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discussion of this subject in a pamphlet to which he affixed the title: "Who is to blame? or Cursory Review of American Apology for American Accession to Negro Slavery." In this pamphlet Mr. Grahame admits that Great Britain "facilitated her colonial offspring to become slaveholders,” — “that she encouraged her merchants in tempting them to acquire slaves,”—that "her conduct during her long sanction of the slave-trade is indefensible," — that "she excelled all her competitors in slave-stealing, for the same reason that she excelled them in every other branch of what was then esteemed legitimate traffic "; but denies that she "forced the Americans to become slaveholders," denies that "the slave-trade was comprehended within the scope and operation of the commercial policy of the British government until the reign of Queen Anne," and asserts, that, "prior to that reign, negro slavery was established in every one of the American provinces that finally revolted from Great Britain, except Georgia, which was not planted until 1733." The argument in this pamphlet is pressed with great strength and spirit, and the whole is written under the influence of feelings in a state of indignant excitement. Without palliating the conduct of Great Britain, he regards the attempt to exculpate America, by criminating the mother country, as unworthy and unjust; contending that neither was under any peculiar or irresistible temptation, but only such as is common to man, when, in the language of the Apostle, "he is drawn away by his own lusts and enticed." His argument respecting the difference, in point of guilt, between America and Great Britain results as another identical question has long since resulted concerning the comparative guilt of the receiver and the thief.

At the urgent request of his and his father's friend, Thomas Clarkson, the early and successful asserter of the rights of Africans, he left Nantes, where he resided, in the month of June, 1842, and repaired to London, for the purpose of superintending the publication of his pamphlet on negro slavery. On arriving there, he placed his manuscript in the hands of a printer, and immediately proceeded to Playford Hall, Ipswich, the residence of Mr. Clarkson. Concerning this distinguished man, Mr. Grahame, under

date of the 25th of June, thus writes in his diary "Mr. Clarkson's appearance is solemnly tender and beautiful. Exhausted with age and malady, he is yet warmly zealous, humane, and affectionate. Fifty-seven years of generous toil have not relaxed his zeal in the African cause. He watches over the interests of the colored race in every quarter of the world, desiring and promoting their moral and physical welfare, rejoicing in their improvement, afflicted in all their afflictions. The glory of God and the interests of the African race are the mastersprings of his spirit."

After two days passed in intercourse with this congenial mind, Mr. Grahame returned to London, and occupied himself zealously in correcting the proof-sheets of his pamphlet. On the morning of the 30th of June, he was assailed by severe pain, which his medical attendant attributed at first to indigestion, and treated as such. But it soon assumed a more alarming character. Eminent physicians were called for consultation, and his brother, Thomas Grahame, was sent for. From the nature and intensity of his suffering, Mr. Grahame soon became sensible that his final hour was approaching, and addressed himself to meet it with calmness and resignation. He proceeded to communicate his last wishes to his son-inlaw, directed where he should be buried, and dictated his epitaph: "James Grahame, Advocate, Edinburgh, Author of the History of the United States of North America ; aged 51." He, at the same time, expressed the hope concerning his recently published pamphlet, that no efforts might be spared to secure its sale and distribution, "as he had written it conscientiously and with single-heartedness, and had invoked the blessing of God upon it."

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Notwithstanding the distinguished skill of his physicians, every remedy failed of producing the desired effect. His disorder was organic, and beyond the power of their Such was the excruciating agony which preceded his death, that his friends could only hope that his release might not be long delayed. This wish was granted on Sunday morning, the 3d of July.

"His endurance of the pain and oppression of breathing which preceded his death," says Mr. Stewart, "was

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perfectly wonderful. His features were constantly calm, placid, and at last bore a bright, even a cheerful expression. His attendants, while bending close towards him, caught occasionally expressions of prayer; his profound acquaintance with the Scriptures enabling him, in this hour of his need, to draw strength and support from that inexhaustible source, where he was accustomed to seek and to find it."

He was buried in Kensal Green Cemetery, in the neighbourhood of London. His son-in-law, John Stewart, and his brother, Thomas Grahame, attended his remains to the grave. His son, also, who had set out from Scotland on hearing of his illness, though arriving too late to see him before he expired, was not denied the melancholy satisfaction of being present at his interment. A plain marble monument has been erected over his tomb, bearing the exact inscription he himself dictated.

These scanty memorials are all that it has been possible, in this country, to collect in relation to James Grahame. Though few and disconnected, they are grateful and impressive.

The habits of his life were domestic, and in the family circle the harmony and loveliness of his character were eminently conspicuous. His mind was grave, pure, elevated, far-reaching; its enlarged views ever on the search after the true, the useful, and the good. His religious sentiments, though exalted and tinctured with enthusiasm, were always candid, liberal, and tolerant. In politics a republican, his love of liberty was nevertheless qualified by a love of order, his desire to elevate the destinies of the many, by a respect for the rights and interests of the few. As in his religion there was nothing of bigotry, so in his political sentiments there was nothing of radicalism.

As a historian, there were combined in Mr. Grahame all the qualities which inspire confidence and sustain it; — a mind powerful and cultivated, patient of labor, indefatigable in research, independent, faithful, and fearless; engaging in its subject with absorbing interest, and in the development of it superior to all influences except those of truth and duty.

To Americans, in all future times, it cannot fail to be an interesting and gratifying circumstance, that the foreigner, who first undertook to write a complete history of their republic from the earliest period of the colonial settlements, was a Briton, eminently qualified to appreciate the merits of its founders, and at once so able and so willing to do justice to them. The people of the United States, on whose national character and success Mr. Grahame bestowed his affections and hopes, owe to his memory a reciprocation of feeling and interest. As the chief labor of his life was devoted to illustrate the wisdom and virtues of their ancestors and to do honor to the institutions they established, it is incumbent on the descendants to hold and perpetuate in grateful remembrance his talents, virtues, and

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MEMOIRS OF THE PILGRIMS AT LEYDEN.

BY GEORGE SUMNER, ESQUIRE,

FOREIGN MEMBER OF THE GEOGRAPHICAL SOCIETY OF BERLIN; HONORARY MEMBER OF THE ARCHEOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF MADRID; CORRESPONDING MEMBER OF THE ARCHEOLOGICAL SOCIETIES OF ATHENS AND OF POICTIERS, ETC., ETC.

THE position and privileges enjoyed by the founders of Plymouth Colony, during their ten years' residence in the Netherlands, would seem to be not very clearly defined. Every one, who has examined this part of the history of our Pilgrim forefathers, must, I think, have been struck by the discrepancies in regard to it, which occur in the different statements that we have before us.

Robertson, Burke (in his European Settlements in America), and many other English writers of less name, represent their condition in any but favorable colors; and the disparaging statements of these authors have, in some cases, been adopted by Americans at home. The principal among these is the learned Chief-Justice Marshall, who speaks of the Pilgrims * as "an obscure sect which had acquired the appellation of Brownists," and which was forced to remove to Leyden. He then continues:-"There they resided several years in safe obscurity. This situation at length became irksome to them. Without persecution to give importance to the particular points which separated them from their other Christian brethren, they made no converts"; and then, as a cause for their removal to America, he asserts, that, " in the extinction of their church, they

* Marshall's Life of Washington, Vol. I., p. 93.

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