from Deerfield to Casco, was kept in continual alarm and terror by small parties of the enemy. The women and children were obliged to retire into garrisons, the men to go armed to their labours, and constantly to post sentinels in their fields. Troops of horse were posted, and large scouting parties, employed on the frontiers. Expeditions were undertaken to beat up the head quarters of the enemy, and to desolate their country. But when they were hunted in one place, they fled to another. Sometimes while the troops were seeking them in this quarter, they would be plundering and burning in another. The country was interspersed with such extensive groves, hideous swamps, and fastnesses, that notwithstanding the utmost vigilance and exertions, both of the soldiers and inhabitants, they would penetrate undiscovered far into the country, do the mischief they designed, and make their escape.

Col. Church, the next year, was dispatched with about six hundred men, on an expedition into the eastern country. He destroyed the towns of Minas, Chignecto, and some other settlements on the eastern rivers. He also did considerable damage to the enemy at Penobscot and Passamaquoddy.

"Afterwards several winter campaigns were undertaken, and troops marched up the rivers to the principal towns and forts of the eastern Indians, but they found their towns and forts abandoned, and the enemy, for greater security, drawn off to Canada. No very considerable blow could therefore be given them. It was computed, that every Indian killed or taken, during the war, cost the country a thousand pounds.

"Such were the distresses of the country in these times, that they are not easily described or conceived. While large quotas of their best men were in service abroad, the rest were harassed by the enemy, subjected to continual service in garrisons and scouts at home. The inhabitants could till no lands, but such as were within call of their forts and garrisoned houses. They lay down and rose up in fear, and procured their bread at the continual hazard of their lives.

"Little idea can be formed of what is to be endured in a war with savages in America. In Europe the country is cultivated and inhabited, roads are made, hospitals and magazines are prepared. If troops are conquered and taken, it is only an exchange of masters. They expect kind treatment from a civilized and generous enemy. But in a war with savages in America, every thing is the reverse, every thing is terrible. Here troops hold their marches through groves, thickets, and defiles, through a vast and dreary wilderness, where there are neither hospitals, magazines, or refreshments, for the supply of the well, nor relief or conveniences for the sick or wounded. The face of the country, the nature of the service, the face and manner of the enemy are terrible. Their wild and horrible yells, their unusual appearances and manner of attack, are so alarming, that they have often thrown the best regular troops into the utmost

confusion. Their extreme art in first discovering, waylaying, and surprising their enemy, the suddenness and violence of their attacks, and their merciless cruelty, all conspire to make them truly a most terrible enemy. Victories over them, often are not decisive, while defeats involve the vanquished in total ruin. The least misfortune to be expected, in general, is simple death. If in the rude campaigns of America, there be less dignity, there is something more adventurous, more interesting to the heart, and more amusing to the imagination, than in the more grand events of regular war. In them all the powers of courage and address are called forth into execution, and and all the firmness of body and mind is put to the severest trial.

"An Indian war forms a truly critical and dangerous service. It requires a firm body of the best regular troops, with a large proportion of the best marksmen, to compose a light infantry. It requires a commander of the firmest and coolest mind, full of precaution, and rich in expedients; and who with the glance of his eye, can catch every advantage and opportunity."

CHAPTER III.

Conduct of the British Government toward her American Colonies, which ultimately caused the Revolutionary War.

SECTION I.

ORIGIN OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION.

The germ of the Revolution, which issued in the establishment of the Independence of the British American Colonies, appeared at the very origin of their settlements. The component parts of this germ, were selfishness, "political and mercantile" jealousy, ignorance of the state of the Colonies, and of the policy with which they should have been treated, and consequently bad laws and measures adopted by Parliament, for their regulation. This germ, in all its branches, grew with the growth of the Colonies, till it became the immediate cause of the eight years War, which terminated in our Independence, and gave us a rank among the nations of the earth. The intelligent and indefatigable Robert Walsh, Esq. in his “ Appeal, -containing an Historical Outline of the merits and wrongs of the Colonies, &c."-has given the most satisfactory evidence of the truth of the facts above stated, in the documents which he has laboriously collected and furnished from several authors of authority on the subject. We give these documents, so far as they are pertinent to the design of this work, accompanied with the remarks of Mr. W.

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"We have the following testimony in Hume's Appendix to his account of the reign of James I. What chiefly renders the reign of James memorable, is the commencement of the English colonies in America; colonies established on the noblest footing that has been known in any age or nation.'

"Speculative reasoners, during that age, raised many objections to the planting those remote colonies; and foretold, that, after draining their mother country of inhabitants, they would soon shake off her yoke, and erect an independent government in America.'

"In the excellent article on the British colonies, of Postlethwayt's Universal Dictionary of Trade, there is a more particular statement to the same effect.

"It is certain that from the very time Sir Walter Raleigh, the father of our English colonies, and his associates, first projected these establishments, there have been persons who have found an interest in misrepresenting or lessening the value of them. When the intention of improving these distant countries, and the advantages that were hoped for thereby, were first set forth, there were some who treated them not only as chimerical, but as dangerous: They not only insinuated the uncertainty of the success, but the depopulating the nation. These, and other objections, flowing either from a narrowness of understanding or of heart, have been disproved by experience,' &c. &c.

"The difficulties which will always attend such kind of settlements at the beginning, proved a new cause of clamour; many malignant suggestions were made about sacrificing so many Englishmen to the obstinate desire of settling colonies in countries, which produced very little advantage. But, as these difficulties were gradually surmounted, those complaints vanished. No sooner were those lamentations over, than others arose in their stead; when it could no longer be said that the colonies were useless, it was alleged that theywere not useful enough to their mother country; that while we were loaded with taxes they were absolutely free; that the planters lived like princes, while the inhabitants of England laboured hard for a tolerable subsistence. This produced customs and impositions on plantation commodities,' &c. &c.

"Within little more than a generation after the commencement of the plantations, the royal government anxiously began those formal inquiries into their population and manufactures, which were so often renewed until the period of our revolt, and of which the results, as to manufactures, served to place the jealousy that provoked them in a ludicrous and pitiable light. In the reign of Charles I. commissioners were deputed to ascertain the growth and dispositions of New-England. And we find her agent in London, in the time of Cromwell, informing one of his constituents, that, even then, there were not wanting many in England, to whom her privileges were matter of envy, and who eagerly watched every opportunity of abridging her political liberties and faculties of trade. Besides emissaries of the description just mentioned, the ministry of Charles II. despatched spies to watch over the conduct and views of the royal governors in America. From the same motive, printing presses were denied to the plantations. We are told by Chalmers, that "no printing press was allowed in Virginia ;" that "in New-Eng

land and New-York there were assuredly none permitted," and that "the other provinces probably were not more fortunate."* When Andros was appointed by James II. captain-general of all the northern colonies, he was instructed "to allow of no printing press." In an official report of Sir William Berkeley, governor of Virginia, dated 20th June, 1671, there is the following characteristic passage;-"I thank God we have no free schools, nor any printing; and I hope we shall not have them these hundred years. For learning has brought disobedience, and heresy, and sects into the world, and printing has divulged them and libels against the best government: God keep us from both." Accordingly, every effort was made to shut out the pestilent tree of knowledge. On the appointment of Lord Effingham to the government of Virginia, in 1683, he was ordered, agreeably to the prayer of Sir William Berkley, "to allow no person to use a printing press on any occasion whatever."

"The erect port, and firm tone, of the legislature of the infant Massachusetts, not only filled the cabinet of Charles II. with alarm for the metropolitan sovereignty, but actually overawed them, so as to prevent the measures of repression which would otherwise have been pursued; and to maintain the province in the license of action necessary for its prosperity. Curious and remarkable evidence on these heads is extant in the Memoirs of Evelyn, who was one of the council of Charles II. His language deserves to be quoted.

"The 6th of May, 1670, I went to council, where was produced a most exact and ample information of the state of Jamaica, and of the best expedients as to New-England, on which there was a long debate; but at length 'twas concluded that, if any, it should be only a conciliating paper at first, or civil letter, till we had better information of the present face of things, since we understood they were a people almost upon the very brink of renouncing any dependence on the crown.'-Vol. i. p. 415.

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The first thing we did at our next meeting, was to settle the form of a circular letter to the governors of all his Majesty's plantations and territories in the West Indies and Islands thereof, to give them notice to whom they should apply themselves on all occasions, and to render us an account of their present state and government, but what we most insisted upon was, to know the condition of New-England, which appearing to be very independent as to their regard to Old England or his Majesty, rich and strong as they now were, there were great debates in what style to write to them; for the condition of that colony was such, that they were able to contest with all other plantations about them, and there was fear of their breaking from all dependence on this nation.'-Ibid.

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The matter in debate in council on the 3d of August, 1671, was, whether we should send a deputy to New-England, requiring them of the Massachusetts, to restore such to their limits and respective possessions as had petitioned the council; this to be the open commission only, but in truth with secret instructions to informe the council of the condition of those colonies, and whether they were of such power as to be able to resist his Majesty, and declare for themselves as independent of the crowne, which we are told, and which of late years

* Political Annals of the United Colonies, chap. 15.

made them refractorie. Coll. Middleton being called in, assur'd us they might be curb'd by a few of his Majesty's first rate fregats, to spoil their trade with the Islands; but tho' my Lord President was not satisfied, the rest were, and we did resolve to advise his Majesty to send commissioners with a formal commission for adjusting boundaries, &c. with some other instructions.'-p. 417.

"We deliberated in council, on the 12th of January, 1672, on some fit person to go as commissioner to inspect their actions in New-England, and from time to time report how that people stood affected.'-p. 423.

"When the real amount of the "riches and strength, and the power to resist," mentioned in these extracts, is traced in the returns made from New-England at the era in question, it is difficult to think of the apprehensions of the British court, with any degree of seri

ousness.

"The fisheries, shipping, and foreign West India trade of the colonies had scarcely become perceptible, before the British merchants and West India planters caught and sounded the alarm. As soon as the colonists, in the progress of wealth and population, undertook to manufacture, for their own consumption, a few articles of the first necessity, such as hats, paper, &c. a clamour was raised by the manufacturers in England, and the power of the British government was exerted to remove the cause of the complaint. Discourse on Trade, of Sir Josiah Child, a work published in 1670, but written in 1665, and long considered as of the highest authority, expresses, in the passages which I am about to quote, the prevailing opinions of the day.

The

"Certainly it is the interest of England to discountenance and abate the number of planters at Newfoundland, for if they should increase, it would in a few years happen to us, in relation to that country, as it has to the fishery at New-England, which many years since was managed by English ships from the western ports; but as plantations there increased, it fell to the sole employment of people settled there, and nothing of that trade left the poor old Englishmen, but the liberty of carrying now and then, by courtesy or purchase, a ship load of fish to Bilboa, when their own New-English shipping are better employed, or not at leisure to do it.'

to

New-England is the most prejudicial plantation to this kingdom.-I am now to write of a people, whose frugality, industry and temperance, and the happiness of whose laws and institutions, promise to them long life, with a wonderful increase of people, riches and power; and although no men ought envy that virtue and wisdom in others, which themselves either can or will not practise, but rather to commend and admire it; yet I think it is the duty of every good man primarily to respect the welfare of his native country; and therefore, though I may offend some whom I would not willingly displease, I cannot omit, in the progress of this discourse, to take notice of some particulars, wherein Old England suffers diminution by the growth of the colonies settled in New-England.'

"Of all the American plantations, his majesty has none so apt for the building of shipping as New-England, nor any comparably so qualified for the breeding of seamen, not only by reason of the natural industry of that people, but principally by reason of their cod and mackerel fisheries; and in my poor opinion, there is nothing more prejudicial, and in prospect more dangerous to any mother kingdom, than the increase of shipping in her colonies, plantations, or provinces,' &c-Chap. 10.