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V.

July.

sachusetts abounded in kind offices. The colonies CHAP. vied with each other in liberality. The record kept at Boston shows that "the patriotic and generous 1774. people" of South Carolina were the first to minister to the sufferers, sending early in June two hundred barrels of rice, and promising eight hundred more. At Wilmington, North Carolina, the sum of two thousand pounds currency was raised in a few days; the women of the place gave liberally; Parker Quince offered his vessel to carry a load of provisions freight free, and master and mariners volunteered to navigate her without wages. Lord North had called the American union a rope of sand; "it is a rope of sand that will hang him," said the people of Wilmington.

Hartford was the first place in Connecticut to pledge its assistance; but the earliest donation received, was of two hundred and fifty-eight sheep from Windham. "The taking away of civil liberty will involve the ruin of religious liberty also," wrote the ministers of Connecticut to the ministers of Boston, cheering them to bear their heavy load "with vigorous Christian fortitude and resolution." "While we complain to Heaven and earth of the cruel oppression we are under, we ascribe righteousness to God," was the answer. "The surprising union of the colonies affords encouragement. It is an inexhaustible source of comfort that the Lord God omnipotent reigneth."

The small parish of Brooklyn, in Connecticut, through their committee, of which Israel Putnam was a member, opened a correspondence with Boston. "Your zeal in favor of liberty," they said, "has gained a name that shall perish but with the glorious constellations of Heaven;" and they made an

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CHAP. offering of flocks of sheep and lambs. Throughout V. all New England the towns sent rye, flour, peas, 1774 cattle, sheep, oil, fish; whatever the land or the hook and line could furnish, and sometimes gifts of money. The French inhabitants of Quebec, joining with those of English origin, shipped a thousand and forty bushels of wheat.

Delaware was so much in earnest, that it devised plans for sending relief annually. All Maryland and all Virginia were contributing liberally and cheerfully; being resolved that the men of Boston, who were deprived of their daily labor, should not lose their daily bread, nor be compelled to change their residence for want. In Fairfax county, Washington presided at a spirited meeting and headed a subscription paper with his own gift of fifty pounds. A special chronicle could hardly enumerate all the generous deeds. Beyond the Blue Ridge, the hardy emigrants on the banks of the Shenandoah, many of them Germans, met at Woodstock, and with Muhlenberg, then a clergyman, soon to be a military chief, devoted themselves to the cause of liberty. Higher up the Valley of Virginia, where the plough already vied with the rifle, and the hardy hunters, not always ranging the hills with their dogs for game, had also begun to till the soil, the summer of that year ripened the wheat-fields of the pioneers, not for themselves alone. When the sheaves had been harvested, and the corn threshed and ground in a country as yet poorly provided with barns or mills, the backwoodsmen of Augusta county, without any pass through the mountains that could be called a road, noiselessly and modestly delivered at Frederick, one hundred and

V.

thirty-seven barrels of flour as their remittance to CHAP. the poor of Boston. of Boston. Cheered by the universal sym- 1774. pathy, the inhabitants of that town "were deter- July. mined to hold out and appeal to the justice of the colonies and of the world;" trusting in God that "these things should be overruled for the establishment of liberty, virtue, and happiness in America."

CHAPTER VI.

AMERICA RESOLVES TO MEET IN GENERAL CONGRESS.

July.

JULY, 1774.

CHAP. GEORGE THE THIRD ranked "New York next to BosVI. ton in opposition to government." There was no 1774. place where a congress was more desired, and none where the determinations of the congress were more sure to be observed. The numerous emigrants from New England brought with them New England principles; the Dutch, as a body, never loved Britain. Of the two great families which the system of manorial grants had raised up, the Livingstons inclined to republicanism, and uniting activity to wealth and ability, exercised a predominant influence. The Delanceys, who, by taking advantage of temporary prejudices, had, four years before, carried the assembly, no longer retained the public confidence; and outside of the legislature, their power was imperceptible.

After being severed from Holland, its mother country, New York had no attachment to any European State. All agreed in the necessity of resisting

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July.

the pretensions of England; but differences arose as CHAP. to the persons to be intrusted with the direction of that resistance; and as to the imminence and extent 1774. of the danger. The merchants wished no interruption to commerce; the Dutch Reformed church, as well as the Episcopalians, were not free from jealousy of the Congregationalists, and the large land-holders were alarmed by the levelling spirit and social equality of New England. The people of New York had destroyed consignments of the East India company's tea; but from them the British ministry had borne the insult without rebuke; striving only by bland language to lull them into repose. The executive officers had for several years avoided strife with the assembly, listening patiently to its complaints, and seeking to comply with its importunities; so that no angry feeling existed between the provincial legislature and the royal governors. The city had, moreover, been the centre of British patronage, and friends had been won by the distribution of contracts, and sometimes by commissions in the army. The organs of the ministry were to cajole, to favor, or to corrupt; above all, to give a promise on the part of the crown of a spirit of equity, which its conduct towards the province seemed to warrant as sincere. Besides, the assembly had Edmund Burke for its agent, and still hoped that his influence in public affairs would correspond to their just estimate of his fidelity. The lovers of peace, which is always so dear to a commercial community, revolted at the thought of an early and unavoidable "appeal" to arms, caught eagerly at every chance of an honorable escape from the certain miseries of a desperate conflict, and exerted them

VOL. VII. 7*

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