770, when seven soldiers fired into a crowd of townspeople, killing five and wounding several others, helped to inflame the antagonism between the provincials and the military, and Governor Hutchinson, at the demand of Samuel Adams, speaking in behalf of three thousand resolute citizens, removed the troops to an island in the harbor. In April, 1770, Parliament again yielded to the Americans in so far as to take off all the Townshend duties except the duty on tea, which the king insisted upon retaining as a vindication of England's right to impose the duty.

The colonists continued as determined as ever not to submit to British taxation, or to the domineering course of the king's officers, which in some of the provinces had led to harsh and even bloody strife between the people and their oppressors. An armed schooner in the British revenue service called the Gaspee, gave offence to American navigators on Narragansett Bay by requiring that their flag should be lowered in token of respect whenever they passed the king's vessel. The Gaspee ran aground while chasing a Providence sloop. Word of the mishap was carried up to Providence and, on the same night (June 9, 1772) sixty-four armed men went down in boats, attacked and captured the Gaspee, and burned the vessel. Abraham Whipple, afterward a commodore in the Continental Navy, and one of the founders of the State of Ohio, led the expedition. The royal authorities were greatly exasperated on hearing of the daring achievement, and Joseph Wanton, Governor of Rhode Island, afterward deposed from office for his loyalty to King George, issued a proclamation ordering diligent search for the perpetrators of the act. The British government offered a reward of $5000 for the leader, but although the people of Providence well knew who had taken part in the exploit, neither Whipple nor his associates were betrayed. In North Carolina insurgents calling themselves "Regulators" fought a sanguinary battle with Governor Tryon's troops, and were defeated, and six of them hanged for treason. In South Carolina the people also divided on the issue between England and the colonists, but for the time stopped short of violence.

The famous "Boston Tea Party" occurred in December, 1773. This was not a riotous, or, from the colonial standpoint, a lawless act, for the colonists were already administering their own affairs to a certain extent independently of royal authority, with the view to the preservation and defence of their liberties. The English East India Company had been anxious to regain the American trade and offered to pay an export duty more than equivalent to the import duty imposed in America, if the government would permit tea to be delivered at colonial ports free of duty. To this the British government would not consent, on the ground that it would be a surrender of the principle which the import duty represented. The government permitted the East India Company, however, to export tea to America free from export duty, thus allowing the Americans to buy tea as cheaply as if no import duty had been levied. The British authorities assumed that Americans would be satisfied to sell the principle for which they were contending for threepence on a pound of tea. They learned the American character better when two ships laden with tea arrived in Boston. The citizens gathered in the old South Meeting-house, and in the evening about sixty men, disguised as Indians, boarded the ships and cast the tea into the harbor. Upon news of this event reaching England, King George and his ministers decided to make an example of Boston. A bill was introduced by Lord North and passed almost unanimously closing the port of Boston and making Salem the seat of government. Another act annulled the charter of Massachusetts, and a military governor, General Thomas Gage, was appointed, with absolute authority over the province.

With the enactment of the Boston Port Bill, King George and his Parliament crossed the Rubicon. America was aflame. The other colonies joined in expressing their sympathy with Massachusetts, and their resolve to stand by her people and share their fate. A Continental Congress convened in Carpenter's Hall, Philadelphia, on the fourth of September, 1774. The most eminent men in the colonies were now brought together for the first time to decide upon action which would affect the liberties of three millions of people. Patrick Henry was the first to speak, and he delivered an address worthy of his fame and worthy of the occasion. Colonel, afterward General Washington, then made the impression which earned for him the command of the American armies. The Congress drew up a Declaration of Rights, and sent it to the king. The people of Massachusetts formed a Provincial Congress with John Hancock for President, and began organizing provincial troops, and collecting military stores. Virginia continued to keep pace with Massachusetts. At a convention of delegates from the several counties and corporations of Virginia, held in Richmond, March, 1775, Patrick Henry stood resolutely forth for armed resistance. "Three millions of people," he said, "armed in the holy cause of liberty, and in such a country as that which we possess, are invincible by any force which our enemy can send against us. Besides, sir, we shall not fight our battles alone. There is a just God who presides over the destinies of nations; and who will raise up friends to fight our battles for us. The battle, sir, is not to the strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave. Besides, sir, we have no election. If we were base enough to desire it, it is now too late to retire from the contest. There is no retreat, but in submission and slavery! Our chains are forged. Their clanking may be heard on the plains of Boston! The war is inevitable—and let it come!! I repeat it, sir, let it come!!!