acquiesce in Penn's suggestion that they and their councils should meet in separate houses in the town, and treat with each other by written memorials so as to prevent the mistakes arising from ill designs or slips of memory. Wherefore, to bring the dispute to a close by obtaining the decision of higher authority, Penn returned to England in the summer of 1684, leaving the executive power in the hands of the council, of which THOMAS LLOYD was president.

DISAGREEMENTS IN COUNCIL.

It would have been better for the political tranquillity of the province had Penn remained there; for, many times during his absence of fifteen years, disputes arose in the council, which would readily have yielded to his firmness and fairness of purpose. The error seems to have been in lodging the executive power in the council, thus having too many administrators in the place of one. That body likewise, did not work harmoniously with the assembly, nor the latter with the members from the three Lower Counties. Lloyd, disliking his position, was excused from further service, and Captain John Blackwell was appointed by Penn as his deputy. The selection, however, was not a judicious one, for Blackwell was a man accustomed to the military service, and, as he utterly disagreed with the council, he was soon recalled. These disagreements were the occasion of much grief to the proprietary, who frequently addressed Lloyd and others of influence, urging them to "love, forgive, help and serve one another; and let the people learn by your example as well as by your power, the happy life of concord."

In 1691, shortly after Blackwell's return to England, the dispute between the province and the three counties so far increased, that the latter organized a separate assembly. Penn reluctantly confirmed Markham as the deputy of the new

1691]

DELAWARE.

219

commonwealth of DELAWARE, while Lloyd accepted the same position in the province of Pennsylvania. The proprietary felt that he had no moral warrant, much as he loved unity, to prevent the separation. Lloyd and Markham, with their respective councils, joined in a letter to Penn, expressing satisfaction at the change, and announcing their intention to act jointly in some matters, as being both under the general government of the proprietary.

There arose at this time a schism in the religious Society of Friends at Philadelphia, which was considered as much more to be lamented than the division in the government. This trouble was brought about by George Keith, a Scotchman, who had been surveyor-general of East Jersey, but was now master of the public school which had been already established at Philadelphia.

Keith is described as a man of quick natural parts, very ready and able in theological disputations, but with an irritable temper, and a disposition of mind not sufficiently tempered by Christian moderation. He had been a trenchant defender of the Society's principles, and had even visited New England as a champion of its doctrines against Cotton Mather and other ministers of the Puritans. Upon his return, in an elated state of mind, he began to indulge in unwarranted accusations and unbecoming language, and was thereupon dismissed from the Society. Many persons agreeing with his views, they set up separate meetings, styling themselves Christian Friends; but their erratic leader presently went back to England, where he joined the National church and wrote many passionate things against his former associates.

When Keith was found guilty by the grand jury at Philadelphia of "contempt of court," and was sentenced to pay a fine, the Friends forgave him the penalty lest it should seem to the general public that they had grown intolerant, and were persecuting any one because of difference of opinion.

Meanwhile, William Penn had been diligently employed. in England, striving to relieve his fellow-members from the impositions and persecutions under which they still labored; and, since he was high in favor with King James, he had been enabled for the most part to accomplish that object. But upon the accession of William and Mary, the fact of his friendship at the former court operated against him; so that his enemies, taking advantage of the unsettlement prevailing in the colonial councils, and putting the matter in the worst light possible, caused him to be deprived of both his provinces. Thus in 1693, eleven years after Philadelphia was founded, the English sovereigns issued a commission to BENJAMIN FLETCHER, governor of New York, to take control of the provinces on the Delaware, which therefore became for a while re-united.

CHAPTER XVII.

THE COLONIES UNDER WILLIAM AND MARY.

1689-1702.

THE ENGLISH AND FRENCH COLONIES AT WAR.

ON a preceding page have been mentioned the unsuccessful attempts of De la Barre and Denonville, the French commanders, to obtain control of the Niagara region and the Great Lakes, and to intimidate the tribes of the Iroquois league. With the English traders of Hudson's Bay on the north, and those of New York on the south, to compete with, the French became more and more concerned lest the lucrative fur-trade should be wrested from their grasp. They chiefly valued New France not for the possible products of its soil, but because the lakes and the river St. Lawrence were a highway of commerce which their own pioneers had opened, and whose control they were not willing to surrender to any other nation. Hence when war broke out between England and France, in 1689, the northern American colonies took part in the struggle, as having grievances of their own to settle.

BARON CASTIN of Acadie had no difficulty in persuading the eastern Indians to resume the war against the New England settlements. Twelve years had elapsed since Waldron had dealt them those treacherous blows already related. That officer being yet at Dover in command of a garrison, a party of the natives made an onslaught upon the place, killed or made prisoners about fifty of the inhabitants, and put Wal

The

dron (now an old man of 80) to death with tortures. village was then burned, as was likewise the fort which Andros had recently built at Pemaquid on the coast; in short, all the settlements east of Casco bay to the Penobscot, were once again ravaged and broken up.

There was no scruple on the part either of English Protestants or French Papists, against engaging the Indians to aid them in their sanguinary schemes. While French vessels. cruised off the coast of New England, making many prizes, the Count de Frontenac despatched a war-party composed of a body of "converted" Indians, so called, and a few Frenchmen, to surprise Schenectady on the river Mohawk-the northernmost English outpost. Unguarded and unsuspicious of evil the inhabitants slept, when suddenly the terrible war-whoop was heard; in a moment the doors were broken open, the women and children massacred and the village set on fire. Some were carried away prisoners, while those who escaped fled through a driving snow-storm toward Albany, enduring bitter sufferings ere that place was reached. It was surely not Christ's religion that these "converts" were being taught: but, were they or their teachers most guilty?

Frontenac's second war-party crossed the mountains (1690) from Canada to the upper Connecticut river valley, thence across the White Mountain region to the frontier village of Salmon Falls on the Piscataqua. As at Schenectady, this place also was taken by surprise, the men mostly murdered, and the women and children made captive. The houses, and the barns with cattle in them, were destroyed by fire. Then with their prisoners and spoils of war, the victors being joined by another party from Quebec, moved across to Casco in Maine. Fortunately, its inhabitants, by surrendering as prisoners of war, escaped the dreadful doom which had overtaken the other two places.