number of brave and able officers-an incredible quantity of treasure-and an increase of the national debt from eighty to one hundred and thirty millions sterling.

Though many of the conquered places were restored, yet North America remained to the British crown, and the colonies received a reimbursement of their expenses.

.

By the above pacification the British colonies were preserved, secured and extended so far, as to render it difficult to ascertain the precise boundaries of the empire of Great Britain in North America. To the northward, they might have extended limits to the pole itself, nor did any nation incline to dispute the property of this northernmost country with them. From that extremity they had a territory extending, southward to Cape Florida, in the Gulph of Mexico, N. lat. 25°. and consequently near 4000 miles in a direct line. The state of the British colonies at the conclusion of the war in 1763, was such as attracted the attention of all the politicians in Europe. Their flourishing condition at that period, was remarkable and striking: their trade had prospered in the midst of all the difficulties and distresses of a war, in which they were so nearly and so immediately concerned. Their population continued on the increase, notwithstanding the ravages and depredations that had been so fiercely carried on by the French, and the native Indians in their alliance. They abounded with spirited and active individuals of all denominations. They were flushed with the uncommon prosperity that had attended them in their commercial affairs and military transactions. Hence they were ready for all kind of undertakings, and saw no limits to their hopes and expectations.

As they entertained the highest opinion of their value and importance, and of the immense benefit that Britain derived from its connexion with them, their notious were adequately high in their own favor. They deemed themselves, not without reason, entitled to every kindness and indulgence which the mother country could bestow.

Although their pretensions did not amount to a perfect equality of advantages and privileges in matters of commerce, yet in those of government they thought themselves fully competent to the task of conducting their domestic concerns, with little or no interference from abroad. Though willing to admit the supremacy of Great Britain, they viewed it with a suspicious eye, and with a marked desire to restrain it within its strict constitutional boundaries.

A circumstance much to their praise is, that notwithstanding their peculiar addiction to those occupations of which lucre is the sole object, they were duly attentive to cultivate the field of learning; and they have, ever since their first foundation, been particularly careful to provide for the education of the rising progeny.

Their vast augmentation of internal trade, and external commerce, was not merely owing to their position and facility of communication with other parts; it arose also from their uatural turn and temper, full of schemes and projects: ever aiming at new discoveries, and continually employed in the search of means of improving their condition.

Their condition carried them into every quarter from whence profit could be derived. There was scarcely any port of the American hemisphere to which they had not extended their navigation. They were continually exploring new sources of trade, and were found in every spot where business could be transacted.

To this extensive and incessant application to commerce, they added an equal vigilance in the administration of their affairs at home. Whatever could conduce to the amelioration of the soil they possessed, to the progress of agriculture, or to the improvement of their domestic circumstances, was attended to with so much labor and care, that it may be strictly said, that Nature had given them nothing of which they did not make the most.

In the midst of this solicitude and toil in matters of business, the affairs of government were conducted with a steadiness, prudence, and lenity, seldom experi enced, and never exceeded, in the best regulated countries of Europe.

Such was the situation of the British colonies in general throughout North America, and of the New England provinces in particular, when the pacification above mentioned opened one of the most remarkable scenes that ever commanded the attention of the world.

CHAP. III.

Causes of the Disturbances-Proceedings in the ColoniesCommittee of Correspondence chosen in Boston-Congress meet at New York-Their Address to the King, &c.The Stamp Act Repealed-Proceedings in the Colonies, previous to the Commencement of Hostilities.

A SUCCINCT and impartial narrative of the rise, progress, and establishment of the AMERICAN REPUBLIC Will be attempted in the following Chap

ters.

Some writers, in treating of this grand era in the history of mankind, have ascribed the origin of the disputes with Great Britain to the intrigues of France; without looking at the true cause, viz. the desire of power on the one hand, and the abhorrence of oppression on the other. There can be no doubt that the powers of Europe looked with a jealous eye upon Great Britain, after the acquisition of such immense power and territories. This they thought threatened to destroy that balance of power which the sovereigns of Europe have for a long time endeavoured to preserve. They were, therefore, in general, disposed to favour any con vulsion which promised to diminish her overgrown greatness. It could be no wonder that France and Spain, especially, should have embraced the first opportunity, that offered, to humble a nation, which, with the assistance of her colonies, had laid their pride in the dust.

It has been said that these powers employed emissa ries, immediately after the peace, to sow the seeds of disunion between Great Britain and her colonies; but this is a fact barely probable, and remains unsupported, as yet, by any document which the purity of historical truth will admit. However, it is not at all improbable that the French may have employed some persons to gain information of the dispositions of the Americans towards Great Britain: and it is as likely that they found out nothing to gratify their wishes.

Baron de Kalb, who had been long an officer in the French service, and who was afterwards killed in the service of the United States, travelled through the British provinces, about the time of the Stamp act, and is said to have reported to his superiors on his return, "That the colonists were so firmly and universally attatched to Great Britain, that nothing could shake their loyalty."

The hostile policy which led the colonies to examine scrupulously the nature of their dependence on Great Britain followed, but did not precede, her attempts upon the rights and liberties of America. Nor is there any just reason to believe that the French could, by any artifice or address, have dissolved the union of the British empire, at the close of a war in which the interests and feelings of the colonies and the parent state had been interwoven with more than usual strength and energy; and that too in so short a space of time, as elapsed from the peace in 1763, to the promulgation of the first obnoxious acts of the British parliament in 1764.

When the manners and habits of the Americans are considered-the equality of rank which subsisted among them their independent principles-their jealous and watchful care of their constitutional rights-the knowledge of their own strength, which they had acquired in the war with France-the removal of hostile neighbours-their knowledge of the strong factions in the parent state-What might not have been expected from such a people, in such a country, and in such a situation, when their liberties were attacked?-Could it have been imagined that an united body of three millions of people would tamely surrender up their natural and chartered rights?-No! nothing but the height of infatuation could have fostered so vain a hope.

The turbulence of some North Americans, the blunders of some British statesmen, and the assistance of foreign nations, can only be considered as secondary causes which affected the revolution-as circumstances which forwarded its birth somewhat sooner than it would have happened in the common course of nature.

It was a love of liberty and a quick sense of injury which led the Americans to rise in arms against the mother country; at a time when there were very few who thought it their interest, or had any idea, to shake off their allegiance to Britain, until the inefficacy of petitions and remonstrances, and the progress of the war, rendered the declaration of Independence to be a ineasure absolutely necessary for their own safety. This view of the subject is not only natural and just, but it entirely corresponds with the American character, and with the conduct which was displayed through all the vicissitudes that attended the revolt.

From the first settlement of North America, till the close of the war of 1755, Britain followed the wise line of conduct marked out by the charters granted to the colonies, and governed them with mutual benefit to both countries. The colonies were rather considered

as Instruments of commerce, than as objects of govern. ment. They were allowed their own judgment in the management of their own interest. Till the year 1764, the deviations from this happy system, and the griev ances complained of, were few; and their pressure was neither great nor universal. The acts of the British parliament, tending to prohibit several colonial manufactures, and lay restrictions on their trade, although they bore hard upon the spirits of a rising people; yet the articles, the manufacture of which were thus prohibited, could be purchased at a cheaper rate in Britain; and the advantages accruing to the colonies from their connexion with the mother country infinitely overbalanced the evil.

1763.

At length the British parliament resolved to alter the system of colonial government, by raising a revenue in America, by taxation. Mr. Israel Mauduit, the Massachusetts' agent, gave the earliest notice of these proceedings; but the general court of that colony not being called together till the latter end of the year, instructions to the agent, though solicited by him, could not be sent in season.

The next year, however, the house of representatives came to the following resolutions: "That the sole right of giving and granting the money of the people of that province, was vested in them, as their legal representatives; and that the imposition of duties and taxes, by the parliament of Great Britain, upon a people who are not represented in the house of commons, is absolutely irreconcileable with their rights." "That no man can justly take the property of another without his consent; upon which original principal, the right of representation in the same body which exercises the power of making laws for levying taxes, one of the main pillars of the British constitution, is evidently founded."

These resolutions were occasioned by intelligence of what had been done in the British house of commons. It had been there debated, whether they had a right to tax the Americans, they not being represented; and determined unanimously in the affirmative. Not a single person present, ventured to controvert the right.

Accordingly, in March, 1764, a bill was passed, by which heavy duties were laid on goods imported by the colonists from such West India islands as did not belong to great Britain; at the same time that these duties were to be paid into the exchequer in specie; and in the same session another bill was framed to restrain the currency of paper money in the colonies them