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guage of Wales, which he understood, to their dialect.* His ability to communicate by words to the chief, so pleased the latter, that he treated him kindly, and on arriving at Montreal, requested the French Governor to allow him to return to his family without ransom. The request, however, was not granted, and Mr. Lewis was sent as a prisoner to France, from which country, being some time after exchanged, he returned to America.

Although Mr. Lewis was not a native of America, yet his attachment to the country was early and devoted. He vigorously opposed the oppressive measures of Great Britain, and esteemed liberty the choicest blessing that a nation can enjoy. His intellectual powers, and uniform nobility of sentiment, commanded the respect of the people; and in 1775, he was unanimously elected a delegate to Congress. He remained a member of that body. through the following year, 1776, and was among the number who signed the Declaration of Independence. For several subsequent years, he was appointed to represent New York in the National Assembly; and performed various secret and important services, with great fidelity and prudence.

In 1775, Mr. Lewis removed his family, and effects, to a country seat which he owned on Long Island. This proved an unfortunate step. In the autumn of the following year, his house was plundered by a party of British light-horse. His extensive library and valuable papers were wantonly destroyed. His wife fell into the power of the enemy, and was retained a prisoner for several months. During her captivity, she experienced the most atrocious treatment, being closely confined, and deprived of a bed and sufficient clothing. By the influence of Washington, she was at length released; but her constitution had been so impaired by her sufferings, that in a year or two, she sank into the grave.

The latter days of Mr. Lewis were spent in comparative poverty. He died on the 30th day of December, 1803, in the ninetieth year of his age.

It is almost needless to remark, that such an occurrence is, to say the best of it, extremely improbable. There exists no affinity between the ancient language of Wales and that of any of the Indian tribes known in North America.

PHILIP LIVINGSTON.

PHILIP LIVINGSTON, was born at Albany, on the 15th of January, 1716. He was the fourth son of Gilbert Live ingston, and his ancestors were highly respectable, holding a distinguished rank in New York, and possessing a beautiful tract of land on the banks of the Hudson. This tract, since known as the Manor of Livingston, has be longed to the family from that time to the present.

Philip Livingston received his education at Yale College, where he was graduated in 1737. He soon after engaged extensively in commerce in the city of New York, and was very successful in his transactions. In 1754, he was elected an Alderman, and continued in the office for nine successive years. In 1759, he was returned a member to the General Assembly of the colony, where his talents and influence were most usefully employed. His views were liberal and enlightened, and he did much to improve the commercial and agricultural facilities of the country.

Previous to the revolution, it was usual for the respective colonies to have an agent in England, to manage their individual concerns with the British Government. This agent was appointed by the popular branch of the Assembly. In 1770, the agent of the colony of New York dying, the celebrated Edmund Burke was chosen in his stead, and received for the office a salary of five hundred pounds. Between this gentleman and a committee of the Colonial Assembly, a correspondence was maintained; and upon their representations, the agent depended for a knowledge of the state of the colony. Of this committee, Mr. Livingston was a member. From his communications and those of his colleagues, Mr. Burke doubtless obtained that information of the state of the colonies, which he sometimes brought forward to the perfect surprise of the House of Commons, and upon which he often founded arguments, and proposed meas ures, which were not to be resisted.

Mr. Livingston regarded with patriotic indignation, the measures by which the British ministry thought to humble the spirit of the colonies. His avowed sentiments,

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and the prominent part he had always taken in favor of the rights of the colonies, caused him to be elected, in 1774, a Delegate to the Continental Congress. He was also a member of the distinguished Congress of 1776, and was among those whose names are enduringly recorded on the great charter of their country's freedom and national existence. He was re-elected to the same Assembly the following year, and was also chosen a Senator to the State Legislature, after the adoption of a new Constitution. He again took his seat in Congress, in May, 1778; but his health was shockingly impaired, and such was the nature of his disease, which was a dropsy in the chest, that no rational prospect existed of his recovery. Before his departure from Albany, he took a final farewell of his family and friends, and expressed his conviction that he should not live to see them again. His anticipations proved true. From the period of his return to Congress, his decline was rapid; and he closed his valuable life on the 12th of June, 1778. Suitable demonstrations of respect to his memory were paid by Congress; and his funeral was publicly attended.

Mr. Livingston married the daughter of Colonel Dirck Ten Broeck, by whom he had several children. His family has furnished many distinguished characters. Mr. Livingston was amiable in his disposition, and a firm believer in the great truths of Christianity. He died respected and esteemed by all who knew him.

THOMAS LYNCH.

THOMAS LYNCH was born on the 5th of August, 1749, at Prince George's Parish, in South Carolina.

Before he had reached the age of thirteen years, young Lynch was sent to England for his education. Having passed some time at the institution of Eaton, he was entered a member of the University of Cambridge, the degrees of which college he received in due course. He left Cambridge with a high reputation for classical attainments, and virtues of character; and entered his name at the Temple, with a view to the profession of law. After

applying himself assiduously to the study of jurispru dence, and enriching himself both in mind and manners, with the numberless accomplishments of a gentleman, he returned to South Carolina, after an absence of eight or

nine years.

In 1775, on the raising of the first South Carolina reg. iment of provincial regulars, Mr. Lynch was appointed to the command of a company. Unfortunately, on his march to Charleston, at the head of his men, he was attacked by a violent fever, which greatly injured his constitution, and from the effects of which, he never afterwards wholly recovered. He joined his regiment, but the enfeebled state of his health prevented him from performing the exertions, which he considered incumbent upon him. Added to this, he received afflicting intelligence of the illness of his father, at Philadelphia, and resolved to make arrangements to depart for that city. Upon applying for a furlough, however, he was denied by the commanding officer, Colonel Gadsden. But being opportunely elected to Congress, as the successor of his father, he was repaid for his disappointment, and lost no time in hastening to Philadelphia.

The health of the younger Mr. Lynch, soon after joining Congress, began to decline with the most alarming rapidity. He continued, however, his attendance upon that body, until the Declaration of Independence had been voted, and his signature affixed to it. He then set out for Carolina, in company with his father; but the life of the latter was terminated at Annapolis, by a second paralytic attack.

Soon after this afflicting event, a change of climate was recommended to Mr. Lynch, as presenting the only chance of his recovery. He embarked with his wife, on board a vessel proceeding to St. Eustatia, designing to proceed by a circuitous route to the south of France. From the time of their sailing, nothing more has been known of their fate! Various rumors for a time were in circulation, which served to keep their friends in painful suspense; but the conclusion finally adopted was, that the vessel must have foundered at sea, and the faithful pair been consigned to a watery grave.

THOMAS M'KEAN.

THOMAS M'KEAN was of Irish descent, and born in New London, Chester county, Pennsylvania, on the 19th of March, 1734. After completing the regular course of school instruction, he was entered as a student at law, in the office of David Finney, who resided in New-Castle, in Delaware. Before he had attained the age of twenty. one years, he commenced the practice of the law, in the Courts of Common Pleas, for the counties of New-Castle, Kent, and Sussex, and also in the Supreme Court. In 1757, he was admitted to the bar of the Supreme Court in Pennsylvania, and was elected Clerk of the House of Assembly.

The political career of Mr. M'Kean commenced in 1762, at which time he was returned a member of the Assembly from the county of New-Castle. This county he continued to represent in the same body for several successive years, although the last six years of that period, he spent in Philadelphia.

A Congress, usually called the Stamp Act Congress, assembled in New York in 1765, for the purpose of ob taining a redress of the grievances under which the colonies then labored. Of this memorable body, Mr. M'Kean was a member, along with James Otis, and other cele brated men.

A short time previous to the meeting of the Congress of 1774, Mr. M'Kean took up his permanent residence in the city of Philadelphia. The people of the lower coun ties on the Delaware, were desirous that he should représent them in that body, and he was according elected as their delegate. On the 3d of September, he took his seat in Congress. From this time until the 1st of February, 1783, a period of eight years and a half, he was annually chosen a member of the great National Council. At the same time, Mr. M'Kean represented Delaware in Congress; he was President of it in 1781, and from July, 1777, was the Chief Justice of Pennsylvania.

Mr. M'Kean was, from the first, decidedly in favor of the Declaration of Independence. He subscribed his name to the original instrument, but, by some mistake,

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